Chapter Text
The damp crunch of twigs underneath the soles of his boots caused him pause; his shoulders were taut with both caution and cold, head twitching in each direction as he listened for the tiny, quiet snaps of movement from the woods around himself. The pattering of rain had slowed from the downpour it had been previously, and Steve found himself silently mourning the carriage tracks he'd followed earlier on in his journey, the same tracks that led him this far, so far from the rest of civilization and yet closer to his goal than he’d been before.
All he had left to aid him, then, were the muddied, obscured stumps left of trees that had been cut down; by whom, he wasn’t sure, but it must have been the man he was searching for, the thief rumored to hail from this direction. The place was farther north than Steve had been in quite some time, and the layers of wool underneath the leather and scale of his armor just barely kept him warm enough to be comfortable. The chill still kissed his cheeks and underneath his eyes, still sapped the softness from the wisps of his hair clinging to his forehead with moisture. His fingers closed and opened as normal as he sifted through his packs and adjusted the hilt of his sword, though not without a noticeable feeling of effort.
More chilling than the cold and rain was the isolation. For three weeks, he’d been terribly alone. It wasn’t as if he spent most his waking days surrounded by friends, but he was used to companionship, at least— in his more enthusiastic adventuring days, he’d had companions, and after that, he’d had taverns and gatherings and townsfolk to assist through the day. He wasn’t well-loved, he thought— not with his affliction, certainly, and not with the aloofness that came with a handful of years too many of exposing oneself to the dangers of the world— but he was liked enough and, as such, hardly alone.
But he was strong and capable, stronger and more capable than anyone else in town. When its residents required anything outside the bounds of their walls, he was the one to fetch it. More often than not, it was some exotic ingredient for a holiday feast or fine fabric for a family gift. In the worst of the winters when game became scarce in the miles surrounding the town, he was sent out to hunt further.
Well-liked, he called himself.
He didn’t give more thought to it, nor more time. It would only disappoint him.
So when the townspeople asked him this favor, when the broken glass of their windows and the absence of their treasured belongings coalesced into a nigh untouchable fear, he didn’t think twice before venturing out into the dark.
And the cold.
Lord, the cold. Unforgettable, even for a moment.
All he had that wasn’t on the verge of freezing to his skin was a long, thin chain of silver wrapped around his right hand, weaving through his fingers and across the meat of his palm. It burned, in fact, the skin underneath it red and raw with the effort of the touch. Flakes of dried red blood stuck at the hinges. It was painful— actively so, and to an extent that every so often became unbearable, when Steve’s constitution was threatened— but necessary.
The full moon was nearing, and while there was no cure for lycanthropy save for the grave, this was… a suitable temporary fix. He couldn’t afford to damage the armor nor the wool underclothes, and he would be remiss to allow himself to tear his packs— or worse, consume their contents in his altered state.
He’d grin and bear it as he always did, even as he felt the hair on his skin thicken and become coarser, as the tips of his ears sharpened to points, as the blue of his irises were seemingly pulled back to make way for a wolfish golden. If nothing else, the sharpening of the scents wafting through the winter breeze would prove useful.
He sniffed once, twice, and pretended he didn’t feel silly doing it.
rodent dirt twigs trees ice dirt twigs dirt rock
wood trees sap maple sweet something sweet dirt leaves
wet earthy humid almost, not quite, sharp, cold
And then it hit him, a trail of something not quite right, not quite natural for the area; it stood out neatly once he’d pinned it down, the scent of hooves cobble dirt from elsewhere food for the road.
He’d follow that, then, and hope these woods only saw one traveler regular enough to be tracked.
Evening turned to night as he walked, a twinge of pain shooting across the bottoms of his feet with each step he took on the uneven terrain. His strides grew shorter and slower, his wandering gaze sharper and more cautious.
He glanced up to the sky, finding the moon peeking though the dead branches of the trees. It was a perfect sphere of light, bright and large and dangerous. His chest only tightened further as he continued on his path, and he rested his chained hand over the hilt of his sword to grip it tight, pressing the silver further into his skin.
The moon only rose more, taunting him. The corners of his lips drew downward into a comfortable frown.
Spitefully, he kept his gaze low and his pace even, until the exhaustion of the travel and the chill of the air settled deep in his bones.
He could handle himself well enough out here, he thought, and each tree was more or less identical in form to the ones surrounding it; figuring he’d find nowhere more suitable to rest, he took a seat on the ground where he’d paused. He released the handle of his blade, wiped away the blood he found gathering in its grooves, and lifted the flap of a pack to rifle through its contents.
There was little food left save for bread and dried meat. He’d been without water for a full day at that point as well, and the discomfort of knowing what ailments were to follow was overpowered only by the knowledge that he had very little time left to take advantage of his current level of performance.
Bringing a torn piece of bread to his mouth, he let the bulk of his weight fall against the tree behind him. He chewed slow and careful, shutting his eyes to aid in the savoring of the sensation of eating. He felt his hand lower to his pack once more, almost without his interference…
And when he opened his eyes again, he was greeted with the too-bright sun and a fresh layer of snow atop both the ground and his body. A small bird, white with spatterings of brown and black, chirped and whistled almost intelligently from the pile of white on top of his knee. He locked eyes with it, frowning apologetically before moving to stand. As expected, it fluttered away, glancing back at him almost in betrayal from a slightly distant treetop.
“I know,” he said, his voice gruff from the dryness of his throat. “Can’t stick around forever, though.”
The bird chirped once in response.
“I’d have frozen to death, you know. As it stands, my fingers are close to falling off.”
The bird chirped again, then fluttered off quite suddenly, and for a moment, Steve worried he’d offended it. But when he turned back toward the tree he’d slept against, he found the curious golden gaze of a large, snow-covered wolf piercing into him from just feet away. It looked scrawny, to say the least, and when it stepped forward, it stepped with a noticeable limp.
Steve’s brows furrowed. He placed himself down on one knee, nose scrunching up as he sniffed the air quite against his will. This was an older dog, a sick dog.
Steve broke off a piece of dried meat from his pack, moving slowly so as not to frighten the poor creature. It tilted its head with caution as it watched him hold the piece of meat out toward it, his palm open and nonthreatening.
It continued to approach. It bumped its nose against the underside of Steve’s hand, shaking its head in surprise afterward. It tried again, then, and with the help of Steve turning his palm downward ever so slightly, it found the meat and lapped it up quite quick.
Blind, Steve thought. Partially.
He reached into his pack and took out another piece, guiding it toward the wolf’s mouth. It ate slowly and messily, and Steve couldn’t find it in himself to mind. He stood for a few moments more and, when it was finished, wiped his palm off against the thigh of his pants and closed the pack.
“I have a long journey to go, still,” he said.
The wolf stared.
“Right, then.” Steve took a breath, gave it a pat on the head, and continued on his way.
He heard the quiet, tentative crunch, crunch, crunch of snow behind himself and turned around.
Still, the wolf stared.
“You’re not coming with me, are you?”
Predictably, he was met with silence.
“Alright. Fine, then. But you’re not getting much more out of me,” Steve promised, and continued once more.
Truthfully, he didn’t know how much longer he’d be walking. It was better then, though, than it had been— brighter and cheerier, with birdsong sparsely and peacefully filling the air. The wolf, every so often, brushed up against his thigh; whether it was a gesture of affection seeking or a matter of the animal swaying as it stepped, Steve couldn’t tell, but he took the opportunities to reach down and give it a nice scratch.
It was monotonous, repetitive in a way Steve was able to get lost in. If not for the position of the sun in the sky, he very well may have lost track of how many hours they’d spent traveling together, how much time had passed. But he'd tracked the hours until the night fell once more— and sooner rather than later, the heavily populated forest opened up into a clearing.
A clearing with a path, which led to an ornate building posted in the clearing’s center.
The wolf continued forward even after Steve had paused, sniffing along the path in front of him. It veered off quite quickly, and as it navigated the clearing, Steve found it wasn’t as barren as he’d originally thought.
If he were being generous, he’d refer to them as ruins; otherwise, he’d simply call it a small wasteland, a leveled town long-abandoned. It had been reclaimed mostly by nature, he found— so much so that when he squinted his eyes, the whole of the place seemed to disappear. The buildings had collapsed onto their wooden foundations, the wood itself rotting and split. The stones used to fortify the walls were in piles and chunks around the site, no doubt tossed around quite a bit. And all of it was further hidden by the layer of snow atop it, setting an unsettling blanket of peace over the aged site of whatever disaster had occurred here.
The only building still standing was the church.
If Steve were less observant, he’d say it was because of the stability of it— the exterior entirely stone fortified with layers upon layers of wall, or the large, sturdy shape of the thing. But he caught the translucence of the windows’ stained glass, the almost polished shine to the rocks… and the barren, snowless spot on the entryway, arced in such a way that implied the door had been opened after this snowfall.
Steve cast a nervous glance at the creature following him. Quietly, he spoke to it:
“You’re going to have to stay back.”
It blinked. Stretched. Shook the snow from its head.
“… I’ll be back in a minute,” Steve added. Trusting he’d be able to shut the door before the wolf slipped in, he set his hand back onto the handle of his blade and proceeded forward. The door, with immaculately kept hinges, opened easily and closed quietly behind him.
Steve’s pointed ear twitched. The sound of crackling flame accompanied the lit candles in their sconces along the walls, a bright orange-red playing across the interior of the place. The shadows cast by the furniture inside— basic tables and chairs, with the occasional decorative shield or suit of armor— were unsettling at best.
Steve took a shield from its place on the wall, holding it up in front of himself as he drew his sword carefully.
He took care to walk slowly, each step drawn from the heels of his feet to the toes of his boots in a rolling motion. There was only the faintest of creaks as he ascended up the stairs. Tension lined his muscles, and he could almost feel his heart beating in his ears.
There were many doors at the top of the stairs, though none grander than the one directly across from Steve as he approached. It was large and centered, the wood of it red and brilliantly engraved. Two lit sconces held up small dancers of light on either side of it, and finally, finally, Steve’s ears caught something more than flame or animal footsteps.
The sound of breathing.
He frowned, held his sword at the ready, and pushed open the doors.
Beautiful, his mind thought before he had a chance to stop it.
Marble pillars framed large, pointed arches of windows, the sky cloudless and stars brighter through this glass than Steve had ever seen them. The panes seemed to glow blue, a distinct contrast from the bright red of magnificent gems lining the walls. They were like nothing Steve had laid his eyes on. They were pressed, too, into the upholstery of a throne at the center of the back wall, glowing brilliantly.
And atop that throne sat a man.
Beautiful, Steve thought again. Familiar, almost.
This man was adorned in mostly black, the darkness of it causing the porcelain of his skin to seem almost impossibly pale. His eyes were… brown, or… or orange, it seemed, or…
Red.
And his features were sharp and dangerous, and his gaze was inquisitive, and his nails were long and pointed, and he was tall and thin and shapely—
“Anthony,” Steve breathed.
Tony stared back at him, eyes widening at the sound of his voice.
“Steven,” he responded.
It had been years. Steve hadn’t seen him in years. The reality of it all hit him like a tidal wave, pulling him down, drowning him in sensations and visuals— the icy blue of Tony’s piercing eyes in their youth, the warmth of Tony’s hands on Steve’s chest, waist, thighs, the planes of his body that made Steve long for a quill and parchment.
Tony’s eyes dropped, gaze affixed to the sword Steve carried.
“Come to rid the world of me?” he asked, his voice low and despondent.
Steve stood, stunned.
Tony frowned. It may have been a trick of the candlelight, but Steve could have sworn there was a flicker of something— anger, perhaps, disdain— across his features.
And then he stood, and Steve took a step back. Tony paused for only a moment, his frown deepening, before he continued his leisurely stride toward Steve.
He rested on one knee, then set down the next. Slowly, he bowed his head.
“Tony,” Steve said, quietly.
“Go ahead.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’m a monster, aren’t I?” Tony looked up, a borderline self-deprecating smile adorning the smooth surface of his skin. “Admit it. You’ve wanted to do this since before— well, all of this.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Please. You shooed me out of your village with no level of uncertainty, Steven. Whether I’m a whore in your eyes or a beast means little to me if this is where we end.” The tone of his voice betrayed him; the slightest of wavers slipped in, the slightest layer of glassiness coating his eyes.
Steve knew there was a greater quest at hand. He knew. But he’d always been weak for this man— he’d never stopped, never, he had no clue what Tony was going on about— and he couldn’t push onward like this. He sheathed his blade and dropped the shield. A moment too late, as the shield clanged loudly against the tile of the floor, he caught the disapproving twitch of Tony’s brow.
“Sorry,” he whispered.
Tony said nothing.
Steve lowered himself down, then, too, resting on both of his knees to meet Tony at eye level. The muscles of his legs ached and the bones of them creaked and groaned with the effort, but they were grateful for the moment of reprieve, he thought— it was his heart’s turn to find strain in this journey.
Carefully, in much the same way as he’d approached the wolf prior to all of this, he stretched his hand outward to set it on the side of Tony’s face. He was cold to the touch, his expression inscrutably hesitant.
“My love,” Steve started, “I don’t— I don’t know what you mean.”
“Which part?” Tony prompted, his tone less than amused but with a strain to it, almost a sense of restraint. Steve frowned.
“I’m not… here to slay you. I never wanted to hurt you, I never wanted— I never saw you as anything less than the man I love. The most gorgeous man in all the world, the most intelligent, the most kind.”
“You abandoned me. You treated me like— like garbage, like worse than garbage, you locked me out of our home—”
A soft gasp tore itself from Steve’s lips as his posture shifted, became more curled inward, more tense. He’d forgotten. Of course he’d forgotten.
“No, no, no— No, Tony, that’s not it, that’s not it at all.”
“The only reason I didn’t freeze to death in the snow, Steven, was because one of these monsters you seek to slay saved me. Turned me.”
“I was bitten,” Steve says. “That night, I was bitten, it was— It was the full moon. I’d turned. Tony, I couldn’t even get back inside. I had to— I had to call the locksmith the next morning to fix me a new key. I wasn’t myself.”
Tony stopped. Stared.
Steve held up his hand, the chain having burned a good bit of its way into his skin. “Lycanthropy,” he said, pleaded. “I never meant to abandon you. I came home and you were gone. I looked for days, for weeks, I— Jesus, I still look every Christmas.”
Tony flinched at the word, but otherwise kept still.
He hung his head once more. A desperate, distraught near-whine rumbled in Steve’s throat.
“I don’t want to hurt you. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m not—”
And Tony fell into dismay, his shoulders wracked with silent sobs and his arms wrapping tightly around himself. Even then, he was quiet, unassuming, like he’d prefer to sink into the ground beneath him and never be seen again.
“My darling, my love,” Steve pleaded, pulling Tony in. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. I tried everything in my power to get back to you.”
“Why are you here?” Tony asked. He’d hardly had the time to gather himself. Steve expected his face to be red and puffy with the effort of the crying he’d done, but it wasn’t; he supposed it made sense, startling as it was. He considered how he, himself, must have looked in that moment as well, and he figured they must have startled each other. “Why are you here, if not to—”
“There’s… been a surge of break-ins back home,” Steve explained. “Most of the damage done, consistently, has been at the northern edge of town, so I… I suppose I thought the perpetrator of the crimes would be up this way.” He frowned, pulling back just enough to set his hand on Tony’s cheek again. “… You didn’t do that, did you?”
“Of course I didn’t,” Tony answered. “I have no use for— for anything there, anymore.”
Steve fell quiet, uncertain whether or not he was included in that.
“It wasn’t me,” Tony said as he stood. “So if that’s all you came here for, you can take your leave.”
“Tony.” Steve took Tony’s hand before he could pull away completely. “Tony, please. Please.”
“They don’t want me back home.”
“They don’t want me, either. They don’t. But we could go back together, we could get back to normal, we could show them…”
Tony stared.
“We could show them we’re no different than we were before. I’m still the soldier that fought for them, and you’re still the… Lord, the world’s most talented smith, the most beautiful passerby.” Steve searched Tony’s gaze for anything, anything at all that might show warmth— and lo and behold, he found it, the smallest of twinkles in Tony’s eye as he stood and waited for Steve to finish. “The most… er, charming chef the town has ever seen,” Steve continued, and the laugh that bubbled out of Tony’s throat seemingly against his will brought a smile of relief to Steve’s face.
“We could go home,” Steve said. “Come home with me.”
Tony glanced down at their intertwined fingers, his small, careful smile dropping from his face. “No.”
“No?”
“We find the thief first. And when we return home, we’ll carry his head on our belts. They’ll love it,” Tony suggested, and Steve supposed he couldn’t blame the man after a decade spent seemingly alone in the woods.
“Er. I was thinking we’d bring him back to… be tried in the public court,” Steve replied. Tony thought for a long moment, and then nodded.
“Yes, fine,” he said, dusting his knees off. “If you’d like to take anything for the journey, there’s more weaponry downstairs. As well as some armor, should you find yourself needing it.”
“You won’t?”
“Regrettably, dear, I’m incredibly dexterous. Against my will, I’m nigh unkillable.”
“I wouldn’t call that regrettable at all,” Steve argued. “And, ah… by the by, where did you come across all of this, if you didn’t take it for yourself?”
Tony huffed, giving Steve one final once-over before passing him on the way downstairs. “It was all here when I came across the place. I didn’t do anything but tidy up.”
“And no one came with you? The… man who turned you, he didn’t accompany you?” Steve set his hand on Tony’s lower back as they descended, almost removing it when Tony tensed at the touch. But Tony took barely a moment to relax into it, setting his stride closer to Steve’s while they walked.
“I may have intentionally misrepresented the facts,” Tony admitted. “He’d drained me. Turning me was… unintentional.”
“Oh, darling.”
“You needn’t pity me. I think it made me sexier, if anything. Look at my jaw. Did my jaw get sharper?”
Steve stopped at the bottom of the stairs, lifting his free hand to turn Tony’s chin toward himself. And then he planted a sweet, chaste kiss on the side of Tony’s jawline, much to Tony’s surprise.
“You’re as beautiful as the day I last saw you,” Steve said.
“I looked terrible that day. Steve, I’d been working all morning, I hadn’t even done my hair…”
“Gorgeous. Stunning as always.”
“Yes, yes, you and your flattery.” Tony sighed, pulling away from Steve’s touch to unmount his own sword and shield. He wasted no time in arming himself. Despite his prior assertions that he was unkillable, he also equipped himself with the chestplate— which was a little funny looking with the whole get-up, but overall quite nice.
“What’s that for?” Steve asked.
“Oh, you know. Wooden stakes.”
“Ah. Right.”
“Are we ready, then?”
Steve took one last look around, patting the packs on his belt and making sure his sword was still tightly secured to himself. “I suppose so. One last question, though… Is this, er, yours? All of this, I mean?”
“Well, no one’s come to take it from me in the last twelve years, so I’d assume so.”
“Are you ever returning to this place? Are you… going to stay here?”
Tony frowned. “Well, I…” He looked up at the staircase as he trailed off, awkwardly running a nail over the edge of the chestplate’s collar as he did. “I suppose sometimes, I would, if you’d like to. But we have a home to return to, do we not?”
“We do,” Steve said, a smidge too quickly to be casual. “Of course we do.”
Satisfied, then, Tony nodded. “We’ll call this a vacation home, then. Shall we?”
He took the lead outside, opening the door to reveal a large, sulking white wolf curled on the edge of the church’s entryway.
“Oh, Tony, this is… a friend,” Steve said.
Tony took in the sight of thing carefully, sharp eyes discerning and squinty as he did so. He watched as it stood from where it lay, stretching for a long moment before flopping over to reveal its belly.
“Is this meant to be some wicked form of flirtation? Is your friend exposing himself to me?” Tony asked.
“No, no, it’s— That’s not a werewolf, Tony, it’s just… It’s just a wolf. Just a dog.”
“Oh.” Tony gave the dog one careful pat on the stomach, then drew the hood of his cape before stepping out into the open. He pulled it far enough over his head that his skin would be shielded by any direct sunlight when it came. There was a distinct discomfort in his movements, as if he was self conscious of it, but he said nothing. Steve didn’t, either. They had limited time and limited resources, and he was sure Tony knew as well as he that it would be morning soon; waiting for another nightfall would be more dangerous than beneficial.
He took Tony’s hand, an almost child-like gesture in the expanse of the woods, and lightly tugged him in the right direction.
“We continue north,” Steve said.
“North it is,” Tony agreed, though he seemed hesitant to move. Steve watched as Tony’s gaze scanned the outside of the church— noticed, belatedly, that each cross that had appeared in the windows had been scraped through— and paused to wait for him.
A moment. They could take a moment.
Steve wrapped his arm around Tony’s waist, tiredly resting his head atop Tony’s shoulder. Tony set his head against Steve’s in response.
“We’ll come back, yes?” Tony asked. “Like I said? I’ll show you all the places I’ve found. The towns I’ve seen.”
“Whatever you want. Really, Tony, I’ll go wherever you want me to go.”
“… It’ll get late soon, you know…” Tony began, almost bashfully.
“That’s alright. We can protect ourselves.”
“I was just thinking. I have a— well, a terribly comfortable bed upstairs, and a part of me wonders if it’s not better for us to have a nice, long… rest, let’s say, before traveling?” Tony’s eyes flitted up to Steve’s.
“Oh! Oh. Oh, yes, that’s—” Steve cleared his throat, stepping aside and gesturing toward the door for Tony to enter. “I can’t say no to that.”
“Bring the dog in.”
“What, to bed?”
“Of course not to bed. I just don’t want him out there all shiver-y.”
“And then… we’re going to bed.”
“Yes.”
“Together.”
“Yes. And then home, after… all of this,” Tony said, sternly.
“And then home,” Steve repeated, voice soft and almost in awe. “And then home.”