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Two nights before the start of the war - the real start with the real players, and somehow both of them knew this was the real deal coming - Rider and his Master laid in their beds and thought deeply to their respective views of the ceiling.
To be precise, the boy was in a bed. He didn’t see why he should give his bed up when it was clearly him who did all the work bewitching the old couple into letting him stay. It made no sense to share a bed with someone that large either, so he left Rider to his own devices; sprawled on the floor, hands tucked behind his head, legs only slightly splayed though still monstrous enough to fill most of Waver’s room.
“Boy,” he called out in that gruff voice, and Waver would remind him to lower his voice because it was the middle of the night when normal people were sleeping, goddamnit, but realized he was as much asleep as Rider was, so what did that make him? “What’s keeping you up?”
He said instead, “What do you think?”
Waver has this patiently impatient way of speaking, Rider thought, and it was extremely amusing. He always tried to play the adult, as if forgetting that Rider’s twice his age. Maybe more. Definitely more than twice the wiser.
“I get it, I get it. You’re nervous about the war. But that’s nothing new, boy, so,” he tried again. “Why’re you awake?”
This time there was no annoyed pause before the reply, and the King of Conquerors was honestly surprised at how quickly he caved. But it was a nice kind of surprise, the kind that spoke of growing up and the maturing of puny little wizards.
“What happens to servants at the end of the war, Iskandar?”
Iskandar laughed. “They disappear. You know that.”
“But what if-”
“Of course, you can grant them a physical body. If that’s your wish.”
“It’s yours, isn’t it?”
“Damn right, kid,” Iskandar replied with a dreamy sigh. A manly, dreamy sigh.
“Then-”
Rider cut him off before he could finish the sentence. “But it’s not your wish.” Suddenly all the humor burnt out of his eyes; extinguished fire leaving only a trail of smoke behind. “Don’t you forget that.”
Two nights after the end of the war, Waver entered his room to find it clean for the first time in forever. He closed the door behind him with a barely audible clink and slid down against the wooden surface, exhaling contentedly at the pristine state of his quarters. It was finally devoid of trash, empty bottles, half-filled bottles, empty styrofoam boxes, half-finished takeout, and finally, finally, it felt like Waver’s again. Not some shared, dingy thing with some sketchy guy from a whole other era.
So why was he crying?
Before he realized what he was doing, he had drawn his legs up to his chest. His arms had formed a protective pillow around his knees, whose crook his head was immediately buried in. And obviously he couldn’t see his own tears but he could feel them hot and wet against his cheeks.
The last time he cried Iskandar had been around. He’d always been a crybaby so he couldn’t remember specifically when the last time was - whether it was the time when he gave up his right as a Master, or the night before when he asked Rider to go away so he could hole himself up in a quiet corner and cry, or the time on the bridge before Caster’s attack when everything just exploded. He couldn’t remember when, but it didn’t really matter because he was sure Iskandar was around, and that was all that mattered.
Waver lifted his head from its sanctuary between his limbs and slammed it against the door. For a second he was worried that the thud might be loud enough to wake his fake grandparents, but it did sound kind of dull, and they were probably asleep anyway. They weren’t like Iskandar, who were with him every second and knew every nuance of his brilliant moods. Of course he didn’t expect anyone to be like Iskandar, or come close to the King of Conquerors.
He is King for a reason. More so since he’s not just any King, but Waver’s.
When the young mage in training had satisfactorily bawled his eyes out, he started crawling to the television right across and pressed on a worn out button to turn it on. Static filled the screen before he could insert the stupid game the stupid King wasted his money on. Stupid.
The opening credits started playing, and Waver picked up a console, already connected from the sheer amount of hours he’s spent playing. He’s not even going to bother unhooking it anymore.
He clicked through the tutorial and the badly-animated sequence, already reeling to take today’s enemy on.
As the screen loaded, Waver couldn’t decide if Iskandar was most stupid or if he was, sitting here in the dead of night, alone, playing some shitty game belonging to the man he was trying to forget, knowing that this was the only way he’s ever going to forget, starting from now.