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Olruggio came to the hill outside the atelier whenever he needed a moment to breathe.
Inside, sat by the warmth of the hearth, were Qifrey and the children. Tartah had been nursing a second cup of tea when Olruggio had stepped out into the cooling air of the shifting season.
Thoughts weighed down his skull; he hunched his shoulders to support the load.
Silver Eve approached them once more. The passage stars had soared above him, mind cloudy from a sleep he couldn’t remember falling into but calmed by the warm presence of Qifrey next to him. The soft ground of the hill he loved to watch the horizon from cushioned his aching back.
His sigh rustled the field as the tasselmice scurried back to their burrows to sleep.
After their most recent brush with danger, Olruggio wondered how he was supposed to find the courage to send the girls into a crowd of thousands so soon. Honestly, he couldn’t comprehend how Qifrey could be so calm.
As the adults responsible for four children, they’d had no opportunity to decide how they should move forward to protect their safety since they’d returned. Tartah had appeared before they'd had the time or rest required for such a discussion. Yet, Qifrey so easily agreed to attend as though Olruggio’s concerns were unnecessary.
It frustrated him. Qifrey hadn’t witnessed the way fear raged through Olruggio’s chest with every morning he woke and Qifrey did not. He hadn’t been awake to see how the girls brushed off the terror they’d gone through so easily as though it were nothing. Olruggio watched those children move on with smiles and wondered whether he was the only one who’d retained his memories of that dreadful cave that had filled with the sour stench of petrichor and blood.
And when the fear had consumed him, he was alone.
He’d sat there in that hospital room, where two hearts were beating; one thrummed slowly with sleep and the other raced with night terrors.
Ash-mottled dragons cried overhead. Olruggio took a deep breath, felt the chill burn his lungs and groaned on the exhale. He fell backward and stared at the stars. The grass tickled his cheek, brushed away the tears that left glittering trails down his skin.
He took another breath and let the calm return to him.
Qifrey knew he couldn’t push his shoulder any further. He also knew that Olruggio’s commissions were at their most demanding during Silver Eve, and that to say he had no time was more of an understatement than it was an exaggeration.
He knew this, and had decided that the potential to use the opportunity to broaden the girls’ horizons outweighed the fear that may grip their hearts as the worrisome adults who took care of them.
It was the move of a master who cared about his apprentices. It annoyed Olruggio that despite his recklessness, he was probably right to agree to take them.
Olruggio rubbed his temples. Danger and wonder had begun to blur when it concerned the girls’ education. He didn’t understand how Qifrey managed to lead them through it with courage and smiles on their faces.
He scrubbed a hand across his face and removed his hat. Fresh, soothing smells of earth and plantlife reminded him to steady his mind and allow the space to comfort him.
This hill had never betrayed him. The stars watched over him with a gentle sparkle that shone beautifully in the tears that built but never broke. He felt safe here, mind empty of worry as the breeze rustled his hair like the caring hand of his master that once passed over his scalp.
On the soft dewy grass he could breathe out the fear and think of nothing but the glow of the moon. He traced spells of warmth and comfort into the air. A gesture of thanks to the nature that consumed his nerves to give him such blissful peace on nights like these. With a deep breath in, he completed the circle.
The wind wrapped around his shoulders and nuzzled into his chest with every inhale.
“You’re out here late.”
Fabric rustled as footsteps approached him. He saw the swish of Qifrey’s smoke cape when he dropped to the ground next to him, his knees pressed together to one side with his hips twisting his body towards Olruggio. His eyes followed the slope of his body, from the relaxed droop of his shoulders to the slight curve of his waist. Underneath, his turtleneck hugged the skin. The leather straps at his neck had been pulled open.
“Was just thinkin’,” Olruggio dragged a hand through his wind-matted hair. “There’s no failed projects or commission requests waiting for me out here. Needed the peace.”
Qifrey’s hum of acknowledgement was bird song in the quiet.
“It’s calm out here,” he agreed. “I rather enjoy taking a few moments to let nature soothe me on difficult nights too.”
“Is that after you stop messin’ around in the kitchen for hours?”
“Naturally,” he smiled. “Every good breakfast is made with a loving attention to nutrition and late-night restlessness.”
With a snort, Olruggio buried his chin into the velvet of his robes. Loose fibers tickled his nose; he wrinkled it to stave off a sneeze.
Absently, Qifrey adjusted the excess fabric that had fallen from Olruggio’s legs and onto the grass. He placed it back over his shivering limbs. Attentive fingers tucked every inch over his body until Olruggio was wrapped in its encasing hug. However, Qifrey ceased his fiddling when a flinch surged through his body.
Eyebrow raised, Olruggio focused on the way Qifrey cradled his right arm by the bicep.
“Did you take the medication for your shoulder?” He pressed his knuckles to Qifrey’s forehead. “That fever never came back so it must be doin’ some sort of good.”
“One dose of anodyne and a half dose of febrifuge,” Qifrey confirmed with a playful smile. “The fruit wine should be finished fermenting by the time I’m able to drink again.”
Relieved, Olruggio sighed. “I’m hoping the girls will’ve forgiven us for all the late-night snacking by then. Hard to enjoy a drink when they give us those looks before they go to bed.”
Qifrey laughed.
“I thought I’d be used to their guilt-inducing looks by now, I’m rather impressed that they still hold such an easy power over us.” Qifrey rested his hand against his cheek with a smile. “Either we weren’t as sneaky as we thought we were when we were kids, or we’ve gotten worse at tiptoeing around at night if we can’t get away with a few late-night drinks.”
“I think our problem is that we never outgrew sneaking around at night, and now we live with four children who are learning how to do it themselves.”
“I suppose that’s a fair point. Well, Richeh is doing fairly well, considering we didn’t know she’d caught us eating after midnight multiple times,” Qifrey chuckled.
“Coco’s tiptoeing could use some work, I hear her sneaking into her workspace when she should be sleeping,” Olruggio huffed with amusement. He reminisced on the time when he’d realized that he’d never heard her return to her room, and had found her sleeping draped across her desk instead. She never seemed to question why she’d woken up in her bed the next day.
It wouldn’t be the first time Qifrey or Olruggio had carried one of the apprentices back to bed after passing out elsewhere, surrounded by half-finished seals. It probably wouldn’t be the last either.
“Agott is improving, though she’s yet to realize that I know the kitchen inventory by heart and know about all the snacks she steals.” Qifrey leaned back onto the grass and moved a hand above his head with an absent sway. “Tetia is either a master of stealth or she simply doesn’t engage in any sneaking about.”
“Tetia uses her sylph shoes,” Olruggio grumbled. “Nobody can hear you sneakin’ if your feet ain’t on the floor.”
“Master of stealth it is then,” Qifrey smiled. Pride swam in that expression. “Clearly, we’re outmatched.”
With a snort, Olruggio let the gleam of the stars sear into his eyes so that he could track the echo of their glow across Qifrey’s face. He blinked to disperse the burn. The spots of light danced from his vision.
“So, what do we do? Are we gonna be drinkin’ behind a locked door from now on?” Olruggio raised an eyebrow and shot Qifrey a playful look. “You think my room’s too messy and you hate lighting the hearth in yours because it gets too hot.”
“I don’t think that will be necessary,” Qifrey hummed. “I’m certain the girls won’t mind us having a few nights to ourselves, so long as we don’t snack without them too often.”
“They’re good kids,” Olruggio said. He meant it so genuinely that it made his heart burn with a gentle flame. Cool enough to run his hand over, prepared to flare blue at the next threat of danger.
“They are.” Qifrey looked at Olruggio and smiled. “They’re a lot less work than we were.”
A laugh burst from Olruggio’s chest, it bloomed as sweet as spring flowers in the autumn breeze. The sound of Qifrey’s joining it created a melody so blissful, Olruggio wanted to pen it into a song-seal to play on repeat forever.
“I’m not sure that’s totally true,” Olruggio caught his breath. “After all, they could be the biggest handfuls on the entire peninsula and we’d still think they’re the best kids in the world. They’re your apprentices. It doesn’t matter if they’re hard work, you just want to see them flourish, y’know. Beldaruit probably doesn’t think you were as much work as you think you were.”
With a soft exhale, Qifrey’s lips lifted with a pretty smile. His laughter was breathy, whispered into the dark lull of the sky. “I rather like the sound of that, when you put it that way. Though, my heart would prefer it if they kept the escape acts to a minimum.”
“Coco running off to the Tower of Tomes was enough excitement to last us the year,” Olruggio nodded, the memory flashing darkly in his eyes. For that one afternoon, Coco had joined Qifrey in his attempt to make Olruggio faint from worry. “You better be sure that going to Silver Eve is a good idea.”
“Quite certain,” Qifrey hummed. “It’s better for the girls to enjoy themselves, even if we’re feeling a little shaken, than to have them confined to the atelier. They’re already so excited, Richeh was telling Coco about the legend of the silverwood and the star when I left.”
Olruggio snorted. “She might not be a fan of the ending.”
There was no responding laughter as Olruggio had expected. For a while, there was no response at all. The silence wasn’t uncomfortable, however. It rarely was with Qifrey.
Olruggio took the quiet into his hands and blew it away gently, like the fluff of a sheep flower in the wind. “There’s a lot of stars sailing above us tonight, right? You can see the constellation of the silverwood maiden.”
He raised his hand to point to the small collection of stars that twinkled in the inky abyss. With his eyes closed, he let the fairytale float through his mind as though dancing to the music that the bards often put it to.
When he looked at Qifrey, he was staring at the constellation with a crease in his brow. He looked lost in thought; his eye gazed so gently at the sky above him that Olruggio almost felt jealous that the look wasn’t aimed at him.
He looked beautiful. Starlight kissed his hair like a celestial blessing.
Qifrey sighed. “I wonder if she waits for the star to sail past her again.”
Surprise shocked Olruggio into stillness. Sadness flooded through him, the way Qifrey had spoken pulled a tide of emotion from a place in his heart that he hadn’t known had been storing it. Then, it melted into something more sentimental. It was as though Qifrey had pulled him from the ground to float in that starry sky, a place where fairytales were real and not myth.
“She’s been waitin’ a long time if she does,” Olruggio murmured. “She’s spent a lot of time watching the consequences of her choice to give the gift of magic to us, huh? Even if she’s sad waitin’ around for him, I hope the magic we cast at least makes her smile. When she sees young witches like our girls puttin’ their all into making the world a better place with their magic, I hope she thinks it was worth it.”
Qifrey ran his hand over the grass, his eyes fixed on something far away. “I think she’d wait another eternity to make the same choice again.”
Inquisitive, Olruggio cocked his head in a silent request for him to elaborate.
“Her choice wasn’t about the consequences, but about what she believed would be the greater good. Even though there are times when our gift of magic is used for terrible things, her belief that magic could provide something kind and valuable to our world was correct,” Qifrey hummed. “She made that choice knowing she’d part with the one she loved for an eternity. So, indeed if another eternity were to pass, I believe her choice would remain steady and determined.”
The sadness grew in him, as though the tears shed by the lonely lovers were filling his heart the more he considered them. He mourned for the concept they stood for, of abandoning love in the face of one’s duty or beliefs. Even if they weren’t real, the pain they represented was.
“I wonder how the silverwood felt.” Olruggio’s voice turned wistful as he pondered to the sky. “When she betrayed the star to gift the world with magic, did it hurt to make that choice?”
Qifrey covered his cheek with his hand, his eye disappearing behind slender fingers. “To betray the one she loved, I imagine it was rather excruciating.”
He paused at that. Time passed peacefully in the silence.
“I guess that makes sense,” Olruggio looked at the stars. “It must’ve been painful for both of them. To betray and be betrayed, when there’s love involved there’s probably no way to escape it without agony. I wonder if apologies and forgiveness could ever fully heal those wounds.”
Light glimmered from the largest star on the horizon that marked the approaching autumn. Frigid, fresh air swirled in the breeze. It slipped over Olruggio’s cheeks kindly, cooling the skin.
Qifrey looked up at the mess of constellations overhead, never flickering his gaze away from it.
“I wonder,” he mumbled. His voice sounded as though it were as far away as the stars he stared at. “The story never actually tells of what happened to them after she gave the gift of magic to us. For her, loneliness was a punishment she willingly bore for the sake of doing what she thought was necessary.”
“You make it sound noble, but for the star that would’ve been a curse,” Olruggio added. Not unkindly, but in a continuation of the strangely charged thought that had weaved its way into the air between them. “If one person willingly chooses loneliness, where does that leave the one they abandoned?”
An unfamiliar sound fought its way from Qifrey’s chest. It sounded close to a gasp, as though he’d gone to take a step only to find the ground missing beneath his feet. A vulnerability hid in it. The air between them thrummed, heavy and foreboding. Olruggio couldn’t understand why their discussion of witch society’s oldest tale had turned the inches between their bodies into miles.
Qifrey didn’t say anything. He pulled his cloak tighter around his shoulders and stared at the sky.
Olruggio hated the way the silence rang so loudly between them. The hill was betraying him now that Qifrey sat next to him, the peace abandoning him in wake of the strange fear that curdled in his chest for a reason he couldn’t place.
“It’s probably a lot lonelier to be abandoned,” Olruggio said to distract himself from the quiet. “The silverwood got to choose her fate, even if it was a painful one. However, the star had no choice or control. No explanation, no option to help her or find a way to be together. Just.. nothing. The silverwood sees the empty space between her and feels comfort knowing she made her choice for the greater good; the star sees the empty space and wonders why she’d never simply asked him to gift his magic to the world instead.”
Qifrey surprised Olruggio by turning to look at him with his face contorted in an attempted expression of neutrality. In reality, he looked pained.
“But what if the silverwood only had the illusion of choice? Perhaps she knew that any decision the star made to stay with her would place him in a great amount of danger,” Qifrey urged. He sounded as though every word that poured from his lips was against his will. Emotional in a way that should’ve made no sense given the context.
Olruggio felt just as desperate.
Oh, how often their peace soured these days.
“And if the star would gladly put himself in danger if it meant he could stay by her side?”
Qifrey gripped his skirt and stood up. The motion startled Olruggio, a breath caught painfully in his lungs and burned. His heart began to pound in his chest, yet he couldn’t place what made him so nervous.
“It’s late,” Qifrey forced a smile. It made Olruggio nauseous. “I think we’ve bickered about this fairytale enough for one evening.”
“Bickered?” Olruggio laughed in disbelief.
“Mildly disagreed about what may have occurred after the ending,” Qifrey sighed and corrected himself. There was a nervous twitch to his lips, a flush rising on his cheeks out of an assumed embarrassment over his small outburst. Olruggio longed to press his lips to it and feel the heat that bloomed beneath his skin. “I’m sorry, the medication for my shoulder makes me awfully drowsy. I feel a bit out of sorts.”
Olruggio stood up and took his hand. Their fingers twined together, though Qifrey’s quivered a little before settling comfortably. Gently, Olruggio brushed his thumb over the back of it. The skin was icy as always, slowly thawing from the molten heat of Olruggio’s palm.
“I’m no stranger to gettin’ cranky when I’m tired, it’s okay.” As he’d taken the hand that wasn’t attached to his injured shoulder, Olruggio began to pull Qifrey towards the atelier. “C’mon, you said it yourself that it’s late. You need to get some sleep.”
“I absolutely deny being ‘cranky’, but you’re probably right about needing sleep.” Qifrey laughed, so light that it soared on the breeze and carried over the hill. Something else seeped into the sound though, an emotion so heavy that it immediately sunk to the ground. “You still have work to do, right? I’ll head to bed alone.”
Part of Olruggio wanted to tell him that there was no chance that he’d get any more work done until the following morning. He wanted to tell him that they both desperately needed sleep, and that he wanted nothing more than to curl into bed together and slip into a dream as sweet as the fruit wine they both favored. More than anything, he wanted to place his ear to Qifrey’s chest and listen to the steady, comforting beat of his heart to dispel his fears that its cadence has turned rapid.
Yet, the words didn’t come.
Qifrey’s hand slipped from his. He clutched the air into his palm, empty and cold.
It felt like rejection. Something about the way Qifrey had spoken of his intention to sleep alone sounded like a promise rather than a circumstance. A choice he’d made himself, with no intention of allowing Olruggio his own.
Shivers crawled their way across Olruggio’s skin. It felt disgusting as they rippled uncomfortably down his neck like a predator breathing in its prey. He couldn’t move as he watched Qifrey walk away. Cold air froze him, his mind running wild with a searing panic that had him kneeling back to the earth and clutching the grass into his fists.
Qifrey didn’t look back once.
The air that had hugged his shoulders tightened and choked him.
The hill felt as though it was collapsing beneath him. The clear air turned murky, the horizon fell dark and the stars glared at him as though they dared him to run. Or, did they beg him to? He couldn’t quite tell.
He wanted to chase after Qifrey and burrow into bed with him. Those soft sheets, stitched with seals that Olruggio’s hands had clumsily made almost a decade ago as a gift to his best friend who’d sworn to live alone following his graduation.
Not that he ever did. Olruggio had left with him.
When he was younger, he used to attribute the peaceful rest he got in that bed to the luxury those sheets surrounded him with. It had taken one disaster that pulled Qifrey from the atelier overnight to assist some villagers that made him realize it was the company, not the sheets, that gave him such peace. He’d tossed and turned in complete comfort that night, longing for the crick in his neck that came from dozing on Qifrey’s chest instead of his pillow.
He curled into himself on the grass, feeling the dew seep into his robes. He saw the pained look of love that Qifrey so often looked at him with when he closed his eyes, no matter how hard he’d tried to deny he’d ever seen such an expression.
The kindness in his eye, juxtaposed with an agonized look of longing as though Olruggio was fading away. More than once, had he stood before a mirror to reassure himself that his body remained tangible and opaque. He pressed his fingers to his skin, held his wrist and traced the bone that often ached after days of commissions with his eyes closed and imagined that Qifrey had touched him without that perceived fear that his fingertips would fall through.
He wiped tears from his own cheeks. He heard an old echoed whisper of his name and sobbed a little harder.
The moon rose higher over the hill. The stars continued to pity him.
Not for the first time, Olruggio found himself sleeping under the stars on the hill he sought for comfort.
With a tremble, his mind went blank as unconsciousness welcomed him with freezing arms.