Chapter Text
Winter birds, hopping between puddles of slushy mud, fluttered away as Essek intruded on their morning with his own self-indulgent wander. Tonight the Christmas tree farm would be bustling with people– hopefully– but for now it was still quiet and remote, and the wildlife didn’t mind his lack of footprints. Tonight–
Essek touched his lips again, unable to stifle the smile that had been visiting like a shy bird since last night. Light, he’d kissed him. And Caleb had assured him they’d see each other again tonight– said he wouldn’t miss it for the world– and looked at him like maybe he didn’t want to return to his hectic professor life for the spring semester, like maybe–
Not that Essek would let him. Not that he could. The charming professor had only taken a semester off in this small town to finish his book– quite nearly done– and there was no world in which Essek could really ask him to stay for only him. He had already steeled himself to soaking this in for the next few weeks to tuck away into his heart like a pressed flower in the yellowed pages of a forgotten book; all he could do was make sure he saved away as many precious memories as he could.
The warning call of a jay carried through the trees, and Essek shook himself from his more melancholic musings. He would see Caleb tonight. And then–
“Dezran!”
Essek startled out of his float into the slushy mud. Thank the Light and his paranoia that he kept his disguise up even when expecting to be alone.
“Caleb!” The smile returned again, with more teeth than he’d let show to anyone else, but this was Caleb. “I wasn’t expecting you?”
“Ah, hallo. Dezran, um…” Caleb shoved his hands into his pockets, brow pinching, no hint of his usual reciprocated delight.
Essek’s smile melted away. “What’s wrong?”
“We need to talk.” Caleb wouldn’t meet his eyes.
“I’m listening?”
“I, um, is this private? Is this a safe place?”
A cold mycelia of fear was spreading through Essek’s heart. “Caleb, what are you talking about?”
“Dezran, I– th–” Caleb wrung his hands, looked around and sat down heavily on the whimsically decorated crate that hid the electrical utility box for the overhead string lights. For a moment he looked up at Essek and forced a smile that couldn’t chase the sadness from his eyes. Essek returned it, waveringly, and the moment held until Caleb dropped his eyes again and let out a heavy sigh. “I have a confession to make… Thelyss.”
—
“It’s been an act.” Bren couldn’t bear to watch the worried softness of Thelyss’ smile crystalize into fear. A coward and a thief still, he thought as he tucked away that final memory of affection stolen from some timeline where he’d lost his heart without duplicity. He watched Thelyss step back, hands flinching with readied somantics, then fixed gaze down on his boots.
“Who are you?”
Unimportant. “They’re coming for you tonight. You need to leave.” The Sending had come this morning without warning. Bren kept his own hands clasped together on top of his knees: a spellcaster’s apology. “I know you have no reason to trust me–”
“Who are you?”
Slowly telegraphing his movements, Bren pushed up his sleeve just far enough to reveal the margins of his circuit-like tattoos. “You know what I am.”
No reply. Bren’s neck should have been prickling with the vulnerability of looking away from a mage of this caliber.
“I–” I’m sorry. I wish you’d never believed me. I wish I’d made some kind of mistake before this even started. I wish– “It w-wasn’t real.” The shake in his voice was a sure confession, but Thelyss could choose to ignore that. Must choose to.
He schooled his face into something passably impassive, and looked up to snowy footprints backing away from him, ending abruptly where their owner had vanished.
He was gone.