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1.
He can’t think.
He’s trying to, but there’s a rushing static in his head that won’t let up, and attempting to get to anything past it feels like wading through an open field covered in dense fog.
It’s fucking terrifying. He’s far from a stranger to numbing his mind — had even been doing just that before Andreas rounded them up for another fruitless witch hunt — but when he normally indulges in substances, not thinking straight is the whole point. He has never felt like this — forcefully locked out of his own intellect.
He’s not even sure if it was really Saul’s voice he just heard talking to Sky in their room or if it was an illusion somehow, but his clothes still smell like the smoke that wafted off of their home as it burned to the ground, so he’s not sticking around to find out.
There’s just not really anywhere else for him to go, and he can’t think, and if anyone ever asks, that’s going to be his excuse for why he’s ended up here.
It takes three bouts of knocking, the sound of his knuckles rapping on the wood only aggravating his throbbing head, before one half of the large ornate door finally opens.
“Where’s Red Flag?”
“Who?” Terra’s eyebrows furrow, either at his presence at their suite in general, the nickname she’s never heard before, or the fact that he kind of stumbles in place. “Riven? Are you drunk?”
He leans a hand against the doorjamb to steady himself. “The mind fairy, Terra, is she here?”
She opens the door a little further, revealing her flannel pants and oversized band tee, and he has a tiny strike of clarity about what time of night it must be.
“You mean Musa?” she murmurs lowly. “Well yeah, she’s in our room, but—what do you want with her?” Always so suspicious of him, like it was never the two of them against the world.
“Can you go get her?” he presses on.
There’s no chance he’s going to tell her why he’s asking for her roommate, but Terra’s sensitive to urgency, and he can already see the debate on her face. Before she can make her decision, however, the other half of the door opens as well and the fairy he’s after appears from behind it. She’s in nightwear too, a low-rise pair of sweatpants and a crop top, her shorter hair messily pulled into a low bun.
“What can I do for you?” she deadpans, defiantly tilting her chin up to look him in the eye. “Teach you to read a clock, perhaps? The big hand is the minute hand, and the small hand is the hour hand.”
His fingers twitch, but he stops himself from grabbing her by the arm and dragging her into the hallway. He can hear shuffling in some of the other bedrooms, and Stella would gladly have him kicked out of not just Alfea but the entire realm of Solaria if he touched a girl without consent after showing up at her dormitory past curfew.
“I need to talk to you,” he hisses under his breath. “Alone.”
“Musa…” Terra cautions, but the mind fairy stays quiet.
He braces himself for her eyes to flare up, but they don’t. She just lets them wander coffee-colored over his dimly lit form, probably noting the way his chest rises and falls with quick, shaky breaths, the vein on his temple that’s ticking like a pulse, and how he’s still grasping onto the doorway for balance.
“Fine,” she sighs when their gazes meet again, stepping aside and pulling the door along to create a bigger passageway.
He shakes his head just as another bedroom door creaks open in the background. “Not in here.”
She rolls her eyes but bends down and grabs a pair of boots from a corner he can’t see, shoving her feet into them.
“If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, find Andreas and tell him this one knocked Beatrix up,” she throws over her shoulder to her rapidly assembling friends. “I’m feeling confident he’s a ‘stab first, ask later’ kind of guy.”
His stomach churns for other reasons than she probably intended. He bites his tongue and pushes off from the frame, stalling for a second to stop his head from spinning before leading the way.
Two corners from their suite, there’s an alcove with a narrow window and perpendicular wooden benches on each side. It’s not hidden from sight if you’re in the same hallway, but it’s far away enough that her friends won’t be able to overhear them. He ducks in, and she follows, arms wrapped around herself to fend off the draft.
For a moment, he considers the very likely possibility that she’ll tell him to go fuck himself no matter what he reveals. They don’t really know each other, and he’s not kidding himself about the fact that some of his recent choices have been unpopular.
He doesn’t know what he’s going to do if she does.
“I need you to tell me if my mind’s okay.”
She blinks twice before letting the corner of her mouth quirk up. “Are we talking brain cell death due to all the weed, or are you worried they dropped you on your head as a baby, because I don’t actually need my magic to confirm—”
“Rosalind did something to it.”
Her eyes widen, then instantly narrow again. “Define ‘something’.”
“I…I don’t know.” He runs a hand through his hair and leaves it gripping a handful of strands halfway. “She went in there and messed around, but I don’t remember what or why, and everything’s hazy and I just…” He gives his locks a firm tug. “…I don’t feel right.”
“Okay,” she articulates, hands slowly reaching for him like he might snap at her fingers if she makes an unexpected move. “Okay. Let’s sit you down.”
Her palm curls around the Alfea logo on his bicep, not an actual grip, but enough pressure that she’s able to steer him towards one of the seats. He lowers himself onto it, pulling his hand from his hair and clutching the wood instead.
She sits down on the opposing bench, their knees only a hair’s width apart once she’s settled. “What are you asking me to do, exactly?”
His leg starts bouncing up and down. “See if she—if anything’s…just check, alright?” he grumbles, avoiding her eyes.
“You’re giving me permission to go into your head?”
“Yes.” The word tastes like venom on his tongue, but he swallows it down alongside his pride and looks up to face her. “This once.”
To his surprise, she nods. It’s pretty telling that the only person he could think of to go to with something like this is a fairy he’s had a grand total of one conversation with — and not even a pleasant one — but if she’s amused by his comeuppance, or the fact that he’s asking for the one thing he condemned her for the last time they talked, she’s hiding it well. Maybe it’s just that her face looks softer without her eyes all done up, but she almost looks a little worried.
When the violet bleeds into her irises, his fingers grip the edge of the bench so tight they turn white, every muscle in his body tense. He’s been training to defend himself against fists, legs and swords for two years if not his whole life, but there’s nothing he can do to stop a mind fairy from wreaking havoc inside his head. Rosalind could’ve taken anything she wanted from him, could’ve erased his existence from his own mind altogether, and he would’ve been forced to stand there and let it happen.
“Riven,” she calls out gently, the first time she’s ever said his name, “I’m already back out.”
There’s a hint of a smile on her face when he opens his eyes. He hadn’t even realized he’d squeezed them shut.
“Right,” he coughs, leaning forward and clasping his hands together even though there’s no way he’s feigning nonchalance after that. “Well?”
“She’s definitely locked something away, but I think it’s only one memory.”
The swift rush of relief at her words is the first thing he’s felt in the last hour that isn’t complete helplessness. One hidden memory sounds a lot more curable than an irreversibly scrambled brain.
“How do I get it back?”
“I don’t know if you can,” she grimaces. “Memories aren’t my connection, so I can’t help there. Ms. Dowling might, once we find her, but until then I think you’ll just…have to accept that memory’s gone. You’ve been trying so hard to remember it keeps triggering her defenses, that’s why everything feels blurry. It’s kinda like a tripwire you keep stumbling into.”
He groans, burying his face in his hands and rubbing his temples. “So the way to fix it is to stop thinking about the only fucking thing I can think about. That’s just wonderful.”
“Whatever you do, don’t think about pink elephants,” she confirms. “Although actually, in this case, pink elephants might do the trick.”
Despite himself, he snorts, then lets all of the air in his lungs rush out in a heavy sigh before sitting back up.
“You’ll be okay,” she consoles, bumping her kneecaps into his. “But fucked up as it is to have to say this, if there’s anything else you’re planning on keeping from her, maybe try to not let her find out?”
It’s even more fucked up than she knows, considering he’s got his girlfriend — ex-girlfriend, he supposes — to thank for that particular revelation. There’s a lot more than one memory he’ll have to force himself to forget about after tonight.
For a moment, he thinks about telling her everything, figures she’s read it all in his mind either way, but all he says as he gets to his feet is, “Guess I’ll have to call you Yellow Flag from now on.”
2.
Riven’s beat. Not beaten, because that rarely happens these days — Musa’s definitely got some talent for combat, but not so much that she already poses an actual challenge to his head-start of many years — but the kind of tired that runs all the way to his bones.
Between attending his own classes and training, his strictly-off-the-record teaching sessions with Musa, and wondering where his grief-stricken best friend has gone off to before making sure he’s not at the bottom of the training pond after one too many, his days are long and strenuous. To make matters worse, tomorrow is the date of his last ever Celtic runes exam, and previous pubescent petulance means he pretty much can’t afford to not ace it, so many of his recent nights have been spent cramming instead of snoozing.
Which is why he wants nothing more than to quickly wash the day’s activities off under a steaming hot shower before diving under the covers of his bed and getting a decent few hours of sleep for once.
But he can’t. Because the door to his room is locked.
Or, more specifically, his roommate, who came to find him earlier today to ‘borrow’ his key after ‘losing’ his own, has locked him out of his own room.
“For fuck’s sake, Sky,” he sighs, bumping his forehead into the arm already resting against the door after relentlessly knocking until his knuckles hurt, “I know I’ve been on your case, but can your payback not be tonight of all nights? I won’t say a word, alright, I just want a shower and my bed.”
The only answer is a faint retching echoing from the direction of the bathroom.
He’s not even fully sure Sky’s done it on purpose, but on any other day he’d concede that he probably deserves it after being on Sky’s side of this tableau many times over the past few years. Riven would’ve woken up with his face plastered to some sticky linoleum floor or the grass of the front courtyard much more often if not for his best friend dragging his wasted ass back to their dorm time and time again, and he’s expressed his gratitude for those moments exactly never.
He’s also never been in love to the degree Sky had been ever since he first laid eyes on Bloom, and while his most recent ex stabbed him in the back and then got herself killed before he matured enough to admit he would’ve really liked to talk to her about it, he morbidly can’t help but think that’s still a better outcome than having your girlfriend tell you she loves you right before walking into a portal to an unknown, dark dimension with no way back.
So even if this really is his roommate’s way of telling him to go screw himself, and not just a momentary lapse of clarity, he can’t really blame him, but the timing couldn’t have been worse.
He sighs again and weighs his options. He’s already checked the windows, but they’re all latched. Kicking in the door would have someone alert Silva, the only person Sky wants to see even less than Riven himself, and would probably mean he’d have to pay to have it replaced as well. Sleeping in the hallway is not something he’s never done before, but it’s not as appealing now as it is when he’s black-out drunk, especially with the hallway heaters having switched off for the night. Nor is finding Dane’s room, because he’s pretty sure he saw Luke sneak in that direction when he just came in from sparring, and it would probably give Dane the wrong idea either way.
Basically, none of the options are any good. But staying until Sky changes his mind seems equally futile, with him clearly either incapable or unwilling to let him in — or both.
“Fine,” he exclaims loud enough to be sure it’ll be audible in the bathroom, “you win. Text me if you need me, okay?”
He lifts his head and pushes off from the door, bending down to grab his duffle and making his way back out into the night. He fishes his phone out of his pocket, hoping Sky will feel guilty and text him a peace offering before he even gets across the courtyard, but no such luck. He opens up his chat with Musa instead as he sneaks into the Fairy Hall.
22:41
you up?
22:43
Not even if you were the last guy in the Otherworld, Riven
22:43
not like that
I’m at your door
22:44
Doing nothing to convince me it’s ‘not like that’, just saying
22:44
please just open up
22:45
Fine
give me a minute
Female minutes usually take a lot longer than that in his experience, so he’s surprised when a key is turned in the suite door and she cracks it open an actual minute after her last message. She’s clearly been able to enjoy what he’s been rudely denied, because her hair is wet and dripping onto the navy blue robe she’s wrapped up in, bare legs sticking out underneath.
“Who’s dying?”
He frowns and forces his eyes up to meet hers. “What?”
“You said please,” she points out, then smirks as she starts to realize there was no actual emergency behind the plea.
“Fuck you,” he retorts automatically.
“I thought you said this isn’t a booty call?” she counters without blinking an eye, their verbal sparring much more evenly matched. A dozen possible replies to that sentence swim through his mind, but all of them end with a door slammed in his face and him sleeping outside of his own bedroom door tonight, so he lets them float away.
“Sorry to disappoint, Pixie, but I…kinda need a different type of favor,” he laments, allowing his tiredness to drag his shoulders down, “Sky locked me out. And before you say it, I’m sure I had it coming, but—”
“Wait, you think he did it on purpose?” Musa asks. “Is that why he came to get your key earlier?”
“Maybe, maybe not,” he shrugs, “but considering it sounds like he’s draped across our toilet vomiting 80 proof, it doesn’t really make a difference.”
Her demeanor shifts immediately, and she opens the door wider to allow him in. Between himself and Stella — the only other person able to tolerate Sky’s attitude and the only one he actually listens to sometimes — she’s kept pretty informed about the state of him since Bloom’s been gone, and it’s felt good to be able to share his concerns with her from time to time while they take a break during sparring.
He hesitates, running a hand through his hair as he steps into the living area. “I’ll sleep rough if that’s what he wants, not like I don’t have the experience, but…is there any way I could use your shower first?”
“No need to be dramatic,” Stella, who as it turns out is still awake, huffs from the steps up to her and Flora’s room. “Aisha has the keys to Silva’s office, we’ll just go and get the master key.”
Right. That’s a thing he definitely remembered exists.
He rubs a hand across his face, and when he looks back up, Stella and Aisha are already halfway down the hall and Musa’s closing the door behind them.
“They’ll check in on him and let you know if it’s safe to go in,” she explains, walking back to the couch and gesturing for him to sit down. “You okay?”
“Just…tired.” He doesn’t know whether he means in general, or of this situation with Sky.
He swings his arm and tosses his bag onto the couch, but it hits the edge and flops to the ground instead, his gloves, deodorant and a set of flash cards spilling out the front compartment. He rushes forward, but Musa’s closer and sweeps the cards up from the floor before he can, smugly shuffling through the runes he struggles with most.
“You know, Terra has told us many times that you’re secretly a massive nerd, but I don’t think I really believed her until right this moment.”
“I’m a man of many talents,” he deflects, “such as making paper planes out of Celtic runes answer sheets instead of filling them out.”
“It’s tomorrow, right?” she asks, and he’s surprised she remembered, because he’s avoided talking about it all week.
“Yeah,” he breathes. Four years in and finally he knows what it’s like to feel nervous for a test.
She hands him the cards back. “I can quiz you for a bit while we wait if you want? I just need to finish drying my hair first, or my bangs are gonna be all messed up.”
“Sure.”
The hum of a blowdryer starts up in the bathroom, and he kicks off his shoes before stretching out across the couch, his head on the armrest and the flash cards in hand. He gets the first five right, checks his phone for any news on Sky, then correctly guesses another three, four, five…
He’s woken up at seven by an alarm from a phone that’s not his, with a heavy quilt across his body and a kink in his neck — but feeling more rested than he has in a long time. His flash cards are tucked back into his duffle, a sticky note attached to the top one with his key and an anonymous, cursive message:
Good luck today, nerd.
3.
He’s pretty sure his knuckles technically haven’t even touched the door yet when it’s yanked open, like someone was able to look through the wood and see him coming, and when he realizes it’s Flora on the other side, he really wouldn’t put it past her. She’s been discovering potions — antidotes, tracking elixirs — left, right and center, so who’s to say there’s not a combination of herbs that would grant her X-ray vision.
“Oh thank God, you’re here,” she exclaims, and he blinks at her tone. He hadn’t told anyone he’d be stopping by.
“Been a while since I’ve had that reaction from someone finding me at their door, but I’ll take it,” he quips.
She ignores him, instead doing a little half turn and gesturing to Musa and Terra’s bedroom. “Can you please come tell her to stay in bed?”
He snorts. “That bad?”
The earth fairy hooks her arm into his and practically drags him through the suite and towards the muffled sound of Terra’s mom-voice. “If you’d taken any longer, we would’ve had to break out the vine restraints.”
“Okay, I think she’s probably alright to be up if it takes that much effort to keep her down, don’t you?” He gently pulls his arm free as they arrive at the door, giving her shoulder a quick squeeze.
“Head wounds are no joke, Riven. They can cause all kinds of side-effects later on if not handled properly, so please take it easy with her?”
“Left my swords at the Bastion,” he promises, raising his palms in defense.
She shakes her head in exasperation, but grabs the door handle and pushes it down, leading the way into the room. He follows her, taking in what is obviously Terra’s half of the dorm — nearly every bit of free space covered in plant pots with different sorts of greenery — before looking towards the elevated part of the room where Musa’s bed is, and the fairy in question lying in it.
She’s always tiny, especially from his point of view, but she looks even smaller within the plethora of pillows behind her head and back.
He crosses his arms and leans against the doorpost instead of moving further into the room. “My saves are not an infinite resource, you know? If this continues, I’m gonna have no choice but to start charging you for them.”
She shoots upright and turns her head to look at him, and if Flora doesn’t have X-ray vision, she’s definitely developed some fire fairy skills, because her eyes just about shoot flames at him.
“Riv! Did they pass you? I can talk to them and explain it wasn’t your fault if I need to.”
“Musa! Lie down!” Terra flails from the foot of the bed, a vial of a bright pink liquid in her hand that nearly spills over with the movement.
“I’m fine, Ter,” Musa remarks off-handedly, never taking her eyes off of him. “Well, did they?”
“They did,” he confirms with a nod. “It’s all good.”
She sinks back into the cushions with a relieved sigh and he saunters further into the room.
“I’ll take over nursing duties for a moment, Terra.”
“But—” his former best friend starts to protest, but Flora clears her throat and jerks her head to the side, silently ordering her cousin to go along with it. “Alright. But she has to rest her head, okay? And take this once it turns Fuchsia.”
“Yes, Doc,” he salutes and waits for her to pass him the vial before climbing the little stairway. Flora closes the door on the way out, dipping the room into silence.
Musa waits for a few seconds before whispering conspiratorially, “How much to tip that into one of her plants?”
“Yeah, no, that’s a death sentence,” he chuckles. “There are things not even money can buy, Pixie.”
“Worth a try,” she shrugs, pulling the blankets up to cover her collarbones.
“You okay?”
“Yeah,” she sighs. “Probably gonna have a nice, big egg on my scalp for a while, but the blood made it look worse than it is. Head wounds, you know.”
He nods, the evidence of it still visible in the dark streaks throughout her hair. He lowers himself onto the mattress beside her hips, careful to keep the vial upright.
“Are you mad at me?” she asks, peering through her eyelashes.
“Of course not. I’m just glad you ran into the hilt of my sword, not the blade.”
“Me too.” She lowers her eyes to the duvet and clicks her tongue. “Sorry you have to keep carrying me to the med bay, though.”
“You’re so heavy, too, it’s such an inconvenience,” he mocks.
She rolls her eyes. “At least you didn’t chuck me, this time.”
“I did promise to be more delicate, didn’t I?”
As if to prove his point, he reaches for the ice pack that’s slipped off of her head and moves it back, gently holding it to her hair above her temple.
“I really am sorry, Riv,” she insists, voice soft. “You should’ve paired up with Flora, or Stella, or some other fairy that has actual control over her powers and won’t end up overwhelmed and stumbling into the path of your swing.”
Adding a second memory of her covered in blood in his arms was not something he’d anticipated or wanted, and the idea that it was his weapon that injured her, that he could’ve avoided it if he’d been paying more attention to how she was handling it instead of just focusing on beating the virtual enemy, has been weighing on him the entire time he’s had to explain himself to Silva.
“It was just a simulation, Muse, don’t beat yourself up over it. You’ve never had your powers during training, so it makes sense that it would be a bit much to suddenly have them as your only weapon.”
“I just…” Her fingers tangle in the duvet cover and fiddle with the fabric. “I really wanted to fight with you.”
He purses his lips when they threaten to break into a smile. The official Alfea Training Days have never been something he looks forward to, because while he does get a kick out of showing off, he doesn’t play well with others, and the whole point of this annual event is to pair up fairies and Specialists.
During his first one, he was barely able to properly wield a sword at all, and his second one had been right after Beatrix’ arrest and…also not a success. Any fairy he’d tried out with during both of those had not been a good match, and he’d been ready to expect the same from today, until Musa lingered one night after sparring and asked him what he’d think if she asked Silva’s permission to participate.
He’d been game, because she was more than proficient enough to give it a go at this point — maybe more than he’d been that first time, even — but unfortunately, with scouts from the Capitol showing up, Saul could only agree if Musa signed up as a fairy, and fought with her powers instead of weaponry.
“It was only our first fight as a duo. Sure, there’s room for improvement, but I ended my first Specialist class with two black eyes and a sprained ankle, and look at me now.”
She laughs in disbelief, then harder when she realizes he’s not kidding.
“Yeah, yeah, laugh all you want. What I’m saying is, we can train for this.” He uses the underside of the vial to tap her wrist. “Without the limiters.”
He’s been thinking it for a while, but she seemed so happy whenever it was time to suppress her powers and just focus on training. He’s always known that it wasn’t going to be sustainable in the long-run, but he was the one who told her to live her life how she wants, so who was he to now tell her otherwise?
“You’d be okay with that?”
“They don’t think you can be a fairy and a Specialist. I like the idea of proving them wrong.” He shrugs. “Think it over. You’re gonna need a few days to recover anyway.”
He hands her the vial, now Fuchsia in color, and she only scrunches up her nose for a moment before knocking it back. He puts the ice-pack down as well and shuffles to the edge of the mattress, intent on letting her rest, but before he can get up, she grabs onto his arm.
“Don’t go. Tell me about that first class?”
“Absolutely not,” he shakes his head, “You know too much already.”
“Please, Riv? If you leave it’ll be Terra-robics all over again and my poor head just can’t handle that right now after that run-in with your sword.”
“You’re guilt-tripping me?” He raises his eyebrows in disbelief. “I see how it is.”
“Please?” She stretches out the word like a child would.
“Fine, but this is your last save for free, understood?”
“Deal.” She holds out her hand, and he accepts it, shaking it ceremoniously.
“Good. Now scoot over. If we’re gonna do story time, I might as well get comfortable.”
4.
“You look…not terrible.”
He snorts and absentmindedly brushes his hand over the lapel of his forest green jacket. “High praise coming from you, Aisha, thank you.”
The water fairy rolls her eyes as she opens the door fully, but he knows she doesn’t despise him as much as she once did. The feeling is mutual, actually.
“Is she anywhere near ready, or are we committing to the fashionably late route?” he asks, taking a few steps into the suite.
“Just a minute, I promise!” Musa’s voice echoes from what is probably the bathroom.
“Your graduation dance might be the only thing she wouldn’t let you be late to,” Stella chimes in, looking — and he wishes he didn’t have to admit it — radiant in a champagne golden gown that makes it seem like she’s reflecting sunlight, despite it being overcast today.
“I wish she would,” he replies, “nothing good comes from arriving before the chaperoning professors have had a drink or two.”
“There was a time when you’d be five drinks in at this point, without having made it to the party yet,” she reminds him.
“Trust me, it’s tempting, especially with the deadline of being shipped off into your mother’s service looming over my head.”
He’s been deliberating for months on what’s next for him. The Solarian Army is a no-brainer post-Alfea path for a lot of Specialists, but most Specialists don’t have as much disdain for Solaria or its Crown as he does. Becoming a puppet of a monarch he doesn’t support is not his dream job, but it keeps him relatively close to both Stella and Sky, and if he manages to stand out enough in training, it leaves an opening for him and Musa to pair up on the Special Operations Team when she’s finished hers.
He could see himself enjoying that, at least for the foreseeable future.
“Oh,” a soft murmur pulls his attention to the side of the suite, where he catches Musa in an admiring stare. He grins, and lets his eyes wander over her in retaliation.
She’s wearing a sleeveless dress with a square neckline in the same forest green as his outfit, a split revealing one of her legs all the way to her upper thigh. The fabric hugs her figure down to where the split begins, then cascades around her legs until it just barely hits the floor. It’s simple perhaps, especially compared to Stella’s, but her nude open heels and half-updo compliment its elegance.
He likes it a lot.
Likes her a lot, and tonight is pretty much his last chance to tell her for a while. He’s trading Alfea for the Capitol at noon tomorrow, and the introductory course for new recruits is completed without any leave, which means it could be up to two months before he gets a chance to see her again.
They’ve talked at length about the time after Musa’s graduation, when she’ll be able to join the Solarian Army herself and hopefully resume training with him to become a Fairy-Specialist pair, but neither of them have really mentioned the minimum of a year during which they’re going to be separated by not just distance, but also busy schedules.
Part of him feels like it’d be good for them both to know where they stand in the interim. It would just require a level of honesty and vulnerability he’s not sure he’s capable of.
Two beers and a round of shots later, he still isn’t sure, but at least he’s having a really nice night. The DJ is kind of mediocre, but the alcohol helps with that, as does the way Musa laughs when he spins her around to the beat. He can definitely see her dancer’s past in the way she moves, and he kind of wishes he could’ve seen her perform properly, but he’ll take what he can get.
When she wants to rest her feet for a moment, they sample the selection of canapés and make a tier list, which they then compare to Stella, Sky and Kat’s versions until they’re practically arguing over mozzarella skewers, at which point he suggests a break for some fresh air.
It’s a really nice night for a smoke, but he doesn’t really do that anymore, so instead he shoves his hands into the pockets of his aptly named cigarette pants. They casually stroll through the courtyard and the maze, talking about everything and nothing, as they’ve been doing ever since he saved her from Terra’s magical restoration therapy and she asked him to let her come along for his sparring session. It’s easier for him to talk to people in general now that he’s not trying as hard to keep up a persona, but it’s especially easy to share his thoughts with her after spending time together nearly every day for the past year.
Except, that is, for when his feelings are involved.
Ironic, considering she’s a mind fairy. He knows she doesn’t actively try to read him, but she has to have felt something, in all this time.
“What are you going to miss most about Alfea?” she asks as they circle back towards the entrance. The music blaring inside isn’t quite as loud on this side of the door, but it’s still audible and amplifying the closer they get.
“Fishing for compliments, Pixie?” he jests.
“No!” she chuckles, “I’m serious. I know it grew on you, you can’t lie to me.”
“Yeah, I guess it did, but I don’t know…” he shrugs, “I won’t miss classes, or exams, and I’ll still be sparring every day, so I guess seeing people like Sky, and you, whenever I want?”
She nods in agreement, having to say goodbye to two of her closest friends for now when tonight is over as well. “We’ll see each other whenever we can, instead,” she promises, and he feels a wave of warmth bloom in his chest.
They reach for the door handle at the same time, but he wins out and holds it open for her, the first notes of a slow song drifting towards them. He ignores it at first, focused on not losing her in the crowd as they make their way back into the bustle, but when they find a slightly open spot to occupy, he holds out his hand to her.
“Go on then, Miss ‘I used to be a dancer’. Teach me.”
“I did contemporary, Riv,” she shakes her head in amusement but slides her hand into his either way, “not ballroom.”
“Fine,” he concedes, yet again glaring daggers at a fellow graduate — a Fairy, probably, because he doesn’t know him by name — who’s ogling Musa behind her back. “I’ll accept a slow dance.”
For the first time tonight, she notices, and looks over her shoulder just as the guy averts his eyes and scrambles into the mass. “Was he staring at me?” she questions knowingly.
He guides her hand to his shoulder before letting go and reaching for her waist. “He’s not the only one. Can’t really blame them, though, you look…mesmerizing.”
“Thank you,” her eyes sparkle, “but they’re probably just wondering what a third-year is doing here.”
He raises an eyebrow, sliding his hand to the small of her back and pulling her closer. “The only thing they’re wondering is why the hell you’re here with me.”
She tuts and links her wrists at his nape. “All the better if I have poor taste in dance partners. Gotta have a few undesirable traits, otherwise you’d have to scare off the entire male student body of Alfea,” she jokes, but his face remains serious. His free hand comes to rest on her hip, and he leans in slightly.
“Nothing about you is undesirable, Musa.”
She blinks at the blatant honesty in his voice and his lips curl in amusement over the hue her cheeks take on. He doesn’t comment on it, just starts to sway from side to side until she matches him. When they’ve found a rhythm, he takes one of her hands again, and she grabs onto the back of his shoulder as he wraps an arm around her middle.
“I can come pick you up when we’re granted first leave,” he suggests, leading her into a slow circle within the confines of their spot on the dance floor. “Take you to Blackbridge, have coffee or brunch or something. Catch up.”
“I’d like that,” she breathes, leaning forward until his jaw is resting against the side of her head.
“It’s a date, then,” he murmurs, pressing his cheek against her hair as they continue to sway.
5.
Riven’s never fancied himself a soldier.
He grew to both excel at and actually kind of enjoy being a Specialist, liked the camaraderie he found once he stopped being a dick to everyone and certainly didn’t mind the respect it gained him to earn his place as Silva’s second-in-command. But that was college.
The Solarian Army is a military institution, and as much as Alfea likes to pride itself on being the best learning school for the best Fairies and Specialists — and as much as his prior experiences with the Solarian Army did not necessarily paint it in a very positive light — Silva’s approximation of bootcamp has nothing on the Solaria Advanced Individual Training Program.
His agility, astuteness and ambidexterity quickly land him in the close combat division, which probably would’ve been his pick as well if recruits had any say in their own career path. Ranged combat was never his strong suit, although he’s gotten a lot better with the bow and arrow after switching his shooting arm, and while vehicular combat is the coolest thing ever, it’s far too reliant on technology and the Mechanical Engineers Corps — he’s relied on just himself for so, so long, he doesn’t know how to do anything else.
Luckily, that’s exactly what’s expected of him. It’s up to him to make sure he gets out of bed in time to make the morning training session — no access to the grounds beyond 8am sharp. It’s up to him to get himself through the obstacle courses, the battle simulations and the sparring matches until they end or he’s tapped out for outstanding performance. It’s up to him to prove that he can handle it, that he’s strong enough, that he deserves to be here.
Up to him, and everyone else. They’ll be expected to be a battalion at some point, but for now, it’s every man for himself. Here, the Alfea legacy admissions aren’t any better than the hand-selected natural-born fighters — or the troubled nerds who had no business being picked for any kind of prestigious combat program. In fact, for once in his life, he might actually have a bit of an advantage over the people who have had everything handed to them on a silver platter — he has experience being nothing and then working yourself up.
He’s never fancied himself a soldier, but throughout his first six weeks as one, he finds that overall, he doesn’t mind it.
And then the order comes.
He’s not Queen Luna’s biggest fan and never has been, but it’s not like she ever shows herself amongst the trainees, so he’s almost forgotten he’s technically in her service until his sergeant rounds them up, royal missive in hand.
There’s a hum of excitement in the air and his chest at first. They’ve not been granted any leave yet, so the idea of being sent off premises is thrilling, especially since leading missions was such a big part of his last year at Alfea. He’s not under the illusion that it will be an important mission, let alone a combat one, but anything other than the same thing he’s been doing day in, day out for over a month seems a welcome undertaking, so when his name is called as one of the chosen ones, he can’t help but rejoice.
It doesn’t last long.
“This is where you trained?” his mission partner questions out loud as he lets his eyes wander over Alfea’s architecture. Torren was trained in Andros, is a high-placed member of the Solarian Royal Guard and reminds him a little too much of his best friend’s dead father, so this is the first thing he’s said to Riven that’s not been an instruction or a sneer.
“Yes, Sir,” he confirms, glancing at the Training Pond. He thinks he sees Silva’s silhouette in the distance, circling between the platforms. He wonders if he’s seen the decree yet, or if conceding leadership of the school to Aimee LeRoy last year means he’s not yet in the loop.
“It doesn’t look all that impressive.”
He kind of agrees, having spent four years in this place and hating it for at least half of them, but finds his throat closing up as they step into the Fairy Hall. It feels weird, walking through the familiar building in not too dissimilar gear to when he was still a Specialist — although the military beret with the Solaria Coat of Arms is new and should be ritually burned if it were up to him. It feels even weirder still to know the first time he’s back here isn’t of his own accord, but on official business for the Solarian Crown.
If Torren notices that Riven walks to the correct suite without ever asking for a room number, he doesn’t comment on it, but he does pick up on the fact that he lingers in front of the door without knocking.
“What now?” he asks impatiently.
When Torren was first introduced to them, Riven had been convinced he was half of a good cop, bad cop act, because he was so opposite to their other instructor on that day it seemed like a skit. Unfortunately, he’s just a dick with a God complex, who’s seemed to have it out for him since day one.
Riven’s not a guy to blindly follow those with more power, is in fact far more likely to act out when faced with unearned authority, but he hasn’t actually done anything to deserve Torren’s ire. He’s made it to all of his training sessions, stands out above a lot of the rest in terms of combat, and hasn’t mouthed off to any of his instructors once, despite being tempted to a couple of times.
Regardless, Torren seems hell-bent on watching him fail, and he’s not subtle about it. It’s Andreas all over again, but this time he doesn’t have some degree of immunity for sleeping with his daughter. In fact, that would probably make it worse.
“Nothing, Sir,” he supplies, “I’m ready.”
“Good. Let’s make this quick.”
Almost as if to hold him to it, Torren reaches out and bangs the side of his fist against the door a couple of times. At this time of day, it’s not unlikely all suite inhabitants would be in class, but fourth-year schedules have more free time to study for final exams, as confirmed by the sound of boots nearing the door.
He can tell it’s her by her footfalls.
The door opens cautiously at first, until Musa catches sight of him and a smile blossoms on her face as she jerks it open. His heart sinks into his stomach.
“Well hello there, Soldier. I thought leave wasn’t until next week? Please tell me you didn’t go AWOL because you missed me too much.”
“You know this fairy?” Torren asks, and it’s only then that she notices there’s another person in the hallway. Her face falls immediately at the rigid sight of him, eyes flicking from Torren to him and back.
“Yes, Sir,” Riven affirms, spine straight and his hands clasped behind his back.
Torren hums in a way that could mean he’s disappointed, or impressed. Either way, he doesn’t step in, just hands Riven the missive envelope.
“What’s going on?” Musa asks after a few moments of awkward silence.
Riven closes his eyes for a moment. If it had been any other name at the top of the list on the missive, he probably wouldn’t have given it a second thought, he reminds himself.
It doesn’t help.
He meets her eyes and hopes she can feel how much he wishes he didn’t have to do this.
“Queen Luna has issued a protection order for all mind fairies, effective immediately. We’re here on behalf of the Crown of Solaria to escort you to your new accommodation.”
“…I’m sorry, what?”
He reaches out to offer the envelope with the royal seal to her. She reluctantly takes it, but doesn’t move to open it, keeping her wide eyes on him instead.
“We’ve received intel that mind fairies have become a specific Blood Witch target due to your ability to block their magic. To ensure your safety, you will be relocated to a secure location until the threat has been neutralized,” he recites.
“Alfea is a secure location,” she argues, disbelief written all over her face. “Is this a joke?”
He shakes his head. “It’s all in the envelope for you to read. You have thirty minutes to pack your necessities.”
“Thir—What the hell?” she balks, tears springing to her eyes. “You can’t be serious. What about my friends? My classes? This is my final year.”
The muscles in his arm twitch, aching to reach out to her, but he can feel Torren’s eyes burn into the side of his head and remains at attention.
“Your safety is our primary concern,” he grimaces, because he knows he’s spewing bullshit — Luna’s bullshit, at that — but he can’t exactly drop the act and not expect to be kicked off the program. “While she regrets that the experience will be different, the Queen has appointed private tutors to guide you through the rest of your curriculum.”
She gazes at him like she doesn’t recognize him, and the heavy, loaded silence hangs over him like Damocles’ sword. The hurt is plain in her eyes, but he’s never wanted her to read his emotions more, because he’s hurting, too.
“I’d start packing, if I were you,” Torren interferes. “You have twenty-five minutes left at this point.” He’s enjoying this, the bastard.
“Riv…” she whimpers, a tear rolling down her cheek as the reality sinks in. “Don’t do this. If they come for me, I can fight, you know I can.”
“What an absurd notion,” Torren scoffs at his side. “Can you tell me why, recruit?”
He could desert, right now. He could tell Torren to go fuck himself, grab Musa’s hand and make a break for it. They have the advantage of knowing the area, could probably outrun Torren and get a decent way away before back-up arrives to chase them down.
But if he did, she’d be on the run from both Blood Witches and the Solarian authorities, and she wouldn’t be able to finish school, and their shared future on the Special Ops team becomes a shared future in Solarian jail, probably, sooner or later.
Going along with the royal decree isn’t what she wants or deserves, but she’d be safe, and once the threat has been deterred, they can figure it out from there.
Riven swallows thickly. He’s never fancied himself a soldier, and he’s never wanted to be one less than right this second.
“Mind fairies aren’t suited to combat, Sir.”
+1
It’s been two months, and the moment the door opens, he realizes just how much he’s missed her.
The secure location that was chosen as hideout for the mind fairies is a worryingly easy to sneak into abandoned military base a few miles across the border of Eraklyon, and he’s lucky the road leading down the isthmus to the realm is pretty much a straight line, because it’s allowed him to keep one hand pressed against his stomach instead of on the wheel of the hover bike, putting pressure on the wound bleeding through his shirt.
It really should’ve clotted by now. It’s taken him long enough to reach the base, get past the fence and find out which house she’s in after sustaining the injury that the sun is starting to set — the sky slowly turning red like it knows what’s coming — and any possible explanation for why a wound would still be oozing blood at this point is bad news.
None of it matters in that moment, though. Not when he’s finally found her.
She takes a sharp breath at the sight of him, something melancholic in her eyes, and his chest stutters — but then those same eyes narrow, and the door comes flying back in his direction.
“Don’t!” he calls out, shoving the tip of his boot into the gap to keep her from shutting it fully.
“You shouldn’t be here,” her voice rings out through the gap he created.
“Listen to me,” he urges, pressing the flat of his hand against the doorpost as the aftermath of his quick movement wracks through him in the form of a sharp stab in his gut. “They know where you are.”
After a moment, the pressure on his foot eases off, but when she comes back into view, she’s looking at his hand instead of his face.
“You’re bleeding.”
He follows her gaze to his blood-soaked left hand, the one he’s been clutching his stomach with for the better part of an hour. When he lifts it, it leaves a crimson handprint on the white paint.
“I know,” he says, pressing it back against the wound. “I took out a group of scouts on the road to here and one of them got me, but they’re bound to send more once they don’t hear back from them. You need to get out of here. All of you.”
Her brow furrows. “You took out a crew of Blood Witches on your own?”
“Don’t sound so surprised,” he huffs.
“That’s not—why are you here alone? If the Blood Witches are coming for us, where’s the rest of the army?”
He grimaces. “Luna doesn’t believe him.”
“Believe who?”
“Grey.”
“Grey tipped you off?”
“He’s been leaking Blood Witch intel to Aisha, but since her own intelligence unit hasn’t confirmed it, Luna’s convinced he’s making it up to lead us astray. Clearly,” he gestures to the stab wound in his gut, “she’s fucking wrong.”
The movement of his hand has her focusing her attention on that area, taking in the dark, wet stain on his front and the way he’s hunched over on the porch.
“God, Riven, get in here.”
She grabs onto his sleeve and yanks him inside, then leads him to the kitchen island not far from the door.
“We don’t have time, Musa,” he protests, her name feeling both foreign and familiar on his tongue, “I need you to trust me on this.”
“You’re pale as a sheet; if you lose any more blood I think you might go into shock. How long has it been bleeding?”
Without missing a beat, she lifts his shirt, shakes her cardigan from her shoulders and presses it to the oozing cut harder than anything he’s been able to achieve while also keeping a bike on the road. He lets out an extended groan and leans back on his elbows.
“Too long,” he admits, “I think the tip of the knife broke off and keeps cutting into me when I move.”
“You’re such an idiot,” she mutters, sustaining the pressure. “You did battlefield triage, you know a wound like this warrants a trip to the med bay.”
“Yeah, well, I was a bit preoccupied trying to get to—here,” he snaps. “Besides, going back to Solaria is a really bad idea right now.”
“You’re deserting,” she realizes, eyes flicking up to his for a second.
“Among other things.”
In the last two hours, he’s disregarded a direct order not to leave his post, raised his voice at a superior, engaged in an unauthorized attack on their enemy, and potentially also stole a hover bike — it’s a prototype being tested by the army before public release, and he is a Solarian soldier, but he definitely took one off premises without permission.
She pulls away her ruined cardigan and reaches out, feeling for the edges of his wound and palpating the skin around it.
“Can you get it out?” he grunts, biting his lip and gripping the edge of the counter as each press of her fingers causes a small shockwave of pain.
“I don’t exactly have surgical tweezers lying around. Or even gloves, or alcohol. It’s a huge infection risk.”
“I’ll take my chances over bleeding out,” he decides, the severity of the situation sinking in a little now that making it here can be crossed off the top of his priority list.
She hesitates, then grabs his hand and places it on the fabric of her cardigan, back over the wound. “Hold this,” she orders before moving to the sink to scrub her hands.
“I tried reaching you,” he blurts into the ensuing silence. “Texted, called.”
“I’m about to stick my fingers in your intestines, Riven, you want to talk about this now?” she questions incredulously.
“Could’ve done it sooner if you’d replied.”
She sighs, stepping back to where he’s leaning on the counter. “They replaced my phone with a burner so it can’t be traced.”
He hisses when she slips two fingers through the cut and into the underlying tissue, and despite everything, her eyebrows knit together apologetically.
“So that’s it then?” he forces out through clenched teeth. “You never thought to ask Stella for my number again, or to pass me a message?”
“I haven’t spoken to Stella. Or anyone outside of this base,” she replies bitterly, cautiously sliding her fingers further into his torn skin to avoid cutting herself on the sharp edges of the knife tip when she reaches it. “Don’t act like you sent me on some kind of holiday retreat.”
“I sent you?” He has to consciously stop himself from recoiling at both her words and the agony, muttering a slew of curse words under his breath. “It was a royal decree. My only choice in it was thinking you deserved to hear it from me.”
“From you? That wasn’t you, back then,” she bites. “That was one of Queen Luna’s toy soldiers.”
“I had to be.” He pauses for a moment, squeezing his eyes shut as a jolt of pain shoots through his abdomen. “Torren was right there, itching for an excuse to boot me off the program.”
There’s not a trace of humor in the laugh that rolls from her lips. “I guess I should’ve been happy you finally gave a shit about your future. I just didn’t expect it to come at the expense of mine.” She shakes her head. “This is such a stupid idea.”
“Don’t stop,” he pants, knuckles turning white from their fierce grip on the island. He wipes his sleeve across his sweaty brow and then frowns, refocusing on what she was saying before. “What—what are you talking about?” he heaves on an exhale.
She clenches the shrapnel between her fingers before very, very slowly retracing her movements. “It just didn’t seem very difficult for you to decide your new rank was more important than—”
Even with his heavy breathing echoing through the kitchen, there’s no mistaking the tremble in her voice when she cuts herself off. Instead, she sniffs as her crimson-painted fingers slip from his wound, holding up the jagged knife tip for him to see.
“Got it.”
The relief is instant, the ache by no means gone but no longer the sharp kind, and it might be that relief, or the adrenaline, or the tears in her eyes as they meet his, that prompts his next move.
He crashes his mouth against hers.
Her lips are soft, and warm, and everything he’s wanted for a long, long time. His actions draw a surprised sound from her throat, knife tip clattering to the ground, but then she responds — solid counter-pressure against his lips and gentle fingers on his abdomen to make sure she’s not leaning against his wound. He reaches out to cradle her face in his hands and tips her chin up for a better angle, slotting her bottom lip between his own.
“It’s not more important,” he insists during a break for air, capturing her lips again right after. “It’s not important at all. I wouldn’t be here now if it was.”
Her heartbeat thrums under his fingers on the side of her neck. “But you…”
“I didn’t do it for me,” he shakes his head. “Defying this order meant becoming a fugitive. Both of us.”
His bloodied fingers trace down her arm and intertwine with hers.
“You deserve more than that. You deserve to show them that mind fairies are suited to whatever the hell they want. Even combat. Hell, even a Special Ops unit. So no, I didn’t agree with the decree, but if it was going to keep you safe and give you a chance at that future, then I wasn't going to interfere with that.”
She squeezes his hand and opens her mouth to reply when the sound of a muted yell rings out from outside and snaps both of their heads to attention, followed by the metallic clang of swords colliding in the distance.
“Looks like you might need to start proving them wrong sooner rather than later,” he observes.
“Shit,” she exclaims, rushing towards the cabinet under the sink and pulling out a first aid kit. “I don’t have a weapon.”
“You do,” he counters, lifting the hem of his shirt as she tears open a gauze pack and carefully lays the adhesive pad over his wound, pressing the edges down. “There’s a sword for you on the bike, and I called Sky on the way, so back-up should be here any minute, if that’s not them already.”
Listening out for any sounds coming closer, he wraps a bandage around his middle to cover the dressing while she darts up the stairs to grab her armored vest. The one she shouldn’t have, and wouldn’t have if he hadn’t snuck into Silva’s office one day to put the order into the system. A small breach of protocol with no consequences — if Silva had noticed, he’d never brought it up.
Not that repercussions would’ve stopped him. He’d broken just about every rule in Alfea’s Code of Conduct in his four years there for reasons much less noble and sat through every hour of detention, ran every extra lap around the pond and suffered every Saint Sky lecture afterwards.
But he knows today’s stakes are much higher than that. His actions will very likely be the end of his short-lived military career, if not his life as a free man. He’s going to have to hope that Stella is willing to pardon him once she’s eventually crowned.
And yet, when she joins him in the doorway, blood-smeared but determined, and works the vest over his shoulders instead of her own, he’s not afraid at all. Because if there’s one thing he knows will always be the right choice for him, damn the consequences, it’s fighting for her.
“That future I deserve?” She grabs him by the collar and pulls him down to her level, kissing him hard. “It includes you. So be careful.”
The corner of his mouth curls up as he unsheathes his swords and steps across the threshold after her.
“I’ll watch your left if you watch mine.”