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Occtis was cold. It was a common affliction since his death. Or, undeath, rather. Stitching a soul back together and stuffing it into a body without a heart came with one significant drawback; there was no blood. He didn’t bleed anymore, sure, but the warmth of his body left him too. He could simulate the feeling easy enough with campfires and blankets, but nothing felt right anymore.
He was numb for the most part. Adjusting, still. There was the occasional tremor, a faint tingling in his fingertips at the magic flowing through them, but otherwise… every gust of wind on his skin, every affectionate touch to his shoulder, his spine, the empty space behind his ribs, it was all hollow.
Occtis Tachonis was hollow.
Not a Tachonis anymore. Not a body anymore. Nothing, not anything. Just cold and hollow.
The word echoed in his chest, a palm pressed flat against the spot where his pulse should bloom. Late at night he would wake and search for it in a panic until his memories set back in.
A cord pulled tight around his neck, cold and undead hands – not unlike his own, not anymore – grabbing at him and a knife burrowed deep between his thin boned cage. The dark, the veil, the forest, the nightingale. Him, stitching and pulling and sewing and clawing his way back.
Traitor to his house, Occtis – nameless and, by decree, houseless – stepped out of his room into the dimly lit hallway of the Lloy house. Thaisha slept soundly inside, oblivious to his waking nightmares. She went through so much, he didn’t want to add to her worries. He was responsible for himself. He could handle it. Or so he tried to convince himself.
He tried to feel the biting cold of the night, prayed that he could. It left him aching.
All that remained was pain. He could still feel it tearing at the scar ripping across his torso like a river run dry. He felt along the tear, right underneath his nightshirt all rotten and ragged. The ones across his chest, those he made himself merely a few years ago and left him flat and boy-ish, healed nicely. Not like the work of his brother. The scars formed a cross, a searing reminder of who he used to be and where he came from. Of what was taken from him…
Occtis jumped at the shadowed silhouette beside him.
Julien couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re easy to scare.”
He stood, cross-armed and guarded, in front of a closed door, gauntlet lazily resting on the hilt of his rapier. Lady Aranessa’s bedroom, surely.
Julien was tired, Occtis could see that. Not that he showed it with his rigid posture and smug smile. Not with the way he held himself. The dark around his eyes betrayed him. The faint lines around his eyes and the redness of them. The last wet spot on his cheek which he swiftly brushed away.
“Why aren’t you in your room?” Occtis asked, curious and Julien hated it. The ease with which he spoke to him. The softness of his voice. The way he looked him up and down. The way he was so fixated on his face where mere moments ago tears broke loose.
Julien was furious. He wished he could say he was angry with something else, someone else – anything else really – but he was angry with himself. Beyond angry with his father. Beyond done.
Worst of all, he couldn’t tell him. There was no person to return to, no one in his family left to shout at, to ask why and to hit and to cry with. There was no one left. No one at all. Except for himself, but he didn’t count as much.
“Why aren’t you?” He returned. He didn’t feel like conversing, didn’t feel like reliving the evening. Mostly, he didn’t feel like speaking to the son of his father’s murderer. He spun the image of them standing toe to toe, chest to chest, in his mind like a coin between his fingers.
The youngest Tachonis and the eldest Davinos.
The abandoned and the orphaned.
Julien sneered at the thought of their similarities. The bile rose in his throat.
“Nightmares?” Occtis asked then. He seemed worried.
Julien scoffed. “I don’t dream.”
“Everybody dreams of something.”
Revenge. Bloodshed and screams. Filling the underworld with its own hosts and seeing the life leave Primus Tachonis’ eyes as his blade cuts and tears and beheads him; Julien’s one and only dream. His wish. His promise.
Julien squinted. “Guess I’m the exception.”
Occtis knew he was lying. He wouldn’t tell Julien about his nightmares either. His memories. He wouldn’t want to be left alone with them either.
So, Occtis – the nameless and houseless body he now was – imitated a deep breath and joined Julien’s side.
His shoulders raised on instinct. Julien slightly leaned away and looked down at Occtis with what could only be described as annoyed confusion.
“What are you doing?”
Occtis shrugged. “Keeping you company.”
“I don’t need your pity.”
“I’m not giving you any.”
Julien rolled his eyes and sighed. He let him stay. A part of him knew it was because he needed someone near. He couldn’t burden his lady with his sorrows and there was no way he would confide in Thaisha or the elf. Not that he would bear his heart with Occtis, but the heavy shadow on his shoulders seemed a little lighter in his presence.
“I’m going to kill him,” Julien hushed after a moment. He ground the words out like a stone stuck between clenched teeth. “I’m going to kill Primus Tachonis. I’m going to kill your father for killing mine. I’m going to eradicate your house until none can tell tales of it anymore.”
Not my house, Occtis wanted to say. Not anymore. Not ever again.
“Can you live with that?”
He can’t live at all, Occtis thought. He could never live again. Not the way he was now. Not the way he wanted. He couldn’t tell Julien that though.
“I’ll help you,” he said instead and held his hand out.
Julien let his eyes drop to it. Scanned the bones underneath the thin and sickly looking skin. Stared at the young man killed by his own family. Imagined what he saw, when he looked at the man with none.
He took his hand. He intertwined their fingers like a promise and squeezed. Occtis leaned into Julien’s side. He sought the warmth radiating from his beating pulse, felt it rush through his hands.
Despite himself, Julien let him.
For as long as he was allowed to, Occtis listened to Julien’s heartbeat. A pulse much like his own, much like the one his brother took from him. The one he was going to get back.