Archive of Our Own ^beta

The towers of paperwork loom high, threatening to overtake the spires themselves. Ebenholz feels a crick forming in his neck as he leans back to search in vain for the tops of the piles, and that crick pulses through the base of his skull and nestles right behind his eyes.

"It won't shrink by staring at it." Lessing reaches his sword up to snag the tip of one paper and set it gently fluttering down to the desk. "Do you need more ink for your pen?"

"What I need is an escape from this hell," Ebenholz grumbles as he leans back with the first paper. The words don't yet swim before him, but they would if the font was any smaller. Perhaps he'll soon be in need of glasses. "I never thought I'd say this, but I'm starting to miss the emergency missions at Rhodes Island. I would far rather be wielding a wand on the battlefield than this pen at my desk."

Lessing sighs through his nose, the closest he'll get to admitting that this is also not his idea of a good time. "You'll regret wishing for trouble."

"Only if it results in more paperwork." 

Ebenholz stares at the first paper on his desk, waiting for fate to drop something on his head for daring to utter such a challenge. Yet the world remains at peace. The wind blows gently outside, the Spire servants bustle about outside his room, and the villagers nearby continue their lives with nary more than their usual cares. Some would even admit that things have been turning around for the better, now that they have a Graf working to help them in earnest.

Alas, that help requires paperwork. Ebenholz sighs, grumbles swears under his breath, and settles into work. He always does in the end. The sun drifts along the sky, sheltered behind Autumn's clouds. The chair creaks. And after a time, a rumble grows louder in the distance, but it is not the usual hum of the Urtica landship engines.

Lessing looks out the window. "Motorcycle approaching. It has one rider. An Elafia."

Ebenholz pauses in the middle of writing his signature. He knows an Elafia with a motorcycle. But surely, it couldn't be -

"What is his hair color?"

"I never said - "

"Hair. Color. Now."

Lessing's gaze narrows, one hand settling on the hilt of his blade. "Red."

Air rushes out of Ebenholz's chest as if he's been punched. He cannot seem to move, even to finish signing, while his brain rushes in triple-time. "Lessing. That man is on his way here; meet him outside when he parks, and tell him..." Words fail; what is there to say? 

Lessing looks down on him; "Is he someone you have a headache for?" Someone to avoid, someone for Lessing to shoo away in his no-nonsense manner?

"Nein, nein. If I said so, he'd see right through it." Ebenholz forces himself to stand, even as his stomach roils and his heart hangs itself in his chest with his own veins. "Tell him I will be but a moment. I just need time."

Time to what? He certainly hadn't had time when last they'd seen each other, so much that Ebenholz's farewell had been consigned to a letter. An apology and a goodbye in one, not even a promise to meet again because he hadn't even been able to see a future where he'd survived without others sacrificing themselves for him. So he'd run, and he'd been running this whole time, and now there was nowhere else to go.

Lessing nods as if he understands, as if he has any inkling what all this is about. He marches out in perfect blank expression and Ebenholz can only wonder how that will be met. With disdain? With rage that it is not Ebenholz himself, that the Caprinae is once again proving himself a coward? Or will it be matched with an equally cold and empty face, because any blaze of emotions has long since fallen into dormant ash?

Ebenholz gestures for Lessing to get going, while he goes the opposite direction. Weaves through the rooms of the Spire, drab old walls slowly coming to life with a few recently acquired paintings and tapestries. A pair of maids are singing somewhere upstairs, their voices clear and crystal. Even with how much this place of gloom has been polished up and dragged into the light, in this moment it feels cloying, claustrophobic. Ebenholz stumbles outside into the gardens, where the overgrowth is slowly being tamed, where he and Lessing have started a pathetic garden of half-grown tomatoes, where roses cling to color even as an Autumn chills their petals into crisp brown mockeries of parchment.

Deep breaths, but not so deep as to start hyperventilating. Shake out the nerves, pretend they are being cast out like Arts. Don't think about what his face might look like right now, how long it's been, how warm he is compared to the brisk air. Damn it all, but Ebenholz should have grabbed a jacket before wandering out here, why is he such a fool, he didn't even think to send a letter back after all was said and done because life has been so much, even though not a day has gone by without thinking about him.

"Because he's better off without you." Even without the Witch King in his head anymore, his thoughts still sound like the old bastard when his brain has to chew on itself like this. At least now Ebenholz can recognize this, knows that he's been taking his medication and that the only voices in his head are his own no matter how they sound. 

All the doubts are his own. All the mistakes are his own. And he doesn't know how to make them right. 

It's not like he can just search among the roses to find the one that seems most alive, carve into the stem with the nail of his thumb until he can break it free, tenderly press off the thorns until the flower is completely stripped of its defenses, and offer it in place of his own very open heart.

Yet this is what he does, and when he hears the inevitable crunch of footfalls in the leaves behind him, he turns around and holds out the rose by way of greeting and apology and so many other words that are crowding at his lips.

Czerny stops. Eyes that can't settle on whether they're blue or green, eyes that look more tired than they ever have, trail along the petals and down Ebenholz's arm, up and down his body, before finally meeting his gaze. Brows and lips twitch minutely, fighting between expressions, evening out to appear stoic instead of anything but. Ears flicker, the earrings on them jangling together like wind chimes caught in a sudden storm.

"You think this makes it better?"

"Nein. I do not know what would." Yet he cannot lower his arm, the rose standing in place of his wand, the only defense between his chest and an oncoming wound. "I'm sorry. I meant to write again."

"Better that you didn't."

"Then you're welcome, for not receiving another piece of paper to leave crumpled upon your floor." Ebenholz misses that room, covered in compositions and coffee grounds, the bedsheets never resting neatly, music always a backdrop to voices that could never stay hushed for long despite their best intentions.

"...I heard you've been doing well. A proper Graf." There is a hint of venom in that last word. Always has been, always will be.

"Hardly. The others do not speak with me unless I am strong-arming them into a trade deal, and that is much the way I prefer it. If I ever have to dance at one of their balls again, it will be too soon." The face before him still does not budge. The flower in his hand wavers. "I came out for some fresh air, and to stretch my legs. Would you care to join me? I'm sure you could use both, after such a long drive. But if you would rather not, I could have Lessing lead you to one of the guest rooms, or - "

"I thought you would be less inclined to rambling now." Czerny stares at him a moment longer. Exhales through his nose, somewhere between resignation and acceptance. Plucks the rose out of Ebenholz's hands before striding around to his side and past him. "I hope spending so much time behind a desk hasn't left you unable to keep up."

After all this time, Ebenholz finds his gait still falls in step with Czerny's, his pace ever so slightly quickened to keep up with the other's longer stride. Habit longs to reach out, to intertwine fingers in and out in search of a comfortable way to hold hands that slip into pockets instead; got to keep them warm somehow.

"Surely, you didn't drive out here just to see me."

"Nein. I've a letter from Rhodes Island. There have been some developments, on the landship and in Laterano; Doctor wanted to update you, and had questions in turn. I was the only one available to drive out this way."

"Otherwise, he'd be avoiding you the same way you've been avoiding him. Because you have, haven't you? You ran and then you lived, and you couldn't dare go back and fix what you broke in your haste. Just like when you left Urtica the first time in your haste for freedom. You're always breaking things, Ebenholz you fool."

"I will try not to bother you with too many questions. The Doctor does tend to say exactly what needs to be shared, after all, and no more than that." So surely, the Doctor knew the consequences of sending Czerny out his way. No one could miss that the two of them had been close, even if few understood the depth of it. Did Ebenholz himself even understand, truly, what it was he'd walked away from?

Yes, he did. That's why he'd felt he had to leave the way he did, to preserve even a fraction of it. No matter how much it hurt.

They keep walking. It's quiet out here, and Ebenholz is used to that, as Lessing is hardly a talkative partner when he joins along as a bodyguard. (Even now, he's watching from nearby, just in case he needs to rush in and rescue Ebenholz from some unseen foe. Or from Ebenholz himself, maybe.) But this silence from Czerny is new; he is always making some sort of sound, the scratching of pen on paper as he composes, humming a song to keep it around before he's had a chance to nail it down, even the idle tapping of a foot or fidgeting with his jewelry. If Ebenholz closed his eyes, he wouldn't think the composer was beside him at all. Anyone else could crunch leaves underfoot beside him, but there's only one person who should be finding music in it all while he does so.

"How has your music been? Compose anything of interest, lately?" Let there be something, anything, to break the ice between them again. Let there be passion in the voice beside him, something he has only been able to poorly recall in his own memories, faded more each time like a well-worn stone.

Yet the silence stretches instead, one too many measures too long. Until Czerny finally admits, "Nothing."

"Nothing of interest, or - "

"I have not composed anything at all. I've even taken a break from teaching. I've been absent from public performances so long that there have been rumors about my health turning for the worse again."

No. That's not the way things are supposed to be. "Have you been that busy? Scheiss, if you need a break, I can - "

"I haven't done anything, damn it. It's worse than being sick again." Czerny's voice is harsh now, cold and sharp like shards of glass waiting to slice Ebenholz on their edges. "If I'm not out on a mission, I can't bring myself to do more than stare at a Gott verdammt wall."

Ebenholz looks again at Czerny's face. Pale, worn, tired. Pointedly avoiding his gaze. Ebenholz could ask the obvious question, but they both know he is neither so clueless or heartless.

"...I left the way I did so you would live," Ebenholz says instead. Calm and certain as he does not feel. "I did not know if I would survive, and if I had done so at the cost of your own life, it would have ruined me utterly."

"Do you call this living?"

Being caught in Czerny's glare is like facing the full brunt of the sun, and here it is breaking through the clouds. Shrugging off a fog, those blue-green eyes that Ebenholz has spent so much time staring into bore down upon him, as hands shake in rage and petals fall off the tightly-held rose.

"Do you know how sick I am of losing the ones I love, Ebenholz? Do you know how many times I never even got to say goodbye? And here you are, leaving with a letter to spare your own selfish goddamn feelings because you couldn't trust either of us to survive this time?" He runs a shaking hand through his hair as he grimaces, as if he is plunging himself directly into fire and forcing himself to endure its sting. "I wanted so badly to do something, anything, to get back at you. I don't know if I wanted you back or to tell you to fuck off forever, but at least it'd be on my own terms. But without you there, right next to me, my own heart would hardly beat. It almost didn't matter if you were alive or dead, because you were gone."

Ebenholz wilts. How could he not, under such heat, such harsh light that shows him exactly what he is and is not? Yet he loves the sun, even when it burns him, even when it blinds him because he has been hiding away in his Spire for too long. The warmth, the light, this is what living is for.

"...I meant to write."

"Another letter to shove in a drawer so I don't keep reading it over and over again with nothing to say. Fuck your letters." The anger shaking through Czerny's voice is spreading through the rest of him, his shoulders quaking, the rose in his hand falling apart. And his voice, its fury brings it to such a pitch that it becomes nearly inaudible. "I...I..."

Ebenholz awaits his damnation.

Yet it is not a scream that comes from Czerny's mouth, but a whisper. "...I miss you."

Like a trigger fired, Ebenholz surges forward, closing the distance between them with enough force that they both stumble. He wraps his arms tight as he can around Czerny, as if he could bring all that quaking emotion back to stillness again. He half expects to be smacked away. Instead, arms wrap back around him and his face is tucked back into the crook of the other's neck, mere inches from those glimmering dark crystals.

"There there," Ebenholz mutters into skin. "Beruhige dich, I'm here now."

"I will not calm down, dammit," Czerny answers with his face buried in Ebenholz's hair. He takes a deep breath, and his shoulders slump when he exhales. He repeats again, bolder this time, "I missed you, you stupid idiot of a man."

"I'm so very sorry. I didn't..." Think? Bother to do anything beyond convince himself that they were better separated, no matter how heavy it made his heart sit in his chest? Misery was an addiction that, even now, he hasn't quite shaken. "You deserve better, William."

"Back on first name basis already? Bastard." A rose devoid of petals falls to their feet, and the hand that let it go reaches back to rest on the back of Ebenholz's skull, fingers intertwining with his dark curls. Strong hands, warm hands, hands that could snap his neck. "I don't want better, damn you. I want you, even when I don't want to want you."

"Even if I'm a dangerous and foolish person to want? There are still many who want my head. Either of us could still die."

Czerny sighs into his ear, and Ebenholz never realized until that moment how much he missed the sound. "I am getting quite fed up with people making decisions about my health, my life, without consulting me about it."

Cold Autumn rushes past them, but only now are the two of them finally still again. Peering over Czerny's shoulder, Ebenholz catches Lessing still watching, hand on the hilt of his blade. Ebenholz dislodges one arm just long enough to flash his retainer a thumbs-up. After a drawn-out moment, the gesture is returned, though the boy does not move to head back inside. Something to figure out later, he reckons.

"...I know the feeling all too well. I apologize again, for not thinking of that when I left you."

"If you apologized for every time you did not think, I do not think you would ever shut up." Yet when Czerny pulls away, and even though his eyes are tinged with red now, there is a relieved smile on his face. It does not rest there easily, but it is there, light breaking through after the rain. "You've learned your lesson this time, I hope. I think it would kill me, if we had to repeat this one."

Ebenholz nods; "No more letters as my voice. Which is fine by me; I would hate to add any more paperwork to my desk." His ears droop a fraction, at the reminder of his present duties. "Though I am afraid I will not be able to return with you to Rhodes Island, at least not for long. The people of Urtica...I am finally in a state where I can help them the way they deserve. I cannot leave them now, either." He nods his head in the direction of the village, which even now reminds him of the Afterglow and its people. It does not shine with its own light in the same way quite yet, but one day, he hopes to hear that same music, see those same smiles.

Czerny follows his gaze, simply watching the town for a long moment. He squeezes Ebenholz's shoulder in the same way he does when the Caprinae has finally nailed a particular section, a bloom of pride. "As it happens, things at Rhodes Island are...complicated, right now. Few are staying at the landship. I have actually been traveling for a few months now, delivering messages and the like for them. This was the last stop I had planned in my journey until...whenever they call us back."

"...Then if this meeting went poorly, were you just planning on leaving again yourself?" Finally at last, Ebenholz takes Czerny's hand in his own, their fingers intertwined. The rose remains on the ground, but perhaps that is for the best; there will be fresh ones come Spring, anyhow. "Come now. We'll catch our chill out here; let us head inside, and you can fill me in on what has gone on. And I can talk at you until you've had your fill of me and have to compose something just to shut me up again."

"What a miracle that would be. Though...I am afraid I did not bring any ink or paper with me."

Ebenholz thinks to his desk, with its piles of parchments awaiting his signature. "I would be more than happy to loan you some."