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“Trust is what gives us the confidence to step outside the safety of our own headspace and enter the darkness of another. What fuels us, guides us, pushes us to keep going, even when all hope feels lost.” —Tiergan
A few centuries ago, before Tiergan knew to be careful, he and Prentice would go to Tiergan’s favorite place in the woods and train to be cognates. They’d spent their later years at Foxfire practicing with their mentors and they continued a few years after they graduated. Tiergan knew which shadows in Prentice’s room still scared him even though he was much too old for that now and Prentice knew that Tiergan was the one who burnt Lady Galvin’s cape even though he blamed it on an unlucky first year passing by in the halls.
Work made them busy and trust was a fragile thing, but Tiergan enjoyed the serenity of the two of them. As they sat in their spot, the grass flattened from all the times they had done this before, Tiergan felt his heart beat extra fast. Today was going to be different. For the first time, he was going to be sharing a secret about Prentice.
They held hands as they sat facing each other, as they always did. The sweet smell of Prentice’s coconut scent and the golden light shimmering in his blue eyes and brown skin did nothing to calm his nerves, sending a hurricane of butterflies through his stomach.
“Am I making you nervous?” Prentice asked. He was teasing, raising an eyebrow as a thumb ran patterns over the back of Tiergan’s knuckles
Tiergan closed his eyes, ignoring him, and entered Prentice’s mind. At this point, he was probably more familiar with it than his own. Thoughts and colors swirled and pushed at him and the familiarity eased the uneasy feeling in his stomach.
Prentice?
Here. Why don’t you start? I’m worried if I go first you’ll puke on me.
Ok.
Prentice silently waited for Tiergan to continue. That was something familiar, something sweet that they had together. No longer how long it took, they would wait for the other to be ready to speak. No prodding, no pushing, just trust that they would tell them when they were ready.
I like you.
I like you too.
Prentice responded easily. His voice was amused.
I don’t want to be just friends but I’m scared that this could ruin what we have
How could it ruin what we have?
What if we fight? What if it doesn’t work out and then I lose you.
We already fight. Remember last week when we argued over who could get the last piece of mallowmelt?
Tiergan smiled at the memory.
A bond like ours is not easily broken, Tiergan. Have a little faith in us.
Faith. That word was rarely used in the Lost Cities and he and Prentice only became familiar with the term in their escapades to the Forbidden Cities. He felt their bond strengthen, gold and silver streaks tying their minds together in a bond that felt unbreakable. In the warm envelopment of the other man’s mind, Tiergan felt invincible, the outside world inconsequential because what he and Prentice had between each other could never be touched nor broken. What they had was sacred and secret and just theirs.
His heartbeat slowed and it felt like the gentle caress of calm over his body. Tiergan decided that if faith existed for him, it was in this. In Prentice.
Ok.
My turn.
Prentice was silent after speaking so Tiergan waited.
I can’t remember a time when I didn’t want to be more than friends.
The words were like the final crack of the ice before you fell through. Tiergan had a moment to take a breath before the rush of emotion overcame him. Relief, joy, happiness, love, swam through his veins and colored his vision golden when he opened his eyes again at the lovely man in front of him.
Their hands were still tightly wound together and Tiergan raised one to kiss the back of Prentice’s hand. Dropping it gently in his lap, he traced the other man’s smile with a finger before they both collapsed a mess in each other’s arms on the ground.
Pressing a soft kiss to the top of Prentice’s forehead, Tiergan marveled at how lucky he was to be partners with a man as lovely inside as he was beautiful out. He felt weightless, like he was light leaping without a crystal. It was the happiest day of his life so far.
Their secrets hadn’t been too heavy then.
Their first decades as (officially) more than friends passed in a blur of sunshine and candy-sweet kisses. The fortress of their love blunted the edges of life’s more unsavory aspects and they spent countless nights sleeping at each other’s houses under the pretense of “cognate training.”
Their days looked like this: they’d wake up tangled together and smelling like each other. Tiergan would leave first, usually for his mentor sessions at Foxfire. Tiergan would get home and make sure the meals were just how Prentice liked it. Prentice would come home and would swoop in for a kiss before setting the table. They’d eat and pass the time in easy laughter as they told each other about their days. Sometime later, when the stars shone bright in the sky, they’d hold each other tight and match each other’s breathing as they fell asleep, smiles buried in each other’s bodies.
One day after a particularly draining session with his prodigy, Tiergan decided to change his routine and peruse the shops in Atlantis – maybe stop at Slurps ‘n Burps for something to help his prodigy with a particularly tricky concept.
He was passing Prentice’s favorite trinket shop when he spotted a familiar face in the corner of his eye. Looking closer, he saw Prentice chatting amiably with Kenric Fathdon, a level one prodigy at Foxfire, in between the aisles.
Curious and not insignificantly nosy, Tiergan entered the shop and approached the two of them directly knowing Prentice would update him later on their conversation. Kenric saw him first, since Prentice’s back was to Tiergan, and when he spotted him he broke off what he was saying to waved him over.
“Tiergan!” he said.
Tiergan found his spot next to Prentice, brushing his arm so gently that it could have been an accident.
“Always a pleasure, Kenric.”
“I was just asking Prentice about Keepers,” Kenric rolled back and forth on his feet, childlike glee still apparent in the way that he moved his body. “Have you ever met one? What are they like?”
Tiergan recited the textbook definition of a Keeper as Kenric nodded along, listening intently.
“Being a telepath is pretty awesome,” Kenric said. “I hope that I manifest as a telepath one day.”
“Prentice is the most talented telepath I know,” Tiergan said. “You made the right choice asking him about it.”
Kenric and Prentice both grinned at the praise. They talked a bit more with Kenric before his mother finally found him and whisked him away.
They browsed a few more shops but Tiergan was more focused on the way Prentice’s hand kept brushing against his own than on purchasing anything. Finally, when they made it home, Prentice brought up a question that Tiergan knew had been simmering in his mind all afternoon.
“So, Kenric,” Prentice began.
“You’ve always had a soft spot for children,” Tiergan said.
“Do you ever think we could have one of our own?”
Tiergan felt a tug in his chest.
“That’s a beautiful dream,” he said.
Tiergan tugged at his fingers and Prentice stepped closer to him, grasping him by the shoulders. One of Prentice’s hands drifted upward, fingers twisting around Tiergan’s blonde hair and tugging gently so that he looked up at his lover’s beautiful face.
“There are too many complications now,” Prentice said, pausing before continuing. “But maybe things will change and we can in the future.”
Tiergan stepped closer so that his chest was pressed against Prentice’s, heart beats touching each other. Resting his head on Prentice’s broad shoulder and relaxing as his arms pulled him close, Prentice gave him a soft kiss on the top of his head.
Not now. But maybe if things change.
Tiergan’s world had been stagnant before. The Lost Cities customs seemed as if they were etched in the stars, immovable and untouchable. Prentice’s words gave him wings, drew him closer to the rules that seemed so concrete before and he dared to wonder: What if things were different?
Bronte was the first to notice.
“You should be more careful. Your affection is so obvious it’s nearly sickening,” he said one day after summoning Tiergan to his office.
Tiergan thought about the smiles they shared when they sat in the same room, the way their touches lingered, and the soft voice Prentice used just for him. That it had been so obvious that Bronte of all people had noticed sent a quiet pride through his body that Tiergan and Prentice were so obviously each other’s.
“A love like yours does not have a happy ending,” Bronte added.
It was then that Tiergan realized that it was not an admonishment, but a warning.
He brought it up to Prentice who contemplated it before asking, “What is your happy ending?”
Tiergan paused for a moment, knowing Prentice would wait while he gathered his thoughts. It wasn’t that he didn’t know, but he wasn’t sure how to verbalize it yet.
“My happy ending is with you,” he said. “It is knowing your favorite flavor of lushberry juice, the way you tilt your body when you laugh; it’s knowing your mind more intimately than I know my own and being able to face the uncertainty of the future because I know that you’re by my side.”
A deep blush was on Prentice’s face and he pulled Tiergan into a warm embrace.
“Mine is the same,” he said, voice thick. “To know your mind as my own, to bring you an extra cape when you get cold, to be comforted by the melody of your voice. That is enough.”
One day Prentice came home with the blood drained from his face. He wouldn’t speak, simply hugged Tiergan tightly with tears streaming down his face.
What happened? Tiergan transmitted.
It was too difficult for Prentice to articulate, so instead he showed Tiergan the memory.
Prentice walked into Bronte’s office. The tired look on the Councillor’s face revealed an age far older than the frozen youth of his face.
“The Council has been made aware of two lovers who are incapable of producing elven offspring. You’re to wipe their memories of each other, they’ve both been dosed with a sleeping draught and won’t wake until tomorrow,” Bronte said.
Prentice leaped to a beautiful manor nestled in a snow-capped mountain. He pushed the large wooden front-door open to reveal a cozy wooden interior, complete with plush chairs and blankets everywhere and a blazing fireplace. Settled in front of the fireplace, huddled under a large blanket were two elves sleeping side by side. It was nearly a perfect, romantic picture until you saw the spilled mugs near their hands with brown liquid staining the carpet.
Prentice walked over quickly and knelt by the first girl’s head. Placing fingers on her temple, he forced his way into her mind. She was sleeping and so her defenses were weak and memories immediately flooded in: the first time she met her girlfriend at someone else’s Winnowing Gala, their first kiss that tasted like chocolate chip cookies, their daily ritual of brushing each other’s hair after they showered before bed.
One by one, Prentice wiped each memory from her mind until the girl laying beside her became a stranger.
Tiergan took a step back to stare at the face in front of him, the man he loved so deeply that he knew it would be etched into the leaves of his Wanderling. He imagined a Washer coming to his home as he lay next to Prentice at night, surgically removing each and every memory of the other man.
“That is what they will do if they find out,” Prentice said hoarsely.
After that day, affectionate touches and revealing words were relegated for the walls of their home or written notes slipped into pockets.
In a moment of weakness a few decades later, Tiergan reached out to intertwine their fingers together at a cafe in Atlantis. Prentice had a bad day at work and it was instinct to reach out to comfort him. Bronte appeared at his doorstep the next day, circlet clenched tightly in his fist, to let him know that the Council was opening an investigation into them.
Their distance the last few years protected them; the evidence was hidden well enough not to condemn them. But still, the thought of losing Prentice was too much, they had come too close to losing each other forever.
They came to an agreement: to remain friends — more than friends — close enough to be cognates, but not lovers. Not now, when every lingering touch risked losing each other — forever.
At first, Tiergan wasn’t used to the distance and he experienced withdrawals. Their relationship withered like a starved animal and he would desperately gnaw on anything to prolong the inevitability of it fading away.
The day that Prentice told him he was signing up for a match list, Tiergan lay alone in his bed and stared at the shadows on his ceiling. It was then that he realized that he couldn’t precisely remember the way that Prentice’s hands traced his skin. Using his shaking fingers, he desperately used his own hands to follow the pattern that Prentice had. It wasn’t right: his fingertips too rough, hands too small, skin too cold.
He wondered if there existed a world where things could be different. Where their love didn’t have to be hidden and he didn’t have to share his partner with another.
When he joined the Black Swan, Tiergan should have known better than to think he could hide it from Prentice.
He thought he’d done well: the late-night meetings he tried to pass off as extra paperwork, the glance he made down dark alleyways he hid as a stretch of the neck, the extra lock he added to his office that he said was just for decoration.
Of course Prentice noticed. That was one of the things he’d first fallen in love with; the careful way that he watched people: bringing someone into conversation when they fell extra quiet, handing over an extra cape when someone began to shiver.
So when Prentice confronted him after dinner about the changes in Tiergan’s routine, he wasn’t surprised, but only wished that it had taken him longer so that he could come up with a better excuse than the Black Swan had given him. “Extra research for his telepathy prodigy at Foxfire” wasn’t going to cut it when his dear, sweet Prentice would eagerly ask for details and how he could help.
Prentice was looking at him expectantly from the other side of the kitchen as Tiergan mulled over his answer.
“Councilor Oralie is having me look into something with her forgotten memories,” Tiergan finally answered.
A slight frown tugged at the corner of Prentice’s mouth, he knew Tiergan was lying — he always knew — but he didn’t push any further.
“Stay, just for tonight?” Tiergan asked as he always did.
Prentice reached as if to clasp Tiergan’s hand before he paused and withdrew his hand, giving him a sad smile.
“Not tonight,” Prentice said.
Not tonight. Not with so many eyes on them. Not with all the memories they share. Not with Prentice’s match list.
The unsaid words hung like dead weight in the air, pressing down on Tiergan’s chest and squeezing his heart too tight. Prentice left and Tiergan tried to imagine the warmth of his hand long past Prentice left.
“Why did you lie?”
It was the day after Tiergan told Prentice about his made-up work sessions with Councilor Oralie. Unfamiliar lines patterned Prentice’s face as he looked at Tiergan across the table. He was waiting, expectantly for an answer that Tiergan couldn’t give him. To distract himself from the matter at hand, Tiergan tried to place the emotion written across Prentice’s face. Disgust? No, Prentice’s mouth was twisted the wrong direction.
Tiergan ran through a few more options before giving up. The silence was bearing down on him and he knew that the other man wouldn’t leave before he gave a proper explanation — no matter how long it took.
“I can’t tell you,” Tiergan said.
Prentice’s face relaxed slightly. Tiergan was telling the truth.
“Why didn’t you just say that?”
“I didn’t want you to worry.”
Prentice was in the middle of reaching for a cup of lushberry juice when Tiergan’s answer made him pause.
“So it’s dangerous?”
“No – it’s not dangerous,” Tiergan said. “Technically.”
“And I really can’t know?”
“No. It’s –” Tiergan thought about the nonsensical notes slipped into his pockets. “– it’s all very secretive.”
“I can keep a secret,” Prentice said pointedly. “But if it’s really that important, I won’t pry anymore.”
Prentice stood, his eyes looking distant. Tiergan couldn’t stand to see him looking like this, didn’t want to be the reason for a crack in the rickety bridge between them. Then, an idea came that he would later think of as a mistake.
Wait. There might be a way. Just give me some time.
I’ll wait.
On Tiergan’s recommendation, Prentice was easily accepted into the Black Swan — of course he was, they’d be stupid not to take him — and it was like a weight off of Tiergan’s shoulder. He wasn’t used to keeping secrets from him even after all these years and the unspoken distance that had grown between them.
They worked together more often now and Tiergan could pretend that it was like it used to be: understanding each other’s needs without words, working as one being with two bodies. It was so easy that Tiergan nearly forgot that things were different now.
He was abruptly reminded when Prentice didn’t show up one day. When he asked Leto, a shrug was given in response and a simple reply that Prentice said he wouldn’t be able to make it that day.
Out of habit, Tiergan used his other home crystal that day, the one that went to Prentice’s. When he arrived, he immediately realized his mistake. The estate was covered with dark blue flowers and the house glittered under the stars with bubbles of light dancing through the sky. The yard was full of people — women — and Prentice was at the center. Prentice’s Winnowing Gala.
Transfixed, Tiergan stared at him. He was as handsome as he had ever been, done up in a dark red suit with gold emblazings complementing his dark skin. He was beauty come to life and Tiergan was forced to watch, a prisoner of his own heart, as the face carved into his memory smiled and charmed another.
Tiergan knew that this was happening. He knew it had to happen. But seeing it broke something inside of his heart that he didn’t know could ever be fixed. Tears blurring his vision, he leapt home — the proper one this time. It wasn’t until he lay in bed that he realized he had gripped the metal ridges of his pathfinder so tightly that his hand had bled.
He stayed home the next day, ignoring all his responsibilities and sent Prentice away when he came to check on him.
Their relationship was first hidden behind secret touches, lingering gazes, and promises to each other that only they could hear. It was so unfair to only exist in the shadows of their homes. To watch their friends giddily plan weddings that they could only attend under the pretense of friendship. Forced to have two homes, two last names, and now forced to be nothing at all; a hollow echo of a bond that had felt unbreakable.
Tiergan felt a wave of anger that nearly blinded him. How dare they force them to exist on the periphery of their utopia?
The white hot anger threatened to boil over into bottomless rage and so he forced his hands to relax and counted his breaths until he didn’t know the numbers anymore. He came back to himself and noticed his injured hand throbbing. An infection was beginning to fester in the wound. Sighing, he covered it in an ointment and waited for the pain to fade.
Tiergan stared at the blue banner. Engraved in his memory was the brave set of Prentice’s shoulders and the slight tremor in his hands, the quiet sobs of Cyrah next to him, and the brief, knowing glance of Bronte before Emory announced the decision.
He hated them. He hated them. He hated them and he was in a body not designed to hold the kind of hatred running through his veins. He reveled in it and considered letting it take him apart. To feel his mind crack, then break just so that he could live alongside Prentice’s broken mind. To be able to know him even in eternal agony. After the break, Prentice’s memories of them would be broken and unrecognizable. Gone. Tiergan would become just another figure in Prentice’s suffering. Prentice’s consciousness, once so familiar, would become unenterable to him. Forever.
Maybe not forever, a voice whispered.
The Moonlark. The project Tiergan had let Prentice sacrifice everything for. Prentice’s only hope. A child with unfathomable pressure and hope mounted upon her shoulders. A source of hope Tiergan clung to with everything he had because he had no other choice.
The tiny light of hope that the Moonlark gave him wasn’t enough for him to hold onto when Cyrah died. He knew it was no accident. Not so soon after Prentice’s death.
Guilt tore at Tiergan with jagged teeth. He did this. He told the Black Swan about Prentice. The most talented telepath he knew, the best Keeper he could hope for. He fed him to the wolves because he was too selfish to be without him. Cyrah got caught up in the mess and now Tiergan was as good as a murderer.
He truly thought his mind would crack if it wasn’t for Wylie. The little boy with his father's eyes and his mother’s smile. The biggest piece of Prentice and Cyrah’s heart, the little boy that Tiergan loved as his own. Tiergan couldn’t fall apart when he was the only one left for this little boy. Their child.
At first Wylie didn’t speak to him. Wylie didn’t speak to anyone. Wylie was a child whose life had been filled with pain and loss in a world that ignored the existence of it.
Tiergan tried to light up Wylie’s world the only way he knew how: putting up pictures of Prentice and Cyrah around their house, giving Wylie pencils to draw pictures and putting them up around his room, feeding Wylie his favorite meals, and making him colorful charms that he could hang around his registry pendant.
Every once and a while, Tiergan would take Wylie to the special place he used to train to be Cognates with Prentice. He would sit and watch as Wylie made houses out of sticks and laughed at the shapes of the shadows he could make with his hand. Late in the day when the sunlight turned golden, Tiergan would tell Wylie stories about his parents. Wylie would sit still in Tiergan’s lap, carefully hanging onto every word. Then he would take Tiergan’s hand and they would light leap home.
It was during one of those days that Wylie first spoke again.
“Did you ever come here with my dad?”
Tiergan looked at Wylie fully for a moment before responding. He had never looked more like his father and for a second Tiergan nearly forgot that he was gone.
“Yes,” Tiergan said. “Very often. This used to be our spot.”
He wanted to say more, share some of the simple secrets that Prentice had told him sitting here in the forest with him, but his throat closed up. Wylie wrapped his small arms around him in a hug.
“I miss him,” Wylie said.
“Me too.”
That night, as Tiergan tucked Wylie into bed, he noticed that his bed was nearly too small for his growing body. Soon it would be time to replace the bed — and Wylie’s clothes — all things Cyrah and Prentice had chosen for him.
He sat alone at the kitchen table and twisted his fingers. Wylie’s clothes and bed would need to be replaced, that was not up for debate. Tiergan would learn to be a father, he would learn to manage a house all on his own, he would find the best ways to make Wylie laugh.
But finding another partner? Lover? Cognate?
Even if Tiergan had to wait until the tips of his ears turned sharp, even if his ability grew stale with disuse, even if he had to relearn every bit of Prentice’s mind all over again, he would wait.