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“Are you coming?” Jupiter’s hand lingered on Bertram’s station door, head tipped slightly to one side. Rosie was at his side, carrying both of their bags, also watching him with anticipation.
Bertram fiddled with the feathers growing out of his hand. Distracted by his schoolwork, he hadn’t really had the time to keep them in check. They were beginning to get unruly, obvious. He picked at them uncomfortably, only when nobody was looking, though. They didn’t like it when he picked at them.
“Yeah, in a minute.” He dropped his hands to his side forcefully, “I just left something in Hometrain.” He avoided their gaze, knowing that Jupiter knew full well he was lying, but hoping he had the awareness to not mention it.
Jupiter stared at him, eyes flicking to the spot they always did when he could tell somebody was telling a lie. Their gazes lingered together for a moment, then Jupiter looked away.
“Okay.” He bit his lip, shuffling his legs a little in the way he always did when he really wanted to pry further, “Don’t be too long.”
He sounded worried. Bertram cringed internally. If he was worried, he would ask questions, and Bertram wouldn’t be able to lie forever.
He watched the door close, a stir of guilt in his stomach.
After a second of feeling sorry for himself, he pressed his back to the wall between his door and Jupiter’s old one. With shaking hands, he began to pull the most unruly of his feathers out, gripping them at the base the way his father had taught him.
You need to remove those awful things. You’re becoming a sight.
I’m sorry, Father.
You should be.
The pain made his eyes water, a stinging that lingered like needle pricks. Small amounts of blood began to trickle from the holes. He always tried to get it done as fast as possible, it was more painful that way, but faster. People worried less if you took less time. And anyway, less time spent plucking meant more time to stop the bleeding before somebody noticed.
After finishing with his hands, he moved up towards his face. Usually, he tried to do his face first, it was a lot harder to pluck himself with shaking hands. He was supposed to do his face in front of the mirror, to produce a cleaner look, but sometimes there was no other option but to fly blind.
He closed his fist around a clump of feathers and was just about to pull when a voice jolted him to attention.
“Birdie?”
He hated that nickname. He knew it was because his last name was Crow and not because he had feathers but he hated it anyway.
“What are you doing?” Gawain, with one hand still on his door, was staring at him, yellow eyes somehow sharp with concern.
“Nothing.” He shook his head, tucking his hands behind his back to hide the fact that they were still bleeding.
Gawain shut his door, “Show me your hands.” He didn’t speak much, but when he did, it was like a command.
Bertram didn’t budge.
“Are you plucking?” Gawain sat down next to Bertram, “I’ve noticed your feathers growing in weird. Awkward angles.” He flashed his hand out and grabbed Bertram’s before he resisted.
Gawain examined his hand, “You’re going to get an infection. How often do you do this?”
Bertram remained silent.
“If you need help with them you can just ask.” Gawain sounded almost… shocked, that he hadn’t.
Much like Bertram was a Crowwun minor, Gawain was a Hawkwun minor. Much unlike Bertram, Gawain manifested in pretty ways. Instead of hair, he had feathers, and he had sharp yellow eyes that made people of all genders stare for just a little longer than they should. Gawain was conventionally attractive, sleek, Bertram had a curse. Feathers grew in random places, especially all over one side of his face. It was abominable.
“I don’t need help with them.” He growled under his breath, “I need them gone.”
The Crow family had a curse, disgusting feathers that would have everybody in town curl their lips and shun them. His brother had always mocked him for them, offering to get his friends to pin him down so they could pluck him. With all the people that pointed and laughed, he had almost taken the offer.
“They’ll just grow back. They’ll grow back worse.” Gawain touched some of the feathers left on Bertram’s hand, already growing at odd angles, “How long? Have you been doing it?”
He didn’t respond.
“Wait here.” Gawain stood up abruptly and crossed over to his door, shutting it behind him.
Finally, Bertram thought, grabbing a handful of his face feathers and preparing to tug.
He hesitated, though. Was he really making it worse?
The hesitation gave Gawain enough time to return with a handful of different oils.
“Have you ever styled your feathers before?” Gawain slowly laid the oils out in front of them, “If your problem is them sticking out, this should help.” He opened a bottle and began to lather it on his hands.
“You can… style it?” Bertram felt a wave of stupidity crash over him. How had he never considered that?
“Yeah, Bird.” Gawain finished applying the oils to his hands then held them up, “May I?”
After a moment of hesitation, Bertram nodded.
Gawain was gentle, rubbing the oil through his face feathers, smoothing them out. It felt nice.
“Thanks.” Bertram muttered when he pulled away, putting one hand on his feathers. They already felt softer.
“Has nobody given you these before?” Gawain took out another oil and grabbed one of Bertram’s hands and rubbed it into the wounds. Bertram winced, but tried not to pull away.
Bertram shook his head, “Mr Smithereens says I should just let them grow and they’ll sort themselves out.”
“No, no.” Gawain shook his head, moving onto Bertram’s other hand, “That doesn’t work. Not for minor wunimals at least.”
“Are our feathers different? To wunimal majors?”
“Very.” Bertram had never heard Gawain so passionate about something, something other than marksmanship of course, “Our bodies are too human to grow proper feathers, but too unnimal to… not grow them at all. The feathers have a lot more hair to them than it looks.” He touched one of the feathers on Bertram’s hand that was turning white at the base, “See? You’re growing in white ones. Because of your thing.” He pointed up to Bertram’s hairline, where his black hair was starting to go white.
He hated the white ones even more than the black ones. Somehow, they stuck out even more, despite being more similar to his skin tone.
“Because they’re so different, they can’t just grow right on their own. We can’t preen ourselves.” He let go of Bertram’s hands, “So we use other stuff to… simulate preening.”
“The first oil is preen oil. Collected from birds who actually produce it.” He held it up, “Makes your feathers soft and clean in a way that normal soap and water just can’t.”
He held up the second, “This is just some stuff to help your wounds heal.” and then another, “And this will make your feathers regrow faster and more healthy. If you let them grow, they’ll naturally fall into place better.” He began to drip that one onto Bertram’s hand, “This one’s going to hurt a lot with your open wounds, but it won’t do anything bad for them.”
Bertram snatched his hand away at the flash of pain, some of the oil dripping onto the pavement.
“Hold still.” Gawain grabbed his hand again and began working the oil in.
Bertram let it happen that time, biting the inside of his mouth.
Gawain finished off, holding Bertram’s hands gently.
“Why are you helping me?” Bertram whispered after a moment.
“Because you don’t deserve all this.” He shrugged, “Your feathers are really pretty, Bertram. Ebony black. If your condition progresses you might end up with a night sky.”
“You think so?”
“I know so.” Gawain nodded, “If one of my little brothers, my other little brothers, were feeling like this… I’d do anything to make them better.”
Bertram’s hesitant smile faltered, “My older brother always threatened to pluck me. Sometimes I wanted to let him.”
“Nobody here’s going to make you pluck your feathers, that’s for sure.” Gawain stood up, “You keep those. I have plenty back at the apartment.”
Bertram stared at them, lined up so nicely. He couldn’t say nobody had ever treated him like that because Jupiter treated him like that all the time. Like he actually mattered.
“Thanks, gunpowder,” Bertram smiled up at his brother.
“Don’t mention it.” Gawain shrugged and jogged over to one of the benches, grabbing a pistol Bertram hadn’t noticed. That must have been the reason he came.
Bertram sat there for another few moments before gathering up the oils into his bag and shouldering through his station door.
Jupiter and Rosie were sitting on the floor of Mr Smithereens’ house, playing a card game. Jupiter’s head immediately snapped up when Bertram opened the door.
“Did you find it?” He asked, clearly itching to ask more, but doing a very good job at restraining himself.
Bertram nodded and sat down, still feeling the warmth of his interaction with Gawain, “Yeah. Deal me in?”