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Scott felt sick. It was nothing to do with Graecie, he knew. He'd left her there, then he'd gone back to his room and now he was nowhere and he didn't know what he was doing. Spirals of pitch and abyssal energy swirled in the air around him. He didn't know where he was. He barely knew who he was—the scar stinging on his side kept him sane right now. Something was wrong. Something had happened.
But where? And who had done it?
Who at the academy would—
Seapeekay?
Wait no—Who was Seapeekay?
Why did he think of that? He heard a fox chittering, and then there was orange fur in front of him and then—
Nothing. Absolutely nothing. His room was silent. The sun was bright in the sky. Aurora sat lazing in a glimmer of light on the floor. Everything was fine. Acid clawed its way up his throat.
Maybe it wasn't all fine.
Blood dribbled from his nose and his vision wavered slightly. His dorm disappeared from view and the blackened void faded in. He swore he could hear crows. Then his dorm was back and whining filled his ears, closer now. Then it was gone again. Then back, then gone. It felt like he was phasing between realities, like the void was trying and failing to capture his soul. He could hear Aurora yowl distantly. The darkness returned, this time covered in red spires that made Scott curl in on himself for some unfathomable reason. There was a red crystal in his hand.
Cackling filled his ears, then gold bled down his eyes and it was all gone again. He could remember his neighbour—flashes of a fox, bells, copper, and stars hit his eyelids. He didn't know what was happening but he knew it wasn't good.
Something was moving him, he could hear the wind racing beside him, feel Aurora tagging along by his feet. He didn't know where he could be going. The swaying of his vision ended eventually, leaving him slumped against a wall in a hallway he didn't remember stepping into. He didn't even know where he was right now. It wasn't anywhere he remembered off the top of his head—maybe the palace corridors?
The wallpaper was torn and bloodied, corruption crawled the banisters and moulded wood splintered dangerously. The mahogany was darkened enough Scott couldn't tell where it ended and the soot-stained wallpaper began. It all stank of smoke. It threatened to choke him and—
He looks around a little more, wandering the long winding corridor until he came to an intersection. Blood began to drip down his face again and he winces. His gloves were already soiled with enough blood he was concerned for his well-being, he didn't need more leaving him. He resigns himself to simply holding his nose and praying it wouldn't last long.
He turns left, dragging his free hand across the wallpaper to leave a thin line of ice for him—or someone else—to follow given this is a maze. He gets to another intersection not even a minute later and he turns right, keeping up the trail of slowly growing rime. The wallpaper slowly returns to what he thinks is its former glory: bright oranges and reds blanketing yellowed woods and white furniture. It looks better like this.
He makes it, after a few minutes of dizzying corridors and doubling back, to a staircase he remembers. It's taller than he thought it was, though. He was on the top floor, but he remembered the way onto the roof. Maybe he was hallucinating. The fog returned to his brain, the hall he's entered from dissipated into the wall. Scott didn't think that was supposed to—
He turns to find a balcony he knows. He'd been here a bit ago with Graecie and her little group. Yes. If he went downstairs here he'd find his way out—surely.
Making it back to the stairwell was easy, simply a feat of walking a minute or two in one direction, but actually braving the stairs might be an issue. His knees cracked and his ankles, from what he could see as he checked them, were swollen and dark with bruising. Gods. How did that even happen?
Then, he hears the clinking of metal on metal and the distinct claw drags of a dragon. The sound echoes through the stairwell and Scott is following it before he can think it through. Aurora is there—the smart creature she is—and she jumps at him the second he's in range. Sun Guard stands there, stoic as ever, and Scott smiles at him in thanks. They only stand watching him for a second before they're turning and leading him down the stairs.
Aurora stays splayed along his shoulders as the Guard guides him back, and they speak quietly on what happened in the academy and all the corrupted rituals. Scott's running theory, and one backed by the story the Sun Guard spins, is that his own magic reacted to the corrupted rituals, sending him into a sort of trance to get out as quickly as possible. Apparently even Aurora had fled the academy with him, but she'd lost him in the capital. She'd been found by Sun Guard, thank the gods, and he'd brought her around with them until they'd found him.
He felt bad, exponentially so, but it wasn't like he could do anything about it now. At least his nose has stopped bleeding, finally. He really needed to stop loosing blood. And by the looks of the small splatters on the floor the way they leave the palace, Scott had been bleeding for a while.
A quiet voice interrupts his musing on the matter. "Have you always reacted to magic so harshly?"
Scott looks over at Sun Guard and blinks. He thinks back to how attached he was to the Folk Flame whenever he was around it, how drawn he was to it. He'd never want to leave the small cavern it was kept in. Though that may have been for the warmth. He didn't know, and would probably never find out. "I don't know. We don't really have…" He waves around, small snowflakes dripping from his recently ungloved hands. "…All this. Where I'm from."
The Guard nods. "You might be sensitive to the corruption then?"
Scott considers it for a moment. "Maybe? I don't really have a reference point."
The Guard stares at him blankly. Scott can't tell what they could be thinking. "Can your magic harm you?"
Scott doesn't know where that came from, but he answers honestly. "Kind of? It freezes up my joints and stuff—but that's just the cold it gives off." He shows the Guard a hand, wiggling black-tipped fingers in the air. "I have semi-permanent frostbite. I think, anyway. It doesn't actually do anything but make my hands really cold and the whole bruised-looking thing." The Guard nods but doesn't speak after that, simply leading Scott and his dragon back to the academy and making sure he doesn't trip up the stairs.
The walk takes more out of him than he'd ever admit, and he's so grateful the Guard drops him off as his dorm without asking.
His room is, however, absolutely frigid. Ice covers damn near every surface and Scott blinks at the carnage. There's blood smattered along the floor too—much more than Scott thinks could have come from him—and he sighs when he realises he'll have to clean before doing anything else.
Maybe he could just sleep somewhere else for now? Clean later when he's actually awake. But that would introduce the possibility of people questioning him, and he really doesn't want to answer. He grumbles and sets to starting a fire, that at least will keep him moving enough to clean up.
The fire is lovely, and Scott ends up lounging near it while the majority of the ice on the first floor melts. The stuff by the door has to be done manually, but Scott takes the help where he can. Aurora cracks away layers of ice and tosses them into the buckets near to the fire, melting them into water he can use for rituals. The snow is more annoying, but he can move that himself if he concentrates enough so even that isn't too big fo a hassle.
In the end, he's sleeping on his own couch as the fire slowly begins to die out, relishing in the little warmth it gives.
It's not like expected to be let off easily, but waking yet again to blood dripping down his chin was annoying. That festering feeling he'd tried to ignore yesterday was at full force, tugging at his magic until it's expelled in a flurry of snow. The bruising has crawled further up his hands, capturing the full length of his fingers in its grasp. Scott doesn't know what triggered that.
He pats at the blood with a tissue, narrowing his eyes at the dark colour of it, before he's hit with a dizzy spell he can't fight. He's down to the ground in seconds, already knowing the protocol for this, and Aurora is curling around his head gently.
They lay in wait there for a moment, then it all goes black again and Scott finds himself back in the void. He's up to his knees in water this time, and he lets himself get swept off his feet. The water rushes around, and soon his eyes open and he finds himself in the ritual room. He doesn't know how he got there, nor how long he's been standing here, but he spins around and makes eye-contact with Terry.
There's something not quite right about the way the magician stares blankly forward. Scott doesn't know why yet, but as he steps into the large ritual circle and feels the residual corrupt magic nipping at his feet, he sighs. He doesn't know how to cleanse whatever this corruption is but he thinks now he really needs to find out.
He scrubs his hands over his face and leaves the ritual room. Heading to the library, he listens out for other people. The halls are eerily quiet. He realises then he hasn't seen anyone in days. Even the day before that first episode, he hadn't seen a fellow student in these halls. He's only seen guards around. That piques his interest and he sets out to try and find someone—anyone—to talk to.
…
He finds no one. There's nobody in these godforsaken halls and Scott has gotten himself lost thrice even though he knows these halls best. He's horrified at the implications this all sends out, then he hears a scream and everything goes dark again.
He just hopes he's in a better place when he next wakes up.
Pyro's getting sick of having to drag a barely conscious Scott places. He doesn't know what's happening and, though it's terrifying, he's more confused than anything. Scott isn't outwardly injured this time though, so small victories. He is, however, currently bleeding from his ears.
There are icicles dragging from his boots to his knees and Pyro wonders why the hell they're a navy blue. He gets no answers, so he simply dredges on with Scott in his arms. They drop him onto they're bed and begins to melt the snow off so they can get his boots off. It takes longer than he'd ever admit for Pyro to get his boots off, but soon enough Scott is comfortable in Pyro's bed with two baby dragons cuddling into him.
Pyro doesn't know what to do with the man now, though, is the issue. He doesn't really want to leave him, because that'd entail him maybe getting up and leaving the room as he's apparently prone to do while sleeping if how Pyro found him is any evidence, but he also can't just stay in here with him.
He sighs, grumbling before waking Cindy up and making sure she knows he wants her to get him if Scott gets up. Hopefully the dragonling actually does that—goodness knows if she'll actually abide by it though.
Pyro spends most of the rest of his day with JoJo and a couple others, running around trying to figure out who the hell decided another corrupt ritual was in order.
That is, of course, when Water is found in the infirmary with no memory of who they are.
Things spiral out of control from there and Pyro quickly takes their leave.
Waking up in Pyro's room was not what he expected after the last time. He also didn't expect to have two baby dragons splayed over each other near his stomach. Huh.
Cindy gets up the second his eyes are open, racing to the door and out of it. Scott decides he doesn't want to know why.
Something like a few minutes later, Pyro appears through the door and Scott is stuck studying their numerous piercings. Scott had noted the holes in which he knew the jewellery was meant to be, but he'd never actually seen the silver worn until now. He couldn't take his eyes off it. It glinted in the light, drawing his eyes from the man's brows, to his nose, to his ears and finally to matching snake bites through his lips.
Scott's throat went dry. He knew Pyro was talking but he wasn't listening, he just laid wand stared at the dangling metal with a mesmerised look. He blinked and Pyro was hovering worriedly above him, eyes narrowed.
He grinned as Scott seemed to finally take notice of him. "Didn't know they were that distracting?" Scott felt his cheeks flush and he rolled his eyes, turning away. "Oh come on! You were staring for so long—I'm entitled a little teasing."
Scott flips him off and grumbles, curling around Aurora with a huff. "Had a few fucking days alright…" He yawns, somehow still tired. "Give me a bit to get my brain working."
"You sure that isn't just because of my face?" Pyro pops back into his vision, so smug it makes warmth swirl in Scott's gut. "You were mesmerised, Boralith. Admit it."
Scott, again, flips him off as he sits up with Aurora in his lap. "Where'd you find me?"
Pyro narrows his eyes in suspicious but doesn't outright object to the change in subject. He'd been almost kinder since the whole 'magical exhaustion' incident. "In the library. You were close to the first secret entrance."
Scott considered that for a moment. He hadn't gotten than far in the weird maybe-dream-world. He'd managed to step into the library and then he was gone. He shrugs, and stands from the bed, almost immediately falling into Pyro's arms when his legs buckle.
"You really need to be more careful don't you?" Scott huffs but doesn't disagree as Pyro helps him over to the couch. He didn't think his legs would be as weak as they were right now. Pyro doesn't stay kind long, flicking his forehead with his middle finger. "Your legs were damn near frozen when I found you. Give them a second."
Aurora, now on Scott's shoulders somehow, snaps her teeth at him and Scott laughs. Pyro makes a face, but then Cindy is prancing up to the couch and jumping into Scott's lap. Pyro makes an upset noise and they devolve into arguing over who the baby fire dragon likes more. The answer is obviously Scott, but her caretaker doesn't seem to agree.
They bicker back and forth for a while as Pyro makes them a small meal.
Scott continues to get distracted by the piercings as they eat, glancing at the small pieces of metal every so often. Eventually, once they've eaten thank the gods, Pyro gets sick of it. "What."
Scott startles out of his staring, blushing furiously. "When did you get them?"
Pyro raises an eyebrow and Scott's eyes trail the way the bar nestled in the skin moves. "You really want to know?"
Scott nods. "All of them."
Pyro rolls their eyes but obliges, telling the long and winding stories of each of his piercings. The three in his right ear were done all at once—they were the first ones he got—and a few months later he'd gotten all the left ones done. His eyebrow was done a year after them, and then his nose and lip piercings were done decently close to one another just over a year ago.
Then Pyro opens his mouth and Scott sees his tongue piercing. He barely manages to stifle his gasp behind his teeth as he stares at the metal ball snugly on the man's tongue. Scott wonders, not at all briefly, what that would feel like on his skin.
Pyro tells the story—a few years ago he'd met another man with one, and he'd decided then and there he wanted one. Scott got no more details than that.
Pyro, in turn, asks about the scars down his chin and throat. Scott winces, but tells the story of angry wolves and broken ribs. He'd been barely 16 and saving a younger boy from a nearby village from a pack of wolves. They'd almost torn out his throat, but he'd managed to fight them off with just a small knife and enough yelling. It was part of why he didn't want a dog, he admitted.
Pyro just nods and asks after the future of the little boy.
Scott sighs, and explains having to keep the boy with him for the rest of his hunting trip, then dropping him at the town he said he'd been from.
There was something Scott didn't want to name in Pyro's voice when he spoke again. "So you have travelled?"
Scott makes a noise in the back of his throat. "Not really. I've visited close towns a few times, but I only ever stayed out for a few days at most." He rolls his shoulders, then settles back into the couch. "I didn't want to be too far from the town in case anything happened." Pyro nods slowly, eyes narrowed as if he wanted to ask more, but he kept his mouth shut. "Things did happen once. An angry group of griffins decided they didn't like Bella. They attacked town." He took a breath. "I only just got there with enough time to keep her from dying. She lost an arm—I didn't travel for a while after that."
Scott pushes himself into the arm of the couch, trying to keep his distance from Pyro as they stayed silent. Watching. It was almost unnerving. Then he grabs one of Scott's hands and holds it tightly. It helped, no matter how little.
Then, in an almost shocking showing of care, they pull Scott closer, hefting him into their lap like he weighed nothing. He hadn't known Pyro was that strong now—though it wasn't like he'd been showing it off as much as some others Scott could name. Pyro buried his face in Scott's hair and mumbled. "You did what you could. I'm sorry I wasn't there."
Scott hadn't expected this, but he supposed he hadn't expected Pyro to even keep him here after his waking up, so maybe he didn't know the man as well as he used to. "I still don't… Why'd you leave?"
Pyro lifts his head, ashen blue locking onto pale lavender. "Because I… I didn't know what to do with everyone's expectations. I wanted the Folk Flame, but I didn't want to be looked to like my parents were." He avoids saying he was afraid, Scott notes, but he can hear the waver in his tone. "I needed to get out. I almost took you with me… I just—I knew you didn't want to leave. I didn't want to ruin our friendship more."
Scott stays quiet, hands reaching up to map out the piercings splitting up Pyro's face. They sit there in the quiet for a while, Scott waits out the small fire of anger burning in his heart before he spoke again. His voice wavers as he talks. "You were scared…" Pyro goes to argue and Scott straightens up. He isn't as tall as Pyro, but sat on his lap he can look Pyro in the eyes easily. "No. You were scared. That's fine. You just needed to—To say that. You could've told me! I don't know why—"
"I didn't want you to think I was weak." Pyro's voice breaks and Scott's heart breaks with it. Seeing his old friend, the person he knew to be strong, breaking quietly makes him ache.
Scott takes hold of his head, and tucks it into his neck, humming a lullaby Pyro's mother used to sing on the colder nights of winter.
They stay there a while, long enough that the sun dips below the horizon and the room is shrouded into darkness. Their dragons snore in a pile on the couch beside them, and Scott giggles at the sight. Pyro's eyes don't leave his face and when Scott catches his eye they both stop for a moment. A flare of sorts lights the nearby candles and Scott is captivated by the newfound light.
Pyro's eyes don't leave him. Scott's hands are still cradling his cheeks. Pyro's arms wrap around Scott's waist and they stay there. Even when Scott gives Pyro's forehead the gentlest kiss, even when they fall asleep on his couch with their dragons tangled between them.