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The sun’s been going down.
Gideon squints up at it, puffing on his cigar as it creeps lower, and lower, until the bottom half is punctured by the black, needle-like tips of the silhouetted pine trees surrounding their camp. Cicadas scream, shrill and constant. The odd lightning bug shivers past the tree line. It’s setting up to be a cool, pleasant sort of evening, though every night feels cool compared to him.
Gods. The things he’d do for two fingers of whiskey and a beautiful woman on his arm right about now.
He sighs long and hard through his nose, thumping the back of his head against sappy bark. He’s been leaning on this same tree for the past hour. Maybe two. Or three. Fuckin’ Kremy, leaving him behind. A test, he told Gideon privately, to see what the goblin and tabaxi would do if they were split up. To see if they were made of the right stuff, if their stories were straight.
“But what the hell am I supposed to do with him, man?” Gideon remembers hissing through his teeth as Kremy finished explaining the plan. “I don’t think I’ve ever even heard the guy laugh.”
The gatorkin only shrugged, which did nothing to make Gideon feel better about the situation at hand. “You know how this works as well as I do. Find some common ground. Get him to like you.” Gideon could only scowl. “Look, d’you want this carnival to get off the ground?”
Of course he did. But that wasn’t the point, and he told Kremy as much. At least Gricko’s funny, at least Kremy got to have a night out on the town. All the tabaxi did was read and follow the little green guy and his owlbear around like a fuzzy, overbearing shadow.
“Like him or not, we need both of them. You got that? Both,” Kremy told him in the tone of voice that meant his decision was final. “Throw on some genasi charm. So help me, Gideon Coal, that cat better be eating out of your palm by the time I get back.”
He considered arguing. Anything would be better than a night babysitting a strange tabaxi in the woods without a drop of booze to be found.
“You’re the boss,” Gideon heard himself grumbling anyway. “But if he gets inside my head again, I’m knockin’ his damn lights out.”
Kremy snorted. “Sure, Gid. You do that.”
A few hours later Kremy, Gricko, and Hootsie disappeared down the path to town with a promise to be back by morning.
Now, Gideon looks over to the campfire, where the single most reticent person he’s ever met has been sitting for the better part of the day. The air smells like damp fallen leaves and mud. Incense, too. It seems to follow the tabaxi everywhere he goes.
His robes are tucked neatly around him, the fabric nearly the same jade green as the crabgrass blanketing the clearing. Tomes float around him. His face is set in the same expression it always is—stoic, yet somehow intense. Like the page before him is some an inscrutable puzzle. Maybe it is, for all Gideon knows. But, he’s growing more certain by the minute that the tabaxi’s not reading the damn thing. His narrowed eyes don’t move across the pages, even as he flips them.
Genasi charm.
Yeah, that’s right. Gideon Coal can charm anybody. Frankly, he’s a likable guy. And from a certain point of view, the tabaxi isn’t too far off from his regular type.
Personality-wise, at least.
There’s something about the hard-to-get ones, the uptight, elegant kinds who thaw out slow but always make it worth his while. It just takes some patience, persistence. A gentle hand.
He takes the cigar from his lip, taps it idly with his thumb, opens his mouth and—
“I know what you’re thinking.”
“You—you’re—” Gideon straightens, brandishing the cherry-red end of his cigar at the tabaxi. “You’re supposed to stay outta my fuckin’ head!”
The end of his striped tail, which had been limp on the forest floor, starts to twitch. “I’m not in your head.” The page he’s on audibly swishes, turning without him lifting a paw.
Gideon shoves his cigar back into his mouth. “Alright. Fine, man.” He takes an angry puff. “You go on and pretend to read—whatever the hell it is you’re pretendin’ to read. I’m not even here.”
His tail goes still. He doesn’t say anything, though his yellow eyes turn to study Gideon as if he was a pinned bug in an apothecary.
The tomes drift down until they meet the grass without a sound.
“I believe we have some matters to discuss.”
”Okay,” Gideon says through clenched teeth. “Like what?”
“To start with,” Morning Frost says, paws settling primly on top of his knees, “you don’t like me.”
Gideon sputters, nearly dropping his cigar. “What? I—“
It’s not that he doesn’t like the fella, he just… doesn’t…
Listen, it’s not Gideon’s fault that the eerily quiet, telepathic cat gives him the heebie-jeebies. He just thinks a man has a right to his own mind, that’s all.
It was a grift gone wrong that led Gricko and Frost to them. Kremy had been working a crowded tavern with some three-card monte, Gideon posted nearby to keep an eye on their marks. The tieflings at the table had looked too drunk to notice the second deck.
Apparently, one of them wasn’t.
The tiefling in blue knows your friend is cheating. His knife is beneath the table.
The unfamiliar voice rang out clear as day, as if it was said right into his ear. He jumped, looked around for its owner but there was no one nearly close enough.
And then, the tiefling moved.
Gideon caught his wrist before the knife cleared the table. Behind Kremy, another blade slipped from its sheath only to stop in midair, suspended in place.
Kremy swept the cards and silver into his coat while the goblin and his pygmy owlbear hurried over from the bar, helping usher the disgruntled tieflings outside before the rest of the tavern caught on.
Across the room, a green-robed tabaxi stood calmly, his yellow eyes fixed on Gideon.
“This is Hootsie the Cutsie Grimgrin, my lovely daughter,” Gricko explained proudly after introducing himself first, the commotion long-settled. “And this here is Frosty!”
“Morning Frost,” the tabaxi corrected.
“He reads minds.” The goblin waggled his tiny green fingers at them for effect.
It was unmistakably the same voice Gideon had heard before the fight, though quieter aloud. Even in the warmth of the tavern, the tabaxi’s embroidered hood was pulled up over his ears, shadowing his impassive gaze as it trailed over the two con men.
A mind-reader. Gideon recognized the glint that appeared in Kremy’s eyes and knew they weren’t leaving without him.
Employment at their upcoming carnival in exchange for food, a safe place to sleep, and various IOUs that Kremy could think to tack on. Gideon doesn’t really pay attention to the business side of things.
By the end of the night, Kremy had struck up a deal.
That was two weeks ago. They’ve put plenty of miles between them and that tiny old town by now. Frost never explained how much of Gideon’s mind he’d read before warning him of the tiefling. Gideon never asked.
A different pair of yellow eyes taunt him from the back of his mind.
So help me, that cat better be eating out of your palm.
Before Gideon can think of how to spin this into more comfortable territory, the tabaxi continues, “I understand I can be… off-putting.” His ears flick, head tilting to the side. He’s still watching Gideon closely. “But it seems we’ll be working together for some time. So, if there’s anything you’d like to know, you need only ask.”
Gideon blinks. “Anything?”
“Yes.”
“And you’d, what, expect me to believe you’re tellin’ the truth? Just ‘cuz you said so?”
Something awkward, almost pained twists his orange and white muzzle. It takes Gideon a moment to realize what it is—a smile. The first time Gideon’s ever seen Frost smile at somebody besides Gricko and Hootsie. “I’ve never been a very good liar.”
Why… what kind of person just goes and admits something like that? What the hell?
He’s seen Kremy swear up and down for hours that he’s an open book, that he’s got nothing else up his sleeve even as extra aces slip past that perfectly tailored purple hem.
But, no. That’s not what this is, it just doesn’t feel right. And Gideon’s the kind of guy who follows his instincts. After all, it was his instincts that led him to re-engineering his manacles, to freedom and then, to Kremy.
“Anything at all?” Gideon asks one more time, just to be sure.
Frost nods, his eyes wide and, Gideon finally realizes, ludicrously earnest. Gods above.
Gideon clears his throat, scratching at the short, wiry hairs under his chin. “So, you read minds. And, uh…” He taps at his temple with that same hand. “You talk in them.”
Again, Frost nods.
“Are you reading mine?”
“At this moment?”
“Yeah.” Little shit. “As in right now.”
“No, Gideon, I am not, and I wasn’t earlier either.”
“Would I be able to tell?”
“With practice, it’s possible.”
Gideon rolls his shoulders, stiff from sitting in the same position for so long. “Alright, and the green, glowy stuff—“
“Psionic magic.”
“Psi—yeah, sure, that.” Gideon waves the hand with his cigar, amused as those yellow eyes dart to follow the cherried tip’s path before snapping back into focus. “You’ve always had it?”
A one-shoulder half-shrug. “In a manner of speaking.”
It’s a cop-out, but one Gideon graciously breezes past. “And at the tavern, that’s how you stopped that knife?”
The tabaxi doesn’t blink. “Mm. Though, that specifically was an invisible mage hand cantrip.”
Ah, of course. Invisible mage hand. Whatever.
Putting a pin in that, he asks, “Alright, and how do you, y'know, do it? The glowy stuff, I mean.”
“How does one do anything?”
Before Gideon can come up with a snarky comment about exotic, know-it-all sorcerers—Frost moves, shifting until he has his knees tucked neatly beneath him, his paws open and flat to the sky. He whispers something that Gideon can’t make out. A green orb appears there, floating over his pink paw pads. Cool light washes over the tabaxi’s face, eyes glowing with it as the intricate embroidery on the hem of his robe comes to life in shimmering shades of greens and blues. It’s so different from Gideon’s own magic, the constant itch beneath his skin, the fire licking at his neck and his manacles. Kremy’s, too, the walking shadows, the ominous jazz, the persuasion practically dripping from his jaws.
He watches as the orb between Frost’s paws grows dimmer and dimmer and then, it explodes. And Gideon absolutely doesn’t flinch. But the magic doesn’t hurt as it flies past him, smattering the clearing with a soft glow.
Lightning bugs, that’s what it reminds him of.
Specks of glowing green and blue scattering around the meadow in all directions. A few patter against his shirt, his skin. They’re delicate, the faintest whisper of a touch that fizzles out like sea foam against red sand. Then, the meadow’s dark again, the sun nearly below the horizon.
Well. Damn.
The cogs in his head start turning. What an act that could be. It’s not even a grift!
“As you can tell, I’m still working on it.” Frost’s impeccable posture has tightened with Gideon’s shocked silence.
So, he forces himself to speak. “That was… Well, if that was you ‘still workin’ on it,’ I can’t imagine what it’ll be like when it’s done.”
Frost’s frowning, clearly unconvinced. “It’s nothing, just something I made to entertain Hootsie.”
“Sellin’ yourself short will get ya nowhere, fast.”
Frost nods toward Gideon’s chains. “Well, what about you?”
He takes the bait, raising his eyebrows as he jabs a thumb at his own chest. “I’ve never sold myself short a day in my life.”
“Mm.” And what’s that, another smile? Teasing, barely there, sharp canines glowing in the dim light of their dying fire. “I meant your magic. I’ve read various histories, but in our travels I have yet to meet another fire genasi like yourself.”
Alright, then.
Gideon lurches to his feet, chains clanking where they sway down past his knees. “Well shit, if you wanted a show, kitty-cat, you shoulda just said so at the beginnin’. But you should know, there ain’t another fire genasi like me.” Kitty-cat? Gods have mercy. But in an easy drawl, he adds, “Scooch, last thing I wanna do is burn ya.” Luckily, Frost does so without a word and somehow, even his awkward scooting is graceful. Gideon takes a step forward, closing his eyes as he lets the heat, the fire always burning beneath his skin rise to the surface.
It spreads—up through his chest with a deep breath, through his shoulders, down his arms. Without looking, he knows his manacles have started to glow the same red-hot as the tip of the cigar still tucked loosely between his teeth.
With a sharp, practiced twist of his wrist, he produces twin pillars of smokeless red and orange and yellow flame in his cupped palms. And yeah, maybe they’re a little taller than his usual cantrip. So what? No one’s counting.
He lets the fire dance across his fingers, licking at his palms and down his wrists to his manacles, weaving through the chains.
Piece of cake.
He turns to get Frost’s reaction and—gods above! Gideon forces himself not to startle. The tabaxi is on his feet, far closer now than the last time he looked.
“Does it have weight?” Frost asks. His yellow gaze is trained on the chains, where the fire trickles down the links to the ends before racing back up to the top in a twisting, intricate pattern. Back and forth, a circuit, a perfect loop. “What about the heat, how does it feel? Will it burn your clothes? What about other people? If I were to—“ He takes another step closer, like a moth drawn to, well, flame.
“Hold it there, Frosty,” Gideon says and tries not to laugh out loud when Frost freezes in place. Not quite what he meant, but sure. “One question at a time. Does it have weight…” He shifts his stance, moving his hands like a tipping scale. “Nope. Not that I can feel, but I am a pretty strong guy.” Frost’s head bobs up and down. He seems about two seconds from writing down notes. “And do I feel it? Sure, I feel it, I guess. Same way I feel sunshine, or a campfire. Won’t burn me or my clothes but it’ll sure as hell burn you or anybody else who gets too close.”
“Fascinating.” His voice is still so monotone but his tail flicks back and forth and back and forth, his gaze intense in the red glow. “And is it static?”
“Static?”
Frost huffs a quick, impatient breath through his nose. “Yes, as in—can it move independently or is it locked to your person?”
Gideon smirks. He couldn’t possibly have asked for a better setup than that. “You’re gonna love this. Stay put, alright?”
Once again, the tabaxi nods vigorously. The attention, the utter intensity of it should be uncomfortable, but Gideon finds himself loose as can be as he starts churning the chains in his hands. They move in crackling, wide arcs by his sides. A quick wind-up, and then—he whips them forward.
Jets of precise, molten red flame shoot from the ends of his chains. And yeah, maybe he overdid it as they hit the blackened logs dead center, re-igniting the dying embers with a loud FWOOSH! A burst of heat blasts from the small explosion but it’s gone as soon as it began, leaving behind a roaring bonfire.
For a moment Gideon just stands there, pleased. Fuck those hobgoblins, they could only wish to have tech like that.
Then, he turns to see Frost’s striped tail lashing, ears pointed straight to the sky.
Before Gideon can offer a copper for his thoughts, Frost turns to him with a strange expression. “Hm. Thank you for that. It was quite…” He pauses, tilting his head, as if listening for someone to tell him the right word to say. “Quite… stimulating. If I may ask, do the chains always require a cantrip to ignite?”
Stimulating.
For the thousandth time, Gideon wonders where the hell Gricko found this guy.
Once Frost is going, he can’t seem to stop. Like a goddamn wind-up motor, the questions inside him springing loose all at once. Admittedly, it’s a little intense. But as Gideon muses on the quirks of re-engineering, he finds himself… excited. He’s excited to have somebody to talk to, someone who’s into this kind of stuff. Kremy tries, but can only go for so long about nuts and bolts before asking Gideon very politely but firmly to can it.
Hours pass as they sit beside the campfire, the moon making quick strides across the night sky.
Gideon gets a few answers of his own. How Frost met his companions by discovering Gricko hanging by his ankle from a tree, caught in a hunter’s rope trap in the woods. How Frost meant to simply deposit the goblin safely in the next town, then the next, and then the next. It’s not hard to notice the way he tiptoes around every question about his life before meeting the goblin. Gideon, in turn, takes a wide berth around his time imprisoned by the hobgoblins.
Like every wind-up motor, Frost can’t keep it up forever. During a quiet lull, there’s a shuffle to Gideon’s left. It’s a small movement that brings them half an inch closer. Their shoulders are practically pressed together.
“Gideon, I…”
Frost starts the sentence like the beginning of a question but he doesn’t continue. Several long seconds of silence stretch out between them.
So, Gideon drawls, “Why yes, Frosty?”
There’s gentle rasping as one of Frost’s claws traces against the dry dirt beneath them, mapping out a delicate pattern with the sharp tip. “I was just considering what Gricko and Kremy might be doing right now.”
The answer seems pretty obvious to him. Because if Gideon had to guess, “They’re probably cross-eyed off of flat, room-temp ale at the seediest establishment in town. At least, that’s what he and I usually try to do on our nights off. Maybe some cards. Poker, if Kremy’s feelin’ lucky.”
A poorly disguised sound of disgust escapes Frost’s throat. “Ah. How thrilling.”
“Hey now,” Gideon gasps, “if I didn’t know any better, I’d think that was sarcasm.”
“What do you mean?” He sniffs, but the corners of his mouth are twitching to fight a smile. “Cheating rubes out of their coin purses is also my idea of fun.”
“C’mon, you’d make one hell of a card shark, Frosty.” Because he really would. Gideon can picture it—the dim candlelight, the sticky floorboards, the groaning around the table as the tabaxi wins yet another game. With his mage hands alone he’d be unstoppable, not to mention the mind-reading. “You’ll never know if you don’t give it a fair chance.”
Frost’s laugh is something so small he almost misses it. A nasally heh-heh, just as monotonous as his speaking voice but it makes Gideon want to puff his chest out. Or something.
“My poker face, well…” Frost’s tail flicks. Gideon can feel it brushing up against his hip. “Let’s just say it leaves something to be desired.”
It’s with a helpless grin that Gideon concedes, “We would have to do something about this tail of yours. The ears, too.” And after some consideration, “Actually, y'know, maybe you should just leave it to the experts.”
“Yes, I think that’s for the best.” Frost looks back to the coals. His claw has gone still in the dirt. “It’s… strange, having Gricko and Hootsie so far out of range.”
“Range?”
“For my psio—the mind-reading,” Frost says. “Thirty feet. That’s the range.”
The more you know. “Shorter than I’d expect.”
“It’s another thing I’m working on.”
“Yeah, thirty feet’s chump change.” He nudges Frost’s ribs gently with his elbow. “But y’know, most people can’t read ‘em at all.”
Frost hums, a vague noise of assent. The fire sputters as one of his invisible mage hands tosses a fresh log into the glowing bed of embers. Like an afterthought, he adds, “Tomorrow, remind me to teach you how to feel it.”
“I’ll bite. Feel what?”
“When somebody—me, in particular—is in your head.”
He tries to get a good look at Frost’s expression but his profile is shadowed, obscured with the shifting light. “You’d do that?”
“Yes. Only if you’re comfortable, of course.”
Gideon can’t think of what to say, his tongue thick and uncooperative. When’s the last time he was offered something so… generous, without asking for anything in return?
But Frost doesn’t seem to expect an answer. In fact, he doesn’t say anything else at all for a long time, breath quiet and even. And neither does Gideon.
It shouldn’t be a surprise that the fella falls asleep, late as it is. Regardless, Gideon nearly jumps a foot in the air when said fella’s weight suddenly thuds against his side in a limp heap of orange fur and jade fabric.
“Frosty?” Gideon whispers, nudging him gently. “Hey, you sleepin’?”
But Frost doesn’t stir. He only shifts closer, slumping into the heat radiating from Gideon’s chest.
Another nudge. “Frosty, you gotta get up now.” Nothing.
His wet black nose is cold against Gideon’s collarbone. It reminds him of staying up late with Kremy, touchy only once the gator’s sprinted straight past his own limits, only this time it’s with far less booze and babes involved than their typical night out.
Gideon will wake him up. Get him to his tent. They can talk again in the morning.
Right as he’s about to do it, an odd vibration seems to come from the tabaxi, something deep in his chest. Though barely audible, Gideon knows what it is. He’s been around enough barn cats to recognize the sound.
Morning Frost is purring.
In his sleep, but still. Purring. He didn’t even know tabaxi could do that and it’s because of Gideon.
Gideon stares down at the top of his striped head. It’s been a long time since anyone besides Kremy slept close to him like this, just to sleep and nothing else and even then, they only did it when the gatorkin’s cold-blooded nature required it. The scent of spiced incense is strong where it clings to Frost’s robes.
Well, he reasons, if there are folks who’re anything at all like himself and Kremy lurking around these parts, it’s in everyone’s best interests to have the guy close enough to keep an eye on him. The woods can be a scary place.
Thin tendrils of smoke twist up toward the dark, starry sky. The embers crackle with the breeze as Frost’s short-lived purr smooths into soft, wheezy snores.
Gideon Coal’s not the type to enjoy a peaceful night. When you’re a free man, why do nothing when you could do everything? Anything your heart desires?
But there are more lightning bugs than before dancing around the meadow. He can remember a few nights he spent chasing them through the fields of his family’s farm, so long ago now they hardly feel like his own memories.
They are, though. He watches the little bugs drift in lazy circles until the sun starts to break over the distant horizon.