kingdomsofrain | crooked moon: draža and gideon

crooked moon: draža and gideon

-The Crooked House. shut the fuck up eustace. WHY ARE INFINITE WEASELS?
-A private word. jack you can't slip away from the bird that easily.
-Where you belong. hello puppy, hello daddy. hello gideon?

supplemental:
-Jack's notes. revelations in the margins.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

After talking to Jean, the party exits the smithy. Jack has, until now, been following along peacably enough, but now announces, "I'm going back to the Inn." When Cala looks torn in response, he tells her not unkindly, "You can do what you want. It's okay. Stay with them."

<.>

Orev's response is immediate, unwavered though there's a warning bite at the edge: "You'll find that's simple, Calamus." And, Looking At You Jack, "We could all use a stop at the inn.

"As I said, I'm not of a mood for bread."

Still watching Jack. Absolutely ready to strike down any argument.

(Anyway, going to the inn means Walt can refill on sausages and give his filthy romance some attention.)

<.>

It's true. Walt will get plenty of read time.

Jack stiffens and his jaw clenches, but he doesn't look at Orev. Unable to back out now, he simply turns and heads for the inn. Cala hurries to keep up with his stride, casting a bemused glance between him and Orev. For now, she says nothing, however.

Back at the inn, Jack says nothing to the party, but makes a beeline for the stairs; it could be he believes he just needs to get to his room and Orev won't follow, or that Cala WILL follow and provide a buffer if Orev is going to try and corner him.

*Cala does not, in fact, follow him.  <.>

Orev hadn't anticipated the lack of pushback. He had, however, absolutely expected the boy to attempt retreat, and follows that beeline quietly, without remark. However close he's able to trail Jack, he will be following him stuck-on-you-like-glue. There isn't any need to speak just yet; best keep words behind closed doors. Well. And. He may be hoping the boy doesn't notice he's been followed.

[orev, stealth check: 19]

<.>

Yeah Jack doesn't actually notice he's being followed.

When he gets to his room, he starts to close the door immediately behind him, so make an acrobatics check to dodge or an athletics check to stop it from hitting Orev in the face.

[orev, stealth check: nat 20]

Orev soundlessly catches the door, preventing it from closing and not alerting Jack to his presence. Jack, assuming the door has closed and he's alone, heaves a sigh of relief, snatches the new hat off his head, and throws it irritably on one of the chairs in the room. His coat follows and he drops onto his bed with a weariness he didn't show at all outside. He buries his face in his hands, shoulder slumped, scrubs his palms through his hair, and then raises his head to stare out the window.

<.>

Orev is going to keep to the room's perimeter, making his way toward the chair.

He's careful with his motions; graceful, focused. And for a moment, he permits himself to stand behind the chair, observing, thinking— He'd like to draw his fingers through the man's hair.

(Thinking— Does he knows its softness?) (It seems not alien to him.)

What he does is settle a hand on Jack's shoulder, speaking soft-firm as he does—

"What was it."

<.>

Although Jack didn't perceive him, when Orev's hand meets Jack's shoulder, the man doesn't seem to startle more than a sudden tensing - almost as though he's not surprised. The only indication he gives that he might have been caught off-guard is an angry snort and a side-long glance.

It's almost bitter, the way he looks at Orev.

"You're not big on boundaries, are you?"

<.>

That's... odd.

How little the boy reacts. Orev might not have intended to give Jack a particularly heinous startle, but surely there ought to have been something more to his reaction. He blinks. Considers.

(Doesn't like the way Jack's watching him.)

"And you're not inclined toward transparency.

"You've avoided the question."

And, after a moment: "You knew I was behind you." It isn't a question. (It's. Kind of a question.)

He hasn't moved his hand from Jack's shoulder.  <.>

"No." Jack doesn't indicate which un-question he's answering, but then again, he's not inclined towards transparency.

He's a gambler, after all.

He leaves Orev's hand on his shoulder far, far longer than seems reasonable before standing and moving away from the man. Folding his arms across his chest, he comments, "If you're here to ask me about your little identity problem, I can't help you."

<.>

The little shit.

He remains in place, hand shifted only enough to rest on the back of the chair, fingers tapping, tapping, claws pressing light into the fabric. Straight-faced, he offers, "I'm sure I don't know what you mean.

"No, 'Jack.' We've other concerns at present.

"What the woman in the bakery told you.

"What you were doing with Tolliver."

<.>

Jack seems thrown by this, then laughs incredulously. With an ugly sneer, he bites out, "I'd say I didn't take you for the jealous type, but it's more like I'm not sure why you think you've got a right to be jealous."

<.>

Oh, he doesn't like that.

Orev's lip ticks briefly, briefly to flash teeth before he can regain composure.

There's a question in mind: Why should Jack assume jealousy at all? Why the biting, the sneer? Just what does he know about Orev.

(And there's a question for himself: Why in fuck's name should he care. Is he jealous, and why, and what is it about this man?)

And Orev. Is going to go for cast number two of Detect Thoughts.

Which is maybe not wise and he's fairly certain it isn't wise, but that's not going to stop him.

<.>

[jack, perception check: 28]

Jack immediately starts with the PUT ON YOUR SUNDAYS WE'RE GONNA DIG A HOLE.

Orev looks as if he'd like to jump out a window.

But.

He's going to ride this out for the moment. Because he would like to trY to get a little deeper.

<.>

Jack manages his willpower save (18 on the die) and shouts, "Get out of my head!"

<.>

That's the spell done and over with.

And Orev is now clutching the back of the chair with both hands, claws clamped a little too harsh. Yes he is frustrated. (And in the back of his mind, he feels as if he's going about this all wrong, but for fuck's sake how else is he supposed to do it?)

His voice low, he offers, "As you wish."

And, "This might be simpler if you'd afford a measure of cooperation.

"We'll put it in your terms, shall we? If you're...muddling about with our potential suppliers, we'll all need to know. Simply to understand our own footing for dealing with them."

That is. Absolutely not what he's concerned about. But it sure is what he's going with right now.

<.>

Jack rubs his forehead as though easing a headache; there's a look of frustration bordering on (?) tearfulness (?) in his eyes, which he tries to disguise by looking off at the window. A silence follows, cold and thoughtful, before he finally responds.

"I'm not 'muddling about' with him."

A beat, and then he continues, "We don't need to keep traveling together. I don't know how this arrangement took shape. It's Cala that insists we have to stay with you and your corpse; I'd be halfway to [NAME OF OTHER COUNTRY] if I had a choice, and believe me, if it meant muddling a hundred Tollivers to do it, I would."

And another pause.

"But he lowered the cost of the gods-damned hat without any muddling. So - your concerns are noted and alleviated."

<.>

A jolted awareness: He doesn't want Jack to leave.

(He can't. The man can't leave. Orev needs— Jack needs— Something, there's something here he can't reach.)

Then, another moment of awareness: He's moved, several strides across the room toward the boy. Not sure how it'd happened. Not sure when. He draws himself up short before he reaches the man, now crossing his own arms, hands clutching his elbows.

What he says, voice less steady than he'd like: "That won't be necessary.

"Fleeing, that is. Whatever's brought us to this village... I suspect our chances are better as a unit."

He does examine the boy closely, trying to determine whether he's lying about any muddlings or non-muddlings with Tolliver, though he suspects it's true enough. (Trying as well to not linger on just how ill-at-ease he felt, hearing this boy speak of parting ways.) (Probably, it's because Orev could use the support, at least until he figures out what in the hells he's doing here.) ((Probably, that isn't the reason at all.))

"Your Calamus is sensible. I'd heed her, if I were you."

Then, irritably, "And Walt is not 'my' corpse."

Well. Maybe Walt kind of is, but Orev has made no claim to him.

Orev gestures toward the bed. "Sit, wouldn't you?"

<.>

[orev, insight check for lying: 16]  Jack seems to be speaking from a place of deep hurt and anger, and he truly seems to believe he'd follow through on his threat to fuck his way across Druskenvald - and also, meant for that comment to hurt.

And he's telling the truth about Tolliver.

<.>

That comment did in fact hurt. At the moment, it's drowned out by the panic (it wasn't panic!) ((it was absolutely panic)) at the thought of Jack leaving. Slowly, though, the sting's beginning to burn through, and as Orev watches the boy, he grips his elbows a little harder, clas beginning to sink through feather and skin.

(Why in fuck is this man so hell-bent on being far from him?)

<.>

Jack sits, but only slowly, and on Cala's bed. Or, what would be her bed if she slept. He doesn't look at Orev; it seems almost as though he doesn't WANT to look at Orev, or perhaps can't look. (Perhaps doesn't want to see the hurt he caused.)

"A unit. I'm sure that's your primary concern. Tactical cohesion." A snort.

"Cala's sensible. She's also too trusting. But if this is what she wants, I'm not going to refuse her."

Now he does look at Orev, his gaze stony and full of acrimony. "Don't make me regret it, or I'll make sure regret's the only thing you know how to feel anymore."

<.>

He blinks, thinks to remark that he is not unconcerned about tactics and practicalities, but it really isn't the point, or it isn't where his attention's focused.

(He doesn't doubt this man could cause regret.) ((Has it happened before?)) (Strange; he doesn't know much of what he feels anymore. Confusion, yes. Irritation. A desire to know... something.

And, when faced with this man, what he feels is something akin to— Well. It couldn't be called longing, could it? The word, the notion makes no sense applied to himself. Perhaps take thought of feeling out of it. Perhaps simply acknowledge that there is something to this man that he doesn't want to let go.)

He meets the harshness of Jack's gaze with a composed blankness. "I don't doubt you will."

Then, carefully, "What I cannot discern is what you believe I'd do to make you regret anything. Or why.

"After all, you've never known me."

<.>

Jack once more crosses his arms and stares impassively at Orev. He seems to be thinking of how he wants to reply to that statement: a comeback, a nasty remark, or just a quiet -

"No. I've never known you.

"But I've known enough men to know which ones will take your heart and break it for a bit of fun." He lets that hang in the air a moment before continuing with a nod towards the door. "But we're talking about her. She still thinks people can be trusted. Don't give her the kind of education I had."

He seems to know he ought to stop there, but he just can't help himself. He adds, "She's not replaceable like some."

[orev, insight check: 21]

That last comment seemed bitter and pointed, as though he's echoing something someone told him.

[orev, wisdom check: 15]

Orev feels a creeping sense that, if only he could remember, he would know EXACTLY what Jack is talking about.

<.>

What he thinks, sharp and sudden, cutting through a growing wariness: 'Who on earth told you that?'

(Who ever said you were replaceable.) (Who could think it.)

And itching beneath his skin, a subtle torment through his mind, he knows, he knows there's something familiar in those words. Which does nothing to settle his unease. Which turns toward its own kind of gnawing, because if he knows those words, if he's not mistaken about having known, he must have known this man—

The conclusions can't bode well. And he doesn't reach to draw them in connection now.

(But he worries. And for the first time, the thought forms coherently, with something like certainty: What did he do to this boy?)

He's looked away from Jack. Finds his eyes tracking along the room's perimeter, pausing now and then to stare at nothing. (For fuck's sake, if he could remember something, if he knew the shape of any piece of this, he might see some way forward.) (Maybe. Or he might bring it to ruin, regardless.)

When he looks up again, his vision settles near Jack, not quite holding him. "I have no interest in quashing her optimism.

"It's— She is. Charming. I don't mean her any harm."

And, after a breath, his eyes fix on Jack. "...I'm not certain you are replaceable."

<.>

"I'm certain I am, to certain men," he responds immediately, but the hardness in his eyes is gone for a moment, replaced with painful longing. This gives way to further anger, as though he can't help but feel furious with Orev for making him feel anything but bitter, and with himself for being weak. (4 on Performance.)

He pokes the inside of his cheek with his tongue, then tries to continue. "You don't know me. You don't know what I've been through. Don't talk about me like you do." A harsh jerk of his head towards the door. "And if you don't mean her any harm -"

There's a pause here as though an idea has struck him. He glances at Orev and seems to soften, perhaps even be considering offering an olive branch. "If we're going to keep together as a 'unit', maybe you could help us."

<.>

He doesn't know what to make of that; the pain, the angry bitterness, and why it feels so pointed, so particular.

(He might know, if he could remember anything, anything.) (It. Might be better that he doesn't know. (He doesn't believe that.))

There's a moment in which he nearly argues that he does know Jack, which must be an impulse toward gambit, toward bravado, because he doesn't know this man. ((However much he might, perhaps, like to.)) (And even if. Even if he knew Jack once before, that knowledge has been excised, with no telling whether it can ever be returned.)

The change in tone throws him. Orev looks at if he doesn't quite trust whatever Jack's leading toward (it's too good to be true, isn't it? when the boy's been nothing but prickly, ireful in his direction), though he keeps hesitation from his voice when he replies, "That strikes me as reasonable."

Possibly. Depending on the ask. (Depending on what Orev is capable of achieving.)

"You have something in mind?"

<.>

He knows it's too easy, but he didn't expect Orev not to be suspicious. Even if he actually didn't know the man, he's a gambler: he knows people don't trust as easily as they claim.

(No one but Cala, anyway.)

Still, it's worth a try.

"I have something in mind. Maybe it'll satisfy your curiosity about the baker," he shrugs. Unfolding his arms, he rests his hands on his knees. "Cala. I won her. Not that I was trying to," he adds, his remark carrying some hints of disdain. "Some piece of shit tossed their contract into a pot he was sure I'd lose."

Of course, he hadn't begun losing that night.

"I didn't realize what it was until after, and now I've got a too-trusting, 'charming' Threadborn at my beck and call. Can't tear up the contract because she didn't make it with me; I just inherited it. So that's what we're out to do: get her autonomy back."

A little wave of one hand. "The baker said she knew I owned Cala's soul. She said our redemption's at the Drowned Crossroads."

[orev, insight check: 20 not-nat]

[jack, deception: 29]

As far as Orev can tell, Jack is telling the truth as though his life depends on it.

<.>

It seems he isn't the only one in the business of owning souls.

That isn't a helpful thought. It also isn't strictly true, and he's not about to say it, for fuck's sake. For several moments, he only lets himself consider the information. Thinking—

Well. The girl is probably better off with this man than whoever came before him.

And. There are always ways to slip out from a contract. (A thought - a knowledge? - that stings sharper than he'd like, with roots he cannot trace.)

Slowly, eventually, he nods, eyes not-quite-settled on the window. "The baker. It might be wise to pay her another visit."

Then, perhaps (??) attempting levity (??), never mind that the words fall a bit flat, "You do still need to eat, in any case."

His arms have settled at his side, and one hand flexes again, again in thought. "Do you know how she came to— Mm. Be parted from her soul in the first place?"

<.>

Jack looks faintly surprised - perhaps that Orev is so amenable to helping - but replies, "I didn't ask. I get the impression her parents sold her. It happens. I don't think it's anything she cares to talk about."

There's another silence from him before he goes on, "You're concerned about me eating. Why? It's not like I'm starving myself."

<.>

"...You mentioned your hunger. I would prefer that you not pass out while we're attempting to get our bearings."

That's definitely the entire reason. Or. It's the entire reason that Orev's given to himself; he's not going to touch the impulses behind it, because it doesn't particularly make sense that he'd give a shit one way or another about this boy's care, certainly not. It's all practicality. Yes, practicality and tactical cohesion.

He shakes his head, huffs a perhaps-forced sound of derision. "I can't begin to imagine what the Old Ways have to say about fainting. The barber might attempt to exorcise you via an over-bloody dental extraction."

He clears his throat. Looks back at the boy. "Are you familiar with the Drowned Crossroads?"

(And. A thought occurs, briefly, dim: Is your soul your own?)

<.>

The joke about the barber passes without reaction.

Jack shakes his head. "I've never heard of it. Them. Whatever they are." The Drowned Crossroads, he means. "But I find out what I need to know over a game of dice, when Cala isn't trying to throttle me for -"

For just a moment there, he had half a fond smile on his face. However, he seems to remember who he's talking to and the smile abruptly vanishes, replaced with his familiar cold impassiveness.

"I have rations. I'll eat when I need to eat. I don't need you mothering me."

<.>

[q: does orev have any scattered memory flashes related to the drowned crossroads, or to crossroads in reference to the owning and exchange of souls?

Nope.
However, everyone in Druskenvald knows -
the crossroads are where one goes to make a deal with "the devil".
Or whatever entities want to accept the terms.
This is, of course, known to be a superstition, so whatever the baker meant, Orev would know it's probably not that]

"I'm not—" He snaps his mouth shut, jaw tightening. Suddenly, he's glaring very sharply through the window.

Fine.

It's fine.

Let the boy do what he pleases, it isn't (it ought to be) (it *is*) Orev's business. He could point out that Jack's state this very morning suggests some need for care, but no, no, he wouldn't want to *mother* the boy.

Prickly little (brat) *shit*.

"Do as you please. Though I'd venture to say that the information may be gleaned without the company of dice."

And, moving quickly along, "I'd like to see the contract sometime. If— She doesn't mind. It might help."

<.>

Jack lets the silence drag out, offering no response to anything Orev says. He seems to be wrestling with himself, perhaps trying to convince himself 'do as you please' isn't a command.

Finally, he asks quietly, "Was there anything else?"

<.>

"...Am I detaining you."

<.>

Jack raises an eyebrow and counters with rising, perhaps performative, suggestion, "I came up here to sleep. Am I tempting you to stay in my room while I get in bed?"

<.>

His response follows on impulse, too quickly, "And here I thought you'd had your fill."

Fucking. Tolliver.

Orev.

Immediately.

Regrets saying that.

(Well. The boy wasn't entirely wrong; he's already got Orev feeling an uncommon amount of regret. ...Shit.)

He takes a breath. Sighs deeply. (Thinks that. Sees that. Yes, this man is... attractive would be an understatement. Appealing. Something about him is— Uncommon. The boy is uncommon. And if Orev were to let himself consider it, wouldn't it be nice to—) (For SHIT'S sake, he can't think about this!)

Again, he clears his throat.

Again, he finds he's not quite looking at Jack.

He makes himself focus on the man.

Breathes again.

Attempts to compose himself, intends to speak, something wry or something vaguely dismissive or something to excuse himself from the room.

What he says instead: "I'm not certain how you knew me. Or what I was to you. But the— The knowledge is lost to me.

"It might do you well to know this."

And once again, he knows Regret.

<.>

Jack holds his eyes unflinchingly, then replies softly, firmly, "I never knew you."

There's a breath half-drawn. An unsteadiness, and then, "I never knew you. You weren't anything to me. You're not anything to me now."

He shakes his head as though unconcerned, his half-smile showing a glint of teeth. "You're never going to be anything to me. Probably will do you well to know that."

[orev, insight check: 1]

Jack seems to be telling the truth.

<.>

Orev hears these words as truth.

Hears these words as truth.

And yet. Something. *Something* nags at him. Perhaps this boy never knew him. Perhaps they've never met. But there's some manner of connective tissue between them. And that glinting smile— Oh he doesn't (and he does, oh he *does*) like that.

What he says, voice near-hissing, eyes burning, forefinger pointed at Jack: "*Listen* to me."

It might be a command. It certainly has all the force of a command, intended or otherwise.

"Whatever it is you haven't said. Whatever it is you're dancing around. Gambler, rogue; speak in what vague truths you like. I *will* find what you've hidden."

(What he doesn't like, what he doesn't want to think about: How much a wounding it is, to hear that never. To know its resonance like vow, like promise, like ending. To have offered— Something. Showed his hand, bared his throat in admission, and this is what he's met with.

Perhaps he should have known. Perhaps the risk couldn't have been worth it.

He's given something up and this is... What? A sour, a corrosive return. It's his own fault, really. He should have known better.)

He shakes his head, arms crossed again until he throws one hand upward. "This ire of yours, for what?

"This poison.

"And yet you'd take my aid."

He watches the boy a moment longer, bright fury (and something, something other, deeper, velvet-looming anguish) crowding his vision. Then, curtly, "Sleep as you like. Join us for dinner if you'd like.

"As you say: You don't need 'mothering.'"

<.>

[orev, insight check: 15]

Orev sees an immediate remorse flickering in Jack's eyes on the heels of what he said; the rogue does his best to hide it, even through the faint anger at being commanded to listen. By the time Orev finishes speaking, Jack isn't looking at him. His shoulders are stiff as though he's fighting slumping, curling in on himself. His hands flex, curling into loose fists and uncurling again.

He remains silent after, only eventually looking up, clearly guilty, clearly hurting, and clearly trying to hide it from Orev.

His jaw works against whatever else he's trying not to say before he replies quietly, "I'll take your aid for her. Not for myself."

<.>

He was on the verge of leaving. He'd felt, nearly followed the impulse to free himself from this room, this mass of stranded... feelings, the thoughts that lead only to confusion, to a sense of, well, it can't be betrayal, but of wounding, of a dagger inflicted with a sardonic, a sneering grin.

This, though.

He doesn't know what to make of what he sees.

What he thinks (what he knows): There's more to this - more to Jack - than he comprehends.

And. There's no need to make this more difficult. (For himself?) (For Jack?) (He doesn't know.)

He moves a hand to his neck. Rubs. Feels the drag of his claws.

And dares to speaks again, "For her, I give it freely."

(Thinking, 'I might, I think I would, for you as well.')

Then. "I don't know your name.

"I don't know my own.

"I would prefer not to be at odds with you."

<.>

Jack needs a minute to think, because he comprehends some sincerity in Orev's words. In, maybe, the way he's rubbing at his neck. (Jack's eyes linger too long and perhaps longingly on Orev's throat.) He considers the offer, and then the admission.

Finally, he clears his own throat. "My name is Jack. Yours is Orev. Jack and Orev don't have any reason to be at odds that I can think of, except that you keep coming uninvited in my fucking room."

It's a wry sort of peace offering; even with that last bit, he doesn't seem particularly hostile. Rather, it's almost an offer to return to square one with each other.

<.>

It's relief. (It feels more sweeping than it should be. He only just met this man. It shouldn't really matter.) (He doesn't believe that, at all.) It's an inhale taken when he'd forgotten, he finds, to breathe. It's a loosening at the center of his chest, slight, slight, but not without (meaning) effect.

(It feels like mercy.)

He very nearly, nearly smiles.

What he does manage, what he offers is a nod to himself, a meeting - if he can - with Jack's eyes. (Eyes someone might fall into. Eyes that might be a pleasure to lose oneself within.) Orev and Jack; yes, they might as well start there. (But what existed before? What might they have—) (It doesn't matter. Not just now.) (Maybe.)

"You present a fair point. About— The needlessness of hostility."

And. Possibly. About the room. But— "Perhaps next time you'll invite me in, and save us both the headache."

<.>

Thinking the conversation is winding down and feeling wearier than he did half an hour ago (and yet somehow lighter?), Jack will wait until Orev seems to take the hint and start heading for the door. Until he has his hand on the doorknob.

He breaks his own silence with a cryptic and almost playful, "If you did know me, you'd know why I'd never invite you in."

[orev, insight check: 7; DC 5]

Jack's not being THAT cryptic.

He seems to be suggesting something about how one would go about gaining entrance to his room, not about whether Orev will always be unwelcome.

But and also, he's suggesting that Orev not knowing how to go about getting into Jack's bed is evidence that they were never involved before.

<.>

Orev will—

Let that remark land.

Decide he isn't entirely clear about its meaning but. But, he thinks he sees it near enough.

And as he begisn to turn the doorknob, he'll offer over his shoulder, eyes seeking Jack, "Something to consider for the future, perhaps.

"Food for thought."

And, as he moves to leave, "Sleep well, Jack."

(Oddly. Oddly, he feels like there was almost another... Name? Term? Something, in place of 'Jack.' It's gone without a trace.)

<.>

Jack rejoins the party and has some bread and cheese, despite Cala’s warning not to spoil his dinner (and ignoring Orev’s encouragement that yes he should eat; he was going to eat anyway, so no one tolD him what to do!).

The party travels to the pavilion, a Very Large (house-sized! whoa!) open-air gazebo. Everyone’s wrapping up their day of trade etc., and the party meets the Jenkins family - Walter, Gilly, Dani, and their dog Shuck - coming from the Druskenvald’s home. Orev is super good at talking with people. They learn the Jenkins family was assigned to the house three years ago by Mayor Summerton, when the house was dedicated to the Druskenvalds.

[Q: Why was the house dedicated to/set aside for the Druskenvalds?]

Walt and Walt shake hands hell yeah! Gilly mentions being surprised that the Druskenvalds ended up showing at all. The subject of previous house residents seems to cause discomfort in the Jenkins family. The Jenkins rarely leave the estate, and grow food their themselves. The Druskenvalds do sound like night people, and Walt-not-undead makes a little joke ooOoOO. Cala is able to approach the dog; Orev is not. Shuck is, according to Dani, much better than Wisp the cat, and protects her. Shuck and Wisp both came with the house. Dani has concerns about ghosts, and is hoping to get a ghost-based book from the bookshop.

Gilly: "You know children and their imaginations. Their fits of interest.”
Orev: "I know how children can be."
Jack (clearly fucking around): "Oh, do you have children?"

The Jenkins family walks off, and though Dani doesn’t look back, Shuck sure does.

As the party approaches the Druskenvald estate, an old man appears ranting about death, doom, pain, the Crooked Man, the Crooked House, the Crooked Queen, death, annihilation, and btw can you spare a copper? Old Man does a lot of pointing. Jack tries to calm Old Man down. Jack gives Old Man a copper to get a drink at the inn; Orev gives Old Man a gold piece for who knows what reason, he’s helping. Orev shares what he’s heard of the Crooked Man with the party - that he takes a myriad of forms, that he has a rebirth every century or so - thinking it a myth.

A bit of info gleaned from a local (most are adamently Not Helpful and don’t wish to speak of these things): The estate was previously inhabited by the Lockwoods. Eustace Lockwood killed his family and the servants. Orev cannot talk like a human, and as they leave, Jack repeats back, “We’re sorry for your loss?” For a moment, Jack seems to show something like… fondness? Then covers it quickly.

They approach the estate and— Well this house that looked well-maintained from a distance is suddenly Very Spooky, huh! A very tall and toothy man-figure greets them, and Jack kind of. Takes Orev to the side. Jack asking whether Orev remembers anything at all from before, because he’s realizing that though he thought Orev simply doesn’t know his own identity, it’s becoming clear he doesn’t remember anything. Orev is not particularly reassuring, but yes he does have magic.

Jack: “I need to know what you remember. I thought this was a joke. [+illegible]”
Orev: “Does it matter?”
Jack: “It matters to me.”

Orev can tell that Jack is distressed, maybe a little scared.

Orev: “I remember enough to get myself through anything. We’re fine.”
Jack: “You don’t remember the Druskenvalds?”

Orev absolutely does not remember anything about the Druskenvalds pre-train.
Jack notes that Orev is a warlock and asks if Orev knows who his patron is. Orev would like to know how Jack knows this! Jack like, ‘because the spells??’ Orev does not catch this not-quite-truth. Jack is concerned that Orev doesn’t recall his own patron.

Orev (lying through his birdman-teeth): “I know who my patron is.”
Jack (relieved, not seeing the lie): “That’s something.”

Meanwhile, Cala and Walt and The Toothy Figure have been standing awkwardly. Walt offered Toothy Figure his book, Toothy Figure flipped though it, and tosses it back to Walt as Jack and Orev finally rejoin the party. (The Toothy Figure and the house itself may be getting pretty sick of their shit, oh no ah dear how sad!) Tells them the Druskenvalds are waiting inside. Seems off his game. But does say something something about all of them returning from whence they came in blood and fire, cool cool cool.

The party enters the house and is met with creepy goddamn portraits, including one with all of them sans teeth, which definitely isn’t weird at all! Orev fails a check and finds a tooth on the ground, which seems strange, but Jack thinks being a bird and having teeth is stranger really. While they argue about teeth, Orev has a sense of deja vu.

The party moves to a gallery room. A bloodstone is taken, a marble peacock is fought (and absolutely, beautifully destroyed by Jack’s final sneak attack) (Orev both turned on and a little uneasy because Jack was that a pointed killing of a bird hold on??). Also there was a ghost or something. Whatever, Jack’s got a nice and presumably decently valuable stone now!

Onto the next room! A parlor with a spirit board, to which Calamus and Orev move. Orev tells Jack to sit. Jack sits at Orev’s right hand, not looking at Orev, though he does have goosebumps. Something about this feels Very Familiar to Orev, and it seems almost like Jack was following a habit.

Cala, Jack, and Orev speak with a spirit that identifies itself as Patrini, oho one of the servants from one of those creepy creepy portraits! They learn that he served the Lockwoods for twenty years and was indeed killed by Eustace. But and also possibly a hag was involved in the death? And also there is a hag in the house, up in the attic. And also it’s mementos time! Patrini tells them to find his son, who still lives.

Jack: “Can I get up now?”
Orev: “You may rise.”
Calamus (spelling it out with the planchet): “Now kiss.”

Jack will noT be kissing Orev, as he says plainly. Orev tries to order Jack to open the door to the next room. Jack resists the command, though and Orev can tell Jack is actively working to resist the pull of (some kind of) command. Orev goes to the door and opens it himself.

Jack (little shiT!): “Good birdy.”

Orev glares. And they move on to the conservatory! Where Orev tries to… buy… the cup Petunia is holding, because see he definitely collects things like this. Calamus achieves he cup by offering to get Petunia a fresh round of tea.

Now it’s kitchen time! The kitchen is just a mess and there are spirits in the fire and yes Jack unlocks it when Orev suggests maybe the rogue should try that lock (which was not a command but sure sounded like one to Jack oooops).

Jack: “Stop ordering me around!”
Orev: “I didn’t…?”

The party takes a short rest, during which Orev realizes Jack is playing with a rabbit’s foot and HOLD ON THAT IS HIS?? It looks really familiar and his focus is honed. Orev asks where Jack got the foot. Jack says it’s been in his pocket this whole time, and in fact has been with him for nine months. Orev orders Jack to give it to him. Jack hesitates, resists, resists, but eventually shoves it into Orev’s hand. Orev now recognizes it as his arcane goddamn focuS.

Orev: “You’ve been using this for nine months?”
Jack: “It’s been in my pocket.”
Orev: “And how long has your luck been awful.”
Jack: (…has… nothing to say to that)
Orev: “I’d be interested to know how you came into possession of this. If I’m not mistaken - and I’m not - this is mine.”
Jack (sounding furious): “Oh, you recognize a rabbit’s foot. Are you saying you have memories?”
Orev: “I’m saying that I recognize it now.”

Jack does not seem pleased at all. Seems to speak with hurt, anger, resentment and he’s not even trying to hide it.

Orev: “Did I give this to you?”
Jack: “You never gave me anything.”

(Oh. No. :c)

Edited 2025-10-29 19:44 (UTC)

Jack, now alone in the kitchen, cries. ;.;.;.; :c :c :c

In the hallway, Calamus shoves Orev.

Calamus: “I said kiss, not kill.”
Orev: (no words; simply stunned??)
Calamus (to Walt): “You said enemies to lovers!”
Walter: (shruggy, hands up gesture)
Orev: “He’ll be fine.”

The conversation turns to discussion of whether everyone’s liable to die in this house (because really if they’re all going to die, Cala would like to know why Orev and Jack shouldn’t kiss!). Calamus thinks everyone dies in this house.

Orev: “I don’t think that’s allowed.”
Calamus: “By who.”
Orev: (suspiciously silent)

Cala asks why Jack obeys Orev’s commands, and notes that she has to obey anything Jack tells her to do, though Jack is careful not to speak any orders to her. She mentions Jack said he’d never order her around, unless it’s for her safety.

Calamus: “He has my contract.”
Orev: “I have been curious about that.”
Calamus: “Mm!”
Orev: “He possesses your soul.”
Calamus: “Yeah. But not for long!”

Cala asks Orev if he tried to sell Jack’s contract (never mind that Orev has neither confirmed nor denied the possibility of any such contract, or that he really, really does not remember), and says the man who held her contract before Jack tried to sell her often. Orev says he wouldn’t sell a contract.

Calamus: “When I met him he was sad. He’s less drunk all the time now. So maybe if you’re not going to kiss, you should stop trying to break his heart.”

Orev enters the kitchen again, to find Jack who is sitting on the floor, head on his arms, looking a bit more composed now, and who definitely wasn’t crying at all not even a little. Orev crouches in front of Jack. When Orev stares at Jack and tries to remember anything about him, he absolutely fails his ability check and sees a tooth on the floor. He does not remark on it.

Orev: “I don’t remember you. I don’t remember anything.”

Orev goes on, saying that he would like to remember. Saying that he has only about a week’s worth of memories, and that his journal is the only thing that’s told him anything about himself. He notes that much in the journal was crossed out, that all names have been obscured. Including what seems to be one particular name appearing over and over. He thinks that name was Jack’s— Or. Well. Whatever name Jack went by when Orev knew him. Also says that he needs the rabbit’s foot since, you know, it’s his arcane focus.

Jack: “I needed it, too.”

Orev once again failing his perception check. Jack asks if Cala sent Orev in here, and tells Orev not to listen to her; she’s got a head full of stupid romantic notions. Orev notes that in that case, she’s in good company with Walt. Orev ventures that he suspects Jack bears a particular mark. Jack says yeah man he’s a gambler with a gun, of course he has marks. Orev asks why Jack is being so difficult. Jack points out that Orev doesn’t know who Orev used to be, so why should Orev think Jack has any cause to trust him? Orev would really, really like to reach something, and makes a… Not. Great. Attempt—

Orev: “There’s something missing in you.”
Jack: (freezes; then, nodding, licking his lips): “At least I know who I am.”
Orev: (has no words; starts toward the door)
Jack (as Orev reaches the door): “You seemed like you meant it last time you said it.”
Orev: “…What do you mean?”

Jack shrugs, big ‘who can say!?!’ vibe. Orev leaves the room, causing Cala and Walt to stumble back from the door, because they sure were listening in!

The party enters the dining room and fights a tablecloth and a jelly while being harassed by hurled fish, sugar, and the like. Jack gets another critical sneak hit, this time on the jelly! Walt gets sugar on his face, but that’s okay because it tastes nice! Orev tries to hurl the sugar bowl at the jelly for vengeance purposes, but hits Calamus instead, oh nO. Walt wipes the sugar off his face with the dead tablecloth, and tries using it to help with Cala’s sugar-on-face situation as well. Orev finds a gold ring and a Pearl of Power. Jack wants the pearl! Orev points out that he himself can actually use the pearl.

Orev: “Why don’t you take the ring?”
Jack: “I don’t want any ring from you.”

In the music room, the party comes across their first round of weasels (let the games begin!!!! all! the! weasels!). Jack crits on a weasel. The harpsicord has been playing a tune. After the fight, Orev uses mage hand to tap the keys. Then Jack sits and plays - quite well! - A Very Familiar Tune. The supernatural music stops, and the spirit of Joseph Patrini appears. He begins singing with the music, much like the spirit on the train. Orev has another memory of dancing: Someone's hand on his waist as they dance, with passing images of Jack smiling abashedly, looking down to keep track of his feet and counting in time with the music. In the wake of these memories, present-Orev reaches out, and Jack goes tense, looks at Orev. Orev can’t read this look (though it seems as if maybe, just maybe, Jack was crying again (f m l)), but will keep all of this in mind.

While heading upstairs, Jack takes one of Orev’s feathers, not trying to be sneaky about it, and sticks the feather in his hat. Orev wants to argue, but he’s… Charmed? He lets the matter go, probably clearly definitely simply because it’s not worth the fight! Also the Toothy Man appeared before they headed upstairs, brandishing an axe and being dramatic talking about people he cut down. Okay bro.

Up to the sitting room they go! Orev wants to check out the books which don’t yield anything of particular interest but dO kick off a fight in which a mass of weasels (writhing! what fun!) occurs and a grandfather clock won’t shut up and Orev gets to set fire to the clock which we know is fun for him. In a could-be-horrific horrific turn of events, Walt is attacked and loses a tooth, then is swarmed by the weasel-mass, which licks licks the sugar at his face. Orev kills off the swarm in a mostly just kind of horrified way. Walt returns the tooth to his jaw, and picks up a pocket watch with etched words that read ‘Remember the 3rd.’ Jack sprawls on the sofa and Watches Orev. The party takes a long rest, and while Orev is sleeping, Jack takes the rabbit’s foot again, as well as the Pearl of Power. He takes the journal, as well, peruses it through the rest, and returns it before Orev wakes.

Edited 2025-11-01 16:23 (UTC)

Well well well, it seems that time in the house is not moving! Look outside? It’s storm and perpetual midnight o dear!

In the midst of this external midnight, Orev wakes from a restless sleep, having dreamed over and over of the scene with Jack, and feels a deep sense of loss. In the dream, there was a bit more detail: He saw Jack smiling, looking down at his feet while they danced, as though Orev were teaching him; Orev also remembered being very happy.

Now awake, Orev wants that rabbit foot back ffs Jack?? Tries to get it back; commands Jack to give him the foot, and has a strong feeling that this has happened before, intuiting that Jack does this when he gets petulant and pouts. As well, Orev feels/knows there’s a way to get Jack over it, but can’t remember what it is. When Jack returns the foot, Orev offers—

Orev: “Good lad.”

Orev, having put Blood Bolt into a small pen, tries to give the item to Calamus. Jack sees the mark on the pen and tells her nope no no no do noT take that! He’s clearly, clearly fixed on the mark on the object. Orev gives it to Walt instead, okay finE. Jack meanwhile explains to Calamus that she ought not to take items bearing that particular mark. And Jack gives the pearl of power - stolen from Orev, by the way!! - to Calamus; Orev feels very tired, very sad. As Cala and Walt start down the hall, Jack puts a hand on Orev’s chest—

Jack: “I don’t have your focus anymore. But I have your name.”
Orev: “I’m not sure it’s my name anymore.”
Jack: “Oh, no. It’s mine now.”

Orev casts Detect Thoughts. He receives impressions: A lot of surface hurt, and Jack isn’t thinking Orev’s other name. At the forefront, Jack is thinking about stealing the focus for the first time, and the feeling that he doesn’t have anything else to remember birdman by. Orev is hit by a wave of hurt, feeling thoughts of ’I had nothing from you’ and ’I couldn’t even follow you.’ For all that Jack seems like he’s playing right now, this is definitely coming from a place of revenge. There’s also a sense of deep satisfaction that Orev is paying attention to him.

Orev: “When was it that I taught you to dance?”

With the question, Orev probes deeper with Detect Thoughts. Jack thinks of a party, where everyone has long gone home, and it’s just the two of them. Jack is so startled by Orev’s question that he doesn’t immediately answer aloud, and there’s a panic in his thoughts, aH!!

Jack: “What are you talking about?”
Orev: “I’d like to know your true name.”
Jack (picking up on the Detect Thoughts cast): “It doesn’t matter. You won’t remember it.”

Jack thinks: Why would he remember teaching me to dance? Why not anything else? The more Jack thinks about it, the sadder he looks, and the sadder his thoughts become.

Orev: “I suspect it matters to me.”
Jack: “You’ve had your memory for a week. Where were you for nine months before that? It doesn’t matter.”
Orev (unintentionally dropping Detect Thoughts): “I have no idea.”

Jack takes this as approval; as meaning that yes Orev’s previous name is his, all his to keep. And Jack will be smirking any time Orev looks over (little! brat!!!).

Into the childrens’ bedroom the party proceeds! With Walt leading, and finding an animate doll who asks him to check for monsters. He does check under the bed for monsters, and he sure does find a horrific one. Orev follows Walt into the room as the battle’s beginning, and is grappled by The Lurker. Jack, hearing this happens, shouts ‘Orev!,’ starts running, and crits on that Lurker goddamn?? (That is HIS bird >:O!!! Only hE may bully!) Jack shoots, and shoots, and shoots the Lurker until it’s mostly a hole-ridden, torn-up and largely unrecognizable corpse. When the battle ends, the mysterious animate doll settles to inanimation, and Walt takes the doll.

In the closet of this bedroom, Orev finds… H u h. That sure is a satchel with a moving eye on it: The Bag (ooOoOoo)! As soon as he touches the bag - part bag of holding; part holder of a Lurker that may fight and allllso might sneak out to cause some shit - it attunes itself to him. He, uh. Waits until the rest of the party has vacated the room to follow after, preferring not to mention or explain this bag.

Now! To the bathroom! Into which Walt leads them because this is what they’re doing, opening and entering every door! This turns out to be a mistake, because the bathroom begins to fill up with blood and weasels until Jack unlocks the door and party members and remaining weasels alike slide from the room in a rush of blood. Walt packs a bunch of weasels into a sack for a snacky snack. Jack does not like being coated in blood very much, and discards the feather he stole from Orev because it too is covered in blood. Orev finds a— Are you kidding, Orev finds a figurine of wondrous power, and though this kind would typically be a raven, this particular figure is a duck. Orev thinks the house maybe has it out for him.

Party takes a short rest. Orev takes a feather from himself and - attempting to sneak - puts it into Jack’s hat. Though Jack does notice, he acts like he doesn’t, and he doesn’t move or say anything; simply lets the feather happen. Orev slinks away, so sneaky!

Next up: A bedroom! And a writhing shape beneath the sheets. Orev’s mage hand pulls off the blanket bit by bit to reveal a bunch of weasels in Phillip clothes. Jack, having anticipated more of this nonsense, prepped a bottle of oil and a rag in the hall, hurls it at the bed, and burns the mass of weasels. Cala follows up by destroying Filthy Jasper with ice. Jack and Calamus have Had Enough Of This. The party is left to regard the journal of Philip Druskenvald, unlocked by Jack. Philip writes of losing his powers on entering Wickermore Hollow; Adela wanted to leave, but Philip figured they could fight through the problem and come out stronger. There’s also a note about missing nobility from Astramar; Headmistress Narcissa has been looking for this missing noble (who ever could that be hahaha haaaaa ha). Jack goes to stand in the rain on the balcony, rinsing off the bathroom blood as well as he can. Afterward, the Toothy Figure appears again. The party is not especially impressed. Jack preps another bottle for fire purposes.

The nursery is filled with an ear-peircing infant scream, and the party fights a trio of animated stuffies. Orev is insulted by the presence of a raven stuffie. (The stuffies are in fact the cutest little guys thank you very much and shhhh Orev.) Cala gives the bear to the spirit babby, comforts spirit babby, and the bear is now in her possession, booM.

In the library, there is a cat! Who wants slash demands a story! Orev tries stumblingly to tell a?? Story?? Of some kind? It does not go well, but then most of the party realizes the cat’s got some serious ill-will and it’s best not to tell a story, anyway. Orev searches the shelves and finds an ancient tome, similar to the stolen paper he had/followed. It tells of a curse that resembles Orev’s, and illustrates parts of an incantation, though there are many blank pages. A note scribbled in the margins mentions secrets collected by demons, and includes symbols of eyes and [ ?? something else… wings?]. Orev will be taking this tome, thanks very much. On the liquor cart, there are four potions of healing; Orev passes one to each party member. Meanwhile, Walt begins to recite a romance novel to the cat, only to be hushed and told ‘later’ by Jack.

The trophy room has a Midsommared lady sewn into a bear, and a lot of taxidermied creatures with bulging eyes. Orev cuts through a seam of the stuffed bear, the creature is defeated, the last memento is collected, and the overhead trapdoor becomes! Accessible! Leading the party upward to a room covered in runes, and a door waiting for the momentos to be carefully (so carefully!) placed within. Jack is a brat about giving up the bloodstone for the door.

Jack: “It’s mine! Haven’t you taken enough?”

Jack does eventually shove it into Orev’s hand, the door opens, and the party enters the cauldron room, where a weasely hag called Vesla Browntooth (ah,yes, the weasels foretold her coming!) is in the midst of some manner of ritual with a bubbling cauldron and Philip and Adela. The hag tried to play a switcheroo by disguising herself as Adela and Adela as the hag, but oops no go on that babe, and the fight begins. The hag makes The Biggest Mistake by going after Calamus, attacking her and then fully shoving her face into the cauldron’s contents. Jack is pissed. Orev is pissed. Walt is pissed. Walt knocks Vesla prone. Orev drags and holds her with his magical chain (Jack, watching this, may or may not be jealous okay yes he iS jealous oh no puppyyyy). Jack shoots the absolute hell out of the hag, unloading round after round and tattering that corpse because you do NOT mess with Calamus! By the time Jack has finished, everyone is covered in Vesla guts and blood, what can u do.

After the fight, Philip and Adela gather themselves. The party finds scribblings that reveal Vesla to be one of three members of a coven or some such. There are also so, so many teeth. (In other worlds, every Rin is so jealous!!) On the way out, Jack snags the bloodstone again, and Walt takes the doll (which will end up tucked into bed in the shared inn room, sorry Jack(. Once downstairs, Philip tells the party he’s decided to remain in the mansion while in Wickermoor Village. In fairness, the mansion is now significantly less crooked and less decrepit, much more livable, and also the remaining weasels have scattered to the village, so that’s nice at least? Philip pays them each 75gp for their assistance. He lets Jack and Orev borrow a pair of clothes, and Adela gives Cala a shirt that fits her like a dress; Adela insists that she keep it, saying it looks better on Calamus. Finally, the party heads out into the 1:00am-ish night and back toward the inn.

Jack, after not speaking during the walk back to the village, goes to take a bath, and is immediately followed by Orev. This time, Orev does doing some staring at those shoulders, looking for the mark and not? Seeing? A mark?

Jack (yep he’s in the tub): “See something you like?”

Orev casts Detect Thoughts and receives: ‘This is typical. Why doesn’t he just do something? I am so tired. I can’t believe he used the chain on someone else.’ Knows Jack is thinking about the feather pretty much every time he looks in the direction of his hat. ‘Never gonna be clean, all this blood.’ A lot of confusion about why Orev is following him and staring. A question about why Orev keeps creating opportunities and not using them. Also kind of thinking about who the other Puppy was, and how many others were there?

Orev catches on this reference to other… Puppies? And okay one, concludes that Jack was his ‘Puppy.’ Two, he has no idea who any other ‘Puppy’ woulD be.

Jack’s thoughts, cont’d: ‘Who did he like better, and why wasn’t I good enough?’ Lots of feeling sorry for himself. And: He misses him so much. Orev can tell that that missing is always there, and that’s probably what Jack’s hiding whenever he tries to reject Detect Thoughts.

Orev crouches by the tub, puts his hand on Jack’s shoulder.

Jack’s thoughts, cont’d: ‘Has he forgotten everything? How to deal with people? What’s he doing? Is he fucking with me?’

Orev (speaking without planning to): “I’m not fucking with you.” And: “Where is it?”
Jack (his thoughts showing confusion): “What do you mean, where is it?”
Orev: “You must have had a mark. I don’t understand why you wouldn’t. Everything I’ve seen. Everything I’ve read— I would have. You would have the mark.”
Jack: “If I’d had a mark, it would’ve been gone when you sent me away.”

Note that to Orev’s knowledge, he is in fact able to take the mark away if he wants to. He has no sense of whether he did or would have done any such thing to Jack. (But. Yes. Draža did remove Gideon’s mark after leaving for the last time. Gideon was given no warning and no reason why.)

Orev: “I don’t know why I would have done that.”
Jack (leaning back, staring at the ceiling): “You would have done it because you were done with me. Hypothetically.”

Jack’s thoughts, cont’d: Going through the memory of that last night in little bursts. A lot of Jack thinking it’s his own fault for saying what he did, thinking it was so stupid. There are images Orev’s glimpsed before. There’s also Orev saying, ‘There’s something missing in you. You’re not enough.’

And Orev immediately drops Detect Thoughts.

Orev: “I wish I could remember. It might be a mercy that I don’t.”

Orev reaches over and brushes back a bit of Jack’s hair. In response, Jack does something that registers as very familiar: He makes a ‘tch’ sound and pulls away, the vibe of which is very ‘don’t do that right now.’

Orev: “I don’t understand or know why this feels so familiar. We should talk about it. Sometime.”
Jack: “Did now seem like the most apt time to you?”
Orev: “It’s beginning to occur to me that it might not be. But I’m not sure there is a good time.”
Jack: “You’re really bad at interacting with people, aren’t you?”
Orev: “What gave that away? If you knew me before, you must have known this.”
Jack (trying to decide if he wants to play the ‘I don’t know you’ game): “I doubt I would have seen you interact with people much.”
Orev: “I suppose that sounds right.”

Jack exhales, rolls his eyes a little bit.

Jack: “Our interactions were probably more of the midnight variety. If we had them. I don’t think I’m the type you would introduce to your friends.”
Orev: “I’m not sure there would have been friends to introduce you to.”

He gets a little laugh! From Jack!

Orev: “But I think I see your meaning. Maybe. No, that doesn’t… Something doesn’t add up.” And eventually, looking away, “What I’ve remembered has felt very warm and very deep.”
Jack: “I thought they were.”

Orev, very quiet and still not looking at Jack, nods.

Jack: “But you found someone else.”
Orev (looking right quickly at Jack): “What?”
Jack: “Suppose of all the things I could have told, I didn’t have to tell you that.” And. “I wouldn’t want somebody who doesn’t want mean.”
Orev: “What do you mean. What makes you say that.”
Jack (lifts his shoulder): “Read your journal.”

Orev goes quiet again. He’s not really surprised, and looks like he wants to be upset, but isn’t.

Orev: “I suppose I ought to thank you for returning it.”
Jack: “You would have noticed if I hadn’t.”
Orev: “Even so. You might have burned it.” And. “I called you. My Puppy?”

Jack takes a sharp breath. Slowly lets it out, and there’s a very long silence. Then—

Jack: “I gather you called a lot of people your Puppy.”
Orev (taking this as confirmation): “It wasn’t a term particularly prevalent in my journal.”
Jack: “Maybe you crossed it out.”
Orev: “Perhaps. I don’t know what those other instances of redaction would have had anything to do with… A. Puppy (?).”
Jack: “You’ve never been very sane. I don’t know what to tell you; who knows what goes through your head.”
Orev: “No, I gathered as much.”

Little laugh from Jack! Who also dips his fingers in the water and flicks them at Orev.

Orev (with a small, soft smile): “You little shit.”

Orev spends a few moments simply feeling Like This. Jack isn’t in any hurry to move the moment along, himself. He’s enjoying this a lot more than maybe he should be. Jack eventually suggests Orev pull the other tub closer and take his own bath, since birdman is still covered in blood. After thinking about it, Orev does this thing.

For a while, they simply talk. Jack speaks of Calamus and asks Orev about Walt. Orev doesn’t in fact know much about Orev, and admits he’s not certain why Walter is following him at all. (Secrets that we know: Walt stumbled across Orev and realized This Man Needs Protecting. And as Walt was trying to find a new existence for himself outside the land of fight fight fight die fight die fight, life as a bodyguard seemed like an all right plan!)

Eventually, the water’s grown cold, and Jack readies himself to dry off and head out (gambling time babeeeey). Orev tells Jack that if he needs somewhere to sleep, he can come to Orev’s room. And Orev can sleep in a chair or on the floor, nbd.

Jack: “I’ll find somewhere to sleep tonight.”

Orev looks like he’s been slapped in the face. There’s no sign of anger; only sadness. And he reiterates his offer. Reiterates that yes, Jack can come to the room, and yes, he’ll have whatever space he likes to sleep, unharried.

Orev: “Do you doubt me?”
Jack (tone more joking than anything): “Infinitely.”

And Jack departs for the gambling table, leaving Orev to watch the door, to eventually sleep.

(And. To eventually wake to Jack’s unexpected return.)

He wasn't going to sleep in Orev's room; he was tempted to stay in the tavern until the proprietress cleared him out - and sleeping anywhere else wasn't an option, no matter what he said to Orev. Draža made sure of that more than a year ago.

(Not that Jack intends to tell Orev. That, or much else. Or. Much else other than what he's already put to paper. Probably.)

It's the darkest part of night, just before dawn, when he picks the lock on Orev's door. He creeps in, stealthy enough not to stir the other man regardless of whether he's awake or asleep. When he reaches the bed, he pauses, watchful, then sheds his coat, vest, gun, and hat onto a nearby chair. He toes off his boots, quieting their muffled thuds on the floor. Without a word, he slips under the covers and lies on his side, watching Orev's silhouette in the darkness.

He keeps a few inches between them, careful not to do more than barely breathe. Careful not to think about how any of this feels.  <.>

He wakes only when the mattress dips, when he knows the presence of a familiar/unfamiliar body suddenly drawn very near. (Not so very near. He feels the inches as a gulf, abyssal.)

Orev doesn't open his eyes. Schools his breathing to retain its steadiness. And— Listens. Feels the subtle warmth of another body. (Feels how little he recoils from this man's nearness. How he feels nothing but welcome; something like (peace?) (safety) an absence of hazard.)

He hadn't thought Jack would return. He doesn't want to scare the boy away. He's... Very, very certain that if he speaks, he'll shatter whatever this might be.

So he lets a moment, a minute pass. Waiting. Then opens his eyes slowly, and extends a hand toward Jack.  <.>

Jack thinks Draža would have woken immediately. He would have grinned his feral little grin and pressed Jack into the mattress, a winged shadow that towered over him and filled his vision, blocking out all the light.

Mostly. More often than not.

(There were times, though. Softer moments, just like this, when Draža waited for Jack - Gideon, Puppy - to come to him. A hand extended and patient, gentle silence.)

Salt tears sting his eyes and he crams them closed, jaw clenched, turning his head towards the pillows. (He can't help but think -) (Better not to think it. He's getting out of that contract, getting away from Orev-Draža-Daddy forever.) (But for now...?)

He sniffs quietly and forces himself to relax, then edges closer. He had meant only to bring himself nearer, maybe slip his hand into Orev's, but the nearer he draws, the less he can fight the pull. Jack presses himself to Orev's side, he rests one hand on the other man's stomach, head on his shoulder.

<.>

[ insight: 15

Orev recognizes the scent of Jack's hair and the weight of his hand, the perfect fit of their bodies together. Even the way the mattress holds their weight together. He can't remember specifics, but he knows he's spent many, many nights like this. ]

He’s done nothing to deserve this.

(A catch in his throat.) (Something flushed and burning at the edges of his mind.) (He knows this man.) ((Why can’t he remember? Why these glints and these obscure sensations only, taunting, gnawing at him?))

If Orev can’t say why Jack draws near, he senses need in it, something like compulsion, or— Something deeper than that; something that echoes in his own chest.

It’s simple, so simple to shift himself onto his back, even as an arm draws itself around Jack, following his movement or guiding him, or it’s both at once. To feels the man’s hand settle, head settle, and think only yes, that yes, Jack has found his rightful place. To breathe shallow but steady, steady, as if to ease Jack toward calm.

He draws one claw along Jack’s cheek, catching a tear and caressing. (He doesn’t notice the burn at the back of his own eyes.) He ducks his head toward Jack’s hair and— No, he won’t follow the urge to settle a kiss, not yet, but he’ll nestle his cheek and breathe deep, breathe steady.

  Thinking, yes. Thinking welcome. Thinking, this is where you belong.

<.>

If he shudders, it isn't revulsion. It's against the urge to sob for everything he lost, everything that is and isn't quite here, now. It's the feeling of a tear traced away, the scent of (Draža) Orev against him, holding him and breathing steadily. It's the feeling of arms, wings around him and a cheek at his hair.

(Why couldn't we keep this? he wants to ask, but asking means breaking the silence. It means inviting conversations he doesn't want to have. It means Orev might stop.)

Drawing his hand upward, he smoothes it into the feathers at Orev's chest, touch delicate and certain because he has done this a thousand times, because he does know how to touch this man. He never forgot. (How could Draža forget him? How? Did he want to be rid of Gideon that badly?)

He matches his breathing to Orev's, in and out, listening to the steady-wild beat of his heart. (Thinking, it could have been like this always.

But Draža didn't want him.

He doesn't belong here anymore.

It's nice to pretend, though.)

<.>

There are things he knows, has begun to piece together about the man he just have been. The journal tells a scattered, broken story, a man bitten by inferno, seeking some manner of exit and given to destruction. A man given to spilling blood, to sacrifice, to words writ in howling and little to suggest softness.

He knows there was something that man wanted, badly.

He knows there was one name repeated, repeated, and redacted.

(What was he trying to lose.) (And.) (What might he have tried to (protect) save?)

Orev can’t understand why he lost this. Why he would have left this. (He must have hurt this man— Oh, infinitely.) (Why. And why. And why?)

There’s so much he can’t put into place, but what he knows in this moment, what he feels with settled certainty (a wild forest stricken with warm light; a breeze speaking home, and a hand gentle, settled at his heart) (Jack touches him now, and something eases in his lungs; it’s so careful, familiarity he knows he ought to recognize), is rightness.

He wants to say—

(How can this thought, the feelings behind these words, exist?)

I’ve missed you.

Instead, he catches his breath gone staggered and once again calms it steady. (Calms it by following the rise, the fall of lungs so near his own.) He shifts, just a little nearer against Jack. Draws his arm closer in hold, and shifts just slightly to his side, the better to curl against this man. And he does speak, soft, nearly inaudible—

“Thank you.”

And he thinks: Puppy.

<.>

Orev turns and Jack moves in tandem, shifting his hand down and around to loop around (Daddy's) the azureborn's back, finding a familiar path through feathers. (He learned so quickly where to touch carefully, where to pull and where to place his palms, his fingertips. He remembers Draža wincing with a too-rough caress that pulled at the feathers of his upper arms.

He remembers Draža's contented, heavy-lidded eyes at the scratch of fingertips at the base of his skull. It's a memory that inflicts itself so strongly, Jack's own breath hitches.)

He breathes in deeply and exhales with a little, lost sound.

Before he drowns in memories, a voice eases against the silence and Jack acknowledges it only with a small shift of his head against downy feathers, a barely-there nudge of his nose upward at Orev's jaw - then stillness. Then a reply equally soft, just as quiet.

"What for?"

Maybe, maybe if they whisper, the illusion won't fall away.

<.>

For everything.

For not fleeing with the train’s crash.

For the surety and softness of his touch.

For speaking in kind; Orev hadn’t anticipated Jack’s voice. Had half-expected the boy to flinch from Orev’s words, and had been readying himself to calm Jack, to press forehead to forehead and hold there until ease was restored.

“For being here.”

He thinks he means ‘for coming back to bed.’ He thinks he means, ‘for returning,’ and that returning means a good depth of other things, and Orev knows a rotten wrenching somewhere in his soul.

(He doesn’t deserve this. But gods, he (needs) wants it.)

Careful, slowly, he draws two fingertips through Jack’s hair. (He thinks about that sound - small, conflicted; miraculous - from Jack.) (He thinks there was history rung deep through that sound.) (He wants to know it. (Knowledge bears a cost.) (He’ll pay it.) In time. In a moment less strung with quiet; he doesn’t wish to disrupt this.) Tilts his head just slightly, to press Jack’s nose, Jack’s cheek.
 And he dares, now: He sets the lightest kiss to Jack’s hair, not pressing to his skull, only offering, only taking in the presence of this man.

<.>

Jack's answer is a catch of breath, not at the words but at the lightest pressure of a kiss against his hair. Lingering? Offering? He can't tell and he doesn't dare move. He doesn't want to risk shaking Orev off, making him think it's unwelcome.

He's not sure if it is or not. (That's not true.)

If it had been only the words, he thinks he might have been angry that Orev would thank him for being here when Draža left him in the first place. Orev doesn't know, can't possibly understand how it feels. But he's being so careful with Jack, caressing so softly with fingertips and the brush of his cheek, that Jack thinks maybe, maybe he understands very, very well that something important was lost.

Given up.

He wants to say, I never left, but he knows how it would sound; he knows the accusation it would carry. He wants to say For now, but he doesn't want the moment shattered by what the future will hold. Instead, he waits, letting Orev draw out the kiss as long as he likes, before lifting his chin and answering, "Where else would I go?"

Where else but home? he thinks, but doesn't say. He'll never say that. (Look what speaking love lost him.)

His lips brush Orev's jaw when he speaks and linger there, not quite a kiss, for a staggered heartbeat or three afterward.

<.>

‘Where else would I go’; another question sparking countless could-be answers. Because he might be anywhere, anywhere away from Orev. Because there are countless places that might hold existence, here or beyond the shade and shield of this realm’s veil. Because Orev doesn’t know where else Jack might have gone, who and what he’s been, so how could he guess where else Jack might have gone?

(No, he— Knows well enough. Hasn’t he heard it in this man’s voice, seen it in the sadness of his thoughts? Heard it in the music drawn from a harpsicord’s keys. Something profound; something irrevocable and bleeding, lost and too far inflicted to be healed.)

‘Where else would I go,’ another phrase that holdings meanings unsaid and more precise. (What might the boy have said, if he’d felt freer, safer?) (If Orev, if the man Orev was and can’t remember, hadn’t… Done. What he did.) And—

Where has this man had to go, these past nine months.

What has he had, since Orev—

Left him. Abandoned him.

What has existence been for Jack, that he came to Orev’s room and slid so quickly, quietly into bed. That after nine months of absence, of nothing (of being told (Orev had said—) (Orev told the boy he’s missing something, told him—) he wasn’t (how could it ever be true?) wanted, needed; not enough), he moved to the offer of Orev’s hand, and holds (clings) so close to him now, lips light like grace at Orev’s skin.

Orev has closed his eyes. He’s counting, rhythmic, in silence. Trying to sustain. Trying to hold this moment, and not to—

Shatter it. He’s marred enough for this man already; he won’t let this night turn rancid.

He’s like to respond to Jack’s words. He’d like to say, You won’t need to go elsewhere. He’d like to say, I’m here, I’m here, I’m not going to leave.’ And, ’I’ve been waiting for you, my—‘

My Jack. (My Puppy.) ((My Dearest.))

He breathes, and he nestles his cheek against Jack’s head. Nudges, nuzzles against his hair. And says—  “The night has been long.

“It has been so long.”

Then softly, deep in his throat, at his chest, he hums. Not thinking, not allowing thought to enter in with questions that might break this song he knows, though he doesn’t remember it. This song that’s gathered somewhere in his bones, and yes, and yes he hums it now, gathering Jack close against him, offering the song Jack played to a haunted parlor, the song they both witnessed on the train, the song connected to a hand at his waist, and a smile from this beautiful, matchless man.

<.>

"Every night," Jack answers. He doesn't need to explain, he thinks, how every night crawled across his skin with Daddy's absence. He doesn't need to explain how he tried to find relief in gambling, in drinking, in walking dark streets, trying to escape that last conversation.

He hates himself for how his voice breaks, but doesn't hate that maybe, maybe, Orev feels it all, too: the absence, the wanting, the sorrow. (Right now, the relief.)

Because Orev is humming their song. (Theirs, when he was Gideon and Orev was Draža.) (Theirs, now? Maybe tonight, at least? Please?)

Jack clings tighter and nuzzles his face into the crook of Orev's throat, eyes closed, feathers tickling his nose, and for just a moment, he's not Gideon. Orev isn't Draža. They're just...them, together, and it feels safe. It feels like someplace he could have stayed once. (Think of Orev's grin when Jack obeyed him and sat. Think of the steady beat of his heart and the lead of his lungs. Think of the ways he reaches. (It's not enough, but it's something for now.))

(Just listen. Just hear the familiar tune and feel Orev's cheek a comforting weight against his head. Just feel the warmth of their bodies, the bed, the blankets.)

Slowly, he relaxes against Orev, and Jack eases into a dreamless sleep.

<.>

He doesn’t sleep.

(He’s slept enough, for the night.) (He’s been— Gone. Far too long.) ((How do you miss what you can’t remember ever having?) (How else to explain the leaden weight in his chest, how he’s known it since awaking without memory, how it’s light now, or simpler to bear?))

Orev hums until Jack’s breath turns to the tidal fall of sleep, and continues humming long after. Picks up the song again, again, throughout the waning night, the growing dawn, as his hands continue in careful soft caressing, as he gazes on the wonder of this man’s face, lit in time by distant purples, rising oranges, softest, growing gold. (How many nights, how many dawns did he watch this way, stricken?) (Perhaps the count is hundreds. Or. Perhaps he never saw. (Perhaps he never stayed.))

Once or twice, he dares another press of lips against Jack’s hair. Still soft, still without claim. Only wondering. Only wanting to, trying to recall, and if not that, if memory won’t come to him, then at least taking in these moments fully, and keeping them for always.

(His, his, his.) ((This man is his.) (And doesn’t he belong… Here. With Jack.) (To. Jack?))

‘Every night,’ Jack said, and those words grew a stone in Orev’s chest. Seep through him as the hours carry onward, and yes, and yes, there’s more aching to those words than can be fathomed in a word or an instant or a march of days, of years.

(Orev would like to mend— Something. (Whatever he’d done.) Everything.) (He doesn’t know whether it’s within his right, or power. Or whether any attempt to mend might only hurt this man deeper.)

The hours pass, and though he doesn’t sleep, he begins to drift within a pleasant haze. Not entirely real. Not needing (not wanting) what’s only real, the convolutions and conundrums of existence that wait yet to be solved, eased. Only knowing Jack is with him. Only knowing steady breath and heartbeat, and the brush of skin beneath his hand, the soft give of blond between his fingers.

Whatever Orev has been, whatever he has done, he knows that here and on this night, he has been blessed.

When Jack awakens a few hours later, he doesn't notice that Orev is still awake. He sees only thin morning light creeping in through the window. He knows he can't stay here, because staying means talking. It means answering questions he's not ready to face. It means confronting what he's done: sleeping beside the man who threw him aside. ((Is that...what happened? Orev seems so broken, so mournful. Is it possible-) No.)

He doesn't think about how he remained still and safe in Orev's embrace all night as he extracts himself from it. He doesn't think about the biting chill of the room when he leaves the bed. He pulls on his vest and gun, sets his hat (adorned by Orev's feather still) on his head, and picks up his boots from the floor. It's as he's picking up his coat that he sees the arcane focus peeking from Orev's clothing on the same chair.

He doesn't think about that, either. He only takes it in the same motion that he uses to collect his coat before he creeps from the room, closing the door silently behind him.

(Not without one last, hungry, aching look at Orev, however. Not without thinking, I miss you.)

At breakfast when the party reconvenes, Jack acts as though the night before never happened.

<.>

What use in either feigning sleep or restraining Jack?

Orev felt the lull of sleep falling away from the man, felt the body in his arms stirring toward awareness, and toward a tension of decision. (For a moment - brief, and overhopeful - he’d thought perhaps Jack would meet his eyes, and raise fingertips to trace down Orev’s cheek. Had thought that they might… Perhaps not talk, but share a morning’s silence before returning to the world.)

(He’s already taken too much.) (He’s had more than his due.) (He should have known— And really, he did suspect what follows.)

Jack extricates himself from Orev’s hold; Orev doesn’t fight it. Doesn’t close his eyes, but doesn’t speak, scarcely moves. If Jack wishes to leave, perhaps permission, noninterference is the least Orev owes him. (He has the knowledge of this man in deepest sleep, held in his arms and peaceful. If there’s nothing else— (This isn’t an end.) (He wouldn’t and he won’t allow it.) At least he has this to grasp in memory.)

Orev notes the swiftness and the grace in Jack’s departure. How easily he (leaves Orev behind) ((oh, but isn’t that only fair?)) navigates the room in quiet; how he might very well have left unnoticed, had Orev not been awake already. He sees his arcane focus taken (and might almost huff a laugh; does smile, slight and crooked, there and gone again). And he sees—

That look. Watches Jack without demanding attention. Only witnessing the… What is that? Hope, longing, hunger in his eyes. Only feeling a pull and twisting of his own insides. (He needs to fix this, he ought to fix it.) (He doesn’t know how. (Not yet.) He doesn’t know what he did, himself. (Not… Yet.))

For untracked minutes after Jack’s departure, Orev doesn’t move. Scarcely breathes. Only stares at the door, not recognizing the voice of a quiet hope in his own mind (that maybe, maybe the door will open again; maybe Jack will return), not thinking of the way his hand’s moved to his chest and begun tracing, imitating the movement of Jack’s hand.

Eventually, he rises. Dresses, readies himself for the day. And when he joins the table, he notes Jack’s posture, notes what he can only class as hesitation, reticence— Or simply a closed door. And for now, he doesn’t speak of the night. If he watches Jack closely, if he watches Jack often, it’s no different from every other day of watching Jack closely. And if Orev appears somewhat off-balance, poking over-much at his breakfast and looking inexplicably at a loss—

Well. That’s not so much of a chance, either.

And anyway. Anyway, the party has business to attend to, and next steps to be discussed.

<.>

When Cala sees Orev coming down to the table, she stands - casually and not so - from the seat she occupied beside Jack. Moving at a pace that isn't idle, she takes the seat on the opposite side next to Walter under the pretense of reading his book over his shoulder. In doing so, she effectively leaves only the seat beside Jack available. Her eyes flicker up at Orev and back down at the book; she fails to suppress a smile.

Jack doesn't notice this. His attention remains fixed on his food; he picks at it, thinking he should have stayed in bed with Orev. He should have touched his cheek, should have whispered to him, should have kissed him - something. He wishes he had, but knows it would have been a bad idea. It's better this way. (And - and. Orev will realize his focus is gone and still, he'll pay some meager attention to Jack. There's that. He'll demand it back. He'll command it back.

Jack shivers.)

He can feel the heat of Orev's gaze on him. He knows the other man is watching him, just like he has the past few days, just like he did when he was Draža. It takes everything in him not to look up.

<.>

He isn't about to argue with Calamus's decision. (He also isn't going to ask Cala or Walt what they may have discerned over the night.) (He is moderately relieved to see that Walt's not brought his doll to the table. Or at least hasn't placed it anywhere within sight.)

Orev nudges a piece of... something, some scrap of meat around his plate, eyes drifting over and again to Jack, peripheral vision focused on the lackadaisical way the man's approaching his own breakfast.

He'll need his focus back. He's not ready to (take it from Jack) approach that yet.

He tries to look at the pair across the table; it doesn't last for long.

Eventually, he clears his throat. Speaks, not quite looking at anyone (not not watching Jack), "I trust everyone slept well."

Everyone. Never mind that there are two members of this party who really actually sleep, and that Orev knows pretty well how that went. It's... Fine, everything is fine, and he's just going to continue with—

"It seems we have business yet in this town. I'd just as soon leave returning to the Druskenvalds for another day... But. Calamus." And. And. "Jack. Perhaps your task is best attended to first."

<.>

Jack stiffens at the mention of the task waiting for him and he darts a glance at Orev as though wondering just what he meant by that; if he's in a hurry to help Jack end his contract - then, of course, Jack recalls Orev knows nothing of the real reason why he wants to go to the Drowned Crossroads. He resumes picking at his food and trying not to be aware of how his arm brushes Orev's.

Calamus merely hums and shrug. "That's not a today thing. We need to rest up after last night. Maybe earn a little coin if we can."

She shoots a pointed, accusing look at Jack, who doesn't outwardly react.

"And," she continues, "I don't sleep. Neither does Walter." In a sing-song, off-hand tone, she adds, "But I'm sure everyone else slept well!"

"I'd sleep better without that creepy doll in our room," Jack contributes blandly.

"You weren't in the room, so why do you care?" Cala leans forward, chin in her hands, and fixes Orev with a Look. "How did you sleep?"

<.>

A quandry (or, a puzzle to be set aside for now and gnawed over slowly): Why Jack tenses at the mention of his task with Calamus's contract. Why it should set him on edge, when it seems so soundly in his and in Cala's best interest. (Perhaps it's only nerves. Perhaps the Crossroads seems to promise some reckoning or startle.) ((Orev doesn't think it's that, at all, but can locate no other cause for such prickling.))

[ insight: 11

Jack seems like he doesn't want to talk about contracts or the Drowned Crossroads. ]

Orev.

Doesn't know whY this might be.

He also isn't going to pursue the question, and in any case, Calamus is correct; it's likely best for all of them to linger closer to town for the day. She isn't wrong about the need for rest, never mind that neither she or Walter requires anything of the sort, and never *mind* that questioning of hers, though Orev finds he's shaking his head, finds he does respond—

"Better than I've any right to claim." Never mind that the brightest part of his night had involved no sleep at all. Never mind that he'd felt more peace while drowsing, awake and holding (his—) Jack than he had while sleeping.

Never mind *anything* because he'll just. Move along from all of that. Clearing his throat again because yes, why yes, wasn't he about to say something?

Yes he was, and he notes now that they'd do well to resupply their stocks, and see themselves better prepared for whatever weasels or intervening spirits might next catch them off guard (not thinking about the way he speaks of 'them,' of this group as a party, a unit that will remain united). After which he comments, not quite idle and very much in Jack's direction—

"Eat your eggs, Jack.

"They're going cold, and you'll need the sustenance."

It isn't a request.

<.>

Jack freezes. He doesn't look at Orev; he only sits there, staring at his food for a moment, feeling goosebumps prickle along his skin and the small hairs on the back of his neck raise. (He remembers the feel of Orev's (Draža's) body against him in bed, the trace of his talons, the thrum of melody in his chest.)

He swallows and shifts against a faint tension he doesn't want to think about, and then, yes, sets to work slowly picking at his eggs.

(He thinks, faintly, Yes, Daddy - then pushes the thought away.

Not here. Not in front of Cala.

Not with Orev?)

As he eats, he thinks about Orev's comment about his sleep and wonders what he means by it. Why he might think he deserves less than good, if he can't remember anything.

Finally, he speaks. "If you want to earn coin, we'll do some day labor. People in little towns always need someone to fetch and carry, hunt down a neighbor, kill some vermin. It might be more than a day to satisfy her ladyship - " He indicates Cala with his fork, "- but we'll manage."

When he finishes the last of the eggs, he sets down his fork, but doesn't push the plate - still half-laden with food - away.

<.>

[ perception: 21

Sitting this close to Jack, Orev can note the evidence of goosebumps on his exposed forearms, the faint reddening of his cheeks, the shiver that rolls through him. He can hear the subtle unsteadiness of his breathing and see the tremor in the hand holding the fork. From this angle, an inquisitive birdman can probably also note that Jack shifted to stifle an erection. He's clearly aroused, terrified, and excited - and just as clearly doing a very good job at hiding it, which suggests he's had lots of practice hiding how Draža makes him feel when in public. ]

He thinks: You little shit.

Noticing that, yes, the eggs have gone, but the rest of the boy’s breakfast remains. Having seen the way Jack focused on the eggs, if slowly, if with some guise of not-quite-nonchalance.

Knowing the reason, or something to its approximation.

(Wondering again, why, why doesn’t Jack bear the mark. And why would Orev have taken it away?

And. Why obey at all, if the mark no longer exists?  (That question, he thinks he might begin to answer. And isn’t going to pursue just now.))

Knowing as well. Noticing as well—

It. Would be difficult (…hard?) not to notice. With how clearly Jack’s body speaks itself to Orev. (Only think how easily it’d shifted to his side last night. Only think how readily his own form had responded, how he’d found perfect comfort against this man.) With how immediately (instinctively, almost?) Orev understands that yes, Jack’s hiding his reaction, and yes, this response and this veiling is familiar to the boy.  (It was more than and other than soft nights, whatever they were, whatever they might have been in proximity with one another.)

((Again he thinks: Mine. And briefly, briefly, there’s a sharp and knowing glint of his eyes.))  He lets his gaze drift over Jack’s form once, up and down, raking lingering. Once, and then again. (Perhaps it isn’t— Unwelcome. Unwanted. These commands he’s offered.) (Only think what he’d seen in Jack’s thoughts; not a revulsion to command, but a wariness around Jack’s own sadness, a desire to keep it hidden.)

((His poor Puppy.))

He sights and shakes his head. Spears a piece of toast with his fork, and moves it to Jack’s plate. Not quite looking at Jack as he speaks, “That, as well.”

After a moment: “And your water.

“You’ll need your energy for a day of continued weasel assassination. Or hunting. Or whatsoever these townsfolk might get into their head.”

He’s thinking that he’d like to return to the bookstore. That he’d like to learn more of the mayor. That, no, he doesn’t have much sense of the worth of coin or the need for its earning, but yes, he could use a stronger store of it himself.

Watching Jack and waiting, waiting to see what he might do.

<.>

He made a mistake. He glanced at Orev to see if the man agreed with his assessment and, in doing so, caught sight of that…look. (And oh, he's seen that look so many times.) Jack finds himself hanging on it, startled and staring, realizing Orev knows exactly what he's doing.

(Maybe a visceral memory, or. Or. Maybe some things are so deeply ingrained in his personality that he can't help himself.

Or maybe he's just enjoying causing Jack to react this way?)

He looks down at the food added to his plate, then quickly steals a glance at Cala to see if - But no, she's reading Walt's book. Neither of them are paying any attention now that Jack's agreed they need coin. They don't see how he's begun to sweat, how his skin is burning.

Under the guise of reaching for, taking a sip of his water, he glances again at Orev and whispers, "Don't."

It's a plea full of complicated emotions. Some of them suggest maybe he's not asking for something he wants.

Still, when he puts the glass down, he obeys and sets to slowly eating the toast.

<.>

That's certainly... Interesting.

(Orev doesn't dislike the way Jack's reaction - the flushed skin and skipping-racing pulse; the wide and startled eyes, the furtive glances toward their companions and the veiled, compulsory reach toward the water, the toast - sears through his being. Nor does he dislike the way his own heart's picked up its pace, the way something electric dances at his skin, the way his head spins vaguely dizzy, the way the world feels— Removed. As if all that can exist is this man and himself, aglow and primary. Vital.)

(He's known this before. He... must have?

Jack doesn't seem surprised, or unaccustomed.

Jack seems—

Not displeased. Playing at a warding off, but isn't there longing in his voice, as well? Isn't there something in him that seems to settle even in this excitation. (Did they have this, as well?) (Did Jack miss this, as well.))

He doesn't take his eyes from Jack. He does cant his head, lift his eyebrows slightly, slightly. He watches the glass. The toast. And finally responds, "I'm not sure what you mean."

He isn't, and he might be. He might have some idea. And it's following this idea, following its impulse, that brings the next words, toned music and with a sense of (is it?) (yes, he feels it; this boy's done very well) pride—

"Well done, Jack."

(My Jack.)

His vision grays at the edges with that praise. It doesn't matter what name Orev used, it doesn't matter what Orev calls himself: the tone was familiar and the words meant him, Puppy and Gideon and Jack. The pride and approval was for him.

(He wants to grab Orev's hand and press it to his groin. He wants to drag the other man back upstairs. He wants to kneel, he wants so badly to kneel -) (Draža, he's missed you so. Daddy. God. Everything.)

(He thinks he can't do any of that here.) (What he doesn't think right now is that he can't do any of that ever again.)

His breathing is too steady and his eyes carry a hint of agony in them when he darts another glance at Orev. Whatever response he meant to give (Thank you, Daddy, it's right there on the tip of his tongue), he's abruptly shaken from the moment when Cala asks, "What's well done?"

He tenses abruptly, his cheeks now flushing pale when he remembers where he is, who he's with. He jerks slightly, realizing he'd been pressing himself to Orev's side, thigh to thigh and shoulder to shoulder. The jolt puts an inch of propriety between them; he swallows hard, one hand now digging harsh fingers into the flesh of his own thigh.

"He's being an ass," he replies roughly. "Because I ate my breakfast. Thinks I did it because he told me to."

"Did you?" she bats back, painted brows raised.

Jack clenches his jaw angrily, though his reply comes soft and even-toned. "I was already eating it."

He watches as she shrugs with disinterest and returns her attention to the shared book. Sharply, he turns on Orev and angles an index finger in her direction as if to say, See!?

Which isn't the point. It's not the point at all, he realizes. The point is - The point is...

The point is, Orev doesn't remember anything.

He watches Orev with a growing longing colored with misery in his expression. Abruptly, wordlessly, he rises from the table and makes a beeline for the stairs.

Cala looks up to watch him go, then turns her attention to Orev. "Oh, no."

"He's going to hate seeing where Walter put the doll."

<.>

[ insight: 21

Yep, Orev sees clearly what draws Jack away from the table. ]

The gods only know why Walter got it in his head to carry along that doll.

Really, Orev thinks it likely that no god below, above, or otherwise situated could say.

(In this instance, though, it may prove useful. Averse as Jack seems to be toward the object.)

(It might… Be more useful. If Orev didn’t sense some depth of the conflict plaguing Jack. If he didn’t suspect that some part of what’s drawn the boy from the table is tied to what Orev does and doesn’t remember. To who he is and was, and the experience lost to his knowing.)

He thinks, perhaps, he ought to let Jack manage whatever mangle of feelings Orev’s left him with.

He knows he won’t do that; can’t do that. (This man is (his to care for) not outside of his responsibility.) He’s rising already, dropping his cutlery to the plate, focused fixed. Moving toward Jack without addressing Calamus - thinking, after all, that she knows the push she just gave (recalling Jack’s words about her stupid romantic notions) (thinking maybe, maybe, Jack didn’t entirely believe that, or maybe he’s held those notions too close in the past) - and following quickly, step-with-step.  If he can, he’ll reach Jack, fall into step just slightly behind him, and settle a hand on his shoulder.

If he can, he’ll speak low: “To my room.”

When he says it, he might almost be, might as well be saying ‘our room.’

<.>

Jack halts at the feeling of Orev's hand on his shoulder. He doesn't know what he expected, but it really wasn't that Orev would follow him, much less -

Suggest? Command? Direct him to Orev's room? He hesitates, looking from Orev to the door of the room he shares (shared?) with Calamus and Walter. (Those words did sound like maybe it's not Jack's room anymore, didn't they? Like maybe Orev meant "our" instead of "my?

Or that's just wishful thinking on Jack's part. That's just longing and desire and confusion.)

"I - need my bag," he tries weakly, but having said that, he still follows Orev instead of making for his (-not-his) room.

Sometimes, he can resist "soft" commands. If he really wants to, he can.

But -

He feels so muddled. The longing in his chest is a heavy stone, and Orev is behaving in ways that seem so achingly familiar.

<.>

A thought, immediate, as Jack follows: Good boy.

(Odd, how readily the thought comes into mind. How familiar it feels.) (How Jack’s obedience eases, subtly voltaic, through his being.)

He doesn’t look at Jack as he goes to the door. He doesn’t need to; he knows the boy will follow.

(The problem. A problem. Orev doesn’t know what he intends to do. …Help, somehow?) (He doesn’t need a plan. The point was to— Well. To not leave Jack to solitude. (To not leave Jack.))

As he opens the door, he comments, “We’ll have your bag later.”

Then enters the room, hand remaining on the door. He’ll wait until Jack has followed - if Jack does follow - before closing it and turning to the man. When he starts to speak, there’s a slight note of hesitation, of uncertainty before his voice evens—

"You keep slipping off." It sounds rather like 'you can't keep slipping off.'

And: “What is it, Jack?”

And. “Tell me.”

<.>

He hesitates at the comment about his bag, a helpless look cast behind him to the hall. Maybe Orev meant that they can go together to get his bag after a conversation.

Or maybe he's saying something else, along with "my room". Maybe he's saying Jack's bag will be brought to and remain in Orev's (and Jack's?) room.

Later.

(After what? A conversation?)

He's trembling slightly, feeling a curl of not-unfamiliar terror in his stomach. (He doesn't want to go in there with Orev. He doesn't want this with a man who doesn't remember himself, much less Jack.

Orev isn't Draza. (Is that true, though? Is Jack only creating a distinction so he can carry out his plan later?))

He steps into the room and watches the door close, waits to see if Orev is going to lock it. (Draza would've locked it.) Then he slides his attention to the other man when he speaks.

He sounds unsure. (Draza never really sounded uncertain.) (Orev isn't Draza.) (He is, though. Look at him. He is.) And still, he commands Jack to speak, which summons a fine sheen of sweat to his brow. The words come because Orev ordered him to tell.

"I'm - trying to get away from you. Trying to be alone." He swallows thickly, trying to silence the words before they form, but they pour out anyway. "It hurts to be near you. It hurts, looking at you and knowing you don't remember me and wondering why, and why you want to be near me at all when you were gone - you were just. Fucking gone.

"And it feels - so good, too. Just being close, but being told, too, like how it used to be -" He grunts with frustration, clearly wishing he hadn't said that. "Except it's not how it used to be. You're not him, you're you; you don't know me. We're not lovers, we're not anything. I'll get excited, sure, but I have to ignore it. I need to breathe through it. Sleep it off. Hope you don't do it again."

<.>

How it used to be, Jack says, and Orev wishes—

Badly. Badly, he wishes he could remember.

(He wishes he could be here for Jack, with Jack, and not only as a shadowed mirror of himself. Not only as this man Jack does and doesn’t know.)

There’s so much here he can only begin to parse. So many words, professions-confessions that pierce Orev, that are clearly thorns lodged seeping in Jack’s skin. So much feeling that works through Jack’s face, catches and pulls at his voice. (So much pain, and such a heavy-hanging loneliness.)

He doesn’t know how to respond. He needs— A moment. A space to let at least a few of these disclosures begin to cohere.

So he begins with the last: Jack’s hope that Orev won’t do it again. And Orev attempts a soft laugh - it’s ragged; it’s a pained noise - and shakes his head—

“You know I can’t promise that.”

Which. He’d intended in jest. But it happens so naturally. The pull to it - to command, to observe, to, yes, to praise - strikes instinctive with this man.

He looks down. Goes quiet a moment. Then seeks Jack’s eyes, and endeavors—

“I don’t know how things were. Between us.” Which is very thank you stating the obvious o’clock, so he tries to hurry onward. “But I have suspicions. From the journal. From my own impulses. And what you’ve described—“

(The ordering. The following.) (‘How it used to be.’)

He sighs, shakes his head. “It can’t be what it was. I— You’re right, of course. What connection I have to that man is clouded. Tenuous.

“I don’t believe it’s gone.” A scowl, a click of his tongue. An emendation: “I don’t believe I’m gone.” Then a thought, and a sharp cant of his head. “I’m not sure I was myself entirely then, either.” Given what he’s seen in the journal.

Which is all beside the point. Which isn’t what requires addressing, and he lifts a hand, seeks to settle it at Jack’s arm.

“I left you. I’m—“ Sorry, he’s so fucking sorry, but what worth’s in an apology from a man who’s forgotten his own crime? (A man who’s forgotten his… Lover? Lover, yes; they must have been.) “I don’t know why, or how I should have sinned so badly. I don’t— I don’t believe I intended you ill.

“What I know, Jack, is that I do want to be near you.

“That you’ve held my attention since we met on that ghost-forsaken train.

“That I find it impossible not to watch you.

“That you look at me. You obey me. You— Smile. And I feel touched by lightning and by dawn’s light.

“I don’t know what I am, or what we were. But I know your importance, Jack.”

<.>

Having spoken as he was ordered, Jack falls into silence now, his wary eyes tracking Orev's. There's one thing Orev speaks that catches him, furrows his brow with perplexity as he's struck by a thought he never considered before: What did happen to Draža? He wasn't wholly sane, that much is true. What if -

(Is it possible he deteriorated further after sending Gideon away?)

(Did something happen to him? Something over all those months, that resulted in this man before him? Is it possible he missed Gideon, needed him just as badly, was missing him the whole time and yet -?)

No. No, it's more likely that the only reason Orev thinks Jack is important now is he doesn't remember how much of a failure, a disappointment Gideon was as a Puppy. (Remember, there was someone else. Remember, that Other Puppy.)

He carefully takes Orev's hand from his arm and holds it in his own, thumb brushing the backs of his knuckles.

"Don't put too much stock in how you feel now. You had someone else who pleased you better. Right now, you can't recall them, and I'm a novelty," he replies quietly, his smile wry and poorly disguising his sorrow. "Like I was the first time. That's all it is. You'll tire of watching. Of giving me your attention. Of being near."

Again, he thinks, implies, but doesn't say.

"And I'll...cope." As best he can, at least until he can end his contracts. As an afterthought, he adds, "Although, if you wouldn't mind terribly releasing me from one of your prior commands, it would go far towards helping me 'cope'."

<.>

No.

Refusal echoing, a clamor through his mind.

He doesn’t like this.

(This: Jack’s distance, Jack’s assertion that these feelings are passing only, that this man could ever fade from Orev’s interest.) (This: Jack’s sorrow, and Orev’s inability to call him from it.) (This: The notion that Orev might have - how could he have?! - lost interest in Jack. That he could have known this man’s brilliance and tossed him aside.) (This: An attempt to extract himself from Orev, asking that a command be relinquished. One command, what could it hurt, but ah, one command, and then how many others?) (This: Orev’s inability to argue against any of this because he doesn’t fucking know what happened.)

He needs to calm himself. He needs to— Breathe. He needs to breathe. Ease the tension in his jaw. Ease the clenching of his fingers, his— He finds he’s dug his claws into his palm. Wills himself to focus on the brush of Jack’s fingers. To… To…

Think. He has to think clearly. He has to speak. Know what to say to— Stop this cascade. Pull Jack from this withdrawal. Focus on what Jack said (there was something, something that requires addressing) (what was it what was it, about Jack thinking himself a novelty, about something else, someone else?).

It’s difficult to put all this in order. It’s happened so quickly, what Jack said and what Orev said, and he’s only now beginning to register his own words, how deeply he felt them, how much he could, he does believe them.

(And he thinks: No.

And: You are mine.)

He closes his eyes. Breathes in and exhales, shaken. Then finds Jack’s eyes.

“I don’t accept that.

“I don’t know what happened. I’m not certain you do, either.” He’s turned his hand, wraps Jack’s within it, careful now with his claws. And, softer now, “I don’t mean to suggest that you ought to know. Or that I gave you cause to— Trust anything I might have meant.”

He pauses, watching Jack’s hand in his own, thinking yes, this is as it ought to be, this is where his grasp belongs. “Give me time, Jack. There are answers; I am going to find them.”

And. Seeking Jack’s eyes: “Do you want the command relinquished.”

Do you. Really.

<.>

He doesn't know what to say. Orev's response is balanced, the kind of thinking Draža wasn't...always. Given to. Asking for more time to seek answers? Pointing out Jack can't be sure what happened? It's reasonable, and he doesn't remember Draža being reasonable often.

Orev hasn't released his hand, and Jack hasn't let go, either. He doesn't want to be the first to let go. However, when Orev pivots to that question, he rather wishes he didn't feel so pinned down, trapped by the mutual grasp. He wishes he could squirm away.

It's complicated.

"You told me I couldn't touch myself," he replies flatly. "And no one else could bring me satiation, either. Only you, you said. When we were together, obviously I didn't want it relinquished - but that was before I lived nine fucking months without you. How am I supposed to answer that question?"

With a sigh, he adds, "How am I supposed to answer any of this? Give you time? Haven't you had enough? And what happens meanwhile? I follow you around, waiting for you to remember anything at all? I can't stop myself from vying for your attention, or being angry with you, or hating that you left me and only came back when you didn't know who I -"

His voice breaks and quickly he looks away, blinking rapidly against the sting of tears.

"What if there aren't answers about me? What if it's just that you grew bored and left me to rot like this because you thought it was funny?"

It matters, that Jack doesn’t slip from his hand.

It matters that Jack speaks to compulsions of his own, his own responsiveness to Orev (and, and/or to the man Orev used to be).

It matters that Jack puts thought, puts care into responding.

It matters that he reveals the command he (perhaps?) seeks to erase. And if it’s true that Orev hear the command and for an instant blinks bafflement, it’s true as well that confusion is replaced immediately by surety. Because yes, of course he would. Yes, it only makes sense. (You are mine.) What’s his isn’t to be touch by any other. What’s his can’t be subjected to other, lesser hands.

(It isn’t right, it isn’t fair, to have left the boy like that, with nothing.)

(But gods. Can he say he wouldn’t be furious to think of any other being in attempted rapture with this man? Or even sustain the thought of Jack meeting pleasure in solitude? It’s a thought that bites, that speaks of wretched lack.)

These words, though. This certainty that Jack is something to be cast aside. That banishment, abandonment is inevitable. (Orev recalls that image, his own voice from Jack’s thoughts. Speaking ‘not enough.’ Speaking something missing.) (It doesn’t sit right. He doesn’t think the words were true, or complete.) (What in fuck’s name had he done, and why?) He wants to brush the tears from Jack’s face. He doesn’t know that it’s within his right—

And yet he reaches his free hand to catch, to brush. And voice low, voice soft, he speaks, “It wasn’t like that. It can’t have been.

“And if it’s true. If that’s the manner of man I was— Am.” A loss, here. For words, for thought. Because the notion strikes him only as impossible. Because if, if if if it was true, if he discarded this man—

Perhaps he forsook his own memory, to escape the wretch he was.

And. If it was true. (It isn’t. It wasn’t.) If it could become true again. (It won’t.) The risk to Jack is monumental.

…He needs to be careful. (He doesn’t want to be careful. He wants to name, wants to own what is his.) For Jack’s sake, at the least. If only he knew more, if only he knew what happened, and yes he does need more time, for gods’ sake he’s had a week.

It’s been nine months for Jack. Remember that. Remember.

A shaking of his head, slow, then sharp. “I don’t believe it. If I can’t recall what I was, I know my feelings now. I am not— Capricious. In that particular way.

“What I did, why I acted as I did— There was a reason, Jack.

“I know you’ve waited. I understand, I— Nine months rings like eternity. I think. But I…

“If nothing else, stay with me. Stay with us. In this village.

“I don’t know the shape of the questions or the answers standing before us. But I will find them. And I—

“I don’t want to hurt you. And I don’t believe I could stand losing you.

“…Again.”

<.>

A pause follows, Jack feeling the afterburn of Orev's hand on his cheek and waiting, waiting for - something. Meaning behind what Orev is saying, maybe: what his feelings are, what he thinks will happen if Jack remains with him and Walter here in Wickermoor Village. What he thinks this will be, if the alternative is hurt and loss.

(It doesn't escape him that Orev didn't respond to the question of his command.

Not yet, anyway. Maybe he's only addressing the more serious subjects first.)

With a slow inhale, a slower exhale, he replies, "You'd have to have me first to lose me. I haven't agreed to that."

Not that he has a choice, really. Not if Orev tells him where to belong. It's a thought that singes through him, raising gooseflesh again and pinkening his cheeks. He looks down, away, ignoring the rising embarrassment to avoid the always-answering excitement.

Weakly, he continues, "I can't even feel justified in being angry at you because you don't know who you were. I can't ask you to be what you were to me - I don't know I'd want it now." He winces under the weight of the lie but continues ahead. "I don't know what to do."

<.>

The trouble is, there’s nothing he can promise.

Not honestly. Not with the void in his memory, the lack of anything beyond the certainty he holds now, feels now, and the wild scrawlings in a half-coherent journal.

He wants to promise this man— Anything. Everything. But there’s nothing to hold onto. (Nothing, apart from Jack, here and now.) (Nothing apart from this brilliant and sorrowing soul, who warms to Orev’s presence and praise, who reaches for Orev in spite of all he’s experienced, in spite of the wounds he’s been left to believe.) But everything’s a mire, cloudy and wrapped in questions, questions, always questions.

What he can do—

What he can say. Admit.

“No— There’s no clear answer here. It is… Jack. I regret that I have no clear path ahead to offer. Only the truth in my intentions: That I am going to find what happened. That I mean to mend anything, everything I can.

“…That I think I meant all along to mend it, however poorly I treated you.

“Be angry with me if you like. As you need. I may not remember what I did; this doesn’t alter what you’ve known. What I - whatever, however I was; whatever I thought that I was doing - brought onto you.

“What I did and didn’t tell you.”

A tic of his lip. A furrowed brow. “I don’t know that I have ever been particularly forthcoming. Or given to… Exposure of what I know as weakness. As faults within myself.

“I wronged you; you’re within your rights to rage against me.

“Be angry if you must. But don’t, please, take yourself away.” A flinch, a brief-darting glance away, because if he thinks of this man vanished, if he thinks of seeking life without this man, all threatens to become inferno.

He finds Jack’s eyes. Clutches his hand a little tighter, adamant. “You say that I don’t have you. I’m not… I think we both know that isn’t quite the truth. I don’t think either of us can help it.

“You are mine, Jack. I think that I am yours.”

He shakes his head, huffs a frustrated exhale. “I can’t say what that means, precisely. I don’t know how it fits against the… Questions. The damage and the hurt.”

…And. And, because he hasn’t forgotten. And because he suspects (he knows) the question hasn’t left Jack’s mind: “…I can’t agree to released my command. And I’m not certain I believe you want that.”

<.>

Jack stares, frowning and trying to decide what Orev means by his last comment (refusal). It's easier to be angry about that (is he angry?) than to consider the many implications of You are mine, Jack. I think that I am yours. After all, Draža never did say he was Gideon's, did he?

Only that Gideon belonged to him. Always.

He never asked Gideon not to take himself away. He never admitted that their connection was deeper than a contract.

Jack doesn't know what any of this means, or how to approach it. (He knows he can't quash the burn of anger, or the desire, or the faint pity for Orev. (And love. The love is always there like a disease.)) He doesn't know how to respond after nine months spent convincing himself Draža never loved him, only toyed with him. Planning to free himself from Calamus and Draža both and - and. Put an end to himself.

(And Orev is asking him not to take himself away. (But it's not a command, at least.) (Does that matter?))

He focuses on the last, instead, feeling impotent frustration boiling over; the only relief he's found has been accidental, sleep-struck or a byproduct of selling himself. Never enjoying release, never answering his own waking demand. (And true, he doesn't want to be released from that command. He wants Daddy, who is not Orev. Not exactly.) After a long silence, he answers darkly, "You can keep others' hands off me and forbid my own, but I won't come to you."

It's a petulant reply, and it's true his lower lip threatens towards a pout, but at the moment, he has nothing else. No other threat, no other leverage. (Orev doesn't need to know that he refused just this way when Draža first won him. Orev doesn't need to know how wrong Draža proved Jack, or how quickly. How thoroughly.) (...Nevermind that Jack wrote down some of those memories in Orev's journal. Fuck.)

<.>

[ perception: 2 (ffs orev)
insight: 9 (:/)

If his journal is lying out somewhere, Jack's eyes flicker to it. Worriedly. Otherwise, Orev is aware Jack is pouting. ]

…Curious.

The way Jack doesn’t argue, precisely, or push (or plead) once more for the command’s removal. Jack isn’t pleased - clearly - but he seems to have accepted his fate.

(And it’s charming. The way a sulk writes itself across the boy’s face.)

Curious, as well, that Jack’s remark doesn’t ring with the finality of a vow. That Orev feels no particular warning in it. That he doesn’t believe it will hold.

And curious, that brief slip of Jack’s eyes toward the bedside table. Where there is, to Orev’s recollection, all of one item. (What did Jack find? What is it he’s thinking of— Worried about?) Orev cocks his head, tempted to cast Detect Thoughts, knowing it might be better saved for later. Instead searching Jack’s face for some further clue.

When he finds nothing, he turns and move for the journal.

<.>

Jack made a mistake in darting a look at the journal, but he couldn't help himself. When he stole it two nights ago, he wrote in it in a fit of pique and grief. If he remembers correctly, one of the things he wrote directly contradicts the very thing he just said.

Shit, shit, shit.

Orev moves toward it and so does Jack with a sudden burst of speed and a rough, "No!"

He'll try to reach it and snatch it up before Orev.

[ roll-off!
orev: 10
jack: 11 ]

Jack reaches the journal first, snatching it up and holding it away from Orev with a panic-stricken expression.

<.>

It was Jack's outburst that jarred him. (Surely whatever the man read in Orev's journal can't have garnered such forcefulness. It isn't as if Orev hasn't read the thing over and again already.) He reaches the end table several moments too late, and can only draw himself up - and ignore the fact that yes he *was* scrambling for the thing - and fold his arms.

Watching Jack.

Watching Jack.

One talon tapping against his own arm.

He considers the Medallion.

He thinks he'll give Jack the chance to explain himself.

So, standing in stillness apart from the tap, tap, tap of his finger—

"Was it something you read?"

<.>

Jack takes a step back, journal held now behind his back with both hands. He looks hunted and perhaps a little wary of Orev's collectedness.

Slowly, he shakes his head.

Just as slowly, he takes another step backward, clearly making for the door.

<.>

...Well. He did try.

The talon stills.

Orev doesn't move.

He speaks again, voice now unyielding. Not harsh, not inflictive; only commanding—

"Stop."

And, slowly unfolding his arms, holding out one hand. Letting a moment hang, and hang, and pass. Then—

"Give me the journal, Jack."

<.>

Jack stops.

He stares, his grip tightening on the journal until his knuckles turn white.

He tries to resist the pull of command, his brow furrowing with the effort.

[ will-based roll-off!
orev: 14
jack: 15]

With a little breath of exertion, he shakes his head again and takes another step back.

<.>

His expression clouds, eyes sharpening.

How.

Dare he??

(The little shit.) ((The little brat.))

Head canting, arms folded once more, Orev takes a step toward Jack.

A very long step.  And another.

(He doesn’t like that the boy disobeyed.)

(…He doesn’t understand why Jack’s chosen to be obstinate about this, of all things. It’s only a journal. It’s Orev’s journal, it’s Orev’s own words, what in fuck’s name could Jack possibly be hiding?)

  His voice is lower now, licked with a hiss. “Jack.

“This is a mistake. 

“I am giving you one last chance.” 

The next words lack the particularity of command. It’s a statement, simply, of a fact, a wish: “I’d like my journal back.” 

He takes another step.

<.>

Rather than encouraging Jack to think of the error of his ways, it fills him with a thrill-sparked terror. He almost laughs, does let out a hysterical not-quite-giggle, humorless and panicked, when Orev strides toward him looking thunderous.

He shivers. Takes another step, angling for the door -

Then turns to run.

<.>

It's an instinctive reaction.

He doesn't have time to plan. This recalcitrance, that panicked sound (not displeasing, but he can't appreciate it now, or feel the way it crackles up his spine) warns of rash action, and it occurs to Orev that Jack might plan to do something to the journal, burn it, shred it, and Orev needs those words, for shit's sake it's all he has, and his hand's raising, conjuring a spectral chain, shifting black and deep red light.

He casts Chain of Conviction, and hurls the chain at Jack.

Edited 2025-11-18 05:30 (UTC)

Rolled an 18 on his save. Jack takes 5 force damage and is hauled off his feet and dragged by a spectral chain across the room towards Orev. He hits the ground on his stomach at Orev's feet with a whumpf, the air knocked out of him.

He scrambles, wriggling against the chain to put the journal between his stomach and the floor even as he struggles to draw in a breath.

<.>

Shit.

He hisses a sharp sound as the chain connects. (He hadn't considered the damage it might do. Would necessarily do.) (Fuck, fuck, fuck, he hadn't meant to hurt the boy.) (He also couldn't let Jack abscond with his godsforsaken journal.)

There's an impulse to loosen his grip, to let the chain slack, but he sees the way the boy's shielding the journal, trying even now to keep it from Orev, so no, no, he won't be letting go just yet.

He does move one foot to Jack's side, attempting - with the nudge of his foot and a careful pull at the chain - to turn the man onto his back.

<.>

Jack's weaker than Orev; he's always been weaker than Daddy. He can't fight both the chain and for air and the foot rolling him onto his back, just like he can't fight the awareness of the chains and of.

(Being here.

At Daddy's feet.) (The stirring arousal, the moan settling in his throat. The wide eyes and reddening cheeks.)

He grips the journal with both hands and stares up (worshipfully) (in terror) (in longing) at Orev.

<.>

His foot moves with Jack (easily) (this, again— is this familiar?), shifting to settle at his shoulder even as he seeks sight of the journal (knows relief, relief that it’s here), then to meet Jack’s eyes and—

(…O h.)

(Hello, Puppy.)

Maybe. Maybe Orev needn’t have worried about the chains damage, after all.

Jack certainly doesn’t look… Pained. Particularly.  And Orev feels at once overwarm (his skin heated) (a not-unpleasant ache of his own stirring), and cool-headed. As if another rightful place has been found. As if the world has cleared away, as if even his panic at the journal’s theft has vanished. For a moment, everything seems terribly simple. All the world is composed of himself and this man, a moan, pleading eyes like amber.

(Beautiful. This man is (perfection) (staggering) beautiful.)

He’s stopped breathing. It’s a wonder he hasn’t dropped the chain.  There’s another moment before he can draw breath again - calmly; steady - and his eyes haven’t left Jack’s.

When he speaks, his voice has softened, though the hiss at its edge lingers, though there might, might nearly be a growl at the back of his throat. And he bends slightly, slightly, the better to watch Jack’s eyes—  “I told you, Puppy.

“That was a mistake.”

[ insight: 21

(2) Orev has a strong memory wash over him of a similar situation: Puppy lying on the ground with Orev's foot not at his shoulder, but at his throat. Both of Jack's hands scrabble and grip Orev's ankle/foot and try to pry himself free as the boy shifts and arcs to escape. He isn't choking; he moans and rasps out please, looking up at Orev with the same longing and fear. Orev hears himself laugh darkly and comment - dialogue you can write because your character - on Puppy's arousal.

There's a cascading awareness that he has done this more than once, both with and without the chain. ]

<.>

As for Jack, he falls very still, the breath he just caught jarred from him again in a whimper by a single word: Puppy.

<.>

At the corner of his lip, the slightest tick of a sharp smile.

(He has done this before.

They have done this before.

And he remembers now, that refrain from Jack’s thoughts, one of many strands he’d been unable to make sense of. That notion Jack kept gnawing over: That he couldn’t believe Orev used the chain on someone else.

Doesn’t it make sense now.)

Watching close. Thinking of that— Sound, that whimper. Knowing a sound at the back of his throat, a pleased hum or a growl. He wraps the chain a little tighter around his hand and tugs.

Just once. Just to see.

And, speaking, “This chain is yours, isn’t it?”

It isn’t really a question.

<.>

The tightening chain lifts Jack's back in a small arc off the floor. He moans softly, wishing he could close his eyes and not daring to take them off Orev.

He'd hated seeing the chain used on anyone else - at least, while it wasn't being used on him. Orev's right, of course: it's his.

The chain, the vines, the ropes, the tendrils of smoke, the silks. Whatever Draža had on hand to restrain him, tease him, remind him where he belonged (and oh, he's missed belonging.)

It wasn't a question, so he doesn't speak an answer. His tension, his alert focus, his lack of effort to scramble away from the chains or the foot on his shoulder are answer enough. The gray fog seeping over his thoughts, that's answer enough. (The satisfaction mingling with his terror, the thrill and triumph at having Daddy's full attention: that's answer enough.)

(The growls and hums from Orev; those are familiar noises. The sharp smile's familiar, too. Does he remember this, somewhere deep down?) (He called -)

He called Jack "Puppy"?

His eyes fix on Orev's face, frantically curious: do you remember me? Anything? Anything at all?

"You remember?" It is a question, helpless and beseeching. Wary.

Almost, almost hopeful.

<.>

Does Orev remember?

Yes— And no.

There’s so much more he can’t recall. He doesn’t remember enough. And the vibrance of this memory (the chain and Jack’s shuddered breath, the smirk laced through Orev’s own voice; the pleasure of it, the pleasure in them both, radiating through memory to spark within his nerves), the life he’s felt in every glimpse of the life he had with Jack, throws into stark contrast the void of all else. The places where he ought to remember and where surely, surely, more of these bright recollections lie hidden.

(He ought to remember more. He wants to remember more.)

(He thinks about the way Jack’s watching him. About something that looks almost akin to hope. (And, a wrenching thought, wrenching feeling: What if it’s not enough? What he’s remembered. What if he can only crush the light grown in Jack’s eyes?))

What if it isn’t enough. What if he can’t recall. What if, what if—

…But.

But he—

Moments ago. When Jack gazed upward, eyes wide. Orev had said it. The word that’s begun to surface in his thoughts. The word he’d heard first in Jack’s thoughts.

‘Puppy.’

((My Puppy.))

He hadn’t marked it in the moment, it’d felt so natural. He’d felt only its place in speaking. Only knew its necessity on his tongue.

There’s so much he doesn’t know. But.

He’s beginning to remember.

So it’s with certainty - with something like triumph, and a note of confiding warmth - that he responds: “Yes.”

Though he maintains hold on the chain, he’s let it slack, only slightly. His eyes haven’t drifted from Jack’s, nor lost their intensity of inspection. He adds (offers), “I’m beginning to recall.)

And if he thinks about this, it’s happening more and more, isn’t it? The glimpses of a life he must have known, did live, settling back into his knowledge. The impulses that feel like habit. The words that seem so distantly familiar, then return again and again, regaining their place. In Jack’s presence, details have begun to return, as if by necessity. As if they belong, and Orev can’t help but know them.

He blinks. Exhales softly, and bends, setting one talon beneath Jack’s chin and sweeping his thumb along the boy’s cheek, steady, tidal. Reverent. “It’s you, Jack.”

And, smile at once sharp and strangely fond: “Puppy.”

<.>

Not everything. He doesn't remember everything. But.

But he remembers pieces, and those pieces are the ones Jack wants him to remember. Not the parts when Draža said he wasn't enough, something in him was missing. Not the parts where another lover came between them. Just this. Just them, together, and how good it was.

(For now. (Until he can break his contract, it's enough for now.) (He doesn't want to think about that right now.))

The talon dimples his skin, counterpoint to a brush of thumb, and Jack fizzles from the inside out. He forgets about the journal. He forgets everything except the smile Orev gives him and the chains binding him, the foot pressing down on him. The gray fog feels heavy and narcotic, a barrier between him and having to think about anything. Softly, he breathes Oh, eyes fluttering closed.

His hands slacken on the journal. He arcs his neck, baring his throat. Tries shifting against the chains in search of relief from growing tension; he finds them looser but still unrelenting.

<.>

Again, again, he tests the warmth of Jack’s (Puppy’s) skin beneath his thumb. (How many times, how often did he caress the boy just so?) (How thoroughly did his body know this man’s?)

He’s begun to drift his foot, its talons tracing the line of Jack’s shoulder. As he admires the boy. As he smiles still, that fond-sharp expression. When his foot reaches the base of Jack’s neck, it settles. Partly curled against the boy’s neck and behind his shoulder, one talon resting at his sternum.

Grin sharpening - ah, slightly, just slightly - he pauses in caress and softly, half a growl and half a purr, speaks—

“I do remember.”

And closes the talons of his foot with care, just enough to give (his Puppy) Jack a sense of pressure. Just enough to draw focus to just where Orev’s foot has wandered.

His thumb resumes its brushing. He returns a bit of tension to the chain. And speaks ahead of calculation, feeling only that these are words he wants to give—

“There are worlds within you, Puppy.”

(And he thinks: How could he ever have said this man was not, is not enough?) (He doesn’t believe it; there’s something in that memory that ticks at him, sings with a message he can’t clasp.) (Whatever he may have intended. Whatever his reasons. He did badly by this man.

He wants to mend it. He will mend it.)

He knows: This isn’t novelty, his interest. This is conviction; this is rooted belief, running infinite, deep.

Now he gives the chain a firmer grasp: “Good boy.”

<.>

Tears would sting his eyes, but nothing can hurt here - not in any way he doesn't want to be hurt. There's only Daddy's foot at his throat offering perfect pressure, the feeling of bruises forming where the chains wrap him that will ache dully later. The warmth and perfection and danger of being here, right here, with Daddy.

Worlds within him, Daddy said.

Not something missing. He's full of whole existences.

He's pinned under Daddy's focus and hold, wrapped in (love) chains and affection. Possessed and perfect and Puppy. It's all he was ever meant to be. All he ever wanted to be. (And. Orev-Daddy-Draža remembers. Remembers him.)

His pulse is racing out of control, thrumming under his flushed, faintly glistening skin. He presses up to meet the hold of Daddy's foot and moans shamelessly. When his eyes find Orev's again, they're glazed and inviting. (This is how it always went, isn't it? This is when Draža would tease him for being wanton - because it's irresistible. It's terrifying and delicious and maybe something is broken in Jack-Gideon-Puppy, but the jagged edges of that break meet Daddy's in wonderful ways.)

"Don't -" he starts, then forgets whatever it was he meant to say, instead inclining his head to the touch at his cheek. "*Please.*"

<.>

“‘Don’t’?” A blinking of his eyes, rapid, and briefly he withdraws his hand—

Then returns it. (Of course he returns it.) Cups his Puppy’s cheek, inclining his own head to catch another angle of the picture laid beneath him.

A gentle teasing in his tone: “Oh, Puppy, don’t you want this?” A soft laugh, dark, as he draws the tip of his talon along Jack’s jaw. Not pricking, not bleeding the boy, but chasing along the edge of incision.

“‘Please,’ you said.

“Ah, but that’s incomplete.

“‘Please,’ what, Puppy?”

How easy this is to slip into. This being, this role, this self; it wreathes itself around him, as if it (never left) (was never gone, not far) was only waiting.

(Waiting for what?) (His return.) (The return of this (beautiful) (perfect) man.) (His Puppy.)

There are no questions; no hesitations. Only a perfect offering of pressure, perfect response of Puppy’s being. Only the pair of them moving with one will, one desire.

(He’s missed this man, and— And he’s missed this, hasn’t he? The wild-blooming warmth, the possession (the being possessed, fixed here at the world’s center with this man, because of this man), the aching want, the softness and the razor’s edge.) ((It defies sense, that he would have left this. Forfeited this man, and left him to—) (Not now, not now, he won’t think about that now.)) ((He can’t lose this again.))

“Speak it. Tell me. What does my Puppy need.”

<.>

This is all he wants. It was all he's been wanting from the moment Draža first tied him up, because here, everything is simple. Nothing matters except Daddy's will, Daddy's desires, and isn't it lucky those are exactly Puppy's desires?

For the first time in almost a year, he feels as though he's found his footing again. He feels like gears the ground out the movements of the world slipped themselves into alignment. Everything is right, and he's in Daddy's care, under his direction, once more.

(A deep, unquiet niggling about what the future holds flickers into his awareness and then drifts away again.)

His eyes fix on Orev again and a shiver rolls through him. He saw the way Orev gazed down his body, how he's staring now as though Jack can't hide anything from him (he never could hide anything from him.) (How easily Orev found Daddy's voice after days of hesitancy. Like Daddy was just under the surface all along.)

((Why did he go? Who was better at being his Puppy than Jack? How could he not feel the rightness of this?))

What does he need? He doesn't have to be commanded, but the command settles on him, anyhow, forcing more bare, desperate honesty from him than he would have given otherwise.

"You," he gasps, barely audible. Weak and ashamed, but clearly nearing some ecstatic peak. "I need you. I need what we were. I need your hands on me and I need your voice telling me how to be. I need you to stay with me until the end -"

He swallows hard, eyes closing against a fresh burst of tears. He can't stop the words from finding voice, however. "I need you to want me more than anyone else. Keep me and torture me and don't let me be alone anymore, even when I walk away. Make the chains tighter, make me beg, make me ache for you over and over."

He's nuzzling Orev's hand, passive under his foot (for now). He finds Daddy's gaze again, agonized. "Don't stop?"

This is fate; something more than, something deeper than chance.

This is where he’s meant to be. (Where he must have, he thinks, sought to return.) ((What he never should have left.) (What was the reason, there must have been a reason.)) This is where he ought to have been all along.

The way he breathes so evenly. Feels the moment settled around him, alive and alight with potential. Roots driven through the center of existence.

(It isn’t inconsequential, the way this boy makes him feel.)

(It’s dire beyond speech, the way Jack looks at him, speaks to him, breathes life in words of wanting, words of need.)

(It’s fate, and it’s necessity; how could this be anything besides?)

What Jack speaks could rend him. Does flay him, somewhere within, and Orev’s certain his breath catches once and again. Is certain his eyes reflect both longing and worry, regret for what he must have done and soundless joy for what he has before him now.

(There are worlds within this man, yes.) ((And.)) ((What worlds did Orev take away, what worlds did he burn for this man when he left?))

Don’t let him be alone.

Don’t stop.

(How precisely this man speaks to Orev’s own wishing.)

What he thinks is ’Never.’

(He’ll never stop. He’ll never be far. This distance, this connection bright with possibility and promise.) (How could he live without (Puppy) any part of this?)

(He’ll never leave. He can’t fathom how he’d sustain being distant from this man.)

((But how. How can he promise anything, after what he’s done, and the time, the self he can’t recall?))

What he thinks is, ’You’ll have this. Always.’

(This thought, too, bears a sting. What happened to ‘always,’ when Orev left this man, when nine months stretched vast, stretched hollow for the boy who melts so brilliantly beneath him?) (Had he promised the boy before? And. How can Orev keep from repeating whatever mistake cut them apart?)

What he thinks is, ’Oh, Lovely, I need you, too.’

(Yes. Yes. True.)

What he thinks is a rush of prickling heat and a settling through his soul, and opening through the world.

What he can say, does say: “Ah, Puppy—“ Smiling fond warmth, and with the slightest flash of teeth. With a sustained tug and holding of the chain, a shift of his foot just a little closer at Jack’s throat (he can feel the boy’s pulse, wild and assured, the thrum of blood, vitality, of want of need of rightness). “There is no other.

“No other I require.

“No other I wish.”

He’s bending low, now. Nearly brushing chest-to-chest with Jack. One hand wrapped with the chain, the other now trailing the line of Jack’s neck, now brushing along his chest. (Testing. Feeling. Learning. (Re)Claiming.)

(You should never be alone. A sin; it’d be a sin to leave you cold.) ((It was a sin, a crime against nature and against his own heart’s cry, to leave this man.))

Voice lowering, soft and yet licked with steel, with blood, “What am I, apart from you.

“The world is so dark, so vast. There is so little I know—

“And yet, you. You appear, and existence glows anew.

“Your eyes find mine, and I know myself again.

“There is you and I; what else amounts? Nothing else matters, or can dare to speak.”

And, eyes softening for a moment, the brush of his hand turned more careful still: “Beautiful man.”

A dip of his head, graceful bend of spine and shoulders while he draws a thumb along Jack’s lip. While the pressure of his foot relaxes subtly, subtly, then resumes. (Not cruel. Not painful. Only possessive. Only a reminder: Here, here, here with me is where you belong. Here, you are kept, secure. Safe. (Cherished.))

“My Puppy.”

His hand at Jack’s cheek, drawing gentle, unyielding caress. His eyes lost to depths drawn in amber. His heart gone unsteady, racing, and all the world is this man.

A breath, and he seeks the press of lips.

A breath, and he draws (his Puppy) Jack into a kiss. Taking and giving; claiming and offering.

<.>

He's dreaming, he decides. Orev is saying all the things he wanted Draža to say, doing everything just the way Gideon might have fantasized. Did, often, fantasize, first in the days between the nights Daddy came to him, and then later, when Draža never came back. It has to be a dream.

The promises, the threatening possession of the chain, the thumb along his lips, the grip at his throat: none of this can be real.

(But what if it is? What if Orev is really making these promises and someday remembers that other lover, his reason for leaving Gideon behind?

(He'll have to make sure he ends it all before Orev does. Before his heart can break again. That's the cost of this.)

(He could always find that other lover first. He could find them and kill them so Draža is left just as alone.)

For now, though -

Just for now, for a moment, for an hour, he can be this again. (The shame will rush in on him later, he knows.))

Each word summons a fresh welling of tears, each touch guiding him to renewed thrill. When Orev's lips press to his, he responds with a startled stillness, however, eyes wide open before they flutter closed. A wondering little sound settles in his throat. His own lips part, yielding (welcoming), warm with longing.

<.>

Light in approach, soft-seeking, and a catch at his throat when Jack’s eyes go wide, a star-crossed pulse of his heart as (his Puppy’s) his Puppy’s eyes slip shut, when the kiss is accepted.

(He has ever kissed this man, he must have kissed this man, strong as the impulse drove him. (But. And. He can’t be certain.) (But. And. It doesn’t matter just now whether he did, whether he can or can’t recall. Because this, he wiil know, will recall, will feel in resonance on his lips long, long after. This, he’ll have to keep.))

It begins with a brush, and another. Soft grace of lips to lips, then the subtlest taste - just a drift of his tongue’s tip - along Jack’s lip. Another brushing, and a soft-crooned, “Good boy.”  Then pressing without release, without relinquishing. One talon of his foot now drawing light alone Jack’s sternum in its own caress, and Orev’s hand at the back of his Puppy’s head, drawing through hair and holding, holding his Puppy’s steady. There’s a sound in his throat, catch of something nearly strangling, catch of the edge of a pleased and wanting tone.

And yes, he ventures deeper, his own eyes now closed though the image of his Puppy burns bright, though still the knowledge of Jack’s being guides his being, guides his touch.

This man, this man, his Puppy.

((Oh Dearest, my Dearest, how I’ve missed you.

I’ve needed you so badly.))

<.>

It's as familiar as dancing with Draža, but without the demand, without the desperation that tinged each kiss. Orev seems to linger as though he has all the time in the world and Jack encourages it, meeting brush for brush, exploratory teasing of his tongue answering in kind. Then submitting, allowing Orev entry and possession - just as he always has, but it's different, isn't it? It's different, it's lovely (it's loving) to be kissed this way.

(He always knew Draža's mind was just a little unsettled at the best of times. Is this how he might have been, absent of madness?) (Is Orev absent of madness?)

(Does any of it matter, when he's missed this so much?)

He wishes he could wind his arms around Orev, but isn't it apt that he can't? That the chains keep his upper arms pinned to him, that he can't claim this man in an embrace? He was only ever meant to submit to Draža's will.

Not that he minded the submitting, but finding out what he couldn't keep had been a painful lesson: he had to hold on to each moment as it passed because he would be left only with memories.

(Something Orev didn't even keep.)

When it ends - inevitable, any ending - he sighs against Orev's lips. He hadn't meant to speak, or hadn't precisely planned it, but the words come as though drawn forth by a kiss alone, a surrender, an admission of defeat and wanting. "Gideon." Then a little smirk, followed by another stolen kiss and, "Mine, not yours."

Gideon.

Gideon.

A name with fancy and firmness. A name standing at the edge of outer wilds, daring a grin against the dark. A name that settles into sun’s light without shirking shadows.

Of course this is his name. Of course.

And Orev’s response is a stricken breath, near-sigh of the name. Simply (and never simply) (everything, everything in this man is layered, is lit by and from a thousand countless lights): “Gideon.”

(This name, a gift. Never mind the tease - adorable tease - of that smirk, the nod toward a name not given, and in any case, what would Orev do with his own name, he doesn’t wan (no, he’s— not yet ready for) his own name.

Far better to have this man’s. Far better to know his Puppy’s name, and so move closer, even just a little closer to better knowing this man in fullness.)

That kiss, radiant, and this name, equally so.

When has Orev ever been so lucky? (Never, he thinks. How could he have heard, have learned anything more vital?)

If his grasp on the chain, if the pressure of his hold has slacked some, it wasn’t intentional. He still holds the boy wrapped, of course, and still he stands above (Gideon!) his Puppy, but for a moment, Orev had been lost within this revelation. To this wonder.

He regains his grasp on the chain, though there’s no sharpness in the pull he gives.  Only slow pressure; only, again, the reminder of nearness, of yieldless (keeping) hold. He’s drawn back just enough to meet Jack’s— Gideon’s eyes, and to regard his face in whole. And the claw of his thumb wisps light caress at the back of Jack’s head, down along his neck, as Orev speaks, voice firmer now upon this man’s name, lingering upon its speaking—

“My Gideon.”

And, pressing a kiss to Puppy’s forehead: “Thank you, Dearest. It’s perfect.”

<.>

He would nod, flickers of sorrow in his eyes, and agree: yes, he is Daddy's Gideon. Draža's. Orev's. Whatever chasms open between them, he belongs forever to this man, in wanting and by contract. (Not. That Orev needs to know that latter for certain.)

It's what Orev says last that holds Gideon stricken, however, spinning him into a breathless, staring silence.

It's what Draža would call him. Dearest, adoration, fondness - the words that don't and might never be "love", but were enough.

It came so easily to Orev's tongue, as though only natural. As though he remembered deep in his bones how this game was played.

Softly, he echoes, "Dearest," and feels the burn of that kiss to his forehead long after its end.

<.>

A glimpse from another world. His own life, lost until this moment.

A sky laden with starlight. Pinprick silver strewn before his view, and he, knowing the subtle damp of grass against his back, his arms around—

Gideon, yes.

(What did we have together? What have I missed?)

He’d been speaking. He must have been speaking in this memory, but what he knows now is the way his Puppy watched him. The way amber eyes seemed deepest gold, like honey, in the star’s light. The way the boy’s hair seemed pleasantly mussed, the way Gideon appeared half-drowsy, and wholly enthralled. And in Orev’s knowing, he sees his own hand clutched tight (for dear, for dearest life) against Gideon’s arm. And hears a word that seems to warm his Puppy further. Hears ‘Dearest’ interspersed, or as an anchor in the midst of Orev’s words again, again, again.

Something he returned to. Something this man may have, must have held onto.

Jack— Gideon. Was Orev’s Puppy.

He was Orev’s Dearest, as well.

(Whatever he may have done to this man, at least he’d given this title. At least he’d called Gideon this, some approximation of the wonder that he is. Some small measure of the way he thrums in Orev’s being.)

Another sounds from Orev, soft, nearly an ’Oh.’ And he draws closer, nearly gathers Gideon against him. Does settle his forehead to Gideon’s temple and nudge, and nuzzle, and remain, remain, keeping steady.

(Keeping steady as his eyes burn at the back.) (Keeping steady though his form threatens to shake, to tremble itself into pieces.)

And softly, voice certain and yet unable to maintain full firmness, wavered here and there with wayward jarrings: “You are.

“You were.

“Gideon, and Puppy. And Dearest.

“Oh, Puppy—“

Again, his eyes slip shut. (Can’t regard, he can’t possibly regard anything more, just for a moment.) (He’s been given the world, all the universe; how much more can he bear?) (Everything, anything. In a moment. In just a moment, after a breath. After breathing in this wonder.) And again he nudges Gideon’s temple, slowly, slowly, thumb drawing its caress, his palm resting against Gideon’s head, feeling the brush of soft, of golden hair.

“How fortunate I am.”

<.>

Whatever Orev does or doesn't remember, it hardly matters. Jack - Gideon - is lost in the moment, succumbed to the feeling of chains that have always been his and claws against the lump in his throat, the burn of a kiss lingering at his lips, and Daddy's hand against his hair.

This is where he belongs. It's where he has *always* belonged - something Draža made him confess again and again after the first time, something Draža delighted in hearing as much as Gideon delighted in speaking. *I belong here.*

(Somewhere deep within him, he feels a pang of yearning to chase that 'Oh' that Orev let slip. He wishes he could draw it from his captor, and along with it, he wishes he could draw all the things that 'Oh' might mean.)

He nudges back, then angles his head to see the blurry outline of Orev's features through a film of tears. When he feels one slip free and roll down his cheek, he wishes he could wipe it away - turn his face away, hide the shame of feeling his longings met after months of absence - but a shift of his arm reminds him again, again, that he remains at Orev's command. He breathes out shakily and whispers, "You are. You were. Dearest to me in every world."

<.>

An ache in his chest, at the base of his throat; a smile crooked, wrought with memories glimpsed and memory unknown, unknown, but waiting to break through (he’ll find it, he’ll find all of it again, he’ll know everything they were together) (what a tragedy, to have lost this man).

Softly: “Ah, Gideon…”

(A name he could speak in infinite repetitions, and never find lacking, never find the end of or grow weary in its speaking.) (A name that belongs on his tongue, in his breath.)

((A thought, dim awareness: When he learns the name he once held, the name now lost, he wants it from his Puppy’s breath.))

His breath’s stalled. His hand draws a brush along Gideon’s shoulder, and a kiss frees the boy’s cheek from the fallen tear. He hears himself speaking in hush, “It’s all right. Dearest, my Dearest, we are where we’re meant to be.”

(Does he believe it?) (Absolutely. With more certainty than he’s known in anything since waking to this name, this existence as Orev.)

And, with the hint of a smirk that doesn’t reach sharpness, deep as it nestles in ache and longing, “You are precisely where I want you.

“Here, at Daddy’s hands, kept safe within your chain.”

<.>

He moves, angling his chin so he nuzzles, brushes, rests his cheek to Orev's, his sighs a counterpoint to every spoken word. (How easily he loses himself to the will of this man. (How easily this man walked away from him.))

((Before. But now?))

It's a dream realized: hearing his name, hearing he's once again held dearest, hearing that he's meant to be here and held by Orev. Feeling his tears kissed away. (Almost as though the past nine months never happened. (But they did.))

It's when Orev calls himself Daddy that Gideon startles, stares without breathing. (He remembers. He does remember. (How much?!) (Enough?)) There's a thunderous silence, broken only when he begins to struggle against the chains. Unsettled sounds - little breaths and grunts - accompany his efforts, and then, finally, he cries, "Let me -"

Not 'go'. He doesn't want to go.

"Get these off me, I -"

He doesn't want that, either, precisely - but he wants reach up and pull Orev - Daddy, he remembers he's *Daddy* - to him, or himself to Daddy. He wants the use of his hands to catch hold and maybe, this time, keep Daddy from leaving him.

<.>

(Poor, poor Puppy.)

(Beautiful man, only reaching to hold.)

“Let you?” It’s little more than a whisper, a half-amused echo of Gideon’s words. Because he knows (he thinks he knows) (he does know, and he’s certain Gideon knows as well) that demands like this won’t go far between them. Not without Orev’s own will. Not without reason that builds like compulsion.

For a moment, he contemplates. Looking down at Gideon, talons brushing left, right, left-right along his skin,

There is in Orev’s mind a quiet query: Is Gideon attempting to flee? (Was it too much, this new word Orev had spoken ahead of knowing, never mind how perfectly it’d fit into speech?) Is Gideon attempting to fight, and is this a ploy to wrestle control from Orev’s hands, to pull himself away?

It’s possible, perhaps; it also doesn’t suit, doesn’t fit at all with the man (Jack, Puppy, Dearest, Gideon) in Orev’s witness.

So he doesn’t doubt. So he doesn’t let silence draw longer, doesn’t hesitate, and there’s a fluid-eliding series of motions to his wrists. First loosening the chain to slackness, to unwind from Gideon’s arms only to rebind against his chest, around his shoulders. No rescinding hold; only adjusting. Only allowing the boy use of his arms—

(He was struggling against something, or toward something, for something. What was it?

Well. Let Gideon show him. Let them both see what happens.)

“A mercy; is that better, Puppy?”

Then tightening the chain again, running his fingertips, drawing his palm along Gideon’s (beautiful, rare and incomparable, name) neck. Smirk now warm-sharp, eyes fixed on amber.

“It will have to do, Dearest. I’m afraid I can’t release you.”

(Yet.)

(Ever.)

(You are mine.)

He stills, pleading eyes fixed on Orev; he remembers very well all the times he was denied something he demanded - at least until he begged for it. (Until -

Until Draža left and didn't return. He'd begged then. He'd pleaded desperately for Draža to stop teasing, to take it back, to say he hadn't meant any of it and was only teaching Gideon a lesson.

Then he had spent weeks pleading with the empty dark for Draža to come back.)

(What if Orev lets him go and throws him out?) Panic builds in his chest and tightens his throat; what if? What if? Maybe Orev remembered something more, maybe he's going to take away the chain and push Gideon towards the door. Maybe he didn't remember anything at all, but the demand was enough to turn him sour towards Gideon?

Except he feels the scrape of talons. Except when Orev removes the chains from his arms, he winds them anew around Gideon's torso, and it's all right.

It's all right.

When he heaves upward to Orev, it's from relief as much as need. He grasps as tightly as he dares, fingers clenched in Orev's feathers, arms locked, his face buried in the crook of Orev's neck. (He can feel himself trembling, terror leeching from him little by little.)

"Daddy." His voice is muffled and tearful, the grief-laced tone of a man who thinks he's regained something he might yet lose again. He repeats it once more into inky feathers. An unspoken why sits in his throat, threatening to remain like a thorny barrier between himself and Draža.

(But why couldn't Draža give him this before? Why wasn't he good enough, when he feels as though Orev thinks the world of him?

Or -

Can Orev lie that well?)

<.>

Questions stalk and howl the tumult in Gideon’s eyes and at the edges of awareness. Fears that drove the boy toward tension, toward a careening like despair. Queries (sorrow-laden, iron-tainted nausea to the tongue) that coil through that one word - Daddy - and through the body wrapped against his own.

Orev can guess some shape of these questions. (He doesn’t know anything. He doesn’t fucking remember.) (But hasn’t he heard enough from Jack, from Gideon? Hadn’t he seen enough in even one memory, his own voice speaking of a lack in value. Why would he have claimed such travesty? (There was a reason. A— Something he couldn’t hold onto, when Orev was whatever creature lived before Orev. Something he could only endanger, riotous as his mind had burned.)) He can’t put the questions into precise language, and anyway, anyway, how could he possibly approach them? He doesn’t know what he’d done, he doesn’t know what this boy needs—

No.

No, that isn’t true.

No, because he knows impulses in himself. Because he knew enough to shift the chains without rescinding their hold. Because he knew to call this man Puppy, Dearest. To call himself— Yes, Daddy. (And didn’t, doesn’t the word in Gideon’s voice run through him as a longing, a restorative shudder?)

He doesn’t know what to make of the way this man clings to him now, face buried at his chest, and at the same time, he understands. He hears. He— Knows this feeling, or something very like.

(If there’s anything that will bring Orev to the answers he seeks, knowledge of the man he was, it’s this man. More than any journal, more than any spell. Nothing draws light upon himself like (his Puppy) (his Dearest) ((his so much more, his everything, his l—)) Gideon.

So trust what this boy’s presence tells him.

Trust what he feels with this man.)

His own arms wrap around Gideon’s shoulders, sheltering the boy in a fall of feathers even as he maintains his grip upon the chain. Setting his jaw at the top of Gideon’s head and brushed, nestling slowly, humming a soft sound, then a purr that might be - is meant to be - reassuring.

“Yes, Puppy.

“Yes, I’m here.

“You’re here with me.

“I don’t— I don’t understand everything. But I’ll find it. I’ve found you.

“I said I can’t release you. I meant now, from the chains— I mean as well in ways beyond this moment.

“Gideon. Gideon. Puppy.” A kiss to the top of his head. Another nestled nuzzle. “I won’t lose you again.”

<.>

When Orev's wings enclose him, Gideon relaxes. It's almost immediate, a dissolve of his tension with a sigh: close off the world by a barrier of feathers, he feels safe. This is familiar. This is as much a haven as a terror and his body clearly, cleanly remembers it.

Draža held him this way in all their aftermaths, shrouded in feathery darkness.

(Still. He hears Orev speaking and feels flickers of doubt. He'll leave again once his memories return.)

(But Orev said, I've found you. Was he searching for Gideon? Was he looking, all this time? Was Gideon somehow lost to him, rather than the other way around? Or is that only wishful thinking?)

Better than contemplating any of this is to simply let it be. To ease his hold and let his tears abate, to let the trembling turn to shivers of delight for the feeling of chains and feathers, for the scent of Orev engulfing him.

Better to loosen the grip of his fingers and let his touch become a caress along a familiar spine, the planes of Daddy's back that he knows so well. Daddy's body is as ingrained in his memory as their song - and it's real now, not just a dream to leave him aching deep in the sucking well of his chest.

He avoids speaking by chasing a second kiss, stealing it the way a wild animal takes food from an outstretch hand.

<.>

Nothing exists beyond the moment, this place, the man held and holding Orev. (Or if there is. If there must be time beyond these hands, this kiss, it’s all brushed aside for the moment, can wait its time within the wings and will be, must be managed when it follows.) (If it follows, because now, right now, it seems impossible that any other state of being could exist.)

Yes, there may be unvoiced questions somewhere, somewhere, but what can they amount, when weighed against the warmth of breath against skin and feathers, the weight and tremor of this man (he’s real, he’s real, he exists and Orev’s found him (again))? When weighed against this kiss, first stolen by his Puppy, then returned by Orev, who’s nearly on the ground himself now, who straddles and enwraps and chains this man.

His own, his own, his Puppy for always.

((A warning, a burn: What happened to always, before? What came between their shared existence then and now?

Never mind, never mind, it doesn’t matter, the contradiction, quandaries can’t exist here.))

The trace along his spine is silken and shocking; claims a soft-jarred catch of breath, a quiet and half-shattered laugh. And he chases into the kiss he’s returned, seeking Puppy’s warmth, the breadth the breath of Gideon’s life and offering his own, one arm wrapping Gideon tighter as the other draws long along the boy’s side down to his waist, to hold with precise tension, a catch of claws that don’t break skin.

And when he draws back from the kiss, just enough to speak, lips brushing still with Gideon’s—

“You burn, Dearest, so bright.

“A flame I’d sing upon. A light to call me, always.

“But Puppy, my poor, poor Puppy—

“Tell Daddy: Does it ache to burn so fiercely?

“Have you been waiting, my Gideon, for apotheosis, for relief?"

<.>

The journal lies completely forgotten at his side. (And why should he worry about it? Anything he wrote in it could be gleaned from his reactions once Orev's chain wound around him and slammed him to the ground. Those admissions could be gleaned from his tears and, yes, from the resurgence of desire burning through him now.)

There was always one caveat to the commands Draža leveled on him: if Gideon didn't understand what the other man was saying, he never felt compelled to obey. Just now, he only thinks he understands what it is Orev is asking, but the uncertainty is enough for him to offer a sly smile and refrain from answering.

(He heard that hitched breath. He feels Daddy grown just as warm from the touch of his hand and the brush of kisses. And Daddy's straddling him now, just the way he used to. Maybe -

Maybe it's all right. (Maybe he can tease without fear of Orev walking out?))

"'Relief'?" he asks innocently, his voice carrying traces of tears, evident but vanishing in favor of husky pleasure. "It sounds like you're burning, if I'm the flame. Maybe you're the one who's aching."

(It's a gamble. He doesn't fancy the idea of leaving this room with another nine months, another *day* of aching looming before him. Still, he can't help himself: he's curious how much of Draža there is in Orev.

How much of Daddy.)

<.>

Oh, this…

This little shit.

Orev doesn’t doubt in the least that Gideon knew exactly what he meant. (Didn’t he see it in that not precisely contrived but absolutely emphasized suggestion of innocence? Those eyes pleading, wide, and accompanied by a little smirk?

His Puppy knows precisely what he’s doing.)

(A corollary thought, question: What is Gideon prodding against, and why? What (…who?) is this boy seeking?)

A click of his tongue. A shake of his head, calculated, theatric, and he doesn’t try to keep the grin - vicious, fond - from his lips. Doesn’t keep himself from giving the chain a tug, or from drawing his hand back through the feathers of his own head, from arcing his neck with a heady sigh.

Then returning, of course returning, his touch to Puppy’s cheek, to a dragging trace of Puppy’s lip.

“Now why in any world, any veil-strung existence should the aching be exclusive?” A cant of his head. A pause in silence, and a blink of his eyes, expression gone contemplative before his grin returns.

“You and I incinerate; you and I may burn alike.

“Must burn alike, each with each.

“What good is there, my Dearest, in walking through the fire alone? What sodden shadow of wonder would that be?

“What a waste, to howl in flames without resonance, consonance.”

His grin sharpens, and again he gives the chain a tug. Again his foot sets deeper pressure against Gideon’s chest, as his fingers trace down from sternum to stomach to hip. As Orev gives his own shoulders a subtle roll, and arcs his back, the better to draw nearer and nearer, to speak in Puppy’s ear—

“Puppy, Puppy… I didn’t say Daddy wouldn’t get his, hm?”

<.>

There he is. Gideon watches with horrified fascination as Orev arcs his neck, as he draws a hand through his feathers. (Beautiful. He was always deadly and beautiful.)

Gideon feels shivers crawling under his skin, his body answering with strung tension and small shifts in hopes of finding some ease where none exists.

For months now, he's avoided arousal; whenever he felt the stir of it, he would find some way to tune his mind to deadening notions, or exert himself in other ways. Anything, anything, to distract himself from need he couldn't sate. Now, though, he allows the full force of desire to seethe through him, a feral wanting that threatens to break him free from stillness.

Gods, he hopes Orev feels this way, too. (He could, sometimes, drive Draža to madness. To frenzy. It felt as good as winning at any gambling table, as good as plunging a knife in a back, as good as any drug he's ever consumed: to know he could make his Daddy need him.

His grin is a mirror of Orev's even if his body feels alight with little shocks, excitement and terror mingling in his breast. Even if his shivers begin anew with Orev's whispers at his ear.

Just one more push. Why not? It's been months since he plied at Daddy this way.

"You didn't say Daddy would, either." He pulls a thoughtful pout, his eyes glinting with half-terrified thrill. "Maybe I've gone so long without, I've forgotten how to burn. Maybe I only remember what it's like to be a light."

<.>

Another soft laugh, this time indulgent and laced with the hint of a hazard, a warning. A signal: *Oh, Puppy, I see what you’re doing.*

Orev sees, and he doesn’t disapprove. Cheekiness sits well on this man. (And it’s in Gideon’s right, Orev thinks, to push a little, to flaunt along the edge of whatever rules lies between them. Rogue that he is. Brat - ah, that’s the word - that he so beautifully embodies.)

The back of a talon traces Gideon’s jaw, and Orev speaks low, matter-of-fact, “I don’t believe that for a moment.”

“You’ve saved it, haven’t you? The knowledge of burning. The sense of fire in your veins. I don’t believe it left you.

“I don’t believe it ever could.”

A downward bend; a catch of teeth, gentle, at Puppy’s lower lip, and a tug with a low-growled purr, a sigh. Then withdrawing to caress, caress his Puppy’s hair as he continues—

“Gideon, Gideon…

“I find I know how to reach for you.

“How to be drawn toward you.

“How to burn for you.

“Doesn’t my Puppy remember the same? Don’t you feel its return.

“Didn’t I see you shiver.

“Didn’t I see you flush. The shallow swiftness of your breathing. The clench and tremor at your thighs.”

And, eyes fixed still with Gideon’s, he lets his hand drift further still, to trace the telltale jut of Puppy’s ache. To cant his head and—

Again, draw his fingertips along its length.

To smile, show a slight flash of teeth.

To caress again, and, “Oh, Puppy. I think you remember very, very well.”

After a moment. (Half-thinking, no, it really isn’t necessary.) (Half-thinking it’s a risk.) (Half-thinking it’s a… vulnerability, and he’s fairly certain he’s never cared to be around other without several layers of dissemblance— But then, Gideon is something better than the nattering crowds of this world.) (Gideon is something, someone, the only one worth calling worth knowing as special.) After a moment, he takes Gideon’s hand in his own, and guides it in a drift along his own aching cock.

“As do I, my Dearest. As do I.”

He remembers what it is to burn for Draža; he’s done nothing but burn for him from the first touch, that unextinguished fire in his blood.

He remembers the intervening months, as well. Every hand that met him without giving relief: unequal exchanges that grew increasingly hateful. Gideon lapsed detached and self-loathing, Draža-loathing, loathing of every man who came to his bed with a handful of coin and a promise. He remembers the accidental climaxes, his only hope for relief, and even those were only momentary flickers of pleasure in the dark. Pinnacles marred by the absence of feathers and a voice melting warm in his ear. Pointless.

It’s as though all the bound agony of those months vanishes with one touch of Orev’s hand. Gideon whines a jarred note, hips bucking towards Daddy’s hand, then falls still when his own is guided along Orev’s ache.

Orev clearly doesn’t remember, but Gideon does. It wasn’t a conversation they’d had - how could they in the beginning, and how could they as Draža became more erratic later? - but he gleaned something about Draža’s relationship to his arousal. He didn’t always meet Gideon desire-for-desire; it was more subdued for him, more a state of mind than body. When it did impact him physically, It seemed to take him by surprise at times, or be a source of embarrassment to feel how desire could drive him. Make him weak, perhaps, or - vulnerable?

(Yes. Vulnerable.)

(Does Orev remember that now? Does he feel the same as he once did?)

He’d been teasing towards violence. Part of him had been hoping for a claiming like he remembers from the days when he resisted Draža; he wants to feel wrung through, used, brutalized -

(But this changes things.)

(He has to -  He has to be careful. He knows he has to be careful with Daddy when he’s excited, not because his excitement can be volatile - think of the scars on Gideon’s hips - but because of the aftermath. Because he needs to feel safe and know there’s no shame in it.

Yes, Gideon remembers how to burn. He remembers, as well, how to help Draža burn without feeling scorched and laid to waste.)  Though he shifts clothing aside to meet skin to skin, he lets Orev guide him, his hand easing in slow, worshipful strokes. It’s like falling into an old rhythm: touching this way with murmured words of thanks and praise. Recognition of this gift, this miracle bestowed on him. (He knows what Daddy needs, just like Daddy always knew what Puppy needed.)

<.>

An arch of his back, drift of his thigh and a pitch of his hips. Into and along the grace of Gideon’s hand, as shivering strikes through him, bright renewal.

(He wouldn’t have thought he’d want this, or take pleasure in it. This: A hand at his cock. This: A hand upon him, anywhere. Orev doesn’t what the man he was before knew of contact shared with others, but he knows now a preference for remaining removed, for letting no one step near him. He knows how he flinched from the fuck-forsaken mayor’s clasp to his shoulder, and how he prefers keeping distance between himself and every being he’s encountered. How the thought of touch seems in abstraction like anathema. Like asking for an open wound.

This, though—

This feels like care. Attentiveness. And if, yes, he feels his nerves lighting, rising tumultuous, there is no sense of wounding, no fear in knowing, in relishing Gideon’s touch.)

(How closely this man watches him.

How well his Puppy must have (never mind what the boy had said about never knowing, about never having met) known him.)

A sigh drawn from his chest. An exhale that crawls up from his lungs into something sonorous, nearly a moan. And he speaks, compelled—

“Yes, that’s right.”

And. “Yes, good Puppy.”

And. “Perfect, oh, that’s perfect.”

(Meaning, yes, ’You are perfect.’)

He hears Gideon’s own murmurs twining, shimmering harmonic with Orev’s voice, with the rush of his own heart, his Puppy’s heart, and if he sets a palm to Puppy’s chest, yes, yes he finds a quickening beat to match his own.

(Bliss, that’s a word for it.) (Transcendence; what’s beyond earthly, beyond the realms of any mortal being.)

His eyes find Gideon’s (and again, a sense of sudden strickeness) (he could lose himself in eyes like this; in these eyes only, only, always), and his hand drifts light along his Puppy’s (his Puppy’s, yes, yes, always) ache. Teasing; promising (ah, it won’t do, it wouldn’t do to leave this man wanting).

Then, voice low, a dusky velvet purr: “Follow me, my Gideon, my Puppy.

“Burn with Daddy, won’t you?”

And there’s another kiss given, and claimed.

<.>

Gideon moans into the press of Orev’s mouth; again he bucks his hips into the touch offered him (too little, teasing and frustrating, but familiar -

Perfectly, wonderfully familiar, all of this, like coming home.)

What he could never understand about Draža is how he could take desire in stride, seeming thoroughly at ease with the sweep of it. No, it wasn’t every time, because there were occasions of wildness and violence. But there was this, too: this control. This welcome, this slow and steady burn. It wasn’t singular of Draža: there were other men who weren’t driven to frenzy, who let waves of pleasure pass through them without losing control, without feeling chaotic and shattered.

Gideon always has lost control. Always. Climax has always crashed on him like a wave, left him panting and messy and undone. (It never occurred to him to think that the reason was Draža’s teasing. That his loss of control was by Daddy’s design, even when Daddy was beyond reach or contact.)

He would watch Orev in wonder now, in admiration of his soft-blooming rise towards release, chain in one hand and Gideon’s hardness in the other, god-like, if not for the building madness in himself.

It’s not enough. He needs more than the drift of fingers and the kiss and the thrumming words. (It’s been so long.)

But there’s nothing he can do to bring Daddy to the same frenzy: he’ll ride his pleasure through to a glorying, beautiful end, and soon.

There’s nothing he can do to make the hand grip him tighter and drag him burning to release. There’s nothing he can do to make this last until they both come snarling for one another -

…Well, that’s not entirely true.

His free hand slips from the back of Daddy’s neck to the column of his throat. The other hand rings the base of Orev’s cock and squeezes, each hand mirroring denial: no breath, no climax.

Against Orev’s mouth, he moans, “More, Daddy. Please.”

<.>

Oh.

Really.

(And— Oh. A gasp, an inhale that can draw no air, meets only the press of a hand, beautiful constriction as his lungs begin slowly, slowly to burn.)

He laughs into the kiss, a near-silent sound that draws the burn of his lungs deeper. He inhales again to feel the failure of his breath, the presence of his Puppy’s demanding hand.

Puppy wants more, does he? Does his Puppy dare to demand anything?

Ah, he did ask so nicely!

And it is his right.

And no, Orev doesn’t resent, doesn’t regret the grip at his throat, or this interruption (that is and isn’t an interruption; that only sparks further collision of white-hot nerves through his body) of his own pursuit. Yes, yes, he might draw out his Puppy’s pleasure endlessly, yes he might tease on and on, but for now - here, when Gideon’s been left without respite for months on end ((without hope for culmination, but no, no, Orev can’t think about that now, the abyss Puppy was left with) (the abyss into which Orev had cast his Dearest)) - it might, it must be only fair, to draw this man to shared ecstasy.

So.

There’s a withdrawal from the kiss, slow, and drawing Orev’s teeth to Puppy’s lower lip. With a tug; with a bite that nearly, very nearly draws blood. With the thrum of a purring growl in his chest.

He tugs at the chain, twists to constrict his Puppy further. Pressure for pressure; it’s only equitable.

He thrusts against Gideon’s hand, perhaps seeking relief or perhaps only wanting reassurance of that grip, that claim (rightful; he belongs to this man just as firmly as Gideon belongs to him).

And he finds Gideon’s eyes - beautiful in haze, in a calculation (ah, the brat!) near-overwhelmed by want, by promises of rapture - with the keen-cutting focus of his own, with a smirk, sharp and knowing.

For a moment, his hand’s drifted off from the jut of Gideon’s cock. For a moment, it’s lingered near, and without touching. As if perhaps it might not return to its application. As if perhaps he’s decided to rescind his touch for a Puppy who dares make demands.

The distance doesn’t last long. Quickly, quickly Orev’s hand drifts beneath fabric, the better to grasp hold of Puppy’s ache. Careful with his talons, his grip unyielding but light, testing the shape of Puppy’s longing, drawn up, then down along the shaft.

A lift of his eyebrows, an arcing of his neck against Gideon’s grip. As if to say, This, Puppy, is this what you need? With a gentle brushing of claws to accompany the pressure of his palm. With a drift of his thumb upward, then along the peak of Puppy’s ache.

Another shift of his hips, demanding Puppy’s caress at his own ache. Another subtle twisting of the chain, and another silent laugh from Orev, as one foot draws along his Puppy’s thigh. As he looks down on this man in adoration; this, the gaze of a man who finds nothing in the sight before him. Who sees all the world in honeyed eyes.

<.>

The chain tightens around his torso, constricting his lungs. Gideon laughs breathlessly, hips rising to meet Orev’s caress and then jerking with the sweep of a thumb at sensitive nerve endings, too-tight skin, evidence of overwrought need. The laugh becomes a yelp at the threat of talons, a sob at painful, euphoric pleasure burning bright beneath his skin.

His grip resumes its stroking as though in satisfying Daddy, he can somehow satisfy himself.

His eyes seek desperately for Daddy’s and when he meets gaze-to-gaze, he falters. He falls into the (love?) adoration he sees: the eyes of a god looking down on a beloved penitent. (Or.

A lover.

He’s missed Draža so much. Is he truly seeing what he thinks he sees?)

(What if.

What if he just kept this?

What if he kept Orev, and never let Draža be remembered?

The look in his eyes is everything Gideon ever wanted. The embraces, the kisses, the tightness of the chair, the control, the clear signs of adoration, all of it is exactly how he wished they could be - but with Draža never gone. Never turning away from him. (Never lost in his spiral of madness.)

Orev is perfect.

If he kept Orev just this way, he could have everything he ever wanted. They could be together, a yield less grasp on one another -)

Oh, he ought to. Let Daddy breathe.

His hand relaxes enough to allow Orev to draw in a full breath, though his thumb caresses the other man’s windpipe in slow, worshipful admiration. Gideon couldn’t hide his own love if he tried; it’s there in his eyes, in the smile that lingers behind wicked smirks on beestung, bitten lips. It hues his pleading, celebratory moans of Daddy, again and again. It’s behind the force of his touch and the sting of his teeth when he lunges upward to capture another kiss and nips at Daddy’s lip in kind.

He stops thinking of the what ifs. His mind sinks into a hazy spill, singularly driven towards one shared goal. He paces his own touch to Orev’s strokes of his cock and whines at the too-slow, too-steady, not-enough. Slowly, his grip tightens once more at Daddy’s throat.

<.>

Beautiful, beautiful, and burning.

The man beneath him, the man wrapped around him holding him, giving and rescinding oxygen, eyes luminous with something (a feeling; a rightness; a truth) Orev can’t bring himself to name but recognizes, feels his soul melt and bloom upon. This man who speaks ‘Daddy’ like holy-unholy symphony, whose form moves in fluent tandem with his own, as if attuned to Orev’s every instinct, as if their beings shared one mind, one desire.

Beautiful and burning, his own body, his own impulse. It’s simple to pursue this man’s pulse and chase it upward, drive his flame toward incineration. Simple to keep chain in-hand with deft applications of twist and pressure even as he strokes this man toward fulfillment, even as his own body responds - with voltaic shudders, with moans, with ‘Puppy’ and ‘My Puppy’ spoken again, again, in adoration - to the touch at his cock, the hand at his throat.

(He thinks his Puppy has always known how to hold him, reach for and incite him.) (And how fortunate, how blessed he is to know his Puppy’s care here, again and as if for the first time.)

(Perhaps. Perhaps this time - whatever happened before; whatever led him from his Dearest last time - he can keep this man forever.) (Perhaps it’s what Orev had wanted all along.) (It— Doesn’t feel amiss, that thought. It’s incomplete, there are complications of his past self missing, but he thinks he understands and yes he deeply feels that there is nothing more important than this man, this perfect being.

Gideon, Gideon, Gideon.)

Teeth at his lip draw starlight to his eyes, and he laughs, voice ragged with the fresh swell of air. As he dips to take another kiss, to hum a pleased sounds against Puppy’s mouth. As he shifts his ache - ah, slowly, slowly, savoring the culminating build; keeping Puppy’s pace in-kind with his own - along the surety of Puppy’s hand.

A whisper, a crooning, “What a wonder you are.”

And, “What ecstasy you draw me toward.”

And, “Puppy, my Puppy, come with me.”

The hand at his neck tightens once more, and once more grey creeps along the edges of his knowing, both soothing and exhilarating. As thought falls further and further off from grasping. As a strangled sound - a whimper, a reverent sigh - climbs up his throat. As again he laughs, and now, yes, now he does quicken the pace of his strokes, steadily, steadily. Now he bends further, to wrap the hand grasping Puppy’s chain around his Puppy’s neck, to draw Gideon nearer, to better to more fully hold his Puppy. The edges of awareness fuzz further even as he knows a rising brightness, a glow that gathers itself in the form of his Dearest, his Puppy, his Gideon, and Orev pursues, calls his Puppy along.

Before the crest, before shatter, there’s a moment where he finds his voice - shaken, yes, and heady - and, cheek brushing Gideon’s temple before eyes find his Puppy again, he speaks—

“My perfect Puppy.”

And, before claiming one more vital kiss: “Now—

“Ah. Now.

“Burn with Daddy.”

Oh. Oh, it’s -

Relief even as he burns molten. Even as his hand relinquishes Orev’s throat and rushes along his spine, burying and clutching at feathers. Even as Gideon gasps for breathes he can’t fully draw against the chain’s merciless clamp. Relief is already settling over him with the rush of release, pulsing violence as strong as the first encounter, rendered painful in ecstasy for all the time he went without.

(And for all the time he went without Daddy.)

He doesn’t shout; his cries are hoarse, breathless, blooms of dark spots forming in his vision and mingling with the image of Daddy above him, shadowy, vast, dangerous. (Loving. He feels it, he feels how much love there is, and it must be from Orev, it must be, because Gideon is too small, too incomplete, too broken (not enough) to embody all the love in the space between them.)

He doesn’t shout, and neither does he neglect to tend his Daddy’s ache. (It was what Draža commanded. He’ll never forget that first night he was given this (very welcome) responsibility. He’ll never forget the first time he undid his Daddy.)

The command keeps him bound to Daddy’s release, his own drawn longer and lingering, viciously slow-burning. Gideon arcs his neck, head back against the floor and throat bared to Orev, his voice breaking against thanks, against “Daddy” and “yes” and “please”, disjointed words that don’t cohere into sentence. Words that shatter into weeping laughter when pleasure grows unbearable, when his own release is wrung out and his cock overstimulated (and still, and still, and still -)

(Draža did this to him a time or two. Not always tying their releases together with command: sometimes, he would order Gideon to continue, to keep going, to come again, again, and “Oh no, Puppy. Again”, until Gideon thought his mind would break and his body would disintegrate, would shatter, would split at its seams.

(Draža never did anything to him that he didn’t love.))

When there’s nothing left but blossoming warmth and breathlessness, he falls back panting, weak, and still whispering thanks to his god.

<.>

His Puppy does so well.

Heeding Daddy’s hand and Daddy’s encouragement. Chasing every spark at Orev’s skin and grasping, a catch of feathers that steals (claims, rightly claims) a tremor of Daddy’s being, that leads Orev nearer, nearer to blinding gold and brilliance.

His Puppy follows Orev and takes him, incites and conducts him beautifully. Until Orev’s skin has turned to firestorm and he longs only for bright and brighter fire, until his lungs ache and cloud his vision, leaving one sight only, one brilliance toward which Orev rushes, one brilliance onto which he fixes focus and into which he breathes, breathes, ah Gideon.

A kiss for this man as culmination crashes toward him, inevitable as tides, as death, as finding and returning to this man.

His perfect, perfect (love) Puppy.

Who doesn’t falter.

Who arcs beneath him, around him, and its with the quaking of Puppy’s body with the fruition of shuddered groans, yeses, pleases writ in Gideon’s voice and Gideon’s breath that Orev knows ascension, as in a rush of atmosphere, the night sky gathering and spinning upward to a burst of stars, to a suspension of vision, to the bursting of bright sun.

And in this brilliance, one word echoed in his voice or in his mind, “Puppy, Puppy, Puppy.”

After, in silence, he feels warmth aglow beside him. Feels his own body gone boneless, though his arms wrap something, someone solid, and infinitely dear.

He’s curled close, he realized, and when he opens his eyes, it’s with a shock of wonder, and a smile small but true, infinitely soft.

(There you are, my lover.)

His hand’s found Puppy’s hair again, and slowly, feeling as though time’s slowed, perhaps gone absent around them, he blinks against burning eyes, and speaks—

“Ah, my Puppy.

“Beautiful.

“That was. You are. Beautiful.”

<.>

When Orev sinks against him, Gideon winds his arm around his lover's shoulders and draws him nearer still. The chain vanishes and with its absence, he's able to draw in a full, deep breath. His free hand settles against Orev's throat, cupping, his thumb lightly sweeping the other man's jaw in slow, idle arcs.

Now and again he shivers, aftershocks of pleasure racing along his spine and raising goosebumps along his flesh.

It's been so long. Yes, since they made love, or fucked, or tended one another (or, since Gideon was at Daddy's mercy), but it's been just as long since they lay together like this. (And still, it's as familiar as dancing, as kissing, as speaking 'Daddy'. He could almost pretend Daddy never left him.) When he opens his eyes to study Orev, his expression softens in a way it hasn't before, full of private tenderness.

[ DC 12 INT, Orev may remember this look. He can hazily recall the protectiveness and aftercare from Gideon that was connected to the times he felt desire/need. If he rolls a 15 or higher, he may have a full formed memory. ]

As his breathing slows and his heart finds a steady rhythm, Gideon traces a finger along the line of Orev's jaw, his own eyes rimmed wet and shining. A smile, small and uncertain but full of wonder, curves his lips.

Softly, he asks, "Are you real?"

<.>

[ intelligence: 21 ]

That tenderness; those eyes.

He’s known this look before.

(Accompanied with a brush of fingers, yes, just like now, like warm skin gentle at his jaw.) (Accompanied with ’Daddy’ spoken soft-awed.) (With an arm wrapping around him, quieting, quieting the raucousness that rose in—

Orev.

Whoever he was, before this name. A gnawing wary, volatile feeling, and he thinks (feels this like knowing) that there were times he must have known desire, known aching like he’s done this day.

It’s a thought that feels like hazard. Like something hunted. Something raging, cornered in its fear.

Something Gideon must have seen.

Something Gideon, Orev is certain, soothed.)

And now. Now, hazy, a memory swims to his mind, a distant echo growing clearer, growing close—

There’d been ecstatic reverence, there’d been a pinnacle in tandem with this man, and he knows there’s been brilliance, he knows there’d been ascendence and it ought to have turned to the warmth and ease he knows here in this room.

But something ran amiss.

But there’d been no soft sinking after, or it’d been painfully brief, because something, something shocked through the man Orev was and set his mind aflame, thoughts racing, raging and recoiling, driven into frenzy, into himself scrabbling upward, unable to stand quickly. Teeth clamping with a stumble, jarring onto one knee with the taste of iron in his mouth, tongue-bitten, then sharpness gashed along his chest and the sight of his own talons glistened, dripped with red.

He must have been speaking he must have been wild-eyed, seeking the door, feeling trapped trapped feeling ire with himself, with his desire, and he’d sought flight, sought to tear free from his skin or to shed blood or anything, anything, to quiet the howling in his mind—

But there’d been a hand at the back of his neck.

But there’d been an arm drawing his face against a throat, warm-dark and pulse still racing. A pull not forceful. A pull careful and inviting, like safety, like blessed silence.

And there’d been Gideon’s voice, cutting through the howling of a thousand half-voiced thoughts and warinesses, there’d been Gideon’s voice banishing chaotic worries: “Daddy, I’m here.

“It’s all right.

“Got you, hey, I’ve got you.”

Sensation of a form enwrapping his, of himself and this other body sinking to the floor. Puppy’s chest against his back and Puppy encouraging Orev(-not-Orev-yes-Orev) to breathe, only breathe, hey it’s okay, just breathe with me, all right?

(Then a word, a name Orev can’t fathom, can’t allow into his knowing. (Hazardous to know.) (Too soon, it’s too soon to let himself know.) A name (his name) offered in tones careful and loving. Offered like guardianship.)

In Gideon’s arms, he’d quieted. Clinging and finally, finally unashamed, unafraid. Held like that, he’d drifted off to silence, into sleep, nestling close as Gideon sang to him, a soft, achingly familiar tune.

It’s—

Oh, it draws the burn to his eyes again, and Orev doesn’t mind. Thinks, yes, this man knows him, better even than Gideon may know. Thinks even in his madness, there’d been one voice, one man who could draw him back toward himself.

Thinks, of course, of course, because isn’t that same man bringing Orev back to his own center? Doesn’t he feel like himself, almost whole, with this man.

He hears Gideon’s words now, and his own smile is complicated: wonder-struck and gentle, sorrowing and writ with adoration. And Orev nods, drawing his thumb along Gideon’s lip, then brushing to catch a tear.

“Yes, Dearest.

“I’m real. I’m here with you.”

And pause. A kiss set with care to Gideon’s forehead. Then, “You take very good care of your Daddy.

“How fortunate I am.”

His smile turns tremulous before he buries his face at Orev's neck, clinging, legs and arms tangling with Daddy's. (He's real. This is real. It's not a dream, not a spell, not an accident of thought.

Somehow, Daddy came back to him. Somehow, he wants Gideon again. He thinks Gideon is dear, and maybe perfect, maybe enough (for now.))

There are thoughts threatening at the fringes of his mind: that they've been gone too long, that Cala and Walter will come looking for them. That they can't remain here all day, much as he wants to do nothing but. (Worse, darker notions crawl like shadows behind these: that he shouldn't have done what he did. That he'll regret it. The spectre of shame is there, just at the borders of comprehension.) For now, however, he doesn't care to relinquish any of this.

It's been so long since he was held safe in Daddy's arms, sheltered by his wings. Since he held Daddy in kind.

After a long span of moments - ten, fifteen, time ticking on and on relentlessly - that he spends breathing, caressing, feeling the beat of Orev's heart against his chest, he stirs drowsily. Nuzzles and trails kisses along feathers and bare skin with idle hums of adoring delight. His hands caress as though committing Orev's body to memory (or reaquainting himself with planes he's known and lost.)

Then, with a quiet, resigned sigh, he relinquishes one hand's hold to reach back and blindly seek the journal on the floor behind him. He offers it, held between their chests, with a lowered chin, an almost-pout, and upcast eyes. There's an air of faint playfulness to this look as well as to the way he holds the journal, as though he's (not-)chagrined and (not-)sorry.

"Did you want this?"

(Anyway, he's still got the arcane focus. At least there's that.)

<.>

He doesn’t track the time spent in drowsy quiet, in the aftermath and memory of Gideon’s heart-breaking smile. He knows it breaks too soon (how could he ever weary of this moment, the perfect peace of this man wreathed with him, breathing steady warmth at Orev’s aching throat). He understands it has to; there’s work yet to be done this day, though the town had fled from Orev’s mind, though at this moment, he doesn’t care a fuck what’s happening outside this room. Can’t recall just now what brought the two of them up to his room, whether he’d followed Gideon (Jack; not even half an hour ago, this man’s name was Jack) (astonishing, that a handful of minutes may turn monumental and cast the world in unguessed light) or the other way around.

He watches, head canted, as the boy shifts (barely keeping himself from setting a hand to Puppy’s arm with encouragement to stay, don’t move at all). Finds himself charmed by Gideon’s loose-limbed reaching, and by the eyes that don’t leave his, by a tousle of golden hair that Orev reaches out to smooth, then ruffle all over again.

He doesn’t register the journal until Gideon’s brought it almost to his chest.

As Gideon settles back into place, it’s his eyes, wide as if pleading, offering a show of penitence, that hold Orev’s focus. The pout that Orev could swear hides a smirking smile, an expression suggesting that Puppy’s very very sorry for something, but shouldn’t his Daddy forgive him? Hasn’t he been such a good Puppy?

Well. He *has*, and Orev’s about to say as much when he sees what Gideon’s brought between them, and the breath that would have become speech turns instead to a huffed laugh. Rather than reach for the book, he draws two claw-tipped fingers along Gideon’s hand, along his wrist. Near the book, but not taking it yet.

Another crooked smile, slight toss of his head. “I’m afraid I do need it, Puppy.

“What a good boy you are, to bring it to my attention.” There’s a kiss for his Puppy, soft offering of brushed lips ending with a press of claim, as Orev’s hand draws soothing through Gideon’s hair.

“Daddy’s perfect Puppy.” Another kiss, the time darted beneath Puppy’s ear, punctuated with a soft, lingered laugh.

When he draws back, he’s aware of the journal, though his eyes fix only on Gideon. “I’d nearly forgotten its presence—  “I suppose I’d forgotten where we were, at all.” His smile warms further, and his thumb brushes back, forth, back and forth along Puppy’s cheek for several moments before Orev nods, lifting one hand, palm up.

“My journal, Puppy.”

<.>

With another sigh, this time resigned, Gideon obediantly hands over the journal. Oh, he would have liked to remain thoughtless and joyful, laughing softly under the ruffle of a hand in his hair and moaning, arcing into sweet kisses. He would have liked to spend hours wrapped in Orev's embrace just this way, just the way they have so many nights before. But some things have to come to an end, and, yes, he knows Orev needs the journal.

Still, his hand lingers on it and a frown tugs at the corners of his mouth when he thinks of what it contains. He considers asking Orev to stop reading it, or to rip out the pages that speak of that other Puppy, but before he can say a word, there's a wooden rapping at the door.

"Helloooo?" Cala sounds hesitant even in sing-song, unsure about what she might be interrupting. "I know you're - well, I don't know if you're busy or arguing again or if you're even in there, but you're not in our room and you're wasting daylight, so Walter's going to break the door down in five minutes if you don't come out."

Gideon shifts to his back, propping himself up on his elbows so he can glare at the door. "That's not necessary, Cala, and you know it."

There's a soft snickering from outside; Gideon he huffs and sets about arranging his clothes, then falters when he sees the stains on them. With an accusatory gesture of one hand to his midsection, he stares at Orev.

<.>

Well; it couldn’t last forever. This respite. This world all of their own.

(It couldn’t last forever. But they’ll find it again. Isn’t it inevitable? Isn’t it dire.)

The journal clasped now to his own chest, Orev gives a dramatic shake of his head at Calamus’s intrusion. Watches fondly as Gideon glowers at the door, and has half a mind to draw the boy back downward, to encourage a day spent here, reclaiming their respite, only knowing one another.

It wouldn’t be wise. There is work to do, and there are problems Orev needs to solve. There’s the matter of the being that stalks his dreams. There’s the matter of his journal, and what in fuck’s name he was trying to tell himself in saving it.

Also, Orev wouldn’t at all put it past Walter to break in the door, which would cause another set of headaches and likely end with their accommodations rescinded.

So as Gideon begins seeing to his clothes, Orev draws himself to sit upright, in no hurry and watching as Gideon sees the— Ah, well. (Poor Puppy.) The mark left on his clothing. Smirk crooked, Orev draws a fingertip across the dampness and speak hushed, conspiratorial and not at all contrite, “Oops.

“Lucky we have coin to see the tailor, hm?”

Gideon isn’t alone in bearing signs of their exaltation, though Orev was luckier - or more advantageously positioned - and bears only sparser stains. There’s a moment’s near-worry in his mind (he doesn’t need others to know what he gets up to!) (he doesn’t like anyone knowing his business), but it vanishes quickly. What can it matter, after all? What can any opinion in this village mean to him, and really it’s none of their affair, and above all, what harm in these stains, when they’ve been given by his Puppy?

Having adjusted his own clothing, Orev tchs his tongue, gifts a kiss to Gideon’s jaw. Pauses before moving to take up the not-entirely-normal bag from the Crooked House, head cocked, his smile speaking reassurance and a flash of teeth.

“For the time being, you’ll simply need to suffer Daddy’s mark.

“Poor, poor Puppy.”

<.>

Gideon answers with an exasperated huff of a laugh and a glance away that was meant only to be a moment, enough for him to begin collecting himself - but it lingers. He settles his gaze on the door, his smile evaporating and slowly turning to a frown.

(What's going to happen when they leave this room?) (What's Cala going to say? What's he going to say to her?) (And - what does this mean for Gideon now? Doesn't it sound like Orev's intent on keeping near, wasn't he already intent on keeping near before this all happened? How is he going to sever his contract with Draža if -

If he doesn't know anymore what he wants? Or is he just indulging in wishful thinking with this belief that Orev wants to stay with him?)

He shakes his head to brush off the thoughts beginning to crowd in on him and pushes himself to his feet. One problem at a time, he tells himself. "I'm going to get my coat and dissuade her from whatever she's planning to inflict on me. Us."

He pauses here, an uncertain faltering in his steps and a rub of his hand along his other arm. Gideon glances awkwardly at Orev, watching.

Waiting.

<.>

[ insight: 25

Gideon is obviously waiting for permission to leave.

And. Is also very obviously hoping Orev will confirm that "us" is a word he can use.

Orev is also able to tell Gideon is starting to feel squirrelly, doubtful, and anxious about all of this. His eyes have darted distrustfully to the journal as though he's worried about what Orev will learn from it. ]

There’s something wearing at the boy. Something closing in, tensing at his shoulders, drawing his sight over and again to the journal in Orev’s hand.

It isn’t an act. This is something other than the contrition feigned, the faux-pout that accompanied the journal’s return. And Orev watches silent, one claw drifting along the journal’s cover.

It’s true, Gideon had been troubled (near-terrified) (mortified?) by the journal. He’d scrambled wildly, had looked rather like a corner animal as he backed off, step by step. Orev can’t begin to guess what it was Gideon had seen, what he’d remembered to drive him frantic. He’ll have to think the incident over. (Later, when he’s climbed up from this drowsiness. Later, because he’s not eager to leave it yet.) He— Perhaps ought to speak with Gideon about it.

“What was it in the journal? Something troubled you.”

Almost before the words have landed, he shakes his head, raises a hand. Suggesting, ‘Not now.’ Because no, this isn’t the time; not with eager ears outside the door and the threat of Walt running rampant. Breaking eye contact just long enough to reach for his bag, Orev slips the journal into it, closes the bag.

“Later, Gideon. You’ll tell me. I’ll keep the book closed until we’ve spoken.

“A promise to be taken within reason, of course. I’ll require my journal’s aid sooner than not, but this talk can wait for nightfall.”

Two steps take him back to Gideon, and Orev settles a hand at Puppy’s bicep, gives a steady caress. Then he nods toward the door. “Go to her, Puppy.

“Tell her what you please about us.” A moment as he keeps the boy’s eyes, unblinking, and offering the hint of a smile. “That she needn’t worry herself. That we’re capable of taking care of one another.”

A squeeze to Puppy’s arm, then, “I’ll be with you shortly.”

<.>

Whatever he'd been thinking about the journal no longer matters; it's out of reach in Orev's bag. For now, anyway. (It's almost a relief, to have the matter settled this way. To have Orev make the decision for him, even if doubts gnaw at his mind.)

He nods, agreeing to something here: perhaps to speak later, or perhaps to waiting for nightfall, or to going to speak with Calamus. It's when Orev echoes his 'us' that a faint blush creeps along his cheekbones and Gideon finds himself unable to suppress a hint of a smile. (For a moment, he looks hopeful. Although the was an 'us' with Draža, he was never told he could speak of it.

'Us' never extended past their door except in play.)

(He thinks Orev knows not to play with him that way in front of Calamus. Probably.)

For a heartbeat, he's unsure whether to simply leave, or to kiss Orev in parting. He settles for taking the other man's hand from his arm and pressing a kiss to the backs of his fingers, slow and light like grace, his eyes held ever in Orev's gaze.

(Trouble's waiting outside the door in the form of all his doubts, but at least there's this. At least he had this hour with Orev.)

Though he turns and heads for the door, he doesn't release Orev's hand until he's completely out of reach.

When he opens the door, Cala - evidently listening at the keyhole - stumbles into the room and then makes a hasty retreat into the hall.

<.>

He nods to Gideon, ignoring the brief tumult of Calamus. Not quite aware that his hand remains aloft, precisely where Gideon’s left it, he smiles, mouths, ’My Puppy.’ And remains in place as the door shuts and Gideon disappears from view for the moment, only for the moment (though there’s a tightness in Orev’s, a brief impulse to follow after, to not lose the boy again) (he’s not going far; Orev will be with him shortly).

In the silence of his room, he draws his just-kissed fingers to his chest. Settles them against his heart and holds, breathes, breathes. Smirks to himself as he draws his hand along his throat, feels the ache of it, the bruise that must be forming beneath feathers. And he looks to the floor, where he found his Puppy, his (love and his) lover, where he knew only trust, only certainty. Knew a connection to existence and to himself he hasn’t known since waking without memory.

Eventually, he gathers the rest of his items - the books to be returned, the parchment onto which he’d scrawled aborted notes - considers attempting to clean the stains from his clothing and decides against it. Take a breath of the air, the room, the lingering trace of what he and Gideon found and became together.

And Orev leaves to rejoin the party.

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crooked moon: draža and gideon

day 2: a private word.

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The Crooked House

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day 2-3: Where you belong. // Daddy and Puppy

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