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kingdomsofrain2026-01-17 02:26 pm
onefellswoop) wrote in kingdomsofrain2026-01-17 02:26 pm
shitlords!
placeholder title above! hmmmm
1) Prelude: Ill-Natured Shrubbery.
2) The Party Gathers: If a Tree Burns in the Forest...
3) Death House Pt. 1: Family, If You Wish It.
4) Death House Pt. 2: Onward and Downward.
5) Awich: The Dead All Know, The Dead All Go.
6) Awich: Investigations.
7) Awich: After the Battle.
8) Loch Bien: Complications, Concerns, Frogs.
9) Loch Bien + Onward: Things Go Very, Very Wrong.
10) Through Forest, Into Mysos.
1) Prelude: Ill-Natured Shrubbery.
2) The Party Gathers: If a Tree Burns in the Forest...
3) Death House Pt. 1: Family, If You Wish It.
4) Death House Pt. 2: Onward and Downward.
5) Awich: The Dead All Know, The Dead All Go.
6) Awich: Investigations.
7) Awich: After the Battle.
8) Loch Bien: Complications, Concerns, Frogs.
9) Loch Bien + Onward: Things Go Very, Very Wrong.
10) Through Forest, Into Mysos.
no subject
Faolan, who has been pretending he doesn't notice any anticipation from Dima and possibly acting as though he forgot, lets the hours sort of...drag out? until it's well past dark.
[note: Dima Keeps Looking At Him. Trying to play it cool nbdnbd.]
Eventually, he rises from the campfire, stretches, yawns as though so terribly tired - then catches Dima's eye and starts to laugh, knowing he's not really fooling anyone. He'll hold out a hand in invitation, and if Dima accepts, he'll - without any shame at all - put on the Goggles of Night so he can lead his mate back to the spring without having to take a different form.
<.>
Gods, how he adores this man.
Fae's laughter draws a huffed laugh of Dima's own, and of course he accepts Fae's hand; hasn't he been anticipating it all evening?
Rising, he cocks an eyebrow, a crooked smile— Attempting wryness, unable to contain its warmth. "A very daring look, my Dearest."
And yes, Faolan is getting a kiss to the jaw before they head off anywhere. And yes, Dmitri keeps his hand, letting the sounds a night's creatures, night's breeze, and the approach of falling water drift around them.
<.>
"Less daring than stumbling around in the dark," he murmurs with a lopsided smile of his own.
He's quiet until they approach the spring; it seems almost as though their twined hands hold all of his focus, and occasionally his thumb brushes a slow arc along Dima's skin.
He doesn't stop at the water, but rather follows it around to the rockface where the waterfall has formed. Before they reach the cascade, before his voice can be drowned out by the minor roar of water, he asks, "Do you remember what we talked about on the dock that night? The places we'd been, the stars and waters we saw?"
He doesn't wait for an answer; picking his way carefully over the sand and stones, he leads Dima to the waterfall itself - and behind it, where the rocks form a natural opening, barely four feet high. They have to stoop to pass inside.
The way the cave has formed, the waterfall's roar is muted, distant, as though they've stepped into a different, parallel world.
Faolan takes off the goggles.
Dima can see why immediately: this is the cave Faolan spoke of: dotting the walls and ceiling are thousands of spots of blue light. In the water, glowing fish swim in lazy spirals.
<.>
He feels Faolan's touch like incandescent shimmer, a light that guides him truer than his own sight. There's no pause as Fae heads toward the water; no doubt that Puppy knows precisely what he doing, where he's going.
And here, Dima can feel the misting spray just as he'd conjured it, earlier, in mind. Here, with the roar of water crashing louder every step, with Faolan speaking of memory, and of course Dmitri remembers; he'd thought of that night while he thought on the mist reaching them now, and his smile - a little daft; a lot grateful - suggests as much.
Fae moves toward the waterfall, and though Dima's head cants briefly curious, still he doesn't hesitate. Feels a thrill rising chirruped in his chest; an understanding that Faolan is sharing something with him. One of the places he saw and held dear, perhaps. One of the locations spoken into velvet skies above the dark, written forever into Dima's knowing.
He recognizes the image from Fae's telling as they step through. Feels briefly that he's walked into a dream conjured by his Faolan, because the world's shifted entirely, turned not alien but astonishing, illuminated softly by the lights contained with in. By creatures, organisms, breath of life among the water's muffled sound.
Dima's smiling - an expression complicated but joyous; humbled, perhaps, to witness both the beauty of this site and the meaning to Fae's sharing - and he speaks, voice not quite steady: "Like the sky and stars brought down around us, or we, rising to their tier.
"Oh, Faolan—“
Dima draws closer. Places a hand on Fae's bicep, curls near against him. There's a space of time before he speaks. Time in which his hand runs its caress again, again. Time in which he leans his head against Fae's arm and settles, nuzzles.
Finally, eyes catching Fae's, and catching the reflections of that luminescent blue: "It is as you said, my Fae.
"As you said, and more astonishing still, in the presence of my mate."
<.>
Faolan holds Dima, arms wound around him in a loose, possessive embrace. This is what he wanted: himself, and Dima, and a cave lit all around as if by stars.
The last time he came here, he'd been grateful to have a secret all to himself. He'd shared far too much, been too exposed. Piece by piece, he'd won privacy back. Secrets, beautiful rather than scandalous. He hadn't wanted anyone else to know. Even when he'd told Dima about it on the docks, he had questioned himself.
Why share it with someone he knew would be gone so quickly?
(Had he known even then, though, that Dima wouldn't leave him? That Dima wouldn't allow him to flee into the woods again?)
"Nothing special happened to me here," he remarks softly. One hand trails up Dima's back, searching in the half-dark to card through his hair. "I don't have a story about it. I just...found it, and saw how lovely it was.
"But that means it's a place where something can happen to give it meaning, and nothing else can share the space of that meaning. Does that make any sense?"
He thinks maybe he isn't giving the right words to what's in his head. Educated as he had to become in his former life, he still finds himself faltering, clumsy when trying to explain something more than the work of his hands or a hunt or the ruin he finds in the world.
He draws his hand down to Dima's cheek, palm cupped and thumb sweeping tenderly. "I'm finding meaning in so many things lately. I'd like to have more of that; to take you to every beautiful place I've seen and let it be a place I saw with my mate.
"I'd like to hold my past up for reckoning against what you are to me. Maybe I'll find the meaning is that I was moving towards you."
His smile in the dark, visible still to Dima, is a complicated one. And then it isn't so complicated.
"Nothing happened here for me; there wasn't any meaning. But then I showed it to my mate. My - " Faolan falters, but there's no sorrow, no shame in the pause. Only dumbfounded speechlessness at his own good fortune. (To be here, surrounded by glimmering points of light, and held in Dima's arms.)
"My Dima.
"This is where I told my mate I love him." Not complicated a smile at all. Only softly radiant, shy, full of hope he doesn't show anyone (except, except.) "I love you, Dima. So much that I want to show you every beautiful place I've been, every perfect thing I've seen, and let it be meaningful because of you."
He pauses, then huffs a little laugh. "I practiced all that and still can't get the words just right. But what's important - the part where I love you? I managed that much. I'll always manage that much."
<.>
He kisses his love, for a start.
Draws inward and upward, his hand carding its path through Fae’s hair. Dima tipping up on his toes to reach nearer, kiss with greater, tender pressure. Hears his breath halt again, again, again.
And whispers between breathes: “My mate. Oh, love.”
He lingers here with words knocked from his lungs; lingers again upon the sight of Fae when the kiss has turned to locking eyes above effulgent smiles. It’s Fae’s smile that brings Dima back to his voice, puts breath behind his crescendoing need to speak. Because it’s worth all the world, to witness hopefulness in Faolan; to see hope freed - even if only in brief spaces; even if it takes time to cultivate - from wariness. To see Fae’s gentle, his daring, his assured heart drawn from hiding.
Dima speaks, feeling the deft-spun strength of every word: “My mate.
“My Fae.
“Oh, my love—“
There’s a soft laugh, a moment to restore himself to speech, because that word alone almost undid him again. He presses a hand to Fae’s chest, as if asking his forbearance and, yes, simply wanting to touch his lave. “Forgive me, Puppy; I’ve thought upon three words since almost first we met. Words I never understood before I found you, and you found me. Words I’ve come to know like burning in my chest; words clear to me in every breath.
“Words brought to truth for me, brought to my understanding by the fact and light of you.
“I love you. My Fae, of course I do.
“How fortunate I am, to have found you. How favored beyond the will of gods, to hold you in this soft-light sanctuary - this cavern, ah, this den—” There’s a pleased smile from Dima, and a nudge of his nose inward, against Fae’s throat before he finds his mate’s eyes again, continues speaking, “How favored I am, to hear ‘love’ from your tongue, and know it blessedly, finally upon my own.
“Here, where my love once found some peace from execrable climes. Where you found protection, before I could shield you."
“Here, where my mate drew me in moonlight and in mist, to share with me the vision of a secret first shared upon the docks - a night forever written on my soul - to let this secret be ours, shared, and to impart a dearer secret still—
“That my mate knows the consonance between us; the call of our hearts, each to each.
“That my Puppy trusts Daddy to help guide him; to preserve him.
“That my Fae knows his love is sacred to and shared ardently with his Dima.
“That my Faolan can smile with such hope; that we might resurrect the world together yet.
“Love, I admire you, adore you. I know excitation at the sight of you - vicious, deadly, tender - and know deepest peace held in your arms. You are everything to me, my Faolan. Every joy and every name.”
There’s a brief moment in which Dima’s speech hangs suspended, and could turn one way or the other. Because in part he thinks he should be cautious, doesn’t want to bring too much upon his love. And then in part - larger, more clamorous part - he yearns to say this, offer this; give it as an option, grant his Fae this token of Dmitri’s sure intentions.
He chooses, or feels the choice slipping into itself. He speaks—
“And if you’re ready, my Fae.
“If you can accept one more name—“ There’s a soft laugh and a shake of his head. “One more name for the moment; I expect I’ll never cease in finding names for you.
“You needn’t accept it now. My mate, I won’t be upset. I want this for you, as one part of the life we share— But in your time.
“We have all the world ahead, don’t we?”
He has, yes, slipped his hand into a pocket of his robe. Deftly. Smoothly. And when he raises his hand, there’s a ring held between two fingers, carefully, presented to the vision his love.
“My world; my Dearest and my Love. Faolan and Fae; my Puppy and my mate. Let me give you another name—
“I’d like to call you ‘husband,’ too.”
<.>
Standing in a cavern full of starlight, his lips feeling beestung and warm from Dima's kiss, (thinking the word 'den' again, again, but not here, no, somewhere warm and dry and safe, a place for himself and his mate-) Faolan realizes he's not at all surprised.
Of course Dima would choose here, and this moment.
Of course there's already a ring.
His first instinct - the first rising emotion - is sorrow. As it climbs upward in his chest, he comprehends something about himself: he's gotten in the habit of feeling sorrowful. He's learned to anticipate the oncoming ruin and strangle whatever hope he might feel for the future.
In this case, a future that might ruin Dima's life. (A future that sees him once again alone, retreating to the woods with a broken heart, a shattered soul.)
(But Sen said.) (Sen had a point.)
But.
What if.
He can't hope, but he can say what if.
What if he just...tried. For as long as he can, with all his will, what if he tried to make Dima happy? What if he could do that so well, whatever was lost along the way simply didn't measure up?
He's fingering the ring without taking it, contemplative.
He could say, You know this will only end badly.
Or. Please, it's enough to be your mate. Let's not talk about this.
Or. Dima, there's no future in this.
What he says instead, very carefully, very softly, is, "Would it make you happy?"
He draws a sharp breath, thinking maybe Dima won't understand why he's asking. Maybe Dima will think it's the only reason he might agree. His hands cover Dima's and the ring, and with the same careful, low tone, he adds, "If the world were perfect - or if I knew for certain you would never regret this moment...or me. Know I want you, Dima. I want to be everything to you, and if I could promise a life free of regrets, I wouldn't hesitate.
"But I don't know, and I can't promise - and you won't let me avoid it, will you?" His smile's a rueful one, lopsided and without accusation.
"I can't protect you, and I can't escape you. So - I suppose I'll just try very hard to bring you a blissful life. Will it make you happy, Dima, to be my husband?"
<.>
no subject
But since Faolan is asking. Since Faolan has dared this far, and since everything he's said, everything's he's been with Dmitri has suggested Fae's hesitation comes more from worry - from wanting perhaps too keenly - than from not wanting what Dima's asked—
Well; it's very, very easy to answer: "It would, Fae.
"It would make me very happy, and tremendously proud, to have you as my husband. To walk with you in daylight, hand-in-hand; to kiss you on the cheek in every street and shop, before the eyes of all, seeing, feeling only one another.
"Please, Dearest: Don't think you lack the power to protect me. Already you guard me from the night's cold. From men and meenlocks. From myself, and what was once a hollow in my heart.
"And you know, you must know you bring me bliss. I've never known such joy before you; I scarcely knew brightness, at all. And my heart never did sing before we met.
"Faolan, listen to me. Listen to your Daddy; listen to your mate, hm?" There's a crooking smile - playful, deeply fond - and a nudge of the back of Dima's fingers to Fae's jaw; a movement that shifts into a cupping of Fae's cheek.
In Dima's other hand, the ring remains. Held now in a hand less tense-kept in anticipation. Held, and tilted slightly for a catch of light.
He continues, "I regret nothing that I've done whole-hearted, whole-minded. When I act in accordance with the truth that sears me— My Love, I know my certainties like flame; they burn with me; they become a part of me.
"I am certain of my love for you.
"I am certain how how utterly I want you and require you beside me, in all names, anywhere we two might do.
"I will always love you, Faolan; I know that too. My Puppy and my Wolf: I want everything you are, and I will keep you."
"Trust your mate on that, hm? Or. Simply know your Dima will always give you more cause to believe. Know that we have time, such ceaseless time, to find what life can be in love; in one another's arms; with one another's fire."
There's a nudge to Fae's forehead. The slightest, lightest tug of Fae's lip, which turns to a brush, lingering and sweet.
"I will never and I could never regret you, Faolan. It isn’t in my nature. It isn't what I am.
"You exist too deep within me; you have always been, I think, within my blood, waiting to awaken. And nothing, nothing can dislodge you from my heart.
"Just as no force, no fiend, no would-be-deity can force me from my Fae's."
Here Dima shifts his hands. Moves the first from Fae's cheek to his hand, to draw it up between them. The better that Dima may kiss Fae across his knuckles, then twice upon his palm. The better that Dima might hold the ring before Fae's finger, waiting only for his mate's confirmed agreement to slip it to its home.
Speaking, as he does this: "Say yes, my Love.
"Say that I may grant this ring and offer up my name.
"I'd like it, Fae; I'd like it very much.
"It would make me - as you always make me - very, very happy."
<.>
Dima's words sink beneath his skin. Maybe it's the cavern's strange lights, or maybe it's just that he's coming to know Dima, to believe him and believe in him - or maybe Faolan is softening. Maybe he's discovering that the world has good still to behold, and much of it begins and ends with his newfound family.
With all the worry now set aside, never forgotten but for now weakened, hushed and ignored, Faolan is free to exist in this moment, where all he has to do is make Dima happy. (And trust that Dima will do the same?) (Yes, maybe that, too.)
This moment and this place where he spoke love to someone for the first time, and heard it spoken back so sweetly, so raw and honest. He wanted this cavern to have meaning; Dima is holding out that meaning, letting it catch the blue glow on its metal surface.
Dima is offering a ring and a name, which are such small things, but they're made meaningful, aren't they? A ring and a name can mean a lifetime. They can mean family and love and forever.
And.
And the thing that would make Dima happy is -
What no one ever wanted. (And Dima hardly asks at all for what they did want.) (Dima gives Faolan room to want both sex and - this. And this.
A ring and a name.)
(Fae Voronin. That might be something real and true.) (Dima's going to regret marrying a scoundrel, a wh-) (No.) (No, he's not letting that thought in here, with all this beauty around them, with Dima waiting eager with a ring ready for his hand. It's a sacrilege.)
He breathes shakily and realizes the lights have doubled, tripled, blurred to starbursts and his eyes are wet. He feels staggered by this place and moment and Dima, who loves him. Who's waiting for an answer.
Weakly, as though the words are a theft of something sweet and long-desired, he finally admits, "I'd like it."
He nods and lets the words come again, relieved and maybe-broken. "Oh, I'd like it.
"Yes, then. For your happiness.
"And mine, Dima." He smiles unsteadily. "And mine."
<.>
Look at him: With all the sweetness of dawn's light; daring past the wounds he's carried for so long and all the fear they've left.
It isn't, Dima knows, that there is no worry left in Faolan. It's that he's letting himself reach forward. Letting himself incline into belief.
Letting himself speak claim for his own joy; to think on what he wants, and perhaps, perhaps permit himself to see something that might not end, or something that is - at least, if nothing else - assured in this moment; something that can offer brilliance, lightness, exalation.
There's a prick of tears at the back of Dima's eyes as he brushes a thumb along the fall of Puppy's tears. There's a stagger in his chest - the sound of air received as his body remembers to breathe - and reverence, gratitude as he speaks—
"There you are, my Fae."
A kiss for one cheek, not to banish weeping, but to take the tears upon his lips; to share in his mate's tumult and relief. A nudge of Dima's nose to Fae's, his forehead brushing at his Love's, then a kiss to the other cheek.
"We shall have it: Every name we share; everything we please.
"Together, and my mate, my husband, you will have happiness. I confess I'm set upon it. If I can't keep all the world's antagonisms from gnashing teeth your way, I'll rend as many as I can, gnash my own teeth—
"We'll shed their blood together, Dearest.
"And our home will be as it is now: Together. Wherever we find ourselves. Wherever we may choose.
"So long as I am yours, so long as you are with me and so long as I can bring you joy, ah, Love, we're always home."
There's more he wants to say. There are star-struck galaxies of words he wants to share, but the moment and the depth of honeyed eyes suspends both breath and voice, and for a moment, a stream of moments, Dima only stands with Faolan, one hand upon his Puppy's cheek, the other at his hair. His own expression at once telling of tidal feeling, and of simple, total adoration.
When he can speak again, his voice falls hushed, and his lop-sided grin shines with wonder. "I'm so proud of you, my Love.
"I want this for you, along with every other freedom, every other bliss: I'd like for you to believe the possibility of your own happiness; to speak for it, reach toward it where you're able.
"And your Daddy, your Dima, your mate and your husband and all that I am with you, for you—"
The smile turns slightly conspiratorial, still suffuse with ardor, as he draws back just enough to show the ring again between them. "I'll be here to help you, Faolan. To believe for you if the world seems dark; to wrap you in my teeth, my thorns, my holding."
There's a moment where he bites his lip, suddenly a little more hushed, suddenly shy. Looking to the ring, then to Fae's hand, then Fae's eyes, and—
"Give me your hand, my Fae."
Deftly, in a graceful, measured string of motions, Dima will take his Fae's hand, and slip the ring onto his finger. Clasping his hand after, meeting his eyes, and yes, there's a subtle wetness at Dima's own cheeks now, and no, he doesn't notice, doesn't mind at all. Knows only resurgent jubilation. Knows only the feeling of his mate's hand between his own.
“You bring me happiness beyond measure.
“You make me happy, my husband, my mate.
"My Love and my Fae."
And Dima kisses his everything, his world.
<.>
Eventually, Dima and Fae return to their camp. By then, Rin is asleep and Sen is in his meditative state - though it certainly looks as though he's fallen asleep.
Dima and Fae curl up together in the hammock, tired enough from the day's travel and evening's events that they drift off almost immediately. Liv takes a place on a branch above, keeping close without sleeping directly on the men.
<.>
no subject
Sometime before the present day, Dima reveals to the children his wish to give the third ring to Faolan.
The children have some misgivings about it at first; Rose demands imperiously to SEE the ring before she'll agree. Upon inspection she frowns, then decides, no, she doesn't think it was anything of importance. Thorn seems to be simply agreeing with her, and doesn't seem to really care all that much about the ring; he asks if Fae has fixed Hildabear, though. (This is in fact a project Faolan has been working on, carefully attempting to salvage piece of the original toy for use in a new one, but he has no materials for the body right now.)
Dima immediately presented the ring for examination, of course. And tells Thorn about Fae's work with Hildabear, indicating that Fae wants very much to find the right fur for Hildabear, and to make sure Hildabear is given the very best mending. He also tells Thorn that Faolan is very very gentle handling Hildabear, and makes sure she's never pinched or pulled while Fae is working.
Dima points out that Rose will have her own ring just as soon as she's returned, and promises to take her to pick out another ring all of her liking. Thorn and Hildabear may, of course, join to pick out their own.
Dima adds that he's certain Fae will find meaning in this particular ring, and the connection it promises to all of them.
...And Dima will also inform Thorn that Rin has taken to stealing Hildabear from time to time in order to tell her stories, then slip her right back where she came from with a little pat, no troubles had!
The children seem quite taken with all of this; Rose looks surprised to learn she might be able to pick her own jewelry, but also appears to be suppressing excitement about the prospect of the third ring's use.
Thorn will, at a later time, pester Rin to hear the stories they've told Hildabear.
At the end of the conversation, the children both intimate that they want to know what Faolan says.
(After all, he might be joining their family!)
Dima assures them that he'll tell them all about it, and thanks them both for their approval.
Dima is, through all of this, doing a very good job of noT having a cry of his own. But damned if it isn't close.
<.>