Foxen Bloom, page 21
"They are hyacinth." Fenton petted the nearest pink flower. "And they are not sad."
"The mood of the flowers wasn't really my point—"
"Please, Prior. Sit," Fenton bit out.
Prior's eyebrows rose but he sat without further hesitation. He smoothed his hands down his thighs as Fenton took to one knee before him. Fenton inhaled the sweet perfume of Prior's scent, to capture it in his memory.
"What step is it we're up to, then?" Prior asked, his voice almost as hushed as the music threading through the air. When Fenton didn't answer, Prior smiled sadly. "It's the step where you leave me here, isn't it." It wasn't a question.
Fenton pressed a kiss to Prior's fingers where they rested on his thighs. He didn't dare take hold of Prior's hand, because he couldn't trust himself to let Prior go.
"I ask that you please remain here while I retrieve Lorcan. Can you do that? Will you wait for me?"
Licking his lips, Prior nodded. He raised his hand and cupped Fenton's cheek again. Fenton felt as if he had learned a human guise solely that Prior's hand might have a place to rest. He leaned into the touch as Prior drew his thumb across Fenton's lips.
"Of course I will wait for you," Prior said. His eyes darkened. "Might I ask you a favour, before you go? In case— Might I ask?"
"Anything."
"Kiss me."
Immediately, Fenton kissed Prior's thumb, savouring the salt of Prior's skin. He nipped at the pad and grinned when Prior gasped and shifted.
"Fenton, that's not what I—"
Surging upright, Fenton drank the rest of the words from Prior's lips. He braced himself with one hand on the wall and his knee on the bench by Prior's hips, crowding Prior between his legs, and leaned his kiss into Prior's plush mouth. He kissed Prior as he had not the night before, when he had lain awake in Prior's arms and yearned for better timing. Prior grabbed Fenton's hips and met him with matching hunger, a moan escaping him between kisses. Desire burned in Fenton like a forest fire, scourging him that he might be made anew. He cradled Prior's face and shared the heat as best he could, pressing himself into Prior's mouth and greedily drinking Prior's delicious noises until they drew apart.
Fenton rested his forehead on Prior's, panting lightly, his fingers playing with the hair at Prior's nape. Prior's fern-and-rose scent filled the air, and Fenton wanted to taste it from Prior's skin, almost as much as he wanted to blanket Prior with Fenton's own scent that all the forests of the world might know who walked in them. His own possessiveness startled him, even as he watched Prior lick his kiss-bruised lips and decided he had to taste the blood beating in them.
When Prior opened his mouth, Fenton ducked his head and snared another kiss. He nipped Prior's tongue, making Prior jolt and groan, then gently push Fenton away. Fenton allowed himself to be moved, and the cold night air and thread of music shocked him from the haze of lust.
"Enough, enough!" Prior said with a laugh as he adjusted himself in his breeches. Fenton swallowed and took another step away. "A kiss, I said. Not a public devouring." Prior sobered, though his eyes were blown black. "Go now, that you may come back to me all the sooner."
Fenton opened his mouth and reached for words—of comfort, of promise—but all he could taste was Prior. He closed his mouth and ducked his head.
Fenton turned, and went.
His mind foggy with Prior—his touch, his taste—Fenton reached the group of revellers at the top of the courtyard before noticing Lorcan had vanished. As Fenton stumbled to a stop, eyes darting for any sign of his sibling, he heard a thready whimper. Only when a passing guest looked askance at him did he realise it had escaped his own throat.
Fenton scratched the inside of his wrist. His ears twitched. He could return to Prior.
And then what? The question asked itself viciously in Fenton's mind, as if the part of him that was fang and claw had been given voice. Should he leave Aspinwick with his tail tucked between his legs? Leave Lorcan and the blight and all else to fate and seclude himself in the forest? Things had been simpler there, but Fenton hadn't any memories to use as comparison. Whether that had been a gift from Lorcan or intended as a further taunt, Fenton didn't know. But he did know, now, what he would leave behind.
With renewed will, Fenton set his shoulders and forged along a canopied path that led deeper into the heart of the gardens. Fewer lanterns spotted the secluded trail, and low laughter emanated from small groups gathered in alcoves that branched from the main path. Music wove through the air.
Fenton could smell water ahead. Skirting a large group that were dancing in intimate embraces around another fountain—this one a dryad, and not at all accurate to life—he descended a short series of steps and passed a groomed hedge. The severe lines made him itch, and doubly so as the filigree of spellwork brushed against his own power. Fenton's eyes hardened. He sent his shadow ahead to track the scent of water; water was ever Lorcan's domain, and if the mage wanted to utilise Lorcan's strength, it made sense to situate them near a source. To do so courted hubris, but Hartling did not strike Fenton as humble.
A thin reasoning, perhaps, but Fenton needed a way to narrow his search; Lorcan's soured magic lay over the Aspinwick Estate like mist. It rasped as bitter as shame in Fenton's throat. He loped onward, each stride a promise: he would find his sibling; he would destroy the blight; he would leave with Prior. Find Lorcan. Destroy the blight. Leave. There could be no room for doubt.
At length, his shadow pooled at his feet in a dark puddle, and Fenton learned where Lorcan had gone. Moving with purpose, Fenton progressed along the dark path and deeper into the garden. No lanterns guided his way, but the stars had always been enough. Sounds of revelry faded, and quiet shrouded the garden as he reached a small outbuilding in good repair. The building smelled of green earth and the insidious poison that tainted Lorcan's magic.
Fenton stretched his senses. No life nearby but the night's creatures, and Lorcan. Somewhere. Bracing himself, Fenton cautiously entered the outbuilding, easing open the door on silent hinges. Yet, aside from bags of fertile soil, well-kept gardening implements, and a pile of cloth and sacking, he found nothing of note. Mice wiggled their furry noses from a crack in the corner, then squeaked and fled when Fenton snapped his teeth in frustration. Taking a sharp breath, Fenton shook off his claws and sent his shadow again to hunt. Lorcan was here. Fenton would find them.
A door. His shadow thrummed.
Whirling on his heel, Fenton rushed to circle the outbuilding. Tucked on the ground close to the wall, and nearly hidden by the bramble of look-away cantrip, an innocuous hatch sat within a neat stone border. If any stumbled across it, they would likely suppose it were winter storage. Perhaps they would not note it had neither handle nor hinge. The cantrip would dissuade curiosity. Even Fenton could feel his attention sliding from the hatch. His vines pricked his ears with thorns, reasserting his focus when it strayed.
Fenton dropped to his knees on the damp earth and lowered his head to sniff at the stone, where someone might grasp for balance as they lifted the hatch or lowered themselves down. Or, failing that, where old stone might recall what young grass could not. Fenton licked the stone, his tongue rasping into the porous grooves. Lifting his head, he spat, and scraped the taste away with his teeth, relief and regret making an acidic mixture. Lorcan had been through the hatch, and recently. Their saltwater magic was unmistakable.
For all he wanted to smash the hatch and launch himself within, the cantrip made Fenton wary. He tried to send a tendril of his shadow through a seam in the wood, but progressed no deeper than the surface. A growl warmed his throat. Frowning darkly, he tried again, and again progressed no farther. Snarling, he leapt to his feet. The cantrip pushed at him, but Fenton planted roots. He held out his hand, palm up, and opened himself to the garden, to the green things that had been bullied into neat lines and straight edges; trees with unsettlingly uniform height, flowers with leaves clipped and faces turned from him. He gathered all of Aspinwick's thwarted potential until a quaking orb of magic coalesced in his upraised hand, scarcely contained by the prick of his claws. Then, with a powerful twisting motion, he attacked the hatch with a blow of pure, living strength.
The hatch broke. Of course it broke, shattering into splinters, and the surrounding stone wall bulged inward under the force of the strike. Fenton's antlers creaked in the wake of his display, absorbing the remnants of power. Birds called raucously through the dark. A fox yowled nearby in confused celebration. Too far to hear the humans, Fenton wondered if they had noticed a thing, or if the wild had left them too long ago for his magic to touch them.
The mage would have noticed.
Setting his jaw, Fenton took hold of a sturdy root and lowered himself into the dark throat that held his sibling. Hand over hand over hand, until Fenton's palms rasped with blood from the abrading root, until at last his boots met firm ground with a splash. He waved off the root, which whipped away. The speed made Fenton start and look up in alarm, just in time to watch a new hatch seal itself over the opening, delivering perfect darkness to the perfect prison Fenton had perfectly, recklessly, trapped himself in. Magic crackled as the seal reasserted itself, and though Fenton thrashed his shadow against the door he gained no purchase. He winced. He was trapped.
Prior might laugh.
Fenton hoped to tell him the story someday. He scratched the inside of his wrist then flicked the thought away. No matter. He had opened the hatch once, and would again.
After he found Lorcan.
Straining his eyes, Fenton tried to see—well, anything. His night vision had never failed him before, but the blackness was so complete he might as well have been human. His nape prickled as his boots shushed in the scrim of water that coated the ground, announcing his progress as he ventured deeper into the consuming dark. His shadow tightened around his torso, forming protective armour. Spit pooled in his mouth.
Abruptly, light blistered Fenton's vision. He flinched bodily and raised his hand to shield his watering eyes as he squinted toward the source. The single flickering candle was followed by a searing arc as high-set lanterns illuminated in a blaze of magical harmony, making Fenton recoil as magic and light scraped across his senses. Rubbing his eyes with his fist, he peered at the figure revealed by the light. Despite the taut, angry lines of their face—without a mask, their eyes smouldered like the blue heart of a fire—Fenton could not remember a more welcome sight.
"Lorcan," he sighed. He smiled.
Lorcan's eyes flashed. They hurled a rock through the air.
Fenton knocked the rock away, almost without seeing it, and he jerked back, but he couldn't dodge Lorcan's lunge, and they collided, landing hard on the ground. Water splashed as they struggled with one another, Lorcan wrestling with a ferocity that Fenton tried to combat defensively, rather than meeting like for like. His hesitancy gained him a crack to the jaw that made blood burst in his mouth, and a blow to the kidneys that made him grunt. Lorcan squeezed Fenton's throat, their nails raking in bloody gouges as Fenton struggled to free himself without hurting his sibling. Twisting sharply had no effect, and Fenton resorted to battering Lorcan with one of his antlers, stunning Lorcan enough that Fenton could wriggle free of the chokehold. His skin smarted with welts from Lorcan's fingernails. At least they hadn't thought to use their talons.
Crudely fighting fist to face seemed more malicious than throwing mountains at each other. Fenton didn't care for it.
Hand raised to forestall another attack, Fenton swallowed, bruise-thick. "What are you— Lorcan!"
Words and breath blew away when Lorcan kneed Fenton hard in the gut. His shadow softened the blow, but Lorcan hadn't withheld their strength. Taking advantage of Fenton's disorientation, Lorcan tried to grab Fenton's antlers, but vines lashed their hands and Lorcan yelped, falling back. With a hiss like water boiling, they dropped to the ground and kicked Fenton's ankle in a vicious snap, trying to knock him down. Fenton twisted aside and shoved Lorcan when they advanced again. Lorcan stumbled to their knees, whatever energy that had fuelled their attack beginning to visibly seep from them. Sweat dripped down their face and over their wild eyes. Fenton pressed his advantage and used his shadow to swiftly bind Lorcan, sacrificing the protection of armour for a chance to speak with his sibling without getting a fist to the face. Lorcan still wore the attire from the party, all but their mask, and fine silk clothes rippled as Fenton's shadow restrained Lorcan's limbs.
Fenton crouched, hoping proximity would help his sibling hear reason. "Lorcan, I—"
Fenton's fangs clacked together when Lorcan headbutted him in the jaw in almost the same spot as previously. Fenton would be bruised purple. He shoved Lorcan's face away as Lorcan snapped their teeth, like they intended to chew their way through Fenton, and he scrambled to pin Lorcan between his knees, his shadow fizzing as Lorcan's magic attempted to dislodge it. Lorcan continued straining their neck and trying to bite Fenton, their eyes fevered, their legs thrashing. The air stank of sweat and rancid fear.
Exhausted, Fenton bent forward to headbutt Lorcan gently on the chest, and let his head rest there. Let Lorcan chew on Fenton's antlers if they wanted. He panted as Lorcan continued to writhe and fight against the hold. There wasn't time for this nonsense.
"Calm yourself," he said, trying to be heard over Lorcan's hissing. "We must leave this place before the mage returns. There is no time for this— This fussing."
Lorcan stilled completely. Fenton froze in kind, readying for a trick.
"'Fussing'?" Lorcan spat, the first word Fenton had heard from them since he could remember. "'Fussing'? How would you I should react to this intrusion? Shall I ready the bread and salt?"
"Before the mage returns, we must—"
"Oho! Are you not here by that one's leave? No bread for you!"
Fenton snapped his teeth. "Will you stop talking and please listen to me, for one cursed second!"
Lorcan kicked their heels against the floor. Their yell rumbled through their chest like a storm gathering over the water, straight into Fenton's skull. "Listen to you? Listen to you! As you kill me, I should pay perfect attention, is that how you'd have it?" They bumped one of Fenton's antlers with their chin, then again, when Fenton failed to react. "Might my agonising death come by these weapons attached to your face, perchance, dearest brother? Or had you planned on using some other trick of yorn, fox-face?" Lorcan kicked ineffectually at Fenton with their bound legs. "Listen, he says, as he rushes in to murder me in my bed."
Fenton remembered, all at once, everything about Lorcan. He closed his eyes. "You are not in your bed, sibling. You are in a— I know not where this is."
"A trap, you fool," Lorcan said, and finally went limp.
For a span of breaths, Fenton waited, kneeling in the muck, to learn whether Lorcan feigned submission as they awaited another opportunity to strike. Tentatively, he loosened his shadow's hold on one of Lorcan's arms, ready to reassert the binding if Lorcan went for his eyes. As he did, his vines readjusted his crown from where it had been crushed against Lorcan's chest. The sensation must have irritated Lorcan, for they swatted—instinctively, it must have been—at Fenton's shoulder, making a pleased noise when they found their hand free. Fenton braced himself for further attack, but Lorcan only began poking his vines as if to hurry the process along, mumbling indecipherably. Fenton waited for them to mumble themself out; Lorcan's heartbeat had finally begun to slow, and Fenton allowed himself to believe the fight might truly be over.
"We must leave, Lorcan," Fenton said as his vines settled, his voice muffled by Lorcan's doublet.
"There is but one door, and it is locked tight against both thee and me," Lorcan murmured.
Silence lowered on them like the lid of a tomb. Fenton buckled beneath the weight of it. This had not been in his plan.
It was possible he should have spent more time on forming a plan.
"We can leave together," Fenton insisted, though he knew the thought to be futile. His shadow had not made a dent on the door, and he couldn't access the energy that he had used to break it open: Lorcan's cell offered death in every direction. If Fenton let himself notice his severed connection to green things, the loneliness would chew his mind to shreds.
"At full strength, yes, we would already be berating one another on the surface. But you're missing half your parts—don't bluster, I can see the spaces—and I..." Lorcan trailed off. Their heavy sigh moved Fenton like a wave. "Let's say that I haven't remained here because I enjoy the ambiance."
"The mage? Hartling?" Fenton asked, to have it confirmed.
Lorcan hissed. "Say not that name."
"All the more reason we should leave, before she—"
"All the more reason we are stuck in place!" Lorcan shouted. They subsided with a slap of their hand to the floor. "After parading me to her guests, she delivered me once more to these delightful surrounds with the indication I would not be called upon until dawn. Some working or another, I imagine, but I have long since ceased inquiries in favour of gratitude for the reprieve. Did you happen note the sun?"
"Not yet a thought on the horizon."
"Precisely." They tapped Fenton's shoulder. "Now then, do shift your enormous head. For one so averse to reflection, your skull certainly makes a cumbersome anchor."
Lifting his head, but remaining in place, Fenton eyed Lorcan warily. The lantern light carved deep shadows into their face and made dark pools of their eyes, and their pale hair had gone grey with muck, while their scales were without lustre. Lorcan had appeared well in the courtyard; surely the fight had not been enough to exhaust them so? Fenton urged his shadow to further lessen its hold, concerned he had exacerbated Lorcan's condition.
Lorcan didn't move, though they must have felt Fenton's shadow shift. "Yes, yes, I've had better days, no need to mention it. Besides, you're hardly pristine." Lorcan's expression grew sly. Familiar. They arched their eyebrows. "Though you're more bipedal than last we met, so that's in your favour. Are you any easier to reason with, I wonder?"
