#derolo

Percy shifted back into his usual form and stretched his legs as he leaned against the wide, thick truck of the tree. He had been the only one of his mother’s children to inherit her gift. His brothers and sisters had all gone for blades or the arcane or to the temple of Pelor, which was just as well. It had left all of the garden to Percy.

Bile rose in the back of Percy’s throat at the memory of the garden after the liberation of the city. It had been black, gnarled, poisoned to within an inch of even the most generous definition of life. Seeing it had felt like the Briarwoods were murdering his mother all over again. It was her place, then their place, and now just his - a sacred shrine she had cultivated over the course of her tenure as Lady of Whitestone, standing desecrated and broken. If he squinted, Percy could just see the huge labyrinth that stretched from the castle to the forest beyond, and the stone statue of Melora that reached up from its center.

The de Rolos had never been god fearing people, his mother least of all. Does the earth need worship to know it must grow? Does the fire listen to prayer? Does the water heed requests at the promise of gold and sacrifice? Does the air cease to chill and blow when there is no one left to will it so? Perhaps that reverence, that knowledge that the natural world would go on with or without you, was a kind of worship in its own way, Percy thought. His mother may have never worn the sunburst of Pelor as his father’s people had, but her bracelets of twisted heather and vine, her necklaces and crowns of flowers, and her pendants of wood and stone, were her holy symbols, just the same.

Whitestone stretched before Percy’s perch, from the very edge of the forests to the north where the mountain was just thinking of lifting up to meet the sky, far to the valley’s end and the path south to the wide world. It all felt so big, even after Percy had crossed so much of it with his friends, even after trials of earth and fire and air. His mother had never told him about the Aramente or about the tribe she had left behind on a mountain in the snow to find her own way. The mountains around Stillbend had taught him two things about his mother: she had never been a Headmaster, and his grandfather still mourned her.

The Ashari were not his family, not really. Percy found himself smiling a little at that word, family. Five years ago, it had meant a mother, a father, and a veritable stockade of siblings. Now, it was a rag tag group of assholes who had become heroes quite by accident. Was it an accident? Percy blinked and for a moment he thought he saw a woman, looming tall in black robes and a white mask, a hundred thousand weaving threads bound to each of her fingers. Was anything ever by accident?

Percy shook his head and sat up. Such questions were beyond his realm, and he was happy to leave them to others for a time. The sun was just cresting over the western ridge of hills when he leapt from the tree and slipped back into a hawk. As he flew down past the tree tops and back towards Whitestone, he repeated the words his mother had taught him as she watched him nurse small animals back to the health and grow flowers from winter’s frost. I am the land. I live so long as Whitestone lives.

The castle windows stood open on the first floor and Percy swooped into one of them, taking a sharp turn to the left of the entrance hall and down a flight of stairs. Vax’ildan would still be at prayers, he thought. Percy wondered if Vax actually knew any true prayers to the Raven Queen or if he was making it up as he went along, and decided it was probably a little bit of both.

Percy ducked under the stone archway that led to the temple and dived towards the floor. He landed as a hawk with a flurry of feathers and rose as a large white wolf shaking out his fur.

Vax’ildan didn’t move when Percy walked into the temple. His eyes were closed, his lips moving quickly in prayers Percy only half heard. May our Lady guide us and protect us as we serve her will…may we have the wisdom to know what can change and know when to witness only…strike true, fly high… Percy laid down on his stomach a few feet back, head tilted on crossed paws as he stared at the back of Vax’s head, his dark hair loose around his shoulders. He never got tired of watching Vax’s piety grow, even if he didn’t always understand his devotion.

Vax grew quiet after a few minutes and Percy’s ears perked up when he saw him put his right hand on the ground next to him, palm up. Percy scooted forward so his nose just touched the tips of his fingers, a whine rising out of his throat.

“Hello,” Vax laughed as he turned to look down at him. His fingers were quick and light as they moved to scratch at the thick fur behind Percy’s ears. “Did you know I was praying for you?” Percy leaned into his hand and whined again. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

Percy stretched and arched his back, slipping out of his wolf form and back to normal over the span of a breath. Vax’s fingers were still buried in the white hair at the base of his neck.

“That’s still a little weird,” he says. “Watching you do that. Not bad, just…weird.” Percy shifted up so he was sitting with his legs crossed and raised an eyebrow.

“You’ve watched me shift before,” he said. “You all have.”

“I know but it’s different when it’s with everyone else,” Vax said with a shrug. “When it’s just us, it’s different. It’s…it’s…”

“Intimate?” Percy prompted. It was hard to tell in the dark of the temple, but Percy could have sworn he saw pink creeping up Vax’s neck.

“Yes. Intimate.”  

Never trust anyone who says they love you, if they haven’t seen you without your skin on.  Percy pushed his mother’s voice to the back of his mind and learned forward to kiss Vax, one hand braced at the front of Vax’s armor. The fingers at the back of his head stiffened before threading anew into his hair. They were both still so shy, painfully so whenever Percy would look back on their little trysts hours later. This thing, this bond they had started to weave together, was still new, like a bud waiting for a burst of sunlight to help it grow, and Percy feared more than anything that running headlong towards it would be akin to ripping the whole plant up by the root. Still, he had never thought he could take to this kind of affection, to softness and gentility and care. Where even a few weeks ago, every kiss and touch would be a contest, a battleground, now they were starting to mellow into conversations, to explorations, and Percy found that he didn’t mind not having to fight for everything he wanted.

When their lips did finally part, Percy leaned forward and press his forehead to Vax’s. “Intimate isn’t so bad, you know.” Vax’ildan smiled. He lifted his hand from Percy’s hair to press his palm to the side of his face.

“No. Not so bad at all. Come on,” he said. “We’re already late for dinner and I don’t doubt my sister will march down here and drag us out herself, no matter what compromising position we threaten her with.” They both stood and Percy noticed for the first time now noticeably dark it had become, even through the small windows that opened the temple to the outdoors. He groaned inwardly. Vax wasn’t the only one with a sister who had no qualms about having his head for lack of propriety. He started towards the door, and had just reached the stairs to the castle proper when he heard Vax’ildan’s footsteps stop beside him.

“Percival…do you ever feel like there’s something heavy just weighing down on all of us?” Vax asked. Percy looked back at him and saw Vax’s head still turned towards the alter, his gaze level at the image of the Raven Queen he had placed there upon their return from Duskmeadow. His fingers brushed against the back of Percy’s hand before joining with his and squeezing hard.