#emiles antics

"You said you didn't care where we went next. I thought you wanted to see Europa." She'd actually been excited when he'd told her their next destination.

Before, of course, he'd shared his reasons for coming here.

"I want a lot of things. A cat. A permanent address. Some decent tea." Behind him, an abrupt rustle of fabric suggested Cynthia's restlessness. "You could get me some, instead of telling me I agreed to something I didn't."

"I'm not—" Cylus gritted his teeth, turning back towards her. She'd rolled away from him, too-thin shoulders hunched beneath the disarray of her platinum hair. Guilt lanced through him; she never showed her back to anyone but him. "You could at least read the packets, just to see—" he gestured towards the table under the window where he'd set out the University's materials for prospective students, even as he realized she couldn't see him.

"It's Windfall, Cylie." Her voice could have been a wall. "I don't care how fancy their university is."

"That's why—" He paused. Breathed. "That's the point, Cyn. These IDs are the best we've ever had, and they're completely fresh. We have a chance to get inside them, and build a real history that no one will question. We can have lives, not just a series of jobs and shows. We can have somewhere to stay! And when we're ready, we can finally hit them back, from the inside—"

Cynthia sat up, a quick, fluid motion that left her facing him, legs folded under her as she claimed his gaze. "If the IDs are so good, we could go anywhere." Her fists balled in her lap, voice finally rising. "Getting into Windfall's special school won't change anything that matters. All it does is put us in danger."

"I wish you would just think—" He regretted the words as soon as he said them.

"Thinking's your job." Her eyes bored into him, bright periwinkle that matched his own. "Isn't it? That's why you brought us here without telling me why. You know I'll follow your lead, so you decided for both of us. And you're right." Her voice wavered. She turned away again, back ramrod straight as she clutched the bedspread. "So go figure out the next step of your grand plan."

"Cynthia—"

"I need a nap." With a precise kick, she levered herself under the covers, pulling them up with a snap and muffling her next words beneath synthetic down. "Leave me alone."

The city was beautiful, in a remote way. The materials he'd read on the passenger ship said the buildings' design was inspired by some of the first missions to Europa, which had found fields of glittering ice spikes. When Windfall took ownership of the world hundreds of years later—as part of their "charitable oceanic conservation mission", a naked public relations move that had won exorbitant but publicly unacknowledged trade concessions from Earth—they had modeled their city on those same striking vistas, reflected onto a much grander scale.

So as he walked along heated stone sidewalks, he was surrounded by tapering towers that could have been made of ice themselves. In reality they were some kind of flexible glass, able to withstand the tidal pull of Jupiter and its many other satellites without disruption. The low Europan gravity allowed for the buildings to reach dizzying heights; though the ground and interiors were kept at Earth-standard grav, just like any other civilized place in the Terran systems.

A group of what had to be university students stumbled past him, laughing and drunk. Rich, well dressed, carefree; like he and Cynthia should have been at this time in their lives, if the world had any justice in it. He could have picked any of their pockets without even making an effort. But the streetlamps all bore the visible eyes of cameras between fluted light fixtures, and the absence of visible security staff was its own statement. Wealthy people, in his experience, preferred their police forces unseen unless needed—but that didn't mean they weren't close to hand, ready to pounce on any perceived disturbance to their pristine streets.

And he wasn't here for that kind of theft. He'd brought them to Europa for exactly one thing, so they never had to steal or busk or beg ever again.

He turned, following a flash of dark greenery down a side street. Rich people also liked parks, and so did Cylus; chances were he could find somewhere to tuck mostly out of view of cameras and collect himself. Then he would find Cynthia some tea and pastries, and maybe by the time he got back she would have at least started to forgive him.

The park was small but pleasant. A steaming fountain radiated warmth from its center, surrounded by unfamiliar vegetation in well-maintained planters. After a short walk around the fountain to assess the likeliest sightlines for security cameras, he chose a bench set back beneath a scaly green bush. It wouldn't have been a safe place to sleep: European security must periodically patrol public places like this. But he could sit here undisturbed for a moment and try to center himself, get his bearings again.

Overhead, lightly obscured by the sheltering foliage, Jupiter loomed above the forest of towers, half-full and smaller than he'd expected from its prominence in the shipboard brochures. He'd thought it might fill half the sky, but he could block it from view by holding his fist a small distance from his face.

It was nevertheless dramatic, a hemisphere of swirling clouds mesmerizing enough that he resolved to remember them next time he was doing a hypnotic induction. They'd make a good visualization, especially here; he couldn't imagine living on Europa for any length of time without getting lost in them. The famous red spot was nowhere to be seen, but smaller vortices curled between bands of rust-orange and milky white. Sol was a distant spotlight low in the sky, beaming cool brilliance that cast long, wan shadows. Some other moon hung between it and Jupiter, a small silvery segment.

The dome between the city and the blackness beyond was a barely visible shimmer, protecting them from a bombardment of radiation and debris that Europa's thin atmosphere would do little to deflect. Or so the brochures had said. Cylus had read them over and over as Cynthia slept through the journey, distracting himself from dreading the exact conversation he'd just had.

He should have just told her. But he'd known she'd hate the idea, had thought that if they just made it here first, then maybe... His hands, unthinking, sought familiar shapes in his pockets and began to fidget, soothed by familiar motions and sounds.

He just needed a little more intel. The fake IDs they'd bought—years of carefully hoarded savings while they performed and pilfered and slept in cargo containers and unsanctioned ship-hull hideaways and portside squats—would be enough to apply to Windfall's elite university. They even came with academic histories and letters of recommendation and records of accomplishments appropriate to the privileged youths they would become. But he needed to know more about the application and interview process: not just what Windfall shared online, but what the experience was like from someone who'd been through it. It was there that his whole plan could founder. The wrong attitude, the wrong reference, the wrong word could ruin everything, and send them back on the run, their precious new identities misspent and worthless.

"Hey, what're you doing?"

Cylie's breath caught as he looked down to his hands. They were occupied, by pure, anxious habit, with two tactical-glass butterfly knives, halfway through a pattern of intricate folding and unfolding. Eyes darting up, he assessed his unexpected watchers. Another group of students, he guessed, half a dozen boys as drunk as the ones he'd passed earlier. The apparent leader, a tall white fellow with dim blond hair and new-looking clothes, had fixed him with an expression of suspicious interest.

There was no way these knives were street-legal here. He'd only gotten them through the layers of ship and port security with the benefit of long practice and their unusual materials. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Cynthia would never have made this kind of mistake.

He closed the knives with a snap, smiling broadly. "Why, just practicing some tricks! I'm a performer, you see."

"What, like the Masked Parade?" The tall boy moved closer, several others near behind him.

Cylus did not wince; no need to discuss his own history with the Parade. Most everyone knew of the traveling fleet of entertainers, which made it a convenient point of reference. "Yes, exactly."

"Huh. Show us something, then."

"Of course!" Stand back, he almost said; but that would be tantamount to admitting his weapons were real, and that seemed like a dangerous idea. So instead he opened his knives and did a quick, casual helix while remaining seated on the bench. Maybe a bit of nonchalant flash would convince them and put them off, though he wouldn't have placed a bet on it.

Most of the others looked at least a bit impressed; one, a short, soft-looking brown youth with sea-green hair, displayed open fascination, stepping closer even as the rest shifted back.

The leader didn't give ground either way, affecting boredom. "That all you've got?"

Cylie's thoughts raced, seizing and discarding ideas as he summoned his performer's smile. "Certainly not. Why, I've got some fantastic new tricks I've been meaning to try out with an audience member, actually. Would one of you like to volunteer?"

The short brown person stepped forward again. A boy, though Cylus would have guessed otherwise from his build alone. His gendermark earring had the same shape as Cylie's, an upward-pointed triangle with a circle encompassing the topmost point. But where Cylie's mark was a simple silver stud in the customary left lobe, this boy wore a dangling golden triangle crowned with a circular green gem. His eyes were the same bright color, wide and eager beneath a pair of fine golden spectacles. "I will!"

The leader rolled his eyes. "Yeah, you do that, Emile," he sneered, not bothering to disguise the disdain in his voice.

Anger smoldered. Cylus couldn't be angry with Cynthia; but he could feel whatever he wanted towards this smug young man. The sudden desire to see fear in his eyes sparked a dangerous hunger in Cylus' stomach.

He turned his attention to the soft youth—Emile—as the boy moved closer with a nervous smile. "Hi," he said, his voice a gentle alto. "How can I help?"

A little more intel... Cylus pushed extraneous thoughts away. Double checking for nearby cameras, he stood and met Emile's smile with his own, turning up the wattage until Emile's cheeks darkened with a blush. "All you have to do..." Cylus tucked one knife away and placed his empty hand on Emile's shoulder, positioning him between Cylie and the other boys. "Is stay very, very still..." Cylus unfolded his other knife with a weighty click, holding the point a careful distance in front of Emile's face. "And keep your eyes on this." The flush on Emile's cheeks spread down his neck; Cylus suppressed a sudden urge to press closer, to place his lips next to the boy's pierced ear and make his earring flutter. "Can you do that for me, Emile?"

"Yes," Emile exhaled. Several of the boys snickered. Emile remained unmoving, only the softest sigh suggesting that he'd heard them.

Cylie began to trick, rolling the knife open and closed, open and closed, around and above his hand, short tosses into the air; all a safe distance from Emile, but near enough that the other boys behind the blond-haired leader started exchanging glances.

"Now imagine, if you will," Cylus said, pulling from one of those inflight brochures, "That you are a cloud in the Jovian atmosphere. You are surrounded by ceaseless storms and shifting pressures, pushing and pulling you this way and that, this way and that..." He wove a slow-building cadence of words through the soft, rhythmic clicks of the tacglass knife as it folded and unfolded. His other hand gripped firm on Emile's shoulder, feeling its warmth against his palm. "Spiraling... swirling... ebbing and flowing... twisting and turning... at the mercy of the winds around you." His blade sped faster, ever faster; a whirlwind of glass to cover his rising panic. Why had he chosen this analogy? Everything he knew about Jupiter's atmosphere he'd learned less than forty-eight hours ago. But he was in it now; nothing for it but to keep his voice and blade in motion. "Cyclones, jet streams, ceaseless circulation..."

Emile's body relaxed under Cylus' hand on his shoulder. A glance at the rest of his audience found their eyes wide; falling, finally, under his spell. Even the leader was quiet, eyes fixed on the movement of Cylie's knife.

In an alchemic instant, Cylie's panic transmuted into confidence, the unshakeable certainty that had bluffed him through countless performances, and out from gunpoint more than once.

He had this. He had everything he needed right here.

"You find yourself pulled inward, into an oncoming storm. You are spun, swept, stretched, swallowed. You fall inward, ever inward, unable to resist." Faster. Faster. He usually used his knife trainers when working this fast. A single wrong motion and he'd lose a finger, along with everything else he was fighting for in this makeshift performance.

But he wasn't afraid. Exhilaration flooded him, adrenaline beating through his veins. He surrendered to his earlier impulse, shifting closer to Emile, the easier to keep him steady. Or to feel him. The boy's back pressed against his chest; a perfect fit. "And then, at the center of the storm, for a single instant, you are..." He leaned in, close enough to inhale Emile's scent: an understated botanical perfume whose elements he didn't recognize.

Brushing the shell of Emile's ear with his lips, he laced his whisper with command: "Still..."

Emile's breath stopped, his body perfectly motionless.

"Until—" Cylie's blade slashed.

Red erupted.

The group of boys staggered back, gasping and cursing, the blond boy nearly tripping over one of his fellows.

"You are lifted anew!" Cylie concluded with a showman's finality, using a flick of his knife-hand to swirl the red silk scarf he'd conjured during his false strike. "And the dance begins again!"

He'd intended to step out into a flourish, but Emile had slumped back against him, trembling. So instead he shifted sideways, sliding his empty hand from Emile's shoulder down to his waist, suddenly aware of soft curves beneath fine cloth. Bracing Emile's back, he guided the lad into bowing alongside him.

When Cylus straightened, Emile stayed bent.

Well, that was fine. Cylie dropped the red scarf across the back of the lad's neck, ends trailing long to either side, tracking the other boys' eyes as he reinforced the frightful illusion he'd evoked. "So! Who wants to volunteer for my next trick?" He beamed, locking gazes with the leader of the little pack.

"Nobody," the boy spat with unconvincing derision, still backing away. "We've got better things to do than humor some random Parade knock-off." As they retreated, Cylie's triumph and relief were soured by irritation: at the boy's jibe, but far more at his own receptiveness to it.

He clamped down on the knot of emotion. For all he knew, they might be off to report him to the nearest security officer, and he didn't want to have to stash his knives to avoid confiscation. It was time to be elsewhere.

His eyes flickered to Emile; still bowed and scarf-draped, knees trembling. "You can stand up now, you know," Cylus said, tucking his knife back up a sleeve. "And your friends left in a quite a rush. You might want to hurry if you're going to catch up."

"Oh," the boy said, straightening at last, cheeks still flushed dark. His speech was slow, still half-entranced. "They're not my friends. l mean, I don't think they are. I only just got here a couple days ago, we're all starting at the University, and my sister said I ought to make some friends. So I asked if I could go with them after convocation. But they weren't... Very nice."

Cylus reached out to reclaim his scarf, studying Emile's face as red silk slid free. The trace of melancholy that had marred Emile's dreamy expression smoothed, and a shiver passed through his body.

Interesting.

Cylie murmured something conciliatory and reached out, making to adjust Emile's outfit as though the scarf had tugged something awry. There wasn't much to straighten; just a small pair of lapels crowning a tight-buttoned vest that flared at the waist, panels angling down to his knees, over a billowy, cream-white shirt—real silk, judging by the feel.

Emile relaxed into the gesture, and Cylie took advantage of the opportunity to examine him more closely, fussing performatively with the rest of the outfit. The waves of his soft, sea green hair were shot through with deeper blues, expensively dyed or permacolored. His gold-and-emerald mark hung from a lobe still swollen, perhaps with recent piercing. His outfit complimented his hair, featuring similar blues and greens. Soft trousers with damask panels of green vines embroidered up the outsides were cuffed mid-calf to reveal tight, cream-colored stockings and tooled leather shoes. Besides the notable earring, he wore a wide bracelet studded with stones that Cylus recognized with a start as sapphires.

It was unlike any clothing he'd seen on Europa so far; or ever, really. It was archaic, and flamboyant, and it screamed of wealth and a sheltered upbringing.

There might be something more to gain here. He wished now that he'd changed into something besides his plain gray travel clothes; but Emile's expression held only guileless interest.

"Well, what a coincidence!" Cylus refreshed his smile, noting Emile's deepening flush with satisfaction and no little pleasure. "I'm looking to make some friends myself. Emile, was it? I'm Cylus, but my friends call me Cylie. Do you happen to know any good places where I could get a bite to eat?"

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Next chapter >

"It's just my eldest sister. I... haven't written her back for a couple days, and normally we message all the time. She's the one who told me about this place, actually!" Before he'd left home, Valerie had compiled a detailed list of her favorite spots in the City. He'd never guessed her recommendations would come in handy so soon. But Callisto's Café was perfect. The decor was spacious yet intimate: open areas partitioned by curtains of translucent, patterned fabric that evoked seaweed, punctuated with softly illuminated hanging glass art in abstract, vaguely aquatic shapes. Tables and booths were numerous, ranging from capacious to cozy enough for two, like the sheltered nook he and Cylie had found near the back. He even spotted several Devigne vintages on the high shelves behind the massive bar.

"You're at the University, right?" Cylus poured them each a glass from the carafe of ice water the waiter had left when taking their order. "I imagine that's keeping you busy."

"Well... yes, but it's not just that. I... ruffled some family feathers recently." Your choice of timing, location, and company for this transition demonstrate a concerning lack of forethought, a deviation from our previous discussions on this matter, and a violation of the Devigne family rules of conduct. I have attached them for you to review prior to your matriculation, Mother's message had continued. Do not forget to update your commcards with your chosen name. True to her word, Lyonesse Devigne had linked the document she and Valerie co-managed on family protocols for online and offline behavior, highlighting the portion about publicizing major life changes. It covered several pages, including security concerns and mitigations, press release review processes, and approved media channels. She'd also included the address of a commcard printer in Europa City, not that Emile had made it there yet.

Cylus studied him with amused interest. "You seem like a proper young man. Hard to imagine you doing too much ruffling. What got you in trouble?"

"An... indiscretion. During my Reterra last week." Emile stalled with a deep drink of water, wincing as frigid cubes threatened to tumble out onto his face. He much preferred his family's practice of chilling beverages prior to serving them. "Have, ah, you ever been?"

"To Old Earth? Haven't had the pleasure. What's it like?"

A smiling server arrived with their wine, leaving Emile time to consider. His eyes lingered on the cascade of red liquid into their glasses, a sight familiar as home, as his memory ranged over the two weeks he'd spent being ferried about Old Earth with a collection of other well-off visitors from across the galaxy.

As the server retreated, leaving two generous pours and the bottle behind, Emile spoke again. "It was beautiful, what I saw of it. They flew us over all the most famous preserves, mountains and forests and grasslands and deserts... like nothing I've ever seen. But they don't take you down into them, which makes sense given the regulations, but I felt so... removed." They'd flown over some of the old ruined cities, too: drowned, or burned, or starved, in the long, bleak era when Terra's population had dropped from billions to its remaining few, heavily regulated millions. The others on the tour had regarded the ruins with the same mild excitement they'd shown for any of the natural wonders, which had left Emile feeling quietly uncomfortable. He sipped the wine to distract himself from the complicated knot of feelings in his chest; it tasted good, mellow and warm with an undercurrent of spice. "But the ocean!" His heart soared and twisted at the memory. "We spent three days on a boat around these remote islands, which was amazing. Have you ever heard of snorkeling?"

Cylus hadn't. Before Emile realized it, he'd finished his glass, waxing rhapsodic about the experience. He'd been one of few on the trip who knew how to swim, and never more grateful for it than when stroking through rock arches and exploring strange stony landscapes below the waves.

But then he paused, sorrow surging through him. "It's so sad, though," he said, voice sinking to a whisper. "It used to all be alive, you know? You can see the echoes of it; shells and skeletons and dead reefs. I've seen vids of how it used to be, before the last mass marine extinction and the resulting... conservation efforts. Now, at least where we were, it was so... empty." Even some of the fallen cities had looked more alive, green with plants reclaiming spaces humans had been forced to abandon.

Silence fell between them for a moment, Cylus studying him over a half-empty glass. "Anyway," Emile continued, a wave of self-consciousness rushing him forward, "We ended up in New Singapore, which is where Brenn and I..." He hadn't meant to mention Brenn. But the experience felt tangled inside him, and he ached to talk about it to someone who wasn't a member of his family. For all he knew, Cylie and everyone else at the University had seen the post already, like the leader of the boys he'd fallen in with after convocation had. Maybe all his prevarication was for nothing. "We... connected, and then got gendermarks together. Then a picture of us got posted on Now, and went... a little viral. And that's how my family found out."

"Ahh," Cylie nodded, refilling Emile's glass without evidence of recognition. "Are they strict about that kind of thing?"

"Not about gendermarks or anything weird like that. My eldest sister got one younger than me. And my third-sib..." Emile recalled Dion's reply to Lyonesse's stern message, perfectly calculated to draw their mother's ire. Dion had taken a series of pictures at a club, surrounded by scantily clad celebrants with left ears pierced but empty. All their gendermark earrings hung from the ornate tunnel plug stretching Dion's left lobe: an assortment of triangles, diamonds, and circles overlapping in various orientations. Dion's note had read: Congrats, little brother! I wanted to follow your example but couldn't decide which gender this time. Think I should hold a public poll??? "Well, they change marks often. It's that my family is..." Once again, he teetered on the brink of dropping his surname; once again, he swallowed it. "...kind of private."

Obfuscation always felt awkward in his mouth. He hadn't thought twice before sharing his family name with the other members of his Reterra tour group. But he'd discovered how the very presence of that name drew conversations into inexorable orbit around the world Emile had spent his whole life deciding, with great reluctance, to leave. And then Brenn, who'd seemed more interested in him than his name, had... Well. Mother seemed sure Brenn had sold the image to the outlet that published it, but maybe someone had harvested it from a more private gallery. After all, Emile hadn't told him to keep it secret or anything.

"Does that mean I shouldn't ask anything more about them? I confess I'm terribly curious now, but I wouldn't want to get you in more trouble."

Cylus' teasing tone made Emile want to keep talking, despite everything. "Well, I'm the youngest of seven..."

Another member of the waitstaff appeared as if sent to spare Emile from his own incipient folly, carrying a plate of the flaky pastries that were the café's specialty. "What about you, though?" Emile asked as he cut one of them open, salivating at the scent from within. The first bite, chased with a sip of wine, sent his eyes rolling back in his head for a moment before he collected himself. A spring-harvest white from home would have been Emile's choice to accompany fish, but the red Cylus had chosen earlier matched better than Emile had expected with the vivid seasonings, creamy sauce, and finely chopped celery and lotus root rounding out the fish pastries. He swallowed, cheeks warming to notice Cylie watching him, and remembered to finish his question. "What's your family like?"

Cylus had a twin sister, it turned out; they were traveling performers, which sounded terribly romantic to Emile. He'd always wanted to see the Masked Parade in person, and Cylus said that he and Cynthia had even traveled with them for a time. Before he could ask more about that, though, Cylus shared that they were visiting to decide if they wanted to go to the University too. When Emile volunteered that he was only just starting there himself, Cylus had leaned forward with obvious interest, veering their conversation into the minutiae of the application and admissions process.

By the time Cylus seemed satisfied with that topic, they'd finished the bottle of wine and half a dozen of the buttery, spicy fish rolls. Emile had grown up sipping at his parents' table and had body mass to handle his drink, but by now even he was starting to feel altered.

Though he had enough self awareness left to attribute some of that feeling to how Cylus' eyes kept lingering on his.

"So, Emile," Cylus asked as he refilled Emile's glass from a freshly arrived bottle, "What made you decide to go to Europa University?"

Emile couldn't help thinking back to convocation that afternoon, and the dean's opening address. Yours are the minds that will guide the future of this system, and perhaps this galaxy. And we at Windfall's Europa University will be with you every step of the way.

Emile hadn't come to Europa to guide the future of the galaxy. Right now he was struggling to guide his own eyes, which kept wandering along the curve of pale hair at the edge of Cylus' jaw. "Well... my sister Valerie... she went here. Did really well. She's amazing. She helped convince my parents it might... I don't know, awaken something in me? Not like that​," he groaned when Cylus snickered. "My mother literally just..." He'd almost said sent me of our family rules of conduct, the sort of comment almost as bad as dropping his family name. "... Reminded me to behave, after the whole... gendermark incident."

"What kind of misbehavior is she worried about? That kind of 'incident' doesn't seem like it'd come up too often, except maybe for someone like your third-sib." Cylus' tone was light, but his gaze held a sharp edge of interest.

That edge sent pleasant shivers through him; words spilled before he thought better of them. "They... don't love either of my longer term sweethearts." Xiomara, too threatening; Marc, from the wrong class. "And on top of that, our family... entertains a lot of guests, and I was supposed to help out. But I kept... Entangling with the guests. Sometimes more than one... on the same night. At the same time."

"Sounds like a perk more than a problem, if you ask me." The warm lack of surprise in Cylus' smile filled Emile's body with champagne bubbles, as did his lack of dismay at Emile's mention of other lovers.

"It wasn't always sex, even!" Emile continued, buoyed by that lightness. He really ought to ask if Cylus was making an advance. "I like... talking with people." Despite what his array of sexual encounters might suggest, Emile had often been told that he was flirting when he hadn't intended to, and equally often his own attempts at flirtation passed unnoticed. He was worse still at recognizing when people were flirting with him. It all ran together in his mind, a blurry continuum of interaction that seemed to have clear demarcations for everyone else. "But Mother's always telling me to think more about others' judgments. How they might harm me, or the family. She's been in PR for a long time, since before any of us were born. I guess it's hard for her not to think about it. But I'm not good at living that way. I just want to..."

The world seemed to contract around the two of them, a bubble of warm stillness.

"I just want to connect," Emile said softly, meeting Cylie's eyes for an instant before averting his gaze into the depths of his wineglass. "With people, and with the world."

Memories swept through him. Home: the tannic taste of first-harvest grapes, seeds slick against his tongue; the warmth of an apple tree trunk against his back as he tinkered with a damaged drone harvester; the scent of crushed green as his father culled unwelcome evidence of their planet's lingering wildness. Xiomara's firm touches; Marc's gentle, enveloping embrace. And more recently, the weightlessness of water; the dance of sunlight on stone; the feeling of earth between his fingers and the sting in his earlobe and the weight of Brenn's arm slung around his shoulders.

His hand fell away from his wine glass, palm upward on the table between them. "So I... I'd really like to know whatever you'd like to share about yourself," Emile finished, self consciousness creeping in again. "Because I also like to talk about myself, apparently. Far too much."

The touch of Cylus' fingers on his hand brought his eyes back up with a jolt. Something in Cylus' expression seemed... open, in a way it hadn't before. "Alright, then. Do you want to hear about the time my sister and I performed on the promenade of Vega Station?"

Emile, savoring the warmth of Cylie's hand against his, wanted nothing more.

The conversation flowed from there, melting into an easy exchange of stories and reflections. All of Emile's were from home: enough interesting people came to Devigne's Paradise that, without naming names, he managed to at least keep up with Cylie's array of far-flung adventures: from an asteroid colony in a distant system, to the crowded streets of Titan, to a harrowing visit to a volcanic planet on the verge of reclamation. As Emile listened, he remembered how Cylus' hand had closed on his shoulder, earlier; the way those fingers had curled against his waist while he was doing tricks with his knives. How fast those transparent blades had spun, how close, while Cylus wove words into the most beautiful shapes...

Across the table, Cylus' mellifluous voice paused.

Emile jolted, realizing he'd practically fallen into a trance; lost in the rhythm of words to the point he'd stopped absorbing their content. "Oh my goodness, I'm so sorry," he gushed, searching for Cylus' expression in the dim cafe light. He needed to clean his glasses; pulling his hand back and retrieving a cloth from his breast pocket, he did so frantically. "I, I drifted away, there! You have such a wonderful voice." No, that was too forward for having just utterly lost the thread of conversation. "I, uh, please, would you be so kind as to repeat the last bit of your story?"

Fumbling spectacles back onto his face, he blinked to find Cylus laughing softly, something new in his eyes.

Something warm, and wicked.

"You're sweet." Cylus drained scarlet dregs from his wineglass without releasing Emile's gaze. "Being flustered looks good on you."

Without thinking, Emile picked up the wine bottle, angling it above Cylus' glass in unspoken offer. Cylus' smile widened, head inclining approval. Emile's next words spilled from his lips as inexorably as the pouring wine. "You're beautiful. Anything would look good on you." Only the truth. Cylus' dress was plain, the same flat gray trousers-and-shirt that Emile had noticed on a number of people in both the Terran and Europan spaceports. Perhaps some widely available matter-printer pattern? Regardless, those plain garments did nothing to diminish the force of his appearance: delicate features, soft-swept hair, and those slender-fingered hands, which had moved with such precise confidence. His skin looked untouched by sunlight in a way that Emile had never seen before leaving home, almost worryingly pale. But paired with his platinum hair and those striking amethyst eyes, Emile found the full effect eerily beautiful.

Cylus snickered, breaking Emile from another momentary reverie. "Really thought you were about to drop a line, there." When Emile blinked, confused, Cylus leaned forward, lowering his voice. "You know, 'anything would look great, nothing would look even better'?"

Emile flushed, shifting with sudden awareness of how wet he was. "I mean, I'm certain that's true, but I, um, didn't think of it and also I wouldn't want to be impolite..."

"Don't worry." Cylus smiled over the rim of his glass, licking a trace of red off his lips. "You've been very polite. Lucky for you..." Pressure ghosted against his calf. Emile nearly jumped from the padded booth seat. "...I'm not." The contact firmed, sliding upward: Cylus' foot, teasing the inside of Emile's knee.

Emile's breath sped.

Cylus' foot stilled, maintaining a light contact that felt like it was drawing all of Emile's blood down towards it. "Now, if I promise I won't consider it rude," Cylus swirled his glass, scarlet liquid dancing in lazy circles, "Would you like to try your line again? If you really want to be proper," Cylus' long lashes lowered, periwinkle shadowing into indigo, "You can work in a please."

"Please," Emile breathed without further thought. "Would you..." The touch against his knee intensified, pressing outward. He let it move his leg apart from its opposite, cheeks burning hot. Cylus' eyes seemed to swallow the world as that pressure shifted to Emile's inner thigh.

Emile let the first words that reached his tongue come tumbling out. "Please would you show me how those knives work?"

Cylus' touch on his leg froze.

Between heartbeats, Emile lived and died a hundred lifetimes. Why that question? Why not the line Cylus had offered him? Everything had been going so wonderfully...

This time, Cylus' laughter was no soft, seductive thing, but a burst of amusement that shocked Emile's heart into beating again. "You..." Cylus just managed to set his wine down without spilling it, bending over the table and muffling a delightfully undignified series of snorts and gasps with one hand. The touch on Emile's thigh vanished, and his whole body lamented its departure. But Cylus' overflowing mirth replaced its command of his attention.

Emile's face split into a grin so wide it hurt. In that moment, he would have said or done anything in his power, if it meant he would hear Cylus laugh like this again.

As Cylus regained control of his breath, Emile seized the wave of exhilaration and rode it through his next few words: "And also please tell me we're flirting and I'm not imagining it because I also would love to see you in anything you want, including nothing. If that's something you'd like too. P-please."

That set Cylus laughing again, which felt so good that Emile found himself able to sit comfortably with the near-agonizing fact that Cylus hadn't actually answered him yet.

"Oh," Cylus managed at last, wiping his eyes with the same red silk scarf he'd conjured earlier. "People underestimate you, don't they, Emile?"

"Sometimes," Emile admitted, suddenly shy. "You too?"

Cylus smiled and slid out of the booth in one graceful motion, standing and extending a hand towards Emile. "Well, I can't do either of those fascinating things you requested here, can I? I don't suppose you know anywhere that's good for a more... private conversation?"

It was only after he'd paid and followed Cylus out the door that he realized Cylus had deflected his last question with two others.

That counted, Emile told himself—hand exquisitely enfolded by Cylus' warm, dexterous fingers, the street air cool against his flushed face— as the best kind of answer: the kind that trusts the listener to figure it out themself.

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Next Chapter >

Cylie inhaled through his nose, steadying himself with cold, salty air. "Repeat the rule as you understand it."

"I don’t come any closer than this while your blades are open, unless you say otherwise."

"Do you have any questions?"

"Yes, Cylus."

"Ask."

"What would have happened if I'd moved earlier? During the trick, in front of the others?"

Cylus channeled the dark hunger bubbling under his skin, baring his teeth in a wicked grin. "I knew you wouldn't move." After a delicious hesitation, long enough that he could practically smell Emile marinating in his own juices, he added, "And I kept the knife away from you while constraining your range of motion. It's hard to gauge the exact distance of a sharp weapon when it's moving edge-on relative to you.

"So if you target your movements at the right height, and then suggest the dreaded but anticipated arrival of blood—how can you fail to imagine it, when a knife moves in the vicinity of vulnerable flesh?—it's effortless for the mind to see it where it's not."

Cylie whipped both blades out dramatically at the visual level of his own throat, pleased by Emile’s answering flinch.

Over the subsequent moments of silence, though, a wave of embarrassment swallowed that pleasure, the words he’d just spoken playing back in his head. That last bit had been... a little much, even for his showman's patter. He'd sounded more like a villain in an entertainment. Was Emile going to laugh? No, he was too polite for that.

He tried to read Emile’s expression in the dim light. Was he surprised at Cylie’s dramatic choice of words? Or worse, truly afraid, perhaps sensing the cruel yearnings seething in Cylie's stomach even now?

"Thank you, Cylus," Emile murmured. "No more questions now."

Putting him on the ground had been an unnecessary indulgence. The sight of him—a wriggle away from groveling, Cylie's silk dark at his throat, accepting Cylie's authority with submissive grace—was a drug far more potent than the alcohol in his veins.

Marshaling his willpower, he tucked one knife away and raised the other, enjoying the play of multi-colored light in the transparent tacglass. Holding the unlatched weapon parallel to the ground, he let one side drop: creating a right angle of the two handles, revealing the naked blade between. “So the spine of the knife,” he traced the blade’s back, “is the side that won’t cut you. The grip facing the spine,” He tapped the horizontal handle with the index finger of the hand holding it, “Is the safe handle, the one you can hold without worrying about injuring yourself. The one on the edge side,” He trailed a finger of the opposite hand down it, “Is called the bite handle.” Smirking, he tapped the blade with the back of a fingernail. “You can imagine why, can’t you?”

Emile’s swallow was audible, a soft, breathy click in his throat. “Yes, Cylus. Q-question?”

Beating back fantasies of teasing that edge along Emile’s skin, Cylus nodded. “Yes?”

“Is that little... thingie... on the end of the bite handle some kind of... latch?”

Fortune, he’s quick. “Good eye.” He let his tone warm with praise. “Yes, there’s a matching notch on the safe handle...”

They fell into an easy back and forth, then; Cylus demonstrating and explaining, Emile asking questions. "Are you satisfied?" Cylus asked after finishing a breakdown of openings, closures, and quick draws. "Obviously that’s only the basics, but I think it qualifies as 'showing you how they work'."

"Yes, Cylus. Thank you." Emile had remained on the ground, right where Cylus had thrown him. Admittedly the low gravity made that less onerous than it might otherwise be, but Cylus allowed himself to appreciate the sight a last time.

With a final flick, he closed and stashed the knife he’d been using, conjuring a tone of casual insouciance to mask the desire that his demonstration had failed to abate.

"Come here, then, if you want me to touch you again."

Emile crawled towards him, peering shyly up through hair still mussed from their descent, when Cylus left the bruises that must still be ripening on his neck.

Cylus felt unsteady, like there was no gravity at all. "Stop," he commanded when Emile was near enough to reach out and touch his knee. "Show me your face." And your throat.

Emile obeyed, head tilting upward. The scarf shifted, ends wafting apart and exposing the bruises: a series of dark impressions below the soft curve of his jaw, more striking than Cylie had even hoped. He wanted to mark the other side of his neck to match. Or better yet...

His mind ran wild, darker and deeper than before. He imagined tilting Emile's chin up with a knife-tip, ghosting along his jawline before making a precise, shallow cut. Not deep enough to harm; just enough to admit a thin trickle of scarlet. A little rivulet winding down the column of Emile's soft brown throat, highlighting the hollow between his collarbones, finding its way between his breasts, staining the creamy silk of his shirt...

No. No, no, no. He gritted his teeth. Tonight wasn't the first time he'd fantasized about using his knives outside the necessity of self defense. Such thoughts left him deeply uncomfortable with himself; he'd never shared them, even with Cynthia. But only once before had so many of those thoughts assailed him at once, and that...

He swallowed sudden sourness. That time had been nothing like this.

“Cylus?”

Emile’s sweet voice called him back from the threat of unwelcome memories, bringing his attention back to the beautiful boy at his feet.

He sank to his knees, placing their heads at the same level. All he could see in Emile's eyes were dim blue-green reflections. He felt agonizingly aware of his body: the tightness of his binder; the metal grating against his shins, admitting light and air from below; chill humidity threatening to condense on flushed skin; the soft sound of lapping water; salt-tang and that strange cocktail of organic smells he couldn't begin to identity.

The lingering taste of wine, and Emile, on his tongue.

"Fuck," he groaned, the rough syllable forcing free from his lips. They were too drunk for this; any of this, much less all of it. But he couldn't bring himself to try and break whatever spell was over them. "I..." One hand lifted, stroking Emile's cheek with shaking fingers as his other found the long ends of the scarf.

Before he realized what was happening, he was pulling Emile in, their breath mixing in the cool air, one heartbeat away from the kind of kiss that would shatter the fragile façade of his remaining self-control. Recoiling internally, he managed to bring Emile’s head to rest against his chest instead. Stroking Emile’s hair, he forced himself to pause, and think.

His and Cynthia's performances occasionally attracted potential patrons, offering the possibility of money and other forms of protection. They avoided cultivating those who expected sex; one brief, disastrous experiment had proven that particular exchange didn’t... suit him. Cynthia, whose self-knowledge generally exceeded his own, had avoided it altogether. But a handful of times, he’d attracted a patron who only wanted to be hurt or ordered around by a pretty person far younger than they. Such arrangements had proved more sustainable, even briefly enjoyable, though none had lasted long.

So Emile’s obvious masochistic and submissive desires weren't unfamiliar to him. During the first time he’d fallen into such a dynamic, he and Cynthia had been on good terms with a small guild of sex workers. At Cynthia's urging, he'd asked pointers from an older domme who he’d befriended over cards.

You’re creating a fantasy where you're leading them, she’d told him, but you can make them tell you where they want to be led.

"...What do you want?" Cylus managed to keep his voice from shaking. "Tell me what you want."

"I want you to cut my clothes off, and touch me wherever you want to." Emile's voice wobbled but didn't break, half-muffled against Cylie’s shirt. "B-but I also want you to be comfortable, and to feel good too, and that's, that's a weird thing to request, it's okay if—"

An anguished sound ripped from Cylus' throat. The other half of his old teacher's advice asserted itself: just don't get talked into going somewhere you don't know how to get back from.

Guiding Emile down to lie flat on his back, Cylus clambered atop him, acutely aware of where his crotch pressed against Emile's lower stomach. His cheap, matter-printed pants did not feel thick enough; he wondered if Emile could tell how wet he was.

"Close your eyes," he hissed. "And stay still."

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Next chapter >

Note: Butterfly knives are also known as balisongs, and are Filipino in origin, with a rich and interesting past! But Cylie doesn't know that, and Emile sure as heck doesn't either, so I pass this information on directly instead.