#galysh

 Zaveid arrives at the cave late in the evening. He stands in the rain with the slope of the mountain at his back and stares at it for a while. 

It is a deep, dark cave. The perfect place for a local monster to hide and terrorise the village that stands at the foot of the mountain. He can understand their fear, their quick conclusions. He can understand it all. It still sucks. 

His shoes click on the stone floor as he enters. As he walks, he brushes his hands through his hair, then over his pants. They dry unnaturally quickly, leaving only fading wet footsteps leading inside. His footsteps echo in the small space. 

It does not take long for the sound to mingle with something else. He has better hearing than most, but it is not far into the cave, still. There is a faint sound of ragged breathing, followed by the shifting of clothing and the clatter of pebbles on stone. 

Zaveid steels himself and keeps walking. A dark form takes shape before him, huddled on the ground like a man injured. 

He stops there, some distance away. He reaches out a hand and lights a flash of magic. Just a brief flare of green, but it tells him all he needs to know. 

Eizen lies on the ground before him, curled up and shivering. His clothing is worn and torn, a far cry from when Zaveid last saw him. His hair is a matted mess, his face gaunt and pale. 

Zaveid focuses on his face, and in the next brief flash of magic, he sees the beginnings of dark scales forming on his cheeks. One of Eizen's eyes is spotted with sickly yellow, the pupil a slit like that of a cat. 

But the most shocking thing about him is the pair of black leathery wings which have torn through the back of his coat. They curl close to him as he shifts uncomfortably, as though he is trying to make them smaller. Zaveid sucks in air through his teeth. 

"You look like hell," he says. 

Despite everything, Eizen manages a dry chuckle through wet lungs.

"Thanks."

There is little more he can say than that about what is happening. Were they different people, he might have been frightened, panicked, even. As it is, he simply reaches into the pack at his hip and pulls out a thick and neatly folded blanket. A girl in the village gave it to him after he healed her little brother. They were the only ones for miles with any good resonance. 

Eizen makes a sound that may be a growl as the blanket is draped over him. Zaveid sits down next to him, reaches into his bag, and lights a small torch which he sets up between two rocks. The light flickers and draws their shadows out over the floor of the cave. 

There is a moment in which Eizen shifts and visibly considers throwing the blanket off, but then he settles in beneath it with a weak sigh. 

"You shouldn't be here," he says. 

Zaveid leans against the cave wall and shrugs. "There are many places I shouldn't be."

Eizen shakes his head, and even that seems to hurt judging by how he cringes. 

"You know what I mean. The malevolence will get to you."

Zaveid huffs, nonchalant. "Please. I eat malevolence for breakfast."

There is some truth to what he means, at least. He stayed so long with Theodora that he must be practically inoculated at this point. Either way, he will not leave. 

"If you get corrupted before you can fulfil your promise," Eizen says slowly, "I swear I will eat you."

"Fair enough," Zaveid says, instead of the many jokes that come to mind. 

Silence falls over them then, and the sound of the rain begins to seep into it. Were it not for the convulsing wings on Eizen's back, it may have been soothing. 

"How did you find me?" Eizen asks quietly. 

Zaveid looks out towards the rain in the distance. 

"The village thinks you're going to eat them," he says. "Some of them saw you getting here."

"Oh." 

"Don't worry," Zaveid says lightly. "I told them you only eat naughty children."

"Fuck you," Eizen hisses softly, but when Zaveid looks at him, he can see a hint of a smile. 

"Nah. You don't seem up to it right now."

He could move closer, could settle on the ground just next to Eizen, but something tells him he would not be welcome to do so. Eizen looks feverish and clammy, and Zaveid hopes that the blanket will warm up him soon. 

"I went to see Edna," he says. To his surprise, Eizen actually moves to look up at him. 

"How is she?" he asks. 

"She's fine," Zaveid says quickly. "Still at the mountain and safe. Missing you, though."

Eizen's eyes fog, and with his eyelids close to closing, his yellow eye almost looks normal in a certain light. 

"I regret very few things," he says. 

"I know," Zaveid says before he can continue that particular train of thought. Eizen relents on it quickly. 

"Take care of her?" 

Zaveid looks him in the eyes and says "She won't let me."

Eizen smirks. 

"Fair enough. Stay close?"

He nods. "That I can do."

It will not occur to him until much later that Eizen may not have meant staying close to Edna. Perhaps he meant both, but it is not something Zaveid understands right now. He has no time to think on it, because Eizen continues. 

"And speaking of, can I ask you to do something else?"

Zaveid looks away from him then. He knows already what this is going to be. 

"Can we just not talk about that for one night? We never just hang out anymore."

Eizen shakes his head softly. "You know what I mean, Zaveid. You promised, and I think this is far enough to be proof that it's not going to change."

"Velvet went much further than this and still restored the world's balance," Zaveid says casually. "I told you we'll figure something out."

"You promised me you'd kill me first. Are you going back on that?"

Zaveid bristles. 

"I'm not. Can we just have one night of not talking about it?"

Eizen stares at him. Zaveid sighs. 

"Look. If it helps anything, I can kill you in the morning. Deal?"

Eizen stares for a moment more before before adding, "Deal."

They glare at each other for a bit, and now Zaveid is unsure of how to continue the conversation. Grudgingly, he reaches out and pulls the blanket a little further up Eizen's shoulders. 

"Dick," he mutters.

"Douche," Eizen mutters back and curls up a little more. 

They stay like that for some time. At first, that seems to be it. There is a long pause in which neither of them know quite what to say. Zaveid is almost swallowed up by his own sad thoughts, looking out at the gentle rain. 

Then Eizen coughs and groans pitifully, and he reminds himself just why he is here in the first place. He did not come for the two of them to sit in a cave and break each other's hearts more. 

He looks at the gangly wings. One of them is unfolding, stretching piece by piece towards the wall as though Eizen is working out a cramp in it. Eizen looks less than happy to do this. 

Zaveid knows that this hurts him. He knows that Eizen is heartbroken that he will be a danger to others, but there is nothing Zaveid can say to make that better. He knows what his place is, and he cannot go through what he went through with Theodora again. He draws in a deep breath. 

"So," he says lightly, carefully, "can you fly with those or...?"

It has the desired effect. Despite everything, Eizen still has it in him to give a weak laugh. 

"You are such an asshole," he says. Zaveid shrugs, smirking. 

He can do nothing more than this, just being here, but perhaps that is enough for the moment.

So he stays there, sitting on an uncomfortable rock and refusing to shut up, until Eizen is finally able to fall asleep. 

***

Eizen wakes from a nightmare to a searing pain in his back. He stretches the wings awkwardly, and warm blood runs down to seep into his shirt.

The world blurs a bit as he opens his eyes. The first thing he sees is a sliver of sunlight. Then he opens them fully and looks out at the mouth of the cave. The sun is already up. It is long into the morning. 

He has not slept like this for a long time, and for the first time in a long while now, he actually feels a little better. Annoying as he is, anything, including Zaveid's presence, would have been soothing in the hell that was last night. 

Eizen sits up, keeping the blanket carefully wrapped around him and looks at the green sunlit glade outside. He does not have to look beside him to know that there is no one there. He knows that. He knew that it would be so when he fell asleep. It still makes him angry, but he is too tired. 

Bren had listenedwith eyes saucer-wide, as Frumpkin had purred in his lap, until hefell asleep to the sound mingled with his father’s low voice, headslumped against his arm.

When Bren had growna little older, the most wonderful thing had happened; a travellingbookseller had come to town, a little old gnome woman riding a fluffyyak with paniers stuffed with ancient, mildewed books. Bren hadscraped together all the copper pieces he had saved from doing choresaround the village: from helping the Heiders milk their cows atsunrise every morning since their daughter went away to serve in thearmy, from delivering parcels of bread from the baker to old Mathildewhile she was sick in bed, from sweeping his cousins’ yard andscrubbing floors until his fingers were raw.

He had taken hislittle hoard of coppery treasure and spent it all on two books: thefirst, an ancient and damp-wrinkled book of cantrips for children,missing several pages and scrawled with graffiti from its previousowners.

The second bookcontained no magic – at least not of that sort – but it wasalmost as great a treasure; a book of tales from far away, journeysacross the seas. It was in Common, which he could only partly speakthen, and written in tiny print in archaic prose too. But Bren forcedhis way through it, both to improve his language skills and alsobecause after the first chapter he was utterly enthralled by thetales of pirates, of murder and betrayal and love on the high seas.

He read it to hisparents proudly, translating it painfully slowing into Zemnian whilereading out loud. He read it to his friends too. Naturally, a fewdays later, all the children of Blumenthal were playing pirates onthe banks of the lake, running and splashing in the shallows withswords made of sticks and planks of wood. He remembered that day soclearly, even now: Eodwulf had accidentally pushed Bren off the dockand Bren had gone down yelling, emerging in a spray of bubbles as heplay-acted a dramatic death in the shallows, sending the small brightfish that swam there scattering. When he had come up, Eodwulf hadbeen standing there looking terrified that he had hurt his friend,until Bren had popped his head above water again, making eye contactwith Astrid who was sneaking up behind him from under the dock, waterdripping from her hair and a mischevious grin on her face.

The two of them hadjumped him and dragged Eodwulf into the water with them, and thethree of them had chased each other, throwing clumps of waterweeduntil the other children joined in. Sides were picked, and all-outpirate war ensued, until eventually Herr Baumann had come out of thehouse with his lazy, gentle old shepherd dog half-heartedly followingbehind, to chase them all off his land.

Still, they had runoff cackling with laughter to dry their hair and clothes in theafternoon sunshine, their eyes bright as the imaginary treasure atthe bottom of the lake.  

Bren had come homewith the worst sunburn of his life that evening, and his mother hadtutted as she rubbed herbal salve into the stinging patches on hisarms and face and the back of his neck. But she also smiled andruffled his still-slightly-damp hair as he had recounted to her hisadventures on the high seas.

Later, at theAcademy or in the library at his Master’s manor house, Bren hadpored over detailed maps of the world. The continents of Tal’dorei,Marquet, and Issylra were separated from Wildemount by expanses ofocean marked in beautiful swirling patterns of waves, but at theedges of the map were monsters of the deep, lovingly rendered withbulging eyes and lashing tails and teeth like razors, ready to tearapart any ship that should venture there. He had shivered once again,wondering if he would ever see the ocean: surely, once he were agreat, powerful mage like Master Ikithon, he’d be able to travelwherever he wanted. His work for the Empire might even require him todo so. In those daydreams, Astrid and Eodwulf were always at hisside, simply because the possibility of a future where the three wereseparated never really occurred to him then.

A lot of thingsdidn’t occur to him then, Caleb thought in the present, as he gazedup into the deep blue. But for once, the thought and all it led todidn’t hurt quite so much as it usually did: somehow, in thismoment of floating, his body suspended on the exact dividing planebetween the sky and the sea, it felt like he was detached from theworld and the cares of the shore. Here, it seemed, they simplyweren’t, fora while at least.

It wasn’tsomething Caleb was used to, feeling this unburdened; he wasn’teven sure if he enjoyed it. He frowned up at the blue. Except for afew seagulls that occasionally flew across his field of view, therewas nothing to break the endless expanse above him. The water wascool, but not cold, gently lapping in waves that supported andcradled his body. Even the sounds of his friends playing on the shorebehind him were all but gone, his ears flooded under the water andall sound dulled to a low roar. He could feel the ever-present weightof the amulet around his neck, resting on his chest, but by now itwas so familiar that was barely aware of it anyway, warmed to thetemperature of his skin as he drifted in the salty water.

He had expected seamonsters. He had expected pirates. Above all, he had expected to growmore and more agitated as they traveled further from the Empire; hewas willing to help Fjord, he was glad beyond words that Jester wasable to see her mother again. But at the same time, he was preparedfor the clock to start ticking louder and louder in his head, themore time they spent here: too long. Every moment wasted is amoment not spent on fixing things. He was expecting the monstersinside his own head to start to grow restless, pulling him back tothe Empire to do what he must, or die trying. As he probably deservedbut nevertheless feared, like the coward he was.

Speaking of which…he was expecting to be afraid. There had been so much fear, so muchdarkness, these last few weeks. Shadycreek Run and all that hadhappened there had burned its way into him, just another wound in hisheart scorched shut to keep the blood from pouring out, just so thathe could keep on trudging forward long enough to do what must bedone. He was practically built of fear, his body scarred over withit, held together and driven forward by it for so long that he hadalmost forgotten what it was like to feel anything else.  

So, the last thingCaleb had expected was to feel so calm.

It was almost arelief, then, when Fjord came bursting into existence right besidehim in a spray of salt water. Caleb yelled in alarm nonetheless, buthe couldn’t help but smile, very slightly.

It was okay,he thought, as the shadows began to lengthen and they left the beachfor the shore. He hung back a little, watching Nott gnawing triumphantly on theneck of a dead seagull and spitting out a mouthful of feathers, andCaduceus shaking an improbable amount of sand out of his straw hat.The sense of calm hadn’t even gone away quite yet, which was…odd.Unfamiliar.

Favorite musician: Brendon Urie if we’re going with playing instruments. BTS if we’re going with singing and performing.

Song stuck in my head: “Hard Carry” by GOT7.

Other blogs: @alley-cat-sunflower​ (personal); @crystalline-lifestream​ (Final Fantasy); @thestorytellersprotege​ (writing/occult); and the brand-new, as of yet content-free @i-got7-bulletproof-biases (K-pop, specifically BTS and GOT7).

Do I get asks: Occasionally. It seems about proportional to how active I am.

Following: 715.

Amount of sleep: Averages out at about 8.

Lucky number: 16.

What am I wearing: Light blue skinny jeans, a Beatles LOVE shirt from Cirque du Soleil, and my new favorite article of clothing: a Panic! at the Disco “P!ATD PFTW TOUR 2019” sweatshirt, which has the band symbols in a sweet constellation style along one arm and on the back.

Dream job: Author and editor.

Dream trip: At the moment? Arcata, preferably with @chibitorra​ (who can answer these questions if she wants, since I tagged her, even if it wasn’t at the end).

Favorite food: Hard to say; it varies depending on my mood. Overall, I’m not very culinarily inclined anyway. The most commonly neglected part of all the video games I play, and the most commonly skipped description, is cooking.

Play any instruments: I’ve never had any formal musical training of any kind, but I can noodle around on my Ocarina of Time just fine.

Languages: Just English so far, but I know some Japanese and a few scattered phrases in Mandarin, and I’m interested in Korean.

Favorite song: I’m just going to copy-paste my last response, because my answers haven’t changed. In no particular order, some of the best are “Just Right” (GOT7); “Don’t Threaten Me with a Good Time” (Panic! at the Disco); “Lie” (BTS’s Jimin); “Zanarkand” (Nobuo Uematsu); the instrumental version of “Turn Loose the Mermaids” (Nightwish); “Competing with the Honor of the Land” (Go Shiina); and “Oath to Order” (dj-Jo/Zenpaku).