#songofthestone

@songofthestone

He isn’t due for another period of stasis; not a long one, at any rate, or the doctors would have told him. But knowing that and trusting it are two different things, and whenever Raphael thinks of Merrick in his arms he cannot help but also think of the Bedlam girl that had been trapped in her markayuq lover’s arms until only her bones remained.

He wonders if the markayuq has woken since then. The thought of either outcome fills him with dread.

He shakes his head, just once to either side. He hates denying Merrick anything, especially himself. But those bones come into his mind again and he rubs at his wrist, slower than he was twenty years ago but still feeling cobwebs on his skin.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, in English. His voice is a strange, humming rasp these days, when he uses it at all. Then in Spanish, guilt and longing tightening his throat: “A second is all it takes.” 

You could turn to dust, he thinks. I could blink and you’d crumble in my arms. 

@songofthestone / @returned-to-the-sea

Through the haze of sleep, the first thought Raphael has is that Harry should be careful climbing the ladder. His shoulder might be more or less healed, but there is no doubt in Raphael’s mind that it’s still delicate, and prone to aching. 

With his hair half-obscuring his face, Raphael doesn’t open his eyes, but breathes in deep as he properly starts to wake, rolling further onto his side to face his friend. The floorboards creak softly under Harry’s weight. He crawls closer, and Raphael realises (with a flush of pleasure that would embarrass him if he were more awake) what Harry’s come to him for.

He lifts an arm, and with it the thin blanket, and silently invites Harry in.

When Harry is close enough, Raphael wraps that arm around him to pull him in the rest of the way, tucking Harry’s head under his chin and burying his face in that soft, golden hair. He catches the smell of soap and clean cotton, and beneath that the nameless but unmistakable scent of Harry himself. It makes his heart ache. It makes him want to pull Harry on top of himself and stay like that for an age.

Harry blinks. All in all, he’s not at all sure that this isn’t some curious death. The end of his mind, perhaps: the final breaths left in his body, slowed and embellished by a brain that doesn’t want to die alone. But the clock - the lamp - feels solid in his hand. The pain in his shoulder is sickening, and Raphael’s language is too good for his own mind to have conjured. He balances himself, propped up against the strangely warm wall, and takes the lamp carefully.

“Is it burning?” He’s whispering, transfixed by the slow eddies that seem to pulsate behind the glass. “Does it… is it alive?” He wants to touch it. It looks like sand, curling from the bottom of a clear pool, disturbed by the splash of a fish. He gazes back up at Raphael. “It’s beautiful.”

“No,” Raphael says, when Harry asks if it’s alive. “Just pollen.” He waits, watching him stare at the curling grains, hears him call them beautiful. Harry is a gardener, Raphael remembers. He inclines his head a little. “It’s from the... candle ivy in the woods. You can see it up close when you’re well enough.”

He’ll have to warn Harry about the border before then, but he thinks it best not to do so when the man might well forget everything he’s said by morning. It can wait. 

Raphael settles for a while, rather than moving from the edge of the bed. He watches Harry, wondering quietly about him, about how long he might be here. He’s certain that someone will come looking for him soon enough and that there will be hell to pay if they find him. 

@songofthestone

Winter, 1857.

He had avoided reading any of the old books for a long time; through the rest of that first winter, then most of the dry season too. Sometimes he would open Don Quixote to the right place and stare at the faded ink, tracing with his thumb old words he could remember Harry saying less than a year before, though it had been more than seventy. 

It had taken him a while to piece together the fact that Harry had come back for him. Over and over, he’d come back. There were pieces of him all over the village. Inti’s grandmother had hung some of his drawings on the walls of their home. When Raphael first stepped foot in the place to do their laundry he’d had to fight to keep from turning and walking back out, afraid that if he stayed he wouldn’t be able to hold himself together. But he had, somehow. His core felt hollow and fractured but to the world he might as well have been stone already. 

Despite his attempts to avoid reminders of the man he’d loved, the life he’d lost, he found it to be impossible. There was simply too much of Harry everywhere; if they weren’t pieces of him, they were pieces of his son, though he had apparently stopped coming to the village some years ago. Raphael ached when he thought about it too hard.

After nearly a year, it had seemed pointless to avoid looking at what little of Harry remained in the church. He hadn’t been able to read through Don Quixote again, though he’d tried; he could never get past the first page without feeling like he’d crumble to dust. But Harry had left notes in other books; some new, some old. Sometimes he would mark out phrases or passages he’d thought Raphael would like, and Raphael found himself just as pleased when Harry had been wrong as he did when he’d been right. Even the wrong phrases he came to like purely because Harry had marked them.

He’d chosen Shakespeare at random that evening. Raphael preferred to work until midnight or well past it unless he was due to travel down to Azangaro the next morning, but by sundown there was nothing more for him to do and he was left to his own devices in the church anyway. Sleep would be an impossibility; he’d lost three hours in the afternoon, his internal clock still skewed by hours as a result. So he’d picked a book, resigned himself to the yearning that might come with it, and climbed up to curl in the loft for the night. 

Opening the book, Raphael could recognise that particular sonnet from a glance, though he needed to lean in closer to the page to do it. 

My dear, Harry’s note read. Raphael traced the writing with his thumb. He read the rest and then read it again. For a long time there was nothing but the trembling of his shoulders as he fought not to weep. 

Having stumbled gracelessly down the ladder, Harry resumes his inexpert coffee brewing with great determination. He’d spent half the past hour grinding beans into oblivion, and his hands are stiff and pungent. He hums to himself. Raphael had seemed quite grumpy. Not an unexpected reaction, Harry reasons, and a soak and a morning of brooding in the sun will perk him up. He needs some time to breathe. And anyway, he’s decided not to fish anything with more than four legs out of the lake, so really, there’s nothing for Raphael to worry about.

The weary smile that finally greets him is gentle and sleep-warmed, and curls ‘round him like a lovely little embrace. Harry hands over a round mug, full of dark (and admittedly rather gritty) liquid. “Coffee,” he announces, and decides not to worry whether Raphael will drink it or not. He busies himself filling the flask with cooled, sweet coca. Tugging on a shirt, he nods to the table, awash with the fruits of his labours. “Lunch!” It’s mumbled through the tangle of sleeves he’s accidentally shoving over his head. Once his shining curls emerge, having triumphantly navigated the blasted smock, he grins. “I already packed it for us.” It’s probably edible: it’s hard to ruin ch'arki, and Raphael had long since instructed Harry in the proper dissection of pineapples.

“Come and curse at the sun with me.” He grins fondly, and wrenches open the door, swollen as it is in the mounting heat.

Raphael looked at the coffee the way he always did when Harry offered him something- like he'd been given a mouse carcass by a well-meaning but misguided cat. Nonetheless, he tried it. The texture was unpleasant - he could feel granules of coffee on his tongue where they'd slipped through whatever filter Harry had used - but it was strong, the way he liked it. He shouldn't have been so pleased - Harry was more or less recovered, but Raphael was still the stronger of them and by all rights ought to have been the one making coffee. But he was pleased nonetheless. It went a long way to making up for being woken at the crack of dawn.

Sipping it, he watched Harry dress, brow furrowing when he realised Harry had done everything that Raphael should have been doing. He wanted to complain - to remind him that it wasn't the way of things here - but it was useless and he still wasn't properly awake, so he let it go. Harry's good moods were always contagious and Raphael smiled into his cup before gulping down the rest of the coffee and setting the cup aside. He’d wash it later.

"I'm coming," he said, giving in, and hauled Harry's pack - which was really his - up from the table, checking it only briefly to make sure the book was in there. Harry had promised to read to him. Raphael intended to hold him to it. He took his rifle from where it hung by the door - just in case - and followed Harry out.

The day was already warm. It was noticeable the moment they left the church, and Raphael eyed Harry sideways, smiling. "You're going to burn in the afternoon," he told him, matching Harry's stride. He was carrying the bag over one shoulder so it hung opposite his rifle, one hand around the strings. He pushed Harry's good shoulder playfully with his free hand. "Don't complain to me when you're peeling like an onion again."

When they passed one of the markayuq, Raphael touched Harry's arm to stop him, and went up to it alone to give it a vial of salt and tie a quipu around its wrist. He came back without saying anything.

Soon enough they were at the cliffs, and Raphael held the rope as they descended towards the lake. The coffee was kicking in; he felt alert, more attuned to their surroundings, and could finally answer Harry in more than monosyllables without feeling like he was putting his brain under a pestle. He let Harry go first, and walked after him with their pack, quietly observing the way Harry seemed to become more himself in open spaces. He wasn't meant to be cooped up, not in a church or anywhere else, Raphael thought. He wasn't a soldier and he wasn't made for adventure necessarily, but he was big and bright and Raphael couldn't imagine him being happy anywhere if there wasn't something new and exciting (to him and whoever else cared about insects and plants) for him to fixate on.

"Hang on," Raphael told him as they neared the water's edge. "Let me check it before you go diving in." He knelt down, brushing his fingertips over the water. It was lukewarm at the edges; it would be hotter deeper in, but safe. "It's fine," he said. "But be careful." He nodded to the deeper water, and rose again, turning away like he intended to simply sit with the bag and his rifle a little way from the water's edge while Harry splashed around in there to his heart's content. He paused though, as he was shrugging the rifle and the bag from his shoulders.

@songofthestone

When he sinks into sleep, he’s more comfortable than he’s been in years. Despite the danger, the men in the tents around them, and the knowledge that he’s very likely going to wake up surrounded by corpses who were ignorant enough to disrespect the markayuq, he’s content when he wraps himself around Merrick’s back. In the dark safety of the tent it feels like nothing could harm them.

But he jerks and Merrick is gone, and for a horrible moment Raphael is terrified that the change of light wasn’t only night to morning--

Behind you, Merrick says. Raphael thumps back down in relief, waving a hand vaguely to say he’s fine, then throws his forearm over his eyes. He can hear the ducks quacking upstream, the faint rustling of Merrick getting dressed. No-one else is awake yet, it seems, so they’re safe for now.

He lies there for a while, feeling heavy. The fear that had struck him when he first woke has rattled the old grief loose, only now there’s fresh hurt settling over it like snow: the terror of losing Merrick, too. The certainty that he will, one way or another. 

@songofthestone

It feels like he’s only just managed to drift off when the sound of Harry climbing up the ladder wakes him, but it had been near midnight when he’d settled down for bed, and there’s light creeping into the church when he cracks an eyelid open. Raphael grumbles like a disturbed bear, curling in on himself, his back to the ladder and the bright face peering up from it. He would love to believe that going back to sleep would help. But he’s never known Harry to let go of an idea once it’s in his head. 

As if he’s read Raphael’s mind, Harry calls up to him again when he withdraws. I’ll finish that chapter for you, he says, and Raphael’s eyes open. 

Resigned, he sits up. He starts to say something in Quechua, catches himself, and slips into English.

“You can go on ahead, if you’re so desperate,” he says, voice like rubble as he starts to dress, “But I’m not leaving this church without coffee, and I’ll need to bring food so you don’t keel over when we’re down there.” 

@songofthestone (from here)

He moves closer as Raphael extends his hands.

It’s fine, he says. It’s not, thinks Merrick, even if you aren’t hurt.

The image of a child, frightened and shy, flits through Merrick’s mind, and he has to shake himself a little, remembering that the curious eyes peering up at him belong to a man more capable than most.  

He pulls at the tips of his fingers, unfurling his hands, and bending his head to examine the damage. A careful stillness settles between them, and Merrick can fairly taste his uncertainty: eager and tentative in equal measure. The burns on his hand are dark and angry, but somehow, even as he watches, reddened skin that should be seared and blistering begins to fade, dulling to a bruise, and then - barely that.

He pushes his long fingers under Raphael’s hands, curling around his knuckles and feeling the endless nicks and scars that litter them. Cradling these hands, so strong and well used, he feels a pulse of anger throb in his chest. Hands, he thinks, worn away in love and service, and no one to thank them, to bathe them, to tend to their aches. He stares down, and it seems to him that Raphael has never thought to ask for something never offered.

They stay together, longer than they ought. Warm hands lie steady in his: soft, and splayed open for him. Merrick doesn’t want to let them go. He brushes his thumbs over the centre of his palms, squeezing gently.

“Will you put some ice on them?” He wants to kiss the tender skin, and smiles a little instead. “I can wrap them, if you like.”

It’s been years since he was touched so kindly. The rest of the village knows him too well, and even if they didn’t, for them to treat him the way Merrick treats him would be nothing short of offensive. 

If Merrick had taken his hands like this less than a week ago, Raphael would have snatched them away. He would have stared at him like he’d offered him something dead. Now he only stays still, unable to feel the heat of the hands holding his but feeling the pressure. 

If Raphael’s heart could still beat, it would thrum like an engine.

He shakes his head, just slightly. “Waste of supplies to wrap them,” he says, in Spanish this time. “And I can’t feel the ice.” His voice is fading to a rasp though he’s barely spoken, but he lifts his eyes just enough to meet Merrick’s. They’re a different colour than he’d first thought.