VerdantStorms

*pushes them together like two barbie dolls* NOW KISS!

They had slept this way dozens of times before. Fearne’s blackened fingers wrapped tightly around his forearm as she snored loudly into Dorian’s ear. Orym’s head rested on Dorian’s bicep, his arms folded together between them, and his bare feet were gingerly resting upon Dorian’s thighs just above the knees, as Dorian had coiled enough to let Fearne’s fuzzy leg stretch over his hip. They were exhausted, and this was familiar, and he should’ve been fast asleep.

But Orym’s mind buzzed.

Fearne had always been a strong source of heat, but now she was a furnace, and even without covers it was too warm. But Fearne was not the reason why Orym’s skin burned where it met Dorian’s.

He was a fucking grown man. He was fully capable of admitting that.

Admitting it didn’t change it.

Neither did it change his awareness that Dorian had been too still for the past hour, his breath too precise and measured to be natural as it fell upon Orym’s hair. Orym was not going to presume that the cause of this was the same thing afflicting him; there were plenty of other reasons Dorian would be lying awake tonight.

“My family will find your brother,” he murmured finally, and Dorian’s breath wavered for just an instant before he regained his composure and returned to his measured, singer’s breathing. It was so slight that no one else could’ve noticed it, but Orym noticed. “You said there’s a body— the Tempest can bring him back, or Fearne, honestly—“

“I know,” Dorian answered, and this too was so faint that no one but Orym could’ve heard. “I know,” he said again, as though this one was only to appease himself.

“Do you think… do you think any of Opal is still in there?”

“I don’t know. I could barely tell what was in there—“ he cut himself off. “I couldn’t even help my brother. I think Fy’ra Rai might’ve… she must’ve seen something. I hope so,” he added, inhaling, trying to capture an airy tone that he didn’t fully manage. “The Spider Queen doesn’t deserve her. She doesn’t deserve anything.”

Orym had nothing to say to this. He hadn’t cared what the gods did or didn’t deserve in weeks, but now he could see the vein of fury that sharpened Dorian’s edges. It didn’t frighten him the way it had frightened him months ago, when things had been simpler, when there was not a war to be fought. It simply saddened him. “I’m so sorry about Opal,” he said, after the silence had lingered. “But I’m,” he breathed out a single dark laugh at himself, his selfishness, “I’m real glad it wasn’t you.”

Dorian’s laugh matched his own. “I suppose that is a silver lining.”

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Orym admitted. It was easier to keep his voice from cracking at a whisper. “I’ve thought about seeing you again so many times— I wish the circumstances were better—“

“I’m here,” Dorian said, for the second time today. “The circumstances tried very hard to make even that impossible, but— I’m here.”

Orym pulled his arm gently out of Fearne’s grasp and raised his hand to Dorian’s cheek. It was too dark to see the tinge of lavender against his skin, but Orym could feel the warmth bloom beneath his fingers. He still couldn’t bring himself to attribute his friend’s insomnia to anything so self-serving as his own, but perhaps it was one factor.

He pulled his hand back. Was there a flash of disappointment in Dorian’s eyes? He couldn’t tell in the dark. But he brushed his fingers together, drawing upon the wellspring of life within the ground beneath this hastily-erected encampment. The Hellcatch looked like a barren wasteland to most, but that life was still present even here.

Perhaps not now, but after a rainy season, the valley would bloom with wildflowers. The seeds waited in the earth for their time to sprout. Life went on, even in the darkest of places.

He produced a small stalk of life from his hands, and held out the tiny bundle of forget-me-nots to Dorian.

He should’ve said that they were for Cyrus, to remember him by. He wanted to say that they were for Dorian himself, that a day hadn’t gone by that he hadn’t thought of him. He didn’t speak at all as Dorian’s hand wrapped around Orym’s, pinching the stem beneath his fingers but not letting go.

“Orym,” Dorian breathed, looking from the flowers to his face. Then a strange expression came over his face, a wrinkle of consternation as he stared into the middle distance. “Fearne, are you braiding my hair?”

Orym lifted his head an inch to peer past Dorian’s ear. He had noticed that the snoring had stopped, but he’d been too caught up in the conversation to process it. Fearne’s wide eyes stared back with perfect innocence, her hands indeed weaving Dorian’s hair into a loose braid.

“Just pretend I’m not here,” she whispered quickly. “I’m totally not here.”

When Orym dropped his head back to Dorian’s arm, he was met with a crooked smile. It was not meant to be disarming, but it disarmed him anyway.

“Just like old times, eh?” he said, but his hand was still around Orym’s.