Archive of Our Own

“And the Martinet…” Wulf began, an uncertain question in and of itself the way his brow furrowed and jaw set, dark eyes fixed on the corner of Trent’s desk—any higher disrespectful, any lower inattentive. 

The seconds of silence there might have been as they went ignored were filled by the incessant scratch of quill across parchment. Trent glanced up from his work just the once, pausing on the annoyed flicker of muscle at Wulf’s jaw that he was better than to show before sliding sideways to meet Bren’s gaze. And the movement of the quill stopped altogether.

Bren offered no outward reaction, had yet to decide to drop his gaze before Wulf continued, and Trent’s age-yellowed eyes snapped back to him.

“What does he know of his Annex’s extracurricular activities?” Wulf asked. 

Monumental, Bren observed, the energy it must have taken not to sigh outwardly. 

“Or our assignment, for that matter.”

Trent’s brow went up with genuine surprise—even if it wasn’t the surprise itself but rather their knowing it that motivated the expression, for the two looked different—before shifting once more to Bren, still silent. His hawkish features twitched again, this time toward a more private amusement.

More silence, then the faint creak of his chair as Trent leaned back. Waiting. Appraising. 

Bren felt Eodwulf eyeing him in his periphery now and really, irritatingly, he should have known better.

He treated Wulf to a sideways glance that didn’t linger. “The Martinent was apprised of the evidence implicating his Annex shortly after its discovery,” Bren supplied neutrally, as though he were not the one to bring the news forward.

It was an act of self-preservation now, dropping his gaze momentarily to the floor. Trent’s eyes had landed on him heavily, a deeply unpleasant sensation that had the hair at the back of his neck standing on end. 

“Ludinus has given this hunt his blessing,” Trent assured, his answer delivered through an unsettling grin—one showing too many teeth. However well he weathered Ludinus’s ire and took the discovery in stride, Bren decided, the only one with cause to welcome a rat beneath their roof was the cat all too eager to make a mess of it. “We all, certainly, have an interest in locating Vence and better assessing these allegations of…” Trent steepled his fingers, taking his time in deciding on the words, “collaboration, with this Dynasty traitor.” 

The back of Bren’s neck prickled, his stomach dropping dangerously. The work of a moment, biting the inside of his cheek and forcing it all back down. Self-preservation, forcing himself to exhale, breathing out until there was nothing left in his chest to choke on. Until there was nothing left at all. 

“I don’t know if it’s fair to even ask you.”

Essek sat with his legs crossed neatly at the ankle, as though it were possible to maintain his usual air of dignity, sitting beside him on the ground as he was, legs stretched out toward the edge of the balcony, backs to the rough stonework exterior. He smoothed his hands in that nervous way of his across the tops of his thighs, finding imagined creases in the immaculate lay of his robes to press away. 

Shoulders nearly brushing, Bren could feel the warmth radiating from Essek’s side all the more for the cool breeze that passed over the balcony set highest in Essek’s towers, where nothing could be seen from below and Rosohna’s starscape shone nearest. He exhaled, watching the fragrant white smoke pulled away from his lips on the wind glimmer as it passed through the bounds of the tower’s many wards like light through a gossamer veil. 

“It is an opportunity,” Bren disagreed. “Not to free yourself from the Assembly perhaps, but from suspicion within the Dynasty, easily. And if done well, it’s a permanent solution. You’d be a fool to pass it up.”

“No, not to free ourselves from the Assembly,” Essek echoed, plucking the rolled bit of paper and herb from Bren’s fingers, ember surging to life as he put it to his lips and inhaled. Bren watched, entranced by the flicker of warmth and shadow across the elegant lines of his hand, the delicate edge of his mouth. 

Essek turned away to exhale, and Bren’s gaze dropped down to the curve of his throat, distant starlight playing lovingly across plum-dark skin. Bren committed it to memory, and the memory to his grave.

“But filling the noose that’s been hanging over my head with a neck other than my own has its appeals, certainly,” Essek continued, breath returned. 

When Bren’s eyes lifted from Essek’s collar, top few clasps so carelessly undone, he found Essek already looking, ghost of a grin tucked into the corners of his mouth. 

Bren hummed a short note in assent. For a moment, he nearly reached out across the scant space between them, nearly allowed himself to trace the curve of Essek’s bottom lip, his thumb to catch on the corner of that mouth parted just so on a halting breath. Nearly trailed that touch down Essek’s throat, fingers brushing, what would only be hesitantly, along the side of his neck, down to where Essek’s pulse fluttered. He certainly entertained the idea. But for the moment, he only hummed his assent, returning to meet Essek’s gaze.

“Are you listening?” Essek chided, a near laugh, pointedly raising an eyebrow as though in reproach but preening altogether too much under Bren’s attention, as though he knew just how to angle himself under starlight to be best appreciated. 

“You have the entirety of my attention, Schatz,” Bren murmured. “Of course I agree with you. Another neck for the noose. Yours is too lovely to go to that particular waste.”

Wulf was looking at him with shrouded confusion, concern, frustration, perhaps all or perhaps none of them—Bren had only that small downward tilt at the corner of his mouth to read. He did not know in what way Trent looked at him. He only knew he could feel him looking still.  

That tilt at the edge of Wulf’s mouth smoothed over, expression going flat, until only his dark eyes conveyed the judgment and doubts he did not voice.

“Fortunate, that Thelyss was in a position to uncover this relationship,” Trent continued, pondering seemingly to himself, but he was never so inefficient. He would have dismissed them by now if he weren't working his way up to something. If he weren’t enjoying it. “More curious, that he elected to share it, and without conditions.”

He had half the mind to let the probing—and Bren had no delusions that Trent’s non-questions were anything but—go unanswered. But then, he hesitated to leave his master to whatever answers he may supply in his silence. 

“No conditions,” he agreed. “But a show of good faith, or if not that, utility,” Bren offered with a faint shrug, a calculated incline of his head, answer vague as was appropriate of a vague read of a difficult asset. 

Ikithon hummed long and low, an explicit, outward show of consideration rarely seen, and immediately, Bren classified it, contrived.

Eodwulf grunted, an inarticulate sound that could’ve passed for disinterest, crossing his arms over his chest like he was resigning himself to stand there for a good while longer. “Mutual interest,” he muttered, “rooting out spies in the Dynasty and Empire.” He followed it up with an equally inarticulate jerk of his chin. “Bit ironic though.”

Bren didn’t react save to tip his head toward Wulf and raise an eyebrow in agreement at that last astute observation. But he would thank him later.

The twist of his master’s mouth turned cruel, but his posture relaxed, projecting a deep-seated satisfaction more than any immediate intent which would have sent Bren’s heart tripping over itself in its flight. “Mutual interest,” Ikithon echoed his words back at him thoughtfully, “mutual advantage,” he surmised. “But certainly convenient,” he continued, the deep lines of his face and too-thin skin contorting around a smile, pleased with his own understanding, “if our conniving friend intends to frame these cultists for the theft of a few relics.” A pause, and Ikithon’s gaze migrated to Bren’s. “Surely you considered this, yes?”

There was nothing calculated or intentional to Bren’s retreat inside himself, and neither was it instinct, but second nature, how his gaze dropped and landed somewhere left of Ikithon’s shoulder, his shoulders dropping with it, his knuckles going white around the other wrist behind his back—grounding, giving the unwanted adrenaline leaking into his veins focus, keeping his breath steady. His teeth grit together in contempt, but that did not mean his withering failed to accomplish whatever a clever lie or act might have.  

Ikithon was at ease again, apparent even to his averted gaze; it did not bear results, hiding his displeasure. Neither was it his practice, masking suspicion with a smile. 

“It is as you say,” he agreed plainly. “I have no doubt Thelyss intends it to come to light that this Taskhand Tasithar stole the beacons in furtherance of whatever this Angel of Irons is set upon accomplishing. But this is neither the first nor will it be the last time he endeavors to save his own hide.” 

“You’re confident you can persuade him in this?” Essek asked, passing the cigarette back. He only succeeded so well at masking his shallow cough in his next words. “All while—” he cleared his throat gently— “All while not appearing to be attempting to persuade him?”

Bren exhaled in soft amusement, even despite the unsavory topic. “I can be very persuasive,” he assured quietly, tipping his head back against the wall to take another drag, relishing the slight burn. And exhaled. “And he will expect me to have an opinion on the matter. It’s been a very long time indeed since I played the mere messenger. You are my assignment, it concerns me. The only potential problem,” he said, “is what motive will he discern in my disclosing it?” 

Essek frowned, eyes turned ahead. He was quiet for a moment, difficult to read in profile and in the dark. Then, “Practicality? Necessity?”

Bren hummed low and short, forearm draped over the one knee drawn in toward his chest, watching the ember at the end of the cigarette pulse and fade. He flicked away the ash at the end. “I can sell him on loyalty, I think,” he mused aloud. “Patriotism,” he stated, hearing his own voice go flat.

Essek no longer stared ahead into the dark, but had a shoulder and knee turned inward, looking at him with a sort of displeased focus Bren thought foreign to his features. “He will still suspect self-interest regardless, yes? I met him only once and still he gave me the impression. And that is only Ikithon. Surely Ludinus will have a deciding voice.”

He grunted in agreement. “Trent despises him for it. Both his authority and sense of reason.” He mulled on the thought a moment longer, long enough Essek’s began worrying at the cuffs of his sleeves, unsettled by his silence or subject or both. “There is a reason you met Ikithon only the once,” Bren observed.

Even low as the light was, he could see the tension take up in Essek’s jaw and around his eyes like a shadow falling over his face. “Ludinus is political, reserved, risk-averse,” he said after a moment, “I’m sure he will decide non-interference is the best policy regardless.”

“Possible.” Bren shrugged a shoulder. “Also possible,” he advised, interrupted by another short drag, “they decide the risk of you framing Tasithar for your crimes and implicating them for theirs is too great. Also possible, they decide the risk of reigniting the Bright Queen’s rage over the original theft and escalling the current conflict is even greater. Even more possible,” Bren listed, “they decide the risk of keeping a Scourger in Rosohna following the conviction of a courtier for treason is too great.”

The scowl that turned the corners of Essek’s mouth was telling. 

“I’m saying, Essek,” he summarized, willing the cigarette back to life with a disgruntled look and a reach toward the ever-kindled warmth that lived under his skin, in his veins, at his fingertips. “It’s a good plan. It just won’t work without  some gentle persuasion.” 

Essek bristled in petty indignation, only another layer over the scowl. “And I am saying, Bren,” he said pointedly, “it will work, and you do not need to play any larger part in this than messenger.”

“Hm.” He extended the cigarette to Essek, an olive branch, chewing at the corner of a small smile. 

A moment passed, but he felt him take it, fingers cold where they brushed.

He paused for a breath. Ikithon seemed to consider his words. Wulf, for his part, only watched, blank expression strained.

Bren continued, fighting to shove down the anxiety working its hands around his throat. “With your blessing, Master,” he said with a deeper still bow of his head, pleased at least how evenly the words came out, “if Thelyss is an asset worth retaining, I might enable him in this. It is a minimal investment of good will for his continued cooperation, as I understand it. And, while there is little I can do to stop him short of acting on formerly implicit threats,” Bren admitted, easy now, leaning into a bloodthirsty sort of confidence, “I am quite certain I can shape whatever narrative comes to light such that the Assembly and Empire play no part in it.” 

At that, Ikithon’s interest piqued noticeably, leaning forward slightly over his desk, quill set aside, forgotten. “You are confident he finds you that persuasive, young pup?” he observed more than asked, a rasping hiss of amusement coloring Ikithon’s words. “Or perhaps, just eager to try.”

Bren forced a well-learned smile across his lips. “Thelyss is ever-distrusting, but open to reason. And I can be very reasonable,” he said simply, allowing Ikithon to interpret that however he may.

His master’s eyes narrowed, passing over Bren once before flicking across to where Wulf stood adjacent, seemingly obediently awaiting dismissal while watching and listening intently.

Bren identified the exact moment he saw some conclusion or other alight behind Ikithon’s clouded expression; he was only at a loss as to what exactly it was.

“No matter, Ludinus and I must discuss further. But yes, that is an option we will consider,” came his abrupt answer, accompanied by a dismissive wave. Ikithon picked up his quill again, returning it to the inkwell. “We will see how your hunt fares and what if anything can be learned from this Vence individual before any decisions are made. Now off. Enough time has been wasted. Take who you need and find him ”—an order, a warning.

Another flick of Ikithon’s hand and the doors to his office opened behind them near soundlessly on well oiled hinges. He and Wulf stepped backward a respectful pace, then two, before turning and departing. 

Eodwulf shifted his weight uncomfortably from foot to foot, just noticeable in his periphery.  Bren paused between coiling and uncoiling an excess bit of silver wire around his fingers, as he’d been doing to pass the time for the last twenty-four minutes. 

It was the sort of brooding best left to sort itself out, he decided. He’d spit it out eventually. And they had plenty of time.

There was little else to do but wait, squatting in a miserable corner of a miserable inn at the edge of a miserable little town a great deal farther south than he’d honestly expected their quarry to make it in the fifty-six hours and seventeen minutes since his last reported sighting in Rexxentrum. He’d already set up a radius of alarms. Wulf stood planted like a particularly grim gargoyle by the half-shuttered window looking down on the front and only door of the establishment (he knew, he’d walked the nearby premises three times out of sheer boredom and would have completed a fourth if he weren’t beginning to attract glances). And a younger one of their lot, a boy hardly into his twenties who looked younger still, wandered the small market outside, prepared to message at the first sight or sound of anything relevant. There wasn’t even anything in the room to turn over, though search it thoroughly they did; Vence hadn’t yet arrived, money and the reservation request sent by a courier in advance, just another stop in a winding string of towns leading down to the coast.

Not a bad plan, altogether. He was smart enough to acquire an amulet of the very type Bren wore before his flight and to avoid travel by arcane circle, the Assembly having eyes on just about every hub east of the Ashkeepers and plenty beyond Wildemount. But roughing it on the road, it seemed, was not among the sacrifices the former Annex was prepared to make in pursuit of his life, even though looking around the dingey room, Bren couldn’t imagine it was worth it. 

He’d even used a readily discovered and very talkative—once motivated—Rexxentrum contact to arrange for the couriers, making him more the fool. 

Bren snorted at the thought, working his jaw in something like resentment for an opportunity wasted. He would have been comfortably in Tal’Dorei by now. He doubted he could sell Essek on the sunshine in Marquette. 

He glanced back to Wulf again, turned three-quarters away from him, still sulking by the window. The sliver of his face that Bren could see from the daylight streaming through the slats only highlighted the frown carved into his brow.

The movement had Wulf’s eyes flicking his way, if only for a fraction of a second. 

“At which point, exactly, were you planning on telling me what the fuck you’re trying to accomplish,” he finally muttered. 

The monotone way Eodwulf dropped it, vaguely pissed off by the tone of it as well, it sounded more accusation than question.

“Well,” Bren began, the non-question posed in Common, his non-answer following suit. “You never asked.” He paused, watching Wulf’s broad shoulders heave with a deeply annoyed sigh. “Are you asking?”

Another long pause. If conversations with Astrid were a lesson in metaphor, a comment Bren reserved to himself, with Wulf the same was true of silence. The man had hardly spoken three words to him since they’d left Ikithon’s office but they may as well have had a full conversation since then based on Bren’s read of his posture and eyebrows alone. 

And at present, they were both drawn in tightly, the dissatisfaction rolling off him not a far thing from unease, confirmed by the continuous shifting of weight to his back foot as he glared through the glass. “Since when do I have to ask before one of you two tells me what the plan is,” he muttered, bitter, but not bristling. With him the difference was important.

Bren gauged as much when he rolled up to his feet with a sigh, crossing the room with unhurried, loud footsteps to lean against the wall at Wulf’s back. “You’re talking about in his office, earlier?” he asked, nudging the back of Wulf’s shoulder with his own. 

It earned him a low grunt.

He inhaled, exhaled. Considered it for a longer moment still.

“The way I see it, there are a few ways this might shake out, a not insignificant number of them involving my Rosohna assignment coming to a close.” The truth. “I like the assignment, Wulf.” More truth. “It’s a soft one as they go. There’s not a lot of oversight, I’ve got discretion to do mostly as I see fit, and the risks are minimal as long as I’m careful. And—I don’t know. I wasn’t wrong, what I said to Trent about it.”

“You like the game,” Wulf disagreed. “Whatever game you’re playing with the Shadowhand. It’s not hard to tell.”

He shrugged, allowing himself a small smile, in the shadow cast behind Wulf’s back. “It’s a fun game.”

“He’s dangerous, Bren.” Not condemnation, not even disapproval. Just a warning.

“He’s capable,” he allowed. “There’s a difference.”

That got him a rough sound from the back of Wulf’s throat. He tore his eyes away from the window to turn and look at him, only for a few seconds, glowering all the darker. 

He offered up a sheepish smile. “And,” Bren admitted, “he is dangerous. There are few people I know who are not.”

Wulf seemed to accept that with a scowl, the two of them lapsing into silence. 

It lasted for all of four minutes and twenty-two seconds. 

Wulf shifted his weight, another low, displeased sigh dragged out of his lungs. “Surprised you said anything at all. You’re not exactly in a position to appeal to Trent’s generous side lately.”

Bren huffed out a short breath of amusement he didn’t half feel. “Don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m clearly still the favorite.”

He watched Wulf cross his arms, his back rippling and tensing. He didn’t voice the obvious, ever-clear fact that even if that were true, it did more harm than help. Instead, “Astrid’s the one with the fancy new house by the Candles.”

“You’re the one living in it,” Bren countered with a grin.

Wulf scoffed and kicked at a bit of straw sticking up from between the floorboards. “Room for you too if you were ever in Rexxentrum long enough to visit.”

“Ah.” He let the comment settle. “If that’s your concern, not sure why you agreed with me in there. You know the likely outcomes just as well as I do.”

“ Hm .” They both knew the answer to that. It wasn’t worth putting to words, even if Wulf were the talking type.

“I appreciate it though, for what it’s worth.” 

“Mhm.”

Bren counted the passing seconds, counted the cobwebs clinging to the corners, counted the pieces of straw insulation sticking out from between the wood panel walls and floorboards. He was never much good at this part. The waiting.

“Wulf?”

A sharp, shallow exhale. “ What .”

Nibbling at the corner of his grin, Bren snaked an arm around Wulf’s waist, shifting forward to press close against the broad plane of his back. He hooked his chin over his shoulder, the light stubble darkening his jaw scraping at the side of his neck, just able to manage it with how Wulf slouched, one side braced against the window sill. 

He didn’t turn away from the window, but Wulf’s arms dropped from where he had them crossed over his chest; pressed against his back, Bren could feel the tension drop from his shoulders with them. Felt one of his hands curl loosely around his wrist, just holding, callused touch familiar and gentler than he deserved.

“I’ll stay more often,” Bren murmured. “I’m sorry I’ve been distant.” The most honest truth yet.

Wulf’s chin jerked in a semblance of a nod, but a long moment passed before Eodwulf did anything but stare in continued silence down at the path leading up the front of the inn. Then, softer than he expected, “I am asking, Bren. If you aren’t going to tell me otherwise, I am asking.”

A beat of silence. He rested his forehead against the back of Wulf’s neck, exhaling long and low. 

“Do you remember,” he began slowly, despite it all unable to keep his fondness for the memory from his tone. The hand not currently trapped beneath one of Wulf’s own crept around his other hip to join it. “Gods, we were young. Only our second year in the dormitories on the Academy grounds. You remember with the—“

He felt Wulf’s abdomen flex beneath his hands as he snorted inelegantly, a short huff of breath through his nose. “I’ve slept in barracks housing more than triple what they should and still had room to roll over without falling out of bed,” he derided, causing Bren to laugh.

“You’re still paying off that debt, by the way,” he said, poking Wulf’s side and earning a low rumble of warning, “volunteering me for the top bunk.”

“I was twice your size,” he countered. Then, “Go on.”

Bren let his grin wane against the soft wool of the cloak thrown over Wulf’s shoulder. “I think it was our first proper scandal. Astrid wanted so desperately to sneak out with the older students to some dance hall or other, but you were so godsdamned annoyed with how she hung off their every word, you wouldn’t hear it. And I… Hm. I don’t actually remember why I took your side in it. But that might have been the only time she broke curfew without us.”

Eodwulf hummed a wordless affirmation as Bren paused for a moment, just to breath and soak in the warmth of the body pressed to his. He made no move nor sound to rush him.

“But she was found out, of course. And do you remember? The very first place they looked was our side of the dormitory. One of our least unpleasant midnight interrogations,” he recalled, muffled slightly by the cloak pillowed beneath his cheek. “I don’t think much has changed since then.”

A deep breath moved Wulf’s shoulders. He couldn’t see more than a quarter of Wulf’s face from this angle, but still he saw the frown that darkened it. “You think we don’t know you’re trying to protect us from whatever it is you’re doing?” he asked, disapproval softened at the edges by understanding. “Keeping us at arm’s length won’t help. You’re damn right if the old man catches you doing something stupid, he’ll assume we were the first to know. And unlike when we were children, our denials won’t count for shit,” he promised, the clench of muscle at his jaw the only indication of the rising frustration behind his words.

“So you want to know everything and have to deny it still?” He squeezed his arms a little tighter around Wulf’s middle. “It wouldn’t be fair of me, not when all I have is a goal without a plan and no way of knowing if anything will come of it.” And not when Essek’s life as much as his own hung in the balance.

“No plan,” Wulf echoed, the doubt written plainly across what parts of his face Bren could see.

Whatever plan there was, was Essek’s. Bren concerned himself less with future gains, more concerned with their immediate survival. “I have contingencies,” he elaborated dryly. “I have ideas.”

It was the ideas that were the most dangerous part. 

He first took Wulf’s silence for annoyance, but when he finally did speak, the pang of guilt though Bren’s chest corrected him. “Don’t even know what you want anymore,” Wulf mumbled, wounded, “and it’s starting to scare us, you know. Thinking about it.”

“That’s not true. Eodwulf—” he sighed, but the man only shook his head and dropped the hand that had rested over Bren’s own. He stared hard enough he was almost surprised the glass didn’t crack.

He withdrew his hands to himself wordlessly. 

“I think you got a taste of something in Ghor Dranas. The freedom, the distance, fuck, the Dynasty’s weird magic, something. I think it’s got its hooks in you,” he warned, voice turning pained as he slipped into quiet Zemnian, “and I think it’s going to hurt like nothing in any of the hells when the old man rips them out.”

“ Eodwulf —” he whined, a pitious complaint. 

“Are you working with the fucking Cobalt Soul?” he asked like he didn’t believe it himself. “Is that it?”

“As if those assholes could keep a secret to save their lives,” he scoffed. “ Or mine . And I’m still here, aren’t I?”

“ Hm .” 

He thought the low, discontented rumble in Wulf’s chest would be the end of the conversation. Reluctantly, Bren stepped away, returned him his space, He was prepared to shuffle back to his corner and scowl in dejected silence at the floor for the next few hours until, in the worst case, their mark never arrived, or in the most likely case, there would be a scuffle when he did. He somewhat doubted Vence would go quietly. 

He’d only gotten a full step into that unsavory plan of action however before Wulf’s jaw tensed as he chewed at a thought for a moment too long, his face too far turned away to read and the lingering daylight depriving him of a reflection in the glass. Bren watched him tug a short length of copper wire free from his belt. Wulf’s somatics were rough but efficient as he twisted it into form between thumb and finger and held it up to speak. 

“Emil, watch the door,” he ordered abruptly, and after a pause grunted something of a confirmation before tucking the wire away. 

Bren stilled, fingers twitching toward his components as he watched the one side of the exchange. There was a question on his lips as to what he had seen, and whether their quarry approached, but all he managed was a strangled note of surprise—turned satisfaction—as Wulf turned in place and reached for Bren’s hips with both hands, wordlessly tugging him in closer. 

He went easily, little necessary to coax him against Eodwulf’s chest. He hardly realized he was being directed a step back though before his shoulders pressed against the wall, and Wulf, taller and broader seeming even more so at this proximity, crowded in close. 

Bren tilted his head back against the wood to search Wulf’s expression, already dark eyes darker still with intent and flicking unmistakably between his eyes and his mouth. “Hallo, Bärchen,” he whispered, feeling what even he knew to be an ill-advised smirk slip across his lips. 

Embarrassing, how his breath caught in his throat when Wulf leaned down to press the bridge of his nose to Bren’s temple, inhaling deeply, right hand sliding up his spine to settle possessively at the back of his neck, and keeping him firmly in place as he nuzzled closer. 

“Missed you,” Wulf mumbled, low and gravely. He felt his warm breath against his cheek, lips just grazing his skin as he spoke.

“I was always within reach,” he reassured, smile softening. “Still am.”

“Hm.” It didn’t quite sound like agreement, or contentment for that matter. “You’ve been saying stupid things since this morning,” he muttered, mouth dragging over the corner of Bren’s jaw, continuing a path down to his lips. “Just stop.”

He was pushing up into the kiss before Wulf’s last words had even fully left him, closing his eyes and leaning into the familiarity of the warmth and taste and touch of him. 

Slowly, an unhurried reacquainting, but demanding. As demanding as Bren allowed, warmth unfurling low and lazy to pool about where their hips pressed flush.

He parted them just far enough to breathe, to speak—” Wulf ,” murmured low, what might have been a plea, a warning, an admission, or nothing at all—interrupted with a low sound from the back of Wulf’s throat and only greater urgency. Little incentive to urge him wait, Bren groaned in complaint on principle at the interruption, but opened his mouth under Wulf’s insisting.

Gods help him, he hadn’t thought he’d missed this quite so much; the tongue behind his teeth begged him to reconsider. Eodwulf’s hands moved to cradle either side of his jaw, fingers curling around the nape of his neck, thumbs rasping over the faint stubble of his cheeks, and kissed him like they’d never stopped.

And left him reeling, suddenly, when he broke away.

With a decidedly satisfied exhale and final nip at his bottom lip, sharp enough to sting and steal his breath on a gasp, Eodwulf released him, but made no move to step away. The smirk curling at the corners of his mouth as he looked down at Bren, overheating in the narrow space between Eodwulf’s frame and the wall, still pressed flushed together, was equally familiar as the kiss had been. 

Bren only blinked, glancing down and away as warmth spread across his face. He nearly startled at the hand he didn’t see Wulf raise to brush a lock of hair that had fallen free from its tie behind his ear, callused fingers tracing the line of his jaw on their retreat. 

“Yeah,” Eodwulf rumbled, low and with an underlying edge to it, like discontent. “Not a lot’s changed. But still more than we give it credit,” he murmured, eyes dancing between Bren’s and his lips again, and for a moment Bren though he might kiss him again. 

Instead he stepped back, turning his face toward the dusty window. 

He found himself leaning more heavily agaisnt the wall, room colder than it had been before. “We are not children anymore,” he echoed Eodwulf’s earlier statement, unsure whether to be touched by sadness or relief. 

Some things had undeniably changed. For better, for worse, or just different… it was beyond him to say.

“But I figure, you’ll remember we’re still here, eventually,” he said quietly. “Either when you’ve decided what it is you’re doing, or when you’re not left with any other choice.”

He breathed in deeply. Held it. Held it until it hurt. “I have a very good memory, Eodwulf.”

“I’m counting on it, Liebling.”

When Bren’s Sending reached him at that very late hour, only slowly did it pull Essek from his trance, drawn back up to the surface of clarity from the murky space into which he’d drifted.

It was warmth first, flickering soft and dull like candlelight at the base of his skull, in the back of his mind. Then a familiar sweet woodsmoke, uncurling across his senses. 

“It’s done.” 

Soft spoken, the two short words carried a note of tired finality with them. Breaking the rhythm of his meditative breathing, Essek inhaled deeply, blinking alert once more where he sat cross-legged in the middle of a cold and empty bed. 

“My colleagues will handle what follows. They’ll deliberate after. Not long. Days, not weeks…” Another pause, not so long as the first. “I’ll update you.” Then, quieter, on the trailing end of the spell, “Sorry if I woke you.”

His smile was private, a rare one, without purpose. The tether the spell had drawn between their two souls went slack, but the warm hum of it remained tucked safely behind Essek’s sternum, awaiting his reply. 

“I am glad to hear it,” he said softly, a rough edge of disuse to his voice that he gently cleared away. “Thank you.” 

He considered how best to say it, if to say it. Considered in which way might sound the least invested, though the question of whether he was invested and to what degree had stopped being one he seriously entertained months ago. Essek exhaled in a soft huff, reflecting on it once more, foolish in light of how he sat there clutching at, indulging in , the warmth of the arcane signature so familiar to him now that lingered on each word, slowly fading. 

“I worried, given…” Essek winced, frowning at himself, his intent clumsy on his tongue. But continued. “Given your intent, more than your hunt.” Wasting your words and your breath, Thelyss . He bit back the sigh this time. “Do not apologize. I do not sleep.”

He breathed deeply, focused intently, but the warmth and woodsmoke faded, leaving only a dull awareness at the loss in their place. Like the long-cold impression in the empty sheets beside him. 

Essek blinked down at his hands.

He didn’t have long to dwell on the odd sensation of loneliness before it was swept aside a moment later with a flutter in his chest and creeping heat like warm molasses or a welcome phantom touch.

A gentle laugh, low and rumbling, met his ears. “Such little faith, Schatz,” Bren murmured, a brief but teasing edge to his words. “I said my piece, did as I was bid, we’ll see what comes.” A pause then, long enough for a deep breath, one Essek mirrored. “Goodnight, Essek. You should rest, if not sleep.”

The tether traversing continents to reach inside his chest and pulse alongside his heart went slack again, waiting. 

Essek caught himself gnawing at his lower lip, caught between his teeth. “If you’re able, tonight,” he found himself saying, no matter how foolish, and hesitated. “If you’re not needed elsewhere,” he added quickly, “I would speak with you further. I could drop the wards in the study, briefly,” he offered, and paused to count his words, the connection between them already fraying..

The heavy silence that followed rang loudly in Essek’s ears. Spell dissipating, he hurried through the verbal component, hands moving through the gestures without their usual grace but with all the necessary precision to draw his own gossamer thread between them, reverberating with each breath. 

“But you need not explain, of course, if it is beyond you tonight or would invite suspicion.” The next breath steadied him. “In which case, goodnight, Bren. Rest well.”

There passed a long enough moment of silence that Essek wondered if Bren might let the spell abate altogether without reply. 

Finally, though, the thread drawn between them plucked and rippled with a quiet hum.

“I couldn’t stay… but, I could come.”

The spell tapered out, but the warmth suffusing Essek’s skin, like he’d indulged in an overfull glass of wine, didn’t quite fade. Soundlessly, and more wordlessly pleased than he cared to dwell on, Essek slid to the edge of the too-large bed, bare feet never touching the carpet as he retrieved the evening robe draped across the back of the nearby armchair and wrapped himself in it.

Essek hurried down to his study, halls and stairways of his tower passing all in greyscale; he would have cast a light before him, more comfort in a warm amber glow than shadows, but his breath was spent instead on the short series of commands to temporarily bring down or permeate just enough of the wards ensconcing his home to prevent Bren’s teleport from being rebuffed. 

As he felt the wards dissolve piece by piece in answer, Essek shook off the slight chill that ran down his spine in response. That, too, he refused to dwell on. It served no purpose, doubting now. There were easier ways for Volstrucker to enter his home than to be invited. 

This particular one was taking his time, however, invitation or no. 

He found his study much the same as he’d left it when Essek pushed inside: the surface of the heavy vermaloc desk neatly organized and cleared of anything remotely sensitive, which left it largely bare; wall sconces only cold for a moment before he summoned a dim light to them with an extension of his will and a word; the lone window adjacent the desk closed and locked, as he had not been expecting late night company, a woven strand of pale purple flowers long-dried and withering in the bottom of the window sill.  

Essek paused to look past his own reflection in the dark glass, out over the empty street and the Firmaments beyond. His fingers hovered over the dried blossoms, but did not touch, the ghost of the smile that the memory attached called to his lips as much an indictment as the plainly Empire braid into which their stems had been arranged. 

A gentle ripple, a near tangible pressure in his inner ears, reverberated low as it extended into the void left by the protections he’d dispelled. The trembling arcane energy expanded rapidly all at once before contracting, snapping taut, just as the soft whoomf of air suddenly displaced behind him announced Bren’s arrival.

Essek wrapped his heavy robe around himself tighter, eyes flicking up to the window and the reflection of the illuminated room behind him in its glass.

Bren sat perched on the edge of his desk behind him, hair hanging loose around his face in damp disorderly waves as he glanced about the room, a crooked smile tucked into the corner of his mouth as his eyes met Essek’s in the glass. He looked freshly shaven and flushed a delicate pink all the way down into his unfastened collar like he’d only just bathed, the warmth still radiating off him. 

“Hallo, Schatz,” Bren murmured low, the rough rasp to the edges of his voice nothing if not intentional, but prickling pleasantly across Essek’s skin all the same. 

Essek turned, a great deal more restrained in his appraisal of the man before him than the half-lidded and hungry undressing Bren treated him to, itself unexpected and sending a warm flush up to the tips of Essek’s ears, which suddenly felt too bare without his silver ear cuffs to mask the effect behind. 

He blinked. Tried not to stare, but there was little else of interest in the room to justify his looking. “You look well,” he said, pleased at least it sounded rather neutral an assessment.

Bren laughed, a short bark that started and ended in his chest. “I did not want to make a habit of it, bloodying your furniture,” he explained, grinning lazily. 

Essek hummed quietly in assent, eyes flicking down to the plunging neckline of the loose-fitting shirt—a simple black, textured fabric that hugged his shoulders and sides where he was seemingly still damp, tucked messily into his pants, the legs of which were tucked with equal lack of time or effort into his unlaced boots, heels scuffing lightly against the side of Essek’s desk. He did not find blood. Did not find so much as a bruise, save the shadows under his eyes which were new but not unexpected. 

He lifted his gaze to meet Bren’s. “I think I much prefer this,” he admitted, wetting his too dry lips.

That grin turned lascivious. Head tilting back, throat bobbing as he swallowed, Bren watched him through the dark smudge of his eyelashes. “Come here,” he purred, settling back slightly with his hands braced on the desktop behind him, knees shifting wider, an open invitation.

Carefully, conscious of his heart beating a too-quick rhythm in his chest, Essek stepped down from his levitation. On solid footing again, it still felt a near thing to floating as he crossed the narrow distance between them. His eyes only left Bren’s long enough to follow the movement of his throat as he swallowed again, caught for a moment on the easy smirk playing across his lips. But Essek was neither desperate nor indecent, tempting as the invitation was, and he’d be twice-damned before he let Bren think that this had been his purpose in calling him here.

Essek stopped just short of the space between his knees that Bren had made for him. Bren’s smirk turned downward at the edges, brow furrowing as he pouted prettily, but Essek’s grin was unrepentant. He reached out to brush a damp strand of hair back from his face, fingertips brushing the high rise of his cheek. “I can only imagine the busy evening you must need to return to.”

“Ah.” The petulant scowl smoothed away in an instant as Bren flashed him an ameliorative, if guilty smile. “I’ve been reminded that I have been neglecting some of my responsibilities, these past months,” he admitted vaguely. “I’ve promised the evening to some others, unfortunately.”

The piqued Essek’s interest. He dropped his hand, realizing he’d let the touch linger in place. “Friends of yours?”

Bren’s tongue ran over his teeth as he thought, gaze heavy where it landed on Essek, roving purposelessly. “Something like that,” he agreed, voice pitched low. He tilted his head to the side then, peering up at Essek as if trying to catch a better light or more attractive angle, reaching out to tuck two fingers behind the knotted belt of his robe and tugging him closer. 

The transparent distraction of it all had Essek exhaling gently, amusement softening the corners of his eyes and smile as he stepped forward where pulled. “Danthe,” he chided softly, his fingers under Bren’s chin tilting his face up with no resistance, “I hope I have not given you the impression I am the jealous sort.”

Bren hummed low, an amused sound as he scooted nearer the edge of the desk, his knees a warm pressure on either side of Essek’s hips. “I think,” he breathed, eyes drooping half closed as Essek’s fingertips moved to trace lightly along his bottom lip, “you are quite content with what you have when you know you have it.”

Essek felt his eyeteeth press at the corners of his smile, genuine, if sharp. He shifted incrementally closer, unoccupied hand settling lightly atop Bren’s thigh, and watched the man’s eyes darken, irises he imagined sky-blue swallowed up by black. “Pretty words,” he murmured, dipping close enough as he said it that he felt the light hitch of Bren’s breath. “And how long do I have you tonight, pretty thing?”

Bren leaned forward then, pressing upward to draw Essek into a kiss. Still waiting for his answer, Essek turned his face aside, graced instead with the warm breath of Bren’s groan of complaint muffled against the side of his neck, sending a jolt of want down his spine that mellowed and sweetened as it pooled low in his belly.

Even if he were prone to as foolish and irrational a thing as jealousy, he was rather sure that sound would have cured him of it quite promptly. 

“I’m rather convinced,” Essek said, still smiling, his hand traveling further up Bren’s thigh, “you could be persuaded to continue neglecting your responsibilities for another night.”

He felt Bren’s grip winding into the deep blue outermost silk layer of his robe, a pressure at the small of his back. Felt soft lips drag along the column of his throat, up toward the underside of his jaw, damp when they parted on a flatteringly unsteady breath. “I can’t stay,” he repeated quietly. “Not tonight.”

He exhaled slowly as he felt teeth graze the corner of his jaw, soothed by a chaste kiss. “Then for how long do I have you?” Essek asked again.

He felt more than heard the sigh breathed into his skin. “Another twenty, thirty minutes before anyone goes looking,” Bren murmured as if an apology. 

“Ah.” The twinge of disappointment in his chest was only that—a small thing, but a discomfort nonetheless. ”Not so long then.” He shuffled it away, something to categorize when his hands and thoughts were not so occupied. He withdrew far enough to meet Bren’s eyes, his jaw smooth under Essek’s palm as his thumb stroked over the cut of his cheekbone, fingertips only teasing at that vulnerable place below his ear that had Bren’s eyes shifting into the middle distance before falling closed. 

Essek pressed a kiss to his brow, his cheek, his bottom lip, the last one lingering. Whatever Bren might have been about to say fled him on a soft exhale; impatience, flirtation, every line of him drawn taut and left wanting moments before melted away under a little gentleness, as lovely as it was predictable. 

Essek paused to appreciate the tired contentment that smoothed over Bren’s expression, his shoulders hanging loose, arms looped lightly around Essek’s waist. Threading his fingers through damp hair, he swept it back from Bren’s face, his hand coming to rest at the nape of his neck. 

When Bren’s eyes fluttered half open again, it was only slowly, and in time with the light fluttering in Essek’s chest. 

“Then tell me about your hunt,” Essek coaxed between plying him with light kisses—little more than the drag of his lips along the edge of jaw—until his next words brushed his ear and had Bren shivering visibly, making warmth swell inside Essek’s rib cage. “I want to know everything.”

Bren swallowed, clearing his throat softly. A quiet moment passed in which Essek did little more than indulge, tracing his fingertips up and down the back of Bren’s neck, his free hand settled warmly on one hip, just two fingers creeping beneath his shirt to touch skin. Bren inhaled deeply, exhaling with clearer eyes as he found Essek’s again.

“You wouldn’t truly care to know the details,” he said, tone hushed. ”There were enough of us chasing different leads that my part in it was mostly just a great deal of waiting, and then when we found him, it was all over very quickly. Unfortunately it was something of a public spectacle, but,” he tilted his head to the side, a restrained shrug. “It happens. We were prepared for that. A few injuries. No one died.” 

He hummed at that, accepting, but not entirely content. “And Ikithon, he is pleased with the outcome?”

Bren scoffed, a gust of breath tickling across his neck. “He is rarely, if ever pleased ,” he contended. “But he has greater concerns at the moment than to worry that we are colluding behind his back, even if,” he laughed, darkly amused, “you are presently at the top of that list.”

Essek raised an eyebrow at that. “Oh?”

“You will tell me honestly that your plans, if you have it your way, do not entail the old man’s death or disgrace in some manner?” he asked, dubious.

“Ah.” Essek dragged his nails lightly over the back of Bren’s neck, corners of his lips twitching toward a grin at how he pressed back into the touch. “It is among my priorities, certainly,” he admitted, echoing, “If I have my way.”

Bren’s only response was a knowing smile.

“And you and, your friends?” Essek promoted softly, with a tone that did not try to pry where it wasn’t welcome. “Not among the injured I hope?”

That smile strained, fumbled almost undetectably. Corrected itself. “We’re alright,” he assured, straightening up slightly, eyes flashing when he met Essek’s. “I’m alright.”

“You look tired, danthe . You are sure?”

“Mhm.”

The pause as his less than compelling assurance trailed off stretched a beat too long, stoking the worry Essek thought abated. He bit the inside of his cheek, debated the merits of questioning further, but then Bren continued with a less than steady breath. 

“You know,” he began again, a slight furrow forming in his brow, “you know there are people I’m not willing to leave behind. Who wouldn’t let me leave them behind.” He was searching Essek’s face for something. “I don’t know more than half of your plans, or how I figure into them,” he stated plainly, “but you should account for that.”

Essek weighed the seriousness underlying his tone. “Is that how you imagined this ending?” he asked, teasing only lightly, at the same time tapping Bren’s lower lip in admonishment. “I steal you away and we flee the continent, to live on hunted and in infamy?” 

Bren only looked on, waiting, but it was confirmation and question enough.

“It makes for an entertaining daydream, but I don’t think I am suited to the lifestyle,” he laughed softly to himself. Then, more seriously, “Nor in a position to pull you away from whomever you might dislike to be pulled away from. So, no, my friend. That shall only be our ending should everything go very, very poorly.”

He sealed the promise with a kiss over Bren’s brow. As he pulled away, he watched the tension bleed away with him. 

Bren slouched further into him, a half formed note of surprise dying in the back of Essek’s throat as his head dropped to the junction of Essek’s shoulder, face turned into his high collar. He tried for soothing, the aimless patterns his fingers traced between Bren’s shoulder blades, the other hand cupping the back of his neck. He might have spoken, had he known what to say; might have made that up too as he went, but there was a weight on his chest and a stone in his throat he struggled to swallow around which he suspected had both everything and nothing to do with the man he held up in his arms. So he turned his face into Bren’s hair and gripped him closer, and hoped it would convey enough. 

“These friends of yours,” Essek said after a moment, if only to break the unbearable silence. “They are capable?”

The laugh that earned him shook Bren’s shoulders. “As much as I am,” he said, words muffled in Essek’s collar. He lifted his head, enough to meet Essek’s gaze, close enough their noses nearly brushed. “Feeling competitive, Thelyss?”

“Always,” he admitted with a grin that Bren matched, only half honest. Then, “Will they help, or will they hurt in the end, do you think?”

Bren glanced away, thoughtful. “Me? Help. Of that I am confident. You?” A pause. “I am not sure how quickly they’d be sold on you.”

“Mm. And if the choice is between you and Ikithon, what then?” Essek asked, and at the sadness that showed itself in Bren’s eyes, regretted it. 

“I think that would depend,” was all he said for a long moment. “I think the choice presented would have to be a permanent one,” he said. A life or death one, Essek interpreted. 

“I see.” He meant it more in sympathy than truth.

“Mhm.” Bren’s forehead nudged his own. 

The moment stretched on. And without reason or excuse, after only one false start, Essek kissed him. 

It was a shallow thing, improved markedly when Bren’s hand found the side of his jaw and adjusted the angle of it just so. But it was mind-numbing, it was good , consuming what focus he had to give it and then some, unhurried and tender and sweeter still for the fact his only motive had been because he wanted to . 

It certainly wasn’t the first of its kind in that respect, but it was a thought that left Essek flushed and heart fluttering regardless.

He lost track of the minutes, unsure if he felt them pass more slowly or more quickly, only knew they had a limited number of them, and his partner’s hands were beginning to wander.

“— Bren ,” he broke away with a gasp, catching Bren’s wrist as his hand crept around toward his backside. It earned him a sheepish grin, a deeper kiss. “You would know better than I,” he pulled away again to admonish, the effect of it lost as he struggled to haul enough air into his lungs, “what little time we had and how little is remaining.”

Bren smothered his sigh in the side of Essek’s neck. “I know,” he murmured, and sighed again. “I should go.”

“Mh.” It was easy, stealing a final kiss. “Probably.” But Essek didn’t move to step away. 

Bren retrieved a bit of chalk from his pocket. “You know about my day,” he observed, crooked grin returning to the corner of his mouth. “Tell me about yours as I prepare the circle?”

Essek could’ve laughed at the domesticity of it. Instead he chose to smile, as much as he would at any fantasy far from reach but fun to entertain. “Court was miserable today,” he complained eagerly, stepping back so that Bren could hop down off the desk. “Approximately nothing was accomplished. It was impressive, really.  I will happily regale you.” 

And it was impressive, just how much of the monotony Bren was able to smile through. 

The teleportation circle was completed sooner than Essek would have liked however, even despite his efforts to distract and an impromptu lecture after Bren caught him watching perhaps a little too closely. (“You will promise me you will not try to replicate this, Schatz. Trust me, that’s not a place you want to go.” And Essek did trust. He did.)

Bren paused at the last few lines though, rising to his feet with a wince and a sigh. 

“That’s it then?” Essek managed with a smile. “No flowers or trinkets this time?” It earned him a soft huff of amusement. “It’s alright. I’m only a little disappointed.”

Bren sympathized with a low hum and a devilish look cast his way over his shoulder. With two long strides he stepped up to where Essek sat on the edge of the desk much as Bren had been, stopped though from going any further as Essek promptly crossed his legs. 

That too earned him a bark of laughter, louder than the last. 

When Bren leaned in to steal a final kiss, he was grinning, unrepentant. “That just wouldn’t do,” he murmured, lips brushing Essek’s cheek as he spoke, and planted a kiss there too. “Admittedly, this one is not so simple as the last.”

Confusion brought a frown to Essek’s face, wiped away by surprise of a far greater magnitude as Bren straightened and fished from around his own neck a familiar pendant, one which Essek had never seen him without. 

He blinked at it, then at Bren, who took Essek’s lax hand at his hesitation and pressed the skin-warm bronze and leather to his palm, curling his fingers around it safely. 

“Our quarry wore this,” he explained before Essek could ask. “I took it. No, no one saw me take it,” he answered that question too as soon as it appeared on Essek’s face. He pulled at the collar of his shirt, revealing a twin cord and pendant around his neck. “I still have mine. I want you to wear this one,” he said curtly, pressing Essek’s hand to his own chest. 

“It will not be missed, or—or raise suspicion?” Essek protested, torn between staring at Bren and the gift in his hand. 

“Small things like that go missing all the time,” he assuaged. “And it is not particularly dangerous or valuable, not to them, and there are many more like it.” He inclined his head to the side, a near shrug. “I had been considering for a while how to get my hands on one for you. This was just a bit of good fortune.”

Essek rose carefully to his feet, placing a hand on Bren’s arm. “Out of an abundance of caution?” he asked quietly. “Or because you think I now need it.”

“I’m always careful,” he said by way of answer, smile not quite the same as he turned the last piece of chalk over and over in his hand. He didn’t seem inclined to address the latter half of Essek’s question. 

Wordlessly, he pulled the cord over his head, tucking it down into the collar of his robe. “Thank you,” he said softly, at a loss for anything else.

The wordless grunt he received as Bren turned away and crouched again over the mostly complete teleportation circle was his only reply. 

A few more quick streaks of chalk across the floorboards, Bren only pausing the once to glance up at Essek a final time, the smile he offered a private one, and then he was gone in a glow of blue-white light. 

When it faded, not even the chalk circle remained. 

Cursing the gods for the hollow weight behind his sternum, Essek dropped into the chair behind his desk and began the long, slow processes of reinstating the wards around his home, and attuning to the amulet burning almost hot to the touch against his chest.