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He writes him poetry.
Renly keeps them locked in a box made from cherry wood, the carving fine and delicate, stags and birds and other beasts prancing amongst the tangled rose vines. It used to be his mother’s, or so his brothers told him, and it was his to have. Robert found it too fanciful. Stannis preferred not to be reminded. And so Renly took it and kept it close, placing trinkets he cherished inside when he was young.
Now all it has is parchment—long scrolls that run the expanse of his arm, and small ones that fit perfectly in his palm. They spill out when he opens the top, falling on to his lap and the floor like rose petals. They smell of leather and roses, sharpness with a hint of softness, just like Loras. The handwriting is slightly slanted and harsh, purpose behind each line and swirl. Renly memorizes how Loras writes, his fingertips following the R and the E and the N, L and Y, taking his time as he reads the words in his head and then aloud, soaking in the rhythm and the tone.
The paper Loras writes on is familiar to Renly, scraps of parchment stolen from his desk when Loras thinks he isn’t looking. But Renly is always watching Loras; like a moth to a flame he is drawn to his vibrancy and his life. Every movement is seen and admired.
Loras takes the parchment and leaves to sit alone. Sometimes Renly finds him, curled up on the beach, his toes in the sand and his fingers pink from the crisp breeze. Other times he’s gone, like Morning Glory in the middle of the night. But he always returns with a smile on his lips and ink stained fingers, the scent of the sea pressed against his skin. The poem is exchanged for a simple kiss—a sweet embrace for an expression of love.
Some poems are innocent in tone, speaking of love and admiration, and of holding hands and gentle caresses. Others are filled with passion, imagery of tangled limbs and pulled hair, lips pressed and teeth pulling. Each poem is written just for him, their shared memories captured in a few quick lines, locked away in ink and parchment for Renly to revisit as much as he likes.
Every day, Renly receives a poem, and he cannot bear to part with a single one.
This is why he hurries back in the dead of night, the bells ringing high above, announcing the death of a king and a brother, to steal away a box filled to the brim with promise and a future--things he’d forgotten about until he gazed upon a boy made of treasures, with eyes of jade and curls spun from gold.
Loras tells him he can write more—that it doesn’t matter if he leaves them behind. They have to leave. The wolf will soon be at the mercy of the lion, and the only safety for the stag is amongst the rose brambles. But Renly goes back. It does not take him long, the hallways etched in his memory by now, and when he finds his box amongst the remnants of his room, he plucks it from its hiding spot beneath the bed and opens it up. The poems spill out like rose petals, as they always do, and he stuffs them all in a leather bag he’d kept empty for something petty—something inconsequential. Now it carries his entire world.
He leaves the box behind, a hint of regret tugging at him as he hurries down the steps, back to Loras and to safety. There is no room for it, though. They must move quickly, like marauders in the night. Loras’ words of love are worth more than the ghost of a mother he never knew.
It is not until Renly wakes from a restful sleep in Loras’ bed at Highgarden that he thinks about what he did. How he’d gone back for scraps of paper when his life was on the line. A second later and he might have been caught; dragged into a filthy prison along with Ned Stark to await a trial he never deserved. But when he rolls over to see the poems resting in a new box—one of Loras’ that had once held riding gloves and silk scarves—the comfort they bring soothes him, and he relaxes as ink stained fingers draw letters along his chest, spelling out his name in familiar handwriting.
XX
He used to write him poetry.
Loras finds the box in the king’s tent. The stench of death and charred tapestry wafts in the air, still not gone even after his long vigil over Renly’s body is complete. He opens the chest. Parchment tumbles out like dead leaves, cracked and brittle and a reminder of life past. He remembers each poem as he picks them up. He remembers what inspired him to write what he did; the love and the excitement and the passion.
But his muse is gone now, and the words no longer make sense as he re-reads them. The letters are jumbled and the paper shakes under his touch. Instead he pushes them back in the box and shuts it tight, almost breaking a hinge. It is the only thing he leaves the tent with, and no one asks why.
Loras does not write poetry anymore.
He buries the box with Renly; places it at his bound and wrapped feet with a rose on top. All of his poems rest with him under the ground, a tomb for their love and their life together. All of the poems save for one.
Atop a grave that will never be found, lies a small piece of parchment that fits perfectly in the palm of a hand. Scrawled along it in handwriting that is slightly slanted and harsh, but with purpose behind each line and swirl, is Loras’ last poem.
Once the sun has set,
No candle can replace it.