“Are you okay?” Kade asked softly after a few moments of tired cuddling. “I didn’t hurt you?”
He was a little sore now that he was thinking of it, but Florian managed a wry laugh, shaking his head against Kade’s shoulder. “I’ll be okay.”
“I could barely feel you at all. That’s why,” Kade said, the pout obvious in his voice; but when Florian looked up at him, he had a similar soft, amused smile on his features.
“Well, this time tomorrow hopefully we’ll be in the Veil,” Florian teased. “And then you can fuck me however you want.”
“Mm,” Kade said, watching as Florian pushed himself away to sit up on the edge of the bed. “There you’ll be the king though.”
The words grated him a little less each time, but still he wrinkled his nose for a brief instant at the implication before turning back with a grin. “Then you’ll just have to fuck me like one.”
Their flight to Nunavut the next morning wasn’t too early, much to Florian’s relief, so they got to sleep until a decent hour before checking out of their hotel and heading back to the airport. This flight was shorter, too; and by the midafternoon they had arrived at the smaller Iqaluit airport, already much colder than Montreal had been.
“This is going to be miserable,” Florian groaned as they stepped out into the cold afternoon. Kade smirked down at him, wrapping one arm around his shoulders.
“The walk will keep you warm,” he said, but Florian only scowled in response. It was meant to be reassuring, but sounded twice as miserable, as far as he was concerned.
Here, they had to rent a car, since their destination was so remote, even for a place as far-flung as Nunavut.
“I can drive,” Kade offered, as they were packing their things into the sleek white hatchback they had chosen.
“Do you even have a license?” Florian asked suspiciously.
“Of course I do,” he sighed. “I came to Earth with your dad a couple times a year, usually. He helped me get my passport and everything.”
“Oh,” was all he could reply. A tiny pang of sadness bubbled up in him at the words, imagining his father teaching Kade how to drive, but he pushed it back down before he could dwell on it too long. “Yeah, alright then. You would know where we’re going better than me.”
They drove until the sun was starting to set. Florian slowly began to make out the shape of what looked like low buildings on the horizon, far in the distance. It was a small town, or maybe even a little village; as they drew closer, Kade pulled off the paved street onto a dirt road leading toward the cluster of buildings.
“Is it there?” Florian asked, frowning.
“No, but it’s close,” Kade replied. “We have a contact there who lets us in. The curtain is part of a fenced-off wildlife preserve. Not like there are many people who would stumble on it by accident so far north, but still.”
“A contact? Like a human?”
“No, a shifter. Sort of like your Uncle August. She was born in the Veil but left to live on Earth.”
“I see,” Florian replied, wondering how common it was for residents of the Veil to live on Earth. How many Veilians might he have met in his life who were secretly the same as him? With how small the populace of the Veil seemed to be now, he thought it unlikely, but certainly not impossible. There must have been others, maybe even descendants of others who had left the Veil generations ago.
“Still nervous?” Kade asked, glancing briefly over at him, before looking back to the road. They were driving down the same dirt street that the village was clustered around. Florian hesitated—he had been trying not to think about it, but he did still feel jittery and sick to his stomach.
“A little bit, yeah,” he admitted, looking out the passenger side window to watch the buildings going by. They all looked worn, almost dilapidated—several looked abandoned altogether.
“It’s okay. I’m... nervous too,” Kade said slowly, and Florian looked back over at him in surprise. “My dad and Jerah were pretty close. I don’t know how he’s going to be. And my mom... Well, my mom is my mom. Hopefully she’ll just be in a good mood for having me home.” After a moment, he glanced back over at Florian with a slight grimace. “Sorry. Don’t mean to make you more nervous.”
“It’s okay,” Florian laughed. “I’d rather know what to expect, I guess.”
“My siblings will be happy, at least,” Kade added.
“How many do you have?” Florian asked.
“Three. Two brothers and a sister.”
“And you’re the oldest?”
“Unfortunately,” he said, a small, chagrined smile pulling at the edges of his lips.
“Tell me their names so I don’t forget,” Florian prompted. This time Kade did laugh, a huff of breath as a wider grin split his features.
