AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The world stayed airless for a heartbeat, swinging in the balance; some old obligation or present loyalty loosened like a knot untying, and Fadi complained, having been conquered by the eyes, “Sit down and be quiet and let me look for a minute, then, I’m not precisely practiced in this particular area, not part of the medical curriculum, but…we’ll find out together, won’t we.” Tir did. Without commentary; with Fadi’s hand on his shoulder. The moment extended.
And then it cracked, relaxing into normality like the release of a spring. “Ah. Oh, that felt—”
“I know,” Tir said. “I’m feeling it.” He still had Fadi’s hand on his shoulder.
“Yes, of course you are…and so you know how magic works, you know that even better than I do, and don’t say it, you know many things better than I do, and you asked me to look. Magic…you know it’s like—like a well, isn’t it? It’s not a perfect metaphor, but it’s what I’m thinking. You go to dip a bucket in, you draw some water out, it refills itself over time? But then there’s what you did, coming this dramatically back to life…asking so much of it, taking so much out…”
“Oh.” Tir’s lips barely moved. “I…see.”
“My guess is you’ve emptied the well at once, as it were. I don’t know whether it’ll fill in or stay dry. Perhaps if you were to travel back home—the other side of the border—”
“No.”
“You’d have magic in the air every time you took a breath, back home. Likely your best hope for—for being what you—for having that back.” They shared a moment, eyes meeting in hospital quiet: both in service to the royal household, in different ways. “You won’t get that here. With us.”
“I won’t leave him.”
“I knew you’d be saying that,” Fadi muttered. “Stubborn pixie that you are.” Tir’s mouth did a little upward tip, at that. “And that’s what I can tell you. You won’t get any worse. You’re simply…something new, I think. Human. Mostly human. You’ve got about a teaspoon left in that well, probably why you’re up and around so fast, considering you were, as the ballads say, dead. You’ll always be a fairy.”
Tir nodded, taking this in. He’d drifted to perch on the edge of the infirmary bed, sleeves pushed up, hair falling forward when he glanced down. He looked more thin and more weary and more heartbreakingly beautiful than Oliver had ever realized: being told just how much he’d given up for the man he’d chosen to save.
He also looked stronger. Like a hero.
“I am going to test a couple of new prescriptions on you,” Fadi said cheerfully, mood swinging and rebounding. “Nothing too dramatic, but I know we’ve not solved much yet; you get tired pretty quick and you’ve been getting those headaches and you’re still needing better sleep, with those nightmares, and, also, if you’re in the way of being more human, I finally get to practice medicine on you.”
And Tir smiled, tiny but genuine.
Oliver surfaced dazed and panting. Tir was hurt—having nightmares—human.
Mostly human. Not telling anyone—not Ollie, not anyone—about the nightmares. Keeping secrets.
And Oliver had a form of scattered slipshod magic now, and once he put two and two together, he stayed away from Tir all morning, sickened. Tir had always been magic-sensitive. Of course it wasn’t only the reminder of loss that was causing pain.
One more way he’d failed the man he loved. No wonder Tirian couldn’t love him back. Too slow, too stupid to figure that one out. Better that he stay hidden in his bedroom forever. Better that he not come out when anyone knocked on his door.
He did do some work. Trying to be good. Trying to not let anyone else down.
He put Tir’s dead knife, the slender fire-melted hairpin of a knife that he’d kept in his pocket, away in a drawer. He did not deserve to hold it.
Tirian himself, when Oliver finally encountered him in the hallway outside the informal family dining room, Ellie having requested the reassurance of her family’s presence at luncheon, said nothing about having been to the infirmary and nothing about nightmares. He looked as if he’d been pacing; he looked worried. A line sat between dark eyebrows, though some of the tension went out of his body when he saw Oliver step out of the stairwell.
Ollie had almost not come. He knew his mother needed them, though. Her children, all of them. Alive and gathered. He couldn’t say no.
He hadn’t planned to encounter Tir. He had no plans at all. No thoughts, only blankness, the running liquid pool of light through windows.
Their eyes met—Oliver opened his mouth to make a sound, lifted a hand as if that might mean anything—but Tir’s gaze dropped first. Down to flagstones, to the patterns cast through open windows and stained glass.
Words tangled in Ollie’s throat.
Cedric came bounding up, waving a copy of a gilt-edged pocket manuscript. “Hey! Come look at this, it’s the winter court masque, I’m going to be a forest god, I get to wear emerald tights!”
Oliver wanted to put a fist through the tapestried wall.
Tir’s head came back up. Relief shone from his eyes. “That’s…wonderful. What sort of forest god? Fertility, wisdom, guardian spirit of the green?”
“Kind of hoping fertility,” Cedric decided blithely, and pulled Tir into the dining room for luncheon in his wake, chattering about codpieces.
Oliver, left behind, set a hand on the wall for support. It leaned sympathetically into his palm, but couldn’t help.
