Archive of Our Own

In all the ways he had ever imagined it, Soren had never thought it would be like this. It wasn't a question of the air, as soft and warm as a breath, gently stirring the soft grass and flowers. Not that — he had always imagined it would be beautiful, even though it had been a harsher-edged, wilder beauty in his mind. But he had also imagined, somehow, that things would be easier.

He grit his teeth and kept on running, trying to lengthen his stride, to push himself faster. He was by no means the slowest of them all, but that was because he kept doing this, running long after everyone else had left the field and the sun was a low, dark orange blur on the horizon. Usually he ran until it disappeared completely, and it was just him on the field — him and the trilling cicadas, and the flowers that bloomed in the dark, opening huge, gently luminescent petals. His skin would grow cold under his heavy armour as he walked up the hill back to the knights' outbuildings.

Not tonight, though. Two figures were watching him from the top of the hill, casting long shadows down onto the grass. One waved, and Soren pretended not to see it, ducking his chin and doubling his pace. When he looked up again, Pirah was halfway down the hill to him, his lope smooth and easy. It took him only a moment to reach Soren, who had to double over to catch his breath.

"I was watching you run," Pirah said, filling in the space left between Soren's harsh breaths. "You're very good — sometimes I forget you were raised by humans."

Sometimes I forget you're half-human, Soren thought, filling in what Pirah was thinking. He was always saying little things like this. All Soren could do was grit his teeth and ignore it. Ignore it while looking at the tips of Pirah's ears poking through his hair. He'd spent so long trying to hide his own that it still seemed so strange seeing Pirah's. He tore his eyes away.

Soren's lack of response seemed to have unsettled Pirah, who looked down at him with a considering look. Perhaps he realised he had misspoken, shifting from foot to foot.

Pirah was very tall with very dark hair, and infuriatingly not in the slightest tired or out of breath despite the long hours of training. Soren had never seen him tire at all, to his memory, not when training with the sword, or the rapier, the spear, the bow, the lance — anything. "Lorien wants to speak with you. Well, with us."

Soren nodded, despite the fact even the name made his heart leap. So the prince was the other figure on the hill — but he had known that by the silhouette and the shadow.

"What does he want to talk about?" Soren said, pulling himself up and shoving his hair back from his forehead. He could see Pirah watching him, just out of the corner of his eye.

"You're red," Pirah said. "Are you all right?"

"Just happens," Soren said, and it was indelicate, rough. Pirah could probably chase a deer down with a bow through half the forest before turning even the slightest bit red.

"Interesting," Pirah said, and then, "I mean, it's probably best if you let Lorien explain."

Soren nodded, a jerky, awkward movement in contrast to Pirah's smile and elegant turn to go back up the hill. Soren touched his scarf, making sure it was still pinned around his neck, even though it was damp with sweat. If only Lorien had come earlier, when he had just started running.

There was Lorien, standing at the top of the hill, smiling slightly as they approached. He looked the same as always: calm and a little tired, his hair russet blond and dark circles under his eyes, a smudge on his golden-brown skin. There was something about him that drew the eye, and always had, from the moment Soren had taken that strange, sideways half-step into another world.

"Soren," Lorien said, and his voice was soft, but Soren could feel all his attention drawn to Lorien right away. "Did Pirah explain anything to you?"

"No, I didn't," Pirah said. "I thought I — you would be better at finding the words."

Soren's stomach sank. It felt like they were about to give him bad news. Preparing to send him back to the world of blood and shit and endless drills.

"I'm approaching my summertime," Lorien said, and he wasn't looking at either of them, but out towards the distance where the first stars were beginning to shine against the dark carpet of the sky. "And that comes with certain responsibilities." Pirah was nodding to Soren's right, as if there was some great gravity in what Lorien was saying. So the seasons were changing — so what?

"I don't understand," Soren said, and he saw Pirah and Lorien trade a glance over his head and pretend they hadn't.

"Think of it like, um — "

"A human's birthday," Pirah said.

"Oh, yes, a birthday, " Lorien said, and from him it sounded like two words, birth day. "I'm a prince of the court, and according to court traditions, there are certain things I have to do."

Soren hated these explanations. It would be easier if Lorien had turned to him and said, you don't know anything about this, do you, you fool. Instead, there was nothing coming from him except quiet kindness. It made Soren want to grit his teeth. Kindness was one step away from condescension. Kindness was its subtler cousin, and somehow worse, because of its pity.

"I need to take a guard," Lorien continued, hesitated, and looked at Pirah again. "Not just a regular guard, but a sworn guard to me. A companion, of sorts."

"Right," Soren said. He still wasn't clear on why Lorien was even speaking to him. It would be Pirah — it would obviously be Pirah. He was the strongest, the swiftest, and his skill with a blade was unparalleled. Just looking at him told you that, Soren thought. He seemed to be always ready, brimming with energy as if he could spring into a fight or a hunt without a second thought. It made Soren acutely aware of how he himself was standing there, face red and wet with sweat, his arms and legs still trembling a little from residual efforts.

"Well, the two I think most promising for the role are Pirah and yourself," Lorien said.

Soren looked up at him, then, even though it was always a little difficult to look at Lorien. There was just something a bit too much about him, his features too pointy, his eyes a dark, rich brown with thick lashes. Inhuman, Soren thought, but so much more than that. He looked like he belonged in the forest, as if he could take a step back and simply disappear into the trees. It made Soren's heart race just to look at him.

"I understand," Soren said. He felt nothing. It was obvious why Lorien had picked him. Give the human a chance, make it look like he had really been considered, when it was meant to be Pirah all along. It would look good for the queens, he thought, that Lorien had considered the outsider. He knew how this went. He knew how to smile and dip his head and stand in grace. He knew how to do all of those things, and knew how to twist his wrist and make a deliberate mistake look like an accident and watch the champion be crowned.

Soren knew how to do all of those things, but under Lorien's level gaze, he found himself doing none of them. He looked back, into Lorien's eyes, despite their radiance, and the way it made the back of his neck hot, his heart thumping slow but hard, rattling in his ribs.

"All right," he said, and he straightened his aching back, pushed his hair back from his forehead and shifted his weight. He'd never felt short before, not among the army, but now — "What do I do?"

"Nothing more than you ordinarily would," Lorien said. "I'll come and watch you train, and a few other things before I make my decision."

Dusk was falling all around them, but the field was only coming alive with the sound of cicadas in the trees. More than that, more than the fireflies; the grass itself was beginning to glow, but only where it was being touched, skeins of light connecting all three of them together.

I'll fight for this, Soren thought, pressing his teeth together until his jaw ached. Pirah was watching him, too, out of the corner of his eye. I don't even want it, but I'll fight for it anyway.

"Wonderful," Lorien said, and somehow Soren couldn't help but think that Lorien was seeing exactly what he was thinking, though he could not explain why. There was no change in his expression, the set of his mouth, or even any tension in his body, but there was just something in his eyes that made Soren think he knew. No, that was madness.

"It's been quite some time since I came and watched the training,” Lorien said, reaching up as if to push his hair from his face, and then remembering it was braided back in an elaborate fashion. All the elves wore their hair back like that, in a twist of heavy braids or a mass of hair that somehow flowed gracefully, interwoven with grass, or herbs, or flowers. Not like Soren’s, black and shorn short by years of army haircuts. Now that he was here, against his will it had begun to grow out, and it tickled at the back of his neck every time the wind breathed.

“Too busy,” Pirah said, off to the side, and Lorien smiled for the briefest second.

“Someone has to be,” Lorien said. The sleeves of his robe were long enough that they covered most of his hands. Soren looked away, then back. “Would you like to have dinner with us, Soren? We can speak further about — ”

“No,” Soren said, without thinking. Lorien didn’t look surprised, but he saw Pirah blink behind him, as if he had taken the affront of the rejection, and it had nothing to do with Lorien at all. “I mean, that’s fine. I have training to do.” He’d have to double or triple the amount of training to keep with Pirah. He would have to run until he fell asleep and woke up in the grass.

“If you find yourself in need of a rest,” Lorien said, tucking his hands into his sleeves, “I think you know where to find us.”

Soren nodded, even though he knew he wouldn’t seek them out. There was no need to. There was no need to rest, not when he had to train. Lorien raised a hand in farewell, and his expression was calm and impenetrable as it often was, except for the weight of his eyes on Soren. Again, it felt like Lorien could see right through his flesh and down to his brittle bone.

Soren slipped and slid down the hill and back to the training yards, thinking at the last moment I could eat with them, but there was no point to doing that. Instead, he went down to the archery courts and shot arrow after arrow until the target was bristling with arrows, each one with a thought fletched onto it. It doesn’t matter what you do. It doesn’t matter how many bullseyes you hit. He will choose Pirah, and he will send you home. Back to the mud, and the dirt, the night dotted by fires in the army camp, where men looked up at him with suspicious eyes. He’d never let his hand stray too far from his sword, walking through those camps. They’d left him alone, after a good few years, but only because they found he could shoot further, draw his sword faster, chase down or hunt any of them before they even knew he was coming.

That was what mattered, he thought, cutting his arrows free from the target. Rest would not bring strength. He had shed his armour and stripped down to his lightest clothes, but he could feel the heaviness of sweat across his body; his muscles ached from head to toe until he could barely draw his bow, hands shaking.

“I thought I’d find you here,” Pirah said from behind him. There was blood on Soren’s fingers; it was his fifth attempt to draw the bow without getting it to feel right, the weight of it slipping in his hands, his eyes stinging with sweat. He had startled slightly, at the sound of Pirah's voice, and fought to hide it, putting his hands behind his back and trying to raise his head.

"I think you spend more time here than anyone else," Pirah said. He was looking down towards the target, the arrows clustered around the centre and then, as he had tired, wavering outwards. "Since you got here, at least."

"Have to stay sharp," Soren said. In truth, he didn't know what to say. Pirah was looking for something to needle under his skin, he was sure. Something to push him away from the competition.

"Do you?" Pirah said. "What Lorien is looking for — "

"I've guarded for nobles and princes before," Soren said, and he knew it was too harsh, too sharp. "They want someone to stand there and make them feel safe as they do what they like."

"That's not what this is," Pirah said, and there was no harshness in his tone, though Soren was braced for it. Another thing they thought he didn't understand. "That's not what Lorien is like."

"He's a prince," Soren said. Wasn't that explanation enough? Yes, it was true there were princes that were nicer than others, and those who liked to feel as if they were a common man, but they were still princes. All they did was either send men to die, or worry that they themselves would have to.

"I see," Pirah said. He didn't appear offended; if anything, he seemed a little pensive. He was looking at Soren now. "Well, I'm sure it will offer challenges. It's a guard for all parts of life," Pirah went on. "Hunting guard, bed guard. Lorien snores, you know, and sometimes he kicks — "

"What are you talking about," Soren said. Sweat was dripping into his eyes. His heart was beating too fast, faster even than when he had been running in his armour. He'd been warned, he'd been warned — elves have unnatural desires — he'd heard whispers behind his own back, too, as he'd ducked his head and hurried away with a red face. But to hear it spoken of so openly — what was Pirah saying, what was Pirah going to do? He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand.

Bed guard? Guard Lorien while he slept? Stand over him and watch him sleep, the soft outline of his body under the sheet, his loose hair sweeping over his bare shoulders? Watch over him when he, when he —

Pirah's eyes were on Soren's face. He was going to start explaining everything again; Soren could see the doubt on his face. It twisted into something else. He stepped forward. Soren restrained himself from flinching.

"Are you all right?" False concern from Pirah. Soren didn't know how to react to it, or how to hide the weakness that Pirah sought.

"I'm fine."

"Your fingers — "

There was blood on the floor. Not much, just a drop or two. He could feel it beading on his hand, and now they were both looking. Pirah took another step towards him, his hands outstretched as if he was going to try and take Soren's hand. Soren recoiled, dropping the bow. The clatter of wood and metal resounded on the mosaic floor.

"I have to go," Soren said, but he was turning away before he had even spoken, the words colliding with the walls and the ceiling around him. He caught a glimpse of Pirah's confused face, and then he was back out in the chill of the night, the rain lightly falling around him.

He charged back up the hill and towards the entrance of the castle. He still thought of it as a castle, even though it was unlike any he'd ever seen before. It looked as if it had grown from the earth itself, a hollow tree laden with night-blooming vines and glowing flowers. It was all unnecessary decoration; he barely paid attention to it.

His breath was coming short and seizing in his throat, squeezed tight. Nothing was making it down to his lungs. He had to stop and lean against the wall, the bark rough against the palms of his hands. The stone under his feet was smooth with thousands of years of elves walking the halls, and little white star flowers pushed up around the edges. He still couldn't breathe. It was dim and quiet in the hall; from somewhere very distant he could hear a harp.

Without even trying, Pirah had made him look a fool. Worse than that, he even felt like a fool, half doubled over in the dim corridor.

Being inside wasn't that much different from outside, here. Everywhere in his chambers was like a ruin gone to seed, moss grown over great flagstones. There was a dip in the stone near where he hung his clothes, where water seeped in with just a thought, whenever he wanted it. It reacted to his thoughts, usually steaming hot when he needed it, but tonight it was ice cold when he ran his fingertips over it; there were even little shards of ice floating on the surface.

He undressed slowly. His armguards were wet with sweat, and the fabric of his shirt underneath stuck to his skin. He had to pull it away. Underneath his skin was red from the pressure of the buckles, marked lines running down his forearms. His muscles were locked together; it was difficult to raise his arms above his shoulders. There was still a terrible bruise down his ribs and side, from when he had fallen sparring against Astrea earlier in the week, and it was now purple and mottled green.

His face — he didn't want to think about his face, or his hair falling messily against his neck now, too short to braid as the elves did, but too long to be accepted back home. very time it brushed the back of his neck it made him jump, even now. He unwound the scarf from his neck. It was damp with sweat too, and the back of his neck felt odd when exposed to the air. It was strange how quickly that had happened.

Soren hissed in a hard breath as he dipped his foot into the icy bath. There was no reason to be a baby about it, he thought, plunging into the cold as quickly as he could. It enveloped him like a freezing hand, squeezing the breath out of his lungs. He groaned, pressing his lips together. First his skin tingled, then went numb, as he leaned his head back against the mossy lip and thought, it doesn't hurt, it feels good, until the pain began to fade. He closed his eyes so he didn't have to look down at himself through the clear water and see the signs of his weakness blooming on his skin.

He grit his teeth and sucked in a breath through them, straightening his back. A terrible fire was beginning to ignite inside the hollow of his chest, behind his lungs.

So he had looked the fool. No one had seen it except Pirah, so it hadn't been that much of a success, had it? And this meant Pirah would underestimate him now.

A man who can't march can march himself to hell, he thought, an echo that still resounded in his mind. I'll be better. He had to be better. There was no other choice. He'd wake earlier, before the sun, and run before Pirah had even turned over from sleeping. He'd train harder, sleep less, pick a heavier sword, a tenser bow. It was all he knew how to do, to get better. If he worked hard enough, even if he lost the battle to Pirah, maybe — and this thought came just as he could barely summon the energy to complete it — maybe they'd let him stay.

He jerked awake in tepid water, which sloshed over the edge of the bath and wet the tiles there. Sunlight streamed through the canopy of leaves above him, and he could see, through his wet lashes, the movement of birds above.

Fuck, he thought, and then again, realising it was well past dawn, and more towards the middle of the morning. His heart banged against the front of his ribs as he pushed himself up from the bath in a great rush, almost slipping on the wet tiles as the water dripped from his body. The ground caught his eye; all around the bath the moss was turning brown and dead, prickling his bare feet. It made his stomach sour to look at it. So he was killing even the land now, as it soundly rejected his presence. He had expected nothing less. If anything, it was a confirmation of what he felt. It exhausted him. He could only choke back a laugh as he looked down at it.

Dressed, he hurried back down the living corridor; he ignored the other elves going about their business, and refused to even look up and see if they were staring at him or not. Apologise — apologise and take the beating. That was what he would have done at home; he didn't even know who to apologise to here.

Outside, the hill was the verdant green that came with early-morning drizzle followed by bright sun. He narrowed his eyes against it. There were just a few smudges of white cloud in the sky, and he was already beginning to sweat under his scarf. Sucking in hurried breaths, he approached the beaten-earth training yard and saw the others paired off for sparring, silver swords flashing in the air faster than any human.

Something was different — there was a red umbrella set up on the hillside, casting shade over a rug. Lorien was there, sitting cross-legged on his perch overlooking the yard. He would have to go straight to the prince, then, and surely that would destroy his chances. But it had to be done. There was no other recourse.

"I'm sorry I'm late," he said, the words coming out all at once, as he teetered at the edge of Lorien's yellow rug and tried not to step on it with his muddy boots.

"What?" Lorien said, startling a little, as if Soren had broken him from a trance. There was a sheaf of papers pinned under his right knee, fluttering in the wind, and an inky quill stained the fingers of his left hand. "Oh, Soren. Hello."

"I said I'm sorry I'm late," he repeated, and tried to sound contrite, not like he was pushing the words through his teeth. That was something that had gotten him in more trouble than not. But Lorien only looked at him curiously.

"Did we agree on a time?" he said.

"No," Soren said, and stopped. That was true, wasn't it? No one had ever told him he had to be at the training yards at dawn, and yet that was when he rose and made his way out to them, when the flowers were just beginning to open. He rarely saw anyone else at that time, it was true, except for occasionally seeing others going to bed. "I don't know."

"I wouldn't be surprised if I'd forgotten," Lorien said, and his eyes narrowed slightly. "But I suppose I'd be early, then, wouldn't I?"

Soren didn't know what to say. Lorien seemed more confused than upset. It wasn't — hold out your hand, palm up — but then maybe it was Pirah he should be apologising to? But Pirah regularly arrived after Soren, second to the field.

"Would you like something to eat?" Lorien said, pointing one of his feet towards a little basket of fruit at the end of his blanket.

"No," Soren said, despite the griping of his stomach. He was late enough already. A man that can't march on an empty stomach won't get very far, he thought.

"Suit yourself," Lorien said. He didn't seem upset, or even particularly concerned, but again Soren could not shake the feeling that Lorien was somehow seeing right through him. It wasn't fair — Lorien was the most inscrutable of all the elves. Soren couldn't read him at all. He wasn't stoic, or passive; it was something else. "Well, you've arrived just in time to see Pirah's new trick."

"Right," Soren said, casting his eyes down onto the training field. Lorien was looking at him sidelong, as if expecting Soren to give something more than one-syllable answers. But Soren didn't have to bite his tongue; talking back had been smacked out of him at an early age. "I'll go down."

"It's not a punishment, being asked to do this," Lorien said, with more gentleness than Soren deserved.

"I didn't think it was, your highness," Soren said, tone flat. The way the title rolled out of his mind and out of his mouth was nothing but a reflex. Lorien blinked. "I'm going down now," he said, before he could let himself be made even more of a fool. It was just something about Lorien that made his tongue want to tie in stuttering knots, though he was too disciplined for that. What was it? As he'd said to Pirah, he'd worked for princes before.

"I see that," Lorien said, watching him slip over the grass. "Have a nice time down there," was the last thing Soren heard him say; it sounded too bland to not have some kind of an edge to it, though he wasn't sure what that might be, and soon Lorien's voice was washed away by the sounds of swords and the calls of partners to one another. Pirah's rang above all, loud with excitement as Soren approached the point where the grass turned into beaten earth.

"Soren," Pirah called, as soon as he had stepped over that threshold. He was — glowing. There was no other word for it, really. The sun was always good to him, rendering him golden, and not pallid, and now it was united with the flush of excitement on his face. "Do you want to see my new trick?"

No, of course he didn't. There was no way this was new, not when he'd decided to demonstrate it for the first time before Lorien. Pirah had been saving this for some time, no doubt. Even if he hadn't been expecting to be competing against anyone. He'd waited until all eyes were on him, and then —

"All right," Soren said. Let's see it, then, he thought, the fire beginning to burn in his chest again, licking at the back of his ribs.

"Again?" Astrea said. She was a slim, athletic elf with a permanent cheerful smile, her hair dark brown with a touch of red under the sun. Soren had found it strange to fight against her at the beginning — back then, the men's and women's armies had always been strictly separated — but it had only taken a few bouts before they'd settled into mutual respect. She didn't talk to him much; no one really did.

"You don't like drawing your sword against me?" Pirah said. It was clear he was in his element, more comfortable than the conversation on the hill last night, and certainly more comfortable than what had happened on the archery range — Soren's stomach twisted. He chose not to think about it, pushing it down and out of his mind.

"Oh, Pirah, I like drawing my sword against you the most," Astrea said, dropping her hand down to her sheathed blade. There was a smile in her voice, and a laugh went around the training field. There was an easy camaraderie between all of them. They'd known each other for so long, he thought. Years. Hundreds of years. It made his throat squeeze tight just to think about it. Pirah didn't laugh; he looked serious, and Soren saw in him the warrior's way of looking, glancing up at down at Astrea, observing her stance, her training. Soren did the same; her stance wasn't as practised as Pirah, her grip on her sword casual, as if she — and the others — were mere beginners. Pirah was the only one who seemed to be truly invested.

Pirah wasn't drawing his own sword, though, just standing there with his hands open, as if he had noticed a friend approaching him. Soren narrowed his eyes — he could see Astrea's muscles shifting, as time narrowed down to the one instant where she went from a guarded stance to drawing her sword in a fluid rush, against Pirah, who was unarmed, his hand not even near his sword. He was still — she was moving to strike —

Soren jerked forward on pure instinct, without even a second's thought — what was he going to do? He didn't even have a sword — and then came to a stop, as the ring of sword against sword echoed through the still air. Pirah had drawn his sword and blocked Astrea's strike before it had hit him.

What, Soren thought, too confounded to be truly called a thought, and then How? He hadn't even seen Pirah move, but there he was, undeniably blocking Astrea's sword, his hands clenched on the hilt of his own, his own blade close enough to his face that he was looking up into his own reflection.

"Even closer that time," Astrea said. She didn't seem rattled at all by how close she had come to striking Pirah directly in the face. She was smiling. "How did you learn that?"

"Practice," Pirah said, and they slid their blades apart with the bright ring of metal. "Before Soren arrived, it would be me out here alone in the morning."

Another dig — I'm more experienced than you.

"It's an old technique," Pirah said, and he was looking at Soren now, his blade still held in his left hand, a river of blue-silver steel. "What do you think of that?"

"It's" — like nothing I've ever seen before — "impressive." It sounded dry. He saw Pirah give him a quick up and down, gaze lingering on his fingers, which made Soren compulsively tuck them behind his back. You don't know me, he thought, fiercely enough that he saw Pirah glance at his face and narrow his eyes. He didn't like that look. That look said something like I'm going to figure you out.

Soren swallowed, slowly. What Pirah had done looked incredible and it took guts, that was for sure, but it was simple. With enough practice, and if he was fast enough, he had a feeling somewhere deep in his muscles that he could do it too.

"I'd like to try," Soren said. He saw Pirah hesitate, and then sheathe his sword in a smooth movement.

"I don't know," he said. The fire in Soren's chest flared. "I don't know if I could — " His voice softened with something. Pity? "I wouldn't want to hurt you."

"You could try to hurt me," Soren said. "I think that would be the point."

Astrea looked up at him sharply, but he kept his eyes on Pirah, whose lips quirked with the hint of a smile. But it disappeared quickly, leaving behind something Soren couldn't read at all. He could hear soft murmuring around him; he knew that preceded a laugh.

Soren reached down for his sword and found nothing — he had never fetched it from the armoury. That was why Pirah looked so confused and — concerned. Was he mistaken? What could Pirah be concerned for? The prospect of the duel itself, or Soren? No, he could not be concerned about Soren at all. Probably perturbed by how they were no match at all.

Soren turned on his heel and headed for the armoury, ducking his head to hide the blush burning on his cheeks. Enough of this, he thought, trying to slow his hurried steps. The stronger he tried to look, the more foolish he made himself look, and the weaker he felt. It had always been like this. The better he'd become at archery, with the sword, the faster he'd run, the more they'd talked about him behind his back. It wasn't fair, they said. He had an advantage. It was unearned.

Inside the shade of the armoury, he sucked in a shuddering breath. There was no excuse for acting this way, for letting his emotions get the better of him. He was a soldier, and he had to act like one. Even here. Even if there was no army here, not any more. And — especially if they were going to send him back.

He thought he'd left his bow on the archery range, but it was here, hanging on the wall with his sword. How had his bow returned here? He hadn't cut the arrows out of the target, either. Soren poked his head around the corner and looked down the archery range. Nothing was out of place. There was no trace of his blood on the stone. Pirah again. Soren pressed it down. It didn't matter. None of this — mattered.

Pirah's bow was on the wall next to his. The two of them couldn't be more different, Soren thought, looking at it. Both Pirah's sword and his bow were thin, almost delicate-looking things. The first time he'd seen Pirah's sword he'd almost laughed at it. It looked like it would break in half at the first blow from a larger sword. But that had not proven to be the case; he was faster with it than anything Soren had ever seen, and he could turn aside even the heaviest blow. You could not overwhelm him with sheer power. Only skill would beat him, Soren thought, scraping his bottom lip with his teeth.

He hefted his blade. It dragged down his arms; bright tingles of pain raced up and down his right arm. He ignored them and grit his teeth. For some reason he could not name, he hesitated at the door. He'd fought a hundred men or more in a thousand training fights, but it felt like there was a weight on his back. He shoved it down until it settled in his sour stomach. It was useless to feel these things.

Outside, the other elves were chattering in a loose semi-circle around Pirah, who had sheathed his sword and was standing easy with his head thrown back, laughing at something one of the others had said. Just the sight of him made Soren determined to win. It was him they were laughing at. It could be no other.

"Are you ready?" he said, and his voice was rough enough to surprise himself.

"Always," Pirah said, and he drew his sword, looking sidelong at Soren — sizing him up. I have no weaknesses you can see, he thought, trying to relax his jaw. He was clenching it; his teeth creaked. You don't know me. The others backed away from them.

"Not going to try your draw trick?" Soren said.

"Maybe next time," Pirah said, and it looked like he could not keep himself from smiling. You can't handle it, was what that smile said. You're weak.

"You can have first strike then," Soren said.

"I don't need any advantages," Pirah said.

"Might as well take them where you can," Soren said. The tension between them was growing thick; it made him feel hot all over. He saw Pirah's stance shift and he moved instinctively to readiness. Pirah's blade caught the light, revealing its etchings, and for a fraction of a second Soren's mind wandered along its length. Beautiful, he thought, like a stained-glass window.

No — allowing his mind to wander even for a second was a fatal mistake. Pirah tensed. Lunged. Soren dodged to the side, knocking his sword away without a thought. He sank into his body. Everything narrowed down. His focus was Pirah. Only Pirah. The way he fought, his twisting blade. Parry. Attack. The ring of steel on steel.

They were evenly matched. It didn't seem possible, but it was true. Pirah's strikes could not break his guard. Nor could he find a way to break Pirah's. The way Pirah fought was a strange, twisting thing. Soren could tell what he was going to do, most of the time, but it was never quite right. Pirah was always a little faster, a little ahead of what Soren was thinking. But the same was true of himself. He was stronger and he could tell that he was hitting harder than Pirah anticipated, though he was doing his best to turn aside the power of Soren's blows.

Every now and then, between the whirl of Pirah's blade and hair, Soren caught a glimpse of his face. He was enjoying this, he realised with a jolt. Pirah's face was aglow with delight. The entire right side of his body was made of white fire, burning his muscles from the inside out. He stepped back as he swapped his sword to his left hand. Pirah's eyes widened with something — pity that he had tired Soren so much already?

"I didn't know you could use both," he said, looking Soren up and down.

Soren grunted in response. Of course he could. It was the only way he had survived.

Their swords met again and again, the sound of it crashing through the air. Soren could hardly find the space to breathe, or the energy to make it seem like his right arm wasn't lying dead at his side. There had to be a way out. A way to win. A way to make it stop. But he couldn't think beyond the pain in his arm. It was taking all of his energy just to stay half a second ahead of Pirah. He was acting on pure instinct. There was no difference between now and when he was one strike away from death on a black-earth battlefield.

Then it happened, as Pirah was in the middle of a feint, his foot sliding out of position. It wasn't a decision Soren made. Pure instinct — protect himself. Faster than a thought, Soren moved; he hooked his foot around Pirah's ankle and pulled. It was sudden, but he could see the surprise in Pirah's body, faltering for the barest moment, his breath whooping in, but Pirah was fast, pivoting to block Soren. It was too late. He hadn't fallen, but their swords were locked, their arms pinned, and neither of them could move without giving the fight to the other.

All Soren could hear was his own desperate breathing, and some murmuring behind them. It took a moment to make his sword arm relax, and allow Pirah to disentangle them. For a moment he could not look up into Pirah's glowing green eyes. Look up — it still felt wrong to have to look up at anyone.

Pirah leaned forward, raising his free hand. Soren didn't know what to do, couldn't tell what was happening. He forced himself to lower his sword. What was Pirah doing? Soren couldn't read a blow in his stance. For one wild breathless second, he thought Pirah was going to tuck Soren's hair behind his ear. Terror spiked in his chest; only that fear stopped him from rearing back.

Pirah leaned close. Soren couldn't look away from his eyes, and he could not read his expression, either; it was looking for something. "Next time," he said, close to Soren's ear, "don't hold back."

Soren shivered, full-bodied, and just managed to swallow it. Pirah withdrew, his eyes glinting, and stepped behind him. Soren was red-faced; he could feel his skin heating as he ducked his head and sheathed his sword left-handed. His breath was still coming fast and deep as he stepped away, trying to stretch out his arm without anybody noticing. Behind him, he could just hear the whispers of the other elves in fractured words: he tried, did you see, cheating — and then above that, Pirah's voice, "It's fine. Things are different there — we can learn from him — "

The sounds faded out as he wandered away to the edge of the training yard. Why had he done that? It wasn't something people did in training, even back there. He'd resorted to low-down, dirty tricks, instead of his skill. What little skill he had. Soren tried not to think what he would have done if Pirah had fallen. How they would all have looked at him. It would probably be less than an hour before they threw him out, if Pirah had not been so fast — if Pirah had fallen and Soren had held his blade to his throat.

He flexed his hand back and forth. Sensation was returning, slowly, as he stretched his arm. There was an ember of pain lodged in his shoulder. He ignored it, stretching his arm out, huffing out short, pained breaths.

"Soren," Pirah called. Soren jumped — why would Pirah wish to speak with him, except to gloat? He turned, trying to settle his breathing and smooth his face into nothingness. Leave no hint of weakness. No thread of anything that Pirah could pull on. "That was wonderful — you'll have to teach me that parry — " His voice faded out. There was nothing on his face but interest, and even when Soren narrowed his eyes, he couldn't see that strange, searching gaze on Pirah's face that had been so present before. A relief. He had to fight to listen to what he was saying. "We're going swimming. Are you coming?"

"Swimming," Soren said, and his voice sounded so dubious that it bordered on rude. Swimming? Even though he had been late, the sun was barely approaching noon. This couldn't be how Pirah had become such a good swordsman. Sleeping late and arriving at all times — Soren was his equal, and he had managed it in a quarter of the time, or — however old Pirah was. He didn't know. What he knew was that he had done it by waking earlier each year and staying out on the field till night, until there was no one else that could beat him, and very few that were willing to try.

"It's warmer by the waterfall," Pirah said, and clapped him on the arm as a friend might, making Soren flinch. "Have you been out there yet?"

Soren shook his head. "I can't," he said. It sounded wrong, even to him. His voice was shot through with something he could not name. Pirah narrowed his eyes. "I just — " There was a desperate edge to his voice that he bit off before it could get worse. "I have to train."

"I think you're doing well enough, judging from that," Pirah said, and he was smiling. It was difficult to look at.

Soren looked away. It was important that Lorien had seen — his gaze wandered up to the hill, but found the red blanket empty. How long had he been gone? Soren hadn't looked even before the duel. Pirah followed his gaze, and there was a brief flash of something on his face that Soren could not read.

"You can never make Lorien sit still for that long," he said, glancing back down at Soren. "If you want to join us later, just come to the waterfall." He moved to touch Soren's arm again and pulled away before making contact, turning around and leaving Soren with nothing more than the whirl of his hair in the air. The other elves were still looking over at them. Soren could not tell exactly what they were thinking, but the weight of their gazes was heavy. Probably they had been watching to make sure he didn't draw his sword on Pirah and attempt to run him through.

He bit at the dry skin of his lips, resting his hand on the hilt of his sword. Even that made white-hot lances of pain shiver up his veins. When he turned, the others were gone and he was truly alone in the yard, alone enough to crouch down and suck in heaving breaths. Being in the silence was worse, because it was not silence at all. He could hear the terrible thumping of his own heart — he was supposed to be strong, supposed to be able to bear anything — and the whisper of the wind through the trees nearby, the sound of the birds. Wasting time. That was that sound.

He drank deep from the cold well water next to the field, and spent what felt like hours trying to stretch out his right shoulder and get the blood moving through it. But the sun had barely moved from noon when he could do no more. Even moving his arm made him grit his teeth and break out in sweat.

He poured water over his head and pushed his hair back, letting the little icy trails shiver down his body. So stupid, he thought, opening and closing his hand and looking down at his fingers. Stupid. No one else got hurt just from everyday training. But even that was wrong. He wasn't hurt at all. He was lazy. Afraid. Weak.

Soren closed his eyes and bowed his head for a moment. He reached down, pulled his sword from his belt, and forced himself to stand, hoisting it back onto the wall. Next to Pirah's slim sword it looked — it didn't matter.

So everyone else could shirk their duties and leave him here. Swimming, wherever Lorien had gone — if he had been one minute late for his duties, he would have been sent to the middle of the training field and —

It wasn't worth thinking about. He would find Lorien. He would see that he was nothing more than an idle prince with no thoughts other than of himself, and the illusion would be dispelled. He exited the training room and charged up the hill, his breathing hard and his heart beating fast. The hot flame under it was burning again, and he could feel it singeing his flesh. It kept burning through the vine-and-flower entrance to the living castle, and all the way to the communal dining room in the centre of the trunk, where the roof stretched so high above it was difficult to see. Lunch preparations were underway, and there were plenty of elves chattering in the corners and at the tables.

Where he usually sat was all the way at the back, as far away from the others as he could get. There was a dark-haired elf there today, her head bent over some scrolls: the court poet.

"Ye-jun," Soren said, feeling immediately foolish. His voice was rough and halfway to angry.

"The reason I don't mind you sitting here is you don't talk," Ye-jun said, without looking up. She dipped her quill in the ink pot and began scribbling in the margin of her scroll. "Don't ruin it now."

"Have you seen Lorien?"

"Of course I've seen Lorien," she said. "Everyone sees Lorien, all the time. I don't know where he gets the energy."

"I meant where — "

"Bees," she said, and then when Soren didn't move, she lifted a hand with feigned exertion and pointed towards the back of the hall, where there was another path Soren had never investigated. "Come back when you're ready to not talk again."

Soren turned and went. His momentum was already faltering. This was nothing like what a warrior should do, this emotional stalking back and forth in a fit of anger. Even so, his heavy steps echoed on the floor as he pushed through the dim corridor and emerged — into a flowering garden. He'd never been back here before. In fact, ever since he'd arrived, he'd been beating a single path to and from the training yard.

He followed the cobbled path, ducking under trellises and past rows of flowers. The moss was overgrown in and around the cobbles. He thought of the dead ring around his bath and swallowed, slowly.

Further past the neat garden, there was a point where the flowers joined the grass, and then sprawling down the hill were the beehives. They weren't the white pillar-boxes tucked into the hill that Soren had expected, but a ring of trees, with the beehives hanging from the branches, or tucked into the crack in a dead tree.

He could see Lorien at the centre of the ring, not wearing any of the beekeeper's garb that Soren was familiar with from when he and the other soldiers had taken some princeling or noble on the tour of the palace grounds. In fact, the only thing different about him was that he was wearing a very large straw hat.

Soren couldn't put a name to it, but it quelled some of his anger just to see Lorien's figure, his brown-russet hair spilling down his back, the grace of his movements. When Soren drew a little closer, he could see that the bees were all over him, settling on his arms, his hair, his hands. The sound of them was overwhelming, to the point that Lorien didn't seem to notice his approach until he reached the edge of the ring of trees.

"Soren," Lorien said then, half-turning away from whatever he was doing. Meeting his gaze was like standing under the full power of the sun. It dwarfed the power of the fire underneath Soren's heart, making it feel like nothing. He couldn't even name what this feeling was. He was so used to naming his practical feelings and dismissing them. Tired. Sore. Those were fixed by a few hours of sleep so deep it felt like death. Anything more than that he did not know. "I thought you were with Pirah."

"Went swimming," Soren said, and somehow his voice sounded breathless and like the rough bark of a dog at the same time. Lorien crooked an eyebrow. His eyes were red-brown in the light.

"Without you?" he said, but his attention was turning back to the bees already. "I would've thought he'd want to take you along." There were bees on his neck among the soft duck-down hair there, moving peacefully along the curve of his nape, the back of his slender hands that did not know war, going up and down his sleeves.

Soren couldn't quite manage to form a thought. He couldn't stop looking at Lorien's wrists, and could only pray stupidly that Lorien didn't notice. He'd never felt like this around a prince before. Usually their titles held no weight to him. Why had he come here? To scold Lorien. "What are you doing?" he said, and instead of any heat it might've held, it sounded curious.

"Someone has to look after the bees," Lorien said, sounding gently amused, though whether it was due to the bees wandering all over him or due to Soren, he could not tell. "And you?"

Someone has to look after me? Soren thought, then dropped the thought like a hot coal. "We were training."

"Ah," Lorien said. "That's where I'm meant to be, isn't it?" He half-smiled and looked away. "My apologies."

"Why are you apologising to me?" Soren said, and it came out of him with more fervour than he had expected. "You're a prince."

"I think that means I should apologise," Lorien said, and some silent signal made all the bees take off from him at once, a little cloud rising to the tops of the trees. He shook out his hands and came a little closer, tipping his hat back so he could look Soren in the eye. "Don't you think?"

"I don't know," Soren said. There were little holes cut into Lorien's hat for his ears. Soren couldn't look away, though it made him feel like his throat was closing. Lorien was looking at him a little sceptically. He felt weak. I can't be here, he thought. I can't feel like this. This isn't what a man — a soldier feels like.

He reached down to grasp at his sword and found nothing. That was right. There was no need, no call to carry a sword here. Lorien had followed his movement, and was looking at him with narrowed eyes. "Come down to the orchard with me," he said. It was a command, not a question. Soren knew how to follow commands.

He trailed behind Lorien as if he was guarding him, watching his bare feet get wet with dew. Lorien was sunkissed. It was a horrible word to use, and it made Soren's stomach twist, but it was the only way to describe him. Where had he even heard it? A poem, a song? Something that had entered his mind without his knowledge. Something that served no purpose. From here, he could see the freckles under Lorien's eye, and the blush of red to his skin. No prince he'd ever seen had looked like that. They always stayed indolently inside, drinking and gambling while Soren sat by the door, squeezing the hilt of his sword until his hand went numb.

Lorien took him down the hill to the apple orchard, where the trees were heavy with fruit, the leaves lush and every shade of green. Soren huffed out a breath and leaned against one of the trunks. It was undignified, but better than pitching over sideways. Lorien was looking at him curiously. "Soren," he said, and Soren wilted internally. It was the way someone said your name when the next thing they said was going to be uncomfortable. "How are you faring? We haven't spoken much since you arrived."

Since I rolled up half-dead and forced you to take me in, Soren thought. He pushed his hand through his hair and tried to think of a way to avoid the question. "I — " Every day hurts more. I've killed the plants in my room. I can't look at you. I think the others hate me. I don't even know what to say about Pirah. "I am well," he said, swallowing down everything else. It sat like a hard stone in his stomach.

"I'm glad," Lorien said, and his tone was too light for the way he was still looking at Soren. The boughs above them were laden with red-golden apples that were as big as Soren's fist. Even the air smelled of apples and honey. The whole grove was a verdant paradise. Soren swallowed, slowly. His traitorous stomach threatened to growl.

"Do you want one?" Lorien said. Soren straightened his back. Was he betraying his hunger? He could not look weak in front of the prince. "I'd be pleased — I've worked hard to revitalise this grove." He reached up and grabbed hold of the branch, pulling himself up onto it effortlessly and with grace. It barely even bowed under his weight; Soren felt somehow small and like a giant, lumbering beast at the same time, looking directly at Lorien's bare feet, adorned only with strands of wet grass.

"No," he said, and the word slipped free of him under Lorien's eyes. No, no. I can't. I — don't deserve it. I don't deserve it. Leave me the kitchen scraps. And then, when he realised the silence had stretched to become awkward, "No, thank you." He knew well enough to be polite even when he felt bleak or snappish.

"Suit yourself," Lorien said, taking off his hat and throwing it down to Soren, who caught it out of reflex. Apples followed, Soren ignoring the shooting pains in his arm to catch them so they would not bruise. This was what he'd expected — to somehow know what Lorien wanted him to do before he did; to be a tool for his whims. It was all the same after all. Then Lorien jumped down, landing with a soft thump. "You know," he said, "if our food is not to your tastes, I'm sure we can find — "

"It's fine," Soren said, too quickly, cutting off Lorien's words. That wasn't the problem at all. Even the water at the training yard was more pure and clear than anything he had ever tasted. Settling cold in his belly, it had made him wonder if he'd ever really tasted anything before. There was no tainted taste of dirt or rust from the sun-warmed bucket and shared ladle.

"I understand," Lorien said, with that selfsame gentleness that made Soren feel like a cat being petted the wrong way. "I would anticipate the transition could be — "

"You don't understand," Soren said, and it burst free of him without his consent. "Don't pretend to. Have you ever left these lands?"

"No, I haven't," Lorien said. He didn't look taken aback or even shocked, which made the cold fire under Soren's heart flare again.

"Then you don't understand," Soren said, and once he began speaking he could barely stop. "How could you? None of you are clamouring for a trip to where I came from, are you? None of you have ever had to think of what it's like on the other side." His voice was rising; he half-expected someone to come charging in with a sword to protect the prince.

"If I had known you were there," Lorien said, and he still didn't sound disturbed in the least by what Soren was saying. He was too calm, too even-tempered.

"Believe that if you want," Soren said. Lorien slid out of the tree and they were face to face again, his cool gaze quelling the fire in Soren's heart. His desolate thoughts were rising to the surface now. No one cared to help — it's only now that they pretend they ever did.

"I do believe exactly what I want," Lorien said, and there was a needle threaded through those words that might scratch Soren if he moved wrong. He prepared for a fight — but when he looked up and met Lorien's considering gaze, he wished he could swallow back his words. Had he not spent years learning to hold his tongue? It had only been a moment ago he had lost control.

"I'm sorry, my prince," he said. How could he have spoken to Lorien like that? Lorien wasn't one of those he had served before, but he knew how this went. His whole body was folding to the ground, telling him, Kiss his ring. Hope he doesn't hit too hard. Kiss his ring. He knelt on the grass, supplicant, waiting for Lorien's hand. It did not come, so he moved forward to reach for it — Lorien would not indulge him by meeting him halfway. Perhaps he wished him to crawl, so he could put a foot on Soren's back —

But Lorien wasn't wearing a ring. He was holding his hat, still laden with apples, and for the first time he looked a little confused and perturbed by what Soren was doing. Soren scrambled to his feet at once, feeling hot and cold at once. He had only made himself look stranger and more stupid — he had called Lorien my prince, and there was no way Lorien would not take some strange elvish inference from that.

"Your highness," Soren said, and then because his thoughts could not form anything else, "I have to go." And then he turned and walked briskly — fled — all the way back up the hill and past the bees, thinking stupid, so stupid, with each footfall. Back through the garden. Back through the living tree, nearly bowling over an elf coming around the corner. But he couldn't stop. There was nothing in his body except the terrible beating of his heart and the sour pain spreading through him.

He should go back to his room — and what, lie there amongst the foliage, the proof of his unsuitability and his failures? What would be the point of that? No, there was only one place to go, and even though he might be grinding his body to nothingness, it would feel better than sitting idle. At least it felt better to be moving than to sit alone with his own thoughts. It didn't matter if his hand even hurt at rest now. Didn't matter that the hot, white sparks of pain were seeping into his blood.

His steps were speeding up, rushing for the exit on the other side of the massive tree trunk. Back out to the yard, where the sun was beginning to stretch the shadows of the trees over the beaten earth, but —

Fuck, he thought, halting with such suddeness that his feet skidded in the loam, right to the edge of the trunk's shadow. Pirah. A wet-haired Pirah, with his hair pushed back against his head and behind his hair, separating into lengths of black. It ought to look foolish — Soren knew he would, but on Pirah it just made him look a little bold and energetic. Soren pictured a shady grove, where the trees were close enough to the water's edge that the leaves trailed on the surface, where the elves reclined on the mossy shore, unashamed in their nakedness, slipping in and out of the cool water. And Pirah — Pirah would have been the boldest of them all —

He shook his head. It was a waste to even think about places he could not go. He wouldn't even strip off his shirt in front of any of the others, lest he have to endure their stares. But he wasn't afraid, he wasn't a coward. It was that he simply didn't wish to. He blinked, dashing away his thoughts. It was obvious that Pirah had enjoyed himself — he still had a small smile on his face, and his movements were fluid and easy. It was better that Soren had not gone.

The coal under his heart was reigniting. He couldn't stand here. At any moment he was sure Pirah would turn and see him. But there was nowhere else to go.

"Oh, there you are," Pirah said, as Soren stepped over the fence and back into the training yard. He was already regretting it; Pirah was better and he knew it, and he must be waiting for another opportunity to show it. Except — his hair was still wet, coiled around his head in a thick, dark braid. As if he had come right from the pool. But why?

Soren said nothing and just approached him; he could not pretend that he hadn't seen Pirah. Why was he back? Surely it was more fun cavorting with the others. Soren just wanted to be alone with his sword, and now he could not even have that.

"I felt bad leaving you here by yourself," Pirah said, and his hands were on his hips, looking right at Soren as if he really believed what he was saying.

"It's" — what I deserve — "fine."

"Ah, you always say that," Pirah said, waving a hand. He was smiling. He was always smiling. What was there to smile about?

"What would you prefer me to say?" Soren said. Pressure was building at the back of his head, an incessant wave of pain rolling over him. Sparks danced at the corners of his vision.

"My only preference is for you to speak your mind," Pirah said, and for a moment he looked confused, as if he had expected Soren to say something different — or to sound different. Soren's voice was a harsh grate; he was pressing his teeth together too hard. Pirah's tone was light in comparison.

"Neither of us wants that," Soren said. He needed to stop talking, before the black blood at the back of his throat spewed forth from his mouth.

"You're a man who prefers to talk with his sword," Pirah said, and whatever confusion he might have felt was restrained behind a sidelong glance. Soren followed his gaze down to the fence; both their swords were there, sitting side by side. Pirah had fetched them in anticipation of Soren returning. They looked ill-matched, Pirah's delicate, pearlescent sword, and Soren's heavy black blade. As incongruous as their owners. In the army, Soren had developed a habit of hunching in on himself to look smaller, more normal. Here, he was small, even with his back pulled straight and his shoulders back — held taut despite the deep ache in his bones.

"It's my preferred language," Soren said, half expecting Pirah to cuff him across the mouth. He'd long since been beaten out of having a smart tongue. Why was it coming back now? He didn't even want to say these things, but he couldn't keep them in.

"Oh, in that case," Pirah said and smiled, dipping his eyes. "I'd very much like to learn it."

Oh, of course he would, Soren thought. Learn all Soren's tricks to use them against him. Learn him from the inside out, so he could figure out what part to press against to crack him wide open —

"There you go," Pirah said, and only a flash of movement in the corner of his eye made Soren turn on reflex and catch his sword as Pirah threw it to him, pure instinct preventing the hilt from crashing against his jaw. Pirah was watching him — always watching him, even as he drew his own sword in a rush of watery steel. Gods, it was beautiful, the way it caught the light and returned it like an overturned shell at the bottom of a clear lake. He had to blink to get his eyes to focus. They stung as if sweat was running into them, but he felt cold.

Soren drew his sword without looking, with his eyes half-closed. "I want to learn from you," Pirah was saying, his voice distant, as if Soren's ears were underwater. His vision was fading. He blinked three or four times, but each time it only made things better for just a moment, before he began to drift again.

"Are you all right?"

He opened his mouth to respond, to say of course I am, and raise his sword, but all that came forth was a rattling sigh. A veil was drawn over his vision. He could not raise his sword, though he fought to do so. Darkness — but a warm darkness, shattered with stars, a darkness that caught him when he fell.

*

For a brief, blessed moment, he was alone. Alone, his mind turning softly in his skull. He thought for a moment that he was in the cot back in the barracks, catching a moment's sleep in between drills. It had always been too light there, too active. He could never sleep, only chase patterns of fragmented sunlight behind his eyelids. It felt like that now. But he was more comfortable now than he had ever been then, even with the dull pain that had sunk into his very bones.

Slowly, he opened his eyes, the patterns above him becoming leaves that moved gently back and forth with the breathing of the wind. He could feel that same wind skimming across his hands and his face. Then he could hear someone speaking, very close by —

"And right then Lorien realised what had been going on the whole time. You should have seen his face! We had to pick flowers for him for three days. But it was worth it."

"What?" Soren said. He was disoriented. Something warm and firm was under his head. He looked up — Pirah was looking down at him. His head was resting in Pirah's lap, and they were up against the wall of the armoury, Pirah leaning back. He was so tired — he couldn't bring himself to move. But he had to move. He had to move now, before someone came and saw him like this, before anything else happened — but he had neither the strength nor the will, just a shiver of terror down his spine.

"Oh dear, you only heard the end?" Pirah said. He was smiling, though Soren could not read his face. "I'll tell you another time. Eat this."

He held a slice of fruit out towards Soren's mouth. Soren blinked, slow, his mind feeling syrupy. He reached up to take the fruit, his bones grinding against each other, and found it cool to the touch. It was sweet and crisp in his mouth, the juice running down the back of his throat. Like everything else here, the flavour was too good. It was somehow floral, rich; he could taste a trace of the dirt it had been grown in, the clear water that had nourished it, the warmth of the sun. He wanted to close his eyes again.

"What happened?" he said instead.

"I think you f— might have had a touch of vertigo," Pirah said lightly. He handed Soren another slice of fruit and then another, until Soren's mind began to clear. Pirah shifted a little, the edge of his hair brushing the side of Soren's face, and Soren realised with a jolt how he was lying, his head turned towards Pirah's waist. He twisted and sat up without another word, even though it made him dizzy all over again, a rush of vertigo from his head down to his body. "I apologise if I pushed you too hard — if there are human limits — "

"No," Soren said, too abruptly. Was that what he had become, this weak, human thing that only grunted its answers for fear of being asked further questions? "I've fought battles that lasted from one first light to the next. I've raised my sword not knowing how many days ago I slept — "

"Really?" Pirah said, cutting Soren off, and he was about to take affront until he noticed Pirah leaning forward, eyes fixed on Soren's face. "You were in a battle like that?"

"Of course," Soren said, frowning. His jaw was drawing tight against his will, his words pushed out through his teeth. "I've been in a hundred battles like that." It was true, but he knew Pirah did not understand the depth of what he was talking about. The dirt, the smell — and then when it was over, when he had cleaned the blood and viscera from his sword, and soaked his aching hands and cleaned those too — rising from his self-made grave of sleep and returning to the barracks. And the snap of the banner in the air, the king — the king himself, who Soren only knew as a scrap of colour on the top of a horse at the start of a procession, or a shadow in a brightly-lit window, looking down at their training for a moment as a distraction from matters of state — the king's voice echoing down, this is just the beginning of our campaign — this is just the beginning —

"Soren?" Pirah said, and his face was drawn with concern. Soren blinked. For just a moment, he could feel the weight of his helmet pressing down, pinching his ears against his head. "Soren?"

"You don't know what you're asking about," Soren said finally. His mouth was dry, his tongue sticking to the roof of it. "Did you think you had my measure? You're underestimating me." "

"I know some things," Pirah said, and he leant a fraction closer, just enough that Soren noticed the movement. Pirah had reached out a comforting hand, but it was suspended between them. "I know you don't like to be touched, so I won't do that. But — "

"What are you talking about?" Soren said.

Pirah said nothing, just reached forward, slowly, with his hand. Soren could have laughed. He was no horse, to shy away from — from — He rocked away from Pirah's hand. It could not even be called half a step back, and yet he had swayed. It was ridiculous. He had endured so much, and even that had been so little. A touch? He was not afraid of a touch. He knew it would not hurt. In fact, what might hurt was the strange look of concern on Pirah's face.

"Don't be ridiculous," Soren said. He raised his arm into Pirah's hand, too quickly, almost knocking it aside. Pirah's hand was warm, and it had landed on Soren's forearm right above the elbow. He made no move to pull his hand back, and tensed — was it meant to be reassuring?

Soren's heart was thumping. It was like that was the only point of warmth on his entire body, leeching into his blood. This was it. This was what he had been warned about. Pirah's warm hand, squeezing his muscle, Pirah's concerned dark eyes, Pirah's eyelashes, the way he said, low, "Soren, do you need to see a healer?"

He pulled back so quickly that he felt Pirah's dull nails scrape at his skin. "No," he said. "Of course not."

"I've offended you," Pirah said, frowning as if he didn't understand why. As if he hadn't intended to imply that Soren was weak.

"I'm not injured," Soren said. "I can still fight."

"I wasn't intending to fight any further," Pirah said, sounding affronted. So he thought he had reached Soren's limit, and was taking pity on him.

"I can still fight," Soren repeated, trying to put conviction in his tone. Trying to convince Pirah of something he was quite sure of. Give him a sword and point him in any direction and he would march.

"And if there's no need to fight?" Pirah said. "What would you do then?"

"There's always a need to fight," Soren said. "If not to fight, then guard, or prepare. Or train."

"And if there isn't?"

"What's the point of this?" Soren said. He wiped his hand across his face. He was sweating now, feeling like the heat was pressing on his back. "Questions with no answer — "

"We have other healers too," Pirah said, his voice very quiet. He was unwavered by anything Soren said.

"I don't need to see a healer," Soren said, and he could feel his jaw creaking as he ground his teeth together. It was like Pirah could see blood where Soren could not. Blood where there was none. "Do I look injured to you? Do I look — " Weak?

"Healers of the mind," Pirah said, his mouth twisting downwards.

"Of the mind?" Soren said, and he couldn't help letting out a blow of laughter, a harsh, ugly thing that shattered all around them. It was difficult to think just a moment ago Pirah had been waiting for him to wake, his voice so light in the story. Had he touched Soren when he was asleep? Was that why he knew of his — fear? "If I think differently from you, it's because I am different. I don't believe that needs to be healed."

"That's not what I meant," Pirah said, tone rising suddenly. .

"I'm human, Pirah," Soren said.

"I know," Pirah said. "That's — that's not what I meant."

"Pick up your sword again and let me show you."

"I think it's you who shouldn't hold a sword," Pirah said. He was slow to anger, but it was rising now. Soren could see it in the tension in his neck. It gave him a fiery satisfaction to think he had scraped at Pirah's armour.

"I'll do what it takes to win Lorien's favour," Soren said. "Even if it means — "

"That's what this is about?" Pirah said, and the tension between them suddenly broke. Pirah broke into a wide smile, dipping his head. "You should have said."

Of course that's what this is about, Soren thought. Was Pirah laughing at him? That's what this is about, being Lorien's guard. Isn't it? The shadows were very long on the ground, the sun a red-and-purple glow on the underside of the clouds. In the tall grass, cicadas were beginning to call; there were fireflies blinking to light in the undergrowth. He did not know what to say.

"Listen," Pirah said, leaning forward a little conspiratorially. "Go and have dinner, sleep early, and then meet me tomorrow at sunrise."

"Where?" Soren said, and then cursed himself for agreeing so readily. Pirah had suddenly completely relaxed, one hand on his hip, and he looked as if he might wink, his smile revealing his dimples.

"Here," Pirah said. He looked Soren up and down quickly, as if still assessing if he was alright, but he didn't push the issue. So he had accepted Soren's pronouncement of health, and all it had taken was a reminder of their competition. For a moment, he thought PIrah would clap him on the arm, as soldiers sometimes did, and he braced himself for it. It didn't come; Pirah put his hands behind his back instead, as if in a conscious effort to make Soren comfortable.

Are you planning to help me or harm me? Soren thought, but Pirah's smile revealed nothing.

Soren thought about it as he ate perfunctorily, unable to taste or think beyond the knowing look in Pirah's eyes, the lingering warmth of his touch, which could not be dispelled even by the icy water of the bath. Only with a sharp shock of embarrassment as he laid his head on the pillow did he remember that he had knelt at Lorien's feet and tried — tried to kiss his hands. He buried his face in the pillow and tried to forget, to dip himself in the endless black void of sleep, but it took too long to come.

He woke either minutes or hours later — there was no way to tell, in this dim grey light — to something cold landing on his face. He flinched away — was there a rip in the tent? — and forced his eyelids open. There was a shivering leaf above him, a second drop of cold water beading on its tip.

"Shit," he said, halfway out of bed before he realised what was happening, jamming his bare feet into his boots. But it wasn't late, not at all; the air was still with the chill of pre-dawn, and a strange grey light twisted at the corners of his vision. It had not been a coincidence, that cold water.

"Thank you," he said, feeling foolish. He was not prone to flights of fancy, preferring what he could hear and see, but it felt right to thank the room, even if it looked even worse than the previous day, even the leaves on the wall beginning to shrink and crumble. He dressed without letting himself look at it, tying his scarf around his neck. Outside, the first colours of dawn were beginning to paint the sky as he hurried down the hill, slipping in the dew on the grass.

Pirah was waiting where he had said. He looked a little different than Soren had come to expect. His hair was loose, dark and straight all the way down his back, tucked softly behind his ears, and he was wearing a loose tunic belted at the waist that rippled with the gentle wind.

"Oh, there you are," he said, blinking sleepily. "I don't know how you get up at this hour."

"You chose the hour," Soren said, trying not to sound mulish, but his voice cracked with tiredness.

"Didn't want to keep you waiting," Pirah said. "If I'd known a different hour would be suitable — "

"This is fine," Soren said. Pirah was holding two bows in his hands, both slim elven things that looked like they might float on the wind. "Are we shooting?"

"Left or right?" Pirah responded, holding up armguards.

"Either," Soren said.

"Oh, really?" Pirah said, looking from one of Soren's hands to the other. "The bow too? Are you as accurate with both hands?"

"Yes," Soren said, because he had to be; it had often meant death to miss. He didn't say the reason he'd taught himself — through hours in the training yard, until his hands were wet with blood and he could no longer see — was because of the sudden paralysis that had overtaken his left arm, one winter night, waking to sudden terrible pain. That was gone, but the skill remained.

"With the spear too?" Pirah asked, as they belted on the armguards.

"Yes," Soren said again, expecting Pirah to turn and go to the indoor range, but he went past Soren instead, heading towards the treeline. "The mace, too, and the quill, though I've been told my script is illegible either way."

"Is that so?" Pirah said. His hair was swaying with the wind, long, elegant ribbons of it. "I can't say I've ever had much skill with writing myself — I leave that to Lorien." Just the mention of Lorien's name set Soren's teeth on edge for reasons he was not quite sure of; of course they had a history, and Pirah would leverage that to best him in their contest.

They were past the edge of the forest now, the leaves closing behind them. The air itself had changed; it was darker and colder, heavy with the scent of loam and disturbed moss. Soren had a sudden awareness of being led into the woods by a person he did not really know, but nothing was telling him to fear. There were little birds flitting about above them, their wings flashing every colour in the light.

"Where are we going?" he said, afraid his voice would be harsh in the silence.

"This is probably far enough for now," Pirah said, and he sounded jovial as he crouched to put his quiver on the ground. "Can you see the targets?"

"Are you testing me?"

"I don't know," Pirah said, spinning his bow idly in his hands. "Do you need testing?"

"No," Soren said, and Pirah shrugged. Soren turned back and forth, looking for the red-and-white stripes of a painted target, and found nothing. "I don't see — "

Pirah was gone. For once Soren was certain that it was no trick, no attempt to prove his weakness, because the arrows were still there, and they were only half a kilometre into the forest; he could see the heart tree when the wind moved the leaves. He reached down and slid an arrow out of the quiver and strung it to the bow, though he knew not what to point it at. He hesitated, eyes sliding from side to side. There were no enemies hiding behind the trees, and he knew Pirah would not want him to shoot a bird.

"It might help if you take off your shoes," Pirah said, from everywhere and nowhere at once. His voice might well have been part of the wind.

"Why?"

"Don't move," Pirah said, and Soren went tight all over, some instinct telling him danger, huffing in a breath and holding it. He heard the soft twang of a bowstring and knew at once that he had only heard it because Pirah had wanted him to, and he felt the arrow fly, its wake moving his hair as it sank into an old knothole, half-hidden by the leaves of a crooked branch. There was the finest scratch of some silvery paint on the knot, now that he knew to look for it. There were no man-made targets wedged against the wood. What Pirah wanted him to shoot at were the trees themselves.

"I see it," he said, toeing off his boots and tentatively placing his bare feet in the cold grass. He wanted to mistrust this — every part of him was saying he's just trying to get your measure, just trying to show you up — but it was overtaken by analytical calm, by the knowledge: I can do that. He raised his bow and marked Pirah's arrow with a twin.

"I would hope you could see it, with an arrow sticking out of it," Pirah said, landing near-silently in the grass next to Soren. The only sign of his having descended at all was a faint shiver in the leaves of the oak he had slid from. But his taunt was good-natured, Soren thought, biting the inside of his cheek. It was unexpected to find no barb in a jibe. He let it slide off him, looking for the next target. There — a glimmer on a broken branch that moved back and forward in the wind.

"Did you do this?" Soren said, bringing arrow to bow, string to mouth, and snapping the branch from its anchor.

"Maybe," Pirah said. He was crouching again, openly watching Soren. "You should grow your hair out."

"Me?" Soren said, reaching down for another arrow. He was only half listening, his mind fully focused on looking for that next silver glimmer. He'd spent so long cutting his hair to army standards that it would feel wrong to do anything else.

"The very picture of an elven archer," Pirah said with some satisfaction, as Soren vanquished a withered crabapple hanging in the open air. "If you had longer hair, I mean."

Soren couldn't help scoffing, even lightly. It had to be some kind of joke — he was too stout for it, too thick in the arms and legs, not to mention elsewhere. And it wasn't even that. He was too weak, too angry, too craven. He had none of Pirah or Lorien's serenity. Perhaps Pirah could not see that. If he couldn't, he was a fool.

"Is this about what I said yesterday?" Soren said, shouldering the quiver and moving on to the next grove.

"No," Pirah said, and he sounded surprised that Soren would even suggest it.

"It seems like it is," Soren said, ducking under a thicket of low-hanging branches.

"I think this is the most I've ever heard you speak," Pirah said, following, and somehow managing to keep his hair from tangling in the branches, in his bow, anywhere. It just did whatever he wanted, remaining perfectly sleek and straight down his back.

"I can stop if you'd like."

"I didn't mean it like that," Pirah said. "Listen, the others, they might take up swordplay for twenty years, whatever, pretending to be a hero from a tale with flourishes, but nobody takes it seriously. Not like you do."

What Pirah didn't understand, Soren thought, putting arrow to bow, was that if he didn't take it seriously, people would die. The way he had said twenty years of swordplay, as if he was referring to a single afternoon, made Soren's throat feel like it was about to close, forcing him to swallow it down. Twenty years was most of Soren's life. How old was Pirah?

It was not worth thinking about. There was a single leaf fluttering on a branch, marked with silver.

"Do you always shoot with your eyes?" Pirah said.

"What do you mean?" Soren said. "I have to see, don't I?"

"Close your eyes," Pirah said.

"You're trying to make me miss," Soren said.

"Not at all," Pirah said, smiling. His tone was warm, as if Soren was merely returning Pirah's earlier teasing. He was crouching again, looking up at the target, and then back at Soren. What was he trying to prove? That oh, Soren did well on the easy targets, but the elven ones, he couldn't hit? He fixed the leaf's position in his mind and closed his eyes, raising his bow. He let it fly, and when he opened them, the leaf was gone.

"Shooting by memory," Pirah said, though he was smiling, "is not exactly what I meant."

"Is that it?" Soren said. He did not understand what Pirah was asking of him. The frustration of an impossible task — or worse, being made fun of — was rising. The light coming through the trees was stronger now, the promise of daylight rather than dawn. "If not by eye or by memory, I don't see another way."

"Mmm," Pirah said. "One more. Come on, I'll show you." Then he left, working his way through the trees with his usual grace. Soren followed him, unsure he wanted to be shown anything. He tried his best to follow Pirah's steps, avoiding the sticks and rocks, keeping his steps silent.

In the next grove, there was a target that was more plain than any of the others. More traditional, a little wooden circle with a red ring painted on it. It was certainly older than the ones Pirah had prepared, the edges of it weatherbeaten and the center pocked with arrow marks. It couldn't be so simple, not after everything else Pirah had thrown at him.

Movement caught his eye. He followed it. There was a ring on a little rope, dancing back and forth in the wind. It was made of some kind of metal that caught the light, weighing so little it seemed to hover. It was unpredictable; he followed it back and forth with his eyes, but it always twisted and turned in a way he could not anticipate.

"What is this?" he said. He'd seen something like it, once, used by a trick archer sent to demonstrate for the army, but that had been a heavy ring that swung from side to side, predictably. The man had made the shot, but Soren had thought it was a waste of time. There were no swinging rings on the battlefield; it was simply a matter of if you could find a man's neck or not.

"A simple test," Pirah said. His tone was light enough that he might have been talking about a target two metres away, with a bullseye twice the normal size. "Everyone here can do it."

"You?" Soren said, in a way that he had intended to be light, but came out cutting. Pirah raised a brow.

"If you wished a demonstration, you only had to ask," Pirah said, and he came over to Soren with a fleetness that made Soren flinch back. But he was only pulling an arrow from the quiver over Soren's shoulder, fast enough that he was gone before Soren even felt the movement of air on the side of his face.

"Look," Pirah said, facing away from the target and closing his eyes. "No eyes, no memory — though if you could do this by memory, that would be another thing entirely — " He raised his bow. Soren saw him breathing, the movement of his slim chest. Soren took two steps to the side to watch his face and make sure that he would not peek. Pirah smiled, as if he knew what he was doing.

He drew the bow without effort, his aim moving slowly side to side in a way that a lesser archer might mistake for hesitance, and then — he loosed. The arrow sprang from the bow with a terrible speed and passed straight through the metal, fletching ringing off it, the chime loud enough to peal through the whole forest, scattering the birds. Pirah was smiling; his hair was gently lifted by the wind. Soren wanted to touch it. That was his overwhelming urge at the moment of Pirah's triumph. He was not thinking about the shot, or his own attempt, just that he wanted to run his fingers through the silk of Pirah's hair.

He swallowed, tamped it down. Even their men look like women, a voice from the past spoke, directly into his ear. They do it to deceive you. He shook the memory off. There was no time to even think about that now.

"Well!" Pirah said, turning on his heel. "Did you want to try?"

"Of course," Soren said. They swapped places, Pirah taking the quiver lightfingered and handing an arrow to Soren. Just one — he had high expectations.

"I'll tell you how to do it," Pirah said. Soren scraped at his tongue with his teeth, trying not to snap back, I don't need your help. "I mean, I can't tell you how to make the shot, but I can show you how to shoot without eyes."

"Tell me," Soren said, digging his toes into the moss underfoot. He put arrow to string and closed his eyes. There was nothing, no special elven vision that came to light, just the distant sound of the birds returning. They were crows and sparrows; he could tell by the wingbeats. Beyond that was the ever-present shift of the wind, making his hair move from one side to the other, his scarf brushing against the back of his neck.

"I don't think I need to tell you anything," Pirah said, and he sounded gently amused. It did not rankle Soren as it normally did; it was just another part of the wind.

He breathed in; he could smell the bark of the trees, the broken moss underfoot, and below that, the darkness of the dirt. If he was very still and held his breath, he could hear the faint chime of the metal ring on the air. It was a shock to realise it. How had he not noticed it before?

It was almost simple now. Feel the wind. Hear where the ring was moving to. Pulling back on the bow was a function of the body. He did not need to bother with that. It was automatic, perfect. A shiver went through his soul. That's where it'll be, the shiver said. Now!

He loosed the arrow. For a long moment, nothing. No thunk of a missed arrow. Then — the chime rang out, his arrow splitting Pirah's in two, right into the centre of the target.

"Yes!" Pirah said, jumping up and down. "Yes! I knew you could do it."

Pirah's excitement was infectious. Soren felt the bone-deep satisfaction of having won something, of having something go right for once. And it was something so apparent — he could look and see that it was still there, even if he blinked. His arrow, splitting Pirah's, his arrow in the centre of the target. He could not keep the smile off his face, though it was thin and shaky at the edges. "I understand what you mean now," Soren said, his brows furrowing. "I didn't know that was possible."

"Ah, you're one of only three people to do it on their first try in the last two hundred years," Pirah said, clapping him on the shoulder — and then immediately retreating, rocking back on his heels and tucking his hand behind his back.

"You said everyone could do it," Soren said.

"Oh, forgive me for lying," Pirah said, his smile taking over his whole face. "The illustrious ranks of myself, you — "

"And Lorien?"

"Oh, no," Pirah said, still laughing. "Lorien drew the arrow, thought about it, and then said he was bored of archery. That's how he is, you know."

"Capricious?" Soren said.

"I would have said 'flighty'," Pirah said, but he could not stop smiling. "This is wonderful. They'll write this in your book of names."

"My what?"

"Never mind," Pirah said. He was gripping the quiver and bow together against his chest, his eyes bright with glee. "Oh, I'm so pleased. I had thought you could do it."

Why would you think that? Soren thought, but did not say. Pirah had no reason to think Soren would be capable of such a feat. It was not a thing that humans could do, he was sure of that. This was Pirah's way of proving to Soren that he was not human, not really. The undeniable truth was there in the split arrow. No human could accomplish it. Few would even try.

Soren swallowed, slowly. He was not one to look away from the truth, and there it was.

Unwilling to dwell on it further, he forced himself to change the subject. "What was that?" Soren said, running his fingers down the side of the light bow. Having no weight to bear his arm down felt wrong, but the results spoke for themselves. "I could feel everything."

"I don't know what you mean," Pirah said.

"The forest, the wind — it was like everything was alive."

"It is alive," Pirah said, and he looked briefly concerned. "Can't you always feel it?"

"Don't worry about it," Soren said, and the redirect was clumsy, thick-tongued. Pirah looked at him, but didn't comment further.

"What are you going to wear to midsummer?" Pirah said instead, drawing his hair back and braiding it swiftly. Soren's attention had drifted in the brief reprieve of triumph, but he could feel the dull pain settling back into his body, his left arm throbbing to match his right. He used to be able to fix it, even briefly, by stretching it out and soaking his arms in hot or freezing water. Nothing helped now. He rubbed at his forearm, chasing the tightness of the muscle. Pirah had said something —

"What?"

"Midsummer feast," Pirah said, flipping his braid back over his shoulder. "Last year we all did some mythology theme, but it was so much effort — the details in the costumes that Ye-jun demanded took days."

"Right," Soren said, painfully aware that they were now on uneven ground once more. He could not figure out what Pirah's motives had been, bringing him out here. The only thing he could see was that Pirah's intent was to raise him up, give him a taste of the carrot, so the stick would hit even harder. Lorien would stand at the feast and say I've chosen Pirah — of course it would always have been Pirah, but we wanted to give Soren a chance. Asking something foolish now, like what's midsummer? would only make that descent faster.

"We could go as a duo if you like," Pirah said. "Lorien and I always talked about going as the hunter and the hart, though we've never done it."

"Which of us would be which?" Soren said, without thinking. Pirah looked him up and down, slowly, the look in his eyes hot. It made the back of Soren's neck feel strange and sensitive, as if a warm breath was being exhaled against his skin.

Pirah stepped towards him, the movement of the wind lifting his hair towards Soren, drifting dangerously close. This close, he could smell Pirah's scent, almost like a perfume of crushed leaves and some kind of dark spice. He was near enough that when he spoke, his voice was low, as if he was speaking just for Soren. "Perhaps you could ask Lorien which suits which — "

Soren turned and walked away. He did not hear if Pirah called out to him. He heard nothing but a high-pitched ring in his ears that drowned everything out. His bow was gone when he looked down at his hands, but that seemed inconsequential. All he had to do was walk away, and everything would leave him behind. He had just been confused, letting Pirah talk to him like that, that was all. Distracting him with archery and the shine of his hair —

No. The captain had been right. Small things were how they began to change your perception. It was better to walk away. He had proved that he could shoot as well as any of them, without needing to discuss whatever it was Pirah had been implying. It had been a trick, a trap to get him comfortable.

He flexed his hand, trying to bring some feeling back into his numb flesh. His bones themselves ached. It was inescapable.

*

"The aqueduct," Ye-jun said.

"What?" Soren said, and cursed how stupid he sounded. He was destined to wander around saying what to all the elves, until they all realised he truly had no thoughts. He had no memory of coming back to the heart tree and standing where he had stood yesterday, but Ye-jun was looking at him all the same, her quill threatening to drip ink onto her page.

"I thought you were looking for Lorien again," she said. "He's down at the aqueduct."

"Right," Soren said, and because all he could ever do was make himself look strange and unhinged, he turned and walked away again. Ye-jun didn't call after him, which made sense, but he wondered once more what Pirah would have said. Nothing?

He had never been to the underground aqueduct before, but it was easy enough to find by following his senses — dark stone and rushing water, underneath the roots of the heart tree. He descended the stairs without a light, seeing the edges of things in the dark.

He reached the aqueduct, but Lorien was not there. The lichen on the walls shed faint light as he peered into the gloom. There were two channels where the underground aqueduct met the roots of the heart tree, one of them flowing with crystal clear water, the other empty. There was a set of gears and chains meant to raise and lower the water flow; he found himself examining them for a time.

"The lever's stuck," Lorien said, voice low from behind him, startling Soren out of his reverie. His hands were dirty to the elbow with grease and he was wiping them down with a rag. "No one comes down here, you know. Water springs forth from the aqueduct, but that was built by someone — our ancestors directed the river so we could live in the tree. Someone has to honour that work."

He sounded the most aggrieved that Soren had ever heard him, and it was about this. Since when did princes care about anything underneath their feet? Let alone descend and get their own hands dirty. In Soren's experience, princes existed to either ignore you, or try and get something from you — but Lorien had done neither.

The gears were a strange mix of metal and vine, where the tree had grown into the metal to repair it and shore it up. Soren turned a critical eye on it, used to looking for weaknesses in his armour after a battle, or assessing an ill-forged sword. Lorien said nothing to dissuade him, but he could feel his eyes on him as he skimmed his hands over the metal, rust flaking onto his hands like blood. Without using his sight, it felt almost like he was trying to find a wound.

"Here," Soren said, after a few moments, his arm pushed almost all the way through to the back. "It's misaligned."

"Can you slide it back?" Lorien said, quietly.

"No, the vine — " He jerked back, pulling his arm free as quickly as he could, scraping the underside of his wrist. The vines began to move, realigning with the gear in a rush. "Fuck," Soren said, stumbling backwards, cradling his wrist with one hand. He was too slow to bite back the word, but Lorien only looked faintly amused, and did not scold him.

"I should have warned you," Lorien said thoughtfully, stepping forward to Soren's elbow. "Did it hurt you?" He took Soren's hand in his cool fingers, and Soren braced himself, his blood humming until Lorien released him, apparently satisfied it was only a scrape. Everything was still again.

No one else would have needed warning, Soren thought bitterly, closing his hand. Nothing happened in the second aqueduct until Lorien indicated Soren should pull the lever. It was old — ancient, even — and took considerable effort to shift, requiring Soren to grit his teeth and pull until all his muscles ached, arms going numb. He was rewarded by the grinding of gears; at first no water flowed from the darkness, but then came a trickle. They knelt as one and peered into the gloom.

"Something else?" Lorien said, but whatever response Soren might have given was lost in the sudden icy spray of water, Soren turning instinctively to shield Lorien from the spray that overtook them, sheeting up his back and over his head. Lorien cried out — or that was what Soren took it for, but then realised he was laughing, his hair half-wet as he ducked out of Soren's protection. There was a fine mist all around them, the air heavy and damp. Things were settling, now, the water in the second aqueduct clear and fast-flowing.

"Thank you for your help," Lorien said, his tone formal for a moment.

"Anyone could have done that," Soren said, running his thumb down the edge of the graze on his inner wrist.

"But you did," Lorien said. He pulled his hair back from his head. "Does it bother you that I'm down here?"

"Bother me? No," Soren said, and it was too easy to talk to Lorien, because he added without thinking, "It's just unexpected."

"Unexpected for me?" Lorien said, and Soren knew a dangerous conversation when he heard one, the kind of conversation where he would say something without thinking and end up trying to apologise again — he felt a flush grace his cheeks at that thought.

"Unexpected for a prince," Soren said, because it was the truth. He was dripping cold water down his back, the rivulets sliding down his neck and making him shiver.

"Oh, well, I do like to do unexpected things," Lorien said, half-smiling. There was a hint of the capriciousness that Pirah had mentioned, behind Lorien's usual seriousness. He looked at Soren so directly that it startled him, as if Soren had come awake all at once. "You're interesting, you know?"

"Me?" Soren said, taken aback. He felt as if Lorien had taken out a knife and cut him to the bone.

"Mmm," Lorien said, pushing back his wet hair. "Perhaps you don't agree, but I believe you are. Or should I say, you are to me."

"All right," Soren said, stupidly. His chest was burning. Lorien would not look away. "I don't see why. I'm not — "

"You don't see it like I do," Lorien said, so matter-of-factly that Soren could barely stand to hear it — what does he see? He had spent so long trying not to be seen that it felt like he was being flayed just to have Lorien's warm gaze on him. It was the way he said everything so directly. There was no hidden ire, no tricks to him. It hurt Soren; he could not stand to see it, but he had already embarrassed himself yesterday, and he had walked away from Pirah — "So few people come here," Lorien said, and he wasn't stopping, couldn't he tell that Soren's breathing was coming short? "You are a rarity."

"No, I'm not," Soren said, reflexively. He could not have stopped himself.

"But you're new," Lorien said, with an honest urgency. "You don't look at things as we do. You're necessary."

"I don't want that," Soren said, all in a terrible rush. All he'd been thinking since the moment the magic had spat him out onto the lush grass was please let me stay, please let me stay here. He didn't want anyone to look at him, to try and slide between the layers of his skin. Lorien had chosen not to look at Soren and see who he was, a terrible oddity with a failing body that might last a few more years, if he was lucky.

Worse than that, Lorien could realise that he didn't belong here, not at all. The very land was reacting to his presence. His throat was tight and frantic as he swallowed. If Lorien looked too closely, he would see that before anything else.

"What do you want?"

"Nothing," Soren said. He should have turned and walked away, but Lorien was a prince, and that authority was undeniable. He could not walk away. He did not want to face the consequences. "I don't want anything."

"I don't believe that," Lorien said, firmly. Lorien had not moved closer to him, reached for his hand, anything. So he was transparent enough that even Lorien had noticed his weakness. If he was another elf — Pirah — would Lorien have put a hand on his shoulder? On his arm, around his waist? He had felt the warmth of Lorien's hand before, like getting too close to a fire. "And if it is true, then it just means we have to find out what you want. Come to midsummer with me."

"What?" Soren said. For a moment he allowed himself to imagine it, himself walking into the hall of the heart tree on Lorien's arm, or with Lorien on his arm — and it was wrong, and if Lorien's royal birth protected him from ridicule, that would not extend to Soren. Perhaps if he was an elf, or a woman, or both, but this was a joke, a schoolyard trick.

He became aware all at once of how foolish he constantly was, squeezing water out of his shirt, pulling at his scarf. The wet cloth brushed at the back of his neck, which prompted a full-body shudder, forcing him to whoop in air. Lorien watched him with a precise stare. "Don't joke with me, I don't appreciate it." It came out in a too-harsh rush, and Lorien crooked an eyebrow.

"I'm not joking," Lorien said. "Trust me, you would know if I wished to make fun of you — though I do not." Talking to him as if he was an equal, pretending —

"There's no need to pity me," Soren said, desperate to wiggle free from Lorien's patient gaze. "Don't worry about me, I might not even go, it's not — "

"Why would you not go to midsummer?"

"It's not necessary, is it, my presence?" Soren said. His words were beginning to tumble over each other. He never talked this much. "I'm sure no one would miss me being there."

"I would," Lorien said. "And I know Pirah would too. Don't you want to — "

"It's not important to me," he said. "I've never — "

"Don't you want to carry on the traditions of your mother?" Lorien said, and he looked confused — Soren had never seen confusion on his face before.

"Of my mother," Soren said, and there was a deadly steel in his own voice that he rarely heard, the commanding tone that would make others turn their head. He had to bite back the words that were burning on the tip of his tongue, swallow the anger that wanted to say fuck you just to see how Lorien would react, and he truly did not know. But he was sure the consequences would be grave and dire. "What do you know of my mother's traditions?"

"It's true I didn't know your mother," Lorien said, and he paused to think. Soren felt heavy and lost, free-falling. Any grounding he had felt here from the water, the stone, even Lorien's presence, was gone. He could not stop himself.

"Neither did I," he said, flat, and he could not have flummoxed Lorien more with any other statement. He was a hot, raw void of anger.

"I'm sorry?" Lorien said.

"You're imagining a heritage I don't have," he said, and his teeth were too sharp, his words too hard. "I'm sure it makes you feel better to imagine me like that, but it's not true."

"But then how do you know of our traditions?" Lorien said. "You've never asked — "

"I don't know a single thing about any of this," Soren said, his voice too loud, bouncing around the stone. Everything around them was alien, strange, wrong. No, it was him that was wrong. "You'd be better served by just sending me back."

"I didn't know," Lorien said, frowning. His disappointment was palpable. Soren's throat was closing.

"I know that makes me weak," he said. "I know it makes me stupid." His throat was throbbing hot.

"I don't think that," Lorien said, with calm certainty.

"If you want to pick a fight with me, pick up a sword, not words," Soren said. It was too much, but he would do anything to forestall this conversation. If Lorien was angry, if Soren could redirect him, maybe he would stop. Tingles were shooting up the back of his hands.

"I have no wish to fight with you," Lorien said. "If you'd told me — "

"Don't pity me," Soren said, clenching his fists. "If you won't pick up a sword it's because I'm not worthy, I'm weak — " There was a choked sob working its way up into his mouth. "I'm not like you, I'm human in everything but name, I don't belong here."

"Soren," Lorien said, and his voice was low and concerned. He stepped forward, and Soren stepped back in turn. He had raked his nails up his inner arm, even the bluntness of them pulling apart the scrape. He saw Lorien look down and see it, right before Soren tucked his hand behind his back. At least that pain was real, he thought, not like the false aches that plagued his bones, or the pain of being looked at by Lorien. "Let me help you."

"I don't need help," Soren said. "I can still fight." He saw Lorien hesitate.

"And if you couldn't?" Lorien said, and he was more dangerous without a blade in his hand than with, cutting straight to Soren's heart. "What would happen if you couldn't fight?"

"Send me back to die with a sword in my hand at least," Soren said, immediately. "Where I have some use, some purpose."

"I'm surprised you think me capable of that," Lorien said, and he looked hurt, wounded by what Soren had said. "Or capable of wanting that for you." His perception of Soren's weakness was deeper than Soren had ever expected, all-encompassing. Why did Lorien even allow him to remain here? Why had he nominated Soren as a potential guard, if he looked down on him so much, like a terrible craven thing, so unworthy that he didn't merit even the sincerity of looking him in the eye and saying I think you've been here long enough now, Soren.

"I'm sorry," Soren said, and then, "your highness." Was that what Lorien meant? No prince should have his motives questioned by someone of Soren's ilk. His heart was racing.

"Oh, don't do that," Lorien said, and for a moment he looked truly offended.

"I'll go," Soren said, and he wasn't sure whether he meant I'll leave you here or I'll go back through the portal, I'll go home. "Don't worry about me, I'm fine, truly. If I can hold a sword, that's all that's necessary." How had he done this? All he had wanted was Lorien to look upon him with the approving eye of a prince on his soldier.

"I don't agree with that," Lorien said.

"I won't bother you again," Soren said, and he turned and left, hanging on the remains of his tattered courtesy. It had been a mistake to come here. It had been a mistake to speak to Lorien like they were equals, or to go with Pirah — making the ring sing in the forest had been a coincidence, a fluke. Anyone could have done it.

Outside by the training field, the air was soft and smelled of apple blossoms, but he ignored it and ran up and down the track until he could barely breathe, his legs shaking underneath him. It's not enough, he thought. Do it in armour or not at all. I'll do better tomorrow, I'll rise with the sun, I'll train all day, I won't speak to anyone. It wouldn't be enough.

Lorien was surely speaking to Pirah right now, and he could see them, heads bent close together, Pirah's easy energy and Lorien's calm. The comfort in knowing someone for hundreds of years. They never doubted, he was sure. They had never looked at one another and twisted the knife, or been weak — I never thought much of him anyway, Pirah would say. He tried to cheat in a training duel, what use would he be protecting you? And then, later, when all around him was darkness and he could feel the jagged edges of his own soul, Did he look at you as he does me? It's pathetic, disgusting. I don't know how he thinks we don't notice. A human? A man? I prefer you —

Soren's legs went out from under him and he fell, hard and awkward, into the dark grass. The wet stalks brushed at his face, shivered against his limbs. All he could hear was his ragged breathing. He wasn't crying, he was a man, a soldier, he didn't cry. Bile rose to the back of his throat. It felt like he was being pressed down into the grass and the dirt by the weight of everything on his back. He could not move, but he had no choice. No one was going to help him. There was no one that would lend him a kind hand.

A man who can't march can march himself to hell, he thought, and the side of his leg was hot with pain. He reached at it, digging his fingers into the marks there, pressing into the muscle until it reached a peak, keeping that pain inside as it evened out and spread through his entire body. He was sweating with it, but it faded to a numbness that settled over his mind, as if he was looking at himself from very far away.

They'll send me home soon enough, he thought, picking himself up from the ground. His body was weak with dread. He wanted to stay, wanted to fight, but there was no spirit left in him. He could not feel anything, not from his fingertips to his back, down the sides of his legs. Even his mind was quiet now. He could not turn his neck to the left or right, but he didn't need to. All he would do was look ahead, move forward in stuttered segments, his thoughts drifting quietly behind.

The next few days passed in a strange fugue. Each morning there were more brown dead leaves on his pillow, caught in his linen sheets. He ate in the morning, silently, with Ye-jun. Pirah sat near them, far enough away that Soren could not accuse him of watching over him, but close enough that he could not discount the possibility. But he didn't care. Eat, train, ignore pain, ignore the creeping dread that pooled at the back of his mouth.

Pirah didn't speak to him, but he was always there, at the training yard, at breakfast and dinner. He didn't seem to take notice of Soren at all, and made no comment when he fumbled his sword or had to lean over to catch his breath after only a few moments. Lorien made no appearance at all, and Soren bent his head in the dining hall and ignored the chatter of midsummer. It was meaningless. He did not care about what people were going to wear, or honeywine, or whatever made Ye-jun so focused, scribbling endless notes on reams of paper.

His room reminded him of a burnt-out forest now. He'd spent a week at one, in the past that felt like another world. They'd put the forest to the torch to burn out the enemy, and the sheer heat of it had flattened him. He'd felt it worse than the humans but had ignored that, going back and forth between the trees with a sharpened spear, looking for survivors. He'd had a fever for a week after, walking the narrow path across the mountains with a wet cloth tied under his scarf, weaving back and forth on the cliff edge. Although it felt so long ago, the Soren of that time felt more real.

It was bad then, he thought, staring up into the darkness of the ceiling where the stars were sliced apart, and thinking of how he had looked into a different sky and dreamed of being here, where all his cares and pains would be lifted. But only because I didn't think it would get worse.

Soren had known the day was approaching, but he didn't realise until he returned to the heart tree after dusk and found the walls painted with pink and gold lights that shifted with the wind, all pointing the way to the great hall. He ignored it, turning and returning to his room. Soaking in the ice-cold water, he could hear faint music. It was a delicate thing, the notes of a harp singing through the air. He held his breath and ducked under the water, grimacing at how it made his face sting.

What kind of coward am I to be afraid of a little music? he thought, surfacing in a great rush. In a frenzy, he dried himself, pushing his hair back from his face. In his clothing chest there was nothing suitable, of course, but he found what was best, knotting a scarf around his neck.

Outside, there was something folded on the floor that he nearly tripped over. It was a jacket, and he cursed himself for his predictability, and also whoever it was who had anticipated that he would — but those thoughts were cast away when he unfolded the garment. It was so light it seemed to hang on the air, but on the back was painted a design. It looked hand-painted. The heart tree, crossed with two arrows, each bearing a metal ring. Pirah, then, Soren thought, and crushed down the flare of emotion in his chest. Unless he had told everybody.

He followed the music. His reluctance melted away as he drew closer, circling around to the back of the hall, ignoring the hubbub. The notes were from an unfamiliar instrument, something pale and shivery that reminded him of the first drops of rain falling onto a half-frozen pond. It cut through the voices, through the darkness, and whispered right into his ear, making the back of his neck itch.

He ducked his head to enter into the dark at the back of the hall, where the leaves provided a veil of shifting shadow. The whole hall was glowing with golden light, dappled with deep reds and purples, like the dying light of a sunset. It seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere, changing the faces of the people it landed on, illuminating them or briefly hiding them in shadow. Magic, he thought, with some trepidation.

Crystalline glasses were stacked on a table by the edge of the main hall, along with various finger-food that was too delicate for his tastes. Even the little glasses of wine looked tiny in his hand. It set his teeth on edge, though he was too numb to feel it much. He retreated to a little niche in the tree and sat, leaning his head against the bark and closing his eyes. He could feel a little of the interconnectedness he'd felt in the forest, just a flutter. The heart tree felt different from those in the forest. Dead? No, just older, its energies conserved.

Soren sighed, and held the glass up to his lips. It smelled of honey, but no honey that he had tasted before. He could smell each individual flower of its provenance. There must have been a day where this started, he thought, unbidden. One day I just woke up tired and sore and it never really stopped — He downed the wine, swallowing the sweetness of it, and sighed, trying to focus on the music.

"Be careful with that," a voice said, close enough that Soren opened his eyes too quickly. It was Pirah, because of course it was, and he was bare to the waist, smeared with golden paint that caught the light and reflected it. He was gently red in the face and soft around the edges, the easiness of someone who had started drinking early but not to excess. "I would not wish you to overindulge and be unable to fight tomorrow."

"I can handle my drink," Soren said, looking at him over the cup. The honey was a gentle warmth in his stomach; the glass had refilled without any jug touching its rim.

"I don't doubt that," Pirah said, sitting next to him. There was gold thread braided into his hair, pulled back from his face; his eyes were outlined in black, the flush of red across both his cheeks and his nose. "He who spills honeywine might also spill his secrets," he said, and winked. Soren contemplated him for a moment, and then drank the wine down. There was a taste behind the honey — it was apple. The crisp taste of the apples that Lorien had been growing out behind the flower gardens. He had not mentioned that they made them into wine.

Speaking of Lorien — he cast his gaze around the room. It was never difficult to find him, and especially not now. There was no throne, but as Soren spied him across the room, it seemed he could not go two or three steps without someone calling for his attention — calling out to speak to the prince.

"I don't have any secrets," Soren said. Pirah was looking at him with something that Soren could not name, his eyes fluttering briefly.

"Listen," Pirah said, leaning closer. Soren wanted to close his eyes again. Any conversation that began with listen always ended badly. He sought that connection back to the ancient tree, or the shivery notes of the music, which were fading. "I believe I misspoke to you the other day — "

"It's fine," Soren said. "I've already forgotten it."

"You're endeared of — "

Silence fell across the hall; Pirah swallowed his own words, sliding a little closer to Soren. At this distance, he could see the flush on Pirah's cheeks that crossed his nose, and how he was smiling with warmth, his eyes dipping. Ye-jun was on the stage now, and with no introduction she began to speak in a language that Soren did not know. The words sounded the same as the music, shimmering syllables. This was what she had been working on so intently.

"Do you know this?" Pirah said, and he was close enough that Soren shivered at the sound of his voice.

"I don't understand it," Soren said, without thinking. Pirah had been asking if he knew the poem, and he had revealed his ignorance.

"Oh," Pirah said, and Soren wondered if Lorien had talked to him about Soren's admission, because he seemed surprised and a little regretful at the same time. He was moving a little closer, and Soren was surprised to find that he did not mind his presence. In fact, the warmth of the wine was spreading through him, tingling in his fingers and toes.

Worse than that, it was lifting the pain from his body, the muscles in his back and neck relaxing. It was a palpable feeling — each one of his muscles easing, his back softening, his head a little heavy on his neck. He felt like he could almost hear his spine and shoulders loosening, his bones sitting easy for the first time that he could remember. His mind, too, was quieting in a way he was unsure of. Is this how I'm meant to feel all the time? he thought, frantically, looking around the room at the relaxed elves, their attention fixed on Ye-jun. And the relaxed Pirah beside him, reminding Soren of a cat in a sunbeam. He wanted to put his arm around Pirah's shoulders, and he did not know why. What would that achieve?

"I'll tell you," Pirah said, and he put his chin on Soren's shoulder in a shock of heat, his hair brushing against the side of Soren's face. To his surprise, he felt no impulse to move away. He wanted to hear what Pirah was saying. "It's ancient, but Ye-jun retranslated it — it's about the history of the heart tree." He spoke right into Soren's ear, telling of the crystal water and the leaves at the centre of the tree, that had sheltered elves fleeing from an endless war. Pirah's voice was soft, and every now and then he got a little confused or misspoke, and eventually there was a hitch in his voice and he pressed his face against Soren's shoulder as Ye-jun was describing how it became a home.

Soren felt warm from head to toe, his mind floating free. Nothing clouded it except the certainty that this feeling could not last.

"Every year, Pirah," Lorien said, arriving during the end of the applause. Soren would not say that he had been looking for him, but he had been looking for the head table and had been unable to find one. "It doesn't matter what it is — you cry every year." The words seemed harsh, but they were said with such unbearable fondness that Soren felt scorched just from proximity.

Pirah pressed his face against Soren's shoulder for a moment more, and then ducked behind him, saying in a choked voice, "There's no harm in it, is there?"

"Of course not," Lorien said. He was dressed in a sheer white fabric, thin enough that Soren could see the shadow of his body, his hair braided with white flowers that wreathed his arms and neck, the air all around him scented with night jasmine, glowing against his skin like little stars. Soren felt warm in the face and light in the body. He and Pirah were pressed together, leg to leg, and for a moment he was unafraid of what Lorien might think of that. "I see Pirah is more convincing than I am." Lorien's gaze was heavy, but bearable. It made Soren want to shift back and forth; he still could not shake the feeling that somehow Lorien could see beneath his guard.

"Is this another one of your tests, Lorien?" Pirah said, from behind Soren. "Is there a danger your guard might have to protect you from by engaging in a drinking contest?"

"Only a danger to my pride," Lorien said. "Either way, it seems you are winning, though I don't doubt you had a head start." His attention shifted. "What changed your mind, Soren?"

"I heard the music," Soren said, and he sounded soft and very tired to his own ears. He didn't much like the weakness in it, but there was honesty in that weakness too. Can a man not rest after a battle won? But you are not a man, and things are different —

"Are you enjoying my wine?" Lorien said, and Soren could tell he was pleased that Soren was there at all, even if it wasn't with him.

"Fit for a prince," Soren said, giving him a little toast with the glass, which had refilled again with golden liquid.

"He's no prince tonight," Pirah said, and he was leaning on Soren quite rakishly now, fixing Lorien with a look Soren could not interpret. "The legend of midsummer, isn't it, where the Queen of the Moon and the Queen of the Sun came down to earth as mortals, just for an hour a year."

"She's up there tonight," Lorien said, looking up to where the huge face of the moon was dappling the leaves with light. "And I find myself down here with you two." Was he drunk? He seemed solid enough, but Soren could not make head or heels of what he was saying, nor his tone, nor the way he was looking at them.

"We've danced enough, haven't we, cousin?" Pirah said, snatching Soren's glass from his hand so quickly he could not react. "Dance with Soren." He leaned heavily on Soren's back as if trying to encourage him to get up, but it was more like having a heated blanket laid over his whole back, the warmth unknotting his muscles.

"I suppose there are a few midsummers to catch up on," Lorien said, extending a delicate-fingered hand towards Soren, who hesitated. "You can ask me to dance, if you like," he said, and Soren knew he was giving him a chance to say no. But he was not some delicate thing that could not make his own decisions. And beneath even that, he felt the strange urge to surprise Lorien, and see it in his eyes — perhaps even in his smile.

"Go on," Pirah said. Soren swiped the drink back from him and finished it, the glass refilling once more but with clear, sweet water this time. Pirah was pushing him a little from behind as Soren grasped Lorien's forearm and let him pull him up. His skin felt golden and tingling, and the music was strumming up to something lively.

"I'm not much of a dancer," Soren said.

"You're one of us," Lorien said, as he led Soren closer to the music. "It'll come to you."

If only that were true, Soren thought, but things were becoming soft and warm around the edges. He truly had no sense of rhythm beyond a tavern song, but Lorien made it easy. "I'll lead," he said, voice low, "or Pirah. I think either of us would be happy to lead." When Soren didn't respond he began to teach him a dance that involved bringing their hands together, almost touching, then moving closer and away in a circle as Lorien moved around, and Soren tried to follow his steps. He knew he ought to feel clumsy, lurching, but the relaxation had brought him to a fluidity in his body he had not known for years.

The golden haze overtook his vision, and he began to remember things in snatches. Pirah joined them, aided by a second wind, red-cheeked and glowing. The dances became more lively, Lorien and Pirah showing off with flourishes and movements that Soren could not hope to match, and for once he was content only to watch. Then, as if no time had passed in between, they were sitting back in that little hollow. Soren was in the middle with Pirah sitting sideways on the bench, legs slung over both their laps, Lorien's hand on his ankle. Soren didn't mind the warm weight of Pirah's legs on his thighs, even when he shifted and pressed down. They were eating apple turnovers, still hot from the oven, made with spices and Lorien's apples. Pirah and Lorien were reminiscing about something that Soren couldn't quite follow, but he found he didn't mind; he let Pirah's laugh and Lorien's soft words flow over him like water, as he licked apple off his fingertips.

More dancing — drinking water so cold it hurt his teeth — for a moment, being outside in the lush grass, carrying Lorien on his back while Pirah said, he really hit the target right through the ring — and wherever they were going he did not find out.

The next thing he was aware of was being somewhere dark and pleasantly warm, and his body felt hot and heavy in a way he could not describe. He was barely aware, just registering feelings, the tingling on the back of his neck — where was his scarf? It seemed like such a faraway thing to worry about. His face, his cheek, was pressed against something warm and slightly moving, and when he breathed in through his nose he smelled jasmine flowers and underneath it, something male that made his heart thump and his mouth water. He could not explain it, but the gold haze was bewitching his whole body.

Lorien, Lorien, he thought, breathing in that jasmine scent, and kissed the stomach he was pressed against and felt the muscles flutter in response, and then remembered he had hands and the will to move them, and he touched Lorien's hips, wiggling down further before he lost his courage and attended to the thread in his mind that was saying, you can't be doing this, it's not right, the Commander will find out —

That sensation was swept away as a hand touched the back of his head. Yes, he thought, and the power of that simple touch swept through him in a glittering rush. Make me do it, make me do it. The hand was gentle, too gentle. It did not grip at his hair and force him down, but it gentled him a little further, until he could feel the hardness of Lorien's cock — and he could not think about it, would not think about it, except he was chasing that male scent. Put my mouth there? he thought, stupidly. His own cock was hard enough that it was difficult not to be driven by it, and he could not help rocking his hips down into the mattress below him and feeling Lorien press up against him in response, and he opened his mouth around the shape of him through the fabric with a hot shock — you did that, no one made you do that — and his tongue felt thick and wet in his mouth, the fabric damp, and under that the undeniable hardness of a cock that he wanted in his mouth in way he had never felt —

The hand slipped down and touched the back of his head, and he had just the barest second to think not my neck before it gripped there, nails scratching at his nape, and he cried out, heard his own voice, loud and plaintive, before he was drowned in pleasure, the scratch reverberating hot down his spine and rolling slowly out to his limbs, shining in his mind and making the gold haze ten, twenty times stronger, every nerve in his body shaking with pleasure until he had to tense his thighs to stop himself coming untouched, the singing of his body saying yes, finally, this is right, yes, finally!

"Shit," he heard himself say from very far away, and everything stopped; the hot wash up his back was difficult to think past, and all he wanted was that hand to grip the back of his neck and make him move —

"Soren?"

It was not Lorien. It was Pirah.

Light bloomed in the darkness, and Soren reared back so hard and fast that he fell backwards off the bed, a dizzying dark-light whirl.

"Soren, you're of the night?" Pirah said, and he sounded surprised and a little lost, leaning over and extending his hand to Soren. "You should have told me. If I'd known, I would have courted you differently."

Courted, Soren thought, and it felt like getting jabbed in the side with a knife, the Commander's voice in his head, don't let them trick you into fucking one of them — but he had been half a minute away from rolling over for Pirah. Pirah, who had Lorien's flowers on his arm.

"Flowers," Soren said, his voice a croak, and the golden haze had lifted so fast that it felt like the world was shattering around him. Of the night — he did not know what that meant. He could not even think.

"Oh, Lorien gave them — " He saw the moment that Pirah realised what had happened, and the hurt that shuttered his face yanked Soren's heart to the front of his ribcage, made him want to say no, I didn't mean it like that — but if that was true, how had he meant it? What had he meant to say?

"No," was what he said. He could barely look at Pirah, with his hair cascading down over his golden shoulders, naked to the waist, lithe and long. That terrible want was crawling on the back of Soren's neck, the feelings he had worked so hard not to feel for his whole life — always cover your neck, lest someone find out you can be unmanned with a single touch —

"I'm sorry, I apologise," Pirah said, stumbling, thick-tongued. "I thought — " But he could not say what he thought, because his mouth twisted into such a downturned frown that Soren could not bear it. "Please stay," Pirah said, as Soren began to pick himself up off the floor. In the dim light he could only see little bits and pieces of Pirah's room, succulents and lush ivy, the grass thick and soft under Soren's bare feet. "I would hope that we can at least speak."

"I can't," Soren said, because he only knew how to run. He had nothing to say. He had no excuses for what had happened. Pirah had not forced him — Soren had been lying half on top of him, and that thought sent a terrible shake through his whole body. There was no excuse. There was no explanation. There was no way to say that he hadn't wanted it. Everyone would know by morning, and if they sent him back —

"Please," Pirah said, softly. "I understand more than you might think. Perhaps Lorien has occupied your thoughts for these months, but for me it has been several hundred years." He drew in a shuddering breath; the acute vulnerability in him forced Soren back several steps. He had never thought Pirah had any worries at all, and seeing them crowd to the front made the back of Soren's throat squeeze.

"I can't help you, I'm sorry," Soren said, the words coming out in a rush. His body was locking into his instincts, telling him to run. "It wasn't my intention to —

"It wasn't your intention to what?" Pirah said, and Soren could not stand here and watch Pirah's face crumple, especially not when the crawling sensation up and down his neck was unbearable. "I had thought that you and I had formed a friendship, at least, a connection — "

"I have to go," Soren said, and he turned into the darkness, blundering towards the exit. He had been foolish to let his control down, to even set foot into that hall, tempted by the music, the lights, the jacket Pirah had given him, still on his back. His stomach was tight with cramps. He could not stop hunching his shoulders up to his neck. Strange, hot-and-cold nausea gripped him, and he was sick with it, sick at what he had done.

There was no scarf around his neck now, and he touched the hollow of his throat. He could not conceive of what might have led him to remove it. He remembered, for a moment, Pirah's voice, close and low, saying do you always wear this? But he could not recall where or when that had been. And what had happened next? Had Pirah tangled his fingers in the cotton and pulled it free from Soren's neck, or had Soren unknotted it and bared his own flesh? There was no way to know.

He stumbled out into the corridor of the heart tree, disoriented and feeling upside-down. He had to figure out what he was going to say before anyone found out what had happened. He could not even say that Pirah had forced him, because down at the bottom of his soul he knew that he wished Pirah had.

It hurt to think about. So many years he'd spent not thinking about it at all, brushing off jibes and invitations to the tavern or the brothel. They'd had so many other things to direct at him that it had rarely come up, but when it had, he had always been careful not to think about it. He had never had an interest in women, but that was normal for some men. Some men just didn't think about it. No one had ever had an interest in him; he hadn't even touched himself in a long time, afraid of the thoughts it might conjure.

He was shivering alone in the corridor, the first fingers of the sun's dawn reaching out to touch his feet. He pulled back from them, running a hand through his sweat-damp hair. The cool air on the back of his neck felt raw, as if Pirah's touch had flayed him. There were precious few sounds of life within the tree: a very distant laugh, footsteps, but the celebrations were well and truly over, most people abed. He wished to join them, if he could only find where he was. He must be somewhere in the inner layer of the tree, when his own room was close to the entrance.

"Are you all right?" It was Lorien, of course, with his infernal need to appear whenever was most inconvenient, leaning half out of his own room's door. Had he been waiting for Soren to emerge from Pirah's room? "Can you help me?"

"Me?" Soren said, doubtfully. There was surely nothing that he could help Lorien with, but Lorien waved him closer without a second thought. Soren hesitated; he could not reconcile this Lorien with the one that he had thought he was with — and even thinking about that was like he had be stabbed in the back, hot agony slicing through his stomach. Surely he had not called Lorien's name. Surely he had not wished for that to happen. Lorien's hands, Lorien's hair, Lorien's neck — all those were the same as the Lorien he had called out for.

"My necklace is tangled in my hair," he said, and for the first time Lorien sounded a little sheepish. "I've been trying to get it out for what feels like an hour."

"Really?" Soren said, and he could not keep his surprise from his tone. Most of the elves wore their hair long and free-flowing, and he had never seen one brush it, never seen it tangle or get caught on anything. But Lorien had no reason to lie, and he turned around and showed Soren where it was indeed tangled hopelessly around the chain. Soren stepped closer, wishing he could somehow evade touching the back of Lorien's neck with his rough and calloused fingers, but it only took a moment's movement of Lorien's silky hair before it finally released the chain, and he flicked the catch of it open with his nail. It was the work of a moment. It should not have been charged with memory, but it was: the memory of Lorien in the dark of the forest, sitting on the edge of the river and tying his hair up, looking at Soren sidelong. Fuck, Soren thought, helplessly.

"Oh, finally," Lorien said, lowering his arms with a sigh of relief. "Such a small thing to cause such trouble, really. I'd best get some sleep before the true morning, as should you."

"Yes," Soren said, and only stopped himself from saying your highness by biting his own tongue. Lorien knew it; he was looking sidelong at Soren, the black paint on his eyes making the look more puckish than Soren was used to.

"Lorien," he said, and the words he wanted to speak — what does 'of the night' mean? — were crowded up around his teeth and tongue, and he could not push them through. Lorien would say where did you hear that? and then everything would change. Lorien would say, ah, it's a man who lies with men, and then look at him with his glittering eyes and see him for what he truly was.

"Let me just say," Lorien said, and Soren realised with a jolt that he had said Lorien's name and then nothing at all. "I'm no different from anyone else. All I truly want is companions that can be honest with me."

"I understand," Soren said. And he did understand what Lorien was saying: Soren was not the companion for him; he was not suitable. He could not be honest.

"I should be honest in turn, then," Lorien continued. "Meet me at the apple orchard in the afternoon tomorrow, if you like."

"All right," Soren said, and his heart was beating so fast that it felt like it would tear through his ribs. It could be only one of two things. First, he hoped it was merely Lorien telling him he did not want and had never wanted Soren as his personal guard. Second, perhaps he wanted to gently break the news to Soren that he wanted to send him back. You've upset Pirah, but you've disappointed me.

"Don't go to sleep with that on," Lorien said, waving his hand at Soren's front. "It stains."

"Right," Soren said, reflexively, though he did not understand what Lorien met until he bade him goodbye and walked into the light and saw his whole front was dappled with Pirah's golden paint.

*

For once, the bath in his room was not ice cold. It was so hot that just putting his foot in turned it red, and he thought, yes, it was right that it should be like this. He scrubbed at his skin until it was raw and tingling, and when he fell between the sheets of his bed there was almost a moment where he allowed himself to relax.

That was the problem, he thought, drowsily, his thoughts heavy and thick. The Commander had once told him, I am the only thing keeping your inhumanity in check, and at that time Soren had been so rigidly disciplined that it had seemed laughable. Now, he was forced to admit that the Commander had been right. He had not been here long enough to lose all his discipline, and yet it had happened so subtly that he had not even noticed.

I need a sword, he thought, and the first thing that came to mind was not the heavy dark-edged thing he had found in the armory, but Pirah's whip-thin blade with the flowers engraved on the hilt. Not that, not that. A real sword for a man, forged for the army, identical to any other. Nothing flashy. Nothing strange, not forged from the black metal at the heart of a star.

His mind was spinning in circles. He rolled over and pressed his face into the pillow. He'd long since had mastery over sleep, because he'd had no choice, and now he was able to plunge himself into the blessed dark void where he could feel nothing, see nothing.

*

"I was wondering if it would be too early," Lorien said, sitting under the apple tree with his straw hat tilted back against his shoulders. "Some midsummers no one even wakes up until dinner."

"I'm an early riser," Soren said, and it sounded dry, perhaps even like it was a joke. Lorien had fresh apples that he sliced with a little knife, and wine, which Soren refused. He might never drink again.

"So I've been told," Lorien said, and still the way he talked eluded Soren's every grasp. Honesty — had Lorien ever been truly honest with him about anything? You're interesting. No. Lorien turned and looked at him directly, and Soren had to look at the sharp angle of his face, his hair pulled back and hanging in a thick braid over his shoulder, the length of his ears in the air, the warmth of his eyes. "I've done you a disservice, Soren."

"No," Soren said, out of reflex.

"Yes," Lorien said, firmly. "You arrived with no warning, and so few do. I made the mistake of thinking I knew your life, even though I have never ventured beyond this world. I made that mistake many times, thinking that it must have been the same as ours, but the true mistake I made was never speaking to you about it."

Oh, gods, there turned out to be a third, worse option that Soren had never even considered.

"So I intend to rectify that," Lorien said, sitting straight and cross-legged, the entire force of his attention on Soren. The wind rustled the leaves of the apple trees above them. Further, the bees were humming gently in their hive, and the sound of the river below them was nothing but soothing. "May I ask you some questions?"

"You can do whatever you like," Soren said, and the tension and pain in his back were manifesting again.

"I wish to be clear," Lorien said, rocking forward and putting his hat down next to him. "Whatever being a prince means to you, I do not intend to invoke the right of that. I am simply asking as Lorien — as your friend."

That only makes it worse, Soren thought, but did not say, his tongue tangled around itself. He nodded.

"So, may I ask you some questions, as your friend?" Lorien said. Soren pulled in a ragged breath and nodded once more, hoping Lorien didn't notice the sheer fragility of his composure.

"You may ask me whatever you like," he said, because that much was true. He had no finesse of words like Lorien did, but what he did have was a finely-honed sense of danger that was waking up now. It would be like walking into a target range when he knew all the bows were drawn.

"I never knew your mother, as I said," Lorien said, and Soren could tell he was trying to paper over their previous conversation. "When you arrived, I did look at her book of names, as is my right now that she has left us. And I have heard tell of her, over my life."

"People here know her, then," Soren said, through numb lips. Did they look at him and expect to see her? If they did, what did they see? He had never known her touch, and no one had ever spoken to him of her before.

"I know Mereid was an unsettled soul," Lorien said, and it was honest and generous at the same time. "The kind of person who could not be comfortable wherever they were, always thinking of somewhere else." Soren rolled his shoulders uncomfortably. Was Lorien watching him closer now, or —

"Mereid?" he said.

"Your mother," Lorien said, and he watched Lorien's face go through confusion, then a flicker of what he thought might be anger, something ancient and slow-moving, a relic of a bloodline. The sun slipped behind a cloud; the bees went quiet in their hive. A cold rush of wind stirred the leaves above them. Lorien's fingers were tight on the delicate wine glass in his left hand, before he placed it down, very slowly and deliberately, on the ground next to him. "Your sire did not tell you her name."

"My sire did not tell me much of anything," Soren said, shrugging. That much did not hurt to think about. "I was raised as a bastard for the army, nothing more."

"Bastard?" Lorien said.

"Child of ill parentage," Soren said. "Out of wedlock, that sort of thing."

"I see," Lorien said. The sun had not yet come out from behind the cloud. So Soren had dispelled whatever grand image that Lorien had had of the outside world, of Soren's life outside. "You must have had some trusted friend of the family to raise you, then, or a nurse of some kind?"

"No," Soren said. "No one like that. Just other boys training to be accepted for infantry." He shrugged again. "It's how it was. There's no grand story." Each of his muscles was locking into pain and stiffness again, the left side of his body going numb. If Lorien noticed, he said nothing. "I don't think it'll be of any interest to you."

"I'd like to hear it all the same," Lorien said — and the clouds cleared, abruptly. Soren sucked in a breath, his stomach swooping as the sky changed from threatening to clear in an instant. Sweat was prickling under his shirt at the sheer abruptness of it — but worse, how Lorien had not seemed to take account of it at all. "But perhaps not today. Turnabout is fair play, isn't it, if you would like to ask me anything?"

What does — Pirah — what does it mean that — "How old are you?" Soren said, suddenly and in a rush, ignoring Lorien's look of mild surprise and amusement.

"Can you not tell?"

"Not at all," Soren said, still ignoring the way Lorien was smiling, the crinkle of the corners of his eyes. They were a warm brown, but he had never noticed before that they were also partly green, like shoots poking out from the earth.

"Would you like to guess?" Lorien said, crooking an eyebrow. But he was smiling, and Soren took it as a joke. Guessing would only rebound on him; to him, Lorien was ancient, ageless. It was the way he carried himself, utterly comfortable in his own skin, completely self-assured. Nothing bothered him. Nothing affected him at all. "No? Oh, well, let me preserve my dignity to you and say I'm somewhere over three hundred years."

"Three hundred," Soren repeated, and Lorien's words crashed over him with a terrible weight that he could not bear. Three hundred years? "Do you know," he said, and he had to force the words out of him, his breaths coming in shallow, pained inhales, "do you know how long people, those of us, how long I might live?"

"I can't be sure," Lorien said, and he was not upset by the question; he merely looked like he was pondering it. "Others like you rarely come back to this side, so I've not known any myself. I do know that those of us who stay at the heart tree live as long as they have a taste for it."

Not three hundred years, but an eternity of feeling like this? he thought. If he would live until he had no taste for life, he should have collapsed long ago. He put his hands on his thighs and sat, trying to cover the terrible boiling of his brain. He had escaped from the shroud of his ever-present anger, but it was flaring despite his will to be calm, to be present with Lorien. It was eating away at him on the inside, digging down into his own flesh.

Lorien was still talking.

"Because we are so long-lived, things are different for us than for humans," he said. "There is freedom to pursue the arts, or whatever you wish — or to do nothing at all, if that is your wont. But some of us never settle, or tend to feel emotions more strongly for certain periods of our lives. I was like that. There was a time where Pirah and I could barely stand in the same room without starting some kind of fight."

"You?" Soren said, startled out of his reverie. "You and Pirah fought?"

"Constantly," Lorien said, pulling his legs to his chest. "It's hardly unusual. We rubbed each other the wrong way, you could say. It's history. That's part of the difference, I think. We fought for a hundred years, we did not speak for fifty, and now we are friends again. I find our most precious resource, what humans are denied, is time."

"You pity them," Soren said, because he was too much of a coward to say you pity me.

"No, I don't think I do," Lorien said, as if Soren had asked him a question. "No more than I pity the birds, or those who leave here. Everyone is born how they are born and make their own choices. My only hope is to shape a world where those choices can be given the grace they deserve."

That meant nothing to Soren, but he nodded all the same. It was, he thought, almost a naive view of the way the world worked. Its sole purpose was to march you to the bone, and then crush what was left until you had no more thoughts. But he could not tell that to someone who was so ancient; he must look down and see Soren as a child.

"Turnabout," Soren said, because he wanted to see the shock on Lorien's face, to make him mentally cast Soren down to sit with others of his age, the children that rushed back and forth under the moonlight until they were called home by their parents. Lorien crooked an eyebrow at him, waiting. "I'm thirty," he said. "Or, I was before I came here."

"Thirty," Lorien said, slowly, and there was no distaste, no pity, only a deep and fruitless sadness that slipped away like water through loosely-cupped fingers. He looked down, long lashes sweeping against his cheek, and said nothing for a moment that began to feel particularly awkward. "I suppose that's enough for one day," he said, and Soren could not be sure if Lorien thought that Soren had had enough, or if he'd heard enough of Soren's pitiful life that he was bored with it. "Unless you have anything else to ask."

"Pirah," Soren said, without thinking, the word shooting out of him like an arrow. Whatever he had meant to follow it with, Lorien dispelled by replying, "How old is Pirah?" and smiling crookedly. "That is something you will have to ask him for yourself."

"You know," Lorien said, as they were folding up the blanket they had been sitting on, "if you wanted to learn without asking questions, there's plenty of books in the library. Ye-jun will help you, if you're quiet."

"Can't read the stuff in there," Soren said, and despite his best attempts, it came across thick-headed, pushed through his teeth. "I tried."

"Oh, of course," Lorien said, frowning. "I didn't think of that. There should be some things in, um, the human common tongue."

"I'll have another look," Soren said, and bade Lorien goodbye, trying not to watch him go.

The conversation that seemed concocted by Lorien to soothe him had unsettled him more. A hundred years of this — a thousand. He could not bear even one more, if he was truly honest with himself. If he really reached down into the mire of his blood and asked what it had left in it, he knew the answer. Nothing. It had had nothing a year before, or the year before that. He'd never done what he knew others had, if anyone else had ever truly felt the black depths that he was adrift in, but —

He made himself walk deeper into the forest, telling himself that it was not avoiding the training yard — or Pirah — but simply light training of a different kind. His thoughts strayed, returned, strayed back. I have never put a blade to my own throat, he thought, or stood at the top of the balustrade and looked down at the black river and whirling snow, but can I honestly say I've watched an enemy blade coming towards my heart and not hesitated before turning it aside?

He hated thinking this. He hated the way it made him feel, like his heart was a rotten apple. He'd not had the will to let it happen then, and still did not. There had been nothing to live for then, but he'd never thought that it would get worse. Even after he found the land of his mother's people, as he had dreamed since he was a child, the story he had told himself silently when he was trying to fall asleep for as long as he could remember, when the others in the barracks were snoring and shifting — the kingdom of the elves, where every day is summer and their table is always full, where my mother will meet me, and hold me close —

"Shit," he whispered into the cool wind. No one was around to hear him; no one cared, anyhow. Pirah thought he was weak; Lorien pitied him. They were right to do so. A hundred years, a thousand years. He had no capacity to change, no capacity to outstrip his own weakness. The Commander had told him that time and time again, and it had proved true. He had never managed to become a true human, no matter how he had tried. In fact, the attempts he made to better himself only set him further apart from them. It was the same here. It would be the same anywhere. The problem was him, and he would never change.

Soren walked for a long time before returning to the heart tree, and found himself following Lorien's words to the library. He had never been there at night; there were little hanging globes of light in the air — no, they were not hanging but suspended in the air by nothing he could see. As he passed through the shelves they followed him, hovering over his head. It set his teeth on edge.

The library was empty even of Ye-jun, though her corner was also lit by the same globes, clustering happily around her desk. Most of the books and scrolls on the shelves he could not read, and he was beginning to think that Lorien had played a trick on him when he finally found a niche at the back of the room, near a window that was blowing fresh and cool air into the rest of the library. The light globes gently bumped into him as he came to a hard stop.

It was a small shelf, low to the ground. It wasn't as if it was shunned, more — ignored. He understood that. It was not like any of them would seek it out. He could not imagine anyone wanting to read about the human world. He crouched by the little shelf and ran his fingers over the loosely-bound titles, alighting on one stitched with golden thread. Of A Human Adventure was the title. He could not tell from its forest-green exterior what kind of book it was, and he could not stop himself from looking both ways before opening it at random. He'd been cuffed and hit enough times for reading that it no longer held the appeal that it once had.

Amistyn thought Emila was a perfect example of the human form, shapely, with curves where he enjoyed to look at them, the red of her hair, the freckles across her milk-pale skin, the way she flushed, as all humans did, when they were secretly aroused; but it was only when she tumbled to the sheets and succumbed to his hands on her thick thighs, her hips, the way she sighed when Amistyn pressed her to the mattress with all his weight and sought her glistening hidden pearl beneath her curled hair, the way she melted into his forthright touch, that he realised if she'd been an elf she'd have been of the night, and as a human she was more sensitive to it, more unpractised to the daylight arts —

Soren slammed the book shut, dust clouding the air around him. He was flushing, just like the book said — was that what everybody thought when he blushed? His guts twisted. Was that what they saw when they looked at him? A weak thing that lay down and took it in bed, and liked it?

That was what Pirah had seen in him. That was what Pirah had seen, thought of him from the very start: someone who would lie down for him, someone weak to a heavy hand. He was wrong. He did not know Soren at all, if he thought that.

He shoved the book back onto the shelf and pulled out another one at random, a thick, heavy thing that was handwritten in a flowing script that he could barely read. He flicked the pages, trying to look for the word night or day, trying not to rip the delicate pages with his angry fingers. A few words caught his eye —

Ife an arrow from a bowe is the elfes oft the nyght, they fit into the bowe oft the daye, being used and fyred from one to another. It is as one might think of the fayerer sexe of humans, made to be delicate and serve the stronger sexe, provide for their needs. It is the duty of the nyght elfes to serve the day, especially in bed, and it seems they have no saye in it, and even believe they enjoy it. It appears to one's eye a wanton syckness to enjoy it as they do, with no control over thine own bodies —

"What?" Soren said, to the empty library. No one answered. "What?" he said again, his voice strange and confused even to his own ears. His mind caught and dragged on words he did not understand: wanton, stronger, from one to another. No one had told him of this expectation. If they decided he was one of them — what, this account said that they were going to pass him around?

Flames were burning under his heart again, cold, horrible flames. The way Pirah had treated him, pretending to be his equal, pretending that Soren had a chance to best him with a sword — it had all been fake, to what? To lure him into his bed, to lie to him about being something he wasn't, he knew he wasn't, he couldn't be.

And yet, he knew some part of what he was thinking couldn't be true. Pirah had never acted false with him. He did not want it to be true, because he had acted false with Pirah — but he knew now it had been one-sided. But he had to push it down. He could not believe there was a third side to himself that he knew nothing of — but then why wear the scarf? — that he knew nothing about.

Prove it, he thought, clenching his fingers around the book. Pirah thought he knew Soren better than he knew himself? Prove it, he thought. Prove it the only way that he knew how. The only way Soren would believe.

*

The last vestiges of the afternoon sun were a golden blaze under the clouds, as Soren pushed through the trees at the furthest end of the training field. Pirah had looked confused, peering out of the gloom, when Soren had knocked on his door with more force than necessary. It was almost evening; had he been sleeping? But he had nodded when Soren had said, through gritted teeth, meet me in half an hour. Had his eyes brightened when Soren had asked him? He could not tell. It was unlikely, he thought. Pirah had just been waking up.

But now, approaching his back, Soren thought that Pirah had misunderstood his intentions completely. It was as if Soren had asked him to a picnic, as he had with Lorien. Pirah had brought cakes and cider; Soren had brought his armor and sword.

"Just wait there a moment," Pirah said, without turning around. "I just want to say something before I have to look you in the eye."

Soren hesitated. Had Pirah heard the soft sound of metal in his movements? Had he sensed his true intentions?

"If I made you uncomfortable or did something you did not wish, I apologise for that," Pirah said. "It is the last thing I would wish to do. What I said about Lorien — I would not stand in your way if — " He cut himself off; Soren did not speak. It was beginning to feel as if his whole body was on fire, starting at the points of his ears and rolling down his body in hot and cold waves. You don't know what I want, he thought. You don't know me at all.

"All I mean by that is, he's had hundreds of years to requite my feelings," Pirah said. And then, after a moment, "I had resigned myself to being alone until you arrived."

Soren held his breath. He could not hear this; whenever Pirah had looked at him, he had seen someone that did not exist. He had seen what he wanted to see. That was the truth, but for a reason that Soren could not name, it felt like his ribs were being sliced through, the point of the knife reaching to his heart.

"I understand if you do not feel the way that I feel," Pirah said. "Everything here is so new, and I do not wish to overwhelm you, but I know there is a spark between us and I know that you — " He turned and the words died in his throat.

Soren held Pirah's sword in his hand, but what Pirah was looking at was his chest, where he had donned his armour. Elven armour was so different to human armour; it felt like wearing a sheet of water that moved with him, rather than heavy steel that worked against him. But Pirah was looking at where his heart was shielded. Soren felt nothing at all.

He threw Pirah's sword down on the ground, and his armour, and his helmet. Three thumps of metal that sounded deeper than they should. Final.

"Pick it up," Soren said. His voice was flat. He was a scraped-out shell.

"No, I don't think I will," Pirah said, his voice hardening. His face went blank. "What is this? What do you want?"

"I want to show you how weak I am," Soren said. "You may think whatever you like of me, but I want to show you."

"I've never thought you weak," Pirah said, frowning. He stood, slowly, and it was an act of power because now Soren had to tip his head up to look at Pirah, seeing him through the metal of his helm. "Did someone say something to you?"

"Pick it up."

"No," Pirah said. "I don't wish to raise a blade against you, not in truth. That's the last thing I want, Soren, can't you see that? Who said something to you?"

"You did," Soren said, drawing his own sword with increasingly frayed control. "You said something to me." He pointed the dark tip of the blade at Pirah, ignoring the feeling in his hands, the numbness, the pain in his bones saying drop it, cast it away. The feeling in the locked muscles of his arms that said, this might be the last time that you hold a sword. The feeling in the rotten blood coming in and out of his heart that said, you're not even strong enough to do this, are you?

"What did I say?" Pirah said. Soren could not look at the sad glint in his eyes. "Is that all it takes, something I said?"

"You think I'm weak," Soren said, and his words were hard, like spitting rocks from his mouth. "You think I'm of the night."

"But you are," Pirah said, surprised. "As much as I am of the day — I'm only surprised I didn't notice it sooner."

"Then draw your sword and prove it," Soren said, through his teeth. He moved forward, because he knew Pirah's reflexes would not allow the blade to come any closer without snatching up his own and bouncing back, light on his feet, the filigree of his blade dancing in the air.

"There have been times where I haven't understood you," Pirah said. Clouds were mounting on the horizon, black and heavy with rain. Lightning flickered. "For a time, I thought it was because you were part human. Now, I see it is just who you are."

Soren sheathed his blade, and he saw Pirah relax a fraction, though he did not mirror it in his own body.

"Draw on me," Soren said, raising his hands. "Draw on me as Astrea did to you."

"I don't want to," Pirah said.

"You don't think I can do as you did."

"I don't know," Pirah said, "and I do not want to harm you. I won't harm you, I won't."

"I can take it."

"I know that," Pirah said. "And that is why I will not harm you further. Haven't you borne enough? War, humans, coming here. Haven't you been harmed enough?"

"You know nothing of war," Soren said. He felt like ripping off his armour, his shirt, baring his skin and his scars to the wind that was whipping up between them.

"When I look at you, you cannot imagine how grateful I am for that," Pirah said, soft, with immense sadness. "No one should have to see what you've seen. No one should have to do what you've done."

"You don't know what I've done," Soren said. "I'm stronger than you."

"I don't doubt that," Pirah said, but he still sounded sad. Why was he agreeing? Didn't he want to refute what Soren was saying? Did he simply not care? "I think if you weren't wounded, you might be as fast as me, too."

"I'm not wounded," Soren said. And it was true, because he was not in pain. He felt nothing.

"I can see it in the way you carry yourself," Pirah said, looking down at Soren's leg, across his arms, everywhere. Everywhere. "I could see it from the moment I first found you. I thought it was from crossing over, but it wasn't. It's something else."

"Stop," Soren said.

"What are you afraid of?" Pirah said. "I've studied to be a healer. I want to help you."

"Draw your fucking sword!"

"If you always run instead of facing things, this is how it turns out," Pirah said. "It is not me you are afraid of, but yourself."

"No," Soren said. He could not listen. All he wanted to do was fight. The hot fire spreading through his entire body was a terrible energy that he could not shake off. Pirah dropped his sword down to his side, and drew in a breath. "You see things in me that aren't there."

"I see things in you that you can't see yourself," Pirah said. "I'd like to see them with you, if you'd allow me."

"Don't spout bullshit," Soren said. Something in him was trying to pull the reins, to slow him. If the fight did not start now, it might never start. He might never be able to start it. "Strike at me."

"I'm over three hundred years old, Soren," Pirah said. He sounded bone-tired. "You can't make me fight you with petty jibes."

This is the price of vulnerability, the Commander's voice said, right into Soren's mind as if he was standing next to him. His hand strayed to his sword as if the Commander's hand was on his elbow. Weakness. "You only want to bed me because you can't fuck Lorien," Soren said, and he saw the moment it impacted Pirah, the words travelling right down to his heart.

Pirah gave no indication of movement before he moved. Soren's perception of time slowed at once, and he saw the terrible deep anger on Pirah's face, like the ripping open of an old scar thought fully healed. Pirah's blade was swift and light, tearing through the veil of the air. Soren was waiting as if he had all the time in the world. Soren never felt clarity — except at this exact moment, when he could be nothing but the blade of his sword. Excitement too — the unknown thrill of matching and being equally matched.

Pirah, coming towards him, realised he was waiting, his eyes widening. For the briefest second, Soren was connected to everything: the grass around them, the clouds in the sky, the flickering lightning that was growing ever closer. His awareness spread with the light until his mind touched the heart tree, travelled along its branches, and brushed against Lorien, who startled and dropped his teacup, which shattered on the ground.

Pirah was not pulling his blow. Soren's sword sang into his hand, despite the pain in his body, despite the blade being too heavy and unsuited to his hand, and it slipped up between his face and Pirah's blade as if he had been holding it there all along. It was easy. It was the first time that he had done it, but it could have been the hundred thousandth time.

"How dare you," Pirah said. "How dare you speak of him like that." Soren had not anticipated how close this would bring them, Pirah's body almost shored up against his, their quivering blades separating their faces.

"You're not going to put on your helm?" Soren said, and he could feel the hot battlefield rage coming over him, holding him up when he could not stand.

"If you're going to do this to me, then you'll have to look upon me as I am," Pirah said, and then they were dancing, air singing with the sound of steel on steel, Pirah's hair floating on the chill wind as he turned and ducked under Soren's sweeps, as he moved backwards and forwards, feinted and parried, his whip-thin blade catching the strength of Soren's strikes and turning them aside. He was always where Soren would be. It was as if he knew what Soren was thinking before he did. It would be impossible to beat him.

But Soren was the same. He could see in each of Pirah's movements what would follow; he could read his intentions in the slightest flex of his muscles, the way he swayed back and forth. He could have closed his eyes and fought him all the same, by feeling the way the air moved between them, by the sound of Pirah's breath. This was perfection. This was the best he would ever be, in a half-dead body with a sword that dragged his arm, his own harsh breaths echoing against the steel of his helm. They were perfectly matched; no sword would win this battle.

"If you hated it so much," Pirah said, and his sword was faster than the lightning that was approaching, the clouds erasing the sunset behind them, "why did you start it?" They were locked together again, Pirah pressing his sword down against the hilt of Soren's blade, exerting his strength, the veins standing out on his biceps and forearms. So Pirah was vulnerable in the same way Soren was; so he could be fought, and beaten, and he did feel tired, and afraid — he could be strained and broken apart. It was a shock to Soren — they were the same. Fighting Pirah was like fighting himself.

"I started nothing," Soren said. "I would never — it's wrong."

"Wrong to kiss me?" Pirah said, and Soren knew Pirah felt his flinch. "You kissed me, and I thought, this is a man who has not been kissed. And I thought, what a shame."

"It's not right," Soren said, pulling back and letting Pirah lunge, spin, avoiding the flash of his blade, catching the strike on his black blade and feeling the power of it turn into pain shimmering up his arms.

"Says who?" Pirah said. And then, "Why?" But Soren had no answers except to redouble his attack, his strikes turning wild and harsh, uncontrolled, his blade shaking in the air, cleaving in the dirt. Of course he was faltering — of course, right at the precipice of victory, he was losing the strength to drive forward. Even when he got what he wanted, he could not see it to the end. Hard drops of rain shivered across his back, ice-cold and working their way down onto his shoulders, his hands crooked. He was holding on to his sword because he could no longer let it go. They were close, far, close again. Every time their swords met it sent a flash of hot fire down into Soren's flesh, scalding him.

"Shouldn't have started what you couldn't finish," Pirah said, his voice coming and going, surrounding Soren until he could hear nothing but it and the roar of the rain. "You were enjoying yourself. You didn't think I was Lorien. You looked me in the eye. You called me beautiful."

"I was drunk," Soren said, desperately. The rain tasted like blood in his mouth.

"Lie to yourself, but not to me," Pirah said.

"This is not what men do," Soren said, blinking stinging sweat out of his eyes. "This isn't right. You tricked me."

"You kissed me," Pirah said, and he was close and far all at once. "You liked it."

Do not let them trick you, the Commander said. They will try. They will try and make you be like them.

"I'm not like you," Soren said. And that was true; perhaps Pirah could sense it, because he backed off, resting on the balls of his heels as Soren swept his sword from left to right, trying to anticipate a strike that did not seem to be coming. He was not like Pirah. Not strong in his own skin like Pirah. Not real like Pirah was. "They told me you would try and trick me."

"I know you will live to regret this," Pirah said, and he sounded sad enough, his voice choked. "I do not wish to be a part of it, but I am, and I will regret it too."

Soren charged at him, and they began to fight again, slicing the drops of rain in two. The droplets were like ice-cold knives where they hit him, rending into his flesh, inescapable, clawing at him. I don't want this, he thought, and he thought of the golden haze, the heavy warmth against him, the way that Pirah's breath had shifted when Soren moved, the sugar of anticipation on his tongue. But I can't have that. He thought of Lorien's knowing glance, and the way he had wrapped his arms around his legs, and the way the bees had landed on the edge of his hat. I can't have anything.

Pirah lunged at him once more, a blade easily turned away, but Soren made no move to deflect it, his sword falling from his nerveless hand and into the mud. Pirah was too deep in his mind, too caught in the reverberations of his own anger, until it was almost too late to pull the blow. Soren watched and waited for him to realise that the point of the blade was pointed at Soren's heart, his hands open, head tipped back.

In the final moment, Pirah let go of the blow and threw his blade. They went down into the mud and Soren had to fight his instincts to make himself keep still, to not crash his head into Pirah's face and begin the fight once more.

"Do it," he said, lying back in the mud. He reached out for Pirah's sword and pressed the hilt back into his hand. The rain now felt like being struck with a hail of arrows. It was tearing the ground apart; it was closing them in with the thickness of it, grey and dark all around them.

"Do — "

"I'd rather die than go back," he said, and he was so tired. The edge of the blade scratched at his throat; he was holding it there with his own hands. "Please."

"Go back?" Pirah said, and he was half on top of Soren. His sword trembled between them, pulled one way and then the other, the cold steel kissing Soren's throat. Their hands were touching; that felt like thrusting his hand into a fire. "Soren, what are you talking about?"

"Kill me," he said, trying to pull the sword hard up into his throat. "Don't send me back, kill me." He had no strength to continue, his arms going slack.

Pirah pulled the sword back, too hard, wrenching his head back to avoid its flick. He was too slow for once, and it licked the side of his face, the cut running with thin blood watered by the rain.

"Ah, Soren," Pirah said, first touching his own cheek, then the side of Soren's face. The gentleness of it stung; it broke something within him, his soul shattering like glass. A terrible sob tore from the bottom of his stomach, seizing the muscles of his whole body and coming out as no sound at all, his throat closing around it. He wrenched his helm off and bared his face to the rain. He was cold all over. He could not stand to look at the blood on Pirah's face.

"Come on," Pirah said, and it took him three or four tries to get Soren up, his legs slipping under him. Soren was soaked clean through, shivering with pain and cold, leaning his whole weight on Pirah. The only part of him that was warm was where the tears were leaking down his cheeks, unbidden.

"Not there," Soren said, words choked, as Pirah pointed them towards the heart tree.

"No," Pirah said, and his voice was warm, his shoulders strong and hot under Soren's arm. "I know a place."

He turned with Soren's weight on his shoulders and led him into the trees of the forest. With a little shelter from the driving rain, Soren could blink it from his eyes and see the wet curtain of Pirah's hair draped over his shoulders, the small trickle of blood running down his cheek. The trees parted, and there was a shelf of rock with a door cut into it that Pirah led him through, the torches lighting at their presences.

Inside, the roar of the rain was dulled, and in the soft flickering darkness, as Pirah leant him against the wall, Soren shivered and found he could not move. His whole body was a block of ice, his soul cracked in half. Whenever he blinked, his eyes stung with hot tears that he could not seem to stop.

Pirah was back after a moment, pulling at the ties of Soren's vambraces and letting them fall to the ground, his hot fingers massaging at the drawn-tight muscle of Soren's forearms. The pressure was enough to be painful, but it was paired with the shuddery-hot feeling of the muscle relaxing fractionally. Soren hissed, but Pirah did not stop, his hair hanging around his head in a series of dark ribbons. He was drenched to the bone, but he did not seem bothered by it in the slightest, only kept his head bent to his task.

Soren's eyes were adjusting to the light as Pirah undid his chest armour at the side and pulled it free, then worked Soren's shirt free and drew it off over his head. The air was warmer in here, but it still stung at his exposed flesh. Soren shivered, gooseflesh rising. He could not stop it, and his arm shook in Pirah's grip as he worked his way up Soren's forearm, unerringly feeling out the knots in his muscles.

"I'm tired," Soren said, and they were words that came from his cracked-open soul, the truth of them too heavy for the air to bear.

"I know," Pirah said, with great regret. "I know you are." He was looking at the scars on Soren's chest, his hands moving up to his bicep, striking sparks wherever he moved. The warmth did not linger, but Soren could not help swaying towards it when Pirah moved away.

"I'm sorry," he said. The words were dull. "I didn't — " His hand twitched involuntarily upwards as if to touch the slowing blood on Pirah's face, but Pirah caught it, held it.

"I understand," he said, and when Soren looked him in the eye he felt that it was true. He allowed himself to think it was true, for just a moment. Pirah did understand. "I have to — you have to get out of these wet things, Soren," Pirah said, and he was half reaching towards Soren's pants, but hesitated. Soren made no move to stop him. Don't ask, he thought, quietly. Just — do it.

Pirah understood, and Soren let him undress him, leaning his weight on Pirah's shoulders, and when he stood, Pirah was still in his armour, and Soren was naked in front of him, shivering and luminous.

Not fully naked — his scarf was knotted so tight that Pirah could not find the end of it, and the shift of the fabric back and forth was maddening, and he knew that Pirah was mistaking the quickening of his breath for pain. "Just a moment," Pirah said, and he unsheathed his belt knife and slipped it between the scarf and Soren's skin, and Soren thought he might die from the anticipation of it, his knees weak. Would Pirah cut him? If he was of the night, how did those who were of the night function, if just the barest touch made him feel like he was going mad?

The knife slipped free along with the fabric of his scarf, and Soren hissed, leaning his full weight on Pirah, who shored him up. The cold metal of Pirah's armor cut into his tender skin, chilling him all down the front, lighting up his long-dead nerves. His arms were over Pirah's shoulder, his face so close, and he could see Pirah's apprehension.

The weariness in his body had peaked; the weariness in his mind had as well. What was the point of this? What was the point of wounding himself, of wounding Pirah by twisting the knife in his own stomach? He just wanted to rest; he just wanted to live in this moment of being so close to Pirah, of feeling the warmth of his body.

I want it, he thought, and the truth of it still tasted bitter in his mouth. Pirah would not move to close the distance between them, and Soren knew that Pirah's anticipation would not last forever — that he was being offered this one chance — if I want it, I have to be the one to take it, he thought, and pressed his mouth to Pirah's, a closed, hard press that was all he knew how to do.

"Show me," he said, drawing back. If anyone was seducing, tricking, it was him, naked in front of Pirah, who was hesitating. He felt the moment Pirah decided to move, his hand slipping up Soren's back, fingers brushing over the nape of his neck. Yes, Soren thought, the sparks shivering down his spine.

"Open your mouth," Pirah murmured, tilting his head, and Soren obeyed, closing his eyes. In the warm darkness he could do nothing but wait for Pirah to lean closer; he felt the shift of his body, the warmth of him moving closer, until his mouth met Soren's, and the hot flick of his tongue into Soren's mouth as his grip on Soren's neck increased, and then released as Pirah pulled back slowly.

"More," Soren said.

"In a moment," Pirah said, and there was the slightest tremble in his voice. You feel it too, Soren thought, with a hot twist in his stomach. Naked in front of Pirah, leaning into him — "A moment," Pirah said, and he bore Soren down onto the ground. Soren flinched, expecting to meet hard stone, and found only lush moss that cradled his body, soft and fragrant. He rolled onto his stomach and tried to breathe air into his heavy lungs, his body singing with exhaustion and pain.

"Are you hurt?" Pirah said, returning. Soren thought he might have been drifting on the edge of sleep, the border between where he was and the place full of dark stars.

"No more than usual," Soren said, and his voice sounded like gravel. Pirah had stripped as well, tied his hair back and squeezed it out, and it was returning to its sleek curtain. He could barely see Pirah in the gloom and yet he could not look away from the long line of his torso, his ribs, the strength and swiftness in his arms and legs. He bore no scars on his skin, not like the old wounds on Soren's back that he knew Pirah was looking at now, his mouth set unhappily.

"Let me say one thing," Pirah said, and he put his warm hand on the middle of Soren's back. Soren tilted his head, looking down at Pirah, wondering if he should steel himself for a blow. No, not here. Not in the warmth with the moss soft against his front, and Pirah's anchoring hand on his back. "Soren, I could no more send you away from here than I could change the colour of the sky." A moment's hesitation. "Which I also cannot do." His hand slipped up Soren's back, slick with something, and he was feeling the muscles with a delicate touch, seeking out where the pain hid. "None of us have any such power, not me, not Lorien. I fear if we tried, the land herself would prevent us. It is not something any of us would try. Please believe me when I say I would rather have you here than anywhere else, but especially not there."

Pirah shifted until he was kneeling at Soren's side, touching his back with his other hand. His hands formed a triangle as he pushed them up Soren's spine, fingers and thumbs feeling expertly for where the knots lay. "Tell me if there's pain," Pirah said, softly, and before Soren could speak, Pirah said, "By that I mean anything sharp, anything new. I suspect this will hurt, but it should be a good pain."

Soren hummed his ascent. His mind was beginning to float somewhere warm, in between the solidity of Pirah's touch and the soft moss beneath. It felt a little hazy, but he was present. "Where are we?" he said, and his voice sounded slightly drunk. It felt like he was being pressed down into the moss, Pirah leaning his weight into Soren's back.

"It's a healing pool," Pirah said. "It doesn't appear unless someone needs it. No one will disturb us here."

"You said you'd been here before," Soren said, his voice slow and thick.

"Yes," Pirah said, and his tone was a little short. Soren knew not to pursue. Perhaps — not yet.

He was beginning to feel like a big cat in a sunbeam, the warmth settling under his skin. Pirah had found somewhere in his back where the worst pain lay, and he was working it out with his elbow. Soren groaned, a deep, primal thing he could not control. The deep, hot hurt of it beginning to unknot was paired with the strange response he had always had to Pirah, his stomach tightening, blood beginning to turn hot.

"What is this one from?" Pirah said, brushing his fingertips over a ridge of scar on Soren's ribs.

"Arrow," Soren said. The golden veil was draping over him. He had not drunk anything, had he? Had that feeling not been from the wine at all? "They had to push it through."

"This one?" Pirah said, and he ran his fingertips over something else. He moved away, his thumbs digging into Soren's shoulder, seeking out the pain.

"I don't know," Soren said. The oil that Pirah was using smelled like something he did not know, a flower or tree sap, something of the earth. "I only remember the bad ones." Pirah's hands stopped.

"For me, they are all bad ones," he said, and Soren felt a brief tremble of anger in Pirah's hands. "I would prefer there were none at all."

"Can't take them away," Soren said.

"I would if I could," Pirah said, suddenly fierce. "I would make it so none of them ever happened." His fingers skimmed down to Soren's hip, the sparking sensation of skin on skin making Soren remember suddenly that he was naked, naked with another man's hands on him, and he could not suppress the sudden shake in his body, briefly jolted out of the haze. "Does it hurt here?" Pirah said, and his fingers slipped against the three or four scars on Soren's right thigh, grouped together in a neat line. "What are these?"

"Ah," Soren said, and then his tongue stilled in his mouth, and he closed it with a click of teeth. He heard Pirah's exhale, and the light changed a little, as if Pirah had moved a torch to get a better look.

"A knife?" Pirah said. "Someone stabbed you?"

"No," Soren said. His heart was beginning to pound. Don't ask questions, he thought, hard, but if Pirah did, he could not help himself but answer. If Pirah asked anything of him, told him what to do, he would obey without question just to feel the honey of it. Don't talk about it. He lifted his hand and formed a fist, as if he was holding the hilt of a knife, and brought it down against his own leg three, four times.

"What?" Pirah said, and Soren thought he might recoil, or even leave, and he would be left cold and alone — but he did the opposite, shoring up against Soren so their legs touched, his hands on Soren's back, and he could tell that Pirah wanted to lie against him or over him, press him down with his weight. Of the night, Soren thought, thinking of how it would align Pirah's mouth, his teeth, against the nape of his neck. "Why?"

"It hurt," Soren said.

"I imagine it definitely would have," Pirah said, and Soren could hear the unhappy set of his jaw.

"No, that is why I did it," Soren said, and his throat was swollen and choked, his mind offset enough to allow words to slip free of his tongue. "I — if I didn't march, they were going to leave me behind. It hurt so much, I thought if I — I thought it would relieve the pain." He waited to hear Pirah's thoughts, waited for him to say that's madness, or something more, but he said nothing.

"That was the day I came here," Soren said. He remembered it in flashes. The rain, the mud, his blood winding its way down his leg. The brief moment of relief he had felt, when he had finally plunged the knife into his own flesh, had faded quickly, and then he was alone, dragging himself into the forest, trying to find a place to die.

Instead — music. The scent of summer on the wind, despite the freezing rain on his back, a rush of energy spurring him on, the light becoming golden and warm on his arms. He'd thought he had died, at first — finally, finally found the courage to die. He told Pirah this, and endured the shake in his hands, the wobbly sound of Pirah's breathing. He did not know why it would upset Pirah; with each word his body felt lighter, his mind unclouded.

"The Mother Queens or the heart tree, or the land itself," Pirah said, and he had resumed massaging Soren's back, perhaps to keep his hands from being idle. "Something called to you. Something healed you." A hesitation. "I am grateful that it did." He bent his body in supplication and kissed Soren's scars, a brief brush of his lips. "Forgive me if — "

"Can I turn over?" Soren asked, his voice coming from somewhere low and dark. If Pirah willed it, he would do nothing. If Pirah willed it, he would do — anything.

"Of course," Pirah said, moving back hurriedly. "Is your shoulder hurting? I can do some for you, but not — "

Soren felt like a huge and powerful big cat rolling in the sun, more present in his body than he had been in a very long time. He felt the warmth of his muscle, felt liquid and heavy and dangerous, felt the strength of his own thighs as he rolled, his legs sliding open and revealing to Pirah his fully hard cock, red and wanting, the wet rivulet of pre-come on the muscles of his abdomen, his nipples tight and hard, his breath coming hot and fast.

"Ah," Pirah said, suddenly shaky. He could not drag his eyes away from Soren's cock, his thighs, and Soren thought, suddenly, I have a power in this, if not in anything else. Pirah's hand hovered over his thigh, over its tense muscle, over the scars. Pirah was looking at him with a hot gaze that he could only describe as hungry, looking at the thickness of his biceps, the veins on his forearms, the jut of muscle in his chest. Soren could feel that gaze as heavily and directly as if Pirah was touching him.

"May I — "

"Don't ask," Soren said, voice a little sudden, a little too loud.

"My apologies," Pirah said, wrenching his gaze away and up to the ceiling. He was still wearing his shirt, thin and light; Soren could see the shadow of his body underneath it. "I thought — "

"Don't ask me," Soren said, and there was an edge of desperation that he could not swallow. "Tell me." Make me.

"I see," Pirah said, and he could tell now how much Pirah was holding himself back from following his instincts. He could see it in the set of Pirah's jaw, in the tension of the muscles in his arms. He wanted to touch Soren. He wanted to run his hands down Soren's sides and up his neck —

Pirah pulled his shirt off, first of all, and then shed his smallclothes with a grace that Soren still envied. He had never allowed himself to look at men, and he had known better than to even think about it, and now he was still trying not to look at the narrowness of Pirah's waist, the long lines of his legs, the cut of his hips.

"It's not just about being you being of the night and me of the day," Pirah said, and then he did touch Soren, but just to gently put the flat of his hand against his ribs, before shifting his whole body and leaning over him. "It doesn't work like that." He pinned Soren with his weight, aligning their hips, turning Soren's head and kissing him so gently that Soren felt scraped raw by it, the barest touch of his tongue. "You feel it too, don't you? Like putting your hand through a candle flame — "

"Yes," Soren said, the syllable stretching long. It felt so good to be weighed down by Pirah, the warm weight of his body pinning him to the moss, and he felt anchored. He did not have to decide anything. He did not have to do anything. Only what Pirah told him. Pirah was nosing at the front of his neck, and every time he moved, Soren shivered as the moss brushed against the back of it, his shoulders trembling with the effort of suppressing it.

"You're unusually sensitive," Pirah said, and the slight movement of his lips against Soren's throat was turning him hot all over.

"I've always been like that," Soren said, though it still felt deeply wrong to talk about it. Pirah kissed the hollow of his neck, dragged his mouth across his chest, ran his fingers over Soren's biceps, his forearms, as if he wanted to understand each part of his body, searching for the spots that made him gasp or flinch with too-raw pleasure, though none were as powerful as the back of his neck.

"Tell me what of the night means," he said, and he did not know if he was allowed to touch Pirah, though he wanted to feel the movement of his muscle under his skin, and the strength of his arms and — everything. He shifted and felt Pirah go still; then he put his hands on Pirah's back and felt him swallow, the rush of air from his breath.

Don't hold back, he thought. Do everything to me.

"Son of Mother Moon," Pirah said, and Soren could hear the suppressed fear in his voice — fear of Soren's reaction. "Some of us have an affinity, some do not. Of the night — you are a vessel of pleasure, and a conduit for my will, if you allow it."

"And for you?"

"It is — pleasurable to indulge you," Pirah said, and he reached down between their bodies and touched Soren's cock, watching him squirm with too-raw pleasure as he rubbed the head with his palm. He had denied himself for too long, and it was too much now, too overwhelming. He clenched his thighs to forestall the inevitable. "If I am able to fulfill you, I feel it as much as you do. Or — I will."

"When will it hurt?" Soren said, and his voice was ragged.

"Ah, Soren," Pirah said. "It won't."

"Oh," Soren said, and the rush of disappointment that ran through him felt like being doused with cold water, the golden haze lifting all at once. He could not speak what he felt, but it was difficult to disguise.

Pirah breathed in, and Soren felt the movement against his body, of the long, slow breath. Then, a hesitation. "Unless that is something you would like," Pirah said, and he raised his head so that he met Soren's eyes, "then I would be very pleased."

Soren felt the truth of that pleasure. Pirah moved his hand, very slowly, along the length of Soren's cock, making him shiver and curl his toes, and it came with the barest hint of pain, the faintest touch of Pirah's nails. It was almost enough to bring him to the edge. It felt the same as if Pirah had cut him deep with a knife, the raw sensation jangling along his nerves.

"It's too much," Soren said with a sigh, his eyes fluttering closed.

"I've barely touched you," Pirah said, and he sounded gently amused, just enough for Soren to flush, his face hot.

"If you gain satisfaction from what I feel," Soren said, with Pirah bending close to hear his words. "What does it feel like now?"

"Too much," Pirah said. "It's everywhere — it's like being bathed in sunlight, all over." But his hand was moving again, an excruciatingly slow movement, Soren pushing his hips up towards the sensation, the hot glide of his hand, the way his fingertips lingered. "I don't feel inclined to stop, even if it is too much," he said, softly. "If what you wish is for me to do as I will — "

Yes, Soren thought, but he said nothing. Pirah was looking down on him, considering, the lance of his gaze too much to bear.

"I've heard," he said, touching the hollow of Soren's throat with one hand, stroking his cock with the other, "that sometimes people of the night like to fight for it." He slid his fingers around to the back of Soren's neck, and simply the pressure of them put Soren on edge. It was as if he was Pirah's delicate sword, about to sing through the air, moving as expertly as he fought. Pirah's fingers were tightening, perhaps beyond his own reckoning, at the thought.

More, Soren thought. His body was reacting all wrong to the threat of this, singing with anticipation. The thought was as vivid as if it was truly happening: both of them unafraid to use their full strength. Soren, muscle and power, Pirah, speed and viciousness. He could feel the blows on his body, taste blood in his mouth. He would be unafraid to fight, to hit and be hit, to see the pure instinct in Pirah's eyes. Pirah's nose bleeding from Soren fighting back, his body hot with the rage of combat, Pirah all hair and teeth, gripping at the back of Soren's neck, Pirah hard and hot against him, digging his nails into Soren's nape —

He began to come as a terrible rush, a hot wash up from his feet to his thighs, his muscles going tense, dark stars erupting inside him, peaking pleasure as he came against Pirah's hand, his hearing fading out and back in, everything around him warm and muted, his muscles lax. He could feel the wetness of his own spend against his stomach, the raw evidence of the act, and it made him flush and his cock valiantly try and kick back to life. A man did that, he thought, and then, I let him do it.

Pirah was still running his fingers up and down the back of Soren's neck, and Soren anticipated and feared, with the same weight, that Pirah would simply start again, circling between touching Soren's neck and his cock until there was nothing left for him to give.

Pirah was rubbing against him now, his eyes shuttered in pleasure, his cock sliding in the wetness of Soren's come, and it felt like being stabbed with heat, felt like being fucked, his arms on Pirah's back, urging him on, wrapping his legs around him, digging his heels into his back, his body singing for more, more, oversensitive and wet, wishing Pirah was fucking him for real, feeling the powerful flex of his body. Fight me until I can't, he thought in the silk curtain of Pirah's hair, which brushed against him with lightning shocks. Pirah's hand was still on his neck, and it was too much and not enough all at once. Hold me down, pin me —

Pirah gasped and came, going slack and boneless against Soren, his head dropping onto Soren's chest. He lay there for a long moment, breaths coming too hard and fast, then slowing as he gripped on to Soren, as if Soren was the one anchoring him.

"Well," Pirah said after a long moment, pushing his hair back from his face, as it slipped back and into place in dark rivers, "at least there's no doubt that we might have some harmony between us."

Soren was still holding him, still feeling the movement of Pirah's breath, trying to forestall the veil of old doubts settling back over his mind. It was there, lurking. It had not been removed at all, simply lifted for a time. "I think we should bathe, don't you?"

*

They sat on opposite sides of the warm healing pool, though Soren was not sure if it was by design or necessity. They were not small men, and so there was a meeting of their legs in the middle, Pirah's foot resting on his thigh. The water was blood-hot and a little hotter, scented with some herb he could not name, and he could lean his head back against the mossy outcropping like a little pillow.

He was exhausted. Not the way he normally was, in a way that was bearable, the way that he always thought, Just a little more. I can walk a few more steps. I can raise my sword a few more times. Not now. He was so tired that his vision was grey around the edges. His body had lost all the energy that it had held in his closed-up muscles, in the pain that kept him sharp. He did not know what he would be now.

Pirah was speaking; it took Soren a long time to focus on what he was saying. "I understand that you do not wish me to ask you questions," Pirah said. "And I will respect that." There was a hint of a for now, though it was forestalled by the tired warmth in Pirah's eyes, and the anchoring presence of his leg against Soren's thigh. There were flowers in the water, floating back and forth between them. "But if you wished to ask me anything, I would readily answer." Soren was looking at the trail of his tied-back hair in the water, but he couldn't help half-smiling.

"You are more like Lorien than you know," he said, and Pirah sighed with a smile.

"Yes, in part that has always been the problem," Pirah said. "Perhaps I can anticipate some of your questions. We've never spoken about it. Or perhaps we have, without using the words." He shifted in the water, sending little ripples back and forth. Soren reached under the surface, touched Pirah's ankle. "But if he wished it to happen, he has had enough years to act upon it. I have made my peace with it, truly." He smiled in a hollow way that told Soren that he had not made peace with it at all.

"You're both of the day," Soren said, and it was a fact he realised at the same time he spoke it. If Soren had looked for it, he would have known all along, and not just by the way that he himself seemed to always turn towards Lorien, like a sunflower seeking the sun. Pirah shrugged, a movement with more grace than one would expect, rippling the water between them.

"Yes," he said.

"Is that frowned upon?" Soren said. "Is it wrong?"

"No," Pirah said, moving a little uncomfortably under the water. He was beginning to flush a little, though whether from the heat of the water or the topic of conversation was unknown. "But it's not usual, and it's not — easy."

"How so?" Soren said, was mapping Pirah's ankle with his fingers, feeling out the bone of his ankle, the muscle of his calf.

"It's instinctual," Pirah said, sinking a little lower in the water. He looked contented by Soren's touch, as if he might begin to purr. "To be commanded by another of the day — it might not feel right. It might feel wrong, and I have never known how I will react to that." He sighed. "It could be anything. I might be able to do as he says; I might be unable. There is simply no way to know."

"You're afraid of that," Soren said, moving his hand further up Pirah's leg as Pirah slid down further into the water.

"Aren't you perceptive all of a sudden," Pirah said, smiling up at him. His lashes were long and dark, fluttering against his cheek. "I know it's obvious. You don't know Lorien as I do. He is kind, patient, and he cares for your feelings above his own, but he has not always been like that. At least not to me."

"He told me you fought for a long time," Soren said. He had found it difficult to envision then, and he still did now. Not just either of them fighting with any kind of viciousness, but the sheer longevity of it — more than twice, three times, the length of his entire life.

"Did he?" Pirah said, surprised. He lay his head back against the mossy bank, and breathed in a great breath, then let it whoosh out of his lungs. "I have to say, I find that unexpected. I did not know Lorien even thought about it any more." He looked up in silence for a moment, and Soren did too, at the glowing lichen like stars on the ceiling. No matter how long they lingered in the water, it never seemed to grow cold, always hot and clear, a gentle steam rising off the surface. "I apologise," Pirah said after a moment. "It was not my intention to dredge up the past, and similarly, I do not wish you to think that you are some kind of substitute, or, or — "

"Consolation," Soren said. "I don't think that. No one could mistake me for Lorien, not even in the dark."

Pirah smiled, his lips pressed tight, and then laughed, putting his hand over his mouth. "No, no, I truly mean it. I find, at this point, I get better results from being open and honest. I would not want you to think you have to keep secrets of any kind, nor expect me to."

"I understand," Soren said, though he was not sure he did. He knew in his heart that Pirah had no wish to hear his true feelings, the ones that felt like the slice of a jagged knife.

"I am not sure that you do," Pirah said, looking at Soren with that familiar hot-edged vulnerability that made Soren feel cut to the quick. "I am old enough to know when I wish to be serious about something."

I'm not, Soren thought, and then, without thinking, said, "Why?"

"Why do I know?"

"Why me?" Soren said. "We've barely spoken. I haven't even been here long — and if it doesn't seem long to me, I can't imagine how it feels to you."

"Well," Pirah said, "I find that if you're doing the same thing every day, the days seem fast. But if you're doing something new, or learning, or travelling, they seem longer. Time seems to slow, hang in the air. I think it's a gift, to savour those moments."

"But why me," Soren said, and he had to bite down at the fire igniting under his ribs. "I have no circumstances of birth, as Lorien does; I have no titles, no accomplishments, no wit or talent, no money, no rank or commission — nothing to show for what I have done. I don't understand it. I may never understand it."

"Soren," Pirah said, sounding bewildered. He slid closer, clasping one hand over Soren's wrist and quelling the shake in his hands. "I think you have a strength and bravery that outstrips anyone I have ever known. You are my equal with the sword, and might outmatch me with the bow, and I want that. I want to be challenged by you. I want that more than anything."

"Stop," Soren said, his teeth clenched together. Pirah's hand was hot on his forearm, and he could feel the truth in that, but the words hurt him as if they were blows with a sword.

"I obey," Pirah said, and there was that same for now, "and there are other ways to express myself." He looked Soren up and down, and then urged him to sit up on the mossy ledge, and laid his head on Soren's thigh, his heavy wet hair shivering against Soren's skin, before he bent his head and put his mouth over Soren's half-hard cock, his tongue soft and mouth hot. Soren was shivering, oversensitised, with the cold air on his hot skin.

Pirah sucked him hard and with considerable skill, and the pleasure was overwhelming, Soren's thighs squeezing around his head, and all he could think was, if it's true, my pleasure is his; it belongs to him — and it took him mere minutes to come, embarrassingly quick. When he watched Pirah's throat work as he swallowed, it set him shivering-hot again, like a reverberation of his own pleasure.

"Teach me," he said, ignoring the stab of shame at the words. Pirah peered up at him with wet eyes and his lips red, and Soren was thinking, what if that were me? Eking out pleasure with the mere slide of my tongue — and he was shuddering and hot all over again, his body tight with the embarrassment of how fast he had come, but despite that, despite his tiredness, he could feel that connection with Pirah and Pirah's body. He knew Pirah could rouse him again if he tried, and even if Soren thought he did not want it, Pirah would know better. It was an immense power that he feared and anticipated in equal measure.

"Oh, I will," Pirah said, ignoring his own hardness to pull Soren back into the hot water and run his fingers over Soren's scalp, raking through his wet hair, the motion sending dark sparks across his body and making him feel once again like a cat being patted, the liquid gold flooding over his entire body. "I'll teach you to do anything you like."

"What if I don't like it?" Soren said, leaning back against Pirah's chest as Pirah looped an arm against his waist. He had to ask now — he had to, before they left the healing pool, before everything that was true about him came back.

"Then I won't like it either," Pirah said, pressing his nose into Soren's shoulder and brushing his lips there. "Do you wish to sleep here, or back at the heart tree?"

"Wherever you like," Soren said, and then could not help flushing at the implication. He was unsure of his trajectory — how had he ended up here, asking a man to sleep next to him, as if he was admitting any of this meant more than fumbling in the dark? And then, thinking twice, he said, "The heart tree — there's something I'd like to show you."

Pirah nodded against his back, and Soren was unsure if he had made the right choice, because it meant leaving the healing pool behind, meant exiting the warmth and towelling himself dry, dressing in clothes that were somehow different from the ones they'd arrived in, the armour and swords gone, Pirah unconcerned — they'll be back when we need them — and heading out into the rain. Soren expected it to still be that hard, driving storm, rain gouging holes into the dark, and was surprised when it was no more than a mist that hung in the air, catching beads on Pirah's dark hair and eyelashes.

"Well, you're feeling better, aren't you?" Pirah said, as if that had anything to do with it. Soren remembered the clouds gathering along with the dark look on Lorien's face, and dismissed it. He had no such power. It was ridiculous to even consider.

It took mere moments of walking to return back, which Soren could not reconcile. It felt like he had been away for months, travelled for days. Was any of that real? he thought. There was simply no way to tell, apart from following the certainty of Pirah's back all the way into the corridor. The tree was still and dark. It was the dead of night, even though it felt like dawn, time stretching and changing to suit them. Pirah paused at the threshold of Soren's room and went no further, waiting.

"I don't know what to do," Soren said, pausing next to him.

"About what?" Pirah said.

Everything, Soren thought, pushing forward through the door of greenery and emerging on the other side. The air smelled wrong; the grass crunched under his feet. He tried to turn back at the last moment, but found Pirah had already come through, crashing back into him with a shockingly opposed sensation of thrill and dread.

"Is there a light?" Pirah said, waving his hand in the air as if he expected one of those little light globes to appear. Soren lit a candle, though he feared to strike sparks. If Pirah saw it and turned away — Soren did not know what he would do. The light that bloomed showed the true severity of what he had done: the dying ivy crumbling into dust, the moss blackened and shrivelled, the spotty canopy of leaves that were falling even now, leaving bare, skeletal branches.

"Oh, Soren," Pirah said with true regret, true grief. He could not have had a more unexpected reaction if he had taken out a knife and stabbed Soren in the back; it felt the same, anyway. "Oh, you should have told me sooner." He took Soren in his arms and pressed their faces together, drew him close against his body. Soren's heart was beating wildly. Was this punishment? Pirah's face was wet.

"Sorry," Soren said, and he knew and did not know what he was apologising for. He felt heavy and brittle at the same time, as if he might fall and shatter irreparably. "I didn't mean to do it. I don't know what I did wrong. Some kind of — rejection."

"No," Pirah said, pushing Soren back and looking him right in the eye. "No, no, no, it's not like that at all. You can't think that — tell me you haven't been thinking that."

"Of course," Soren said, bewildered. And then, without thinking, "I was never meant to be here."

"I do not think that is true," Pirah said, and the unhappy set to his mouth was back. "If anything, I think the total opposite is true. Despite every effort of circumstance to keep you away from here, away from your home, you made it here anyway. Does that not speak to the rightness of it?"

"No," Soren said, and then, "I don't know. Can you tell me how to fix it?" His voice was soft, plaintive. It sounded so unlike how he thought of himself, so vulnerable — but it was safe to be that way, wasn't it? The most Pirah would do is touch his cheek with the back of his hand.

"Yes," Pirah said. And then, "No."

"Was I supposed to water it?" Soren said, looking down at the ground, stupidly. Of course that would not be the breadth of the solution to his problems.

"The heart tree," Pirah said, and then he was quiet for a moment. "The places it creates for us are a reflection of our own hearts," he said. "A place for repose that reflects your heart." And he looked around the room again, slowly, absorbing everything he saw. His mouth was downturned hard, but mercifully there were no tears in his eyes. Soren did not know what he would do if Pirah started crying.

"So there's no way to fix it, you mean?" Soren said. He shifted from foot to foot uncomfortably. "It is what it is."

"No," Pirah said, gripping Soren's arms. "It can be fixed. Of course it can. It will take time, but we have that. I promise it can regrow."

I'm so tired, Soren thought; the mere thought of having to fix something was overwhelming, like turning into a cold wave of water. He swayed on his feet, leaning forward into Pirah, feeling the comfort of his heart beating solidly behind his chest.

"But nothing must be done tonight," Pirah said, kissing the side of Soren's face. They ended up in bed together between Soren's slow blinks, Pirah behind Soren, an arm slung loosely over his waist.

This is what I'm afraid of, Soren thought, a cold runnel of fear inching down his back in the gap between their bodies. Despite his exhaustion, he could not quell his racing mind. This is what he warned me about. In some way, the Commander had been right to warn him. Finally, finally, he had reached his limit. He could not take one more thing going wrong, and especially not this; the combined weight of it all would split his heart down the middle.

"Are you all right?" Pirah said, and then, "There's no need to answer, if you don't wish to." When he spoke, his breath stirred at the back of Soren's neck. The barest movement of the air was enough to make him shiver, though he was able to suppress it.

"I don't — " Soren said, pressing his teeth together. "I don't know how to answer that."

Pirah slid closer, shutting the gaps between their bodies. His exhale on the back of Soren's neck raised his hackles, Soren's shoulders coming up to protect himself. "I confess I am no healer of the mind," he said. "I know the body better than the mind, and even then I am no master of it."

His lips were brushing the back of Soren's neck, and Soren thought he might cry out from the tension and pleasure of it, settling again in his thighs and stomach. Did Pirah even realise what he was doing? His hand had settled on Soren's stomach, hot through the fabric of his shirt, and if he just moved it a fraction lower he would feel that Soren was — was —

"When you speak," Soren said, trying to swallow the timbre of his voice that would betray that he was hard already, "your breath — "

"I know," Pirah said, and blew cold air over the back of Soren's neck, making him wriggle to get away and move closer at the same time, body feeling hot and heavy once more. "Just a breath is enough. So greedy, Soren." But it was not an admonishment, in truth. He thought that Pirah preferred it this way. "Have you ever thought of growing out your hair?"

The question was different now, charged. Just being asked — and was Pirah asking? What would Soren do if he instructed him? It was too much to think about, to always be under Pirah's instruction. It threatened to push him over the edge. "No," Soren said, through a gasp. Pirah's hand moved not down but up, fingers digging into the muscle of Soren's chest, skimming over his over-sensitive nipple.

"Would you ever think of it?" Pirah said Tell me to do it, Soren thought wildly, and I will. But he could not speak the words; it was too much.

"Ah, my apologies," Pirah said, kissing the back of Soren's neck as his fingers stroked over his nipple, leaving it throbbing. "I aim not to make a request of you, but I think it would be nice."

"Distracting," Soren said. His balls were hot and tight, his cock too sensitive even for him to reach down and press the heel of his hand against it. How many times had Pirah made him come today? How many more would there be? "It would — distract me."

"Yes, I imagine it would," Pirah said. "That's why I think it would be nice. If you were to be distracted, all of the time."

Soren's imagination was as hot as his blood, imagining his own hair keeping his nerves in a state of constant agitation, just a touch away from coming, all the time. When he was sparring with Pirah, when he was talking with Lorien in the orchard — and that was a mistake, to think of Lorien now when it was Pirah behind him, testing the skin of his neck with the barest hint of teeth. He could imagine Pirah's voice, when it got dark and low, saying greedy.

The scrape of teeth against his neck was too much; it promised too much, and the shock of it flooded his whole body, eclipsed his ability to hold back. Soren had the barest moment to suck in a breath before he was coming — it was too much, almost painful in its overstimulation, his body protesting. "I can't," he said, choking on a sob, insensate, and only then did Pirah touch his cock, pressing his hand over it as Soren kicked his hips up into Pirah's hand, the slide against the skin too much. He could feel the hot nudge of Pirah's cock against his thigh, the swell of his ass, and he swallowed very, very slowly. He knew what men did. He knew the jokes, the jibes, and he'd gathered enough from that to learn exactly what he had to not think about, and he had very carefully not thought about it until this exact moment, thinking about what it might feel like, the hot stretch —

"Let me touch you," he said, and it sounded like a croak. Was that how this worked? Was he allowed to ask at all?

"Not right now," Pirah said, and he kissed the back of Soren's neck once more, sending another little lightning thrill through him, though his body was too tired to truly respond. He knew it was the right decision, because he was right on the edge of that void, his mind and body already surrendering to the dark. But he could not help thinking, I want it. It's not fair — but the moment passed, that trickling ice-water sensation passing with it, as he slid into the void of stars.

*

"You seem different today," Lorien said, and Soren opened his eyes. Everything did seem a little different, as if the colours were fuller, the scent of flowers on the wind more real.

"I don't think I'm different," Soren said, and that much was also true. There had been no change in his room when he had woken in the mid-morning, despite the obvious addition of Pirah's presence, his hand falling free of Soren's body as he slid out of bed to splash cool water on his face. It seemed unreal that Pirah was still there in the soft light of day, covered by light linen sheets, his face smooth in sleep, his body tired and relaxed. Soren did not know the etiquette. He did not know if it was wrong to leave Pirah there on his own, but he could not remain abed. "I think I'm the same."

"The same and different," Lorien said. "Like a flower throwing a new bud."

"I'm no flower," Soren said, and he could not help a rusty chuckle at the thought.

"Perhaps that was ill-worded," Lorien said. They were under the apple trees again, though Lorien had brought no provisions this time, and he had not yet spoken of anything serious. Soren found he could could look at him now; it was as if Lorien's power had been tempered a little, softened around the edges. Lorien's golden-brown hair tumbled unbound around his shoulders, its gentle curls stirring a little in the wind. He had spent rather a lot of time, Soren realised, thinking about the idea of Lorien, seeing him from the periphery rather than meeting his eye.

This way, Lorien looked more real, a little tired around the edges, a smudge of darkness under each eye. He dressed no differently than any other elf: a tunic cut deeper at the neck than Soren might have considered proper. He was slimmer than either Pirah or Soren, and his shoulders bowed a little bit, as if he was bearing some weight on them.

"Not a flower," Lorien continued. "A tree, if you like. Like this one, blooming for new fruit."

Soren closed his eyes and tried to seek out the tree with his mind, but he felt nothing, no connection. He did not know how to reach that place on purpose. He only heard Lorien moving, just a little.

"You and Pirah fought," Lorien said, and it was not a question. Soren feared being in trouble; he opened one eye. Lorien had not asked very much of them — only to have the will to protect him, and instead they had done the opposite, and put each other in danger. Contravened the spirit of the contest, and of Lorien's instructions. But there was no air of authority around Lorien. "There is no issue. You may fight whoever you like, of course."

"Whoever?" Soren said.

"Not me," Lorien said. "If that is what you are hoping for, you will be fair disappointed. I am no more skilled with the sword than with the bow. Not like you and Pirah."

"Pirah told me you could have made that shot, if you wanted to," Soren said, thinking of the trembling movement of the golden ring in the air, and the design of the hand-painted jacket.

"Yes, I suspect it does require wanting it," Lorien said, and smiled his secret smile, as if he was thinking of a private joke. "Perhaps that is why I am no good at it. Would you lie down for me?"

"Why?" Soren said, turning his head towards Lorien. He could not stop the swell of nerves. What was Lorien planning to do? "I'm well, I'm not tired."

"When you fought with Pirah, you reached out to me," Lorien said. "I felt it."

"I felt it too," Soren said, in a whisper he could not take back, looking up to meet Lorien's forest green-brown eyes. "I didn't — I don't understand it."

"You have a world connection," Lorien said. "A life connection. Not all of us have it, and certainly not as strongly as you do."

"If it's so strong, shouldn't I know what you're talking about?" Soren said, digging his fingers into the grass. "Shouldn't I have felt it before?"

"You connected with the heart tree," Lorien said. "I felt that too, though in less — detail, shall we say. That's unusual. You certainly have some kind of sensitivity."

"What did you feel?"

Lorien shrugged, rolling his shoulders. He pushed his hair back behind him, and Soren watched him, the steadiness of his hands, the way every now and then his eyes would wander to the horizon, as if he was hoping to somehow find a way to peer beyond it. "I felt what you were feeling. Perhaps not the specifics, but the intensity of it. I have known many people connected to the world like I am, or like how I suspect you are, but I have never felt a connection to that degree before. I do not know what it means." He sounded more fierce than Soren expected — more passionate.

"Is it a matter of my — my parentage?" Soren said, pushing his fingers down into the damp earth, trying to find some sense of that connection now. There was nothing. He did not think Lorien was lying, but he was sure that he was mistaken. "Is this something my mother could do?"

"Not that I know of," Lorien said, and if Soren's discomfort with the question had bled through, Lorien did not show it. "Nothing in her book of names indicated as much to me. Mereid was — " He swallowed whatever he had been about to say. "It did not seem so to me, though the lens is clouded by what I want to see, I think."

"I don't know what you mean," Soren said.

Lorien smiled with teeth, ducking his head, letting out an amused huff of breath. "I mean that I do not like her, so I am inclined to see the worst, because that is what I wish to see. I can admit that to myself, and therefore to you."

"Oh," Soren said, feeling a little stupid, and then grateful, and then stupid again. He lay back on the grass, at Lorien's almost-forgotten direction. He was unmistakably tired, and it was a relief to avoid Lorien's gaze and close his own eyes. He tried not to try to focus, and just that thought made his head spin a little.

He breathed in, feeling the movement of his lungs, and beyond that were the small sounds of Lorien moving. Then further still, the bees in the trunk, and the birds overhead. It felt like lying at the centre of a great web of strings, and if something shifted it moved something else, each string being plucked and making a noise until it rose in a great cacophony —

"Come back to me just a little," Lorien said, laying a cool hand on his forehead, and the noise reduced as if Lorien had laid a veil across his face — a veil that felt good, and he wanted to open himself up to it in a way he could not explain. "I wish to ask you some questions, and I ask you not to answer if you do not wish to."

"Mmm," Soren said. Where he was floating was partly the cool crisp wind with the promise of autumn against overheated skin, partly the thrum of music, partly the golden haze, though he was unsure where its origins lay. He felt like he was floating in a pool — no, an ocean, with the salt to buoy him. He could feel Lorien's presence in the web of strings, closer than all the rest and brighter, too. His presence gave off a sweeter music than most.

What was this? It was like nothing he had ever felt before, raw and sensitive. He could feel the movement of the wind in the trees as if it was touching him; he could feel the grass growing, the flowers turning towards the sun. Laid bare in that moment, it was all he could do to keep himself together. Is this what I'm meant to be like? he thought, with sudden sadness. Is this what I could have been?

Lorien's presence anchored him, pulling Soren back to him like a kite on a string.

"Tell me of your father," Lorien said, and his hand was still on Soren's forehead, fingertips in his hair. "Please." Soren swallowed, slowly. The entreaty settled over him — Lorien was speaking to him not as a prince, but an equal.

"The Commander?" Soren said. His thoughts were slowly rising to the top of his mind like oil on water. "I don't believe there's much to tell, or much that's interesting, at the very least." He was not sure if that was strictly true, but he was unsure what answer Lorien sought. Surely nothing about battle plans, or the Commander's words. If he sought tales of being raised by a father, Soren had none of those either.

"What was his name?"

"Wulfric," Soren said, and could not help wincing a little. He had called the Commander by his first name only once, and it was an unpleasant memory. He felt just a little of that touch Lorien, and felt him cringe back. "Are you looking for something to make yourself mad, Lorien?" he said, and he could taste the salt on his tongue that was normally pressed back into his throat.

"I don't know," Lorien said, measured and even. "Yes, probably," he capitulated, after a moment. "But I do genuinely wish to know as well."

Soren-in-the-void could huff out an amused breath and say, "You truly are a peacetime king, aren't you?"

"What's that?" Lorien said, perhaps sharper than he intended to. "You say it like an insult — do you not think it's good to avoid war?" There was that hidden needle in his voice again, that Soren had only heard two or three times before. He felt the ripple of it through the web, resounding in his body as if he was a glass chime rippling in the wind.

"Or a peacetime prince, perhaps," Soren said. "They say a peacetime king has more worries than a wartime one, whose only concern is war. Harder to be a peacetime prince, in that way."

"That much is true," Lorien said, though he did not sound particularly pleased about it. "Do you see me as a worried prince?"

"No," Soren said. For once, for the first time he could remember, it was easy to think and feel, and speak those thoughts. "You're unlike any prince I've ever met."

"How so?"

"You have thoughts beyond your own person," Soren said, wry. "Is there anything to be gained by comparing yourself to other princes, really? Should you not compare yourself to those who outstrip you, and attempt to rise to their heights?"

Lorien was quiet for a moment. "You have more insight than you know," he said, softly. "It is that which I see in you and I wish to have by my side." He could sense the movement of Lorien's hand, clenching a little at his side, a spike of sudden determination that disappeared as quickly as it had arisen.

Soren started a little. He had almost forgotten his whole purpose. Everything that had happened, everything with Pirah — he veered away from that thought. He did not know what Lorien could sense from him.

"And Pirah?" He could sense the way Lorien winced a little at that, wrinkling his nose. It felt a little discordant, like a run of untuned strings.

"I love Pirah," Lorien said simply, and it was enough to make Soren's heart squeeze in his chest. Of course, of course he did. There was so much history — Soren was small and new compared to that. "It might be a disservice to him to say more than that."

"I don't know what you mean," Soren said.

"Neither do I," Lorien said, and his tone was a little closed. Soren was unsure — he loved Pirah like a brother? As family?

"And your parentage?" Soren said. "Or his? I recall us agreeing that turnabout was fair."

"To think I believed I would be asking the questions," Lorien said, amused. "Of course you know Mother Moon and Mother Sun. Sometimes they come together — I'm sure you've seen an eclipse, haven't you?" He said it so casually that Soren still could not question the truth of it, though it made no sense to him. "And Pirah is what we call a child of the heart tree. Someone whose parents are gone, by death or circumstance. If you wish to know more than that, you ought to ask him."

"Like me," Soren said. He could feel the edges of the web expanding, despite the cooling influence of Lorien's hand. The great power of the heart tree was the centre of it all.

"Oh, I hadn't thought of it that way," Lorien said, sounding surprised. "Yes, I suppose you might call him brother. He'd probably like that."

Soren did not think about the peculiar warmth that came at the thought of calling Pirah brother.

"You've given me a lot to think about," Lorien said, and Soren could hear the frown in his voice. Soren opened his eyes slowly and then all at once, the light too bright even through the dappled leaves, the blue of the sky between them. The strings of the web vanished, the notes lingering in the air. He glanced at Lorien, a little unsure if he had offended him, but he looked pensive. Whatever Soren could have given him to think about was certainly beyond him.

"Was there a point to any of this?" Soren said. Lorien pulled his hand back and Soren sat up, pushing his hands through his hair. "Is it to do with guarding you?"

Lorien laughed, gently amused. "Does everything have to do with that?" he said. "Talking to you is refreshing. I do it because I wish to. It gives me new perspective. I would hope it does the same for you."

Soren's head was still chiming with notes that did not belong to him; he felt a little off-key.

"Here," Lorien said, touching the side of Soren's face, turning his gaze to meet Lorien's eyes. "Do not go into the connection without me — I would rather not have you lost in it, as happens to some." His fingers lingered dangerously close to the corner of Soren's lips. The tips of his fingers were soft, the barely-there sensation distracting.

"May I ask a question?" Soren said, and his voice was too breathless; the movement of his mouth against Lorien's fingers — he had meant to distract, not —

"Always," Lorien said, indulgently.

"If there was someone here who did not abide by the laws, or did not act in the interests of others," Soren began, the words slipping free of his mouth without thoughts. Vulnerability, openness, honesty; all these things still scared him, though he could not say that. Every time he had reached out in the past, it had come back against him as ten times worse. He feared it. He had no specific person in mind; he thought only of being hit from behind with something hard and being dazed by it, thought of an unwelcome questing hand, thought of being woken by the splash of cold water. Even though he no longer had a conscious connection to Lorien, Soren was still bare to him; he could not hide the unhappy twist of his mouth. "What would you do? By your authority?"

"Well," Lorien said, and he leaned back against the trunk of the tree, putting his hands together and interweaving his fingers. "The first thing I would do would be to speak to the person; if that brought no change, I would recommend them to the mind healer." Soren met his green-brown eyes. He thought Lorien might think Soren was speaking of himself. Lorien was looking at him with an incisive gaze, but his answer did not satisfy Soren; he was not speaking of himself, not at all. Not in the way that he suspected Lorien thought he was, anyway.

"And if that brought no change?" Soren said. There was dirt under his fingertips from the ground; Lorien's hands were clean.

"Well," Lorien said, serious. "If it was truly such a dire situation as that, then I would ask this person to leave. If they were so misaligned that it was affecting others, I could not let that stand."

"Exile," Soren said, and his voice sounded flat and dead even to himself. Lorien had promised — he had promised he would not send Soren away. Was this a threat? A reminder. No, it couldn't be.

"I was being polite, but yes," Lorien said, and he leaned in a little closer, his hair slipping forward over his shoulder. His voice lowered slightly, as if it was for Soren alone, betraying the seriousness of what he was saying. "I could not — would not let such a person remain here, someone that would choose to harm others."

"Was my mother asked to leave?"

"I don't know," Lorien said. "Truly, I don't."

"And if such a person refused to leave?"

"Are you asking questions to upset yourself?" Lorien said, and there was a faint smile on his mouth, though it was unamused, a ghost of his usual one. "I would prefer you not to dwell on this."

"I might dwell on it more if there are unanswered questions," Soren said, and he turned and faced Lorien, hoping that perhaps there was some power in his gaze. It seemed there was; Lorien was the one to duck his eyes first.

"Well, I'd kill them," Lorien said, and he said it so directly, with such confidence, that for a moment Soren was sure he was joking. But there was no hint of laughter in his tone. There was an ancient fire in his eyes, an echo of some past justice done. This was Lorien's authority and duty, and Soren had not been privy to it before, not in the way he was now. Lorien's hand was clenched at his side, tucked away as if he was hoping Soren would not notice it.

Soren said nothing, just bowed his head. He felt — too many things at once, angry at something he could not name, and filled with a thrill that felt hard-edged. Lorien would, would —

Lorien reached out and put his hand on top of Soren's hair, gently. "It's an impossible situation, I know," he said. "And it would be on my authority, so it would have to be by my own hand. It would only be done if it were the only way. I cannot suffer someone so bent against the good of the others." It sounded a little like Lorien was trying to shield him from the truth of the act, as if Soren had never seen a man's throat cut before.

"I understand," Soren said, and there was a shakiness in his voice he could not hide, fighting to keep his tone level; and Lorien reached down and tipped his chin up, to meet Lorien's warm eyes.

"I know that you do," Lorien said. "I know that you have taken lives. It is not something that I take lightly, and it is not something you should think about. The only time it would occur to me to involve you would be for your advice and council." His voice was urgent, his grip on Soren a little too hard, as if he was trying to impress upon him the seriousness of what he was saying, his gaze grave and stern.

That was not why Soren had asked, nor why he had driven for an answer. Lorien did not truly understand, but he could not cut himself down to the bone and say: Will you keep me safe? If you choose me to protect you, will you protect me too? But he nodded in an effort to soothe Lorien's spirit. Lorien smiled then, with grace, but Soren could see the faint pain behind his eyes.

"Are you all right?" he said, ignoring the irony of being the asker of the question.

"No," Lorien said, and then smiled and shrugged. "That is the truth — I find myself more ill at ease than not these days, and I cannot account for it." He spoke it with such frankness that Soren could not deny the truth of it, and he was a little taken aback by Lorien's honesty.

Lonely, Soren thought, without proof or provocation.

"Perhaps I am a peacetime prince, if all I can think to do is sit and fret," Lorien said, smiling once more. He stood and offered his hand to Soren, who took it with the barest hesitation. Lorien's hands were soft and smooth, and Soren found himself unwilling to let go, thinking of Lorien's tired face peering out into the corridor, Lorien saying, all I want is companions who can be honest with me. "Well, shall I see you on the morrow?" Lorien said, brushing dirt and grass off his tunic. "There is much left to discuss."

"I look forward to your tutelage," Soren said, perhaps a touch drier than he intended, and Lorien parted from him with a smile. Soren lingered in the grove for a few moments more, thinking of a Lorien with a knife in his hand and lightning in the clouds behind him, a Lorien with blood in his teeth and peace in his heart.

*

"Come in here a moment," said Ye-jun as Soren passed the library. He came to a sudden halt and turned. She had a quill in her hand and had clearly come to the door in haste when she heard him coming past. It had not been a question, so he followed her inside, inhaling the scent of a millennia of well-kept pages.

"I don't want to intrude," Soren said.

"Did I not just ask you to come in here?" Ye-jun said, dropping the quill back on her desk and turning to him. "I'm done with my translation, so I do get a little bit of leisure time before the next project." This seemed to be both true and a lie; Soren could see another manuscript on the table she kept her hours at, the beginning sketches of an illumination. "All right, I mean I'm done with the midsummer translation," she said, and rifled through the papers on her table until she found a scroll. "This is for you."

"Thank you?" Soren said, as she pressed it into his hands.

"I was informed that you could not understand the poem," she said. "It was a day's work to translate it into human common — read it if you like, I don't much care."

"Thank you, truly," Soren said, holding it with both hands close to his chest. It was a surprise he had not anticipated; he had not thought that Ye-jun would notice his lack of understanding. Had someone put her up to this? "I appreciate it very much."

"Yes, yes," Ye-jun said. "Along with that, having turned my mind to human common, I've done a little bit of pruning of our human common library section, at the advisement of our illustrious prince."

Soren flushed deeper than he desired, thinking of either of the two books he had plucked from the shelf. He was unsure if Ye-jun had meant those specifically, but from the gleam in her eye at his blush, it seemed likely that she did.

"I would have gotten there eventually, with or without you," she said, waving a hand. "I cannot abide someone that would write their thoughts of us with such little grace or truth. If I'd known it was there, I would have archived it long ago. Soren, I would have preferred that you had not read those words — that you could see how we write about it from our own perspective instead."

"About being of the night?" Soren said, and Ye-jun's tight-lipped smile, nod and subsequent shrug told him all he needed to know. "You are — as well?"

"Of course I am," she said. "And I could tell you were from the beginning. If I had known you did not — "

"Who told you I didn't know?" he said, too loud, too defensive, and she raised a hand.

"Do not take it as idle gossip," she said, firmly. "I am capable of putting two and two together, especially when there's a reading list involved. Like calls to like, after all. Don't bruise that paper, for goodness' sake."

Soren relaxed his hands, striving not to rend the scroll in two.

"You do not like asking questions, and I do not like answering them, overmuch," she continued. "I am not going to say something like 'you may come to me with your problems', as I would very much prefer you do not."

"That makes us well-matched then," Soren said, and Ye-jun raised an eyebrow. "I do have something to ask of you, though."

"Oh, no, you haven't written a poem you want me to look at, have you?" she said. "I'm not doing that. I refuse entirely."

"No," Soren said, baffled. "I haven't written anything."

"Forgive my unfounded fear," Ye-jun said. "Only, that is what I am mostly asked, and I do not enjoy it."

"Right," Soren said, knocked off course for a moment. "I only thought — is there a way to learn the script, the language the books are written in? If it is as you said, that I ought not to read the human common books."

"Of course there is a way," Ye-jun said, sounding surprised. "I mean, I will not teach you, but someone will. I can point you to the books for learning, if that helps you. You're of the blood, and I think it will come naturally to you, once you start."

"Would it really be that easy?" Soren said, the words cold from his lips. It was too late for him, wasn't it? Surely it was too late.

"Oh, it will not be easy," Ye-jun said, a sparkle in her eye. "But I do think it'll be worth it, if you put your mind to it. Now, go away and come back tomorrow, and I'll have some things to show you." She turned her back on him and settled down at her desk without saying anything more. Soren knew better than to ask questions, and ventured out of the library, returning to his room to leave the scroll on the table there. Pirah was not there, but the bed was neatly made.

He knew where Pirah would be, because it was where he would be if he had to think about something, and that was indeed where he found Pirah, arrow nocked to bow in the archery yard, shooting a neat line of arrows down the target.

"Have you not long ascended past this level?" Soren said, trying to make light, but his voice betrayed him, unsure of how Pirah would react to his presence. He was feeling a little unsteady around the edges in a way he could not articulate, like a fraying thread.

"I was waiting to see if you would come and find me, in truth," Pirah said, frankly, letting go of one last arrow and turning to face Soren with a smile.

"I was meeting with Lorien," Soren said. "I didn't mean to leave you alone."

"Do not worry about that," Pirah said, putting the bow down and coming over to Soren. Just his proximity made Soren feel suddenly thrown off course — the scent of him, his armguard still on his arm as he reached out to touch Soren's shoulder. It made Soren waver in a way he was not truly fond of, but that he could not resist. "Are you well?" Something in him had been set alight, burning under his ribs, that same ill-formed flame that had made him want to fight Pirah. Pirah must have sensed it, because when Soren reached for his hand, he saw Pirah hesitate, considering if he should move away.

"Do you not wish me to touch you?" Soren said, all at once. He was unable to stop himself from asking. "Is that not something I'm allowed?" He wanted to do it now, wanted to grip at Pirah's waist to hold himself up, wanted to slide his arms around him. If Pirah said no, if his only purpose was to take pleasure from Soren and not give it, he thought he might crumble, consumed by his own flames. Or did Pirah want him to ask for it?

"Of course you can," Pirah said, taking Soren's hands with swiftness and sliding them up under his shirt, placing them over his heart. Soren choked at the sudden sensation of it, the heat of Pirah's skin, the warmth, the feeling of the beat of his heart. "Did you think I would deny you that?" he said, and then frowned. "Have I denied you that?"

"I wished things to be reciprocal," Soren said. "Twice you steered me away."

"I did not mean to deny you," Pirah said, mouth twisting. "Perhaps spare you from things I thought you would be uncomfortable with." His heart quickened under Soren's hands, as Pirah looked up and away.

"I would prefer you not try to anticipate what makes me uncomfortable," Soren said through gritted teeth. He could not explain why it bothered him so much, but it felt bad, to receive and not return. "You said yourself you would know if you did something I truly did not like. Why not rely on that?"

"I — " Pirah closed his eyes for a moment, and it was rare to see him so unsettled, so unsure of his words. "I feared that if I made a wrong move, it might close you off to me. It seemed easier to avoid that than risk it."

"You said it was best to be open," Soren said, and he was pushing against Pirah now. "Do you think I will back down?"

"Are you afraid?" Pirah whispered, gripping at Soren's hands with his own.

"Yes," Soren said. Pirah's hands shook on his. "But I should be, shouldn't I? I have never done this. I am afraid of it. Doesn't it speak to my seriousness that I still persevere?"

"I don't know," Pirah said.

"Then I propose you do something I don't like," Soren said. "You'll feel it, and then you'll know what it feels like. Will that satisfy you, to let me do as I wish?"

"What do you wish?" Pirah said, and there was a tremor in his voice of anticipation — hope?

"I wish for your will," Soren said, and he sank to his knees, fingers sliding down Pirah's ribs, feeling the flutter of the muscles around his stomach, catching on the fabric of his leggings, remembering the scent of him, the heat, the inexorable maleness of him in the warm dark. He closed his eyes and leaned forward, Pirah's hand catching in his hair but not urging him back or forward. "Do I dislike this?" he murmured, looking up at Pirah. It felt like hot water running down his back, as Pirah tightened his hand in Soren's hair to the point that it hurt, tipping his head back, but all Soren could feel was yes, yes, his heart quickening, his cock swelling.

"No," Pirah said. Soren's head was pulled back, his throat a trembling line. Pirah reached down and touched it, his hand like a benediction, and for the barest moment Soren felt fragile, vulnerable, Pirah's hand closing around his throat, pressing with the slightest pressure. Testing him, to see if he would rear back, push his hands away.

He did nothing except yearn into that touch, feel the rapid rise of his blood, his pulse fluttering under Pirah's hand as the golden veil draped over his vision, over his shoulders, down his naked body, shivering against the back of his neck, his nipples, his thighs. More, he thought. Pirah had the finest control in his hand — he knew that, from seeing his skill with the sword, but having the selfsame skill applied to him was too much, the slightest increase of pressure until it dragged on Soren's soft breaths, just enough for the ragged hitch of it, the golden chime of it resounding in his mind —

Pirah released him. There was the stinging hint of water in Soren's eyes as he looked up at Pirah, leaning forward, his mouth opening.

"I am afraid as well," Pirah said, touching Soren's bottom lip, and Soren could feel Pirah's urge to push them into his mouth. "I fear you, because I fear that there is nothing you would not like. That there would be nothing that would not reflect into me in a way you enjoy."

"Is that to be feared?" Soren said, lips brushing against Pirah's fingertips, hoping to stir some reaction from him. He was rewarded with the parting of his lips, the softness of his sigh. Pirah's eyes were dark, half-shuttered, and there was the faintest cool breeze that stirred the hair at the back of Soren's neck, dipped beneath the armour of his shirt.

"Yes," Pirah said, and then, "I don't know. Is it wrong to wish to be tempered? Honed?"

Soren had no answer that he could speak. Honed, crafted, the pain made precise, pinpointed to take him apart. Pirah's fingers slid into his mouth, pressing against his tongue. Soren's mouth was wet. He thought Pirah might be right. He could not think of anything that Pirah could do that would make him retreat. If Pirah hit him across the face, he would yearn into the sting of it; if Pirah fought him with all his strength, leaving him printed with the bruises of his fingers, coaxed blood from his nose and mouth and kissed it back onto his own tongue — none of that would turn him away.

"Am I down here for nothing?" Soren said, and his boldness shocked him. It made him feel set alight. The Commander had been right. One moment of weak will, and he was shattering apart. Pirah made no move, so it was on Soren to make the decision to move closer, to take Pirah in his mouth and feel him melt into the pleasure of it, or what pleasure he could give with his inexpert mouth, wondering at the heat and weight of it on his tongue, the taste, the satisfaction of it.

All of it made the golden veil go liquid and flowing around him, Pirah's grip on the back of his neck too much and not enough all at once, the tension in his hand too much — Pirah was clutching at him, and there was nothing better than to listen to the change in his breathing, feel the clutch of his hands, his shudder as he approached his peak, and the hot pleasure-shame of thinking this is what they all thought I would be — and they were right, as Pirah shuddered to a climax in his mouth.

"You're beautiful," Pirah said, and that was when Soren felt the cold-water sting on the back of his neck, the dousing of his ardour, and he knew Pirah felt it too, because he flinched a little and then grit his teeth and said, "You're — perfect — " His face twisted as the cold water grew worse, a sick and cold sensation that made Soren shift his shoulders uncomfortably, the dread growing in the pit of his stomach, and Pirah closed his mouth and nodded, drawing Soren onto his feet and kissing his hot mouth. "I know what it feels like," he said, against Soren's lips. "I felt it."

"Then don't be afraid of it," Soren said, but he could sense Pirah holding back still, in the way that he retreated with a closed-mouth smile, laying his head on Soren's shoulder for a moment, pressing his face against his neck. If there was a succor that would soothe him, Soren did not know how to give it, but it felt right having returned a fragment of the pleasure that Pirah had afforded him, and it felt right to be able to put his hands around Pirah's waist and draw them together. Lonely, Soren thought again. Greedy. He refused to chase the thought.

Some days passed this way — lying in the apple grove with Lorien's hand on his forehead, Soren gaining more and more awareness of the web, of how everything was connected, to him, to Lorien, to the heart tree, the language of the trees and the history in the layers of the earth. Lorien was comfortable, almost indulgent, but he could not shake the feeling, sometimes, of taking up the prince's time.

When Soren was not there, he was whiling away hours in the training yard with Pirah, who would halt what Soren was doing at the first flinch of pain and spend an hour rubbing his arm or his back. Or he was lying in the healing cave, Pirah's hands inexorable on him, determined to take Soren apart with a single touch, trying to seek out Soren's every like and dislike, as if he was afeared of stumbling upon either by accident.

Then the library, silent except for the sweep of the wind, the scratch of pen on parchment. It was difficult, sometimes, to be alone with his thoughts. It was more difficult still to confront the enormity of the written language, struggling to hold the words in his head, struggling with texts that a child should be able to read, whispering to himself as his pen scratched on the paper. He felt woefully out of place, too unwieldy and rough to hold a pen, despite the silent encouragement of Ye-jun's continued tolerance of his presence.

Am I getting better or worse? Soren thought, looking at himself in the dark glass of the mirror. No answer came. Each day that passed, his muscles felt stronger, he was faster, the pain receding.

But he was coming together and fraying apart in equal measure, caught between the rightness of Pirah's hands on him and the wrongness of it in his mind which only made it more pleasurable, fighting to escape the loop of his thoughts. There was a little greenery in his room now, enough that he could bear to look at the rebirth of it, like a plant growing from the split of a burned tree. Is this better? he could not help thinking every night, listening to Pirah's soft breath next to him, feeling his movement as he turned or settled, or reached out to Soren in his sleep. Will it truly take so long?

He avoided bringing up Pirah to Lorien or Lorien to Pirah, but when he was with one he could feel the shadow of the other, as if he was in the middle of a rope being pulled in two directions. It was all in his mind, and he knew it. Lorien had never said anything to him; Lorien had never touched him, had never even implied anything, but it was his own traitorous mind that still drifted to Lorien, though he held it back. Pirah knew — Soren had called Lorien's name in the beginning, after all, but they had never spoken of it since. They lay side by side and had conversations that avoided his name more conspicuously than speaking it.

Did Lorien know of their — he could not even put words to it, but Lorien always seemed to know things, and surely it was not beyond his attention that Pirah's room stood empty, or that they could barely be found apart during the day. But Lorien never said anything, never looked upon Soren with anything less than a friendly if searching eye, always behind a tired veil of long lashes. If it takes a hundred years for you to master this, Lorien said, looking at Soren — Soren was finding it difficult to look away from Lorien's hands as he sliced into an apple with a little knife — it will be a hundred years well spent, my friend.

Soren could not help but think of the night of midsummer, when the heat had persisted after the sun had slipped beneath the rim of the world, and the sense-memory he had of sitting on the bank of the river with his feet in the cool stream — Pirah on one side, Lorien on the other, Pirah trying to tell a story but forgetting the words, who was there, why he was telling it at all, and Lorien laughing on his other side, trying to fill in the words, leaning against Soren, the warmth of him racing up and down Soren's side like a brand, until Pirah reached down and scooped up cool water to flick at them both for laughing —

"What are you thinking of?" Lorien said.

"Nothing," Soren said, too quickly. There was a cramp forming in his lower leg, and he bent his head to massage it, straightening out the way he was sitting.

"You were smiling," Lorien said, stretching out his legs as well. He was looking at Soren, as he often did, as if he was a puzzle that needed a little more thinking before he could complete it.

"I was thinking of midsummer," Soren said, because he had no real desire to lie to Lorien, not at this point.

"Oh?" Lorien said. "Which part?" His tone was light, but Soren heard the deliberate inflection in it — he could hear that now, in Lorien's voice, and he flushed, thinking of the way he had called Lorien's name that night — surely he hadn't heard? He cursed himself for doing so, although Lorien had just asked an innocent question. He could feel the burning of his ears as he struggled to reach for words, but found nothing for a few painful moments.

"The river," he said. "You, me, and Pirah by the river."

"I recall," Lorien said, and he looked pleased. "We could go down there any time you like, you know. We could go swimming, just the three of us."

"I'd like that," Soren said. The wind around them was warm and scented with flowers. It was growing later in the day than they normally stayed out by the apple trees, or perhaps the days were growing shorter, because the light was more golden than Soren expected. "All three of us?"

"If you like," Lorien said. It sounded light, inconsequential, and the warm wind was buffeting his brown-golden curls, bringing with it the scent of fresh-cut earth, like pitching a spade into the forest floor. In contrast with his tone, he saw the thread of tension enter Lorien's body, his face considering, and buried behind that, a spark of mischief in his eyes. "May I give you something to give to Pirah?"

It was as if Lorien had been waiting for Soren to bring up Pirah in order to speak of him. Soren hesitated; he could not bear if the message was something — something that might speak of the past in a way that he could never understand.

"Yes," Soren said. And then after a moment's hesitation, "If it's something I'm able to understand."

"I think you'll understand it," Lorien said cheerfully, and Soren thought his next words might be something like shall we have dinner all three of us or you need to stop leaving your shoes in the hallway. Instead, Lorien caught his eye with a movement, pressing two fingers to his lips and kissing them, and then he moved through the air swiftly before Soren could understand or protest, and brushed his fingers against Soren's lips, lingering.

"I — "

"Just a moment," Lorien said, interrupting him. "Let me fix your scarf before you go."

Soren's lips were burning as if he had kissed a hot coal, and it felt like he had taken it into his mouth and swallowed it, lodged it in his throat. Lorien had — Lorien had all but kissed him. Lorien had kissed him, and he was sending him to — was his scarf twisted? Lorien was behind him, moving the folds of fabric, lifting them, and he blew cool air across the back of Soren's neck.

Soren gasped, and the dropping of the golden veil over his vision was as sudden as if Lorien had pulled a rope tight around his neck. A hesitation, but not his, Lorien still holding the scarf up with Soren's neck exposed, and he thought well, I would kill him, as Lorien leaned in and bit him on the back of the neck, teeth sharp, pressure hard. A thousand bells rang in his mind all at once, glass chimes, church bells, something solid and resounding that shattered through his very core. Lorien understood him. Lorien understood everything. Soren felt everything from Lorien in an overwhelming rush — regret, pain, tension, swept away by the overwhelming rush of lust and power at Soren's reaction, the satisfaction of watching Soren melt.

Go on, then, Lorien said, and Soren was on his feet with no memory of standing, as if he had floated there by the simple touch of Lorien's hand on the small of his back. Deliver the message.

Soren knew exactly where Pirah was, because how could he not? He felt like a compass with a spinning needle that was finally pointing north. Pirah burned like a star in the night, Soren's entire being oriented towards him, spurred on by the brand on the back of his neck. It had been just a moment ago, but he felt like it had been on his nape for as long as he could remember. Pirah, he thought. He felt like a tracking dog.

He blinked and he was somewhere different, somewhere the glossy dark leaves of the forest were brushing against his overheated body. Pirah's scent, Pirah's hair, Pirah's smile, the dark of his eyes. Lorien had spun him like a top and set him on an inexorable course. His lips burned as if he had drunk poison, as if Lorien had fed it to him from his hand.

He stumbled, but did not fall. Then, pushing clumsily through a final thicket — his legs were so wobbly he could barely walk, and there was no way Pirah could not hear him coming — he saw Pirah kneeling at the edge of the river, his hair wet. He turned, slowly, at Soren's approach.

"Where have you been?" Pirah said, as if he had invited Soren to meet him at the banks of the river, or perhaps Soren had heard the inflection wrong, his ears still ringing with the chimes. Pirah was out of focus, growing clearer as he stepped closer. He was not wearing a shirt; Soren wanted to put his mouth on his stomach.

"Are you all right?" Pirah said. "You look like you've got a fever." And then, as he stood and grew closer, he was frowning. "Did someone say something to you? You look — "

The closer Pirah got, the more the back of Soren's neck burned, until he was sure it was on fire, tearing through his scarf. "Lorien," he said, and his voice was burned out, his throat scorched. "Lorien sent — "

"Lorien?" Pirah said, taken aback, but Soren was too far gone, too deep in the golden chimes to stop himself. He collided with Pirah and reached up — up on his tiptoes to push their mouths together, his arms around Pirah, pulling him against his body, Pirah's wet hair feeling like it should sizzle where it touched Soren's face, and when Pirah slid his tongue into Soren's mouth and reached up underneath Soren's scarf, he shuddered as Pirah's fingers brushed against the edge of Lorien's bite. The sensation exploded inside him, as if Pirah had triggered a trap Lorien had set for the both of them, the veil crashing down over him so fast he was overcome with dizziness and the strength went out of his body, Pirah catching him at the last moment.

I need to be on my knees, he thought, and he tried to wiggle out of Pirah's grasp and drop down as hard as he could, but Pirah held him tight.

"Let me look," he said, pulling at Soren's scarf too hard, too rough. He turned him around, pulling Soren back against his body, and Soren could feel how hard he was, and it was so sudden it must have hurt. "Let me — " And somewhere, distantly, Soren could feel that cold-water sensation, though he knew it wasn't from him, in the instant before Pirah kissed over the mark of Lorien's mark, sucking hard against his skin. He was transcending — his body was a conduit for pleasure; it was being struck by lightning, his whole body alive with it from his head to his feet. Soren's choked-out moans were too loud; Pirah's other hand was covering Soren's heart, feeling the kick against his ribs. He was trapped between the two sensations, hot mouth, cold water.

"For you," Soren said, thickly, because his brain was more gold than thought, sex dazed, and all it had taken was one movement of Lorien. Pirah reached down and slid his hand over Soren's cock trapped inside his smallclothes, squeezing hard enough to make him wince and push up onto his toes again. "From Lorien."

"Soren," Pirah said, and his voice was shattered glass. He bit at Soren's ear, ran his tongue over the shell of it. Soren could barely think. Do it, he thought. Do anything. Make me do it. Do something I'd hate. "Can you run?"

"I don't know," Soren said. It was true. He was unsteady, coltish. The bite throbbed with the beat of his heart, his limbs shaky, equilibrium rocked like being tossed around on a ship in a storm. He did not want to leave the warmth of Pirah's embrace, the tightness of his arm around Soren's waist.

"Run," Pirah said, and Soren could feel the sharpness of Pirah's teeth next to the side of his neck, the vein there. He could not ignore the instruction, not from Pirah — and he did not want to. He pushed Soren hard in the small of his back, right where Lorien had touched him, and it was like the sun had vanished and all around him was the velvet of night, the moon's silver-golden light.

He ran. He ran like a deer startled by a hunter — the hunter and the hart, thought a Soren that could still think, fading somewhere behind. Pirah was right on his heels, reaching out for the hem of Soren's shirt, and it was like striking sparks off a whetstone, honing a blade. He could see, when he turned back to look, that ancient instinct on Pirah's face, akin to rage, his teeth bared, his brows drawn down, his eyes focused on Soren and only Soren — the same thing he had seen in Lorien, something old and well-hidden that only reared its head in necessity.

His heart was beating too fast now, his breath coming ragged as he desperately sucked in another one, his lungs starving. He could not outrun Pirah forever. Maybe now. Maybe for the next minute. His vision was expanding, senses flaring, as if both of them had that ancient instinct, sharp-edged, bloody-clawed. Cold leaves slapped at his face; sticks scraped at his arms and legs. He had no sense of where he was. There was only the movement of his body, plunging down a riverbank and into ankle-deep water, scrambling up the other side, his body working hot, muscles loose and well-used, thinking, if he catches me he'll fuck me for real, and unsure if the power he felt behind him from Pirah was anger or anticipation. If he had long hair, Pirah would have caught its ribbons, yanked his head back and pulled him to the ground, wrapped his hair around his fist and —

He wanted to be caught, but he wanted Pirah to catch him. I'm fast but you're faster, he thought, and for a moment he was drowning in the web that rolled out in front of him, showing him where to step, guiding his feet, unfurling like a scroll, and then — and then, meeting with Lorien, Lorien, naked and looking out through the flames, looking straight into Soren's heart. It felt as if Lorien had reached out and touched him; he could feel his hands all over him, leaving a mark, a bruise, something permanent.

There was a root, a niche in the ground, or he was betrayed by his own feet; it did not matter. He went down and Pirah crashed onto him, no hesitation, nothing but his hands, the sheer strength of his arms, and Soren knew he was as strong as Pirah, knew he could fight, but the will for it had gone out of him, attacked from all sides. He found that strength in surrender, baring his throat for Pirah's mouth, his teeth, as Pirah pressed him down onto the mossy floor of the forest and rolled him on his side effortlessly, reaching down between them only to roughly push down Soren's trousers — and Soren thought yes, make it hurt, make it real — and push his thick, wet cock between Soren's thighs.Soren's cry echoed out as Pirah hunched over him, at the slide of his cock against the underside of Soren's balls, against his cock, and when he looked down and saw it, the red wetness of both of them together. Pirah's breath was hot and wild over the back of Soren's neck, as he reached around to take great squeezing handfuls of his pectorals, thumbs scraping over his nipples, and Soren reared back against him, twisting his neck to yearn for Pirah's mouth.

It was like he had awoken something ancient and forgotten within Pirah, and Soren's fear and excitement were one and the same. It would be too much. It already was. Pirah's nails were digging into Soren's chest, his thrusts hard and erratic, sliding between Soren's thighs.

"Brother," Soren said, the word choked out, and for a wrenching moment he was unsure if Pirah had heard him at all, until he bent his head, his whole body going taut, and then he was coming, pushed right into the juncture of Soren's thighs, coming against his cock with a shock of heat. It knocked the breath right out of him, and he cried out, the force of his pleasure unable to be reckoned with, as if fire had burst from him and consumed the entire forest, consumed his entire being, until he was nothing but a conduit for it, his nerve singing with sensation until it was pain, then pleasure; then it began to fade, the glass chimes fading from his hearing, but the gold veil still lingering over his vision.

Pirah was lying next to him, close enough that they were shored up against each other, Pirah's skin overheated and hot, his hands over his face, and for a moment Soren was unsure if he was crying; Pirah's eyes were wet when he pulled his hands down from his face, but he was still, looking up into the sky.

"Should I not have — "

"No, no," Pirah said, and he reached down and touched Soren's palm, fingers brushing the inside of his wrist. "I just — I never thought it would feel like this."

Soren did not know what he was referring to, but he could not find the words to ask. His throat was tight, and he could not explain that either. All he could do was search for fruitless words, as Pirah leaned against him, turning his face into Soren's shoulder. Words were beyond him, but he could hold Pirah as Pirah had held him, try and be calm, unshakeable.

"You have taken part of my burden," Soren said, and behind his words was the sound of shifting leaves above, the world returning, opening up from the narrowness of his focus. "Would you not allow me to take on yours?"

"No one deserves to take on three hundred years of burden," Pirah said. "Especially you. I would not — I would prefer not to do that to you."

"If it's shared — "

"Let me think on it," Pirah said, cutting off Soren in a way that was unusual for him. "Please. Let me think, and meet me in my room when the sun sets. I should have an answer for you then."

And he bent his head and whispered further instructions to Soren, making the shivery golden veil descend once more, and it remained until Pirah bade him goodbye, his touch lingering on his wrist, and the mark of his mouth still overlaying Lorien's. Soren could feel the web trembling on the outside of his consciousness, closer than he found comfortable, but when he reached into it, there was no trace of Lorien there.

*

It seemed to take days for the sun to slip beyond the horizon. He paced back and forth in his room, barefoot, trying not to think, trying to think, trying not to dwell on the dark throb of the double bite on the back of his neck, the ghost of Lorien's sharp teeth and the dull bruise of Pirah's mouth. He would reach to touch it, stop himself midair, and then reach to touch it again.

The veil had never truly left him, and he felt burning hot and ice cold at the same time. He was splitting in two, totally down the middle: Soren the human, raising the Commander's battle standard over a field washed red with blood, proud, unquestioning, with his body ripping itself apart; and Soren the elf, a thousand years old, long-haired, fluid-limbed, a bow grown out of flowers in his hand, silently stepping through the forest — and neither of those people were real. Instead, he was the malformed middle of them, a combination of the best and the worst of both.

He rubbed at the sensitive points of his ears until they felt raw, his blood singing through his body, and pressed his hands over his closed eyes until he saw the fireworks of dark stars burst behind his vision. Who was he? Was he even real at all? He had never felt like this before. His muscles were trembling up and down his arms and legs, and time was slow, then fast, then slow again, the chimes ringing too loud in his ears, then soft when he covered them, the veil shimmering in his vision like the precursor to a migraine, when things went soft and strange around the edges. Do something, he thought at the air. It felt like the moment before a string was plucked and a song began; it felt like the stillness of a pond before a rock was skipped, the surface trembling before the ripple.

Then — the moon was shining through the leaves of the tree, and he slipped out of his room, barefoot, like a thief in the night. Pirah's room was empty, standing still and quiet in the dark. It smelled like him, underneath the ivy, the crushed-moss scent, the jasmine. Whoever he was, he was someone who wished to do what Pirah had asked of him. That much was an indelible truth, though the shake in his body was as much uncertainty as anticipation, still feeling the ripple effect of his thoughts — he was half here, half drifting, ungrounded. He wanted Pirah — he wanted to feel that anchor drawing him back to the dirt. He took off his clothes, slowly, the air a little chill on his overheated skin, his body feeling overly tender, and knelt at the edge of the bed, putting his hands flat on the surface, feeling the softness of the linen sheets. He was already hard; that felt like an inevitability.

The anticipation was swimming around him, knowing that when Pirah came in he would see the muscles of Soren's back and his ass. He swallowed slowly, his mouth wet, throat feeling like it might close. It felt like a cloak of lightning was settling over his back, his muscles jumping. He felt the air move, heard the curtain of vines being parted, and he could not help tensing, his shoulders rising.

"That's a welcome sight," Lorien said, low. Soren jerked, his breath rushing out of him like he'd been struck in the stomach. That wasn't — Pirah hadn't said anything about — "Though truthfully, not what I thought Pirah wished to speak to me about."

"I'm sorry," Soren said, for reasons he could not fathom. Was he apologising to Lorien, or to himself — or to Pirah? The guilty thrill of feeling Lorien's gaze on his back was overwhelming; he could not help shifting slightly, feeling the movement of his own muscles in a way he knew Lorien would not look away from. If there was one thing he had confidence in, it was the obvious strength of his body.

"Do not be sorry," Lorien said, and he still sounded so calm, but in a way that Soren could not dismiss as mere indifference. Did nothing shake him? Did nothing excite him? "I'd like if you'd touch yourself for me," Lorien said, and his tone had changed, voice dropping low and laced with fire and authority. Soren shivered; that feeling of being a great cat lounging in the sunshine felt close and far away at the same time. The power of Lorien's gaze on his back was like being branded, and he felt naked to the bone, without the anchor of Pirah's weight on him, but he could not deny that he was harder than he had ever been, the entire sense of his body focused on his cock, the inevitable shift of his hand off the bed and down towards his stomach.

"I don't do that," Soren said.

"Ever?" Lorien said, sounding surprised; the hot wash of humiliation across the back of Soren's neck made him shudder, but something more as well — so he could surprise Lorien, he could get a rise out of him — and he heard Lorien breathe in slowly. "Then I think it's a good time to start."

It was an order, wasn't it? He wanted it to be an order. It was excruciating to reach down and touch himself, to feel how embarrassingly wet he was. He ducked his head and tried not to look at his hand on himself, the roughness of his calluses dragging against himself, the sensitivity of the head. He sucked in a ragged breath, and clenched his thighs to keep from coming.

"I can tell you're trying to be good," Lorien said, and there was just a fraction of roughness in his voice that Soren honed in on. "At what point does Pirah surprise us together?" he said. "Is that what the plan is? I'd very much like to watch him take you."

"I don't know," Soren said, his hand unsteady.

"Did he not tell you?" Lorien said, and Soren could hear him walking around the room. He could not think past the intensity of the golden veil. He hated this; he hated having to touch himself, hated the power that Lorien had over him — but he loved it. It was undeniable. He had not known that Lorien could anchor him as Pirah did, although it was different — like being pinned rather than held. And then, after a moment, Lorien said, "Where is he?"

"I don't know," Soren said, and ice water splashed over his back, as swift and decisive as if Lorien had truly doused him. He turned his head slowly, and saw Lorien standing there looking lost and suddenly younger than Soren had perceived him, his hands clenched at his sides. The fire of lust in the room had been snuffed out as quickly as a candle.

Soren struggled back into his clothes, and he could hardly breathe, his shuddering breaths bringing no air into his lungs. Lorien came up behind him and laid a hand at the centre of his back, causing Soren to jump as if he had pinched him in the side.

"I cannot feel him anywhere," Lorien said, pacing back and forth. "This is my fault," he said. "I know that. But I cannot help but think — why now? After all this, why now?"

"You know why," Soren said without thinking, and Lorien turned to him, a little wild-eyed, as Soren reached up to touch the bruise on his neck. Lorien winced looking at it.

"Perhaps I was a little too forthright," Lorien said, sounding a touch sheepish, which made Soren blink. He had never heard Lorien sound like this before. "It's just — it was just flirting."

"Flirting," Soren said, aggrieved, incredulous, and Lorien shrugged. "It's not my place to say," Soren said, with great reluctance. "But — "

"It is," Lorien said, suddenly and fiercely. "It is your place to say."

"I don't know the past," Soren said. "But I do know he has been greatly wounded, and hasn't healed."

"Has he spoken of me to you?" Lorien said, and for the first time Soren saw him as vulnerable, looking past the curtain of his hair.

"Somewhat," Soren said. "But like calls to like, after all."

"I suppose somewhat would be enough," Lorien said, ruefully. "Would it help if I told you it was a long time ago?"

"No," Soren said. "I doubt your sense of a long time ago and mine would meet anywhere."

"It was never my intention for things to turn out this way," Lorien said, and after a moment's hesitation he leaned against Soren, his slight weight threatening to unbalance him. Not for a lack of strength, but from surprise. Lorien had never been like this with him before. "Does that help?"

"I can believe that," Soren said, and after a moment's hesitation he put his arm around Lorien, who closed his eyes. "I can't fix this," he said. "I don't — I don't understand any of it." But he could not deny that a world — even his narrow, wrong world — would be terribly bereft of Pirah's presence. I only just got here, he thought stupidly, plaintively, as if it would make any difference. I only just got — him.

"I would not ask you to fix it," Lorien said, and he sounded as if there were tears in his throat, the anger at himself something older and more fierce than Soren was familiar with. "In the past I did my best to hurt him, because it was easier than facing what I would ask of him."

Fuck it, Soren thought, and managed to hold back from saying. Clarity, as sudden and bright as looking into the sun. His worries, his fears, were dashed in the brightness of that light. He wanted Pirah back, felt his loss as keenly as if he had been killed himself. Lorien wanted the same thing.

"Well?" Soren said. "Are you just going to stand here and feel sorry for yourself?" Lorien blinked up at him, as if Soren had slapped him across the face. "We're going to go after him, aren't we?"

"Go after him?" Lorien said, and he sounded hopeless. "If he's chosen to go — "

"He's chosen to go for stupid reasons," Soren said, fiercely, cutting through whatever Lorien was going to say, and ignoring the flash of surprise on his face. "And if you've acted the fool in the past — "

"The fool?" Lorien said, frowning.

" — isn't it time to make amends?"

There was an expression on Lorien's face that Soren had not seen before, a twisted-up expression with a hint of poison. "What is it, exactly, that you think I might have to make amends for?"

Soren was extremely aware that he was treading on dangerous ground, forcing between the folds of years of history that he could not understand. "You said you wanted my advice, didn't you?"

"I did not mean in matters of the past," Lorien said, affronted, challenged, and his eyes were narrowed. Soren had overstepped, but he did not care. "I did not mean in personal matters."

"Yes, you did," Soren said, with utter confidence. Lorien was frowning mightily, his eyebrows drawn together. There was a hint of petulance in his expression, as if he knew Soren was right and did not want to admit it. "You said you wanted companions who could be honest with you. Are you taking that back?"

Lorien's eyes narrowed. "No," he said, eventually, and then, "I did say that, didn't I. Well, go on, then. Tell me, honestly, what you think."

"I think you hurt someone you love," Soren said. Lorien frowned, deeply. "Or loved, or it was that love that hurt you both. A true, deep wound that can only come from a well-wielded knife and a wielder that knows where to cut."

"It's foolish to bare all and not expect to be cut," Lorien said, mouth pressed thin. "I would avoid that for either of us — and you."

"I don't wish to be spared," Soren said, and he took Lorien's hand and drew it to his heart so Lorien could feel the quickness of its beat. "I'd rather be hurt than spared." It became true as he was saying it, and the dizziness of that truth came across him.

"I was more — capricious in my youth," Lorien said, and his face dropped, fingers curling against Soren's chest. "I would not have him suffer me — I would rather not ask of him what it is I wish to ask."

"You're afraid he'll say no," Soren said, thinking of what Pirah had said.

"Not at all," Lorien said, and then, quietly, "I am afraid he will say yes."

"You're making his choice for him," Soren said.

"I know," Lorien said, and his eyes were wet when he turned his head to look at Soren. "I tried to push him away to make things right, and that certainly did not work. I cannot recall a worse time in my life. When we fought, at least he was there; at least he cared enough to fight me. Then we did not speak, and I felt I was in a dream I could not wake from. Now — he is here and not here all at once; we speak of idle things, we take pains not to speak of each other — " His hands clenched against Soren's chest. It felt like being cut to the quick. "How ironic I can make this choice for him, when I cannot even choose between you two for the smallest, simplest things, for matters of duty — "

"You're telling this to the wrong person," Soren said.

"I am most certainly telling this to the right person," Lorien said. "But I take your meaning. Shall we go, then, if we are to go? I cannot help but think it is a mistake." He bent down and kissed Soren on the mouth, briefly and with a hint of regret, the taste of bitterness lingering. "Despite appearances, I do truly never know what I'm doing," he said, and brushed his hair back from his shoulders. "Peacetime prince."

"I didn't mean that as an insult."

"Insult or not, it's true," Lorien said. "The fear of taking action eclipses the fear of what the action may result in. Let us go before I lose my nerve altogether."

Outside, the moonlight seemed to reinvigorate Lorien a little, as he tied his hair back and whistled into the night, a pure clear note that shivered upon the air. The night grew darker for a moment, and then there was a flash of light that had Soren throwing his hand up to protect his eyes, the afterimage dancing behind his lids. When his vision cleared, there was a horse standing on the grass in front of them, its outline wavering a little at the edge of Soren's vision. Soren sighed, overcome at once by the thought that Lorien having a horse made of moonlight with a mane of stars was beginning to seem normal.

"Mother Moon won't mind if we have you back before sunrise, will she?" Lorien said, and it took Soren a moment to realise he was talking to the horse as if it could understand him — Soren could not think on it too long, because his head was beginning to hurt. "Thank you," Lorien said, pressing his face against the horse's neck. The horse shifted restlessly; Soren felt as if he ought to say something, felt too foolish and nodded instead, and felt even more foolish when Lorien turned and looked at him, frowning a little.

"Thank you?" Soren tried, and the horse shook its head and blew air from its nostrils, turning away.

"Never mind," Lorien said, cupping his hands for Soren's foot and then swinging up behind him, his arms reaching past him to grip onto the horse's mane, which pulled him tight against Soren's back, making him shiver a little. "You are very — attuned, aren't you?" he said, close into Soren's ear.

"Don't worry about me," Soren said. "Focus your attention elsewhere."

"But I like worrying about you," Lorien said, and it was a return to his usual tone, though he made no more further implications, shifting his weight a little. He did not nudge the horse, but it took off with no warning, moving swiftly through the forest. Soren closed his eyes to stave off the nausea of moving so quickly and with such sure footing; it felt like no horse he'd ever ridden, a wild and untameable thing, subject only to its own whims and the grace it afforded Lorien. Behind his eyelids, the world spread out around him in light and sound, the tremulous music of souls all around them, down to the shift of his own muscle and bones.

"I could not see him anywhere," Lorien said, and Soren heard and did not hear him at the same time — a faint impression of Lorien's essence, a bundle of herbs thrown on a smouldering fire. "He knows how to not be found. Or at least — he knows how to not be found by me." That bitter note crawled into his tone again.

They came to an abrupt halt at the edge of a silver lake, the moonlight tracing a path across it, the reeds and rushes brushing against Soren's legs.

"Where would he go to be alone?" Soren said. "The healing cave?"

"What healing cave?" Lorien said. "I don't know — wherever he's gone, it'll be far. It might even be on the border of this land and the next."

"What's past the border?" Soren said. He expected Lorien to say something like trouble, or something to put off his attention, like, I'll tell you when you're older. Lorien hesitated.

"The mountains," he said. He wrapped his arms around Soren's middle. "That is where someone might go if they truly wished to leave everything behind — there is no way we could find him again, and he could only return if he truly desired it in his heart."

"You know that's where he'll be," Soren said. Lorien squeezed him a little, though Soren could not tell if it was an admonition or reassurance.

"I had hoped to be wrong," Lorien said. "Perhaps he just — tripped and fell somewhere."

Soren did not dignify that with a response; he knew Lorien did not believe it in the slightest. He shifted his weight and the horse wheeled again, so suddenly that Soren had to clench his thighs to stay on, Lorien gripping him tight.

"I ought to have told you to bring a coat," Lorien said, and his front was hot against Soren's back. Soren could not deny what Lorien had said. He was attuned — and the depth of that attunement still scared him. He was different now, he had changed, but he could not deny his old thoughts were only quiet now for the magnitude of the new ones.

"I've been on colder rides," Soren said, and even though his words were bare whispers he knew they reached Lorien's ears, by the way his grip shifted against his arms. "At least it's not raining." It might as well have been, for the way he felt in the core of his body, cold and wanting. If Pirah left, truly left, he would be adrift. All the work he'd done over his life to make sure he relied on nothing and no one, so that he could still exist no matter what was taken away, had been undone in what felt like a single night.

They went straight as an arrow now. Lorien had said mountains, and Soren had noticed them on the horizon at sunset or daybreak, the planes of stone that were lit and shadowed as the sun moved. Capped with snow — and he could feel the change in the air that set his teeth on edge, and raised goosebumps on his arms.

He thought, suddenly and unbidden, of a mad dash into the snow as he carried a message on to the next war camp, unconfident in an unknown horse's footing, surrounded by nothing but the darkness and the snow blowing into his eyes, riding into an endless void — this felt like that, but the darkness was whatever they were riding towards, and not the pearly moonlight around them.

"There," Lorien said, after what felt like an hour of riding along the edge of the trees. Soren was jolted out of a half-trace of twisted worry, and saw what he was pointing at: a tiny golden-red spark between the trees. The horse leapt forward at the shift of Lorien's weight, stride lengthening, and Soren grabbed at Lorien's hands as an anchor. They came through the trees in a rush, Lorien leaping from the horse before it even came to a halt, Soren sliding down with considerably more wobbly legs.

Pirah's little camp was what Soren had expected: a little fire built just enough for warmth and perhaps a hot drink, a packed bag, a sheathed sword within easy reach. Pirah's hair was bound back and his cheeks were red with cold, and he looked as icy as the air.

"Is this not too much trouble for me?" Pirah said, nodding at the horse. He did not sound surprised to see them at all. "What did you trade for the use of Eralwen?"

"Nothing I cannot live without," Lorien said, and he sounded somehow both poisonous and cheerful in a way Soren had not heard before. Still, that did not seem to surprise Pirah either. His voice held none of the vulnerability he had shown Soren in Pirah's bedroom. "A year and a day as the moon. Something like that."

"I do not think I am worth such trouble," Pirah said, and he stood, tight-lipped, as though bracing for a blow. "Or did you come to see me off — did you come to gloat?"

"Gloat?" Lorien said. "About what?"

"Is it not enough to take Soren from me?" Pirah said, a high note of despair in his voice. Soren could not grapple with the emotion in his voice; he looked up into the sky, and tried to ignore it, blinking rapidly. "Must you come here and show it off?"

"That was not my intention," Lorien said. "And I do not think of Soren as a thing that can be taken from you."

"You know I loved you," Pirah said, jaw tight. His face shuttered.

"Yes," Lorien said. And then, "Loved?"

"If you never felt the same way," Pirah said, "there's no need to punish me for it. Is there? Is it that much of an affront to you, to be plagued by my affection?"

"The only thing I have ever felt about your affection," Lorien said, "is shame at my inability to accept it." And he drew in a breath and straightened his back, as if waiting for a return blow.

"It's unkind to play with me," Pirah said, looking down at where his sword lay, the movement seemingly an unconscious reassurance.

"If you wish to draw a blade against me, I may have to nominate a second."

Soren was cold on both sides now, rocking back on his heels. So much of this he could not understand; so much of this had nothing to do with him. If they were to reunite, there would be no place for him here. There was so much weighty history —

The horse nudged him in the back, sending him stumbling forward, until he was at the edge of the circle of firelight. "Go back with him, Soren," Pirah said, and the way he met Soren's eyes felt like a knife being twisted in his chest. "Forget that you and I ever — were friends. It would please me if you were able to gain a measure of peace, and it's the same to me, whether that's with me or not. Choose him, Lorien, to be your guard — I think it would be best for both of you, truly, I do." It was a lie; there were tears in his upturned eyes.

"It's not my place to come between you," Soren said, quietly. "It's not even my place to try and understand what happened between you."

"Is this what all of this is about?" Lorien said, sudden and cutting. "I cannot choose between you two — I was a fool to think I could. It was a mistake to pit you against each other. I would have both of you guard me."

"You can't do that," Pirah said. "It's a fool's compromise."

"Then let me be a fool," Lorien snapped. "I already am! Soren, you were right." He turned to Pirah with suddenness. "I have always known how you felt, Pirah."

"And?" Pirah said, the word shaky.

"And I feel the same," Lorien said, shrugging. He sounded calm, too calm, once more. It was a ruse; his face was completely blank, as if he felt nothing, thought nothing. Soren did not think that he would believe what Lorien was saying, if their positions were different.

"If this is a ploy, cousin," Pirah said, "I'm afraid I cannot see its end."

"I have been a fool," Lorien said. The world around them was cold and still, no warm wind stirring the cloud of Lorien's breath in the air. "I have learned to hold my poison tongue, for you. I have learned to accept my duties that are virtue of nothing but my birth, as you have said to me; and I hope that I have risen to their occasion, as you once asked me to, but I could not."

"Don't say you did any of that for me," Pirah said, unbelieving with a hint of viciousness. He turned away as if he could no longer stand to look at either of them.

"I did all of it for you," Lorien said, and there was the crack of passion in his voice, as clear as if he had taken a knife and driven it into his own chest. "But the thing I could not do was ask you to kneel for me, and for that I have tortured both of us."

"Is this an apology?" Pirah said, and he sounded exhausted, turning his head to look back at Lorien. "It's too late, if it is."

"Should it be?" Lorien said. "If there was a way that I knew how to apologise to you, I would have done that. I thought that Soren — " Lorien turned to Soren and he felt it like a shock, a realisation, I am here. I am part of this.

"You thought that Soren what," Pirah said, his teeth clenched.

Lorien turned to Soren. "You've seen what a mess we've made of things," he said. "Pirah wants tempering" — and Soren saw Pirah wince at Lorien using the same word that he had used — "and despite appearances, I am a terrible coward."

"I don't have any ability to heal the past," Soren said. How could he fix a year of fighting, if not more? He was as small and useless as a child. "And I don't have healing to offer. I just — " His throat was closing. "I don't have anything to offer, really."

"I doubt that any of us do," Lorien said.

"Let me speak a moment," Pirah said, cutting in between them. Lorien jumped as if he had been shocked. Pirah was angry; Soren could see it as clear as if there was steam rising from his face. "If this is the truth, why have you never spoken of it before? Am I so repulsive that you cannot look past it?"

"Will you kneel for me?" Lorien said, simply, and it hung in the air like a challenge. Soren saw Pirah hesitate, and Lorien's mouth twist. "Do you understand now?" he said. "This is what I've feared — or half of it."

"All you ever had to do was ask," Pirah said, and his eyes were ablaze as he thumped down to his knees on the ground, hard enough that it had to hurt him. He looked up, and such heat and light blazed through Soren that for the first time he understood why they were called of the day. "What did you fear? That you and I are both of the sun? That you are a prince?"

Lorien, mouth closed, nodded firmly twice.

"I can do it because it's you," Pirah said, fiercely. "I can do it because it's you."

Lorien stepped forward, and Soren saw Pirah set his jaw, clearly enduring — Soren could feel the tension growing in the air, swelling with each step, until he had to crouch down and put his cold hands on the back of his own neck to try and relieve the pressure. Lorien had almost reached Pirah now, an arm's length away, and as he reached out, Soren's voice caught in his throat — don't —

Pirah snapped at Lorien's hand, but his teeth closed on empty air. Lorien was fast; he had anticipated it. Pirah was dark hair and anger embodied in one moment, his instincts pushed too far. The sensation of it put Soren's teeth on edge, tensing his jaw until it ached. The connection between him and Pirah was open, and he could feel how wrong it felt for Lorien to challenge Pirah's instincts. Pirah's shoulders rose and fell with the force of his breath, and he was shivering, his breath billowing around him in great gouts of steam. Soren's heart was thundering in his chest.

"That was the other thing I was afraid of," Lorien said, cool and calm — but at this point Soren knew that this calm was a form of self-protection. Lorien was holding his hand against his chest as if Pirah had truly bitten him. "Any affection you may have for me cannot eclipse the nature of who you are."

"Soren," Pirah said, and he reached out to him, his hand shaking in the night. "Can you — I need — "

Soren went to him as if he was drawn by a hook in his heart. He could not stand to be between them; it could not have felt more dangerous if they were pointing swords at each other. Instead, he moved behind Pirah and put his hands on his shoulders, feeling the tension in his muscles, the heavy shudder of his breath, and beyond that, the way he was yearning towards Lorien, leaning towards him as if he was inevitable. Now that he was close, Soren could not help slipping his fingers under Pirah's shirt, and he could feel the incremental relaxation as Soren laid his hands on his skin.

"Try again," Soren said. He could feel Pirah begin to tense, but as Lorien approached, he leaned back against Soren's legs, and there was something cavalier about the way he was leaning that made Soren go a little warm. Pirah reached up to touch Soren's hand, and there was a shake in his fingers and his breath that revealed his fear.

Lorien reached out again and touched the side of Pirah's face, and Pirah sighed, closing his eyes. Lorien caressed Pirah's cheek, then dragged his hand down to touch Pirah's lips directly, running his thumb over his bottom lip until Pirah exhaled raggedly and grazedLorien's fingers with the tip of his tongue.

"Not in front of Eralwen, my love," Lorien murmured. "I would prefer to keep you private — both of you."

"Is the horse going to — tell someone?" Soren said, utterly unsure for a moment whether or not what he was saying was unhinged.

"I hope not," Lorien said, seriously. The horse raised its head and then shook it, its mane of stars sparkling light in every direction. "I think we will walk home, if you don't mind."

"You traded a year just to walk home?" Pirah said, and the movement of his lips brushed against Lorien's fingers. Soren hunched his shoulders, trying to avoid the tingle going down his back from the reflected sensation. Lorien looked up, his eyes slightly narrowed, as if he knew what Soren was feeling.

"I traded three hundred years for this," Lorien said, looking right at Soren. "What's one more?"

*

"Are you really going to be the moon?" Soren said when the heart tree was coming into view again, feeling foolish once more. "It's not a — metaphor?" They were walking in a line, Pirah in the middle, Soren talking across him.

"Does it sound like a metaphor?" Lorien said, looking back towards Soren with a glint in his eye. "Don't think a year away will grant you freedom — I can see everything you do from the sky."

Soren looked up at Pirah, unsure if Lorien was joking or not.

"I did tell you you didn't know what he was like," Pirah said, and his voice was cracked through with tiredness. "I thought you'd quelled your tongue."

"I said I quelled my poison tongue," Lorien said, looking between both of them. There was a trace of raw liveliness in him that Soren had not seen before. He still did not know if Lorien was making a joke. He gazed at the moon, with the familiar-unfamiliar shapes upon it, and considered looking up at it and seeing it changed —

"We won't miss you," Pirah said.

"Yes, you will," Lorien said, and bumped into Pirah in a companionable manner, putting his hand on Pirah's arm.

*

Lorien's room was larger than both Pirah and Soren's, and at first Soren took that for granted, before Lorien looked at him sidelong and said, "It's not the virtues of my birth, if that's what you were thinking."

"Pirah said it had more to do with the virtues of the heart," Soren said. He was cold all over, and could not seem to get warm despite rubbing at his arms.

"Did he?" Lorien said, faintly amused.

"That's how I've always thought of it," Pirah said, turning away a little. "Or that it reflects one's innermost feelings."

"Perhaps I have a very virtuous heart," Lorien said.

"It wasn't like this before," Pirah said. Lorien followed his gaze. Unlike the sparseness of Soren's room — the less thought of that, the better — or the lush greenery of Pirah's room, it seemed like every part of Lorien's room was blossoming: from the clover in the grass at their feet, to the glowing lichen on the wall studded with smaller starlike flowers, to the hanging pots from the ceiling resplendent with crimson flowers.

"I did say I made an effort to change," Lorien said, and he untied his tunic at the waist, that small gesture making Soren look away and flush.

"I mislike the idea of you changing yourself for me," Pirah said, frankly, and though the tension between the three of them had changed, it was not as if everything had resolved with no lingering effects. Even now they were standing as the three corners of a triangle, equally spaced apart.

"I did not change for you," Lorien said. "I changed at my own will, because I wished to be closer to who you thought I could be."

Pirah nodded in acknowledgement, but with a short, unhappy twist to his mouth.

"Come, now," Lorien said, releasing of the ties of his tunic and letting it fall open. Soren could not look away from the slimness of his waist, nor the promise of his hands, but the confidence that he held himself with was truly overwhelming. Look as much as you like, he was saying. "Do you wish to solve every problem in one night? Would you have us go over every little thing that has ever happened before the sun rises?"

Pirah shook his head, his long hair slipping over his shoulders. Words seemed to have deserted him. Soren moved towards him — he wished to shore him up once more.

"You are exhausted," Lorien continued. "And I am bone weary, and I dare not even think what Soren must feel. Can we not rest, and consider these things one at a time over the coming days — the coming months?"

"What do you think?" Pirah said, turning to Soren. "I cannot help but fear that I have pulled you into something you did not wish for."

"I came here of my own accord," Soren said, quickly. It was how he felt; he no longer felt caught by a rope, but centred. Not just his equilibrium — he could feel the presence of the web all around him, spiralling outwards from where he was. Everything formed part of that connection; he was right where he was supposed to be.

"To this land?"

"All of it," Soren said. He turned his head to Lorien. "What would you have me do?"

"You don't have to — " Pirah said.

"What would you have me do?" Soren repeated, and he felt the rush of surrender going through him, the same as plunging off a cliff into an unknown night.

"Have you not already been given instructions?" Lorien said, arching an eyebrow. It was true — he had.

Soren undressed quickly, feeling heat rising to the surface of his skin, his head spinning. He was too tired to truly rouse himself, but the feeling of the cool sheets on his warm skin was enough to make him shudder. Pirah was on one side of him, and Lorien the other, and for a moment Soren felt compelled to twist between them, back and forth, until Lorien looped a hand down over his chest and Pirah drew closer, trapping him between them.

"What would you have me do, cousin?" Pirah said, and Soren could feel the fast tempo of his heart.

"What?" Lorien said, and then yawned mightily. "Well, nothing."

"Nothing?" Pirah said. He moved a little, his hand landing high on Soren's thigh. "Nothing at all?"

"That's what I said, isn't it?" Lorien said, and his hand was right on Soren's stomach, the edge of his hair grazing the back of Soren's neck, like being teased with a feather. "If you can manage not to touch him, or yourself, unless at my command, then you will find yourself greatly rewarded."

"For how long?" Pirah said.

"How long were you having your fun without me?" Lorien said, but his tone was teasing, and Soren did not think he was upset in truth. Lorien reached over and touched Pirah on the hip, which startled him, knocking him into Soren. Pirah was hard against him, and now that Soren was looking at his face, he could see that Pirah was caught on the knife-edge of desire. "Self-denial is often its own reward, Pirah," Lorien said, and he reached down between them. "Can you not follow Soren's example? He does not touch himself, and therefore will have no trouble with this at all."

It was as if the mere words, combined with Lorien's hand skimming up his spine, made Soren have to bite his tongue to keep from revealing that this was affecting him, and that he was growing hard against Pirah. How could that be possible? Lorien had told him not to do it, not to think about it, but all he could think of was the darkness in Pirah's eyes, the heat on both sides of his body.

"Go to sleep," Lorien said. "You both said you were tired, did you not?"

"This is cruelty," Pirah said.

"I suppose it is," Lorien said, and he sounded pleased, pressing up against Soren's back and sighing gently against the back of his neck. Pirah made a sound in the back of his throat and then leaned forward and kissed Soren fiercely, the shock of it going through his entire body as Pirah's tongue invaded his mouth, his hand pressing against his throat. Then he moved with feral swiftness to kiss Lorien as well, crushing Soren between their bodies; Soren could feel Lorien's shuddering breath against his nape, and the thump of his heart against Soren's back.

"Aren't you tired?" Pirah said, pulling back. "Go to sleep."

"Exhausted," Lorien said, breathless, and he kissed the back of Soren's neck.

*

When Soren woke, it was still dark. They had separated in the night; Lorien had rolled away and Pirah lay with his arm flung over his face. The bed was warm, and there was a faint autumn chill in the air as Soren rose. There was something tugging on his heart that he could not ignore. Something golden that was not the veil, but a thread of the web, like he had been woken by a shiver, a whisper close to his ear.

A quiet air of slumber hung over the heart tree, with the only light coming from the library, and outside the moon was low in the sky, marking the first changes of day into night. Despite the lack of sleep, he felt attuned, awake, moving silently through the forest with a grace he had not known he had, his feet swift and purposeful through the dew-wet grass.

A ghost of wind touched his back, and he turned to look up at the moon. Is it always going to be like this? he thought.

No, the moon said, and he felt its grace upon him, shivery on his arms, the pale light settling around him like a cloak, then fading.

Back through the trees, the grass, the birches and the berry bushes, back across the small creek; it was both further and closer than he had thought, his leg throbbing as he approached it. There was a lightness in him that he could not name; not just the lightness in his body, but a lightness in his soul, despite realising where he was going. He had never come back this way, though whether it was out of fear he could not say. He was still looking, searching, his heart thudding in his chest. Is it here? It was. Were the answers he sought here too?

The grove where he had entered into this world looked the same as any other. There was no indelible mark on the ground as he had imagined, no red flowers fed by his blood.

I came here of my own power, he thought, looking through the air at the trees. There was no portal here, not now, nor would there ever be again for him. That was something he was sure of. No one had summoned him here. No one had reached out a hand — until after he had arrived. I came here of my own power, but I do not have to go on that way. It had taken all this for him to feel real within his body; for him to realise Pirah might have been right. Perhaps he should consider going to the mind healers.

The soft wind that rustled the trees settled over him like a blessing. The old wounds on his body and soul would not heal overnight, but for the first time he felt the pain changing from unquenchable to healing.

"Is it my turn to run away into the night next?" Lorien said, from behind him. Soren turned. Pirah and Lorien had found him — he did not know how to conceal himself in the web, and he had not thought to. Pirah was white-faced and leaning heavily on Lorien, who had the solemnity of the truly fearful.

"I think the moon spoke to me," Soren said, voice coming out quizzical.

"Did she?" Lorien said.

"That's quite a blessing," Pirah said quietly from behind him.

"I want to stay," Soren said. "I don't want to go back, not ever."

"Then the reason for your midnight flight?" Lorien asked, his voice tinged with worry despite its airy tone.

"I think it only opens if you truly want it to," Soren said, turning back to look at the empty night behind him. "I supposed I wanted to know — what I truly wanted."

"What conclusion did you come to?" Pirah said. Soren noticed that Lorien was holding his hand low to block Pirah from advancing, and he did not know why, but then he saw Pirah's hand clenching deep into the flesh of Lorien's upper arm.

"I want to go back to bed," Soren said, and he laughed. The sound of it was ragged and unpractised, rising up amongst the leaves of the trees. He curled his toes in the dew-wet grass and turned to face them fully. "I'm sorry for giving you a fright."

"Next time you wish to go wandering, perchance leave a note," Lorien said.

"I will," Soren said, crossing his arms against the cold.

"Let's go home," Pirah said, and Soren came forward into their embrace, and the warmth of them, as they turned back towards the heart tree.