Chapter Text
It had been like any other fight.
—
"Why do you always have to be so stubborn?"
Verso grit his teeth at the sharp stab of pain in his side, the night breeze prickling goosebumps on his half exposed chest. A smooth, wooden hand held against his stomach while they other worked, a damp rag gently working around the wound.
Monoco sat back on his haunches, his fingers lingering as Verso's chest heaved. The cough racked through him, causing another trickle of blood to ooze out of the deep cut. He rolled his head to one side and covered his face. Something tickled in his throat.
"Do you want some water?" He jerked a nod in response. "Well, luckily your ribs stopped the spear from going any deeper." Monoco sighed. "But that was a reckless move, even for you."
The gestral held the water skin to his lips and lifted his head gently. The long fingers caught in his black hair, damp with sweat. The water was cool, fresh from the spring. He felt Monoco rub his scalp gently, and it sent a wave of calm through his limbs. He felt more tired than he could remember.
The night was still in the Meadows, the soft breeze rustled the long grass and the blossom laden trees. The air was fragrant with flowers, wood smoke from the fire, and the musty lanolin of Monoco's mane.
"You should get some rest." Monoco laid his head back down on the bedroll and brushed the white streak of hair back. Verso's eyes fluttered open and saw the concern in his best friend's posture, the tension held in the tilt of his mask. The blanket was warm as it was tucked in tightly around him. "I'll keep watch."
And in a heartbeat, he was gone. Verso always marvelled at how silently the gestral could move when he needed to. He had always been the better scout of the two. And the best fighter, and the best thinker, and… His thoughts drifted off as sleep crept up on him. As he dreamt, his palm loosened and a single petal caught on the breeze. It tumbled over and over, the firelight catching the gold veins that glittered against the bright velvet red. The eddies of hot air destabilised its path, and it flipped, down, down, into the flames.
His foot caught on a loose rock and he stumbled. The white stone under his palms was smooth and cold. Tears fell on his hands as the pain shook him, burning his lungs. His core contracted, muscles twisting unnaturally, and a raw croak passed his lips as his chest squeezed. It felt like vomiting, but even worse. No matter how many times it happened, how empty he thought he must be, it would strike again before long. And the time between bouts was getting shorter.
His throat undulated, massaging its quarry towards his mouth. Please, stars, please make it stop. He hacked, choking, clawing at his throat. His decollete sported thin red stripes, half healed, from the scratching. He hardly noticed as his fingernails dug into his pale skin. The sensation was drowned out by the convulsing in his lungs and the ache in his heart.
Verso made a strangled sound and spat. A wet mass smeared across the white cobbles. There were too many of the petals to count now. They mocked him, the deep red staring back at him as blankly yet full of meaning as those painted eyes. The gold chroma around the edges fizzed and bubbled, making the delicate veins of the petals seem like they pulsed with their own dark life force.
His affliction had only built since that day when they had fought the Chromatic Veilleur. At first, they had thought it was just the lingering effects of its curse. But it hadn't gone away. He had felt such fear that day as he had never known, not in this life at least. He had been pinned down and Monoco was cornered. The rest was a blur. He just knew that somehow he'd broken the bonds and leapt in front of the Nevron, deflecting its blow. He hadn't cared that it had hit him, hadn't even felt it in the moment, all he could think of was protecting Monoco.
He lifted his head up to the grey pre-dawn sky. "How could I tell him!" He screamed it, tears streaming down his dirty cheeks. "How could…." The stone scraped his knees as he sobbed into his hands, wishing he could hide his face. But there was no-one to see. He and Monoco had parted in anger months before.
The pain of separation stabbed in his heart, black tendrils licking around the edges of his mind as surely as the cursed roots dug deeper into his lungs. I should have told him. Surely he wouldn't push me away. He shook his head, his cheeks flushed and burning. "You fool, Verso. You always reminded him of him. You wear his face, you abandoned him… he abandoned…I…" He trailed off, his mind whirling in confusion. He couldn't tell where the old Verso ended and where he began. And he had caused such pain. And so did I, he thought.
"I made him suffer through all these expeditions, I made him pick up the pieces every time I die! He has only ever been good to me and all I do is repay him in pain."
He sobbed
"He was painted to care for me. None of it is real. None of it really comes from him. It's the memory of a dead man. That's what he cares for, not me."
He slumped forward, crawling on hands and knees. The cough racked through him again, bringing more blood-red and gold clumps with it, the petals clinging to each other with spit and phlegm. The physical pain and the pain in his heart seemed to fuse more with each shuddering metre. His legs wobbled with the effort, his muscles straining for oxygen as the flowers stretched inside his bronchi. He wheezed. He had suffocated before, and drowned. This felt similar, just much slower. At least the water rushed in, leaving little time to think, little space for the pain. He felt a tree root under his palm, rough against his callused hand. He wailed at the touch, how similar the grey wood seemed to his favourite gestral. How he wished it was his hand, his shoulder, that he felt as the end approached.
He had died so many times in his arms.
He scrabbled into the curve of the tree roots, they swooped up to the thick trunk, leaving a nook just large enough for a man to rest. He struggled to move now, his feet and fingers had gone numb. His teeth fizzed and his ears rang, his blood dark in his veins. He twisted in a feeble attempt to press his cheek against the bark. There was a rough join where the lifted root met the trunk. He brushed his hands against the smooth greyness, desperately searching for any comfort to push away the encroaching dark. Deliriously believing the roots could be his companion's arms come to sooth him as he slid into the next life.
He gagged. Panic overwhelmed him when it stuck in his throat. His core spasmed, back arching as he groped at his mouth. His fingernails were stained with gold. He managed to wiggle two fingers far enough, fearing the swell of bile in his belly, and grasped the blockage.
He pulled out a perfect double-flowered rose, its stamens all turned to velvety petals dusted in shifting gold. A short stem had snapped off harshly, and scratched the roof of his mouth. He pricked his finger on a shimmering-tipped thorn, his blood beading the same dark red as the bloom. It's beautiful. He cried, sorrow crushing his chest as the flowers burst open inside him, filling up the space in every alveoli.
He coughed, and no air flowed. Only a faint spattering of golden pollen on his tongue.
He looked up at the tree canopy, the white bark stretching high above him. The branches reached out like a thousand brittle hands reaching towards the horizon. Red leaves waved in the breeze, infinite, painting the tree in blood. He fancied they whispered to him, though he couldn't understand their language.
"It was never me," he mouthed, soundless.
Maybe the leaves will tell him.
The sun came up. And Verso died.
The night breeze lifted the inky petals, skimming them across the path. They swirled around bare wooden feet as Monoco crouched to inspect the dried clump of petals.
He picked up the mass and watched them fall apart, slipping between his many jointed fingers. The gestral looked ahead to the dark canopy in the distance, erupting violently from the mist.
He padded along the trail, following the path of petals and blood.
He found Verso where he had lain, still and cold as the rock under his feet. A perfect sculpture, brutal pale marble streaked with his life's essence the way mica runs through the sculptor's stone.
He ran the last few meters, breathing hard, and sank to his knees in the bole of the tree roots. As he set down his staff the surface of the globe shimmered with chroma, a single bright point glowing on the rough map of the Continent.
Verso still held the bloom in his rigid hand. Monoco plucked it, smoothing over the skin where the thorns had scratched pink welts. He held it up to the moonlight, the veins glittering, his painted eyes hardening at the mocking echo of the petals' colour. He crushed it between his strong fingers, chroma dribbling across his wood and in between his joints.
"Verso…" The human lay curled up, cheek pressed against the wood. He was cold to the touch. Monoco felt a familiar dread coiling in his stomach, the fog pressing in on him. He brushed the white strands of hair away from Verso's face. "It's alright, I have you now. I'm here." He lay down, wriggling his large frame between the man and the unforgiving tree root. It was strange to manoeuvre the stiff form; his oldest friend was always so warm, so quick to fold himself into the gestral's mane. Monoco squeezed his arm under Verso's neck and cradled him as best he could, two sets of knees tucked together. "Okay, you can be the little spoon tonight." His voice cracked as he stroked the shock of black hair, carding through the knots. The night was eerily quiet, the fog dampening the noise of a faraway waterfall like the felt of a piano pedal. The cold of him seeped into his wood, or maybe his heat was absorbed by the other, he couldn't tell. He rubbed the human's chest roughly before pulling him close, the chroma that stained his hand smearing dark on Verso's shirt. Monoco's breath felt laboured, his heart squeezed by regret and grief. He moulded himself as best he could to Verso's form, willing his heartwood bones to bend and break if only it would comfort him in his journey through the veil. If only it would bring him back a moment sooner.
His voice was a pleading whisper. "Verso, please wake up."
Monoco's bark itched and he felt a tickle deep under his mask.
Waking up from death was like walking into a different room.
The first thing he noticed was light, he fluttered open his eyes only to immediately squeeze them shut, the brightness assaulting his senses.
The second thing was something tickling his neck. It was soft and warm and stars he felt cold. He tried to twist, seeking the heat that felt like the only thing tethering him in the cold darkness of oblivion. He failed, only managing to jerk his aching muscles in a clumsy spasm. His lungs burned, he could feel parts of their inside that he should never be able to feel. The lining that had been ripped apart by the tangling roots had knitted back together, cells forming and reforming like paint bubbles. As it healed, the chroma sent searing pain through him. Cauterising, pulling at the raw edges of him.
"Breathe… breathe Verso. It's alright." Monoco's voice cut through the barbe-a-papa in his mind. He gasped, air rushing into his burning bronchi. This life's first breath. His chest wheezed, muscles tightening until he thought he'd suffocate once more. Monoco's arms were folded around him, like rings around a barrel, holding him together. He felt the gestral squeeze him ever so slightly as he tried to lift his head. He slumped back down, this time at least onto smoother wood than the rough roots than had served as his shelter. He tried to speak, but his throat was bone dry. An achey moan was all he could force past his lips. He trembled, pins and needles shooting through his limbs as the nerves slowly came back to life.
He flexed a hand, and Monoco caught it in midair, threading their fingers together. A large thumb rubbed the back of his hand. He didn't usually like holding hands, Monoco's wooden digits were too large for his fine, bony ones. It spread his fingers apart more than was comfortable. Now though, the discomfort felt more calming than the strange agonies working through his body, and he clung on.
"Good morning, sleepy head." The joke made him want to laugh, he managed a squeak. The gestral hummed against his back. "It's time we left this place. I'll carry you, agreed?" Verso shook his head weakly. He felt detached from his body in every way except the pain, and could only tell which way was up because of the hard ground under him.
Monoco loosed his fingers, and Verso's back went cold. He heard the gestral's joints creak as he shifted, arm still crooked underneath his neck. The other strong arm hooked under his knees, scooping him upwards into the sky. He flailed for a moment, disoriented by the motion until Monoco pulled him face first into the fluff of his mane.
"You'd better not be sick in my fur. Took me all day to wash it out last time." There was no real threat behind the jibe, only affection.
Verso worked his fingers into the grey hair that smelt of parchment and dust. "M'noco…" His eyes drooped, his limbs heavy.
"Save your strength, mon vieux."
Monoco coughed.
There was something soft and smooth against his cheek. Fabric. Verso drifted on the edge of sleep, swayed by the gentle tones of hushed voices and a warm breeze ruffling his hair.
"What's wrong with Verver? He seems very sick."
"He is. I'm not quite sure, there were… I think he had something inside him. Flowers. I've never seen anything like it."
Verso couldn't really move, his limbs felt weighed down, heavy as a waterlogged blanket. His head felt fuzzy, thick fog slowing his thoughts under a pulsing pain at the base of his skull. He lay face down on Esquié's squishy back. He let himself sink into the comforting presence, eyelids heavy as exhaustion raced in to claim him once more. Monoco's hand was on his back, rubbing with the gentlest of pressure from one shoulder blade to the other. Verso was transported back to his childhood, to Maman's warm embrace and the smell of honeysuckle. Her hands had been that much smaller, but then so had he.
"Esquié, you're almost as old as me. Have you ever heard of such an affliction?"
"No, I don't think I have. I'm sorry."
They flew in pensive silence for a moment. Verso could heard the soft, hollow sound of wood scratching against wood. "Don't worry, mon ami. I'll find out, somehow."
"That's good Momo, he needs you."
Monoco huffed a sharp laugh, tinged with some emotion Verso couldn't place. "He doesn't. He never did. But I'll try anyway."
"Oh, Momo! Don't be sad!"
"I'm not…" His words were clipped. "Just fly, Esquié. I'm not in the mood."
So easily riled, he thought before sleep claimed him. He didn't notice Monoco scratching the edge of his mask as he watched him sleep.