Private Tales She Who Dares, Wins

It was amazing how Favashi's home wound itself around and through itself. Vaer was once again in awe of the oddity that his friend called home and was grateful for her escort. Even with the image of his suite in the forefront of his thoughts and its owner at his side, the house offered a wild offering of temptations. Ornate doors, open archways, and yawning intersecting halls all beckoned him to explore – and get lost.

As he had proved earlier, when totally sober it would have been challenging but not impossible. Slightly inebriated from leisurely drinking in the good company of duanann whose biological tolerance for spirits far exceeded his own? He might have reached his bed by midday.

Walking beside her, Vaer cut Favashing a sidelong glance. He had been smiling to himself for the past few hours without ceasing but his lips found more room to curl at her question.

"I think I should not have invited them to meet my mother and sister," he replied, watching her. He waited a beat before adding, "They may get along too well, and my mother will get lofty ideas when Pandora and Persefoni start batting their lashes at me."

He rumbled with amusement, the sound coming easier with his edges blunted on spirits.

"They are lovely, Favashi. I hope that I do not bore them too quickly; I rather enjoyed their company. Though I should like to see them when they mean to be frightening. The Long Night will be very fun this year with them on the hunt."

“No brothers, unfortunately, and in keeping with my brotherly duties, I must declare my sister strictly off limits,” he laughed. “I do, however, have cousins in droves. A few are black shucks, but most are cwn annwn.

“The two species are particularly close, sharing similar cultures and traditions. We all love running and barking at livestock,” he mused aloud. If Favashi was overly familiar with cwn and shucks, he doubted she’d spurn the chance to hear it again from someone native to that culture. He absently laid his hand over hers as they continued walking at a leisurely pace. “The only true difference (besides the obvious) is that cwn live in their multi-generational septs while shucks prefer their family dens limited to individual families. We are all the same, however, in the eyes of our mothers and matriarchs, always looking to shack us up under someone else’s roof by any means possible. Only two of my cousins are considered Matriarchs of their septs, and they’re constantly gifting one another kids and cousins back and forth and complaining about too many ‘pups’ underfoot. One word to either of them or any of my shuck aunts, and you’ll have so many options for Persefone she’ll be scheduled out with dates for months.”

Vaer smiled broadly, amused at some memory.

“Have you been inside a sept before?” he asked.

She winced. Vaer only noticed because he had already been watching her, eager to converse with her about quite literally anything. He should have been more scandalized by how readily he tried to share his life with her, but he was pleasantly buzzed and ignoring that. Instead, he watched her.

And she had winced.

Vaer didn't have to work too hard to understand her meaning. He winced, too. He wasn't certain if apologizing would make her feel better or if it might instead make her feel worse. It wasn't like her to show remorse over who and what she was. This was totally unfamiliar territory and it unsettled him. As always, however, he rebounded with grace

"Thankfully my family has good taste. Most of them." Vaer gave the hand on his arm a gentle squeeze and he leaned in to lower his voice as if they might be overheard.

"If it would give you peace of mind I will speak to my mother, and, as I promised, you will have the chance to meet her and Hallori prior to the Long Night festivities." His eyes were warm and sparkling like her dawnish wine. "My family is not easily frightened or offended, Favashi. They will adore you and your sisters."

In one conversation, Vaer had somehow managed to conjure both a wince and hesitation out of Favashi. His level gaze watched her, nearly looking away out of some strange mixture of regret and sorrow before she answered.

Perhaps he was pushing too hard, or maybe he was opening up too quickly. Favashi was his friend and one that he wanted to keep in his life for as long as possible. Their friendship had worked just fine the way it was, only recently stumbling in moments like these. What was he doing wrong?

What was he doing right?

Not that. Anything but that. Keep them at arm’s length; that was the rule. Favashi shouldn’t have been an exception. He didn’t want another Samara situation on his hands. Once bitten, twice shy.

Vaer smiled and nodded, happy that she agreed – happy that she was happy. There was a bittersweet twinge in his chest.

As they reached the door, Vaer turned to meet her and she did the same. He should have expected this and yet he looked down at her with brows arching in surprise and question as Favashi stepped close.

The energy between them was palpable. The soft pull of the boa across his neck and shoulders awakened every sense in his body and he was all too aware of her proximity. Again. He shouldn’t tease her like this. He shouldn’t have put himself in this exact spot over and over again. If he didn’t want it, didn’t want her and everything those dusty gold eyes promised, it might have been easier.

But he did. That was the problem.

“I have never feared what you are, Favashi,” he replied softly, his voice a rumbling timbre as he blurted out the first words he could form. They were recklessly sincere. She was as terrible and beautiful as a force of nature. She shook and awed him the same as wildfires and floods. There was nothing she had ever done or could ever do that would not change how he saw her, how he respected her.

Vaer swayed closer against his better judgment. His knuckles brushed along the bare, velvet tract of her upper arm. His palm splayed over the curve of her shoulder and continued its slow creep upward until he was cupping her face, his long fingers lacing through her hair at the nape of her neck. His thumb traced the line of her jaw while his resolve waged war upon itself.

Her breath was sweet and he wondered if her lips would taste like the wine they’d shared at dinner.

With that, Vaer’s resolve wavered. Not long, but long enough. He closed the scarce distance between them slowly like she might shy away – like he might. His lips pressed against hers, as warm and soft as he’d not dared himself to imagine.

It was a disappointingly chaste kiss, and yet that simple act left him burning alive. His skin was flushed as he withdrew and it took several full seconds for him to open his eyes. His dark purple tongue slid along his lower lip.

She did taste like the wine.

He finally managed to hobble his senses together into something that felt like Vaer… but Vaer was born to run. The same twinge as before ached behind his ribs, and this time he didn’t do so well keeping it from his features. His hand slipped away and a crease formed between his brows when he smiled.

“Six days left. I look forward to the fresh torment tomorrow,” he laughed. So far the worst torment he’d experienced was taking a measured step away from Favashi toward his door.

Sleep was difficult to grasp that night. Vaer had taken a very cold sobering shower, during which he had thoroughly chastised himself, and his mind had continued to turn long after he had laid down to rest. The moment he closed his eyes he could picture Favashi as she had been at his door, her gaze burning with anticipation and a certain feral glint that he refused to give a name to. Naming it meant admitting that he understood it.

The shuck rose the next morning in a rare mood. He dug through his wardrobe thrice and still nothing felt right. His hair wouldn't lay right. He had three missives waiting for him between, none of them bad news but not necessarily positive either. He had a mild headache.

Worst of all, he felt anxious. His heart thundered at the thought of stepping out of his suite. He wasn't nervous about what Favashi had planned, but to see the woman herself.

Vaer finally settled the nerves, picked something to wear, and use a bit of magick to fix his hair. He drew a deep breath at the door before straightening and stepping out. He'd dressed mostly in his usual blacks, but he had pulled an emerald green tunic from his room's wardrobe. It was far too ostentatious. He kind of liked it.

With nothing else to delay himself with, he pictured Favashi in his mind and began walking.

The house had taken him on several odd journeys, but this morning's walk piqued his curiosity. With an intent it had taken him on a meandering path. When he was fixated on Favashi?

The first room hadn't been all that strange, and certainly Not thought-provoking. Of course Favashi kept a well-stocked armory. He wasn't surprised. Vaer allowed his mind to wander, to imagine how many years she had had to collect so much. He dared not linger too long; he kept Favashi in his mind and walked straight through to the other door.

The next room was where the questions started. A bedroom. Vaer halted.

He had assumed the property conjured doors and halls at random. If not at random, then perhaps it was guiding him where he wanted to go? Vaer was not about to admit any such thing about himself, but it was clear the damn house knew.

His frustration hitched abruptly, however, and heat flashed through his chest. Surely it hadn't brought him to Favashi's room? Vaer hurriedly looked around and was grateful that she was not there. He gently closed the door behind him, made a sign across himself in prayer, and opened the door again. It led somewhere new and he quickly exited.

The next was bright and open. He took a long moment to linger there, grateful that, once again, his hostess was not here. Vaer passed through the room, looking curiously at the easel. Did Favashi paint? He paused to stand beside it and look out the windows. There, another question pricked at him. Were the rooms random, picking up on his thoughts… or were they about Favashi?

He thought of the precious everything he knew about her – what she loved, who she was. Favashi probably spent a great deal of time in the armory. She had not been shy about her open attempts to woo him into her bed. Or were these places she had recently visited?

There was only one way to find out. Vaer took one final look and moved on to the other door.

Favashi was on the terrace. It was green and buzzing with life and he immediately felt at ease. In the brief moment before she turned to him, she looked content, comfortable. Favashi rarely looked otherwise, but here she looked right. She was suited to these bright places, as golden as the morning light that filtered through the foliage. They could not have been more opposite.

"Good morning," he answered with a smile. He didn't have to force it; it came so easily. He'd expected to feel anxious and awkward, but instead he felt relaxed, glad to see her usual fiery gaze. He must not have fucked up too bad.

"Yes, please." Vaer nodded to the dryad and took his seat. He looked out over the gardens and his smile reappeared anew.

"Your gardens!" he breathed. "They’re beautiful." Even if he could lie, he didn't need to. Wild and chaotic, they were exactly the kind of garden he had expected her to have.

"Over years of courtiership, I have seen many gardens. I have also learned that you can determine a lot about an individual based on those gardens – or lack thereof." He plopped a second cube of sugar into his tea and turned to Favashi with a conspiratorial grin. "After we last saw each other, I was invited to Lord Pauuish's home on business. He bought Elmsdowns from Lord Gisela last year, and he demolished the garden. It's just an empty grass lawn now. Utterly horrifying. I knew he was a terrible person."

He added a third sugar cube and finally set down the tongs and began stirring his tea.

“No, thank you,” he chuckled, stirring his sugar with tea and then sipping it to make sure it was to his liking. Vaer sat back for a moment, contemplated, then added a drizzle of honey. He suffered bitter wines all the time. He’d be a corpse before he ever drank a cup of tea that wasn’t sickeningly sweet, and therefore pleasant.

Vaer waited for her to select her pastries before selecting a purple one. He could have argued for the sake of being contrary, but he agreed.

“I like my routines, but the world is made of chaos. Life feeds on it, from queens to worms.”

He sat back in the chair with his tea to look out at the gardens. It surprised him once again that they had known each other for so long yet knew so little. He resolved to rectify that. Not all at once, of course. She’d be suspicious and Vaer ventured to assume that she was dangerous when suspicious. He liked her like this, relaxed, grinning like a cat basking in the sun – his polar opposite.

“Do you choose the plants yourself?” he asked, turning back to Favashi.

He listened studiously to what she said while his eyes scanned the garden. There was such a variety. He recalled the globe she had shown him yesterday, all the books in the library. Once more he felt a twinge of yearning. All the time, all the things she had learned and the places she had seen. The garden was another narrow glimpse of her part of eternity. His fascination was renewed, he searched the garden for things that were especially peculiar.

"Oh?" Vaer gave Favashi an assessing look. There was no use hiding his suspicion. He had lost a bet to be here and She had promised torment. So far the worst torment he'd experienced was the frigid shower he'd taken the night before.

"And that is to be our quarry?" He managed to keep a straight face, his features slack in his best look of courtier disinterest.

For once he wasn't that surprised. This was more in the vein of what he had expected to do on this trip. He doubted Favashi had much interest in hunting game, given what he knew about her. An animal, as she said, posed little challenge to one of her ilk, to one of his. It didn't think, didn't strategize. There was no thrill in conquering what couldn't understand its defeat.

"I will," he replied simply. He held her gaze for a moment longer before sipping his tea.

"How exactly does one pray to Favashi, in particular?" His crooked, boyish grin curled past the edge of his cup and he flashed her a playful glance that danced like gold coins. "Waiting on the post is most inconvenient."

"Very creative. I'll improvise, then."

Vaer took a bite of a pastry to briefly give his face a task while she looked at him like that. It helped. Sort of. No, it didn't.

"Most do – when they have the time. Though it is never to me. The breath would be wasted on my name, even if it did have power. No, they beg, mostly. Some don't do either, going out of this world as violently as they lived in it. Those are my favorites. It makes it easy. The begging makes me feel… dirty, I guess, is the best way to describe it. The praying is just embarrassing."

Vaer spoke matter-of-factly, only frowning at the end. He had been a Hound for some time. One did not simply earn a title from Midir without seeing a great deal of death, and every one of them went differently.

"Early on in my career, I Hunted a particularly nasty elf. I remember thinking he was so vile that this must be what evil incarnate looked like. He was fascinating, to be completely frank. My first serial killer. A butcher and necrophiliac, but so very methodical about his work. It was odd, finding things that I respected and appreciated about him. When I finally caught up to him, finally got to mete out his death, I remember being so angry at him – for the things he had done and the lives he had wasted, but also for making me feel like him, like we were somehow the same."

His laughter broke, then. It was an odd moment for laughter, so he pressed on, chuckling over his words.

"The moment he saw me he pissed himself and started crying like a child. This man, who I had thought so unfeeling, so evil, sobbed and begged me for his life. In the coming years, I'd really learn to discern the sincere from the false, and his was genuine. It was so embarrassing that I didn't even want to kill him. I ended it swiftly, reluctant to hear more of his pathetic drivel. I couldn't believe I'd ever thought him menacing. It certainly changed the lofty delusions I had of my work as a Hound. Piss on my paws really sobered me."

He shook his head in amusement.

"What about you? Surely they must. The kind of people who charge into war are so different from those skulking in the shadows. I bet you get those wide, adoring eyes in the final moments – the gratefulness, like it's an honor."

Favashi offering sober counterarguments? She had been utterly rapt by his story, but he had a difficult time reading her now. Vaer gave her a measuring look, ultimately deciding she was being as forthright as he had been. What a subject to be frank on, at that. Vaer had chased down quarry that had left a bitter taste in his mouth on Hunts, people whose only guilt had been being in the wrong place at the worst time. He didn't reflect on that much now that he was Titled and had the liberty to choose his targets, but he knew exactly what she spoke of.

He scoffed at her final remark, lifting his tea.

"Cowards," was his only remark. Vaer lived with the assurance that, should either his King or Queen call him to serve, they would stand beside him. He couldn't say the same for all fae, and many throughout history had run afield at the coercion of their superiors.

"Where will we be hunting today?" he asked, not quite changing the subject but steering it back toward its original destination. "And what form am I permitted to take when we get there?"

The look Vaer took on as he surveyed his host over his tea was almost as predatory as hers, calculating in a different way. This was her prize week, he resolved; he'd treat her to whatever she wanted.

Almost anything.

"I'll be a good boy and not frighten the mortals. Unless you'd like me to."

A good gamble. Her amusement pleased him as it was far preferable to any more smouldering. Satisfied he had deflected last night's errors, he took up another pastry. This one was a little tart with an odd undertone he couldn’t quite place. He frowned momentarily and set down the remainder of the pastry to remind himself to ask her what it was.

Vaer held his remarks about being gods among mortals. That was absolutely true for Favashi, but not quite for Vaer. It was true that he would wreak havoc unimaginable among their ranks. Black shucks were feared and revered spirits the world over and this escapade would cement their presence in the Steppes. He was also far more vulnerable than she was. The presence of an ounce of silver on the field would be as offensive to him as iron and burn just as hot.

Ah, but what a pair they would make. He reflected as she did, letting his mind reach to imagine them both on the battlefield. It gave him chills, imagining Favashi where normally Midir might stand.

A little treasonous, too.

“What weapon do you prefer? It would be gauche for me to wield the same.”

When in the company of his superiors (few as they were) Vaer always chose a weapon that would complement theirs. Nothing was going to take away from Favashi’s glory on the field, but mortal minds often made errors, and he didn’t want today’s legend to be skewed by something as horrible as inconsistent story details.