rhy maresh (goldenhelm) wrote in thedisplaced, @ 2018-06-14 18:53:00 |
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Entry tags: | !log/thread, alucard emery, rhy maresh |
WHO: Rhy Maresh & Alucard Emery
WHAT: Alucard finds Rhy practicing magic. Also they talk about Alucard's sister's death.
WHEN: near the end of May (waaaay backdated, we totally forgot to post this)
WHERE: Maresh palace
WARNINGS: Mentions of canon deaths, also Rhy has a lot of emotional baggage about magic
When Kell and Rhy’s magic had been swapped, Kell had been able to make some use Rhy’s magic. Not a lot, nothing like what he (or even Rhy) could do with his Antari blood, but much more than Rhy had ever been able to manage in all the years he’d tried.
Which meant that it was not impossible for Rhy to do magic with his own meager abilities. It was just that he hadn’t figured out how to use it yet. And now that he knew what it felt like for the elements to respond to him easily, maybe -- just maybe -- he could find some small amount of that skill in himself.
So he had taken to practicing by himself whenever he could find a moment that both Alucard and Kell were too busy to find him doing it. It had not helped him to have a teacher, and had possibly even made it worse, increasing Rhy’s insecurities every time he failed in front of an audience.
One evening, he was alone in the palace for the moment, so he chose one of the sitting rooms and drew a binding circle on a table, before placing the box of elements in the center of it. He sat down at the table and leaned in, his eyes on the little glass ball of water. He spent a long time just looking at it, breathing in and out, remembering the way it had felt to curl his fingers and feel the entire river stop moving. He tried to reach for that feeling, that connection, inside himself -- because it was inside him somewhere, it had to be -- and tried not to strain for it, not to try to hold onto it too tightly, because that never helped, only made him frustrated.
Then he held out a hand, and made a slight gesture with his fingertips at the water, as if pushing at it. The tiniest of ripples appeared on the surface of it. Rhy inhaled sharply, and the water faintly rippled again.
And then the door opened unexpectedly, and he looked up, guiltily. But it was Alucard, not Kell. Rhy let out the breath he was holding, a little relieved, because his lover made him feel at least a little bit less insecure than his brother when it came to magic. He didn’t entirely know what to expect from Alucard finding him like this, though.
He opened his mouth to say something, to explain, but it seemed silly and unnecessary; it was obvious what he was doing, and he wasn’t doing anything wrong, so why did he feel the need to justify it?
After a pause, he said simply, “Hello.” He reached out and closed the box, and then started to erase the binding circle. Alucard was here, which meant that magic practice was done.
--
Alucard chose, despite all instincts, not to pause in the doorway at the look Rhy gave him. Instead, he continued to make his way in, a book under his arm, a bottle of wine in one hand, two wine glasses in the other, and Esa trailing at his ankles. His steps led him to the table, where he pulled out a second chair - with his ankle, not magic - and sat. Before any items could be set down, Esa leapt into his lap, circled once, and settled into her position for the time being. Only then was he free to set down the wine, then each glass, and lastly the book.
“It may not help,” Alucard commented, “but you can drink wine and practice magic at the same time.” He smiled, light but earnest. Hopefully it would set Rhy at ease. But given the furtive nature around what he was doing and ending it, Alucard did not expect too much. He set about opening the wine, though, and pouring it.
--
“I doubt that would help at all,” Rhy said, a little dryly, but he was amused. “It seems more likely to end badly. I’ll stick to one at a time.”
He finished erasing the binding circle and moved the element box out of the way so that there was plenty of room for the wine. He wasn’t going to be doing magic, so he accepted a wine glass, and took a sip, barely resisting the urge to chug it back.
But the taste of it did steady him, and so he settled a little more comfortably into his seat, the fingers of one hand still curled around the glass. “I’ll have the wine now, and practice again some other time.”
--
“With Bard, I doubt it mattered,” Alucard commented with a small shake of his head. Rhy had only met his thief for a brief amount of time, a few days, while Osaron had raged over the city. But he had seen her in the Essen Tasch likely and out and about. Her situation had been different; her magic was so tangled and Bard so impatient it was nearly unbelievable what she came to do with it in a few short months. But antari were antari, and Bard pushed herself beyond her limits time and time again.
But he drank some of the wine as well, without pushing Rhy to practice again then. He had come, with the intention of sharing a remarkable vintage of wine that someone else had held and aged for longer than either of them had lived. It was just the right time to drink it.
Alucard looked across at Rhy, curious most of all because it had been done in secret. Still, it was not so hard to guess some of the broader strokes. The antari magic lessons had not been the most enjoyable for anyone. But for Alucard, Kell’s presence had more to do with that than Rhy’s inexperience with such powerful magic. “It is the only bottle of its kind, in all the world,” Alucard agreed. “Worth savoring.” And granting attention to.
--
“Yes, well,” Rhy said, “She’s an Antari. The elements are unbelievably easy for them to work with.” Which had been terrifying, when he’d suddenly been granted that power. But having to work so hard for the tiniest ripple of water was frustrating, too. “Mine is uncooperative. But that’s more me than the magic, apparently.”
Maybe he should try practicing after having some wine. He was scared of the prospect, afraid of starting another blaze, but he just wanted it to feel a tiny bit easier. Just a little bit more progress would be heartening, make it easier to continue. He stared down into his glass. “I wasn’t really trying to keep it a secret. I just wanted to practice on my own.”
And the way he felt just because he’d been caught at it only served to highlight why that was necessary. The feeling was distracting him even from properly appreciating the wine. He couldn’t pay the right kind of attention, be in the right mindset, for working magic when there was someone else in the room watching him.
--
Alucard chuckled. “She may be an antari, but she was the strangest damn antari I had ever seen,” he motioned in a way that made sense to him but paused. No one else could see magic as he could, so it likely made little sense to Rhy. “Her magic was all tangled up, wasn’t working right, when we started,” Alucard explained. Perhaps Lila wouldn’t have liked someone else hearing that, but he hadn’t told her either. And now, here, anyone could read it in their books. It had felt something like teaching Rhy with Kell’s powers sometime after that.
Having been coming back from working, from studying the magic of the portal, a somewhat regularly scheduled affair now, Alucard would have been counted as being out of the palace. He hadn’t seen Kell, nor did the traces of antari magic suggest he had been in the palace for a little time. No one else, save Esa, lived there. So Rhy had been good and well alone. Alucard truly wished Rhy had shared it with him, of his own choice, even if he refused to let Alucard watch. That stung, slightly, though he understood it and did not nurse the feeling.
“I practiced alone all the time growing up,” Alucard shared. “More time than I ever did in class. It’s the majority of how I practice even now.” He could perform on cue, on command, as need be. Alucard was good enough not to need to warm up, if something happened. But honing his craft, attempting something new, that he did usually alone. Mirror magic made sense, but Alucard was no master at it yet.
--
“That’s still an issue with her magic, though,” Rhy said, quietly. It was interesting to know that even an Antari could have trouble with their magic, but it didn’t really solve his problem. And this was the heart of it -- it was not really an issue with his magic. The magic was there. Rhy was lacking in something, and it was even harder to deal with that when someone else could see it, too. It shouldn’t have mattered, probably, but it did.
He was really struggling with the urge not to waste the wine by downing the whole glass at once. He lifted it to his lips and took another delicate sip, trying to focus on the flavor, let it ground him again the way it had the first time. It worked a little bit, but to a lesser extent than it had before.
--
“And she created more issues than it did,” Alucard countered. “If she could move water, she wanted to control the ocean. If she could use one element at a time, she wanted to use them all.” He shrugged. “She always expected to be able to do more than she could and pushed herself farther than was safe, time and again.” No matter what Alucard said. That was Bard. Wild and uncontrolled. Holland had done much to temper that with the rings.
He leaned forward, able to see Rhy was still uncomfortable. “Many people have expected you to work wonders with an element or not at all,” Alucard said softer. “You can simply be you, whatever that means with magic. I can see your aura. You have magic. It won’t come like languages do for you, you’re practically the antari of that field, but it’s possible, if you want it to be and you work at it.”
--
Rhy listened, but he really wasn’t sure what lesson he was meant to be taking from this. Was Alucard warning him about the dangers of pushing himself too far? He really didn’t think that was going to be much of an issue. He would be doing well just to push himself enough.
He felt, and heard, Alucard leaning in, and looked up to meet his lover’s eyes. It wasn’t hard to hold the eye contact, but his jaw remained tense with emotion. “It is,” he said quietly, “One of the things I want most in the world, second only to doing well by the people I love and my kingdom. But…”
He paused, and took a deep breath before continuing. “Many of the reasons I want -- wanted -- it are because I wanted to prove myself, but I’m trying to move on from that. To do it for myself. But if someone else is watching, I…” he trailed off, shrugging helplessly. “I’m not doing it for me anymore, it’s for showing them, and then I start feeling like a failure before I’ve even started.”
--
Alucard listened. Everyone had their own relationship with magic, no matter how many people worked with flame, everyone had to do it themselves, understand it for themselves, and do what they did with it. Alucard’s relationship with magic would not be Rhy’s, couldn’t be. They had been shaped over the years in different ways. Alucard had taught magic all of once, something negotiated for him to deliver on. It had not been something he had much experience with, privateering generally interfering with taking on any pupils. And Rhy was his lover, and Alucard cared more about that than whatever Rhy could or could not do with magic. There was no ability Rhy had to reach for him. But even if Rhy knew that, Alucard was sure he did, that didn’t make everything easier for Rhy.
“I often feel the same way,” Alucard admitted, “about magic being a show, as soon as anyone is around. The Essen Tasch was the show of shows.” It also tested his abilities in ways that he hadn’t frequently faced. And he liked it, both elements. “It was a show for other people but also a proving ground for myself. Once the show elements were stripped away, it was a contest where I was not certain to win.
“I had greater power, yes, than… almost any competitor there, certainly any competitor I faced,” Alucard could not help that that was the truth. Nor would pretending he had less ability than he did do any good. It would have only been a lie and a poor one at that. “But I did not want to win with brute force, by the virtue of having greater power and relying on that.” That… had often been his issue with Bard. She depended on her strength too much. “I desired to win as myself, as Alucard Emery, using magic the way I wish to, with fine control and finesse, with strategy and outwitting my opponents,” he took a large breath, “To win any other way would have been a failure, would have made me feel like I was Berras. And I would rather have lost than won like that.” The Games. He had used magic as brute force to survive Berras, when it was the only way. He still preferred to live, and he had wanted to save Anisa.
“It took me a long time, to be able to perform magic in front of people and to have it also be mine, for me,” Alucard reiterated his point. “And it’s harder that way. I will not ask that you practice before me or offer any teaching, not unless and until you feel comfortable enough to do so. Know that I believe in you, in your abilities and I always have. I want you to succeed because you want it, but I will always love you the same, no matter what.” It was not easy to start on something, to do something new. They could both practice magic on their own. And Alucard would always support Rhy.
--
If it had been literally anyone else, or if he had known Alucard any less, Rhy would have laughed at the words I often feel the same way. He would not have believed that someone who had so much control over magic, who was a literal champion of a competition involving magic, could know how he felt.
But it was Alucard, and Rhy did know him, and so he didn’t laugh, didn’t say anything, only listened. Even as Alucard reached the end of the story, he wasn’t really sure that their emotional states were truly comparable, but it was enough to know that Alucard could empathize with him. And that Alucard believed in him, which Rhy had already known, but it was always nice to hear it again. It made his eyes sting, and a lump formed in his throat.
“If you have advice that you think will help me, then by all means, share it,” he said quietly. Alucard had already taught him about control over the immensity of Kell’s power, but Rhy’s own magic was a very different beast. He had been hopeful that it would help, and it had, a little, but it still felt like pulling teeth. And it hurt his pride to even allow the possibility of taking advice, but at the same time the old insecurity, the old desperation - the feeling that had gotten him killed - had hold of him again, and he wanted to grasp at anything that could give him control of his magic.
He drew in an unsteady breath, trying to calm the emotional turmoil inside of him. There was absolutely no way he was going to be able to focus on magic like this, but he could remember whatever Alucard wanted to say for later. “But I will still work on it on my own.”
--
Alucard took another sip of wine. It was silky and exquisite, flavors that came immediately and others that came out over time. It was a wondrous distraction while he waited to see if he had made an ass of himself. It was not the only way he struggled with magic, not even perhaps the way that most closely reflected Rhy’s struggles. But it had been - and still was, even to this day - a central struggle for him. A defining issue. Something that often came in the way of his controlling something at all, when he did something new. Controlling it with power, wildly, was something he shied away from, even when that was often the first step.
He nodded and thought of what he knew, of the students he had shared classes with as a small boy, of the magicians he knew when he was older. Of everyone. “There are hundreds of metaphors, thousands of means, to connect with an element,” Alucard replied, “for any one of us, most of them will feel ridiculous, fall flat, and fail us. What matters is finding the way you connect to the element, whether its words or an image or how you consider it… When you find that connection, embrace it and use it. The element often comes easier when you utilize that.”
Alucard could no more predict what would make that connection for Rhy than he could Bard. But he did not have to run through the usual metaphors with Rhy. That was for Rhy to do, on his own. “It may feel silly,” Alucard admitted, “but I find metal nearly impossible without it. And even then, I only manage a mere iota of what your father could.” It was not his element. Alucard had three, more than most people. But it still left him struggling to some extent with the remaining two.
--
“Oh, saints,” Rhy breathed out, “Let’s not talk about my father.”
That was the exact opposite direction that he wanted this conversation to go in. And none of the rest of that was anything new. Rhy had heard all of it, read all of it, so many damn times. He knew there were multiple ways to connect to magic, multiple ways of thinking about it, and he had literally tried all of them. Words had worked, somewhat, for fire. Moving his fingers was starting to work a little bit, with water, probably only because he could still feel the movement of water in his hands from when he’d wielded it with Kell’s magic. He was trying, trying so damn hard to find the method that worked for him, and the only thing that had made it easier so far was working on his own.
This conversation was only serving to reinforce that. The farther it went, the more it hurt, and it was taking every ounce of his self-control not to show it.
He got to his feet, and picked up the element box. It was incredibly tempting to throw it across the room, but he didn’t. Instead, he just looked down at it in his hands. “Let’s just - not. This is something you can’t help me with.”
--
Alucard nodded. Fathers were a sensitive topic for them. And on magic, on magic it was probably even worse for Rhy than for Alucard. The exclamation was enough of a warning. The wrong reference to make. There were thousands of metalworkers. And the memory of a Veskan fleet and Alucard sharpening fragments of metal, piece by piece, while he held up the fog. But that pain, his pain, Alucard was used to. It was uncomfortable, but it did not matter compared to what he had done to Rhy.
He stood, slowly and crossed the distance to Rhy, one hand of his resting atop Rhy’s. A physical connection and hopefully a reminder of something else, of something that did not hurt him. Alucard hated that he had caused Rhy pain. But he hadn’t known how to learn magic without facing his own. It had started a wonder but quickly become a defense. Then it had helped him separate himself from his brother, from the parts of his family he didn’t want to be. And the whole time, all that pain had been with him. As a child, Alucard had rarely learned magic without a bruise or worse on his person.
Perhaps he shouldn’t have opened his mouth. As he had said, everyone connected in their own way. And Rhy would find his, and it wouldn’t be Alucard’s. “Not without a hundred false starts, each of them painful,” Alucard agreed. His other hand brushed Rhy’s cheek. “But you can do it without me. And that’s what it’s about - you, not me.” It had been easier with someone who threatened to kill him, than with the man he loved. Alucard had rubbed Bard the wrong way plenty of times too, and he had apologized as best he could. But he didn’t want to hurt Rhy.
It simply did not need to be a secret. Alucard would not judge, no matter how long it took.
--
“Please stop talking,” Rhy managed, voice strained and unsteady. He closed his eyes. “Please.”
It was not Alucard’s fault. It was only that Rhy had come to associate these words, this kind of advice, no matter how well-meaning, with the feeling of failure, of falling short, disappointing the person who was trying to teach him. The feeling of being pitied, a prince who for all his wealth and privilege could not manage to understand the most basic things about connecting to the elements, things that he should have been able to manage and still failed to learn at the age of twenty. Magic lessons had battered his pride and his self-esteem until he’d thought so little of himself that he’d risked trying Holland’s gift, knowing that it was risky and dangerous, feeling as though it was worth the risk because he mattered so little without it. He could feel all the confidence he had regained since then starting to slip through his fingers.
A tear slid down his cheek from behind his closed lids, and then another. “This is why,” he said thickly, “This is why I didn’t tell you.”
He pressed the box into Alucard’s hands, because he was desperate to be rid of it. No, that wasn’t quite it -- he was desperate to work with it, to get even just one more ripple out of the water, to make the earth shift and the flames blaze. But even if somehow the pain and desperation would help him with it, he would have no control over it. He would destroy something, hurt himself or someone else, and then he would only feel worse. He already felt awful enough that Kell was sure to feel it, and if Kell came to find him like this, the very last shreds of his pride would disappear. He clenched his trembling hands, dragged in a shaky breath, let it out, and dragged in another.
“It’s not your fault,” he added, after swallowing down the lump in his throat. “There are no right words, even the good ones have already been ruined by someone else. I shouldn’t have asked for your advice. Just -- just put that away,” he gestured at the box, “And let’s talk about something else. I want to enjoy the wine you brought me.”
--
For a while, Alucard simply stood still. His wine sat at the table, and a salty tear ran along the edge of his hand, where he still brushed Rhy’s cheek. Alucard should have known better; he knew Rhy well. And anything someone kept hidden, even when it did not need to be, was worth treading lightly. Lighter than he had. It pained him to see his presence, his words, hurting Rhy. He wasn’t sure what would build Rhy’s confidence in himself. But Alucard could only maintain his belief in Rhy. Everything took time, especially what did not come naturally. No amount of failures, no kind of setback, could diminish Alucard’s faith in Rhy. He could see it, and he knew it was possible. Difficulties came in all the baggage, everything the past weighed down on it. Not from Rhy.
He glanced down at the elemental set, something Alucard had practiced on when he was younger, something his sister still liked - had still liked to practice with. He frowned. Alucard hadn’t forgotten her death, and yet… he still had these moments when it slipped his mind. He had been gone for so many months at a time that it had not stretched beyond them.
Gently he moved to place the set off to the side, finding a spot on a shelf where it just fit. Easily found, easily used. For another day. Alucard returned to the table, thoughts of Anisa a bur stuck under his skin. After swirling his wine a few moments, uneasy whether the topic would truly let them enjoy it, Alucard looked over at Rhy. “For a moment, I forgot Anisa was dead,” he shared, “I am trying to move on, I was. But Kell and Holland… they are both here from before she died.” Alucard declined to add the comment that he was fairly certain Holland was dead at the time Alucard came from. “Why shouldn’t she get another chance?” That was the knife that slid between his ribs whenever he thought about it, whenever he thought about Holland alive and well here or Kell not having paid the price to defeat Osaron.
--
Rhy stayed where he was for a moment, just breathing, looking at Alucard, his eyes moving over his lover’s features in an attempt to soothe himself, ground himself in the moment. He wanted to press himself into Alucard’s arms, but his pride could not allow it just yet. He also wanted to go and find somewhere in the palace to curl up by himself and cry. He wasn’t going to let himself do that, either.
A moment after Alucard moved back to the table, Rhy moved back to his chair too, and sat down. He curled his fingers around the glass of wine but did not yet drink it. He wanted very badly to find something to say that could restore the lightness to Alucard’s mood, if not his own. But before he could come up with anything, Alucard broke the silence.
“I forget that my parents are dead, too,” Rhy said quietly. He knew how that felt, that awful jolt of remembering, after slipping and thinking of a lost loved one as being alive. He reached across the table, holding his hand out, palm up, to be held if Alucard wanted it. “It would be wonderful if she was able to come here. I am very sorry I never got to know her.”
--
He continued breathing and tried not to be bitter. Sometimes it was challenging. Holland had died, in the end, to try to save his world, stopping Osaron only being part of that. Kell had not paid so steep a price - something Alucard was grateful for - but had still paid something of a price. Alucard had seen it in the way his magic looked, the way it worked. Neither of them had to pay any price here. Alucard did not wish to lose the silver in his veins, the price he had paid to deny Osaron entry, certainly one of the two worst days of his life. But the injustice that Berras lived when Anisa had died, when he had been weak and she was strong, that had snagged his thoughts whenever he thought of his brother. To add this to it, Alucard did not need anyone else to have dark moods. He never had.
With a blink, his vision focused more, and Alucard saw Rhy’s hand on the table. He took it, resting his hands in Rhy’s. For this moment, he leaned on Rhy, rather than the other way around. Alucard was not embarrassed by how much his sister’s loss hurt him. Anisa had been the most important person in his life, more important even than Rhy.
“She was only just getting old enough to attend anything at court, if she pushed for it,” Alucard replied, “Anisa spent much of her time at the Sanctuary, some of it with friends she made there, some of it on her own.” There was not too much a young girl of such good family was allowed to do, though Alucard had never known that to hold her back when she wanted something. Then he smiled, bittersweet. “You may have never gotten to know her, but she watched you and listened to what people said, parsing through the gossip of course.” Anisa had, after all, known about Rhy, was the only one Alucard had personally told.
--
When Alucard took his hand, Rhy reached his other hand across and held Alucard’s hands in both of his own. The contact comforted him, at least; he hoped it helped Alucard as well. He was unsure of what to say, but he listened, his gaze intent on his lover’s face. It might not have improved the mood, but he was certainly no longer thinking about his own insecurities surrounding magic.
“I’m sure I would have loved her,” he murmured, quietly, and then, “Would love her, if I had the chance to meet her here.” He wondered what she had thought of him, but didn’t ask. It wasn’t surprising that she had paid attention to him; most people did, but she would have had a different perspective, given Rhy’s relationship to her brother.
He ran his thumb over Alucard’s knuckles. He didn’t know if it had been the right thing to mention that she could come here, but he knew that Alucard was thinking it. But it was a hard thing to risk getting one’s hopes up, because they might get crushed; that was the majority of Rhy’s relationship to magic. So he did not try to get either of their hopes up any further.
--
It pulled at Alucard’s heart, to hear that language - words that spoke of a chance of a future, any future - aloud. His thoughts ran over them all the time, unable to avoid them. But Alucard had not spoken about it aloud before this conversation. So it was only in the last few minutes he heard anything like it. And from Rhy’s mouth, from someone else, it felt that much more… more than a dream. Or a nightmare. Alucard still saw her frequently there.
“She was not terribly fond of some of your exploits,” Alucard pointed out, trying hard not to smirk. Others had been encouraged or found it charming. Those moments, those times, it tipped past flirtation, when some of her friends grew jealous or wistful, Anisa had mostly judged Rhy. Alucard had not, whether he read it between the lines of what she wrote or the gossip that flew around the docks. Alucard had had some of his own after all. And Rhy hadn’t known.
But he sighed. “I am sure that would be no impediment,” Alucard continued. “She was, after all, one of the two masterminds behind the Essen Tasch strategy. And she wrote to the Aven Essen herself about it.” Alucard had already been thinking of the Essen Tasch as means to return to London, to court Rhy. But Anisa had reached the conclusion on her own. Saints, she was brilliant, soft and sharp each in their turns. What Alucard wouldn’t give to have Anisa back, for her to have a chance at life.
--
Rhy managed a small smile. “Well, I can’t really blame her. All of them fell short compared to you.”
Hopefully, if she had lived long enough to know - or appeared here through the portal to discover it - that Rhy had loved Alucard all along, she might not judge him too harshly. Certainly from the perspective of someone who wanted the two of them to be together, it did not look too well on him. But none of it would have happened if he had not thought that Alucard had left him, tossed him aside.
And as a result he had not understood the purpose behind Alucard coming back for the tournament, not at first. He appreciated it now, in retrospect. Knowing that Anisa had helped him with it actually made quite a bit of sense, especially given that Alucard was not really supposed to come back to London. “I’m glad to know she approved of us enough for that.”
--
Alucard exhaled sharply, rather amused. “She was comparing them all to me,” Alucard agreed. Sometimes those points landed on fashion, others on loyalty or depth of feeling. There were plenty of ways to judge a person. Anisa had been pleased that none of them seemed likely to last very long at all. Alucard too, honestly, when he knew of them.
He looked to catch Rhy’s eye, rather than focusing on their hands or the wine sitting untouched for the moment. “It was a story tale ending,” Alucard said, “She knew stories were stories. But she believed in people getting those endings, in stories being made even in our day and age.” It was hard to resist one about proving one’s love to a charming and handsome prince and forming a happily ever after. Or the start of another tale. Alucard knew life would never be dull.
Squeezing Rhy’s hand, Alucard took one of his back for a sip of wine. It was quite good. “Sometimes I wonder,” he admitted, “she wasn’t about to put me off it, and we never quite managed to have our usual frank conversation when I returned for the Essen Tasch.” Trust Berras to come between them for that too. Alucard would have had to go deep enough into the house that Bard couldn’t listen in. But she wouldn’t have stopped him.
He shrugged. And, as much as it hurt, said, “We may yet find out.”
--
“You set an exceptionally high standard,” Rhy said warmly, smiling. It had been a painful truth to come to terms with at first, but it was not anymore, now that they were together again. “I am so very glad that our story will continue.”
He did not immediately reach for the wine, mainly because he was still loath to release Alucard’s hand. He glanced at his glass, considering it, and then drew one hand back to pick up the glass, but he did not immediately drink it. He got to his feet instead, still holding one of Alucard’s hands, and moved around the table to sit down in Alucard’s lap, sideways, with both of his knees on one side of the chair. He released Alucard’s hand, then, and pressed his free hand against his lover’s cheek, the other one still holding his wine glass.
“I sincerely hope,” he said quietly, “That we do.” He let out a breath. “I know it must be hard to get your hopes up, perhaps as hard as it is for me to get my hopes up about magic, but I will hope it, for both of your sakes.”
--
Alucard watched Rhy, in a purposefully casual manner. It had been an emotional evening of all sorts, some of it tense between them. But it pleased him that they could be - they were - close, still. Not everything had been figured out, and Alucard had not forgotten what Rhy had gone through, emotionally, because they spoke now of his sister. But it felt good for both of them, moving on to it. And for Alucard, to speak about it.
Esa curved around a leg of one of the chairs, still mildly upset at having lost his lap some time ago. But Alucard gave more attention to Rhy, now the one getting in his lap. His face leaned, slightly, into Rhy’s hand. And his newly freed arm wrapped around his lover, holding him comfortably close. They had a whole bottle of wine, if they decided they wanted it all that night. Perhaps not, Alucard thought. But they had as much as they wanted and time.
His hopes pressed on, as impossible feeling as many before them. But many futures, many dreams, felt impossible. That didn’t make them so. “I have chosen before to hope for something when I saw no reason to, besides wanting it,” Alucard looked fondly at Rhy, “So I will choose to hope again, even though I cannot see any clear way to influence whether or not it happens. It is all… muddled at the moment. But perhaps something can. And if I can figure that out, we can be that much closer to seeing her again.” Strange, to speak of seeing people after they were dead. But it was not, truly, about after she was dead. Just sidestepping time itself, as this place did.
Alucard knew each time that it could end in heartbreak, or death in some cases. But he chased his dreams, pursuing them to the best of his ability. It was not easy, any step of the way. But it was the only way hope had a chance.
--
Rhy smiled at that, and leaned closer in against his lover. The closeness was comforting, and he was glad he had come around the table to be here. At long last, he took another sip of his wine, giving himself a moment to contemplate what to say next.
“Thank you for sharing that with me,” was what he finally decided on. “I’m sorry that I can’t -- couldn’t -- share my magical practice with you in the same way. I don’t want to shut you out. And I know you want to help me.” He traced his fingertips along Alucard’s jaw, then down the side of his neck, and along his collar. “But I have been taught by the finest teachers, learned every theory, every method available to me -- my parents made sure there was no stone unturned. So it is not a lack of understanding the process, nor is it a lack of magic, as you said. It’s me.” He breathed in, steadily, and breathed back out. “Kell always tried to tell me that I should speak to the elements as a friend, but magic has never felt like a friend. It is either absent or out of control. It scares me, and yet I desperately want it. In order to have it, though, I think I have to see it and speak to it differently, and I can’t figure out how to do that if part of me is worrying about the other person in the room, and I can’t not do that. Even if it’s you, who will not judge me.”
It was more than he’d expected to be able to say, after his near-breakdown only minutes ago. But Alucard had made it possible, by dropping the subject, by making himself vulnerable as well, by allowing Rhy to come closer, by holding Rhy in his arms. And by listening when Rhy had asked him to stop talking about it. He had done that once before, too, when Rhy had confessed to a different kind of insecurity, and Rhy trusted, now, that Alucard would continue to keep to it. “Does that make sense?”
--
While Alucard had done what he could to help Rhy after a disastrous attempt to do the same, Alucard’s issue had been both percolating for some time and poignant in the moment. The intimacy was no less true because he hoped it would have an effect on Rhy. One it seemed it had accomplished, to some degree. Alucard continued to listen - that lesson had already been driven home - and not comment, directly on what Rhy said. Not about Rhy and magic. Much as he disagreed about Rhy finding the fault in himself. But there had been many times in his life Alucard had not been ready to understand or to accept something that would have been obvious to someone else. Probably still were, in some dark corner of his heart. So he didn’t judge Rhy for blaming himself.
Instead, listening. And an amused note that he and Kell thought about magic in anything like the same way. But it had been an early friend for both of them. He moved on.
He nodded. “I understand,” Alucard replied. “I have no expectation to see you practice magic. You no longer need to sneak it around me. If you want privacy for some time - for any reason - you only need say so, and I will respect it.” Even if his curiosity pulled like the tides. Alucard was the sort to be curious about most things and had learned to live with it. If Alucard sensed Rhy wished to be alone, he would respect it then too. But that was a less reliable way for Rhy to carve out time for himself.
Privacy and time were luxuries for Rhy back in Arnes. They were the both of them too busy to have much of it. So whatever they wanted of it, this place was the right time to get it. “I am quite able to entertain myself, even if I am not working or otherwise engaged.”
--
Rhy smiled over his glass of wine, and took another sip of it before responding. “I doubt it will happen very often,” he said. “You are a much higher priority than magic.”
He slid his free arm around Alucard’s shoulders, and leaned his head in closer, brushing his lips over Alucard’s temple. He was not really sorry to have kept the secret for a short time, but also not sorry that it was out now. He had feared only the way it would affect his psyche to be seen, to be helped, not Alucard’s opinion of him. And in some ways, because Alucard was the one person who had never been disappointed in Rhy for failing at magic, he had feared being seen by Alucard most of all, and indeed, it had hurt worse than it likely would have if it had been Kell. A part of him would still have liked to have been spared the pain of it entirely, and not have shared the secret until he was ready, until he could show what he had accomplished.
But who knew how long that would have been? Alucard was clearly glad to know it, and while it was not necessarily better for Rhy this way, it was also not really worse. Not now that the hard part was over. “You will be the first to see when there is anything worth showing. And if you should ever need your privacy, please know that I will respect it, as well.”
--
Alucard leaned his head against Rhy’s, while holding his lover gently close. Just sitting there, he felt grounded and solid, from the dry land, from Rhy, from the palace solidly beneath his feet. It was a different kind of comfort than the rocking of the sea. Acknowledging things, rather than holding secrets, was also easing. Alucard knew to live with secrets, even from those he loved. But there were different sorts of secrets, and overall, he preferred not to have them unless there was a particular and convincing reason. At the same time, Alucard usually did not broach others’ secrets without some mulling over on what he observed. They were testy matters.
With a quiet nod, he recognized the mutual respect, the understanding and treatment of each other as people, individual and separate at times from each other. Neither one of them could have their identities consumed by the other. “I have been practicing mirror magic in my own time,” Alucard shared. “I do not mind if you see it. It has been, like you said, that you are a higher priority. So I simply have not practiced much when you are around.”
--
“Mirror magic?” Rhy asked, curiously. “You mean with the liran?”
He was curious only because it was something that his lover was interested in; he doubted very much that it would ever be something he could manage. It was fairly clear that he would only have a very basic grasp of control over the elements, at best. He certainly wasn’t going to get his hopes up about anything more.
And because of that, he shrugged. “I like to know what you are interested in, because I am interested in you, and also to know what you can do, so as to better strategize with you when we act together. But I have no real need to observe your practice unless it is easier to show instead of tell.”
--
Alucard’s smile curled up. “The liran is far beyond anything I can do just yet, possibly ever,” Alucard replied. “I do use the liran fairly regularly since it is the only way I can observe the portal’s magic readily. Still, that was not what I meant. I have seen many kinds of mirrors over the last few years, and their magic fascinates me. I had not had the time to do more than read about what I could find in books and to pass by, looking briefly at any mirrors I came across in my travels. But now…”
One hand motioned widely around them. Not so much about their physical surroundings, though the lack of servants or guards gave the palace another feel. But this world, so far from their own. “I am not sure what I will do with it. For now, I am simply learning new magic as best I can.” That in and of itself was a joy. Alucard would turn it into something useful, something they could use together for themselves, for Arnes, for something. But just doing it was its own reward.
--
“What is it you would like to do with them?” Rhy asked, curiously. “Could you see things through them? Connect one mirror to another?”
He paused, because the implications of that brought a memory to mind, and he drew in a breath. “My mother used to use water to listen. She kept water in every room in the palace. She said she would teach me how once I got better with magic, but…”
There was no real need to finish that sentence; Alucard knew. Rhy had not gotten better at magic, and now Emira Maresh was dead. It was probably a skill that could be learned from a book, perhaps one in their library, but she would never teach him.
--
Rhy’s questions amused and pleased Alucard, ever excited over magic itself. Magic, what he did with it, and the showmanship around it were all aspects he loved and appreciated. But that awe for magic, learning it for its own sake, had never gone away. Nor the wonders at what it could do.
Alucard made a small sound of understanding. It was not the same to learn from a book or Alucard or Kell or anyone else in all the worlds who was not his mother. And a childhood promise at that. Alucard had some memories from his own mother, promises she had not been able to keep. “I thought that was her doing,” Alucard commented. “Never had a chance to discuss it with her.” Despite having spent much time in the same room, nearly alone, during the last times Alucard had seen her. But his mind had not much been on her magic with Rhy laying there, a corpse or barely alive.
He smiled. “She was never quite what many people” - his father and brother high among them - “thought she would be.” Alucard had liked that about her. How strongly she was still herself, no matter how many years she sat upon the throne.
--
Rhy smiled, a little sadly. “Maybe if she’d lived a little longer, she could have taught you, instead.”
He wanted to believe his parents would have accepted Alucard as his partner. He didn’t know that they would have truly accepted Alucard as family, just another magician who could protect Rhy, help to strengthen the throne. But being able to listen in on every room in the palace was certainly a skill that would strengthen the throne -- even if it had not protected Emira or Maxim from the Veskans’ betrayal. Once she had finally given up on being able to teach it to Rhy, Emira might have been willing to pass it to Alucard, so that at least someone in the palace could keep up the tradition.
And it pleased him that Alucard smiled when he talked about Rhy’s mother, that he had at least something positive to say about her. Rhy knew his mother hadn’t been perfect, at all, and she’d undoubtedly had a part in his father’s decision-making, including the ones he hadn’t personally agreed with. But he resented her a little less, and it was nice to know that maybe Alucard did, too.
--
Alucard let one hand drift, resting on Rhy’s back, and moved it in slow circles. No matter how flawed Rhy’s parents were, they had loved him and wanted the best for him. To a much greater extent than his own father, they had let Rhy be himself. There was plenty to think well of, even though Alucard’s thoughts were less charitable about certain matters. “I would have liked that,” Alucard said. It was far more likely than metalworking lessons from Maxim Maresh and far more enjoyable a thought. Alucard did not take well to metalworking.
There were any number of possibilities Alucard had considered when it came to a future relationship with them, at least when he had been planning his courtship. Certain goals had to be reached - their acceptance of him as a spouse for their son - and the rest had been desirable but unnecessary. Still, Alucard had worked toward the best possible outcomes, despite some of his feelings. For Rhy’s sake. It had turned out to be in vain, sadly.
--
Rhy let out a breath. “I wish sometimes I could ask their advice,” he admitted. “About how to make this work for us.”
He kept his arm around Alucard’s shoulders, his forehead resting against Alucard’s temple. He brushed the thumb of his other hand along Alucard’s jaw. He trusted Alucard, trusted the partnership that they already had and were continuing to build. But it was getting more and more difficult to disentangle his heart -- how much he wanted this -- from his mind, which could help him figure out how to get it. Being away from Arnes gave him time to think about it but it had also prevented him from being able to sense the political climate in the aftermath of Osaron and the Veskans, from noticing the subtleties of people’s reactions to them as they moved around the palace and the city together. The longer he was here, the more he seemed to go around in circles in his mind and get nowhere.
He curled his fingers into Alucard’s hair. “It’s hard for me to think about it objectively, in terms of the bigger picture.”
--
Rhy’s parents had been a love match. Versions of their love story were prolific around Arnes, and Alucard had heard plenty of them. Some commonalities were likely true, and others simply could have been proliferation of myth. So it was difficult to parse, even as Alucard had the advantage of having met and interacted with them multiple times. And his much better knowledge of the son they had raised. But the point remained that a courtship had happened - had likely been required - and despite Emira’s good blood (much of it the same good blood that flowed through Alucard’s veins) she had not been a natural fit for what most people thought of a good queen. But they had figured it out, despite all that. So indeed, Alucard would have appreciated the chance to pick their brains about how they managed it.
“Mmm,” Alucard acknowledged. He sighed slightly. “I know well the difficulties associated with me as your spouse, your partner. Much of them I can do little about. But I have done everything I can to excel in every other way,” Alucard laid out the facts, as objectively as he could. “Your heir is the stickiest point,” Alucard admitted, even as he felt a sharp stab saying it. He closed his eyes, focused on the slow movements of his hand, flat and wide and warm.
That only laid what they were both too conscious of before them. Here, there was some sort of hope, some idea, that there could be a magical solution to it, even if it were not their magic. But back in Arnes, without anything here? “I had considered means of resolving the issue, but as it stands back home, I am drawing up short,” Alucard admitted. None of the variations of ‘Rhy having sexual relations, if not more, with a woman’ were easily settled.
--
This was so hard. The intimacy between them deepened every day that they were here, but they were no closer to finding a way to stay together, to rule the kingdom together. If it was hard on Rhy, it must have been at least as hard on Alucard, who had been waiting and trying to plan for this even longer. He could keep promising, over and over, that they would find a way, and he meant it, but it didn’t really make anything easier.
He swallowed. “If there was no other way,” he began, “Except for me to be with someone else - not instead of you, but in addition to being with you - would that - would you still stay with me?”
It was not what Rhy really wanted, at all. It was hard to even imagine. And yet in some ways it was the simplest solution, politically speaking. If Arnes could accept two kings, it was not much more of a stretch to accept two kings and a queen as well. But on a personal level, a three-way relationship was much more complicated, and it tore at Rhy’s heart just to think about it. He knew that Alucard must have thought of the possibility already, long before it had occurred to Rhy, and had already decided what he felt about it, but it was still a terrifying question to ask.
“That is not,” he added, “What my heart wants. But I would do almost anything to keep you, so… it is something I’ve thought about.”
--
It was no surprising possibility to raise. Alucard had long considered that possibility. No one he knew of in the Arnesian court came to mind as a plausible practical choice. It was an awkward intimate solution at best, and without just the right person, it would not be its best. As he had many times before, though Alucard had been alone usually in his quarters then, Alucard steadied his breathing before forming any coherent answer.
He heard the insecurity in Rhy’s voice, the worry that this solution could ask too much of Alucard, could make Alucard walk away. Indeed, Alucard had made it clear that they had to make it work; they had to go beyond what they had had back in their world. This uncertain status could not last forever. Court expectations and people’s reactions, judgment, and choices in response to any solution was - to some degree - beyond Rhy’s control.
“It would not be simple,” Alucard replied. “Finding one good partner for the crown is challenging. To find a second, one where we could keep our relationship, something like what we want, and where we could work well together, despite the cultural resistance to what it represents…” Alucard sighed. “I will not have the title in name only, and neither can they. I will not walk away from you before I consider it. As simple a concept as it is, it is no simple matter to achieve.”
Destroying their relationship and their love for each other was worse than having to walk away from it. His words had been no comfort to his ears either. Alucard steadied his breathing again. “It is not what I want, either, to share you, beyond with Arnes as a whole.” Rhy had his duties, and Alucard did not begrudge him those. But another person into their lives, into their hearts. It asked a great deal.
--
Rhy felt that by even asking the question, he had somehow brought that person between them, pushed them farther apart. His eyes stung and blurred, and his heart ached. He wanted to take the words back with every fiber of his being. But there were so few options available, and at some point, it was a question that would have to be asked. There was little point in putting it off any longer.
His fingers instinctively curled into Alucard’s hair and shirt, holding him tightly. He closed his eyes against the tears that filled them. “I do not want to share you, or to be shared,” he said, voice strained. “No one else will ever be your equal, not to me. But… politically, yes, equal footing would be ideal. For us and for the child.”
It was all he could manage to say. It took all of his willpower just to hold himself together. In that respect, this was not the best time to have this conversation, when his emotions were already raw, when his insecurities were at their very worst. But hopefully, getting this conversation over with as well as the one about magic would make them both feel a little better after they were done.
After managing to pull himself together just a little bit more, he said, “I would trade all of my magic and years of my life for a way to have an heir while keeping you all to myself, my love. And I will, if such a thing exists. But I have a feeling… a woman willing to be a queen with two husbands might be easier to find, if not necessarily easier to keep.”
--
Alucard’s arms tightened around Rhy and held him close, with some pressure. His lover, fully in his arms and held dear, hopefully it felt as comforting to Rhy as it did him. Their faces were pressed enough against each other that Alucard could not see Rhy’s face, truly, and his own features were obscured from view. A small mercy, for a short period of time. Alucard could not pretend to have spent less thought mulling over that possibility than he had. But it was the first they spoken of it aloud. Sharing Rhy sounded more miserable that way than it had only stuck in his head.
The way Rhy felt toward him was not the sticking point that kept digging under Alucard’s skin. Everyone else’s reactions, the way Arnes and the world treated them. It would be much easier to accept a queen and rather plausible that Alucard would be viewed only as Rhy’s lover, as an indulgence that was publicly recognized. That haunted him. Then, when his mind turned course toward a happier idea - everyone accepting him as a true king and partner, where did that leave this third person, this partner required namely for a child and little else? Would they be seen as only a womb? A source of children? It was treatment battled by many queens in many generations. But here, it was more plain.
So little felt in their control. It depended on so much beyond them. And Alucard could do nothing for it here. There was no need to share Rhy in this world. No throne demanded such things of Rhy. Everything was simpler and easier, for their relationship. The rest of it, well, any world was a messy place. But this respite could not be counted on, depended on. Alucard had never been able to simply live what good life he had found without plotting and planning and working toward whatever he wanted most. It rather interfered with enjoying what good they had. Not entirely, but his mind never let him be, once it was dark, and he was still.
“I do not want to know what Maris would ask for that,” Alucard commented. Surely, if there were one place in the world it was most possible to achieve that, it was the Going Waters. He leaned back just enough to pinch his nose. “We will do what we need to,” he said. Whatever that ended up being.
--
The only thing harder to imagine living with than any of the options on the table was a future without Alucard in it. It had hurt enough to lose him the first time, when Rhy had been able to tell himself that the relationship had just been a fling, had not meant anything real. This was real and true and still so difficult to keep. He pressed in close, his arms tightening around Alucard’s shoulders, and pressed his face into Alucard’s hair just behind his ear, cheeks pressed together.
“I love you,” he murmured, even though what he really wanted to say was, I’m sorry. He was sorry for bringing it up, sorry for the complications of his ties to the throne; it would have been so much simpler for them if he had not been a prince, and now a king. “I will do whatever needs to be done, I promise you.”
He would not, could not, be the one to say goodbye. It was too much for him to live with. But Alucard had already said he would walk away if they couldn’t make this turn out right.
--
Alucard continued to hold Rhy, unsure of what else either of them could say. The dynamics of such a potential relationship was sure to haunt Alucard every time he lay to sleep for weeks now, a tangled ball of interpersonal politics harder to unknot than Bard’s magic. Even that could only go so far, so much depending on the identity, inclinations, and actions of a third person, unidentified. It would not make Alucard feel any better, but if it could make him more prepared for when the inevitable came, then it was worth it.
The alternative was not something he wished to spend much thought on. Though that would plague him too, perhaps. Alucard respected both of them too much to do anything less. Another unpleasant thought.
So he clung to Rhy the way sailors gripped the ship during a storm. Perhaps they could see it through. “And I love you,” Alucard whispered in return, its own form of an apology.