WHAT. Del hides during the truth allergies; his boyfriends hunt him down for a little clearing the air WHERE. The Great Library WHEN. During the truth plot WARNINGS. None really STATUS. Complete
Del did not get sick. It was a fact of sheer biology—he ran internally hot, so much so that it would literally kill any normal human, but he was a dragon despite his body. It burned through bacteria and alcohol faster than was conceivable. Situations tended to get a little sticky with the last one, but the former made him a somewhat healthy member of society when he needed to be.
So allergies were a new thing. One he thought he'd power through like the stubborn beast he was, until he realized that these symptoms came with a compulsive need to do something inexplicable like telling the truth. He wondered that morning, when he blurted out a few not-unordinary compliments that sounded more feral than his average appreciation, if this was how Cayden felt. Unable to lie. This though, between a sneeze, was worse. Del was a serial sidestepper, pushing around thoughts and truths in his mind until he was ready.
He was certainly not ready to explain the last week of feelings that had been bundled in the dark recesses of his mind. Even if he knew that Eli and Cayden were aware something was certainly up.
In the most aggressive bid of 'employee of the month' (something that did not exist at the Great Library, but he was considering implementing it now), Del was hiding out at his part-time menace-making job shelving books like his life depended on it. Being honest with patrons about history or where a book was located or who would know the information was easy. It didn't require him to lie. Maybe tease, or bother, or be generally charming while simultaneously being annoying, but not lie. That was the important part.
But now he was sneezing again, like an allergic reaction to books, when he realized he overheard Cayden's voice ask where he might be. And Eli's voice saying thank you to being directed. And then, the approach of footsteps to stacks he was definitely not hiding behind. Del never felt more like a cornered animal than he did right now.
Before he could make a decision on what to do—drop the books and run, pretend he didn't see them (which was impossible he always knew where they were like a sixth sense), or become one with the books in his arms like camouflage—they were at the end of the aisle. He sneezed. Shit.
"If you're here to comment on my work ethic, I'm trying to make a point right now and I can't be stopped," Del said, shoving a book onto the shelf. It absolutely did not go there.
It had been pretty easy to convince Cayden to go with him to harass Del, especially after the weirdness of this morning. He was smart enough to figure out that Del was clearly avoiding them, he never seemed so excited to leave them to do work. And when he wasn’t feeling well?
Eli was pretty sure that in itself was unusual, he’d never seen Del sick that he could remember, in this form or as a dragon. He would’ve expected Del to curl up in bed and want to be cuddled in his normally-needy way, not avoiding them. Something was up, and Del’s all-too-honest remark as soon as they walked up confirmed that. Eli was glad he opted to put on something a little shiny that he knew would catch Del’s attention, and left a few buttons unbuttoned for Cayden’s viewing pleasure, went out of his way to make himself as enticing as possible for a public outing.
When he still wasn’t looked at immediately. Eli huffed out a little noise and put his slutty self against a nearby table. “I was going to comment on how great your ass looks but now I’m wondering what point you’re trying to make. Cayden, help me out here.”
If the suspicious sneezing had started months ago, when they'd first gotten to the mortal realm, Cayden would have assumed it was because of that. Because Del had certainly never been sick in Faerie. Cayden had a hundred years of observation to support that fact. But it had been months here without so much as a sniffle. With considerable physical interaction with a human at that. If the dragon was going to suddenly take ill, he should have done so some time ago.
Even if that wasn't true, though, Cayden would have been easy to lead to the library. He wanted to stay close after the lingering heartache he felt from their portal experiences. He wasn't, however, in anything shiny. He had a hooded sweatshirt on today in a soft pink and he lingered beside Eliphas looking out of place in the Great Library.
"How am I meant to help? I could try staring it out of him?" He did stare, though the joke softened into genuine concern when he felt like Del looked uncomfortable with their presence. "Are you avoiding us, sia tov?"
They were actively trying to end him, Del would swear it. Having both of them looking as enticing as a flash of coins and as comfortable a plush bed was going to be his unfortunate demise in this life. But dying—or a version of it—had been heavy on his mind late and had led him to circumvent even the most obvious options of spending time with them. He thought the Library would be safe. Del was wrong and he sniffed, loudly. His body was a traitor, moreso than usual.
"The point is, it's—" Del tried, and oh. It wasn't coming out in the way he wanted: a lie, a tiny fib, his usual conversation-dodging tactics. All the truth was crowding on his tongue, and he snapped his mouth closed. If he didn't talk then he wouldn't say anything at all. It was foolproof.
But he couldn't help hearing the word avoid, and his instinct was to say something to that because he didn't want to avoid them. He dropped the stack of books down on the cart. "I'm not not avoiding you. I mean, I am. I mean—" He made a frustrated noise.
Eli’s eyebrows went up. He was used to Del caging around things, it was always like playing fun opposites with Cayden’s honesty. But now, like this? It was weird. Eli was left with a sinking, horrible feeling that they’d done something wrong.
He knew that things had been a little strange since the last world they’d been stuck in. Eli didn’t have memories from it and Del had been very hesitant to talk about it, so they were left with more questions than answers and Eli simply fell to the end of pretending everything was fine. Maybe it wasn’t.
His eyebrows knitted together, having talked himself into a worry. “Did we do something wrong? Is it cause of that fucking world because that stuff is over now so whatever it was, you can just-- I don’t know. Pretend it was a movie or something. Fake stories.”
Cayden frowned. Del was being evasive and Eliphas looked hurt, and neither of these things were allowed as far as he was concerned. He crowded close to Del, stepping around a table to do so. It didn't matter that they were in a library; he was fae and was ruled by his emotions, no matter how hard he controlled them.
"Did we do something wrong? You do not need to avoid us. You can tell us. Or tell us that you do not wish to speak of it?" His frown deepened. While he didn't love that option, it was better than avoidance by a mile.
"I can't pretend, not with either of you," Del said, in a burst of sincerity that was actually not reliant on whatever this sinus situation was. His memory had been a blessing and a curse, unable to forget the best things but also unable to forget the worst things too. His mind was a chaotic, uncategorized mess of happiness and pain. All he could think of when looking at the both of them was how much he could cause by simply not being here. His current avoidance adding to it, it seemed.
"All I want to do is speak about it." His voice pitched, high and loud and horrifically honest. Cayden in his space was not helping. He tried again, his voice more appropriate as an indoor voice. "There is nothing that you have done wrong." This was said to Eli and Cayden, locking eyes with each of them, making sure they understood that this was unabashedly the truth.
His eyes burned, but that was allergy-related and not emotions. Maybe. "But something is happening to me that I can't—" He looked to the ceiling, and took a congested breath. "I can't seem to lie. About anything. Not even the tiniest amount."
Eli was staring at Del with even more confusion, if that was possible. First there was the outburst, then there was sincerity and something that seemed so worried and annoyed. His eyebrows shot up at the admission, it startled him.
But it also made him start laughing, quietly. “So, like Cayden.” Cayden was refreshingly honest, but had also learned the fae-way of speaking around truths when he didn’t want to be too on-the-nose about something.
It wouldn’ve been the mature thing to nod and walk away, leave Del to his privacy and not harass him about telling the truth, but Eli wasn’t particularly mature when he didn’t need to be. While he wasn’t about to take advantage of Del with anything heavy he did sit up a little from his perch with interest. “Can’t seem to lie, but are avoiding us because you don’t want to--- tell the truth? Is this about the shirt I wore yesterday? Tell me what you actually thought about it because you said it was nice but I’m wondering now if you actually hated it.”
The tone of Del's voice was startling. Cayden wasn't sure he'd ever heard him sound quite like this. He very nearly stepped back to give him room, to let him breathe, but then the reality of the situation caught up with him and he scowled with equal parts frustration and amusement.
"You worried us and you are just panicking because you cannot lie?" He made sure to inject that comment with as much dry judgment as possible. "Eli has the right idea, I think. Answer his question first. And then I would like to know what you really thought of my latest painting attempt." It had been ugly, even if it was better than each horrendous attempt that came before it. It would unfortunately seem that remembering a past life in full did not immediately grant one the abilities of that life.
The compulsive need to speak his truth, a truth, any truth was terrifying, while being this close to the both of them. As they peppered him with seemingly innocuous questions, Del wanted to melt, impossibly, into the bookcase.
It also didn't help that Cayden was doing that thing, that way of speaking that sounded like a command without room to negotiate. Del liked it more than he ever let on. "I lied," Del said, as his attention drifted toward Eli, like he was mentally putting that same half-buttoned gauzy black shirt back on his body now. "About the shirt. It was more than nice, the way you looked—" He swore, then sneezed, glazing away. "I wanted to tear it off your body with my teeth, you looked so fucking good in it."
There was relief there, like some of the sinus pressure was subsiding by being honest, which meant when he looked to Cayden, his body was still chasing that relief. And he could do nothing to stop the words from pouring out. "It was terrible, but I didn't want you to be discouraged. You have done great things, and I know you will again. But that was not one of them."
Eli barked out a laugh that was way too loud for the library, and immediately made a my bad gesture towards nothing in particular. No one was even over here to shush him. Still, he was too fucking delighted by this.
“Okay, I kind of love this even if I can tell you’re miserable.” Eli reached out to swat Cayden’s ass lightly. “But also I didn’t think it was that bad. Way better than what I could paint.” That was true and Eli wasn’t even under some kind of truth spell. But Del was, and he was cagey and miserable about it, which didn’t delight Eli in return.
He wasn’t exactly the most honest person in the world himself, so he couldn’t judge, but it did make him wonder if there was something else, something bigger that Del was keeping hidden from him. Memories they hadn’t uncovered, really. “At home it’s just us. What are you afraid of blurting out? I can handle being told you want to tear something off my body, promise.”
Cayden snorted inelegantly. Del was often so tightly contained that he could tell the dragon was bursting at the seams with things to say. This was a bit like that, with the addition of him clearly not wanting to say the things but still finding relief in it. As much as Cayden preferred the truth, he preferred it given freely. Anything that forced either of his loves to do something they didn't want to do was an immediate concern.
"Curious," Cayden murmured. He was examining Del now like a puzzle he couldn't quite figure out. "It is a good point. These are certainly not such horrifying truths that you needed to keep them bottled up. If there is something more serious you do not wish to impart, you should say so now, so that we can leave before you are compromised against your wishes."
What Del couldn't seem to say was that he was already compromised, though he hardly wished against it. There would always be a softness to him when it came to Eli and Cayden, a sort of way where any rational or logical thought went out of the window if they were hurt or in trouble or just looking at him pitifully. He didn't need some magical allergies—which he was now suspecting were not going away any time soon—to be honest with them, or do something dangerously stupid on their behalf.
He covered his eyes with his hands, because the sinus pressure was awful and everything was itchy and looking at them shining so brightly in his direction was entirely too difficult. Compelled though, he continued. "There are so many things that I shouldn't say, at home or otherwise, but I want to." That was a half-truth. What Del really didn't want was to make them sad, again.
"I can't stop thinking about how miserable you two were and I couldn't fix it," Del said, and he finally dragged his hands away from his face. "And it was my fault."
Eli squinted over at Cayden with a petulant little look. “Speak for yourself,” if Del had something serious to impart he’d rather be here to hear it, compromised or not. But Eli was far less concerned with secrets on most days. He already didn’t like that Del was holding back from them for various reasons.
So he turned his frown on Del. “Sounds like after all this is over we need to have a talk about honesty and people’s boundaries.” They had that talk a few times when it came to physical boundaries and had figured it out, surely it wouldn’t be that difficult with emotional and honest ones. Right? Or they’d all tip-toe around their feelings until Eli’s own exploded. “But for the record I prefer honesty, like, almost always.”
Some of their lives and some of these worlds had been fucked up, that was at least one universal truth. “Also on the record, I doubt it was your fault. These worlds have sucked, and shit happens. But we aren’t them. We’re us.”
Cayden blinked, surprise evident all over his face. He had wondered if either of them were still carrying any weight from their experiences, but he hadn't considered Del was carrying the burden of guilt. His mind tripped over what little he remembered of his time there and knew it was not enough to be helpful.
"I…" He swallowed and turned to Eli first. "I too prefer honesty, obviously. But never at the burden of compulsion." It burned that Del was feeling forced into talking about something that haunted him. The fae often compelled mortals to terrible deeds, after all. He wanted no part of it. He stepped closer to Del and reached up to cradle the side of his face in one hand.
"I know you are a stubborn and proud creature that carries hundreds of years of trauma," Cayden said, "but what could possibly make you believe any of that was your fault?"
He wanted to believe Eli. They were different people in different places with different circumstances shaping the events of history. But if anyone knew about how time changed people, Del would. The portals had been a what if to this life, but there was always a chance it could just be a warring future they all had yet to live. It made him sick.
But Cayden's hand on his cheek was a balm against that rolling feeling in his stomach. And even though Del wasn't speaking the truth, leaning greedily into Cayden's palm was giving in to his wants and needs instead of holding back; it was a honesty all on its own. "I wasn't sure how to say, how to talk about it. I thought it was better to just hold on to it because I will never be able to forget it, even if it is not us, now," Del said, frowning and looking particularly pathetic as he held back another sneeze.
Compulsion or not, as his eyes searched Eli and Cayden's faces, he knew it would never be right to keep hiding this or anything. They had come this far with one another because Del stopped lying before. They could do it again.
"I died." That felt strange to say out loud, especially since Eli was right—how could it have been his fault? "I died protecting the both of you, but I have never seen the effects it has on you. It has always been me mourning your loss." And sometimes starting wars over them, but it didn't bear the need of repeating.
Eli had an immediate visceral reaction to that truth, and his body gave a full body shudder as he shoved himself off of the table. It was like getting hit with the hearse - immediate memories flooding his brain with previous lives, and all the times they’d lost Cayden or they’d lost Del. It had happened before, he knew that now as he suddenly remembered a previous life but wasn’t sure which one.
Del was supposed to be untouchable, in Eli’s mind. Until this moment he hadn’t remembered ever losing him, and hated every second of it. Cayden was already there, in his space, and Eli hesitated at trying to squeeze in, so he stayed back a few steps as his face contorted the way it did, both from the pain of newly remembered lives and from the pain of loss.
“Well, fuck. That’s worse than being without you guys and having to find you later. I’m beginning to think the old fucks are right when they tell me it’s a bigger burden to be reborn each death.” He sunk back against the table again, a little dejected. “Are there any lives where we get to just fuck and live forever?”
Cayden's grip on Del's face tightened reflexively. He'd suspected the horrible fact, but he hadn't wanted to examine it too closely in the light of day. Especially not where Eli would feel Cayden's heartache. It had led him to certain thoughts about needing to revisit his quest to free Eli from his faerie curse, but that was a problem for a different moment. One where he wasn't facing Del's wounded eyes.
He stepped back a little, just enough to let Eli get closer, and gave the space around them a furtive glance. They had some protection from onlookers thanks to a bookcase on either side.
"I…I wondered if that was the case," he murmured. "It felt like we were living the lives of ghosts." There was a sharp pain in his chest even discussing this. He frowned and dropped one hand, shifting the other to the side of Del's neck so as not to disconnect from him entirely. "And yet, I still do not see how that is your fault when it seems entirely the fault of whomever killed you. Which I assume was some terrible kin of mine."
He shouldn't have told them. That was the immediate thought running through Del's mind. But the rational part of him that did exist knew this was better. That hiding it away from the two of them, with this strange twisted guilt, was unhealthy. In another life he would have clung to it out of fear or self-loathing, but not this one. Not the one where they were doing things differently than all the lives before. He took a deep breath, and it didn't feel as congested as before. Maybe there was something to all of this mess.
Del reached for Eli to pull him into their little orbit, careful not to break his contact with Cayden. It was all very calming, even when he felt like his heart was racing. "I'm still sorry. Even if the death wasn't my fault, the pain of it was. It made both of you be something you weren't, hurt and cold and unable to trust. I like the way you both are now, I love the people you are becoming. I don't want to be the reason it gets ruined."
His whole expression shifted, trying for something not so fucking wounded. They may have been living through it like ghosts, like Cayden said, but Del still remembered the harsh and haunted words from that Vallo's Cayden and Eli. All of it was still so real to him, and he needed something kinder to focus on. "I can't speak on living forever, but we do a lot of the other activity in this life."
When Eli got pulled into their circle, he immediately felt a little better, even drawing on their emotions. Being closer to both of them always helped soothe the inner turmoil that wracked Eli regularly. He had a hard time imagining either him or Cayden being cold, but the loss of Del would be one of the very few things that could manage it.
That thought sucked, and Eli scrunched up his nose. “I get why you were trying not to throw any of that on us, but next time just say something, ok?” It sounded more than an order compared to anything else Eli usually threw at them - except in the bedroom. “I’d rather be sad and deal with it with you guys than think you’re freaking out or upset.”
Especially if he was upset with them. Eli was too fragile for that sort of thing, his nerves couldn’t take it. “But they’ve got the beast and it’s over now, right? So now we can focus on us, the three of us here, alive, together.”
"There is no way to protect us from losing you, my love," Cayden whispered. "I am sorry you had to see first hand how we will hurt, but there is no escaping that. Not any more than there is a way for us to save you from mourning us, when the time comes." He leaned forward and pressed a tender kiss to the corner of Del's mouth.
"But Eli is right. It is better for us to talk about it and find comfort in each other than to let it fester. Worrying in solitude is no way to live when you have this." He grabbed both of Del's hands and placed one over Eli's heart and one over his own. He let his steady breaths flow in and out for a moment and closed his eyes, finding them in his mind like lights in the dark.
The three of us, here, alive, together, Cayden echoed across their mental bond.
Something settled, comfortably, in the middle of his chest. Maybe it was the fact that Del was feeling the most clear headed he had been in days. Maybe it was the connection between the three of them, the way his palms settled on both their chests in a physical tether to both of them. Maybe it was Cayden's voice in their shared mind, another reminder of their closeness. He closed his eyes too, briefly, to stop the knot that seemed to suddenly lodge in his throat. He wished he could blame it on his allergies, but they were slowly dissipating with his honesty.
He leaned in to press a kiss to Eli's cheek, then to Cayden's. It was so chaste, so delicately sweet, that Del had a hard time thinking he had the capacity for it. He was not a gentle creature, but they had made him that way. He would stop thinking about the inevitable end. He didn't choose this body just to give this time with them up, now that he had it.
"You both are being very romantic in the Library, and the things I would like to do would get me fired," Del said, first solemnly, before adding brighter and clearly more mischievous, "But I am willing to be."
A shameless grin blossomed on Eli's lip, he wished he had a free hand to reach up and start unbuttoning his shirt, but instead sent the image to both of them telepathically as his hands remained on them. “Okay but who makes the rules about that?”
Eli took a step backwards, towards the table he had lounged on. “I bet we could get away with it with a little magic, right?”
Cayden went from deeply pleased at Del's relaxation and tender little kiss to exhaling a deep and exasperated sigh that other library patrons could certainly hear from a few rows over.
"I swear you are both ridiculous," he said fondly. Grabbing one of each of their hands, he turned and pointed them towards the exit. "Take a break, Mnestaes. And we will see that it is a stimulating one."