[Wild Roses]
Follows previous directly; 1348 words in this section.
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It took a long moment to register that he was awake. Once he had, he was struck by the sudden overwhelming impression that something had died and begun rotting in his mouth. His teeth felt scummy, like a slick of mold had begun growing over them.
His eyes, by contrast, just felt a bit like he'd slept too long and his eyelashes had been glued together by sleep gunk.
The transition between the wood of the hallway and the tile in the washing-room nearly made him stumble, and he caught at the threshold hard enough that the wood creaked.
He stuck his head under the shower spout briefly, trying not to gag at the taste in his mouth, shook out his hair within the confines of the tile-and-glass space, then turned to the sink, dripping.
A mug of cold tea was resting on the molded soap-dip, somewhat to his surprise. He sniffed it in mild suspicion, pondered, then rinsed out his mouth with it, spitting the first mouthful into the sink. No ugly green swirled through the liquid, which was promising, and when he scraped a nail across a canine it came away no uglier than two or three days without cleaning would have left it.
There was a blank, square-ish space above the sink, darker than the surrounding paint. Mirror-space, like as not, and he had no memory whatsoever of the mirror itself. Which was a little disturbing--he couldn't remember if it'd been there or not when he first arrived. Which meant that he might find mirror-shards scattered through the house, broken reflective charms glancing off dark corners instead of aimed at them.
Come to think of it, he didn't remember brewing the tea. That he didn't remember buying the tea was actually less worrying, considering the dragon-faced woman's method of introduction.
He found no mirror-pieces, when he looked, which implied either that it had never been there, or he'd somehow managed to banish it. He still wasn't sure which option he liked less, and he circled back to the kitchen to see if he could find and brew more tea.
The tea he found in an opaque glass jar, resealed with soft wax to keep it fresh, next to two empty jars with the remains of honey inside them.
He considered his options, and then brewed his next batch of tea inside the less empty of the honey containers to catch the dregs of sweet clinging to the glass. He'd found an empty pot on the stove, and after refilling and heating it, he carefully poured near-boiling water onto the cloth-wrapped tea. Swishing the jar around until the water in it coloured, he pulled the package out and tossed it onto the top of the debris-pot by the icebox. He half-knelt to blow away steam, taking stock of his body's complaints, then lifted the jar to take his first sip, willing his hands not to squeeze too tightly in response to the heat and shatter the glass, then willing his tongue not to burn.
Both worked, and all the effort earned him was a feeling of far-away bells ringing somewhere off to the right.
He leaned up against the counter and sipped while pushing lightly at the edges of his hearing, the heat washing away the last of the scummy taste at the back of his throat.
When the jar was empty, he rinsed it under the tap, then went to get his card-case from the bedroom, brought it back to the kitchen and opened it.
"Aodh?" he asked the card he pulled out, and after a moment got a slightly distracted "Oui?" in reply.
"What day is it?"
"Uhm . . ." there was a brief scuffle on the other end, and a half-heard "Yasha, c'mere for a sec--" before his cousin answered "Nine days since we last spoke. Why? D'you need something?"
" . . I think I'm ready to come home."
"Ahha. Hang on, 'f you don' mind?"
He grunted assent, flicked the card around in the air to close the contact, then put it back in its case.
Discovered, when he looked back up, that apparently it wasn't every time his cousin went somewhere that he dropped out of nowhere in a puff of displaced air. At least not if he had a kid perhaps three-quarters his small height in tow, blond curly hair puffed out like a dandelion and wide, staring eyes focused on Isael. The kid was standing just behind Aodh's legs, Aodh having either appeared on or silently climbed up on the counter to sit with his feet hanging in air before Isael noticed their arrival.
Aodh's profile was unmistakably vulpine, at the angle he was holding his head, Isael noted idly, eying the kid back as mildly as he could.
"He speak any languages?" he eventually asked after the staring got to be itchy on his skin.
The kid gabbled something that sounded insulting--and if Aodh's muffled snort of laughter was anything to judge by probably was insulting--then cocked his head, near birdlike.
"Alright," he said calmly. "Do we share any languages?"
"Oh, sure," Aodh said, grinning, exposing a sharp white canine. "English."
'I still hate English,' Isael thought, irritated, then tried, "Again in English?"
"Three day bender?" the kid asked brightly.
Isael froze.
"It took Ceannard Reykjavík a week and a half to look that bad, but he's got unfair advantages." The kid turned his head away, considered the blanket covering the kitchen window, gnawing on his lower lip meditatively before continuing "And the purple under the eyes looked better on him. So--" he tilted his head, peering up at Isael again. "Two, three day bender?"
There was a long, tense pause, then Isael felt his blank mask crack into a rueful, one-sided smile. Shook his head, then half-turned away. "I'm going to go shower. Make yourselves at home."
He walked out accompanied by a burst of mad chirruping laughter, and a thump as Aodh fell off his perch.
"Tha' was beautiful," his cousin said congratulatingly from the floor, if Isael's hearing was trustable.
"Tact is for people who don't hang around Alfheim," the kid replied, studiously innocent.
The apartment was now familiar enough--easily navigated while thinking of other things or not thinking at all--that he was in the bathroom, another blanket robbed from the bed to use as a towel, before he paused to think about the implications of his cousin bringing a child with him.
That could've come from any of three line of thought--a fourth discarded as soon as mentally articulated--he came up with as he stripped down to skin and got into the shower again. His cousin, whatever else he was, was not an idiot.
The remaining soap lathered poorly, meant for cooler water use and well beyond its expected lifetime. Seals and wax-imprinted wishes would keep it safe in a jar, but once cracked the three days of lathering herbals' best use remained.
Line one, that his cousin had spread tell-tales through the space while Isael was prowling the rest of the building, was possible. Any story told of foxes featured their sneakiness and disregard for laws, and his cousin hadn't lived through two wars by luck and quick hands alone.
His shoulder popped as he scrubbed at an itch on his back, thinking. Possible, but he was inclined to disbelieve it. He'd lost a potato to rot and the pot of cheese had gone green--either his cousin was sneaky enough to leave such things untouched to feed the illusion of privacy or was absentminded.
Line two, then--that the small fluff-haired boy was trusted enough in his own right to run when told to do so, or to fight himself. The first was more likely than the second; the boy didn't move like a mageblood, his hands human fast, not faster slowed and controlled to human speeds.
The third line of thought--that Aodh his cousin trusted him enough to control unthinking reactions to the point that he'd not hurt a child--was a little terrifying.
-------------------
It took a long moment to register that he was awake. Once he had, he was struck by the sudden overwhelming impression that something had died and begun rotting in his mouth. His teeth felt scummy, like a slick of mold had begun growing over them.
His eyes, by contrast, just felt a bit like he'd slept too long and his eyelashes had been glued together by sleep gunk.
The transition between the wood of the hallway and the tile in the washing-room nearly made him stumble, and he caught at the threshold hard enough that the wood creaked.
He stuck his head under the shower spout briefly, trying not to gag at the taste in his mouth, shook out his hair within the confines of the tile-and-glass space, then turned to the sink, dripping.
A mug of cold tea was resting on the molded soap-dip, somewhat to his surprise. He sniffed it in mild suspicion, pondered, then rinsed out his mouth with it, spitting the first mouthful into the sink. No ugly green swirled through the liquid, which was promising, and when he scraped a nail across a canine it came away no uglier than two or three days without cleaning would have left it.
There was a blank, square-ish space above the sink, darker than the surrounding paint. Mirror-space, like as not, and he had no memory whatsoever of the mirror itself. Which was a little disturbing--he couldn't remember if it'd been there or not when he first arrived. Which meant that he might find mirror-shards scattered through the house, broken reflective charms glancing off dark corners instead of aimed at them.
Come to think of it, he didn't remember brewing the tea. That he didn't remember buying the tea was actually less worrying, considering the dragon-faced woman's method of introduction.
He found no mirror-pieces, when he looked, which implied either that it had never been there, or he'd somehow managed to banish it. He still wasn't sure which option he liked less, and he circled back to the kitchen to see if he could find and brew more tea.
The tea he found in an opaque glass jar, resealed with soft wax to keep it fresh, next to two empty jars with the remains of honey inside them.
He considered his options, and then brewed his next batch of tea inside the less empty of the honey containers to catch the dregs of sweet clinging to the glass. He'd found an empty pot on the stove, and after refilling and heating it, he carefully poured near-boiling water onto the cloth-wrapped tea. Swishing the jar around until the water in it coloured, he pulled the package out and tossed it onto the top of the debris-pot by the icebox. He half-knelt to blow away steam, taking stock of his body's complaints, then lifted the jar to take his first sip, willing his hands not to squeeze too tightly in response to the heat and shatter the glass, then willing his tongue not to burn.
Both worked, and all the effort earned him was a feeling of far-away bells ringing somewhere off to the right.
He leaned up against the counter and sipped while pushing lightly at the edges of his hearing, the heat washing away the last of the scummy taste at the back of his throat.
When the jar was empty, he rinsed it under the tap, then went to get his card-case from the bedroom, brought it back to the kitchen and opened it.
"Aodh?" he asked the card he pulled out, and after a moment got a slightly distracted "Oui?" in reply.
"What day is it?"
"Uhm . . ." there was a brief scuffle on the other end, and a half-heard "Yasha, c'mere for a sec--" before his cousin answered "Nine days since we last spoke. Why? D'you need something?"
" . . I think I'm ready to come home."
"Ahha. Hang on, 'f you don' mind?"
He grunted assent, flicked the card around in the air to close the contact, then put it back in its case.
Discovered, when he looked back up, that apparently it wasn't every time his cousin went somewhere that he dropped out of nowhere in a puff of displaced air. At least not if he had a kid perhaps three-quarters his small height in tow, blond curly hair puffed out like a dandelion and wide, staring eyes focused on Isael. The kid was standing just behind Aodh's legs, Aodh having either appeared on or silently climbed up on the counter to sit with his feet hanging in air before Isael noticed their arrival.
Aodh's profile was unmistakably vulpine, at the angle he was holding his head, Isael noted idly, eying the kid back as mildly as he could.
"He speak any languages?" he eventually asked after the staring got to be itchy on his skin.
The kid gabbled something that sounded insulting--and if Aodh's muffled snort of laughter was anything to judge by probably was insulting--then cocked his head, near birdlike.
"Alright," he said calmly. "Do we share any languages?"
"Oh, sure," Aodh said, grinning, exposing a sharp white canine. "English."
'I still hate English,' Isael thought, irritated, then tried, "Again in English?"
"Three day bender?" the kid asked brightly.
Isael froze.
"It took Ceannard Reykjavík a week and a half to look that bad, but he's got unfair advantages." The kid turned his head away, considered the blanket covering the kitchen window, gnawing on his lower lip meditatively before continuing "And the purple under the eyes looked better on him. So--" he tilted his head, peering up at Isael again. "Two, three day bender?"
There was a long, tense pause, then Isael felt his blank mask crack into a rueful, one-sided smile. Shook his head, then half-turned away. "I'm going to go shower. Make yourselves at home."
He walked out accompanied by a burst of mad chirruping laughter, and a thump as Aodh fell off his perch.
"Tha' was beautiful," his cousin said congratulatingly from the floor, if Isael's hearing was trustable.
"Tact is for people who don't hang around Alfheim," the kid replied, studiously innocent.
The apartment was now familiar enough--easily navigated while thinking of other things or not thinking at all--that he was in the bathroom, another blanket robbed from the bed to use as a towel, before he paused to think about the implications of his cousin bringing a child with him.
That could've come from any of three line of thought--a fourth discarded as soon as mentally articulated--he came up with as he stripped down to skin and got into the shower again. His cousin, whatever else he was, was not an idiot.
The remaining soap lathered poorly, meant for cooler water use and well beyond its expected lifetime. Seals and wax-imprinted wishes would keep it safe in a jar, but once cracked the three days of lathering herbals' best use remained.
Line one, that his cousin had spread tell-tales through the space while Isael was prowling the rest of the building, was possible. Any story told of foxes featured their sneakiness and disregard for laws, and his cousin hadn't lived through two wars by luck and quick hands alone.
His shoulder popped as he scrubbed at an itch on his back, thinking. Possible, but he was inclined to disbelieve it. He'd lost a potato to rot and the pot of cheese had gone green--either his cousin was sneaky enough to leave such things untouched to feed the illusion of privacy or was absentminded.
Line two, then--that the small fluff-haired boy was trusted enough in his own right to run when told to do so, or to fight himself. The first was more likely than the second; the boy didn't move like a mageblood, his hands human fast, not faster slowed and controlled to human speeds.
The third line of thought--that Aodh his cousin trusted him enough to control unthinking reactions to the point that he'd not hurt a child--was a little terrifying.