by Dan Wingreen
"What happened?" he asked quietly.
Eallair blinked, his eyes refocusing on the present.
"He wasn't like you. Or anyone else I ever taught. He had power and he knew it, liked it. Liked it too much. He was jealous and vain and angry at so many things and I was arrogant enough to think that I could fix it—fix him. That I could make everything better and teach him to be the greatest wizard that ever lived. I could have swore he weren't like that in the beginning, but…" Eallair let out a short, empty laugh. "Maybe I liked his power as much as he did, enough to ignore all the signs and…"
He sighed. "Don't matter, I guess. I taught him, and he soaked up everything I had to tell him like a dry sponge. He was everything I'd hoped he'd be, powerful and clever and motivated, ready to bring in a golden age. And then it went wrong. He went wrong. He killed people, a lot of people, and tried to take over the entire country, not for the people, but for himself. In the end, he weren’t any better than the government you lot have over here. All he wanted to do was control people because he had the power to do it. He twisted everything I'd ever tried to teach him about Arthur and Camelot into somethin’ just, wrong.
"The worst bit, though? Was that I weren't even the one what stopped him in the end. I wasn't even there. My best friend, the one I told you about, was the one that did it, and I never even knew until after it was over. I was miles away lost in my own bullshit while my best friend and the monster I created fought a war and killed each other."
Aidan's heart clenched at the raw pain in Eallair’s voice. "Just like Merlin and Arthur," he said, easily recognizing the similarities to the story he knew so well.
Eallair looked away and closed his eyes. "Aye," he said. "Just like. It's why I spent so many years lookin’ for Arthur. If I can wake him up, if I can save this country the way I almost destroyed another one, maybe I could start to deserve forgiveness."
That's how his friend started him on his quest.
Aidan felt even worse about being jealous now.
"And that's why you didn't want to tell me," he said, suddenly understanding. “You were afraid the same thing would happen to me.”
"Aye," Eallair said, opening his eyes and giving Aidan a fond look. "I knew if you asked, I wouldn't be able to say no. One of the hardest things in the world, sayin’ no to you."
He smiled briefly.
"I don't wanna ruin you, Aidan. Not the way I ruined him. You ain't nothin’ like he was, but I don't wanna risk turning you into a monster, too."
He looked so fragile. It shocked Aidan, even though it shouldn't have. Eallair was a human, with emotions and feelings and all the terrible insecurities and doubts that came with them, but no matter how many times Aidan told himself that, he was still surprised when Eallair acted human. Surprised and usually saddened, because Eallair never seemed more human than when he was miserable, or exhausted, or caught up in memories Aidan couldn't even begin to understand. And all Aidan could do when Eallair got like that was watch and wish he could say or do something to help.
Except it’s different this time, isn’t it?
This time he could help. This time, he knew exactly what to say.
"You're such an idiot."
Eallair looked like he'd been slapped. "What?"
"You're an idiot," Aidan repeated. "You're not gonna 'turn me into a monster' just by teaching me to use magic. Weren't you the one telling me I'm not dangerous?"
"Yeah, but—"
"And didn't you say you taught a bunch of people? Did they all turn out to be monsters?"
Eallair frowned. "Well, no—"
"And didn't you just say that I was nothing like that guy anyway?"
"Aye," Eallair said cautiously, like he wasn't expecting to get the whole word out before Aidan cut him off again.
"There you go." Aidan spread his arms and smiled. "I'm not a monster-in-waiting."
"It's not that simple," Eallair tried.
"I think it is," Aidan said. "It's exactly that simple." He softened his voice. "Whatever happened in the past is the past. Whatever mistakes you made—”He almost said if they were even mistakes, but at the last moment the words caught in his throat; he wouldn’t invalidate the trust and vulnerability Eallair had shown him with platitudes—"are over and done with. You're trying to make up for them, and you're doing it in a way that makes life better for everyone, and not just you. I'd say that's pretty deserving of forgiveness; from yourself, if not any of the ghosts you're carrying around with you."
"Aidan…"
"And," Aidan went on, his voice brightening. "Didn't you say you wouldn't be able to say no to me anyway?"
Eallair nodded.
"Good. Because I think teaching me magic is the best way for you to get past all this stuff from your…past." Okay, so maybe that could have been worded better. He ignored the heat he could feel blooming on his cheeks, stood up straight, and looked Eallair directly in the eyes. "Lee, will you teach me to use magic?"
For a moment, Eallair looked stricken, and Aidan started to doubt he was doing the right thing. What if he ended up making things worse? What if Eallair walked out of the Yurt and never spoke to him again? But then, right as Aidan was about to take it back, several emotions flashed rapidly across Eallair's eyes, over and over like a crystal ball recording stuck on a loop. Aidan held his breath as he watched, then let it out when Eallair's face finally settled on a single expression. One that Aidan had no trouble recognizing.
Hope.
"Aye," Eallair said softly. "I'll teach you."
Aidan grinned; a pretty good imitation of Eallair's grin, if he said so himself.
"Great!" he said. "When do we start?"
Chapter 5
As it turned out, it was quite a while before they could start anything.
The Shaman, who up until then had been content to sit back and watch, broke his silence to tell them any lessons had to wait until after they took care of the necromancer. Aidan had started to argue—more out of eagerness to start learning magic than worry Eallair would back out—and the Shaman told him if he was so anxious then Eallair could start teaching him as they walked to where the necromancer was thought to be hiding. That, in turn, started Eallair arguing about Aidan even coming along because it was "too dangerous" and that just pissed Aidan off again and started another argument between them, which the Shaman had to interrupt to tell them they only had until morning to kill the necromancer or else it would be assumed they either ran away or were actually in league with him. He'd actually used the term, "in league" too, which amused Aidan since he only thought characters in badly written comics said things like that, and it made him laugh. At least until the Shaman and Two Rivers had left and Eallair rushed after them to continue their argument about Aidan going along, and then he stopped finding anything funny.
The adults are arguing about whether or not the kid gets to go to on a trip. So much for not being at the kid’s table anymore…
Except now the kid’s table had expanded to at least the first few feet outside the yurt, which was as far as Aidan was willing to go into the village without Eallair or the Shaman nearby to—and oh how this smarted even more now that he knew he could use magic—keep him safe from anyone who wanted to take some of their anger out on the smaller of the temporarily resident outsiders. It had somehow gotten even colder as he waited, and he quickly buttoned his jacket up and wrapped his arms around his himself. When that didn’t help, he tried to distract himself by observing the village. At some point while they were inside talking, all the little fires had been put out and the debris had been sifted through. As he watched, the other shaman—or People he supposed he should call them now, even though it seemed odd to him—made one giant magical fire in the middle of the village and were now in the process of burning the bodies that littered the sandy ground. Tears stung Aidan's eyes as he watched, and not just from the acrid smell of burning flesh blowing towards him on the wind.
The People mostly ignored him while they worked,
aside from a few glares, and even fewer curious, but not openly hostile, glances. He thought about offering to help, but he didn't know if that would offend them or not. They weren't just corpses; these people were burning their brothers and sisters, their parents and friends.
Their children.
If Aidan was laying his loved ones to rest, he wasn't sure he'd want some stranger touching the bodies. Especially if he couldn't be sure the stranger wasn't part of the reason why he had to bury them in the first place.
Honestly, he was kind of surprised no one had tried to kill him yet. The protection offered by his proximity to the Shaman’s yurt was all in his mind, just like the streetlights from his nightmare. Eventually, he guessed the Shaman must have told the rest of the village to leave him be. Not that Eallair had bothered to figure out if it was safe to leave him alone with them before he ran after the Shaman to try and exclude Aidan.
These people are burning the bodies of their kids and I'm sulking about Eallair trying to leave me behind. Way to be mature, Aidan. You picked up way too many bad habits from those teenagers.
Aidan sighed, the resentment bleeding away into the night. He was being stupid again. Even if Eallair got the Shaman to agree to let him stay behind in the village, Aidan would just go with him anyway. There was no way he was letting Eallair go off after a necromancer all on his own. Even if he couldn't use magic yet, he could at least be an extra pair of eyes, and maybe even a source of extra magic if Eallair ran low during the inevitable fight. Aidan nodded and resolved to use that in the, also inevitable, argument that would happen if Eallair tried to tell him not to come
He was busy figuring out the rest of his argument in his head when Eallair came back with a sour look on his face.
"I guess he said no, then?" Aidan asked.
Eallair snorted. "Aye. He said that since we both want passage then we both need to 'prove ourselves'. Stubborn bastard."
"Good," Aidan said firmly.
Eallair turned an exasperated look on Aidan. "Look, I get you don't like the idea of bein’ left out, but going after a necromancer is dangerous and—"
"Exactly," Aidan cut in. "It's dangerous and I don't want you going off and being all solo hero and putting yourself in danger—"
"I don't wanna put you in danger either!"
"Why?" Aidan asked. He didn't understand. If it was him, he'd be grateful for someone offering to help him with something like this. Even if he was basically useless, no matter what Eallair had said in the hotel room.
Maybe that's it. Maybe I am a burden and he's just trying to keep it from me…
Eallair looked stunned. "Do you really not know?"
"Know what?" Aidan asked. A lock of hair fell into his eyes as he tilted his head.
Eallair looked even more surprised. Then, sudden understanding dawned in his expression, like he was realizing something for the first time. He let out a short laugh and shook his head. "Bloody hell…"
He cocked his head, then, in a mirror image of the way Aidan was looking at him. But while all Aidan felt was a growing confusion, Eallair seemed to quickly come to a decision about something. He stood up a bit straighter and took a deep breath, steadying himself.
Oh Merlin, he really is gonna tell me I'm useless, isn't—
And then Eallair's lips met Aidan's.
Aidan froze. For a few seconds, he didn't even really know for sure what was going on. He knew what kissing was, of course, the basic idea behind it and everything, but it had never happened to him before, and now there were lips on his lips and it completely killed his ability to think. Eallair is kissing me was the only thought to find any purchase, but even though it was happening, he couldn't quite believe it. He couldn't even say it was a fantasy come true because, embarrassingly enough, his fantasies about Eallair had never gotten very far beyond some vague, abstract idea of closeness and maybe a grand declaration that wasn't in any way completely stolen from a scene in the last book he'd read. It took a few more seconds to fully process it was actually happening, and then his instincts took over and he was grabbing Eallair’s face and kissing him back.
Eallair paused for just a fraction of a second, then his fingers slid through Aidan's hair and pulled him closer to be kissed harder. Aidan tentatively copied Eallair, sliding his hands from his scratchy jaw to his clean, shiny hair.
It was even softer than he'd imagined.
Not knowing how to kiss, he ended up just mimicking what Eallair did. So, when Eallair's lips parted, Aidan's did too, and that was how he found himself with a mouthful of tongue. He gasped silently because that was definitely something different.
Right. Tongues. Kissing with tongues. I have a tongue, too…
He decided he kind of liked using it.
They kissed for several more minutes, tongues and all, and by the time Eallair gently pulled away, Aidan was even starting to tentatively try doing things on his own without Eallair doing them first. He opened his eyes and blinked in confusion because the lips were gone and had the kissing actually happened, or did all the corpse smoke cause him to hallucinate? Eallair's hands were still in his hair, though, even if they were slowly being removed, and Aidan didn't think they'd be there if it was all just a hallucination. One of them paused on his face, cupping his cheek and gently caressing it with his thumb before dropping to Eallair's side. Aidan stared into Eallair's eyes. They blazed, not with the strange glow they'd had in the yurt, but with an emotion that warmed Aidan's body in a way even his magic had never managed.
"You kissed me back," Eallair said, almost accusingly. Aidan blinked again, then nodded slowly. Yes, I was there for that. "I kinda thought I'd be earnin’ myself a smack.”
"W-why?" Aidan asked, the whole word little more than an exhalation.
"Why did I kiss you, or why did I think you were gonna hit me?" he asked.
Aidan nodded. "Yes."
The corner of Eallair's lips quirked into a brief, amused smile. "I kissed you because I like you," he said simply. "I've kinda been wantin' to do it for a while now, actually. And I thought you'd hit me because I was gettin' the impression that you didn't like me all that much."
The light, floaty feeling that welled up in his chest when Eallair said he liked him popped like a bubble. "Why in the ancient hells would you think that?"
Eallair seemed surprised. He raised an eyebrow and crossed his arms across his chest. Almost defensively, Aidan thought.
"You're always hittin’ me and yellin’ at me and callin’ me names! One minute we can be havin’ a great talk and I start thinking that maybe you like me a bit, and the next you're callin’ me a liar and givin’ me that look you got."
"What look?" Aidan asked with a frown.
"The one that says you don't really trust me, or don't think you can. The one that makes me think you still blame me for everything that's happened to you." Eallair sighed. "I thought I was being pretty obvious with, you know, the likin’ you bit. Flirting and the like. Every once in a while, I thought maybe you were responding a little, but then that damn look would come back and put me right in my place. I thought you knew how I felt and that was your way of tellin’ me you didn't feel the same."
Aidan's mouth felt dry. "I don't look at you like that."
"You bloody well do!"
No! I…" Aidan let out a frustrated breath. "You never take anything seriously. It's not that I don't trust you. I trust you more than I trust anyone else. And I shouldn't, because whenever I trust someone it just comes back and screws me over, but I trust you. I just…don't always believe you. I never know when you're serious or when you're just teasing me."
Eallair started to argue, then paused. "Oh," he said after a few moments. "I…guess that makes sense."
"And," Aidan said, "I don't blame you for anything. I'm-I'm grateful, okay? You came back to save me, and you protect me and you're giving me my magic—even if someone else had to tell me I could even use it—and what I do matters now. You've kinda given me everything I ever wanted, e
ven if I didn't know I wanted it." Aidan looked away, suddenly shy. "How could I not like you?"
Eallair stepped closer to him, his shadow flickering in the light of the nearby fire. "You said you liked me.”
“I was there,” he snapped, shooting him a glare.
Eallair raised an eyebrow.
Oh, right. I guess I see what he’s talking about, now.
Aidan took a deep breath. "Yes. I like you." he said softly, ignoring how pre-magic school this was starting to feel. Then, wanting to make sure Eallair knew he was serious, he added, "I've liked you ever since the hotel room."
"Where I had my shirt off?" Eallair asked, a bit of teasing creeping into his voice.
“No, Lee,” Aidan said. He pushed down his annoyance with less effort than it might have taken even a few minutes ago. Maybe…maybe Eallair so often turned to jokes for the same reason Aidan fell back on short-tempered words and petulant looks. Maybe they were both more comfortable expressing themselves in ways that were tried and true, ways that usually elicited predictable reactions. This direction that he and Eallair were heading was new, and uncomfortable, and more than a little terrifying…but Aidan didn’t want to this new journey by putting up the same knee-jerk, instinctual front that had made Eallair think he hated him. Even if it only lasted for this one moment, he wanted to be honest about his feelings. There wasn’t much he could do to repay Eallair for everything he’d done for him, but he could give him this. Aidan gathered up courage he never even knew he had and looked into Eallair’s eyes. "Not where you had your shirt off. Where you put your jacket on me to keep me warm while I slept. Where you were exhausted, but still used magic to clean off the bed because you knew it bothered me." He took a step closer. "Where you gave me a life that actually means something."
Eallair once again looked stunned, but it was a good kind of stunned, one that melted into a soft smile and made the firelight reflected in his eyes take Aidan's breath away, despite its source. "Truly?" he asked, all the teasing gone.