Empty Vessels

by Meredith Katz

  Hiraeth smiled at him, almost shy. "I'd love that," he said.

  They looked at each other, and Keith felt his hot cheeks grow hotter, both of them seeming reluctant to pull away first. But Hiraeth did finally, half turning away and starting to unbutton his shirt.

  "I'll get ready, yeah," Keith said, to avoid watching Hiraeth strip, and got up, heading into Hiraeth's bathroom.

  When he came out again, Hiraeth was seated in just his boxers, seeming perfectly comfortable despite the cool air. Keith began to talk to try to cover the way his eyes were wandering, for the second time, over that narrow, furred chest, the dusky flat disks of his nipples, but he only got as far as, "Uh, so, I remember you were looking into—" before he saw the burn and switched to, "What's that?"

  "What?" Hiraeth asked, going very still and wide-eyed.

  Keith pointed, reaching almost to touch it, then abruptly remembering how much that'd hurt. He tapped his own throat instead, the hollow between his collarbones. "There's a mark on your neck—it wasn't there when I saw you shirtless before—"

  "I wasn't aware you were looking so closely at my neck then," Hiraeth said, and put two fingers to the burn. "It's fine. It'll go away soon, I'm sure. Or it won't!"

  "Okay, but." Keith sat facing him, squinting at him a little. "What is it?"

  "Oh, well, the necklaces," Hiraeth said, kind of awkward suddenly. "When yours broke, mine melted. I got it off me quickly enough, but it did a good job getting my attention."

  Keith felt a rush to his head. He wasn't sure if he'd gone white or red or some horrible mottled mix of both, but he was absolutely sure he didn't look right. When he tried to speak, his voice came out in a wheeze and he had to cough to clear it. "I'm so sorry," he said. "I didn't mean—we didn't know—"

  "I just said it was fine, didn't I?" Hiraeth gave him a slightly odd look. "Injuries heal."

  But you're hurt. He didn't say it aloud, couldn't. No point. Hiraeth's total lack of concern over it made it feel weird to continue, even though he was sure the thought would be chasing itself around in his head for a while. "You've taken care of it, right?"

  "It didn't even blister, love. You were saying?"

  Keith cleared his throat. He looked at his knees instead of at Hiraeth at all, since he was running out of what felt like safe places to look. Not his face, not the burn, certainly not lower. "You were researching things," he said. "Did you find anything?"

  "Oh! Yes. I was going to save it until tomorrow morning and let you rest, then run over it with both of you at once." Hiraeth hesitated. "Would it make you feel better to hear it now?"

  Keith nodded. "Yeah. I mean, I think so. I'm going to be worrying about tomorrow no matter what, so might as well do it with less… horrible… unknown things."

  "Fair enough," Hiraeth said, smiling again finally. "I was able to dig up some house records. There was in fact an older man who lived out that way, and details on that were fairly easy to track down because he was in a number of newspaper articles and crafts magazines. He made traditional dolls. This was back in the late 1950s."

  "Ah," Keith said.

  "Right. I thought that was pretty relevant. It started out as a career, and then became something he did for his daughter, and after his daughter passed away, he threw himself into his work, making all kinds of dolls. A bunch of them are in local antique stores—I probably have some. Anyway, like I said, there were lots of articles. The combination of sob story and talent makes for good reading."

  Keith nodded slowly. "Well, that fits what… what I saw in there."

  Hiraeth flopped down on the bed and patted next to him, trying to encourage Keith to lie down next to him. Keith thought about pretending he didn't notice and saving himself potential embarrassment, but slowly curled down next to him.

  Pulling a blanket over them both, Hiraeth cuddled in. Keith's breath caught, coming a bit fast, but Hiraeth wasn't doing anything else, just curling against him, sharing the warmth starting to build between their bodies.

  "The perfume was related to that," Hiraeth said. "It doesn't seem to be related to his use of magic or anything else, but he'd perfume the dolls to make them seem more life-like. It'd explain why he still had so many bottles available to convert into something else, at least. Even if I'm not sure how he got them back when he clearly wasn't the last homeowner. Maybe they were stored in the house still."

  Managing a weak smile, Keith quipped awkwardly, "Or maybe he had to use Terrors to rob antique shops after all."

  "Or that," Hiraeth said brightly. "Anyway, that's all there is to it. He was a dollmaker, got obsessed with making them, faded to obscurity, and died in his house. I assume he practiced magic of some kind during his life, given the enchantment on the bottle, but you're hardly going to find any of that in the papers."

  Keith nodded.

  "Nobody lived in the house for more than a few years after, and it would have been eventually torn down in the construction, but as you know, construction has been halted due to inexplicable deaths at the site."

  "So what made him start getting active again now?" Keith asked.

  "A good question," Hiraeth said thoughtfully. "It might be simple: construction often disturbs spirits. Even if it hadn't reached his house yet, there would have been people around it, assessing the property and so on. It probably brought him back. At least enough to start to act out."

  Keith nodded slowly. "I guess it makes as much sense as anything. Can I have his name? If he's… I mean, like, his face was all gone to darkness. And he's researching memories. He's not a Terror, but I'll bet you anything you like that he's on the edge of turning to one. That's what you said, right?"

  "Yeah," Hiraeth said. "A ghost who forgets who they are for long enough slowly turns into a Terror."

  "So if we know who he is, we might be able to use that. I hope so, anyway."

  "Smart thinking," Hiraeth said. "I'll show you the articles tomorrow first thing. You can get his name, his daughter's, whatever you like."

  "Thanks."

  Hiraeth smiled at him and put a hand on Keith's chest. "So, you said something about betting me anything?" he said archly.

  Keith almost missed the humor in it, missed the edge of hopeful teasing, almost took it too seriously. Almost had to cringe back under the weight of all this all over again, the attraction, the desire, the fear, the guilt—

  And then the sparkle of mischief in Hiraeth's eye clicked, and he grabbed Hiraeth's pillow and shoved it in his face.

  "You're so relentless!" he said, laughing helplessly despite himself. "Do you ever quit?"

  Hiraeth batted the pillow aside. "I made you laugh," he said. "That's all I was really going for—"

  And Keith kissed him.

  He did it quickly, ducking in while Hiraeth was distracted and pressing his mouth to those open lips. It was less to catch Hiraeth off guard and more to catch himself off guard. His feelings were exhausting, his self-doubt more so. What Hiraeth was actually offering him was simple, sweet, harmless.

  He was lonely and he hurt.

  But still the kiss was quick, and he pulled back before Hiraeth could even respond, staring at him.

  "Keith?" Hiraeth asked softly, putting a hand to his cheek. "Do you want me to thank you and tell you to go to sleep?"

  Keith shook his head. "No," he said, and blinked rapidly against the tears he felt trying to well up.

  "Don't feel guilty," Hiraeth said, gentle. "It's okay to find whatever comfort you can when things are dark, darling. It truly is. Sometimes that's all we can do."

  "It doesn't feel okay," Keith murmured, shifting in closer. He raised one hand to brush through Hiraeth's fine, pale hair, and found one of his antlers with his fingertips. Slowly, he closed his fingers around them. The base of them was soft and velvety, with bone rising out of it.

  One corner of Hiraeth's mouth lifted in an awkward smile. "Have you tried letting it be okay?" He closed his eyes, tilting his face up but not leaning in for the kiss himself.


  Keith heard himself make a soft, strange sound. Of course he hadn't. He didn't let go of Hiraeth's antler. "It's fine if I let myself accept this?"

  "I can't answer that for you," Hiraeth said, chin up, eyes closed. "Would he rather you held off for his sake?"

  He could already imagine Lucas's face at the thought of that, choked on another odd sound that didn't know if it would be a laugh or a cry even as it came out. He kissed Hiraeth again, pulling him into it with the hand on his antler.

  It felt good. He let himself admit that, let himself let go, closed his eyes and kissed and kissed until they were both breathless, kissed until the wetness on his cheeks could be passed off as sweat from effort and arousal, kissed until both of their hair was a mess in between the knots of their fingers.

  Hiraeth was shifting against him by then, a slow and steady grind that felt even better, and Keith let himself just be a part of that, let himself enjoy the feel of a body moving against his, the feel of wanting each other and being able to touch. He let one of his hands drift down Hiraeth's side, felt a shiver, and an answering pass of a hand down his side as well.

  It dawned on him: Hiraeth was mirroring him.

  The thought was both frightening and arousing. This had to be his decision every step of the way, and Hiraeth was acknowledging that. What they did for each other, with each other, would stop or start with what Keith wanted.

  "You're…" Keith said, heard his voice come out thick and strange. It didn't sound like it belonged to him.

  He groaned softly, drifting his hand along Hiraeth's stomach, pressing down past the band of his boxers, curling around his hard cock.

  Hiraeth let out a gasp, almost a laugh, lips curling against his, and did the same. His hand was hot and firm—firmer than Keith's, though Keith didn't think that was deliberate—and it sent a shock of pleasure through him.

  "Just this is fine?" Keith whispered. He couldn't imagine more, not now, not really. Not exploring and trying other things. That was something for when they had time again.

  "Just this is wonderful," Hiraeth whispered back, and leaned in for another kiss.

  Keith moaned into his mouth, kissing him back, hand starting to move. He rocked into Hiraeth's touch as Hiraeth began to stroke him in a return; he found he didn't need to think at all. It was just this, just heat and pressure, the movement of bodies on each other, mouths on each other. Rolling against each other with their arms working against and between their bodies, a hot tight pressure to rock against as their movements became more unsteady.

  It didn't take long. He came almost before he was ready, biting down on Hiraeth's lower lip with a little whimper as pleasure caught and exploded.

  Hiraeth made a soft, delighted sound at it, praising him in soft, incoherent whispers, picking up the pace himself with straining muscles. He had to rock into Keith's hand himself, since Keith couldn't quite make it move, too caught up in his own pleasure.

  Keith came down from it, felt the guilt almost hit, and, gasping, dropped his forehead to Hiraeth's shoulder instead of letting it, focusing on getting his heavy arm moving again, keeping his fingers firm, wanting to give something to Hiraeth too—

  "Oh," Hiraeth breathed, head falling back, and he came, spilling across Keith's fingers, his stomach. He clung close to Keith, almost trembling, until the tension ebbed from his body.

  They both lay together, breathing hard, sweaty and overly heated. And then Hiraeth began to pull away, skin peeling off of Keith's. Keith watched him, the distant expression on his face, still lost in the echoes of pleasure.

  In the rush of cold air between their bodies, Keith couldn't hold the guilt back any longer.

  He thought all kinds of things in that brief moment: Hiraeth was leaving, Hiraeth was done with him now, he deserved to be left. It had to be true; Hiraeth was getting up already.

  Keith watched Hiraeth pad across the room to the bathroom, breathing in depression in the aftermath of pleasure.

  Then Hiraeth came back, carrying a wet washcloth and smiling at him.

  Oh, he thought, numbly.

  "What's that look on your face?" Hiraeth asked him fondly, kneeling on the bed again. Keith reached for the washcloth, but Hiraeth dodged his hand and leaned in to do it himself. The strangeness of the sensation, the intimacy of having someone else doing it, knocked through that growing emotional fog. "Did you think I was going to ditch you, darling my love?"

  "I can… I can be an idiot sometimes," Keith said. "I just feel—"

  Hiraeth dropped the washcloth next to the futon and slid back under the covers. "It does seem like you can be," he agreed warmly, and put a hand over Keith's eyes. "Go to sleep. I'm here."

  I'm here.

  Closing his eyes obediently, Keith replayed those words in his mind until sleep claimed him.

  chapter fifteen

  That night, his dreams were confusion: running through a heavy fog, slamming into shapes in the darkness without knowing what they were. He tried, at first, to feel them out with his hands to understand them, but something about them was wrong, leaving him shuddering hard and forcing him to pull away to run blindly into the fog again.

  In the dream, he felt bodiless and yet every impact hurt bone-deep. He couldn't seem to find himself, not with hands or sight, but he could hear himself, the raggedness of his breathing, the sounds of his body against the shapes, his gasps of pain.

  He wanted to slow down and feel his way around but couldn't seem to bring himself to, too panicked to control himself. Eventually he was forced to regardless, out of breath and in too much pain to keep going at that pace, his arms extended and finding things in the mist without seeing himself approaching them.

  Finally, something began to walk towards him in the fog, a figure gradually taking shape. A person.

  His first sensation was relief, dizzy and elated at finally having seen something, but a cold chill crept in and pushed that feeling away.

  The person coming towards him was himself, but couldn't be himself.

  There was no way to describe the realization. He could see a form that he knew was 'himself', but he couldn't make any sense of the features. It was like a magic eye picture. He'd been bad at those, growing up. No matter if he knew there was a horse in the picture, he couldn't see the horse.

  His eyes couldn't make sense of the awareness to show him himself. Instead, it was a stranger, a horrific jumble of features that he intellectually knew was him but that barely looked even like a human being.

  It was the only thing moving in this space, though. Something had chosen to approach him through the fog, mimicking him inaccurately.

  His heart was pounding, his throat dry. He felt that in the space where his body wasn't, and he felt his arm begin to raise again.

  He couldn't see it. Couldn't tell for sure how close he was to the figure, but could feel his arm tensing, rising from his side.

  He tried to grab it with his free hand, stop himself, but couldn't find his arm.

  Coldness against the ends of what must be his fingertips. He was touching the person's chest, hand against it. The thing lifted its own arm—late, slow, wrong.

  The coldness turned to heat, and a hand took hold of his, gone to a vague shadow and no longer recognizable as his own, and it yanked—

  Who am I?!

  It was Lucas's voice.

  Keith woke up with a strangled sound in his throat and his heart pounding. He lay there in a panicked daze under a heavy weight that he slowly realized was Hiraeth passed out in his arms, breathing heavily and drooling on his upper arm.

  Not for the first time, he wished that it was easy to tell himself that a dream was just a dream. It was too real, and he could still feel that uneven grip.

  But it couldn't be any kind of prediction, he decided as he mentally replayed the details. There was no way it was a true dream. Just a nightmare, same as anyone could have. He had a lot to be afraid of, and had just seen some really weird shit inside Marion. That was all. A dream doing what a
dream should do: sorting through experiences and trying to make sense of them.

  Even so, he couldn't shake the sense that there was something real about it.

  Who am I? The figure, himself/Lucas, had wailed. It was despair and loss, and the worst part was that Keith didn't have an answer. He hadn't seen anything he recognized there.

  It was a good hour that he lay there, watching Hiraeth sleep, the way his ears twitched with any sound in the room, before he eventually calmed down enough to fall back asleep.

  This time, he didn't remember dreaming.

  ***

  When morning came for real, he was awakened by Hiraeth trying to slip out of bed. Keith blinked at him blurrily and muttered something so incoherent that even he wasn't sure what it was supposed to be, rubbing his face.

  "Morning," Hiraeth said, freezing in spot and wincing at having woken him. The expression melted, a moment later, into a smile. "Sleep well?"

  "Uh." How to describe it? This morning might be awkward enough without the dream on top of it. "Not really, but I'll get by. What time is it?"

  "Little shy of eight," Hiraeth said. "I was thinking of getting some food. You'll be wanting proteins to face the day, I imagine, but I don't exactly keep bacon and eggs on hand."

  Keith shook his head, blushing a little as Hiraeth sat next to him again, warm and familiar. "It's fine," he said. "What do you have?"

  "Cereal. Fruit. Vegetables. Bread." Hiraeth shrugged helplessly. "Seriously, though, you're going to need to eat right for today! Even if it's not something I'll want to put in my mouth, I don't mind trying to cook it."

  "I'm not going to make you cook things you don't eat," Keith said. "I can grab something out. We're downtown anyway." He sat up, rubbing his eyes and letting his arm bump Hiraeth's. "How did you eat in the trenches? Weren't you limited to rations?"

  "Poorly," Hiraeth said immediately. "I ate poorly. Lots of sweet biscuits, vitamin chocolate, and oatmeal. Traded out my canned meats to other soldiers when I had any. I grazed on the side when we were lucky enough to have grass, and hoped nobody caught me."