the air that inhabits you
The Day after Imbolc, 1018 II Age
Viktor woke slowly, drawn into consciousness by the languid, gentle drift of Yuuri's fingers through his hair. The bed they shared in Hasetsuil was softer than those back in the North; he remembered the way they'd sunken into it, how cocooned he'd felt, drifting off to sleep. Softer still, better than down feathers and knit blankets was the awareness of Yuuri nearby, his feelings broadcast, the bent of his thoughts towards Viktor an audible and wonderful thing as he came out of sleep:
… you’re so beautiful, Vitya …
He smiled, because he couldn't not, when Yuuri beheld him thus, like Viktor was the one who was the miracle, even if Viktor knew otherwise. “... Good morning.”
“Good afternoon,” Yuuri corrected him, with subtle bemusement, and Viktor’s eyes opened wider, glanced up at the window. His husband was right: shadows stretched in the wrong direction, and yet … his husband answered the question before Viktor could ask it: “You needed your rest,” he hummed mildly, and Viktor glanced up, shook off the last vestiges of sleep. Yuuri, seated at the head of their bed with his back to the wall, was already fully dressed, and his wind-swept hair suggested that he'd been out at least once already. His magic had settled around him, no longer an erupting wildfire of life and heat, though his eyes still radiated the flickering warmth that Viktor loved so much. Coming back, he must've repositioned them both, and even that had not shaken the depths of Viktor's slumber. At the end of their magical race southeast, and Imbolc itself, Viktor had finally crashed headlong into the deepest rest of his life.
“Whose fault was that?” Viktor teased, and his grin grew in time with the spread of Yuuri’s blush, the one he’d known to expect. The high prince sat up to capture a belated good morning kiss, soft and delicate, nothing like the fireworks he remembered from the night before, then rested his forehead against his husband’s with a gentle, private smile. Now who’s beautiful?
“Still you,” murmured Yuuri, who neatly swept his fingers through Viktor’s hair one more time, and then feathered them over Viktor’s biceps, up his shoulders, laced them together at the nape of the prince's neck. “You need to get dressed,” he added reluctantly.
“Oh? You’ve made plans?”
There it was again, that blossoming blush, this time spreading up to the neat tapers of Yuuri’s ears. “Yes.”
Viktor swept aside Yuuri’s bangs, dropped one more kiss on his forehead, and stood up to get ready, lingering for a moment on both feet as he registered the protesting stiffness of his muscles, glanced down to take in this last tangible evidence of Imbolc.
Sorry — I probably got carried away. Yuuri was sheepish, rubbing at his own neck, now that they were separated, though Viktor knew perfectly well that he hadn’t been the only one; remembered digging his fingers into Yuuri’s shoulders, wondered if there were still scratch marks down his back. How many times had he bitten at Yuuri’s lips, or along his neck; how many times had he insisted that he still wanted more? Bonfires were often lit on the holy days of the sun; last night they had burned hotter and brighter and now there were cinders. … I could fix it, if you’re sore?
“No, no.” Viktor grinned, flashed the full width of his heart-shaped smile. I want to remember, he thought back, and moved to see about fetching fresh clothes. He wanted to feel it, still, the way they’d come back together; intended to relish every ache that recalled the press of Yuuri’s body, the heat of his mouth, the burn of his fingers.
- - -
Yuuri introduced him to Mama’s cooking, some local dish that was a Hasetsuil favorite, which Viktor probably finished too quickly to have been polite, strictly speaking. He’d been ravenously hungry, something which Hiroko attributed to exercise with a perfectly straight, saintly face.
He loved her all the more for it.
Still, they hadn’t lingered; Yuuri took him by the hand, led him out to one of the beaches to whistle for Vicchan.
“Where are we going?”
“You’ll see,” Yuuri promised, and from there they flew southwest on the coast, where the land gradually and steadily rose upwards over the sea until Vicchan flew over the white cliffs that Viktor remembered seeing at a distance from the Ardor. Below them, Vicchan made a series of baying noises, answered in a chorus from the cliffside, and then several other shadows emerged from the rocks and caught currents of air over the ocean as they took flight. Vicchan darted sharply left and flew out over the waves to join them. There were three other eagles; two slightly larger than either Vicchan or the third, and Viktor, who knew next to nothing about them, asked for no explanation and allowed himself the simple joy of enjoying the flight, the cutting chill of the ocean breeze in early spring. The four birds circled around each other in a loose helix, and raced across the sea in big, sweeping arcs, majestic and graceful. He lost himself to the rhythm of it. The ease. The ancient gods had placed men and elves and dwarves alike together on earth; had not given them this expanse of horizon, this unparalleled freedom.
To borrow some of it now was, he understood, a gift.
They circled back slowly, and eventually Vicchan landed at the top of the bluffs, and both he and Yuuri carefully slid off the eagle’s back before he settled down, turning his attention to cleaning his feathers with a series of neat, precise nips. “This is Vicchan’s family, as far as I can figure …” Yuuri explained, as two of the other eagles landed at a bit of a distance, clearly a little less acclimated to the presence of a stranger among them. Yuuri wandered underneath Vicchan’s big wings, then ran his hand over the bright yellow beak, standing between two of his talons without any fear. The biggest one’s his mom, I think, he explained, without looking back as Viktor studied them all. So his dad's the one with her, if I'm right, and the one overhead —
The one overhead was a little bigger, too, with tail feathers that weren’t quite so long as the rest. “A sister?” Viktor guessed, and Yuuri smiled a little bit, offered a nod.
Baby sister, he corrected. She’s just getting her grown-up feathers, see? She won’t stay here for too much longer, when she fledges.
There was some detail Viktor was forgetting, some reason why Yuuri was telling him this, some hint …
“You should see if you can figure out how to get her to come down,” Yuuri murmured, hiding a smile, and, for that matter, the rest of his thoughts.
“How would I do that?”
Yuuri glanced over the cliff’s edge, looking down at the tidepools below. “Personally? I went for for bribery,” he admitted with a short, breathless laugh, and this was a hint Viktor could get: fish. With an answering chuckle of his own, the Prince shook his head, walked over to the edge, and closed his eyes to extend a hand towards the water, summoning up a large, swirling ball of it. This orb drifted steadily upwards, before he splashed it out over the rocks, leaving half a dozen fish flopping about on the grass. Vicchan cawed in approval, though the two other great eagles took off, wary of this strange, splashing magic. “Show off,” Yuuri accused Viktor, though he reached for a fish and tossed it Vicchan’s way to stop his own bird from rushing through and ruining the impromptu buffet. The halfling received an answering bay of approval, and smiled so broadly the corners of his eyes crinkled. “Spoiled,” he accused Vicchan, but with such warmth and fondness that there couldn’t possibly have been any real sting in the word.
Go on, he encouraged, as Viktor walked forward, picked up one of the fish by its tail. Call her.
How?
Patiently.
Patience had never been something Viktor had possessed in abundance.
You’re patient with me, Yuuri reminded him.
I love you, Viktor thought back automatically, which was perhaps an answer in and of itself. Viktor sat on the edge of the cliff with the fish extended, looking upwards at the circling shadow that was Vicchan’s younger sister. He loved Yuuri, and Yuuri loved Vicchan, which meant Viktor loved Vicchan by extension: he loved everything Yuuri loved, because Yuuri had loved them first and so made them lovable …
The force of the eagle’s dive took him by surprise, a blast of air that ruffled his hair as strongly as any wind would have, and so did the neat snatch of the fish, straight from his outstretched hands. “Good!” Yuuri sounded delighted, and laughed again as she descended a second time for seconds among the pile of fish left among the grass. “Try it again.”
The fish did not last for very long, and neither did the tolerance of Vicchan’s parents, who took off to hunt bigger, more satisfying prey before sunset. Yuuri came to sit alongside Viktor, leaning into his shoulder. “You’re going to have to give her a name,” the halfling murmured, lacing their fingers together, and raising them to his lips so he might press a kiss to the back of Viktor’s hand.
“A name?”
“Mhmm.” Happy belated birthday, Vitya.
He understood, suddenly, remembered the conversations they’d had about a long future. You’ll teach me how to fly one of those eagles your people train, Viktor had said, and Yuuri had replied back: You’ll have to get one first.
“She’ll come with us?”
“If she likes you enough. We’ll come back tomorrow.” Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, if they had to. There was time, Viktor understood suddenly, so much time. “She needs a name.”
Viktor looked off at the horizon the eagles had taken off into, smiled. “Her name,” he decided, “is Makkachin.”
- - -
They headed back before it got dark, floating into Hasetsuil while the sky shifted to muted mauves and dusty violets out to the west, where gray clouds had gathered, promising distant storms. Yuuri waved Vicchan off as they strode back along the beach, fingers twined, wading through the incoming tides, and Viktor considered the way his life had so easily settled into this — this gentle, all-encompassing contentment, in just a handful of days.
Hey, idiots. It was just like Yura to interrupt this sort of contemplation, though Viktor had to smile at the umbrella inclusion of Yuuri, who tilted his head suddenly, and who also flashed an incredulous smile. As though he’d just remembered that he had a brother, now, too. If you hurry back you can come with us to the hot springs.
Us? Viktor prompted, giving Yuuri’s fingers a gentle squeeze, and then, forever obedient to his own whims, bringing them up to his lips.
Beka and I. Yuri’s thoughts were clipped, a little strident, even: Shut up. Are you coming?
We’re on our way, Yuuri answered for them both, which made Viktor happy too, in some strange way he never would’ve been able to put words to. Because he couldn’t resist, he added:
Wouldn’t miss it. Besides, you might need a chaperone.
For a moment Yuri’s thoughts radiated the cold, blazing light of his temper, and then he shot back: choice words for someone whose sister had to cast a silence spell around his room last night, and who couldn’t get out of bed until well after lunch.
Yuuri’s face, even in the twilight, turned bright red, but Viktor was too busy laughing to care: sister, Yuri had said, so easily, because it was true; they were family now. Mari was Viktor's sister now; in a way, she was Yuri's, too.
Quit being so sentimental and just hurry up, will you?
- - -
The hot springs were another kind of bliss: rising steam, healing waters, perfect heat. Yuuri, who’d had boundless energy for days, who’d stayed up late, who’d risen early, was still now, the only tangible sign of life the steady hum of his heartbeat and the way he kept fiddling with the long silver tails of Viktor’s hair, wet and just barely troubling the surface of the water.
It was perfectly soporific. Viktor turned and kissed the top of his head.
Yura was ill-content with silence when it wasn’t the steady darkness of the ban side who sat in one corner of the springs. Otabek’s head was tilted back against the rocks, gaze up on the twinkle of constellations overhead, and now wasn’t the time to ask him what he was thinking, what he saw when he looked up there, counting the radiating planets and distant galaxies. “You were flying, earlier, I thought?” Yuri murmured, idly curious. “Where did you go?”
“Mhmm. Yuuri took me to where Vicchan’s parents … nest? Is that the word?” Viktor felt Yuuri’s nod against his shoulder and the hum of approval in his thoughts. “Nest.” He confirmed, then, and smiled a little bit at his brother. “He’s got a sister,” he added. “Maybe you can come with us, tomorrow, to meet her?”
It won’t chase her off, will it?
As long as he’s patient. Yuuri opened his eyes, and glanced back across the hot springs, evaluated the distance between Yuri and Otabek, who sat at opposite edges of the pool without tension or need; comfortably distant. Viktor had settled in next to him without an ounce of hesitation, draped an arm over his shoulders. The prince was still making up for lost time, still filling all his empty spaces with physical reminders of Yuuri’s presence. They’d come together like a comet, this past year; blazing and brilliant, fast, inevitable. Otabek and Yuri made him think more of the planets, the way they moved together so slowly in the sky, progressed over years and years and years through the careful patience and perfect design of everything that orbited the sun. It’ll be fine.
“Really?” There were few things better than watching Yuri react to surprise; to this fresh reminder that the things that were Yuuri’s were now, in a way, his too. Viktor had already taken in the lesson that the world did not need to be all frozen, hard edges, was not quite the place Yakov insisted it was; Yuri was still learning, coming to his own conclusion about gentleness, striving to find a way to bear it without sacrificing any of the sharp edges he’d spent so many years crafting. Viktor did not think the subtle flush on his cheeks was from the heat of the onsen alone. “… Thanks,” his brother muttered, and he shuttered his thoughts before anyone had a chance of accusing him of being pleased.
Viktor lost track of time after that, but it couldn’t have been too terribly long. Like always, it was Yura who sent him out of his meditative lull, already climbing out of the springs. Otabek sat at a distance, wrapped back up in one of the Hasetsuil robes, nearly dry. “Mari says not to stay in too long,” Yuri warned them both, casting a piercing glance in Viktor’s direction, and whatever else he was thinking about saying was cut off on a sharp clip, and then so were his thoughts. He dressed quickly, and when he left, took Otabek with him, slipping his long fingers around the ban side’s wrist before Beka caught his palm, and twined their hands together.
“They’re cute,” Yuuri murmured, turning his lips to Viktor’s shoulder, kissing the outside edge where sinew meets bone.
“Oh?” Viktor replied idly, sweeping a hand through Yuuri’s hair, all soft curls, made more wild by their afternoon of flying and only now tamed a bit by rising onsen steam. “Say that to his face sometime,” he quipped, flashing a brief, crooked grin.
“Vitya,” Yuuri admonished, quite seriously. “I think that’s the worst advice you’ve ever given me.”
Was he ever going to get tired of all the different ways Yuuri might say his name?
“It probably is,” Victor murmured, running a thumb over Yuuri’s bottom lip.
The answer, he decided, was no.
- - -
One week after Imbolc, 1018 II Age
They went back, time and time again, until gradually Makkachin needed no bribes of fish to come down to Viktor, at least. He was generous with praise and affection for the eagle’s progress, a natural teacher, Yuuri thought. Otabek watched at a distance, subtly bemused, though the ranger never went so far as to admit what was funny. This attitude lasted until Yuri finally was able to call Makkachin, too, stroked the side of the great eagle's face. “What,” he called out, looking back at the ban side, who’d chosen to sit halfway between Makkachin and the roost of her parents, who watched them all from the edge of the bluffs, “you think you can do any better?”
Now there were three pairs of eyes on him; two aes sidhe royalty and the halfling who bore the phoenix totem, and for a moment it looked as though Otabek would do nothing in response. Then he seemed to sigh, perhaps at himself, or perhaps at the three of them, curiously bunched together around the eagle. No one had demanded answers and yet it was the way of their people to want them. This was harmless. He would not disappoint. Otabek turned his head, glancing back towards the other pair of eagles, and began to sing. Yuri and Viktor had heard before the banshee’s song of mourning, but this was different, somehow; the baritone of his voice was gentle and even, soothing. While they all stood there watching, one of the other eagles came forward, followed at a short distance by the other, and slowly they crept forward together, turning their heads this way and that as he sang, until the larger of the two — Vicchan’s mother — nudged the ranger’s back with her beak.
“... Show off,” muttered Yuri, without spite; his citrine eyes lingered on the ranger for perhaps longer than they should have. Banshee tricks, Yakov might've said, were he here, but there was so much more to it than that, such an understanding of the natural order. When Otabek stopped, suddenly, Yuri almost protested the loss out loud. The ban side froze, his eyes fixed off in the distance, fixated on a thin trail of smoke nearly invisible on the western horizon.
“We need to return to Hasetsu at once,” he said, expression grave, and as he strode forward shadows gathered ahead, solidifying into the familiar shape of the wyvern.
“Beka, what is it?”
“Trouble of some sort at the cauldron,” Otabek replied, unusually terse. “I can barely make it out.” He looked past Yuri, fixed his gaze on Viktor. “The singer is one of the rangers, and he’s hurt.” the captain murmured, with a calm Yuri could tell he did not feel. Otabek climbed onto the back of the shadow guardian, fixing his eyes on the western horizon. “Christophe will be calling for aid, I suspect.”
“Christophe?” Victor echoed, somewhat incredulous.
“Christophe,” Otabek confirmed. “It is his mate who sings the song.”
Yuuri whistled for Vicchan, after that, and as Otabek took off he extended a hand for Yuri, drew him up on the wyvern. Before he and Viktor took off, Viktor looked back at Makkachin, clawing impatiently at the earth.
“Makka,” he called gently, “you can come with us if you want.”
- - -
Minako met them at the city gate, and Viktor followed wordlessly to the wayseeing stone, which was not Christophe, as Otabek had predicted, but Jean-Jacques, standing in the same hall where he’d once been in Vaux Romandith.
Jean-Jacques looked shaken, standing in front of the stone with a subtle twitch in his cheek. Isabella lingered behind him, one elegant hand pressed to the curve of the newest Prince’s shoulder. “… Christophe says Rafael’s trying to make for A’ve Palmera, and he’s rushed out to go get him, told me to stay here to make sure I could speak to you —“
“One thing at a time,” Viktor instructed. “Tell me what happened.”
“According to Christophe, Rafael thinks the cauldron may erupt soon. Apparently he was investigating when he came across one of the dragons — the one you fought, maybe, he says he has the impression it was damaged, otherwise he’s sure Rafael wouldn’t have made it.” Jean-Jacques winced as he relayed the tale. “He was here when it happened. Viktor, you should have seen his face, he —“
“I understand,” Viktor said quietly, glancing back at Yuuri, who looked down at the floor with a flash of regret.
I’m sorry that you do.
Nothing for it now, Viktor reminded him, and because it wasn’t enough to channel that reassurance over the bond, he looked away from the clear orb of the stone, from Jean-Jacques, and said the words aloud: “It was worth it,” he reminded Yuuri, who looked up in surprise, eyes suddenly shining. “I’d do it again with no regrets.”
“Where is Christophe now?” Otabek asked.
“He left for the oasis almost immediately. Viktor — before he left —“
“Yes?”
“He grabbed me by the shoulders,” Jean-Jacques relayed tersely. “Told me to beg you, if I had to — not you, Viktor, but … Yuuri. Yuuri, he asked for you.”
“... This is worse than I thought,” Otabek murmured, and he stepped back towards the door. “I am going to call Seung-gil.” He looked at Viktor, and unspoken, some understanding passed between them, something that had Otabek’s shoulders softening in relief.
“It’s Yuuri’s decision,” Viktor said, and he looked back at his husband.
Christophe and I have each ruined each other’s lives once, but he recently saved mine, I think.
“You mean Samhain,” Yuuri whispered, almost inaudibly. “You really mean that?”
He kept me from making you into something you are not for my own comfort.
“I would like to repay him," Viktor added quietly, "but the power he’s asking for is yours.”
What's mine is yours, Yuuri thought back, and when Viktor's eyes softened, he reached up for just a moment to touch the high line of the prince's cheek. “... Otabek,” Yuuri said, “Viktor and I will ride ahead. We can travel faster than the rest of you.”
“… If you travel over the canyons, you may be seen,” cautioned the Ranger from where he stood in the doorway.
“We will take that chance,” Yuuri decided, with a wry smile. Luck is on our side. “You, though, will need a second flyer and safe passage. Speak to my sister. Her illusions should grant you cover.”
“Should I meet you all there?” Jean-Jacques asked, desperate to be useful.
Viktor shook his head. “Not yet. Order evacuations from the mesas, if you haven’t already; have those who live nearby come shelter at Vaux Romandith if they must.” Sensing, perhaps, that this was a disappointing answer for the brash young prince, Viktor appealed to duty. “If Rafael is right about the cauldron, people will look to you for calm,” he reminded Jean-Jacques quietly. “We will need you still, if that is the case.”
“A’ve Palmera still has its wayseeing stone,” Jean-Jacques reminded them.
“Then we will use it at first opportunity to contact you, and hopefully with good news. Yuuri?”
Yuuri’s normally soft gaze had hardened, and in it Viktor could read the courage that he’d learned to expect from his halfling, the only person on earth who he could imagine might face down his own death year after year and emerge from it singing and dancing at Beltane, wonderfully, beautifully alive.
Yuuri, who’d rewritten the definition of bravery for him, along with everything else that mattered.
“Let’s go.”
Otabek held them at the door for a moment, laid his hands on each of their shoulders. None of them could understand what he said next, but it sounded a little bit like a benediction, a blessing, a prayer:
be humble, for you are made of earth;
but be noble, too: for you are also the stuff of stars.