Not Wisely, But Too Well, a carry on fanfic

This story is cross-posted on AO3. See end for author notes.

Not Wisely, But Too Well

Simon Snow is going to die kissing me. Just not today.

They've never discussed it, this old age thing. It's one topic of conversation they've pointedly avoided over the years. It's never been far from Baz's mind, but to discuss it would make it feel… real. And if they don't discuss it, they don't have to worry about it, right?

Besides, Simon would probably die before he reached old age anyway. Even without magic, the kid was a walking disaster. As much as he had complained about his Great Destiny, once it was fulfilled, Simon had to find himself, or rather, reinvent himself. Who was he without magic? Without the power of the universe thronging around him? Who was he if he wasn't the hero? Who was he without a destiny to fulfill?

An adrenaline junkie, apparently. Somehow, Baz wasn't surprised. Simon purchased a motorbike, which he would drive through the city like a maniac, invisible tail following as he whipped around corners, knocking down bins and sometimes becoming entangled in dog leashes or clotheslining passers-by. Simon didn't care. He loved the rush, the speed, the wind in his face and the air in his wings, which he used to decelerate like a parachute in a drag race.

Baz had hoped he would settle down when they were older. Once he had graduated from uni and they could start a proper life together. He should have known better. He had lived with Simon for seven-and-a-half years, and he was well aware that the boy never shied away from any source of excitement in his life.

First it was the street racing. Then it was the boxing. (Wings and tail tucked in, naturally. Simon refused to have them removed for reasons Baz couldn't understand.) And then it was the skydiving, which was the worst of all. Simon would charter a private plane and throw himself from its open doors, whooping like a banshee and plummeting towards the earth at high speeds, always refusing the pull his parachute until the last possible second. Baz always attended these jumps, wand tucked up his sleeve, ready to throw an Upsy-daisy! or a Whoa there, pardner! at his idiot boyfriend as Simon grappled with his gear while rocketing towards the ground.

He never needed to, of course. Simon did have wings after all, even if he couldn't use them in front of the Normals. It didn't mean Simon could fly, but it did mean that he was perfectly capable of breaking his fall if necessary, using them in the same way he did when he slowed his motorbike without using the breaks. Somehow this didn't make Baz feel any better.

Then came Natasha Penelope Snow-Pitch. Simon and Baz had discussed having children, but had come to the eventual conclusion that it would be a Very Bad Idea. There were reasons of secrecy, of course – mages didn't give up magickal children, so they would have to adopt a Normal child – but there was also the issue of Baz's habit of draining small animals when he got hungry and the fact that from time to time after a particularly bloody dream, he still awoke on top of Simon, face tucked into the crook of his neck, fangs halfway out.

Simon never called him out on it, but Baz knew that he noticed. Sometimes he wondered why Simon never said anything. Then he did his best to forget that question and move on.

Natasha came into their lives on a trip to Cairo to visit some of Baz's extended family. Baz was interrogating a terrified vendor about the authenticity of his dragon-skin wares when Simon hurtled into him, eyes wide and hair tousled madly, clutching a small bundle of rags in his arms. Baz was about to ask what was going on when the rags began to cry. Simon grabbed Baz by his elbow, pulled him into a side street, and held out the wailing bundle to him.

"She's magickal," Simon said urgently, before pulling the baby back into his arms and bouncing it carefully against his chest.

"People don't give up magickal children, Snow. Besides, how do you know?"

"I can smell it on her," Simon said insistently, and with a jolt, Baz realized that he was right. The infant's scent was muddled with Simon's and the smell of the filthy rags, but it had a static crackle in the air was that distinctively magickal. "I found her in a dumpster," Simon continued. "Crying. I could feel her magic. It drew me in. Like a magnet."

"A dumpster?"

Simon nodded, and his eyes began to well with tears. He pressed the child tight to his chest and said, "She's mine now. I'm keeping her."

"Simon, she's not a stray alley cat. You can't keep her."

"Watch me." Simon stuck out his upper lip and said, "You don't have to. But I am."

Baz sighed. "No parents in sight?"

"She was in a dumpster, you clot. I'm not letting her go to a Normal orphanage either. They wouldn't know what to do with her." Baz could hear the unfinished sentence on Simon's lips. Just like they didn't know what to do with me.

And so Natasha came into their lives, all 2.2 kilograms of her. Baz cast protection charm after protection charm over her to safely transport her back to London, where Dr Wellbelove could begin tending to her as her private physician. She was premature, they learned, likely born between 30 and 32 weeks. But she was a fighter, Dr Wellbelove noted, and she would grow into a proper weight soon enough.

Her name was obvious. It's not like they had anyone else to name her after, and she was their first (and likely only) child. Her name had to be special. It had to have meaning.

"Well, it's not like you can name her 'Mage Humdrum Snow-Pitch,'" Baz commented dryly. "That would be idiotic. How many other formative figures do you have in your life?"

Natasha Penelope it was.

Nat's sudden introduction into their lives changed a lot of things very quickly. Both Baz and Simon both realized they really had no idea how to parent, Simon due to his upbringing in the foster system and Baz due to his shitty father. Baz's stepmother would help from time-to-time, as well as Penelope's parents and Dr Wellbelove. But for the most part, Baz and Simon had to figure it all out on their own.

Penelope and Micah were asked to be Nat's godparents. They said yes in a heartbeat.

Simon stopped skydiving. Baz supposed that was his one concession to his new role as a parent. He did pick up cliff-jumping, however, which wasn't Baz's favorite thing, but was certainly better than watching his boyfriend hurtle from the sky. (Were they still boyfriends now? They were parents. They had a child together. Did that make them married? Baz felt like it should.)

Natasha attended Watford. She was a bright young thing, not the most skilled at incantations but a voracious reader. (Simon blamed Penelope's influence. Every birthday Natasha celebrated, she received more books from Penelope than proper gifts from Baz and Simon.) (Every year, they tried to outdo Penelope, but every year, Penelope somehow found out how much they had bought for Nat and outdid them. It was infuriating.)

Simon and Baz were quite possibly the proudest parents ever. Although Natasha's performance in Magic Words was average at best, she excelled in Political Science and History. Headmistress Bunce told them with a wink that in her Non-Human Relations class, Nat had done an outstanding presentation on the systematic oppression of vampires in modern society. When Natasha came home to visit them for a long weekend, Baz scooped her up and congratulated her on excellent presentation.

"I hope it helped," Nat said, chewing her lip thoughtfully. Her dark eyes were concentrated and her brow was furrowed. She looked much older than eleven. "It makes me sad when people say bad things about vampires. And other non-humans too. It's not fair."

"No, it's not," Baz said. Natasha nestled her face into Baz's dark hair.

"Baba," she said, her voice muffled, "what's going to happen to you when Dad dies?"

For a moment, Baz was too stunned to answer. Then he realized that with all her research, she must have discerned the unknown end to his story. "I don't know," he said softly, stroking Natasha's hair. "I try not to think about it."

Nat doesn't bring it up again. For this, Baz was grateful.

They finally get married after Natasha's graduation from Watford. Baz never could figure why neither of them seemed to want to do it sooner. Perhaps they didn't want to upset the status quo they'd created with a child to care for. Perhaps they were both too scared to formalize what they had in front of the World of Mages. Imagine the gossip rags! Gay Vampire Mage, the Last Male Heir of the House of Pitch, Marries Former Chosen One, Now a Normal with Wings and a Tail! Natasha would never hear the end of it. Children could be so cruel.

At least, that's the rationale Baz fed himself.

Simon was the one to propose, in the end. Baz always figured that it would be him. Simon was the assertive one. Simon was the one who made all the moves in their relationship. When Simon got down on one knee, Baz was suddenly filled with rage, with fury, with the burning pain of whyohwhyhasthisneverhappenedbefore and wecouldhavehadsomuchtimetogether and goddamnfuckingsimonsnow.

Then he kissed Simon. Naturally.

Light a match inside your heart, then blow on the tinder.

Baz's heart was aflame.

They argued over wedding planning. They argued over how the roles in the wedding would work. Who would walk down the aisle? Who would give one of them away? Why did no one ever come up with a simple formula for same-sex weddings? Do they even have to follow the formula to begin with?

Penelope was the maid of honor and Micah was the best man. Baz didn't have many options, mind you. He only had one male best friend, and that was the one he was marrying. Baz's father refused to attend the wedding, but his stepmother came, and she sat in the front row proudly, happy to support the boy who had become her son. Mordelia came as well, along with the rest of Baz's younger siblings, all with names equally as ridiculous (Montressor, Marvolo, and Montague). Mordelia joined Penelope as a bridesmaid, and the gaggle of young adult men joined Micah as groomsmen. It was almost like having a proper wedding party.

In the end, Natasha gave them both away. She walked her fathers down the aisle, one arm linked with each of them, and at the end of the walk, she gave them each a peck on the cheek. It was unorthodox, but it worked for them.

Marriage didn't make Simon idle. If losing his magic, settling down with his boyfriend, and having a child didn't do the trick, Baz figured there wasn't much chance married life could either. But with Natasha attending uni (St Andrew's, studying Social Anthropology), Baz found himself more and more aware of Simon's impending mortality. Like after the skiing accident that broke both of Simon's legs. Or the time Simon was in a car crash on the M25. Or when Simon began to complain that his hair was greying. Or any time Simon moved a little too slowly, or took a long time to stand up, or began needing reading glasses to see what was right in front of him.

Simon was getting older. And Baz wasn't.

He hadn't told Simon yet. He didn't know how to break it to him. He was still aging, sure, but much more slowly than he should be. While Simon looked to be in his mid-fifties, Baz could still pass as twenty-four.

That is, if Baz would show it.

The thing was, Baz wasn't showing it. Instead, he cast small enchantments on himself every morning – glamours, of a sort – to change his appearance, just enough to look like he was getting older. Just enough that Simon wouldn't know. It was his daily ritual. He would shut himself in the bathroom and draw age lines across his face, adding wrinkles and spots and streaks of grey in his perfectly black hair. The incantation was Shakespearean. He'd discovered the magic on his own. "All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: They have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his Acts being seven ages."

It was long, but it worked.

Natasha knew. She'd caught him at it one time, when she was sixteen years old. "Oh Baba," she'd said as she took in the scene, Baz's face half aged and half youthful. She didn't pry any further, but Baz saw the looks she gave him for the rest of the summer.

Natasha became a professor. It wasn't a tremendous surprise, because she had always loved to teach. Penelope was beyond proud and insisted that she was the reason why. Simon told Penelope that she was a terrible influence and he could have had a footballer for a daughter if she'd just kept her nose out of things. Penelope laughed and continued to gloat.

Time changed and seasons passed. Simon came home with a cough one day that he couldn't seem to shake.

The tremors started later. Baz would hold Simon's hand tightly, feeling the shakes that Simon couldn't control. He couldn't tie his shoes. He could barely eat without coating the entire kitchen in food flung from his fork before it made it to his mouth. Simon was still proud. He was still clinging on to his dignity.

He couldn't even piss upright anymore.

Simon fell, once. He fell on the tile floor of the bathroom and couldn't get back up. The shakes were too strong, his balance too poor. Baz held him close as Simon cried into his chest, shaking all the while. His words were hard to understand. "I just… I want to… to be… to be at rest…" Simon whispered. "I'm so… so tired. I can't… I can't keep moving… forever. Shaking… forever. My body… my body is tired."

Dr Wellbelove said that there was nothing to be done.

"It will take over eventually, Basilton," he said softly, with a heavy hand on Baz's shoulder. "I can try medications, I can try magic, but in the end, I need you to accept that. We can prolong his life as much as possible. That doesn't mean we can cure him."

When he was finally alone, all of Baz's anger and pain and fury and suffering exploded out of him in a supernova of emotion. He drained creature after creature as he stalked through the woods behind a local park. It didn't help. Nothing could.

He punched a boulder hard enough to break his fingers. They made a satisfying cracking noise as they shattered.

After healing him, Penelope asked him to see a therapist. "You're grieving, Baz, and that's okay. But remember that he's not dead yet. We're all getting older. You are too. It's part of the process. We all have to learn to accept that."

"I'm not getting older," Baz rasped out, his throat sore from crying. "It's a trick. A fucking magic trick."

Penelope's gaze softened. "Basil… what do you mean?"

With a shuddering sigh, Baz raised his wand and dropped his glamours with a quick "To thine own self be true." He could feel the age melting off of his face. He could feel his hair thickening, his skin tightening. He could feel Penelope's wide eyes on him.

"Baz," she said with a tremor in her voice. "Baz, have you told him?"

"No. And you won't either. Swear to me."

For a moment, Penelope could only gawk at Baz's true form. Then, she reached out and clasped Baz's hand. "I swear."

Simon Snow dies with his lips pressed to Baz's, Baz holding him closes as he hears Simon take one last shuddering breath. Simon's still body turns cold in Baz's arms as he clutches his extinguished star, the brightest thing in his life and the center of his entire universe. Evening glides into morning, but Baz's world is still eternal night. The glamours melt away, and Baz doesn't reapply them. He holds his Simon – his darling, loving, beautiful Simon – until Natasha arrives, opening the door to the bedroom slowly so as to not interrupt him.

"Dad," she whispers in shock, before settling on the bed next to Baz. Baz turns to his daughter, and they clutch each other, raw and desperate and empty with loss.

Natasha settles the funeral arrangements. Baz is incapable of moving, incapable of feeding, incapable of any form of consolation. He sits in the bed for two days after the undertaker removes Simon's body. He can't speak. He can barely breathe.

The funeral is at Watford. Baz barely registers it. He can barely register anything at all. All he knows is that Simon is gone. And without Simon, he has nothing left. He has Natasha, but not for forever. One day, she will die too. And Penelope, and Micah, and Mordelia, and everyone he has ever loved. One day, they will all be gone too. And he will be alone. Forever.

Natasha holds him tightly as they stand by the side of the lake, preparing a wooden boat. Simon's body is inside, surrounded by what must be an entire meadow of flowers. He is still. For once in his life, he looks at rest.

The arrows are lit before the boat leaves shore. A Viking funeral, then. Baz stares distantly into the crackling flame. Pitches are good with fire. Baz is good with fire.

"Baba," whispers Natasha, her voice thick. "Go."

Baz turns to look at her. She isn't crying, but she's close to it. She seems to be holding herself together just for him. "What?" he asks.

Natasha chokes back a sob. "Go. Baba. Go be with him." She heaves a heavy sigh, and then says with practiced composure. "You're flammable."

Everything falls into place.

A flaming pyre, set adrift on the sea.

Last scene of all, that ends this strange eventful history, is second childishness and mere oblivion – sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

Natasha cries.

Thank you for taking the time to read this story. The beginning and end came to me fully formed, and I had a lot of fun finding the middle. I haven't written fiction in a very long time, and to have an insistent plot bunny is the best feeling in the world! Please feel free to leave any feedback you might have - as an author, I devour any favorites or reviews you may care to offer.