written for fma rarepair week 2017! prompt was 'mythology au,' so i went for a retelling of the myth of atalanta and hippomenes for the underappreciated ship, russell/roy. hope you enjoy! feedback is appreciated.
The lush greenery of Xenotime couldn't hold a candle to the beauty of one Russell Tringham: beside his golden hair, his slate-blue eyes that shimmered in sunlight, and his fine, slender build, like a dancer, those rolling fields looked dull and gray. Coupled with his charm and wit, he was something truly exquisite. A word, a gesture could bring the stubbornest to their knees, and even the harshest melted just to hear the melody of his laugh. Like a crystalline stream, he dazzled.
His coming of age brought suitors of all genders to his door, each one more eager than the last to claim this stunning young man for their own.
Russell turned them down, every single one.
"Why?" his father asked, time and time again. "I don't understand. What was wrong with that one?"
"He was homely," Russell would say, examining his cuticles in disinterest. "He had a spot on his chin. If we married, I'd never stop staring at it."
Indeed, for every suitor, Russell could find some infinitesimal flaw to make him turn the poor person away. He was homely, she was boring, they had a voice like pins in his ears—meanwhile, he only grew lovelier as the years passed, and his father's patience grew thinner and thinner.
"I've had it," he finally said one summer, weeks after Russell's twentieth birthday. The day had brought him many gifts from visitors who had traveled far and wide, all intending to win his obstinate heart, and Russell had barely blinked at any of them. "That's it. You'll marry before your next birthday, or I'll throw you out of my house, mark my words."
Russell argued, Russell fought, but his father—though normally weak-willed—held his ground. At long last, Russell surrendered—under one condition, he said. Throughout the country, his beauty and grace had him on a pedestal, a prize to be won, so to speak; if Russell were a prize, then, he would be earned, not claimed. He proposed a competition, the winner of which would become his betrothed.
"What sort of competition?" his father asked warily.
Russell smiled, stretching out his long, elegant legs where he sat and folding his hands in his lap. "Simple," he responded. That smile grew sly. "A race."
The news spread throughout the east and beyond. A race! A mere footrace to win the hand of the loveliest youth in Amestris! The trains clogged as suitors from all walks of life hurried to that land of green, where, so it was said, they only had to beat Russell Tringham in a simple footrace to make him theirs.
However, Russell was crafty. Standing at more than six feet, with long, shapely legs and a trim waist, he was a born sprinter: he could easily outrun all of his classmates in his schooldays and now, as an adult, hardly touched the ground as he flew. To defeat him in a race would be no mean feat. His father drew out a track stretching from one end of town to the other, and the wooers arrived by the dozens, all determined to best him and thereby claim him.
The first candidate was no competition at all. With his build and the homefield advantage, Russell was lounging at the finish line long before the man trudged up, panting and dripping sweat, and with a wave of his hand, Russell sent him away. Again and again, it ended the same: some suitors speedier than others, a precious handful even offering some semblance of a challenge, but all ultimately failing to outpace the swift, hard-hearted young man they so desired.
It seemed that Russell would remain forever a virgin, doomed to live out his days as a spinster with only his sweet-faced sister for company. Though much gentler than her stubborn brother, Fletcher agreed with the way his shunned every suitor who flocked to him; she supported him when their father only pleaded with him to soften, in vain, of course.
"You should marry for love," Fletcher told him simply. It's what she had done, mere months before. Indeed, the whole town was stunned when that brilliant golden-eyed traveler, the blood of ancient Xerxesians in his blond hair and dark skin, had breezed into town and passed right by Russell to deem his younger sister the most beautiful person he had ever seen. Whispers on the street called it a hoax, a scheme to weasel in closer to Russell and win his heart—but Russell had seen the letters Alphonse Elric wrote Fletcher, praising her kindness and cleverness, and knew that their love was true. He had yet to visit in the weeks since they became man and wife, up to his eyes in lofty research, but each missive he sent promised that when he at last returned, his work complete, it would be for good. His devotion was something to envy.
"Would that I could," Russell said dully. "But a deal is a deal. I have until my next birthday to find someone to marry, or Father will throw me out. I'll probably be forced to leave town."
"Then I'll leave with you," Fletcher said at once, and she clasped his hands. "My Alphonse has a sister, or an almost-sister, in Resembool who makes prosthetics. We can stay with her until he comes back to me, and then we'll all live together. How does that sound?"
With a smile he didn't feel, Russell deemed it wonderful, and the siblings embraced. It would be better, if nothing else, than spending a life alone, or being left to gather dust like a doll on a shelf.
One unusually warm autumn day, he came.
"Roy Mustang," the man introduced himself in a voice as warm and rich as honey, his hand smooth and deft around Russell's own. He lifted that hand to his mouth to brush it with a kiss, gentle as a feather. "I must tell you, Russell, that nothing I've heard in my many travels has done your beauty justice. Leto might have crafted you in his own image."
He spoke very prettily, true, but so had many others. Russell treated him with no more than due courtesy as his father invited him home for tea, where Roy sat opposite Russell and watched him curiously.
"I am sure," he began, with frank honesty that made Russell turn his head, "that there's nothing I can say to you that you haven't heard many, many times before. Hm, Russell?"
Russell's mouth opened, then closed. He averted his eyes to his tea. "That's true, yes," he murmured. There was a noise that might have been his father sucking his teeth in displeasure.
"Then I won't talk about myself. You can ask any person in the east about my fame as a general, or my skill as a politician; I won't bore you by droning on and on about it myself. I want to hear about you." Roy's eyes shone, black as onyx, as they drank in Russell's face.
And, unbidden, that face flushed, color rising high in Russell's cheeks as he blinked. Too many suitors to remember, but he knew this: not one had ever asked Russell to talk about himself.
So he did. He explained his love of books, describing in intricate detail the latest text he'd read. He gushed about his garden: fruits, vegetables, flowers, all grown from seed by his own tender hand. He listed his favorite foods, his favorite time of year, his favorite sort of music, and soon his mouth grew dry with all his talking; Fletcher happily refilled his teacup and shooed away their father, who seemed to think that Russell was being uncouth.
When Russell had talked his fill, Roy, with his eager prompting, explained his own history. He was the son of Xingese immigrants who had died in his childhood; from there, the young Roy had been raised by an aunt in a small but bustling brothel in the nation's capital. It had seemed that a life of ignominy was his due, but Roy had been more determined than that. He enlisted the day that he came of age; through his own cleverness, determination, and grit, he soon established himself as an accomplished military officer, who went on to play a vital role in reforming an army that too often veered toward harshness and intolerance.
At thirty years old, Roy, now a decorated brigadier general, had retired from his position and turned his attention to politics. Positive change remained his goal: indeed, he could speak himself hoarse on the council floor explaining why a certain tax would only bleed the poor, or why the ratification of a detailed human rights bill—the inclusion of marginalized groups underlined and bolded—was irrefutably necessary.
And yet, accomplished though he was, he remained a simple man at heart. He enjoyed warm, fruity wines, games of chess, and long, cold nights in a lover's arms by the fire. "I have seen more, achieved more, and dreamed more in my brief time on this world than many three times my age could even imagine," Roy said, fixing Russell with a deep, dark gaze that sent a shiver up his spine. "And this is only the beginning for me, of course. Yet, in spite of it all … I have felt for so long that something has been missing from my life. A hole in my chest still aches to be filled. When I look into your eyes, Russell?"
Here, he leaned in close—closer than was strictly proper, but what did Russell care?—and tipped Russell's chin up with careful fingers, so that their gazes locked. Those eyes! That inky black reminded Russell so much of a night sky, he almost expected to see stars reflected in the gleaming irises.
"I think I may at last have found my answer," he murmured. His other hand cradled Russell's as though it were made of finest, most delicate glass. "What's the world without someone to share it with?"
The perfume of his skin, heady wood smoke cut through with gentle lavender. The elegant arch of his eyebrows: not one stray hair marred that perfection. His lips, red and ripe as cherries, so smooth and soft-looking. So close to Russell's own. A kiss would border on outright scandal, but, oh, how very tempting.
Instead, though—not moving his face an inch—Russell said softly, "Here's hoping your feet have half the skill of your tongue, then."
He stood and swept from the room, leaving Roy to boggle in his wake.
Roy Mustang had not divulged all his secrets, of course. Love was about honesty. Wooing, on the other hand—that was about surprises. And did he ever have a surprise in store for fair, clever Russell as they dawdled near the track in the minutes before their race.
Russell suspected nothing, of course, stretching so that his body curved long and supple as a hunter's bow. Roy was of a fair height, but Russell dwarfed him; his shapely legs made Roy's seem ungainly indeed. It was a shame, Russell thought, with a touch of genuine sadness—here was the first suitor he might be actually sorry to lose.
"Isn't it warm for gloves?" Russell inquired, quirking an eyebrow as Roy pulled the fabric taut around his fingers. His only answer was a small, queer smile, and then a toss of his shining black hair.
Russell couldn't suppress a flicker of agitation. In this weather, gloves—especially thick, delicately embroidered ones such as Roy's—would only make him overheat all the faster, slowing him all the more. Didn't he want to win this race? Of course, he wouldn't—nor did Russell wish for him to; he was no prize!—but he could stand to put forth a bit of effort and not waste Russell's precious time. A sneer twisted his lips as he took his position.
"On your marks," his father said. "Get set—"
He gestured to Fletcher, and she waved a billowing white flag as a signal for them to start. The sound of whipping fabric hadn't left the air before Russell took off in a sprint—within mere moments, Roy was left behind as Russell flew down the path his father had made, the lightness of his feet a direct foil to the inexplicable heaviness in his heart.
At Russell's own request, the racing track his father had drawn was not straight. It wove and curved like a serpent through their bustling town: slicing through the square, looping around city hall, and dipping into the woods that cradled its borders before reaching its end on the front steps of Russell's own house. The complex path, as opposed to a clean shot from point A to point B, was meant to slow speedy Russell down, thereby ideally giving his opponents some hope of defeating him—but so many journeys along this track had made it so that Russell could have found his way in the dark, eliminating the challenge.
So familiar was he with the trail that when he tripped, shock, rather than pain, made him cry out as he fell.
"What the—?!" Spitting out dirt, Russell sat up, brushed the dust from his clothing, and glanced indignantly behind him to learn what had made him stumble. His eyes widened as they found a small crevice in the hard-packed earth of the road, as though the ground had split—but there was no such hole in this road, he thought. He would have remembered! As he stared, blinking in confusion, Roy breezed past him, looking unfairly handsome even with his pink cheeks and sweat-stained shirt.
"Do be careful, dearest!" he called between breaths, and then turned a corner and disappeared before Russell could even think of a response.
Russell merely gaped after him, his own face reddening, before he remembered himself. With a sputtered curse, he bolted upright and resumed his running at such a breakneck pace, his chest began to burn. Exhaustion had forced him to slow to a jog by the time he at last caught up with Roy.
A breathless smile appeared on that fine face as Roy looked over his shoulder, and he spun on the spot so that he might face Russell as they continued their trek. "I think I enjoy you more from this angle, darling," he panted, that smile turning distinctly wicked, "though you do look lovely from behind, of course."
Oh, did Russell's eyes grow at that! The vulgarity! The audacity, to utter such a thing with so dignified a voice, so stately a visage! Worst of all—despite innumerable wooers in the brief time since he came of age—Russell didn't have the experience with such talk to offer a witty retort, choosing instead to boggle as Roy tipped back his head and laughed.
"Get out of my way!" Russell finally snarled, and pushed past Roy with rudeness to outmatch even Roy's words. Tired though he was, Russell sprinted his fastest; within moments, Roy was left to choke on his dust.
It didn't last, however. As their contest stretched on, Russell began to theorize that nature itself must be conspiring against him, or else conniving with that handsome general against him—Roy's tongue if any could sweet-talk woodland sprites! What other explanation could there be? Once known for his grace, now Russell stumbled over every rock and root, tripped over cracks and crevices in the hardy ground, and was repeatedly stalled by sudden boulders that stood in his way—obstacles that must have fled his memory since the last time he ran this race. These same obstacles did nothing to impede Roy, it seemed: indeed, each time Russell was delayed, there Roy was to grace him with a dazzling smile, offer a compliment or some tidbit of advice, or simply laugh that lovely, hearty laugh of his as the distance between them grew and grew—as did Russell's frustration.
And, before long, his suspicion, too. How should Roy—politician and commander, not foot soldier—be able to navigate such unexpectedly treacherous terrain so easily? Were his wartime habits really that stubborn? Or—was Roy more underhanded in practice than in speech? The very thought made Russell's blood boil, and yet—if Roy were cheating, how was he able to do so? To manipulate this environment like this, he would have needed hours, perhaps days to do it all; between taking tea with Russell and departing to join him at the racing track, he would have had no more than half an hour at most, and the labor would have had him disheveled, not clean and pressed as ever as he had been. Had it been Russell's father, then, desperate after so long to at last marry him off? Or perhaps Roy had made allies within the town—that would fit a politician, Russell thought.
As he ran on, however, he thrust the ideas firmly from his mind. It didn't matter. Let Roy, his father, and whoever else play their little games—Russell would simply win once again and prove them all wrong. The additional incentive made him sprint all the faster.
In the woods just outside of Xenotime—the last leg of their race—Russell found Roy again at long last, leaning with his back against a tree to catch his breath. Russell sneaked up behind him with light, soundless steps, allowed himself a moment to admire that tousled hair and those cherry-red cheeks, and then said, in his smoothest voice, "It seems you won't make a trophy of me after all, darling."
How satisfying to see Roy jump a foot, then whip around with wide, shocked eyes to see Russell lounging behind him. "W—we'll see about that, dear heart," Roy retorted, panting around his words, and then—most clumsily—he threw himself from his tree and barreled through the greenery for the finish line just on the other side.
Russell permitted him a few yards' head start. He did enjoy a challenge—as well as the idea of Roy believing himself the sure winner, only for Russell to emerge and leave him floundering in the last seconds.
Just before Roy left his line of sight, Russell began to follow on swift feet—covering much of the ground between them in mere moments. He grew close enough to hear Roy's ragged breaths as he struggled to maintain his lead—beyond, a break in the trees revealed the Tringhams' small cottage, where much of the town waited on tenterhooks for the victor—any second now, Roy would stagger, and Russell would take the opportunity to surge past him toward the finish—
And then Roy raised his right hand, his middle finger and thumb touching, and snapped.
From the cloth of his glove, sparks flew; they soared upward and danced along a tree branch until it caught flame, then broke free of its trunk with a deafening crack. Russell dove out of the way as it fell—in the brief time it took for the fire to gutter and die, and for Russell to stifle his shock, vault over the branch, and sprint out of the forest, Roy found his way to the finish line amid gasps of surprise. When Russell joined him, clutching a stitch in his side, Roy stood on his own front steps with his hands on his hips—exhausted, clearly, but just as pleased with himself.
"How?" Russell breathed, disbelief and windedness quieting his voice. "H—how did you do that? With the fire? And the—?"
Roy interrupted him with a chuckle. He pulled those gloves from his shapely hands a finger at a time and carefully pocketed them as he spoke. "I did want to wait until after I had won to show you my trick, Russell," he explained, with a note of genuineness, "but, my, the legs you've got on you! Desperate times call for desperate measures—I do hope you aren't hurt."
"It was you, then," Russell said, eyes growing wide. "The holes, and the other things in my way through the whole race—" Never mind that he still didn't understand how Roy had done it; he pointed an indignant finger between his eyes and cried, "You cheated!"
Amazingly, Roy only smiled. "Not at all, Russell. Your father's rules—" he nodded to where he stood, gaping, "—were quite simple. I win your hand if I win the race. It was never stated that I couldn't use alchemy to impede you along the way."
Whispers began among the throng of spectators at this revelation, and Fletcher—far more than their father—appeared livid at the foul play. But Russell, curious in spite of himself, clung to the one word Roy spoke that he didn't understand. "Alchemy?" he repeated.
"Alchemy. The science of transforming one material into another, first by deconstruction, then by re-composition." Roy once again retrieved one of his gloves and extended the cloth toward Russell, who accepted it with inquisitive hands to peer at the complex embroidery. "What you see stitched there is an array—the conduit for performing alchemical transmutations," Roy explained to him. "This was how I was able to manipulate the racing track before and during our race. I had to be most cautious, of course—but, judging by everyone's expressions—"
He gestured. All around, Russell's neighbors stood with mouths gape, eyes round as cenz in their faces.
"—I would say no one suspected a thing," he concluded mildly.
"You're a liar and a cheat," came an unexpectedly cold voice. Russell's sister drew herself up to her full height, her normally sweet face creased with rage. "If you thought you could connive to marry my brother, then you were very wrong. Now get out of here before we throw you out."
"Fletcher," Russell murmured, surprised and touched.
Roy stayed her with a hand. "I connived to win the race. Not to marry Russell. I acknowledge—" he turned to face Russell now, his expression soft and tender as a spring bud, "—that I won our race through means Russell had not expected, and to hold him to his word in spite of that would be wrong of me indeed. I couldn't live with myself, doing something like that. No, Russell: I only wanted to show you what I have to offer you. Not merely wealth, or status, or even protection or safety." He gathered Russell's hands in his own. "I offer you the opportunity to learn with me. To grow with me. I want to eat the world raw, and I want you to partake, with eagerness—not sit idly by and watch. What do you say?"
Had the crowd grown silent, or had Russell's hearing left him? Either way, he could hear nothing as he stared into those dark, dark eyes, lips slightly parted as he processed his words. A choice. Russell was being offered a choice. How odd that that had never factored into Russell's courting before! Never had Russell's own desires been placed at the forefront of the matter—it was always his father's desires, or his suitors', or else propriety or expectations or a myriad other ridiculous things. Russell's desires, Russell's wishes—no one but Fletcher had ever seemed to think them worth more than a passing thought, until now.
And alchemy—for some reason, Russell remained stuck on alchemy. The more he dwelled, the more he thought that he had heard the term before, or read it in some old book—but the libraries within this town were too small, too dated to contain any detailed information on so complex a science. He would never have the opportunity to learn more about alchemy here in Xenotime. Not in Resembool, either.
"What do I say," Russell repeated softly. He touched his tongue to his teeth in thought as Roy drank in his face, clearly eager for his reply. "This alchemy," he said, a smile twitching his lips, despite his efforts to remain cool. "You would teach me?"
"If that's what you wish," Roy answered at once, his eyes sparkling.
The onlookers watched with baited breath. Fletcher clasped her hands under her chin as she anxiously shifted her weight.
"Then, yes," Russell said. "I say yes."
Roy threw his arms around Russell's neck, and Russell happily caught him and held him tight, affectionately nuzzling the top of his tousled head. Fletcher clapped harder and louder than any of the many spectators, and no one seemed to notice their father slinking off to—as he would so eloquently phrase it—"get a damn drink."