Name: Aut Viam Inveniam Aut Faciam [I'll either find a way or make one.]
Author: Me
Info: All characters belong to. . .someone that is not me.
Rating: T, for maybe some magical violence and some slight BL later on.
Summary: Arthur is a noble's son, who feels out of place among his family and society, plus he has a secret, he knows magic. When he meets another magic user, Matthew, a boy with no home, they immediately find a sense of companionship and journey to find a place where just having magic will not ostracize them. Eventual Arthur/Matthew.
Arthur waited until his mother and brother had been distracted by the books at the store before walking out. Arthur loved to read. It was a daily activity for him. But he liked adventure stories, knights and dragons. He didn't like princesses though. In his opinion, they were annoying and selfish. That might have something to do with the fact that the only women in his life were his mother, his older sister, and the girls his mother kept trying to engage him to. She hadn't succeeded yet.
So anyway, he liked action, not stuffy political papers like his family was poring over right now. His older brother, he had three, really enjoyed James Joyce. He forever argued that there was a deeper meaning in Ulysses then a drunk guy wondering around Dublin. Arthur walked away from the store briskly. He just had to get away from his family. They were suffocating him. His mother's main purpose in life was to find him a wife. His father's main purpose was to ignore him and his brother's was to tease him. Arthur was the proverbial black sheep of the family. He was plenty smart but didn't see much point in learning some things.
For example, he picked up Latin fast enough. The ancient language fascinated him. But when he started French, after a year, he was still at basic conjugations(even though the conjugations were similar to the ones in Latin) "and his pronunciation is terrible," his French tutor sniffed. Reading was fun but Descartes, Montaigne, and Rousseau had no interest to him. Voltaire was funny though. His mother was of the opinion that Candide was too mature for him but he read it anyway. He loved how Candide parodied the distinguished society he hated so much. Plus, Arthur couldn't learn what he really wanted to.
Arthur's family was bourgeois and proud of it. His father had the title of nobility and his mother's family had money so they made a convenient marriage. Arthur personally couldn't stand it. He wanted to go find somewhere to clear his head. All the formal traditions and expectations were dragging him down. He walked into an alley to sit down in a place that was relatively clean. He took a deep breath, looked at the mouth of the alleyway one more time before fixing his gaze on the water collected from the rain this morning.
"Iubeo aquam commotare." [I command the water to move.-Latin] He watched with satisfaction as the water shifted, moving in peculiar patterns because of the unseen will of the caster.
"Wow." He heard someone breath. He looked around panicked and noticed that there was a person there, a boy huddled in the corner of the building. He jumped to his feet, poised to run away. "Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to look. I-I have magic too." The boy nervously met eyes with him then looked quickly down.
"You do? Can you show me?" The boy nodded and extended his hand over the water, which was still moving from Arthur's spell and closed his eyes. As Arthur watched, the water froze, still in the same patterns that Arthur's spell had accomplished. There was a moment where the two spell casters admired their work and then they had to face the reality that magic wasn't a gift. Arthur immediately felt a sense of companionship with the boy. People with magic were ostracized in society. The only reason Arthur hadn't been disowned was because he hadn't told his family. Arthur had been born with magic but he hadn't understood his abilities until someone told him.
Arthur, ever the gentleman, proffered his hand. The boy stood up and took his hand.
"I'm Arthur."
"Matthew." Now that Matthew had stood up, he could see that his clothes were hanging of his body. He had obviously been underfed. Arthur instantly felt protective of the boy. He didn't know why but Arthur immediately felt the need to protect him and make sure that he was alright.
"Do you have a family?" Matthew paused for a moment then shook his head. "A place to stay?"
"No."
"Come along. I know somewhere you can stay." Arthur saw the gratitude in Matthew's eyes and felt that it would be worth it. He set off through the streets, looking back every couple seconds to make sure Matthew was still following. They arrived at a cottage at the outskirts of town. I had a tall fence that you couldn't even see over and looked very foreboding. Arthur went forward to lift the latch.
"Um, Arthur, are we allowed in here?"
"Yes, I know who lives here." He pulled open the latch and stepped inside. Matthew followed. Inside was a surprisingly cheery garden with a cozy cottage at the center. Not what you'd expect with such a foreboding atmosphere. Arthur strode to the front door and knocked on it firmly. After a couple seconds a woman answered the door., she was quite pretty with short blonde hair, tied back with a red ribbon. She looked at Arthur and her face brightened.
"Hallo, Arty." [Hello- Dutch]
"Hello, Miss. Belle, how are you?"
"Fijne. Maarten sends me money every so often and with your gifts, I've been doing good." [Fine- Dutch]
"I'm glad. If I could I'd like to ask you a favor."
"Of course, anything."
"I have someone who needs a place to stay. He's magic too and he doesn't have a family. Can he stay at your house for a little bit?"
"Ja." [Yes- Dutch]
"Thank you. Matthew,- where'd he go? Matthew." They found him at the side of the house looking at one of the flowerbeds.
"Those are tulips," Bella explained. "They're my brother's favorite flower." There was a wistful tone to her voice when she said this.
"They're beautiful. I've never seen flowers like this before"
"Miss. Bella, this is Matthew, he needs a place to stay."
"It's nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet you too, Mathieu."
"Parlez vouz Francias?" [Do you speak French?- French]
"Certains." [Some.]
"Je n'ai pas rencontré quelqu'un qui parle français ici avant." [I haven't met anyone who speaks French here yet.]
"Je ne connais que quelques personnes." [I only know a couple people.]
"Tuteur d'Arthur a essayé de lui apprendre les conjugaisons de base pour au moins un an." [Arthur's tutor has been trying to teach him basic conjugations at least a year.]
"Il n'est pas si difficile." [It's not that difficult]
"Arthur peut parler latin, il fait de la magie en latin." [Arthur can speak Latin, he does magic in Latin.]
"Alright, I know you lot are talking about me. But I'm glad you two are getting along. I have to get back to the bookstore now before my family notices I'm gone." Arthur shook both their hands in farewell.
"Afscheid." [Goodbye- Dutch]
"Thanks, Arthur. I'll see you later." Arthur hurried out the fence and back to the bookshop.
After he had left, Bella turned to her guest.
"Are you hungry?"
"Were you making lunch?"
"Yes."
"Then yes." Bella pocketed the coins Arthur had slipped into her hands and took him inside and showed him the room that was formally her brother's before he had left for the continent.
Matthew then tried to be as helpful as possible in preparing lunch but it was clear that he wasn't familiar in making a stew. She gave him the job of chopping up carrots but after he cut himself, she assigned him to stirring the stew periodically, hoping that he wouldn't manage to burn himself. Matthew had placed the injured finger in his mouth and started sucking on it while he was stirring. It wasn't that bad of a cut, just as bad as a paper cut. But after the stew had been cooked, Matthew ate ravenously and thanked Bella profusely.
After lunch, Bella excused herself to do some gardening outside and Matthew volunteered to help. She gave him the relatively easy job of watering plants and taught him how much water to give to each plant. Most of the plants were fruits and vegetables to eat but there was a small flowerbed to the side, containing most local flowers and some from her homeland of Belgium.
After Matthew finished watering and Bella weeding, they headed inside. Bella quickly got ready to go into town to buy milk and bread. Matthew asked to stay and do laundry. Bella offered to do it but Matthew didn't want to inconvenience her so Bella showed him the materials, gave him some extra clothes of her brothers to wear, which were huge on him, but there wasn't anything else, and headed to town. Matthew sat down at the tub of water and plopped his clothes. Bella had given him a washing board and a bar of soap so he started scrubbing. After Matthew had gotten the clothes as clean as possible, he took them and hung them on the line, just as Bella had suggested. He purposefully didn't think of home and concentrated entirely on the task.
After he had finished, he sat down in one of the chairs and waited. At one point, his hands went to his necklace and he fingered the ornament on it absentmindedly, a bear fang. Matthew blinked away the tears that had sprung to his eyes and tried to think about how he had finally found a friend in Arthur, Mrs. Bella was nice, and he had food and a place to stay.
Matthew realized what he was doing, tucked the ornament back into his shirt and then tried to distract himself by looking at the small collection of books by the fire. The well- worn pages suggested that they had been read many times by many different people. The problem was that they they were in Dutch so Matthew couldn't read anything. He looked absentmindedly at the pictures. At the end of one of the books, he found a pressed tulip flower and a note. He decided not to pry, plus the note was in Dutch anyway and closed the two back up into the book. He did his best to arrange the books were in the same places they had been in before.
Matthew wondered about the brother Bella had been talking about. Was he the one who wrote her the note? He like tulips so maybe that was him. He wondered where her brother was and why her brother would leave her? How did Arthur and Bella know each other anyway? Did Bella have magic? A lot of things weren't adding up here and although Matthew wanted to believe the best in people; he just couldn't trust anyone easily anymore.
Matthew heard the noise of Bella opening the door and waited until she was inside.
"Hallo, Matthew," she greeted warmly.
"Hey. Did you get everything you need all right?"
"Ja."
"Great. Is there anything I can help you with?"
"No." Matthew didn't know what to do so he just sat back down while Bella put the groceries away. He wished Arthur would come back. He instantly felt comfortable with Arthur and not this stranger. She was nice but Matthew didn't know anything about her. He did notice that he didn't know anything about Arthur either but Arthur was his age plus he knew that he had magic. It was clear to Matthew in the strained atmosphere that Bella did not want him around so he excused himself to the room she had shown them and sat there quietly.
Before today, he couldn't help but hate the new land he had come to. Magic was hated, he was pick pocketed, he couldn't find anywhere to work, people beat him up, he didn't know anyone. But now maybe things were looking up. But he couldn't help but think somewhat sardonically that it didn't really matter because everything would change soon.
Okay, if you didn't know, this is the rewritten version of The Sight which is on my other profile(this is the yaoi one.) So yes, second yaoi fic and I feel nervous. The yaoi probably isn't going to come for a while but reviews can change that.
Notes:
The three older brothers are Scotland, North Ireland and Wales. The sister is Ireland. They are OCs and will leave the story soon. I just needed to give Arthur a family that he hates. So don't worry about them staying. I think they're only going to actually be present in the story for like one more scene so don't shoot me or anything.
Candide is like the best book ever. Look it up. Okay, best book written in the Renaissance.
Arthur does all of his spells in Latin. Yep. Keep in mind that all my latin is a fail mix of what I know and google translate. So please correct it.
The French is even worse. I don't know barely any French so its all on google translate so please correct it.
Maarteen is the Netherlands. Bella is Belgium. Bella speaks French because half of Belgium is French and apparently Mathieu is one of the most common last names in Flanders(which is the French area, I think). So Matthew could tell she spoke French by the way she pronounced his name.
Okay you guys, please review. I really need feedback on this one because I'm not sure about the fic. Especially if you read The Sight, I need to know whether you like it or not. So yes, I am begging. So review.