Marron Glace sighed as he meandered through the forest outside ex-
Sorcerer Hunter's Town. Two years had passed since Mama's great and noble
sacrifice that brought peace to the torn world. Two years since Carrot and
Tira's wedding, since regaining his beloved mother, since every ounce of
excitement, interest, and activity had vacated his life.
Always the quiet, powerful one. A few moments of worry, vague intensity, and brotherly/friendly concern were all he could remember letting himself show since childhood. Lately, though, he couldn't help it. Emotions would spill out for no real reason. He overreacted to everything, and even found himself crying at night with no provocation. For the first time he remembered, he'd fought with Carrot that morning. Had anyone else been acting so oddly, the town would have been in uproar, but Marron had fallen so far from notice not even his family really knew him any more.
With a heavy, tragic sigh, he sat down heavily on a fallen tree and tried to decide exactly what was wrong with him, aside from sheer boredom.
The sense of abandonment he'd felt at Carrot's and Tira's wedding probably figured in, though he'd thought the scars had closed over that wound; the loss of Mama and Grampa was certainly real, but when he really stopped to think the deciding factor was his loss of self. He didn't know himself any more. He had no purpose, was full of feelings he couldn't explain but completely empty at the same time, no longer drew any special enjoyment from much of anything.
Rather pathetically, he toyed with the dagger at his belt, but left it alone. Whatever happened, he refused to even consider suicide. So there.
Gradually, as laid back against the log, he noticed a complete lack of his usual vague longing for Gateau's company. Since the breakup-well, they'd never been "together," so it wasn't exactly a breakup-Marron had felt sort of generally drained. The fact that the only attraction Gateau had was also being gay didn't help much. As a friend, he was fine, but as a lover, a muscle-bound, oversexed, possessive thickhead was really the last thing the younger Glace wanted. Still, an intricate combination of sexual frustration and loneliness left its mark.
So what do I want, Marron wondered as the thought hit him. What the hell do I want? For the sorcerers to return? For Carrot to leave Tira and go back to just loving me? That Gateau was thin, sweet, not quite so generically handsome, and smart?
Croissant.
The name came so suddenly to his mind that he couldn't place it for a moment. Then he remembered a thin, delicate face. Enormous purple eyes, the kind of eyes that combine the innocence of earliest childhood and the sorrow of the ages. Long, flyaway hair, black as midnight and shimmering with stars of its own. Smooth, deathly pale cheeks and slim, white hands. Gateau's only words of wisdom to date sliced through the wavering memory. "That which is beautiful transcends the sexes." Only it wasn't sexes, it was reality. Croissant, the young parsoner he hadn't been able to save those years ago, was truly a creature from beyond this world.
Only then did he realize how ridiculous he was being, but Marron was never one for denial. I'm in love with a relative stronger. who happens to be dead. thanks to me.
At least, he thought it was love. Never having experienced the romantic side of the emotion, Marron wasn't sure. He tried to remember everything he could about Croissant, who all but his subconscious had mostly forgotten until this very moment.
Croissant had lived in a large city completely and cruelly dominated by the local sorcerer. While most of the young men had been persuaded or coerced into joining the force working on the elaborate castle Artichoke (the sorcerer) was having built. He was so small he could pass for a child or an invalid, whichever was most useful at the moment. And, having lived on his wits and luck all his life as an abandoned orphan, he was very good at telling exactly what would be useful for any given situation. When Marron, Carrot, and Tira had arrived, six years ago, they'd nearly been seized immediately by Artichoke's mercenaries, and only a whispered "Over here!" had saved them from having to fight a battle that would have killed several innocent bystanders on the crowded streets and lost them the element of surprise. Carrot thought their rescuer was gorgeous until he realized Croissant was male (the cloak he was wearing sort of bunched up over the chest), then declared the heroic youth a pansy and sulked when Tira and Marron decided they would stay with him in the decrepit warehouse he called home. So far from a pansy was the rogue he insisted on guiding the sorcerer hunters to Artichoke's temporary quarters and letting them in. Defying strict instructions to stay out of danger, he followed them into the sorcerer's chamber and saved all their lives by absorbing a spell of general destruction just as it left Artichoke's hands. The power rebounded on the caster, but also the building itself. A hasty spell by Marron shielded his brother and Tira, and should have saved Croissant, but something went wrong. The rubble of the collapsed house was imposable for three to dig through, and none of the city's inhabitants were at all interested in digging out the corpses of their oppressor and an unknown brat, as the ungracious mayor said.
Marron had suffered terrible guilt for a few months, though he was good at hiding it, and then had let Croissant slide into the shadow world of memory as a pleasant but rather depressing figment of recall (a realm far chancier than imagination). Why he would resurface now, and such turbulent emotions with him?
Always the quiet, powerful one. A few moments of worry, vague intensity, and brotherly/friendly concern were all he could remember letting himself show since childhood. Lately, though, he couldn't help it. Emotions would spill out for no real reason. He overreacted to everything, and even found himself crying at night with no provocation. For the first time he remembered, he'd fought with Carrot that morning. Had anyone else been acting so oddly, the town would have been in uproar, but Marron had fallen so far from notice not even his family really knew him any more.
With a heavy, tragic sigh, he sat down heavily on a fallen tree and tried to decide exactly what was wrong with him, aside from sheer boredom.
The sense of abandonment he'd felt at Carrot's and Tira's wedding probably figured in, though he'd thought the scars had closed over that wound; the loss of Mama and Grampa was certainly real, but when he really stopped to think the deciding factor was his loss of self. He didn't know himself any more. He had no purpose, was full of feelings he couldn't explain but completely empty at the same time, no longer drew any special enjoyment from much of anything.
Rather pathetically, he toyed with the dagger at his belt, but left it alone. Whatever happened, he refused to even consider suicide. So there.
Gradually, as laid back against the log, he noticed a complete lack of his usual vague longing for Gateau's company. Since the breakup-well, they'd never been "together," so it wasn't exactly a breakup-Marron had felt sort of generally drained. The fact that the only attraction Gateau had was also being gay didn't help much. As a friend, he was fine, but as a lover, a muscle-bound, oversexed, possessive thickhead was really the last thing the younger Glace wanted. Still, an intricate combination of sexual frustration and loneliness left its mark.
So what do I want, Marron wondered as the thought hit him. What the hell do I want? For the sorcerers to return? For Carrot to leave Tira and go back to just loving me? That Gateau was thin, sweet, not quite so generically handsome, and smart?
Croissant.
The name came so suddenly to his mind that he couldn't place it for a moment. Then he remembered a thin, delicate face. Enormous purple eyes, the kind of eyes that combine the innocence of earliest childhood and the sorrow of the ages. Long, flyaway hair, black as midnight and shimmering with stars of its own. Smooth, deathly pale cheeks and slim, white hands. Gateau's only words of wisdom to date sliced through the wavering memory. "That which is beautiful transcends the sexes." Only it wasn't sexes, it was reality. Croissant, the young parsoner he hadn't been able to save those years ago, was truly a creature from beyond this world.
Only then did he realize how ridiculous he was being, but Marron was never one for denial. I'm in love with a relative stronger. who happens to be dead. thanks to me.
At least, he thought it was love. Never having experienced the romantic side of the emotion, Marron wasn't sure. He tried to remember everything he could about Croissant, who all but his subconscious had mostly forgotten until this very moment.
Croissant had lived in a large city completely and cruelly dominated by the local sorcerer. While most of the young men had been persuaded or coerced into joining the force working on the elaborate castle Artichoke (the sorcerer) was having built. He was so small he could pass for a child or an invalid, whichever was most useful at the moment. And, having lived on his wits and luck all his life as an abandoned orphan, he was very good at telling exactly what would be useful for any given situation. When Marron, Carrot, and Tira had arrived, six years ago, they'd nearly been seized immediately by Artichoke's mercenaries, and only a whispered "Over here!" had saved them from having to fight a battle that would have killed several innocent bystanders on the crowded streets and lost them the element of surprise. Carrot thought their rescuer was gorgeous until he realized Croissant was male (the cloak he was wearing sort of bunched up over the chest), then declared the heroic youth a pansy and sulked when Tira and Marron decided they would stay with him in the decrepit warehouse he called home. So far from a pansy was the rogue he insisted on guiding the sorcerer hunters to Artichoke's temporary quarters and letting them in. Defying strict instructions to stay out of danger, he followed them into the sorcerer's chamber and saved all their lives by absorbing a spell of general destruction just as it left Artichoke's hands. The power rebounded on the caster, but also the building itself. A hasty spell by Marron shielded his brother and Tira, and should have saved Croissant, but something went wrong. The rubble of the collapsed house was imposable for three to dig through, and none of the city's inhabitants were at all interested in digging out the corpses of their oppressor and an unknown brat, as the ungracious mayor said.
Marron had suffered terrible guilt for a few months, though he was good at hiding it, and then had let Croissant slide into the shadow world of memory as a pleasant but rather depressing figment of recall (a realm far chancier than imagination). Why he would resurface now, and such turbulent emotions with him?
