Welcome back, everyone! I'm so sorry I've been absent for a few days! I was occupied with the No.6 Discord's online convention, as well as posting/working on a few others fics that have been waiting in the wings. But I'm back to working on this fic, too, so I hope you enjoy it!
I also thought it would be a great time to let you all know that White Eevee (an amazing author and a wonderful friend who I am honored to be able to work with!) and I have officially posted our collaboration project, Beyond the Horizon. We've been working on it for well over a year now, and we finally decided to post the first chapter in honor of Shion's birthday yesterday.
It's an AU in which Shion has telekinesis and Nezumi has telepathy, and we're going to be updating it every Monday. You can find it here on by going over to White Eevee's profile page and searching for it there!
It's been a little while since we're updated, yeah, so let's get into it, shall we?
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Nezumi lay on his back, staring up at the stark white ceiling. The mattress beneath him felt surprisingly comfortable, despite the faint stench of the metal springs beneath the cheap padding and flimsy fabric. Not exactly iron, not in its rawest form, but enough to singe the fine hairs in his nostrils and make him wince. His head felt muzzy and thick, like the remnants of an illness. He'd grown accustomed to it after spending so many months wandering back and forth between the human world and the Unseelie Court, but despite his acquired tolerance to it, Nezumi was still a member of the Folk.
Iron could still hurt him.
He exhaled slowly. A few hours had passed since Nezumi and Shion burst their way out of the Unseelie Court, fleeing through the forests and staggering down the concrete sidewalks until they reached the iron fortress of the bakery. The curtains were closed, concealing them from the prying eyes of the outside world, but the fabric was thin and white, allowing the pink sunlight to trickle across the ruined carpet.
Shion lay beside him, curled on his side. His hair was sharp and sticky from blood and sweat, but as soon as his head hit the pillow, he'd dropped into the world of unconsciousness, freed from the memories of what had almost become of him. The bed was a twin-size, so it didn't surprise Nezumi that there wasn't much room to move around. Though, he wasn't sure he would move away even if he did have more space.
In his sleep, Shion mumbled something, his voice muffled by the pillow. Nezumi knew now that Shion spoke while he slept. He'd murmured a few things in the Unseelie Court, but Nezumi had dismissed it as the drunken ramblings of a boy who'd consumed too much faerie wine. Shion lay at his side, whispering late-night secrets into the fabric of his threadbare pillow.
Nezumi's head felt so thick and uncomfortable that he couldn't lay still anymore. He knew that tossing and turning would be counterproductive, and he didn't want to risk waking Shion. The boy had dropped into unconsciousness as soon as he'd settled down on the mattress, but that didn't mean his over-stimulated mind wouldn't rouse him at the first sign of danger.
Nezumi brought his finger up to his lips. Even now, he could remember the phantom brush of Shion's sliding beneath his own, the crisp taste of spiced apples on his tongue. It'd been an impulse more than anything else—his desires bubbling to the surface so suddenly he hadn't been able to quell them.
There was no Court to stop him now. No feral king to use his weakness against him. If Nezumi were to lean over and press his lips against the curve of Shion's cheek, what would happen?
Shion hadn't brought up the stolen kiss, but Nezumi supposed there were other more pressing things to focus on. When Shion woke in the morning, what would he say? Once his mind was cleared of the adrenaline pushing him onward, where would he demand Nezumi to go? How long would he be permitted to stay by his side?
Would it happen again?
Unable to handle the thoughts spiraling through him like a flurry of snow, Nezumi eased himself off the mattress, mindful not to make much noise. He tiptoed across the carpet, naturally light on his feet, and nudged the bedroom door open. On the mattress behind him, Shion snuffled in his sleep, but didn't wake.
Nezumi didn't worry about Shion waking and discovering him no longer in the room. Nezumi had given his promise not to leave, and so he wouldn't. He couldn't. He would walk the perimeter of the bakery and get his bearings, gathering his thoughts and working off the nervous energy until sleep returned to him, but he wouldn't leave.
The hallway was still dark, despite the rising sunlight trickling in from the window in the tiny sitting room. Nezumi's sharp eyes picked out the filaments of light and sharpened his sight, exposing the worn corners of the room's molding and the speckled detail of chipped paint. The apartment was old and outdated, but it smelled clean. Nezumi's nose itched as the chemicals Shion's mother used to clean the counter-tops and the carpets wafted around him, the artificial dyes and bleach blazing around him so heavily that he felt instantly sick.
He crossed to the door leading down to the bakery and ducked into the stairwell. The door clicked shut quietly behind him, and Nezumi exhaled as the overwhelming stench of human cleanliness disappeared behind the barrier of wood.
Nezumi wasn't accustomed to this. He'd spent time in the human world, but always outside—always in buildings that were constructed in the old days and still managed to serve the Folk's paltry whims. Shion's bakery was an older building, certainly, but it wasn't an old construct. There were iron bars embedded deep in the drywall, holding the whole structure together. Tiny screws peppered their way beneath the wooden slats, and Nezumi could smell the burn of them as he drifted down the stairs and tried to catch his breath.
The glamouring device Griva had provided him kept the worst of the sting away. If Nezumi dropped it and stood in the bakery as his most authentic self, he knew he'd fall to his knees and vomit all over the floor. He'd wretch until there was nothing left in his stomach to expel, and then he'd stagger back upstairs, his nose and head so stuffed up that his sense of smell would vanish completely, his vision blurring into a state of near blindness until he could escape the iron-soaked walls and return to the fresh air of the forests.
He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes, applying pressure until he saw spots.
Nezumi wasn't built to survive in the human world.
He wasn't built to survive in the Unseelie Court, either.
He'd stumbled his way through both, doing what was necessary only to survive. He hid beneath glamours among humans, and he terrified those in the faerie realm who might pose a viable threat to him. He'd suffered at the hands of the Unseelie King and done his bidding only to keep the physical harm to a minimum, but even so, he'd spent years with his arms covered in bruises and scrapes, his back burned and disfigured where Griva had cauterized the wound left by his amputated wings, his lip split when the King grew bored with emotional damage and struck him in the face just to get a reaction.
He might've escaped the Unseelie Court for now, but there was no telling how long that would last. If by some damnable chance the Unseelie King had survived, there was no corner in this world that Nezumi could hope to hide. The Seelie Court would never accept him back so long as doing so would incite a war, and remaining solitary would mean disappearing into the world alone and remaining on the run.
But a life in the human world was equally impossible.
The glamour might've kept Nezumi protected from the worst of the iron, but he couldn't live with his senses diminished. The iron sizzled away at him, the glamour too tight against his skin, the ever-present threat of harm clinging to him like a layer of cold sweat. Iron was poison to the Folk, and breathing it in for days, months, weeks on end would leave Nezumi weaker and weaker until there was hardly anything left of him.
He pressed his hands harder against his closed eyes until it was all he could feel.
A tiny chittering sound echoed from the kitchen below him. Nezumi's head snapped up, his vision tinted at the edges with stars of sapphire and ruby. Cold fear lanced through him, and every bone in Nezumi's body stiffened at the realization that someone might have found him and Shion well before he'd prepared to handle it. He took the steps two at a time and swung into the darkness, peering out with a strange sense of curiosity.
In the middle of the kitchen sat a mouse. Its pale brown fur caught the edges of the buttery streetlight filtering in through the closed white curtains. It washed its little nose with bright pink paws, silver whiskers twitching to absorb the lingering scents of the bakery nestled in the adjacent room.
Nezumi's heart slowed as a wave of calm washed over him.
Not a fae creature, then.
Just a plain, mortal mouse.
He stepped carefully across the solid panels crisscrossing their way across the kitchen floor. The mouse responded to his approach by darting a glance at him, its paws stilling in the act of washing its face. As soon as its grape-colored eyes landed on him, however, the tension in the mouse's little frame vanished and it quickly returned to swiping behind its ears.
Wild animals thought of faeries as one of their own. Nezumi's appearance might have been remarkably similar to a mortal man, but his scent and aura were so fundamentally different that no primitive creature worth their salt could possibly mistake him for human.
As far as mice went, Nezumi had always had a soft spot in his heart for them. His name—the public facade he offered in place of his true name, as all members of the Fair Folk did—had come from the rodents that thrived in the Seelie Court, plump and happy to gorge themselves on dandelions and tulip bulbs. Nezumi spent time in the fields where they roamed; sometimes when he sat beneath the trees, his little sister curled with her head in his lap as she dozed, the rats and mice would come to sit around him.
Nezumi crouched down and extended a hand to the creature. He clicked his tongue and flicked his index and middle fingers against his thumb. The mouse looked up at the motion, curiosity and excitement warring in its watery eyes.
It scampered up to him and nudged its nose against his skin. The glamour seemed to throw it off for only a moment—mice were rather intelligent creatures, as far as Nezumi was concerned—and it quickly sniffed each of his fingers and his palm, searching for food. Its silver whiskers brushed his flesh; despite everything that'd gone wrong tonight, he couldn't help the smile that pulled at the corner of his lips.
He eased himself back onto his feet and wandered out into the bakery itself. It felt wrong to tease the poor thing with the prospect of food and then fail to provide it with anything substantial.
The bakery was pristine and neat, and Nezumi suspected Shion's mother had scrubbed every inch of it to keep her mind occupied as she focused on what might have become of her son. He could smell cleaner in here, too, but far gentler. With food lingering nearby, Shion's mother seemed to have put an emphasis on safety measures to avoid cross-contamination. He reveled in the reprieve from the overpowering stench of bleach and chemicals and went to the glass case situated at the top of the counter.
Wrapped in the case were a handful of pastries. Nezumi suspected they weren't fresh—perhaps the very same Shion had wrapped the night Rikiga swept into the bakery and hauled him away—but they were perfectly acceptable for a mouse.
He slid the glass case open, unearthed a croissant wrapped in plastic wrap, and quickly undid it. He pinched an end of the croissant, the bread squishing beneath his fingertips despite being a day and a half old. Satisfied, he picked a tiny shred off. He didn't think Shion's mother would mind too much if he used one of the croissants she'd likely have to toss out in the morning.
And even if she did mind, he could always enchant her into not caring about—
He shook his head. No. He couldn't think like that anymore. Remembering the way Shion's face twisted when Nezumi influenced his mother to return to her bedroom made him feel like he'd been punched in the stomach.
He never wanted to see Shion cry again.
Nezumi dropped the piece of croissant onto the floor. The mouse chittered happily and dove for it. The white nails on its paws picked the flakey bread up and held it to its mouth as it sniffed and gobbled. It sat on its hind legs to do so, scarfing the whole thing down so quickly Nezumi wondered how long it'd been since the poor thing had received a meal.
He ripped off another chunk, larger this time, and plopped it in front of the mouse. It snatched that up, too, and swallowed it gratefully. It made happy sounds as it consumed the buttery croissant, and Nezumi felt his heart swell with just a hint of pride.
He lingered in the back of the bakery, tucked behind the counter. The bakery's large glass windows had no curtains to conceal the inside of the little lobby, but as Nezumi peered out into the street, he couldn't see anything that caused him alarm. Sunlight rose above the horizon, painting the world in a lovely array of pinks and oranges. It was still too dark to be considered morning, but it would soon be upon him.
There wasn't much time left.
Nezumi pursed his lips and tried to think. He didn't know what had become of the Unseelie Court since he and Shion escaped the carnage. How many of their number had fallen to the bloodshed? Had Nezumi's knife driven far enough to wound the King enough to fall to someone else's sinister hand? His blade certainly hadn't killed him—not yet, at any rate—and if someone else bore the Unseelie crown, then perhaps Nezumi could… bargain for his freedom.
An idea came flooding to him, then. So sudden that Nezumi reeled as if he'd been struck by a bolt of lightning.
He dashed into the kitchen, mindful not to trod on the mouse, and placed the half-eaten croissant on the counter. He scanned around for a bit of paper—a Sticky note or an old receipt he could tear a chunk from—and a pen.
It was a risk. A major one. There was no real guarantee Nezumi would even get a response, and if he did, there was an even greater chance that he would dislike the result. But Nezumi had no options. He'd run out of time, acting on impulse instead of logic; any information was more useful than sitting like a duck in a pond, waiting for the hunter to swing by.
Nezumi didn't know if they were even still there. The Glass Graveyard was a treacherous place for the Folk, and they often moved around with their hounds to avoid being found by those who might deign to seek them out, but it was a better lead than anything else Nezumi had.
He quickly spotted a shred of paper—scraps of old receipts Shion's mother must have used to scrawl messages to herself while she worked—and unearthed a pen from one of the far corners. He scrawled a quick message on a tiny piece of paper, scratching it deep and inelegant against the thin white sheet, rolled it up and hurried back into the bakery.
The mouse, who'd finished its bit of croissant, looked up at him expectantly. It was risky, but Nezumi felt a bolt of confidence in his message. He'd been careful with his wording; nothing that would link back to him if the tiny brown mouse were to be snapped up by a hungry faerie or cat along its journey, but just enough to get his point across to his target.
"Here," he said urgently, offering the piece of paper out to the creature. "I need you to locate someone for me and give them this message."
The mouse cocked its head to the side.
"Once you've delivered it, if they choose to respond, return it to the bakery by sundown." He paused. "We... won't be here longer than that."
Nezumi hadn't said much to Shion about it. He'd expressed that staying in the bakery was unsafe, but he hadn't expressed how urgent it was that they depart. He felt a bolt of misery trembling through him, but he swallowed it back. Now wasn't the time for such things.
He quickly explained to the mouse where to go and who to seek out. Mice were intelligent creatures, after all. Nezumi had no doubt that the mouse would understand what he intended.
If he and Shion weren't here when the mouse returned, Nezumi instructed it to shred the response and go about its life. Live happily in the bakery and gorge itself on whatever pastries it could seize in its little grasp. His heart soared at the look of glee in its deep purple eyes, excited to have a task as important as this.
It carefully took the letter in its mouth and squeaked in approval. With a flick of its tail, the mouse turned and scurried into one of the tiny cracks in the wall, the note clutched securely between its teeth.
Nezumi sat back on his heels and sighed. There was nothing more he could do.
When at last he could bring himself to return to Shion's bedroom, he was unsurprised to find Shion still fast asleep. He hadn't moved from his side of the bed; Nezumi could see the indent in the mattress where his body lay, seeping warmth into the fabric. His heart pounded as he stared down at Shion in the darkness, misery and guilt and an unfamiliar wave of protectiveness bursting through him with such ferocity it left him reeling.
His plan might not work, and the King might not be dead, but if Nezumi was destined to die, he would go down fighting until the last scrap of breath left his body.
He clenched his fist and stared down at Shion with conviction, a silent promise fluttering from his lips as he slipped back into the bed.
To Be Continued...