Chapter 10

It was winter when he returned. The trees for the most part had been reduced to naked, shivering skeletons by the harsh winds of late winter. Icy fingers of wood scratched at Doumeki's worn leathers mournfully, and he shivered, partly from the cold, partly from the hollow song the breeze raised from creaking branches. Mostly from thoughts of what he had since seen his last coming, weighing heavy on his mind.

Frozen dirt and snow crunched beneath his boots as he limped around the bend. The Cottage stood as always, consistent, steady, its front obscured by piled snow, its roof caught in a similar predicament. The booth's flattop was covered, but he could see the purple cloth was gone.

Doumeki heard Mugetsu's barked alarm from inside the home, and felt warmth spread through his weary body when the door opened, and light spilled from inside, and the warlock's shape appeared in the way.

--

Watanuki saw immediately the weight of exhaustion in the way Doumeki moved. He supported him with a slim shoulder, helping him to drop easily onto a pillow placed before the hearth. He didn't speak when Watanuki began to undo the buckles and laces securing his jacket, nor when, finished with that, the warlock removed it and the thin tunic beneath it, leaving the Hero's torso bare. He hung the pieces of clothing from a line in the corner over a basin to catch the drops fell, and left the man's equipment nearby. Watanuki watched a pot of water heat over the fire and when it was warm, he took it off and wet a washing cloth in it.

Doumeki remained silent and still as stone as Watanuki knelt by him and washed his chest, his back and neck. The spellworker tenderly took his cheek into his hand and bathed the warm cloth over his face, gliding gently over closed eyes, across his cheekbones and his forehead. Then, setting it aside he hummed softly. Wettting his fingers in the cooling water, he positioned himself behind the Hero and wove the dripping appendages through the Hero's dark hair.

Watanuki pressed his face against the back of Doumeki's neck and puckered his lips in a sneaky kiss. "Are you going to tell me what happened?" He asked softly.

Doumeki turned his head to the side, and Watanuki felt something like grinding through the contact between them. It was the stone coming to live, moving.

"A man murdered two girls for gold." His voice was rough, scratching against his throat as he spoke.

Watanuki waited, moving his hands to the hold the taller man's sides.

"Blood was…You could smell it in the air, through the rain. Their mother screamed when we returned with the bodies. And all because his father didn't leave him any money."

Doumeki curled into himself, bending over his lap, elbows on his knees. Watanuki scooted closer so he could hug him tightly from his seat at his back. He pressed another kiss, this one more obvious, to his spine, and asked, "What can I do for you? Speak what you want from me, please."

"This." Came Doumeki's voice, muffled by his crumpled posture. "Comfort. Just…stay with me, please."

Watanuki smiled dourly, rubbing his cheek against the hot skin of the Hero's back. He sighed.

"This I can do."

--

Eventually the warlock stood, stretching muscles stiff from sitting so long, and guided the Heroto his feet. He led him with both hands to the bed, climbed in after him and, cuddling into his chest, threw one arm around him.

The next morning dawned cold and dry, no matter the snow on the ground, and Watanuki woke alone in bed, curled up in the warm hollow left by the Archer's body. Smiling as he listened to the man's heavy, rhythmic steps receding from his home, he pressed his nose into the blankets and, inhaling the thick, musky scent trapped in the cloth, drifted again into sleep.

The end of chapter nine was supposed to be foreboding, you know? With the "Dun dun duuuun" in the background and all. I'm starting to wonder if only reason it seemed like that was because...it's me. Oops.

Tell me what think? Also. Editing, again. Hasn't been...redone.

-Oceans