Your Future Hasn't Been Written Yet
by K. Stonham
released 10th February, 2023
Douxie woke up, as was becoming habit, before Jim.
Funny. At home, I sleep in. Here I'm up with the birds. He blinked blearily up at the witchlight on the ceiling, then closed his eyes again, drawing the chilled arm that had somehow arced itself around his head back under the hoodie-duvet. Outside, the local avian wildlife kept up their racket.
Of course, at home I'm usually out with Archie 'til all hours, keeping Arcadia safe from mumbos and ghoulies. Here, there was no such concern. Oh, the more supernatural critters were definitely out and about, that was for certain. But this was their time and place, not his, and Douxie's mission here was singular: keep Jim safe.
He wanted to go back to sleep, to not have to wake up and deal with another day of shoring up his own crumbling mental stability sans familiar. Jim shouldn't have to deal with Douxie's deficiencies any more than he had to.
But I'm up now, Douxie thought with a sigh. Once he was awake, that was it for him. No drowsing back off to sleep.
He sighed again, breathing out through his nose, and opened his eyes.
And stilled, as he became aware of something. Of Jim pressed up against his side, and a particular firmness of anatomy in Jim's boxers region.
Fuzzbuckets. Douxie glared impotently at the ceiling.
He knew for a fact that Jim and Claire had been lovers before the whole time reset debacle, and even though he didn't think they'd resumed those particular relations yet, Jim was still a teenage boy. It also wasn't like Douxie hadn't experienced morning wood himself, now and again across the centuries.
Which did not help him with the quandary before him: how to extricate himself from Jim's sleepy embrace without unduly embarrassing Jim? Because Douxie wasn't that much of an jerk, to take pleasure in the humiliation of someone he genuinely liked and admired.
He sighed for a third time, and decided on the lesser of two evils.
Jim's first awareness of morning was Douxie ripping the covers off the bed, calling "Good morning, sunshine!" and grinning like a manic asshole.
Jim flailed and squawked and fell off the far side of the bed from the sadistic wizard.
"Up and at 'em!" Douxie crowed. "We need to get going if we're going to reach Charlie's by sundown!"
"Fuck you," Jim shot back immediately, grabbing onto the mattress and hauling himself upright. "I was having a good dream, Douxie!"
"Oh yes." Douxie smirked at him, gold eyes glittering with wicked amusement. "I know exactly what you were dreaming about."
Jim paused. Douxie did...? Wait, what had he been dreaming about?
He thought about it, then flushed red. The heat on his face almost beat out the morning-chill of the room.
Douxie's smirk melted away into something kinder. More understanding. "I'm afraid you'll have to save up such dreams to share with Fair Claire."
"Uhhh..." Jim said intelligently.
"Anyhow!" Douxie turned away and went to the row of pegs that held their hopefully dry clothing. "We should get dressed, break our fast, and then head on toward Charlie's." He shot a grin over his shoulder. "Now that you've got the hang of geomagnetism."
Jim blinked his way through the awareness that he was still only wearing his boxers, as Douxie ran a considering hand over their clothes and plucked them off the pegs, throwing Jim's at him. After a moment, Jim sighed, wiping his hand down his face. "I am so sorry," he mumbled.
"Don't worry about it." Douxie dropped down onto the other side of the mattress, somehow already in his jeans and tank top. "Happens to everyone. Well," he added with a tone of consideration, "everyone with the right equipment, anyway. Dunno about girls. Or Akiridions. I should ask Krel sometime, maybe."
Jim pulled his own shirt over his head, squinting. "Even you?"
"Even me," Douxie confirmed with a smile. "Not being interested isn't the same as parts of the body working differently, you know?"
Jim didn't know. Or hadn't. Other than talks about respecting other people's pronouns and self-identifiers, his mom had never gone into the mechanics of things like differing sexualities with him. And school hadn't even covered as much as she had.
Jim kind of wanted to ask about it. But spending this much time mostly naked or nude around Douxie was already pushing his comfort levels. Though clearly not Douxie's, which spoke either of what Strickler would call /historical mores/ or of Douxie's unusual upbringing; Jim wasn't sure which. Regardless, Jim didn't actually need to know anything more.
"All right," he said, pulling on his jeans. "Walking all day again it is."
"And if we're lucky," Douxie said with a grin, "Charlie will invite us in for tea and bloodberry pie at the end of it."
"My royals," said Zadra, "you have done so well here. I could not be more proud of your actions on this pathetic planet. But," she said, looking up at them from where she knelt before them, "you must return to Akiridion-5. The Resistance needs your leadership."
The King- and Queen-in-Waiting, both in their native disguises, exchanged a glance, silently communicating. Then-
"No," Princess Aja said, shaking her head.
"But-!" Zadra protested, standing.
"Zadra," said Prince Krel, placing a hand on her shoulder. "There is no way to guarantee the safety of our parents' cores on Akiridion-5. You must know this."
"It will be the highest priority of the Resistance," she protested.
"And," added Princess Aja, "so long as we are here, our mere presence will divide Morando's forces and his attention. He will keep sending OMENs and bounty hunters after us. And so long as he must keep doing so, his attention will not be fully on subjugating our people and solidifying his reign."
"My lieges!"
"The King- and Queen-in-Waiting are correct," Varvatos, not in his disguise, agreed, laying a hand on Zadra's shoulder. She glared at him and shrugged it off. "We cannot guarantee the safety of the Royal family upon Akiridion-5. We must remain here until the King and Queen have fully regenerated. Only then may we make our plans."
"That and a couple other things that are important here on Earth," added Prince Krel.
"What," demanded Zadra, "could possibly be important on this Seklos-forsaken mudball?!"
Aja and Krel exchanged another speaking look. "We cannot tell you," Aja said. "Ah!" She held up her hand as Zadra began to protest. "What you do not know, cannot be tortured out of you," she said. "And torture is the least of what General Morando will stoop to, in pursuit of what is here on Earth."
Zadra's mind blanked. What could possibly exist on this primitive world that would be of interest to Morando?
But she had to have faith in her Royals. They claimed knowledge of the future, and nothing in their actions or mannerisms since her arrival had led her to believe that a lie.
"I will... stand down for now," Zadra allowed.
"Thank you," Prince Krel said gravely, inclining his head.
"Now, come, Lieutenant Zadra." The traitor's hand was on her shoulder again. "I have spoken with some of our allies, hooman and otherwise, and found a warrior's training class which I think you will find most interesting. The hoomans call it 'krav maga'."
Fuming, she allowed herself to be led away, feeling like a child being given a sweet in exchange for good behavior.
"You know," Krel said, watching as Varvatos led Zadra out the door, "I think we need to order those red boots for her sooner rather than later."
Aja snorted. "You are resorting to bribery, little brother."
"I am using my tactical knowledge to lessen the hostility of my troops," Krel shot back. "Zadra will be happier once she internalizes that we are staying here a while."
"True." Aja hopped on one of the stools at the breakfast bar and swiveled back and forth. "You are already thinking about Gaylen's Core?"
Krel shrugged. "I am thinking that it is best left alone. All we have to do is ensure Morando does not go through our memories, or our parents', and he will never know where it is."
"Varvatos and Toby also know where it is," Aja pointed out. "But he will not think of asking them."
"I hope not." Krel sighed. "Mother. Has the OMEN come back again?"
"No, Prince Krel." Mother's holographic interface hovered near him. "Your upgraded defenses appear to have been effective."
"For now," Krel grumbled. "It is a learning machine, which worries me."
"Oh, don't you worry, honey!" Lucy appeared, wielding a broom. "Me and the Big Dipper here will scare that nasty robot off."
"We'll knock him out of left field!" agreed Ricky.
Aja laughed. Krel could not suppress a smile. "I certainly believe you will try," he told the Blanks.
"You're mad at me, aren't you?"
Douxie sighed and paused, hand against the trunk of a gnarled oak. "I'm not."
"Doesn't seem that way," Jim said from behind him.
"It's... not you that I'm upset at," Douxie told him, never looking at his -brother- -king- friend. He didn't know where things had gone wrong. The day had started well enough, and they'd made good progress, but... He swallowed. He was tense, in a way that hurt. They were so close to (hopefully) safety, but Herne had only promised one day of leaving them alone. Herne had hunted wizards. Killed them. Every bird call, every rustle in the brush, every snapped twig was just setting Douxie more and more on edge. And his thoughts sawed through him, full of betrayal.
How many others like me have died, murdered because of their magic? I'm the one who made it this far. The one who got lucky. That's the only difference between me and thousands of other mages.
He'd beaten the odds so many times that he didn't trust the next roll of the die. He was waiting for the ambush.
"I know I'm behaving like a git," he said, "and I'm sorry. But I can't stop thinking, and every thought I have just winds me up more, so I'm being horrible and I'm sorry."
Jim's armored hand was on his shoulder. "Whoa. Back it up a minute, Douxie. You're fine."
"I really am not," he enunciated clearly. Wizard, know thyself. "I am scared, there is an Archie-shaped hole in me, and I can't keep control of my feelings enough to keep them from spilling over onto you, so you have to deal with them, which is not your job-"
Jim's fingers tightened. "When we get home," he said, "maybe we should get you tested for manic-depressive disorder or something. Because I'm not sure this is just anxiety."
"Depression, sure." Douxie gave the ghost of a laugh. "That I know I've got, on top of the anxiety. Had 'em both for a long time, if never this bad."
Jim's arms were suddenly around him, hugging tight from behind, his face pressed against the back of Douxie's neck. The message was clear: your messed up brain chemicals can't have you.
"I'm never going to get out of the depression, Jim," Douxie said softly.
"You will," said Jim. His voice was sharp.
Douxie shook his head. "I'm not. And do you know why?"
"No."
Douxie sighed. "Because I'm not callous, like Merlin." He took a moment, gathering his thoughts, trying to explain what was obvious to him, but that he'd never had to put into words before. Archie just understood. Douxie was blessed that way. He concentrated on the rough grain of the oak's bark under his fingers, grounding. Name five things you can see, he thought. Four things you can feel. "I didn't... understand, before."
"Before what?" Jim asked, barely a murmur against Douxie's back.
"Before I got my staff." Douxie breathed and thought about how many centuries he'd wanted nothing more than that one singular thing, to prove that he was finally good enough. Good enough for Merlin to look at him and see him. Good enough that Merlin might finally be proud, the way he was of Morgana.
Brilliant Morgana, to whom the mastery of magic had come so easily. "The finest pupil I ever taught. Until she tried to kill me," he remembered Merlin saying. And he still couldn't disagree with that assessment.
"Mastery isn't just... finally being good enough," he said. "It's weight, Jim. It's consequences." He felt a smile crack his lips, bitter as brine. "For everything I could do with my staff, back when I had it... there was always the awareness of everything I couldn't do. I couldn't save you from the shard, no matter how hard I tried. I couldn't keep the Seals from the Order." His voice dropped to a whisper. "I couldn't even save Merlin." And so many more names. He couldn't save Nomura, Archie, Charlie. Nari. Toby.
What good was he as a wizard, if he couldn't even save the people dearest to him?
"I couldn't save Draal," offered Jim. Giving something of equal weight, to show that he understood. "Or Vendel. Trollmarket. Everyone we lost at the end."
Douxie nodded. "And you bear that weight marvelously. Far more so than I." Which was part of what made Jim worthy of Excalibur, worthy to be the divine king he had become.
"Douxie." Jim's hands persistently pushed and pulled, until Douxie had to turn around to face him. "First," Jim said, "you are not a burden. Not on me, not on any of us. I know Merlin is an emotional cripple and convinced you that wizards don't need support, but I'm pretty sure that's a lie, okay?"
"Mm." Douxie's gaze shied away, unwilling to directly disagree with his king.
"No. Look at me," Jim demanded, and Douxie did, at the sharp flashing blue gaze of the best man he'd ever known. "You are my friend. My brother. My wizard. And I am Atlas, all right? I can bear whatever weight you need someone to help you carry."
Douxie's chest felt tight. Like he couldn't breathe. He was over nine hundred years old, and this child was offering to bear him up, because he was too weak to manage it for himself. "I can't-"
"You can," Jim insisted. "I know you're not used to relying on anyone but Archie, but I need you to be able to lean on me too."
Tears pricked hot at Douxie's eyes. He hated crying. It was weak. He needed to keep himself under control-
"Let me be strong for you, Douxie," Jim said, very gently. "And trust that when it's my turn, you will be strong for me. All right?"
Unable to speak, Douxie just nodded. He didn't know if Jim was pulling on his loyalty right now. Did it even matter? Because he wanted this so badly.
"Second." Jim's tone shifted. "Herne can go frag himself. I don't care how many wizards he's proud of having murdered, he's not touching you. I will kill him before he can lay a finger on you."
"He's not allowed to hurt you either," Douxie managed.
Jim nodded, accepting that. "Third... I know I can't make you feel happy, Doux. But I want you to be happy. I want you to, to /thrive/. But I can't help with that if I don't know what makes you feel that way."
Douxie wiped at his traitorous, watering eyes. "Music. Magic. Stagecraft, sometimes."
"Right. As soon as we reach Charlie's, we're gonna see if he has a lute in his hoard or something. And you're gonna give me lessons." Jim cracked a smile. "And I'm gonna be terrible at it."
Douxie laughed, a pathetic, wet thing. He couldn't help it. "Can't be worse than I was when I started."
Jim grinned up at him, fierce and relieved and burning so brightly. "Watch me."
Jim sometimes had a pretty good imagination. Right now, though, he was drawing a blank. On top of having Merlin the Emotionally Unavailable as a primary parental figure, what was it like to survive nine hundred years of humans trying to kill you and everyone like you? And then to discover it wasn't just humans targeting you, there was a literal god doing it as well?
For all that he'd studied World War Two in history class, Jim had never really internalized the word /genocide/ before this moment.
No wonder Douxie's messed up.
But Douxie was one of his, Jim's friend, Jim's brother, and there was no way he was letting an asshole god with his horns up his butt touch Douxie. Not now, not ever.
"Come on," he said to Douxie, who was rubbing his eyes with his sleeve, "let's get moving. Miles to go before we sleep, and all that."
Which was when a dark chuckle sounded from behind him. Jim whirled, Excalibur appearing in his hand. He'd been so focused on Douxie he hadn't heard anyone sneak up on them.
Behind him, Douxie's breathing kicked up a notch even as Jim's heart rate did the same.
Because it was Herne.
Of course it's Herne, the snarky part of Jim's mind piped up. Jerkfaces always show up at the worst time.
Herne's green eyes glinted. His mouth curved up in a snarl. One of his wolves actually did snarl. "I gave you a day," the god of the hunt said. "You're still in my forest. Trespassing."
"Yeah, well, I haven't got a shadowmancer in my back pocket," Jim shot back.
Behind him, unexpectedly, Douxie snerked. "Right now," Douxie muttered.
Jim shot him a look, agape. Astounded. First, that Douxie would make a dirty joke at all. Second, that he'd been able to pull himself back together so fast.
There was sure no sign of mental problems on Douxie's face now, as the wizard smirked up at Herne. Like he was rock-solid confident that between the two of them, they could take the god and all his wolves.
Jim's heart sang as he turned back to face Herne. He wasn't stupid enough to tempt fate by saying something like "Do your worst," but knowing that Douxie had his back was as good as knocking back three espressos in a row. Energy buzzed in his veins.
"Come get me, Herne," Douxie said softly. Magic ghosted around him, raising the hairs on the back of Jim's neck. "If you can."
"Not helpful," Jim said between gritted teeth.
The wolf who had snarled, lunged.
And Douxie, to Jim's astonishment, stepped forward to deal with it himself. Bare-handed. Eyes blazing blue, he grabbed fistfuls of fur and flesh mid-air. He spun, using the wolf's own momentum against it. A clean release - some kind of judo throw or something.
The wolf slammed, spine first, against the tree they were under. There was a definite cracking sound accompanying the impact. The wolf fell to the ground. It whimpered.
Holy shit, magic or not, I need to learn some unarmed combat, Jim thought, wide-eyed, as Douxie turned back toward Herne.
The wizard's weight was balanced, something less than fully sane write large across his expression. "I told you I was not prey," he said to the god. "If you didn't listen... that's your fault, isn't it?" In Douxie's hand glowed a small sphere of something white-hot.
Jim's breath hitched, recognizing it.
"Hexfire," Douxie had told him and Toby and Claire sometime later. After Area 49-B, where they'd seen him use it. "It used to be called Greek fire, once upon a time. Magic napalm, essentially."
Jim had subsequently looked up napalm. And Greek fire.
He swallowed now, looking at it in Douxie's hand.
Douxie grinned savagely, baring his teeth as Herne also looked at the hexfire in his hand. "I told you not to pursue me," he said to the god. "Touch me, or my brother, and this?" He nodded at the hexfire. "This will make a lovely crown fire. Destroying your forest."
The god looked unsure. Like he was being caught on his back foot. "You wouldn't."
"Burn down Britain to banish you from it?" Douxie snorted. "I would. Your choice, Herne."
"You would destroy magic?" the god demanded.
"No more than what you've done," Douxie snarled. "I've spent my entire life watching magic be hunted down and killed, and I will not be another sacrifice on that pyre." His eyes glittered, dangerous. "So. Choose, Herne. Your hunt, or your life?"
Herne glared balefully at Douxie. Then, between one heartbeat and the next, he was gone. And so were his wolves. Even the injured one.
"Douxie..."
Douxie ignored Jim, looking at the globe of hexfire that burned above his hand. Lips in a line, he brought his other hand over it. Crushed them together, squashing the white sphere. Smoke wafted, and there was a smell of burning flesh.
"Douxie!" Jim grabbed for him.
"Ow, ow, ow," Douxie whimpered. His hands parted, revealing unblemished palms.
A new red line streaked, instead, raw and weeping, up his left forearm, beneath his vambrace. Right by the white scar that Douxie had never talked about.
Jim's eyes shot up to meet Douxie's. The wizard's pupils were blown wide.
"You don't make hexfire," Douxie said, his breathing ragged, "unless you're going to use it."
"Are you okay?" Jim asked.
"It hurts. Quite a lot," Douxie managed. He gave a wan, unconvincing grin. "I'll survive. I have before."
"Obviously," Jim retorted, vanishing Excalibur and pulling Douxie's right arm over his shoulders. "Come on. I know you're hurting, but I don't trust Herne. We've got to make it to Charlie's."
"Agreed," Douxie breathed, falling into step beside Jim, his injured arm curled to his chest.
"So." NotEnrique eyed the dab of wasabi paste on his plate, swiped it up on his finger and stuck it in his mouth. Ophelia watched, wide-eyed, as he rolled it around in his mouth, considering the flavor like a sommelier tasting wine. Then he swallowed and nodded. "Not bad. Can I get some more a' that?"
Their server, similarly wide-eyed, nodded and scurried away. One of the sushi chefs, on the other hand, had a broad, pleased grin spreading across his face as he reached for his tub of wasabi.
The pair of them were definitely the center of attention at the sushi bar.
"So?" Ophelia prompted.
"I was thinkin'," NotEnrique said. "Even though I'm free and clear of the Darklands, there's a lotta my kind who ain't. And now that Gunmar and his dum-dums are gone, there's not going to be anything protecting them against any of the nasty things that like to eat little trolls for snacks."
She raised her bowl to her lips, sipping at her miso soup as she turned his words over in her thoughts. "What is your proposal?" For all his crude mannerisms and abrasive behavior, she'd discovered there was actually a shrewd mind at work within the little green Changeling's stony skull.
"Nomura over at the museum's got a Fetch." NotEnrique gestured widely with his own bowl of soup. "I could use it to go in, find some a' the rest, and bring 'em through."
"A rescue mission." That would play well with the Changelings, Ophelia thought. She wasn't as sure about the trolls down in Trollmarket. The humans in Arcadia seemed, so far, wary but willing to wait and see. Well, she thought, with certain exemptions. Mister Johnson had been in the town hall every single day now, as much as pounding his shoe on the desk and demanding they expel all these foreigners, but so far he was an outlier. "All right." Ophelia set down her bowl. "Let's talk logistics: what do you need? How many do you expect to rescue? And have you thought about placement for them afterwards?" Because Arcadia Oaks had a zero percent homelessness rate, due to the rehab programs and city-sponsored temporary housing she and Javier had lobbied and fought for, for so long. And she was not about to return to the bad old days because of a sudden influx of refugees from another dimension.
NotEnrique scratched a claw along the table. Now that he was no longer pretending to be an infant, he'd stopped wearing Enrique's onesies. Instead, he'd scared up a pair of khaki shorts and a t-shirt that proclaimed him to be Baddest of the Bad. Ophelia would suspect Claire of having a hand in his wardrobe, but instead she accepted that it was probably his own execrable humor at work. "'Kay," he said, and drew a small notebook out of the brightly colored child's purse he'd taken to carrying. "Here's my thoughts..."
Hexfire burned. That was its purpose, that was what it did. And right now it burned its way through Douxie's veins and arteries.
"Do we gotta worry about, like, infection?" Jim asked eventually, still supporting more of Douxie's weight than Douxie liked. But for once, he didn't complain.
"No," he managed, bringing his dispersed self back into focus. It was hard to concentrate on anything but the pain and fire. He felt like one raw, live nerve right now. Every stumble through the woods amplified the sensation. "'S like hydrogen peroxide. It burns out all the, all the germs." As well as everything else. He doubted that anyone not a wizard could survive hexfire burning inside them.
For wizards, it merely left lifelong scarring.
I have got to stop doing this, he thought.
"Doing what?" Jim asked.
Oh. He must have said it aloud, Douxie realized. He managed a sort of laugh. "Getting myself into situations where everything hurts."
Jim was silent for a minute. "You're really not all right, are you?"
"Not by a long shot," Douxie agreed.
"No more playing with fire for you," Jim told him. He was probably trying to sound stern.
Douxie gave an honest laugh this time. "Fire's one of the things I'm good at," he told his brother.
Jim huffed. "Agree to disagree."
"No, look." Douxie unwound his arm from Jim's shoulder and managed to snap the fingers of his uninjured hand. A small flame appeared over the palm, wavering in the faint breeze. Painstakingly passing his injured hand over it, Douxie fed the flame with magic, until it burned bright blue. "I can't create much of it, that's true. But manipulating it? That's easy."
Jim was looking at the ball of fire in Douxie's palm, his expression dubious.
"You can touch it," Douxie offered. "It won't burn you unless I want it to."
Jim still looked dubious, but he took a breath, I trust you written across his expression, and reached an armored hand into the flames. "It's warm," he reported, surprise flashing across his face as the fire tickled his armor. "I thought it would be hot."
"I wouldn't let it burn you," Douxie repeated. He rolled his hand around, the burning blue sphere following the motion like it was a contact juggling ball. Jim's gaze followed it. He looked a bit like a kid at a carnival, watching wide-eyed the easy showmanship of Douxie's moves.
Something eased inside Douxie. He felt like he could breathe again. The hexfire in his veins ebbed. Slightly.
"What does it feel like?" Jim asked, unexpectedly. His eyes met Douxie's. "Your magic, I mean. What does it feel like to you?"
Douxie looked at the ball of blue fire as he kept it rolling, the motion easy and instinctive. "It's warmth," he said. Like a Heartstone. "Warmth all the way to my bones. Exhilaration. Or maybe delight. At its best, joy."
"Like it was something you were born to do," Jim said, a smile on his lips. His fingers touched the amulet embedded in his armor.
Jim understood.
"Yeah," Douxie said, extinguishing the magic fire in a shower of blue sparks that drifted harmlessly toward the ground, winking out before they ever got there.
"Fuck Herne," said Jim.
"Yeah," Douxie agreed, smiling. Because as he looked up, beyond Jim's shoulder, he saw a clearing with a circle of laid stones jutting up out of the grass. It might have been the mouth of a well. But he knew it wasn't.
"Jim," said Hisirdoux Casperan, "we're here."
They had arrived at the lair of Charlemagne the Devourer.
Author's Note: Thank you to frequent commenters Merrie and varve, for making me realize NotEnrique should form a rescue plan for the Changelings still stuck in the Darklands! Douxie taunting Herne with "Come get me" is at least partly an homage to Atreyu doing the same to Gmork, in the film The Neverending Story. And, yes, the hexfire absorption is a implied backstory for Douxie's scar on his left wrist.
