Ousted

[Seven Xu]

“Ah yes,” Seven laughed in reply, “or the timeless tale of the poor damsel, swayed by a spider’s lies.”

The halfblood grabbed hold of the hand that lingered between them, tangling his fingers around an assortment of bone-thin claws; he pressed the pad of Veldrys’ thumb with his own, hoping to coax the climber’s reflex. He’d been given venom and fang, his small eyes could pierce the grey ambiguity of twilight, but he was awkward and earthbound as any trueborn human.

“Rarely a day goes by when I’m not reminded of the things symenestra have done, as if I’m to blame. She hates me so much, that woman; it isn’t as if I took anything from her.” Their shoulders bumped as Seven closed the distance between them. “My father sides with her, usually. They both hate me. I know every kid thinks that about their parents sometimes, but … I really think they do, you know?”

His brows seemed to shrug and his eyes rolled dismissively.

“Petch them both; I’m tired of talking about them. Come on, we’re almost there.” He gave Veldrys another light squeeze and again moved to lead him. “I’m sorry it’s not an easy place to get to. Nothing good is ever easy.”

[Veldrys]

„I know“, Veldrys murmurred, even though he didn’t, not really. His parents didn’t hate him. They weren’t content with him, they constantly criticized him because he had the wrong job, the wrong attitude, because he didn’t act Symenestra enough and had no intention of condemning a woman to a painful death, but at least they did not hate him.

„But I don’t think there’s anything you can do about it. You could talk to them, you could try to convince them to stop hating you and use every logical argument you can think of, but it wouldn’t change anything. Besides, he hurt you. I agree. Petch them both.“

He allowed Seven to move in front of him again and lead him, although he was ready to reach out to him and support him again if it became necessary.

„Nothing good is ever easy“, he agreed. „But if we work together and help each other, it will become a little easier, and we’ll reach our destination before too long.“

[Seven Xu]

“You’re awful good at repeating what I say,” if Seven was teasing, it was hard to tell through the grunts of his labour. Then, he turned to that ash-white face and smiled. The blemish across his cheek had begun to fade and his swelling lip had stopped bleeding. “Now it’s straight up.”

One would note that the road had ended in a wide turnaround; the glimmering stair of the Observatory was sprawled before their right and to their left jutted grey-brown rock, the Sartu’s sharp pinnacle, too small for any sort of structure but large enough for Lhavit’s most daring children to ascend and brag they sat upon the city’s highest peak. Seven wasn’t long shrugging off his sandals and putting hands and feet to uneven rock.

His heart thumped painfully against his chest, and his arms wanted little more than to turn to mush, but Seven worked through nagging exhaustion. He’d grab hold of a tiny rock ledge with one hand, find the next with his foot, heave his small body upward, and repeat with the opposite limbs. Until the stone face turned to endless sky, Seven hadn’t stopped, not once, not even to catch his breath. At the end of his short climb, he rolled onto the plateau and sprawled on his back, sweating, greedy lungs sucking in the cool, thin mountain air.

“Gods.”

[Veldrys]

„I suppose I am“, the Symenestra agreed and shrugged. He didn’t know whether Seven was making a compliment, teasing him or complaining about him. It didn’t really matter as long as the halfblood smiled at him like that. „And I don’t mind that it’s straight up“, he remarked and returned the smile. „You should have seen some of the rocks I had to climb in Kalinor.“

He raised his head a little to take a look at what was above them. As far as he was concerned, the peak wasn’t too far away. While Seven grew exhausted, the Symenestra climbed the rocks quickly and seemingly effortlessly, extending countless tiny hooks from his skin as he did so.

Every now and then he looked back to see if Seven needed his help again, but the younger man seemed determined to reach the peak alone. He didn’t stop once. That was something that Veldrys admired.

Once they had reached their destination, Veldrys just stood there for a moment and looked around, his eyes wide with fascination before he lay down besides Seven. “This is what the Ukalas must look like”, he murmurred as he turned his head to look at the halfblood next to him. “Don’t you think? I’ve never seen something like that before.”

[Seven Xu]

Seven’s heavy head rolled to favour Veldrys with a sideward stare. “If you’ve never seen anything like it, how do you know what it’s like?” Teasing the patient spider had become a game in its own right, and it kept his mind away from the darker things that plagued it. Perfect silver strands mingled with his muted white-blond when Seven leaned closer.

He imagined himself looking down from the high day’s sky; how strange, how human he must have looked on Veldrys’ side. He was alien to two races, some terrible in-between that neither could recognise as their own. Yet, the Widow kept him close, whispered sweet songs of Kalinor, beckoned him home. But Seven had realised early that Kalinor would be as much a home to him as Lhavit.

He’d miss Veldrys.

“I told you it’s the nicest spot,” he lauded his tiny cliff overlooking Iraltu’s Observatory, propping himself on his elbows after his lungs had caught up with him. He let his fingers roam his split lip to survey the damage. When he pressed too hard, he winced. At least he’d kept his teeth, he thought, as his tongue pressed against aching fangs.

“Too bad it isn’t closer to sun set. You can see all of Lhavit shift with the sky from here, every peak.”

Seven exhaled the breath he was holding and smiled. His hand dropped from his mouth to reach blindly for the silk garments that wrapped his friend. The afternoon sky was harsh even to him, and when he realised his sight was strained, he felt a twinge of guilt for dragging the cave-dweller into the unforgiving sun.

“Vel,” he felt like he’d asked the question half a hundred times, but never grew tired of the answer. The symenestra was his only friend—at least, beyond his twin sisters, and even they weren’t above betraying his trust. “Why are you so nice to me?”

[Veldrys]

„I don’t know“, Veldrys admitted. „Not for sure. But I’ve always pictured the Ukalas to be extraordinary, unlike any other place in Mizahar. This peak here is extraordinary, and it’s closer to the sky than any other place I’ve been to so far. Does that make sense?”

He sat up so that he could see his surroundings a little better and narrowed his eyes. Since coming to the surface his eyes had become less sensitive, but this high up the sunlight was unusually bright. In fact it was a little painful. With a sigh he lay down next to Seven again.

“We could just stay here until the sun sets”, he suggested. “and forget Lhavit, Kalinor and your father. We could just lie here, next to each other and forget the rest of the world. There’d be no bad things, nothing to distract us, just an endless sunset …”

He broke off as Seven said his name and looked at him. His question surprised him, and for a moment he didn’t know what to say. “Because you are somebody special”, he finally replied. “Because you showed me that there are some people on the surface that are worth getting to know. Because you gave me something that I didn’t know I was missing. Because I care about you.”

He smiled slightly.

“Shall I show you how much I care about you?”

[Seven Xu]

Seven knew that smile; it reminded him of what had earned him the pain in his jaw. Their first night together had been a gallery of clumsy limbs, awkward laughter, and breathless apologies. The ingenuous halfblood was far from seasoned in love—one might even label him as dismally inexperienced—though Veldrys had cared little. If he had, he was too polite or too distracted to say.

He returned the grin through the rising heat in his face, and then looked away.

“I don’t doubt it,” Seven admitted, “I just like to hear it.” He gathered himself and rose, offering his hand to the symenestra once he was on his tired feet again. Seven had barely caught his breath from the climb, and sweat clung stubbornly to his hairline. The sweat over the blush made him look worse off than he felt.

“Come on,” bony knuckles twined around each other, and Veldrys was hauled to his feet by his staggering counterpart. “The world goes on forgotten and the sun sets just as well beyond a rented room as it does up here.”

The descent loomed ahead of them, and Seven was suddenly made aware of the weakness in his knees. Sleep would come easy tonight, wherever he managed to find it.

End