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The Affairs of Dragons

Chapter 11

Notes:

Ahhh man, I have no idea why this chapter was so hard to write, but you have both Tahariel and that damnable thing called artistic integrity to thank for getting this to you in some form at least slightly more coherent than the interpretive dance version. Not that the interpretive dance version was bad! It just didn't fit well into the narrative flow.

Chapter Text

51

 

The view from Erik’s back was just as beautiful the second time, but Charles gave no thought to enjoying it. He clung on tightly, trying to take what comfort he could from the power in the muscles flexing below him. Given what he now knew, it wasn’t enough.

He wasn’t sure what he expected Schmidt’s lair to look like, and it was hard to recognize familiar landmarks from the air, but in a matter of mere minutes Erik began to descend toward a huge white building with a roof ringed by raised windows, which he landed between with plenty of room to spare.

Charles lowered himself carefully off of Erik’s back, wary of slipping on the tiles and falling between the smaller angles of windows, five stories to his death. When he didn’t, he felt safe enough to shuffle a little closer to the edge, hanging onto a bit of fencing as he squinted at the street below. “Piccadilly?”

Erik strode up beside him, thumbs hooked casually around his belt. “And Dover.”

“Mm,” Charles commented, because this was a street he knew—not somewhere far away, or obscure, or hidden underground, but standing proudly in amidst all the trappings of respectability. Well-dressed people walked by on the pavement below, oblivious to the true nature of what they passed.

He shivered. “Let’s get inside, then.”

Erik’s hand on his back directed him toward a dark window, gaping open into the cool night air, and Charles stood in front of it doubtfully. He looked between it and Erik until finally Erik shook his head and crouched down to go first. The blackness closed over him, and he vanished.

Charles waited, heart racing, suddenly and irrationally sure that Erik was gone forever, perhaps killed silently by some trap lurking within—but then that familiar, lean face appeared again, inside now, and Erik extended his hand to beckon for him. “Well? Are you coming?”

“Wouldn’t want to force you to abduct me,” Charles joked, weakly, and took the offered hand, letting Erik steady him as he climbed down into the room. It was no less dark once he was in it, and Charles rearranged his fingers around Erik’s, holding tight.

“It’s all right,” Erik murmured warm into his ear, which inspired Charles to shiver for a wholly different reason. “Schmidt keeps a menagerie of parasitic fiends and vermin close at hand. Your fears are valid.”

“Oh,” Charles squeaked, pressing closer to Erik and staring wide-eyed into the darkness around them. “Excellent. I’m so relieved.”

Erik lead him to a door, and to Charles’ great relief, the hallway beyond was well-lit and clear of anything alive. It took him a moment to realize what was therefore so unsettling about it, but then—oh. It reminded him faintly of home. Not his own flat, of course, but the mansion he’d grown up in: all wood paneling, granite floor, and clean white moldings.

Fingers squeezed his own, and Charles looked up to see Erik watching him in concern. Charles smiled weakly to reassure him, though he had little assurance to offer.

He took a deep breath and started down the hallway toward a slim brass elevator door. Erik didn’t correct him, but slid his hand out from Charles’ to pull it open, while Charles moved past him to push the collapsible gate aside. He entered the red-and-gold confines of the elevator first, and held the gate until Erik had joined him. Glancing at the small array of floor buttons, Charles looked to Erik, eyebrow raised.

Erik smiled thinly, reaching his arm past Charles’ body to jab at the button marked, in flowery black script, 1. It lit up in white and the elevator shuddered as the door outside retreated up into the ceiling.

They stood in uncomfortable silence, watching out through the gate as they descended, and then there was a touch at his arm. Charles jumped, heart racing, and looked down to see Erik lift his hand up level with his elbow, palm-up and fingers spread. His pink human skin melted and blurred, replaced by black scales and long, sharp talons.

Erik lowered his hand again and wrapped those powerful fingers around Charles’ wrist and hand—not as they had been before; not intertwined, but positioned so that it might appear that he was controlling Charles with the strength and threat of his claws.

Charles looked up at Erik and smiled, wrapping his own fingers around one of Erik’s where it lay across his palm. The implication was grim—that a display of friendliness might invite cruelty—but the claws that pricked over his skin were Erik’s real claws, and Charles knew how cautious they could be.

The bell rang as the last door slid into place. Erik opened both gate and door and then pulled Charles along with him into the first-floor hallway. Charles hesitated when he saw they were no longer alone, but Erik tugged on his hand and Charles only barely managed to follow without stumbling.

The people on the first floor looked no different from the people on the street—almost, because some of them were not human. There was no one quite so visually distinctive as the troll and goblin who had attacked him, but Charles could feel the difference, and not only through telepathy.

A woman dressed in a conservative grey business suit approached, them walking in the opposite direction. Charles could not have described her meaningfully to anyone, and she did not even spare a glance toward him, but he was hit by a sudden need for her as sure as gravity, as certain as the progression of a chemical reaction toward equilibrium, and Charles swayed toward her, vaguely aware of the grip around his wrist holding him back, until suddenly—

She passed them, and Charles blinked, dazed, her face already forgotten. Two men followed her, either too engrossed in their conversation to be affected or entirely immune. One of them, whose dark skin was just a shade too green to be natural, dripped with water, leaving small puddles as he walked; the other was pale and sickly-looking but laughed hugely, revealing long, pointed teeth. Charles tried without much success not to stare.

They soon came to a pair of broad white doors, framed by deep red curtains and guarded by a young man with long, wind-tousled hair. This man—though Charles knew well enough that he wasn’t a man—looked them over, visibly unimpressed, and then leaned over to rap on the door with the backs of his fingers.

There was a crumple of misplaced air and then there was a devil standing in front of Charles, and if Charles had been a religious man he might have run screaming right then. Still, he couldn’t help but take a step back when this red-skinned person turned toward him, met his eyes—the other’s were a perfectly ordinary blue—and smirked in amusement.

He turned again, all lanky limbs, and unlocked the double doors with a tiny silver key. Spreading the fingers of one red hand on the leftmost door, he pushed it open with a little sardonic bow, gesturing with a flick of his tail for Erik and Charles to enter before him.

Erik was the first to move, starting forward so quickly that Charles realized this must be a nearly everyday occurrence for the dragon. That knowledge helped, a little, though it did not stop the hairs on the back of his neck from prickling as he eased past the red man.

The door closed behind them, but Charles did not turn to look because there, in front of him, was a man he knew instantly and with complete certainty to be Schmidt himself.

There were other things, too, of course—an expanse of white granite floor, for one, and abstract sculptures framed by the similar whiteness of the walls. There was a woman barely wearing enough to be dressed in white on Schmidt’s left, and a moment later the red man puffed back into existence on Schmidt’s right, framing the rather impractically large wooden desk Schmidt sat behind.

Schmidt himself wore an impeccably tailored white suit, a triangle of wine-red shirt framed between peaked lapels, a scarlet cravat snug around his neck. His expression was a balance of friendliness and businesslike professionalism as he watched Charles approach, and he could have been anyone at all except for two notable details. The first was that he occupied the only chair in the room.

The second was the odd, silvery helmet he wore contoured to his skull, which Charles suspected might have a great deal to do with the utter and ominous silence of Schmidt’s mind.

Erik let got of his hand and Charles glanced back at him, only slightly surprised to see that Erik had returned to his natural form, crouched on his haunches in a way that reminded Charles uncomfortably of a dog waiting for its master’s command. That wedge-shaped head ducked down and nudged into his back, urging him forward.

Charles straightened his shoulders and walked toward Schmidt’s desk, stopping a few awkward feet away. Making no move to stand and shake his hand, Schmidt sat for a moment, grey eyes intent and examining, then turned away to give a significant look to the woman standing next to his desk.

She narrowed her eyes at Charles, and shards of ice prickled at the back of his mind. He frowned, pushing aside the intrusion gently, but firmly.

He’d assumed it was only a test, but her eyes widened in barely-perceptible surprise. She looked back at Schmidt, who nodded as a grin broke out over his face, showing off perfectly white and straight teeth.

“Professor!” Schmidt leaned back to lounge in his chair, hands spread wide, welcoming. “What a fortunate coincidence, that you live right next to my pet’s little den. Very convenient!”

“I don’t think we’ve been introduced,” Charles said.

Schmidt threw his weight forward, resting his elbows on the desk again. “Of course! I apologize; I must seem very rude, keeping you at that disadvantage, and with this silly helmet too—again, I apologize, but it’s my standard policy around telepaths; I’m sure you understand. I’m Sebastian Shaw, and I’ve brought you here to discuss certain potential business arrangements you might find profitable.”

Charles nodded once. “You want me to work for you.”

Baring his teeth again, Schmidt—Shaw, here—said, “Yes, exactly. You see, I can use a bright young mind like yours, and you will be amply compensated for your time and energy, I assure you. Like my dear Emma, here.” He gestured toward the woman telepath, who smiled in a forcibly polite sort of way at Charles, tilting her head so that the diamonds hanging from her neck and ears shimmered and caught the light.

Charles glanced from Emma and back to Shaw without changing his expression. “Thank you for the offer, but I must refuse.”

Shaw’s grin faded, leaving nothing underneath. “I haven’t made you an offer yet.”

“That’s quite all right. I’m more than happy in my capacity as a professor, so I thought I would simply save you the trouble.”

“I’m afraid it doesn’t work like that, my dear boy,” Shaw said, voice soft as he watched Charles with a new intensity.

Charles raised his chin and arched an eyebrow. “I was informed by your two goons the other night that I had a choice.”

“Yes, well, you must forgive them their petty misunderstandings.” The corner of Shaw’s mouth curled up in a wry smile. “You see, they’re not wrong, exactly—you do have a choice—but here’s where the difference lies.”

Shaw spread his fingers out on the dark wood of his desk and levered himself up to stand crouched before his chair, as if to pounce. His voice was gentle, but his eyes remained cold. “You have a choice, Charles, in that you can either agree to work for me now, or—because it’s quite simply bad business to leave an unaffiliated telepath running around outside—you can agree to work for me later, and since you won’t be one of my people during that time…” He shrugged, and lowered himself back down into the chair. “Well! It’s not in my interest to care what happens to you in the meantime; that is, not unless you make it my interest.”

Charles tugged the edge of his bottom lip between his teeth and was silent, thinking. He had no doubt that Shaw meant every word of what he threatened, just as he had no doubt that “in the meantime” would not be something Charles would spend happily working in his lab until he got tired of waiting. This, he knew, was a man who would have absolutely no qualms about imprisoning a civilian—not personally, of course, because this man in the pristine white suit was not the kind of person who would take part in his own dirty work if he could order someone else to do it, but that wouldn’t be much consolation.

To add insult to injury, Erik might even be the one to lock him up.

Clearing his throat, Charles asked, “Do I have time to consider?”

Shaw waved his fingers dismissively. “Of course. It’s a major career decision; I wouldn’t expect you to decide right this instant. Take a day or two to sort out your affairs and then have Erik bring you back here to give me the news.” With that, he lowered his attention down to the few papers on his desk, picking up a silver pen to twirl between his fingers.

Charles nodded stiffly, then turned on his heel and walked past Erik, who assumed his human disguise and circled around to fall into step beside him. None of Shaw’s people opened the door for them this time, and so Charles turned the handle himself and left, holding his back stiff and straight as he went.

 

52 

 

Erik flew them home. Charles was a silent weight on his back, but that was all right; Erik didn’t feel much like talking, either.

He landed on Charles’ warped balcony, nudged the cracked-ajar door fully open, and slipped inside. Charles did not wait for him to kneel before sliding from his shoulders, and in his haste stumbled over a textbook; Erik hooked the joint of his wing around Charles to steady him.

Charles kept his feet, and lifted his hand to touch the leather of Erik’s wing. His fingers stroked, but then he jerked them away. “Thank you.”

Erik dipped his snout in a nod, folding his wing back to himself, and then into himself, smoothing into skin. His eyes re-focused, smaller and closer together, and he saw Charles staring at him with a blank sort of desperation. Sighing wearily, Erik went to switch on the lamp. “Sit down, Charles.”

Charles jolted into movement, walking stiff-legged to the armchair. Lowering himself down into it, he cradled his chin in his hands, fingers laced over his mouth.

“Charles?” Erik asked, after some time had passed.

Those blue eyes flicked over to him, and Charles dropped his fingers from his lips to speak. “I don’t know what to do, Erik. Nothing in my life so far has prepared me for something like this.”

“Of course not. I should have prepared better.” Erik thought furiously inward, imagining. He had been too soft, too eager to please; if he’d stolen Charles as he’d first wanted to, he might have been able to keep the secret for longer. Charles might have been happy, eventually, except… Could he even keep Charles anywhere he didn’t want to be, without Schmidt’s resources? Could he have looked into Charles’ eyes and told him no, day after day?

Could he have lived with himself if he had…?

“It’s been quite the week.” Erik looked up from his introspection to see Charles’ rueful smile. “What do we do now? We have two days to implement a plan.”

A thrill of fear pierced through Erik. Buried deep within his memory he saw again the iron bars of cages in that dark hole Schmidt used to forget people, casting shadows in the light of his torch. “You have to agree.”

Charles’ smile dropped away, replaced by purest disbelief. “What? Are you mad?”

“He’s not going to let you walk away if you say no,” Erik said, staring intently, willing Charles to see. He pushed his memories to the surface, picturing again those rot-blackened fingers wrapped around iron, the creature within pulling itself closer to the very same light that blinded it.

Cringing, Charles turned his head to the side. “I know that. But I’d—I’d rather I go through that torment than be forced to bring it down on someone else. There has to be another way.”

“Brave sentiment,” Erik observed, crossing his arms. “But you’re assuming that you’ll have a mind left to protest with. If you say yes now, you’ll be able to strike back another day.”

Charles’ expression was bleak. “I know, but what do you think happens in the meantime? I’m a telepath, and I can’t be trusted. I don’t quite know how these things work yet, but I think it’s safe to say that I’ll either have to let Frost into my head until she’s satisfied of my loyalty, or my telepathy will be blocked by some application of that helmet. Quite possibly both. Whatever the method, they’ll be sure I have no chance to help recover your egg, and I may even be forced to betray you.”

“You couldn’t feel anything from Schmidt?” Erik asked, because this was, after all, the goal.

“Nothing at all. I tried, but I felt… nothing.” Charles shivered, though he had yet to remove his coat. “With that helmet in place, I’m afraid I’m of no use to you.”

Erik cursed, and stared down at the carpet. “There’s another option—you could leave. Even Schmidt can’t reach everywhere.”

No.” The sharpness of it surprised Erik, and he shifted his weight uneasily, watching as Charles continued, “I can’t go free while you suffer here, alone.”

“You’re not obligated to stay. Consider your debt to me forgotten.”

Charles’ jaw tightened in irritation, and his eyes were bright and tense. “It’s not about obligation, Erik, and it’s not even, I’m sorry to say, entirely out of my desire to save an unborn—unhatched—innocent. I’ve felt your pain, remember, and I can’t leave you to it. I care about you, believe it or not.”

“That’s very kind of you,” Erik said, and stepped back to seek the refuge of the wall, hard behind his shoulder. He didn’t want to think about himself, not when he could be thinking about finding his egg and killing Schmidt, and about protecting Charles, now, too. He didn’t want to see what Charles saw. “But it wouldn’t help me to see you in pain. I’m inclined to kill you myself if you don’t leave.”

“It’s my choice, Erik.” Charles leaned back into his chair, crossing his legs. His tongue swept over his lips, and Erik followed the motion with his eyes, stung with the sudden sensory memory of what that tongue felt like. Not now, he told himself, scowling. “I can’t leave you any more than you can leave your offspring. Now; I’m still in contact with the Silence—could they help us?”

Erik frowned. “Those human—” he caught Charles’ glance and trailed off, awkwardly, “…s? They may have the capability to destroy Schmidt, but I can do nothing directly without inviting the destruction of my egg.”

“What about without your help, then?” Charles asked, and ignored Erik’s offended hiss. “Don’t show up that day, and be late when he calls. I’m sure that if the Silence knew how much of a threat Schmidt really is—if they knew why—they would extend as much help as they could to get him out of their city.”

“I can’t trust those ignorant fools with my egg!” Erik whirled around to stalk deeper into Charles’ flat. “The Silence only looks out for human interest. They’re petty, blind, and—”

“Erik.” Charles’ soft voice cut through like a slap, and Erik went silent. “Do you really despise all of humanity so much?”

Erik shook his head, picturing his egg traded from one captor to another. “You’re an exception.”

“But I’m really not, Erik.” Charles’ eyes were wide with earnestness. “The members of the Silence don’t fear you because you could kill people, but because you already have. I would feel the same if I hadn’t met you first.”

“You would fear me?” Erik asked, stalking forward. “Would you fight to kill me, as your ancestors did generations ago?”

“No,” Charles said. “No, my friend, I would not. I can’t condone killing anything I don’t understand.”

Erik stopped, studied Charles for a long while, and then nodded, relieved to find that he could believe him. The feeling of relief, however, was too new to sit well on his shoulders. “Very well. Then understand this, at least: I like you. I might trust you, if I dared to use that word again. I am… not so prepared to extend that courtesy to anyone else, just yet.”

Charles pursed his lips. “Fair enough. So, if you can’t trust them, can you at least trust me enough to talk to someone I trust about the possibility of aid?”

While Erik didn’t place much value on that, either, he could see how it might have more weight coming from a telepath. “…Perhaps, yes, but Schmidt will be watching you closely. You’re valuable to him.”

“I may be able to work some way around that, but it will have to wait until morning,” Charles said, and then sighed, closing his eyes and massaging his forehead. “Sometimes I miss being ordinary.”

Erik looked away, swallowing the twinge of hurt those words brought. Of course, he had brought Charles nothing but pain and inconvenience since waking his Sight; it was only natural that he’d prefer his previous life.

“It was a week ago now, wasn’t it?” Charles’ voice drew him back and he saw that he was the subject of a close examination. Then Charles shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “I had a—a dream, that night, which I dismissed out of hand because it seemed so unlikely. I dreamt that you came to me where I had collapsed on the floor, and you carried me to my bed.”

Erik nodded. It felt inevitable. “I was going to kill you for having seen me.”

“What stopped you?”

“I wasn’t hungry,” Erik said, and then his stomach clenched as Charles chuckled wryly. “I mean—I’m… not sure why. I didn’t want to.”

Charles arched his eyebrow. “Were you aware of me before then?”

Erik snorted. Oh, he’d seen his neighbor, of course, and had taken note of him for the sake of caution, but Charles had been just another human face. “Of course not; I had bigger things to worry about. Why?”

“Oh, nothing,” Charles said, lifting his hand to press his palm over his mouth, eyes glittering. “I was merely curious.”

Frowning at him, Erik insisted, “It’s impossible to identify a latent changeling, especially one of your age.”

Charles lowered his hand again, revealing his lips, curved in a gentle smile. “It’s all right; I don’t regret that it happened, even with all this unpleasantness. I was able to meet my sister as she really was, and I came to know you. That makes it worth it.”

“You would have been better off without,” Erik told him, flatly. His company certainly wasn’t enough to make up for the looming shadow of Schmidt.

“Really, Erik, there’s a reason I only have one chair,” Charles said.

Erik narrowed his eyes at the threadbare armchair in question. “Yes, that. I could help you get proper furniture.”

“Mm. I might enjoy that, actually. I’ve never picked out my own; you could help me avoid disaster.” Charles tucked his chin down, grinning. “Look at me, talking about shopping while, somewhere out there, Schmidt’s planning just what he could do with another telepath. Hopefully he’s not going to set me up in my underwear and cover me in diamonds. Or any other gemstone, I suppose. It would be undignified.”

Erik blinked away an image of Charles wearing little else than sapphires, pale skin sparkling with faceted light as he sprawled luxuriously over one of Erik’s fine leather armchairs. It wasn’t even remotely sexual, of course—in the old days, it was almost tradition for dragons to cover their human servants in jewels—but perhaps it was… best not to think of it, just in case. It was undignified, after all.

He watched Charles, who in turn stared out the window thoughtfully, bottom lip tugged between his teeth. If only Charles hadn’t gone beyond kissing that night, and hadn’t revealed that… human promiscuity. Erik wanted to kiss him again, wanted to tug that wandering lip between his own teeth, but… But he couldn’t.

It wasn’t fair, learning something like kissing and then discovering that it was something he could only do with a mate.

If only Charles were a dragon…

In the silence of the empty flat, Charles’ body made an oddly feral growl. They both looked down at it, and Charles touched a hand to his stomach, self-conscious. “Maslow’s hierarchy of needs holds true, it seems. Ah, that is… I haven’t had supper yet.”

Erik peered at Charles’ belly through the black wool, fascinated by the idea that a human’s stomach might be its own creature, able to communicate with its owner. “Do you need to eat?”

Charles hugged his arms around himself. “…Yes?”

Restraining a smile, Erik turned his attention to Charles’ kitchen. It was essentially the same as his own, with appliances chosen from those same few available to any kitchen, the same cupboards, and an island counter partially sacrificed to books. He rummaged around through it, glancing over boxes and dried spices, bottles of alcohol, plates and pans, and then ducked his head down into the refrigerator to take stock of what there was to work with.

Charles had food, certainly, but there didn’t appear to be any plan to what he had. His vegetables were well on their way to going soft, and his stove was spotless, though Erik had never smelled any evidence of cleaning on Charles. He felt comfortable assuming that Charles never cooked if he could avoid it, and probably favored whatever food came easily to hand. Thus, the apples that had been in the bowl a week prior were gone now, while the chili peppers and tomatoes languished in the vegetable drawer.

Socks scuffed over tile, and Erik glanced back to see that Charles had joined him in the kitchen, now stripped of his coat, shoes, and the outer layers of his suit. “I don’t have much here,” he said, apologetically.

Erik sighed, and reached into the refrigerator to retrieve some of those sorry vegetables he’d seen. He went back to the cupboards to find a cutting board and knife, and Charles hovered nearby as he began to chop garlic and onions into smaller pieces.

“I can do that, if you want,” Charles said, holding his hand ready to take the knife from Erik. “I mean, it’s my kitchen; I don’t want to be a poor host.”

Erik pushed the cutting board over a little, out of Charles’ reach, and eyed the offered hand suspiciously. “If you can reduce a sauce, then go ahead.”

“I could… make less of it?” Charles guessed, watching in fascination as Erik began again to chop.

“Hm,” Erik grunted, and scooped bits of onions and garlic into a neat pile with the side of the knife. “I’ll cook.”

Charles pressed his lips together, probably not intending for it to look like a pout, but he leaned back against the island and hooked his fingers together over his stomach, saying nothing as Erik sliced the bruises from a tomato before dicing it along with chili peppers. The nervous energy of his watchfulness prickled at Erik, but soon Charles relaxed, evidently satisfied that Erik knew what he was doing and was content without Charles’ help.

The silence became a comfortable one, punctuated by the noises of cooking. Glass bottles clinked together as Erik found oregano and olive oil in one spot, olives and pickled capers in another, all nearly untouched by human hands. The pot and saucepan he took from the hanging rack over the island made gong-like noises with their neighbors, and the water he ran from the tap filled the pot with its own strange, metallic music.

Erik paused with the pan in his hands, squinted at it, and scraped at a crusted something with his fingernail. It didn’t come off, so he shrugged to himself and set it on the range to heat over blue flame. As he did so, he glanced over to see Charles watching still, eyes sharp with questions he didn’t ask. Erik smirked to himself and looked away again; the preparation of a meal was its own ritual, not unlike magic, and it seemed even Charles knew this.

He poured olive oil into the pan and swirled it to coat the bottom, and then, to test the temperature, touched the pad of his index finger through the oil to the metal. Hot bubbled snapped against his skin and Charles gasped, grabbing for Erik’s elbow.

Amused, Erik allowed Charles to examine his hand, holding it between his own with an endearing, absent-minded authority. Charles didn’t appear surprised by the sight of Erik’s unburned skin, but when he looked up at Erik his eyebrows were furrowed. “You don’t feel the heat?”

“I feel it,” Erik said, curling his other, non-oily fingers around Charles’. He called the fire to his veins, and Charles’ eyes went wide; his warm human skin felt almost cold in contrast to Erik’s. “…But it doesn’t burn.”

Oh.” Charles grinned in breathless amazement. “Because you’re a dragon.”

“Indeed.” Then Erik was left looking down at Charles, aware suddenly of how close they were, of how Charles’ fingers were living things against his, and that Charles had tipped his chin up to see him. Erik’s gaze dipped down, settling on those red human lips, parted still from Charles’ earlier grin, fading now.

Charles’ intake of breath startled him into awareness. He’d swayed still closer, using his height to loom over Charles, poised to—

Erik pulled away and returned to his cooking. The water in the pot had begun to make little bubbles along the bottom, and if he wanted the sauce to be done at the same time as the spaghetti he would have to start quickly.

So he ignored that lingering awareness of Charles, every sense still attuned to the peculiar gravity Charles exerted as he huffed in irritation, moved around the kitchen, and then eventually settled back against the island counter. He didn’t speak, but Erik heard every shift and rustle of his clothing and tried to understand meaning from it all the same.

Eventually, mercifully, the meal was complete. Erik drained the water from the noodles and gave the sauce a final stir as he switched off the gas. He sniffed cautiously, and smelled everything as it should be—the sharp sweetness of garlic, the chemical burn of pepper, and mellow acid from the tomatoes and capers. It was not a dish he’d be ashamed to share.

He heard the sound of cupboards opening, and turned to see that Charles was already getting out plates and utensils. This left Erik free to select a drink, so he held a bottle out for Charles to see. “Brandy?”

Charles paused to grimace. “With pasta? Eugh. Choose a wine instead. I don’t care what kind, just… not brandy.”

Erik frowned at the bottle, then put it regretfully away. He stooped down to look at the wine rack on the counter, and because he knew little about wine relative to other spirits, chose one for the red color of the seal around the cork. “Rothschild, nineteen forty-five?”

Pausing with the stems of wine glasses pinched between his fingers, Charles blinked in surprise. “Really? Hm, well, I suppose. I’ll pour, and you can do the honor of distributing the…” He looked over the stovetop, sniffed doubtfully, and raised his eyebrow. “…Spaghetti alla puttanesca?”

“I have no idea. I ordered something like it once,” Erik said, handing off the wine. Charles still looked suspicious, as if maybe Erik had somehow planted all the ingredients in his kitchen beforehand, but Erik merely slipped by him to get at the oven and split the meal.

He turned back again just as Charles lifted the bottle from the second glass, now rather more than half-full with a deep red wine. Replacing the cork, Charles hesitated. “I don’t have a table…”

“It can be an informal supper,” Erik said, and exchanged one of the plates for a glass. He went to the living room, where he waited for Charles to take his seat in the chair before sinking down to sit cross-legged on the carpet. The plate found its home in his lap and he balanced the wine carefully on the cover of a book.

“Oh. You could have used the chair, if you wanted,” Charles said, looking down at him, fork poised and clean. When Erik made a dismissive gesture, he set the plate aside and slid off to join Erik on the floor, shifting around to get comfortable. He reached up for his plate and leaned back against the front of the armrest, smiling. “There; that’s better!”

Sparing a moment to stare at Charles in disbelief, Erik decided he had no reply for that, so he ducked his chin down to focus instead on food. After sampling it, he concluded that Charles had probably been right about the brandy, at least—it probably would have been vile. Erik was no less indifferent toward wine now than he’d been before, but the Rothschild was a pleasant compliment, with a hint of mint to accompany the sweet.

On the floor in front of him, meanwhile, Charles made a little surprised noise of delight. “This is really good! Thank you, Erik.”

Erik glanced up to see Charles smiling at him with the rim of his wine glass perched against his bottom lip, and didn’t mention that there was almost certainly too much salt. “You’re welcome. Really, you’re—welcome to it, any time.”

Those lips widened to reveal a glimpse of teeth, the glass migrating clear. “Thank you, but I wouldn’t want to impose…?”

Shaking his head again, Erik looked back to his pasta. “It’s not an imposition,” he mumbled, though in reality it probably was. He found he didn’t much care.

They ate in silence, then—well, something like silence, because Charles didn’t seem to notice the little hums and croons he made while he ate. Erik endeavored to ignore them but couldn’t quite help the thrill of pride, even though it was nothing so grand as taking Charles into the sky on his back, but only the smaller intimacy of shared food.

Charles finished first, and Erik took the opportunity to sneak glimpses between bites as Charles stared down at the books scattered around his legs, touching the fabric of their covers and caressing the embossed titles to read by fingertip. Erik wanted, suddenly, to lay down among them with Charles, curled between the stacks and around his warm human body in some fiction of safety. At one point he might have, but now—he swallowed, recalling Charles pressed against him, warm in another way, and light-headed dizziness swept over him in a wave.

As if he’d read his mind—and perhaps he had—Charles cleared his throat, and met Erik’s eyes, serious but also, most of all, kind. “I need to apologize, Erik, for what I did the other night. I wasn’t in my right mind and I misinterpreted your interest in me, to your detriment. I’m sorry.”

Erik looked down, hoping for something left on his plate to push around, but there was nothing. “That’s all right. I know it wasn’t anything personal.”

There was a pause, and Erik looked up to see Charles’ confusion, his need to solve shining brightly in his eyes. “How do you mean?”

“You’re human,” Erik said, frowning. “It’s in your nature, isn’t it? Being… indiscriminate.”

Charles tilted his head, eyebrows furrowed. A smile teased at his lips. “Indiscriminate?”

“Yes.” Erik searched for an explanation, feeling suddenly very much as if he were speaking about something he really shouldn’t. “You’re driven to breed, aren’t you? As biological creatures. Even outside your own species.”

He cringed at the sound of Charles’ laugh. “What? Are you saying that I—that being attracted to you is a sort of perverse bestiality brought about by my hormone-saturated biology?” At Erik’s awkward, damning silence, he chuckled. “Oh, my friend, no; I’m sorry, but you’re very much mistaken. While it’s true that I enjoy sex, and I’m far from the church’s ideal of monogamous, joyless procreation, my attempt to seduce you—though ill-advised—was definitely far more personal than physical. I’m long past the age where I’d simply throw myself in the path of any warm body that came along.”

“But I could smell it on you that you already had, that same night,” Erik said, and then, perhaps a little belatedly, schooled his expression into something a little less petulant.

“You could smell—!” Charles interrupted himself with a noise of helpless disbelief, casting his eyes ceiling-ward in surrender, and then smiled ruefully. “I may be an animal, Erik, and I might be driven by chemicals and neurons, but that doesn’t mean that I’m only a sort of biological clockwork. I can choose how to express my interest in someone, and I’d prefer to keep your friendship. I shouldn’t have let anything affect my judgment, no matter how I felt that night.”

Erik narrowed his eyes, studying Charles’ relaxed, casual posture, and recognized it as being that same sort of forcibly nonthreatening posture Erik himself had used when he’d worried Charles might flee. “Am I meant to be offended?”

Hesitating, Charles laid his fingers over each other, and took a deep, indecisive breath. “I… hope that you aren’t. That said, quite aside from the cultural misunderstanding, what I did—well, between two human men, at least, it’s actually illegal. If you wanted, you could have me arrested.”

“I assumed it was normal among your kind.” Which was true enough, in that Erik had simply assumed it to be another one of those mystifyingly human things, but he still found it—not offensive, perhaps, but bewildering.

Where dragons where concerned, mating was very literal. As with all things draconic, it was the idea of the act and not the act itself that brought them together; while males and females weren’t really different, they definitely required each other. The thought that it might not be the same for other species was mystifying—it was the sort of eccentric thing gods did, just to prove they were gods and did not follow earthly rules.

Unless… perhaps human males—and maybe females as well—could be… both?

This idea was so utterly absurd that Erik found it instantly fascinating, and by the time Charles spoke again, he’d thought of and then quickly discarded an entire system by which human men mated with each other in secret and then transferred the offspring to their wives.

“There’s an ample body of research suggesting that it’s normal behavior among many animals, including humans, but unfortunately it’s still regarded as pathological by most of the Western world.” Charles coughed into his hand, and then slouched, losing some of his lecturer’s demeanor. “So, uh, it’s best not to mention it to anyone. Not that you ordinarily talk to a lot of people, I suppose, or seem to care what they think, but… yes. It is what it is. I hope you don’t think less of me for it.”

“I don’t,” Erik said, though he didn’t smile. Instead, he angled his head to look Charles over again, thoughtfully. “You believed you were taking a risk, didn’t you? By… kissing me.”

“I… Yes, I was, but… I wasn’t afraid of you.” A bashful sort of surprise appeared on Charles’ face, as if he’d only just considered that and was considering whether it might be more polite to be afraid.

Knowing all that he felt he needed to, now, Erik nodded. “You don’t disgust me, Charles. Were you a dragon, and female, I—but I can’t even imagine you in that way.”

There followed a silence in which Erik’s imagination demonstrated that no, in fact, he could imagine, even if the actual mechanics remained a mystery. For what seemed an eternity he saw in perfect detail Charles’ freckled shoulders beneath him, Charles’ body fit neatly into the curve of his stomach, and—though the difference of scale made it almost ridiculous—Erik embedded deep inside, bodies and minds joined in an agony far sweeter than what Charles had found within Erik before.

The pink of Charles’ cheeks slowly deepened to red, and Erik remembered belatedly to hope that he wasn’t reading his thoughts, though he could feel the heat of his own face as it betrayed the wanderings of his mind. He knew better than to hope that Charles wasn’t already thinking much the same thing, but… he didn’t need to know it was mutual.

“You’re more understanding than I had any reason to expect,” Charles said, still blushing furiously. “Thank you.”

Erik looked away, swallowing the ache that had lodged deep in his throat. “Don’t thank me for that.”

 

53

 

It felt wrong, later, to bid Charles a good night and go to sleep by himself, leaving Charles unguarded in another flat entirely, but for the first time Erik felt afraid—not of Charles, but of himself.

The loneliness—that desperate ache—did not go away as he lay in the dark of his room. The problem, he determined, was not that Charles had kissed him. Charles knew what he wanted and, apparently, had no problems with it. He was human and had the flexibility of choice.

Erik, however… Erik was a dragon; he was purpose wrapped in scales and leather. This made him greater, in some ways, than those creatures of mortal flesh, but it gave him fewer… options.

He wanted Charles, and should not have been able to.

Perhaps it was only a symptom of his long isolation, deprived of kind words and touch, worn down by the inexorable weariness of time. Perhaps the way Charles saw him had reached deep within and changed Erik, had primed him to respond to Charles as if he were a potential mate and not what he was.

None of that was supposed to be possible, either, but then again… There had been stories, back when there were still people around to tell them, of dragons and humans being together. They hadn’t been good stories—they had all taken the tone of warnings, of perversion and farce, but they had to be true at least in part.

 Take, for example, the legend of the dragon who’d sought the flattery of humans by masquerading as a poet, fawned over by court ladies for his pretty verses and handsome face until finally he begged one of those women to take the human vows of marriage. The legend went on to detail the extremes of secrecy he demanded, spiriting her to his lair while she slept and forbidding her from ever seeking him out when he did not seek her, all so that she would not know his true shape.

His efforts were in vain, of course, because truth had its way of struggling free and dramatic irony demanded it, but in the end that human woman saw her husband for what he really was and had been appropriately terrified by the discovery. He’d sent her away, forbade her from ever returning, and had then presumably gone about his life in the proper dragon way.

Unless… What if the farce had begun not as a cautionary tale, but as a tragedy?

It had been Erik’s own mother who’d told it to him long ago, back when he’d wanted to know anything and everything about humans. She hadn’t mentioned whether that pair had consummated their marriage, but the fact that they’d been happy had to count for something. It had still been love, hadn’t it, even if it was misguided?

Erik sighed, long and deep as only a dragon could, and rolled over onto his side to sprawl over the pillows. The history between their species was more complicated than what had happened since that time the humans liked to call Enlightenment. They hadn’t always fought: there had been a time before that, a revered Golden Age of dragons far removed from the days of skulking around caves and mauling knights.

Wracking his memory, Erik realized that he could think of no specific examples. The royalty of Tibet, he knew, had once included a number of dragons, and still further east his kind had always enjoyed a unique respect from humanity. He’d heard speculation about fire serpents in America worshipped some centuries past, but if they still existed then they did so deep within their jungle temples. In Europe, however…

With an uneasy rumble, Erik admitted to himself that he didn’t know. His first inclination was to blame humanity for that destruction, but on the other hand, dragons were perfectly capable record-keepers, and a few centuries were not so long a time by draconic standards. Someone should have been able to pass the tale, and should have felt obligated to spread it for the very sake of their history.

Forgetting how to trust, however, might well have been the brutal first casualty of survival.

Erik closed his eyes and pictured Charles beside him, small and soft and too trusting to be afraid, and felt that strange fragile emotion again, which he feared now might not be so unfamiliar after all. A part of him still cringed back—Charles was human, and surely there were still other dragons out there who might look past his scars and accept him, but—Erik wasn’t clockwork any more than Charles was, and he could not desire simply out of lust.

It must be possible, then. Whether it was permissible… Well, who was left to object? Either one of them might die soon, and if they could steal some happiness out from the jaws of death—

Still. Still, his thoughts mumbled on, as sleep neared. He needed the opinion of someone who had every reason to argue against it.

He would have to seek out Charles’ wodnic sister, Raven. Surely she could speak sense…