The captain's quarters of the Draigamore have been too ... confining of late. Though he has slept there when he needed the absolute silence of an empty bed (and sometimes one does need that), it now represents something other than his personal space. For a time, it was Tiernan's home as well.
     The great galleon's sails have been lowered and the anchor bedded now longer than it has in years. One has to go back to the High King's arrival on said ship to come to a time when it spent as much time docked. But with business crowding on all sides, and the daily arrival of Potential Betrotheds, the time for sailing (at least for now) has come to a halt.
     He has chambers in three palaces: that of his father on the far islands of the Moonless Kingdom; that in his brother's castle (which also doubles as Powis Castle in the material realm), and in his mother's own. Though he would scowl upon the term, one might say he has taken to 'retreating' to his apartments in his mother's castle in his time of upheaval. Only he would view it as retreating -- what an awful word, retreat -- to lick the wounds of life's most recent change of the course of events. A breakup. His first official.
     Part of him wonders if he might not ought to make it his last as well...
     His apartments are large and quite comfortable, even lavish. He has a bedchamber, a receiving or sitting room where he might entertain and receive official and important guests (and likely future betrotheds and their chaperones), and he has an office of sorts, which is more library than office. Every wall (though decorated in a lovely style) has bookshelves that reach from floor to crown moulding, making way only for the windows that also stretch floor to ceiling and overlook, why naturally, the ocean. The center of this library is taken up by grand seating area of stag leather sofas and settees, chairs and ottomans on rugs woven by the finest rug-makers in the many kingdoms, affiliated and unaffiliated. A wooden, rollaway desk rests on the interior wall beside a great stone hearth, which is not currently lit as it is summer.
     It is at this desk that Iowerth Rhudd Draig is sitting, pouring over ledgers and taking stock of his many contracts, where contracts need to be renewed, tightened, increased and the enterprise papers of the burgeoning navy of merchant marine vessels and converted privateers. A quill moves, pushed by his right hand, while his left hand rests against his forehead. His fiery hair is mussed, but cut short to keep unruly curls in their place. He is pale, as if he has not seen the light of the sun or indeed any sleep for several days. He wears a silk shirt of ivory, untied and baring his tattoos to the chamber and to the view of anyone entering through the door. His wears a pair of stag suede pants, the suede dyed a deep midnight blue to match those marks. His feet are bare, his boots, his sword and all else in his bedroom where he dropped them after visiting the brothels the previous evening.
     Iowerth Rhudd Draig does not stop. There is no stopping now, is there? There is a fleet to build (on his own), a kingdom to construct (again, on his own), a woman to find and marry (he has enough help with that), and family to look after, a people to lead. He has quite enough on his plate. Too much to stop and think about a broken heart...
     Far, far too busy for that...

     There are shadows. And where there are shadows, your brother has entry points into your rooms, into your life. If you did not wish for him to come, after all, easily done, isn't it? Brightest light or darkest night, and he has no way in; every door locked, every window barred. But you have left him a way in...
     He appears, clad in black leather armour. Shirtless, as this armour requires; his skin powdered before the leather's pulled on. He was Somewhere Else when his father, your brother, bade him go. He appears in your midst, hair like living flame, knives and sword in their sheaths as he begins to draw off his gloves, tugging them off and tossing them to one side. "Brawd..."
     It is a word. Only one; emerald green eyes seek out your own, his mouth a firm line with his eyebrows questioning you. I was far away in other places when I heard that you were in need, Io. There are many words I could think of, but I'll put them away until they're needed. But you ... do not seem as if you would be happy for my interruption ... shall I go again?

     You needn't have rushed. As you can see, I'm capable of getting up and almost dressing myself. His pen-scratching halts and Iowerth sits back, turning instinctively toward you. No, you will always have access to him. To all of his places. You will be the only one. He looks at you, then looks at how you are dressed, the armor and swords. An eyebrow lifts. You've been busy it looks like. If you need to return to ...whatever it is you were doing, don't feel as though you need to stay on my account. My brother, your father, is a bit of an alarmist. He seems to think I need my hand held at every turn. I should spend more time with him perhaps. Perhaps he would know me better.
     Iowerth gives you the option to go. You were the first to leave without much warning, after all. Perhaps you still have a reason to want to be away from his person, out of the grasp of the ever-tugging tide. He looks away from you, turning his wooden swivel chair back toward his papers. He rocks a moment side to side, his eyes not really reading. And then a pitcher of cool wine appears on the table in the center of the chamber, and fruits and cheeses. It is an invitation, maybe even a request for you to stay.
     My head hurts. Do you mind if I use my voice? Or do you not want anyone to know that you are here? And... by all means... go ahead with whatever words you have, brawd. Who am I to be afraid of words? Iowerth settles back in his swivel chair, turning it back toward you. Slumping down in it, his legs stretching long (and idly moving him side to side), he stares at you and then at nothing, and then down to his hands, noticing his ink-stained fingers.

     "Don't be an ass. You're more important to me than killing spiders." Gwilym speaks out loud, now, acknowledging your headache without speaking of it. "Noone will know I'm here unless you tell them I am. I don't give a damn what anyone else thinks. I will be who and what I am, and if it lands me trouble," he shrugs, "well, it won't be the first time."
     He moves to your side, then around behind you, his hands landing on your shoulders heavily but gently. There's a squeeze and he releases, bending his head to kiss the top of your head, his eyes closed as he inhales deeply. "You look like hell, Io. When did you last bathe? Or eat? Or anything."
     It is on the inside, not the out. But he can see it all the same. Something is wrong, but you are not speaking of it. Your shoulders are squeezed again, then released, and he moves to your desk, leaning against the edge of it so that he can face you. The green eyes are scrutinizing you closely, so closely. "Paperwork?"

     There is a look of Thank you that crosses his expression, warm and quiet gratitude that needs no other expression. "You know I can't stand lying about in my own filth. I have a delicate constitution," he drawls. It is not of course true, though it is true that he has had a bath. "My whore bathed me last night as a matter of fact. But I drank too much. Even for me. But thank you for the compliment all the same. So, Rhodri just told you I was to be looked after? He did not tell you that Tiernan and I have broken things off, that he has moved out and ... left to find himself. Rhodri is a master of Understatement."
     "But," he exhales, "... such is the life of a High King in training. Paperwork, the occasional broken heart, engagements that must be pursued, contracts and architecture. And the occasional whore," he adds on with a droll tug to his voice. When upset he becomes either horribly violent or terrible caustic and sardonic. "I'm not hungry," he shakes his head. "I have too much on my mind... too much to do. I have no chamberlain, suddenly, and everything I've ignored for the past several months is coming back to haunt me."
     He was tight to your grasp, his flesh like stone. When you come to stand before him, Iowerth tips back his head to look at you. "Everything that Tiernan was before his mother was slain... was slain with her," he softly notes. "So... now he's gone off to see if there's ...anything left, anything of him to be found, anything of meaning. He does not want to be useless, a voided thing. I can respect that, even as I admit that I do not like it. Can I ask you a question, Gwilym?"
     He doesn't wait for you to answer. "Was... I the reason you left without saying where you were going? Do I create such ...chaos in others? I am ... beginning to think, to believe that it might be best for all concerned were I to become celibate. The great celibate sea, an infertile fertile ocean. I ... feel as though I damage everyone I touch or love..."

     "...No, he didn't tell me." Your brother stares at you for a long moment. "I suspect he thought it best you tell me yourself, that it's your news to tell. Da has a delicate touch to him." He stays where he is, staying - remaining. And now, he reaches for your hand, tugs you to him. "Come with me."
     Gwilym doesn't stand yet - he looks at you as steadily as a rock. "You've ignored it a couple of months, Io, then you can ignore it for another night without anything catching on fire. And if you don't come with me willingly, I'll just have to kidnap you, and then there'll be a political tangle the likes of which even our fathers and mother together can't undo; they'll have to just kill us and start over on the entire heirs thing."
     Your question gets a look. "Io... do you listen to the shite coming out of your mouth, or have you been taking lessons from me and papa? Do you really think I need help in being full of chaos? Cut the self-pity - or at least let me indulge it in a way which doesn't make you so damned intent on trying to cut your nose off to spite your face." His voice softens, your hand released. "I love you. I'd wager your boy still does as well. Personally, I can't fathom you handling it this way, but that's why you're going to be the High King and I'm only going to have a couple of piddling kingdoms," he grins a little, "and if da could hear me, he'd smack me. Io... come on, then."

     He starts to say he doesn't feel like an adventure. He doesn't feel like doing much of anything, and that includes sitting in this chair. So what would a change of scenery matter in the long run, or the short run for that matter? He holds your hand a moment before you let it go and he rises as you harangue him, apparently immune but wishing to rise as if on his own accord.
     "I'm not asking out of self pity," Iowerth quietly counters, "...but with an objective observation of a scientific mind. My power is ... hardly warm and fuzzy," eyebrows quirk, "... I do have rather the most profound effect on people. Drowning, capsizing, swallowing." He stands tall and stalwart though he is upset. "I don't know what Tiernan thinks. Neither does he, that's why he's left. I'm going to take the tactic of making no assumptions other than... what was is not, and will not be as it was again."
     That is an assumption, but an easy one for him to make. When or if Tiernan finds his soul, who is to say after all that the souls that once loved, or thought they loved, will do so again when they met again?
     "Where are we going? I'm not dressed for much other than lying about in my own chambers. Do I need shoes?" Iowerth smirks at you, then looks down to his bare feet. The smirk winds away, as inconstant as stray clouds on a blustery day, blown apart by the storms of emotion underneath. Emotion and determination. It is safe to say that he is as disillusioned as he is anything. Disappointed, certainly. If love's going to be like this, what's the point of it all, really?
     Iowerth removes his shirt and tosses it onto the couch. It wasn't serving much purpose anyway, and he waits to hear what you suggest on clothing to replace it, if anything.

     "Bah." Gwilym rolls his eyes at you, rising to his feet. He paces away, leathers transforming to loose silk trousers - still black and shadowed - and bare feet and equally bare chest. "If all you're going to do is lie around, you can do so in my chambers instead of yours." A gesture; shadows take shape, alter. "I can't talk here," he complains. "Your ship - I don't know, brawd; I've just never felt at home on boats, not like you."
     An archway forms, opaque; on the other side, the unknown. "It is one of the ways which reminds me how different we are, Io. I ... could not let him go and move on like that. I would give him his time, certes, but then ... I would have to go after him." Your brother shrugs, moving towards the portal. "I would need to know... that what has been in his heart, in mine, that it was real and not figment. But I dwell too much in shadows; I cannot abide them in that place as well."
     He turns to you, waiting for you, emerald eyes keen with mingled emotions, all close to the surface and lurking. "Do I drown in you, Io? Oes, I suppose I do. But no more than you are lost in me, in my shadow ways. Sometimes, I need to go away, until I can balance again; I'm not good at love." He admits it freely. "Maybe, in some ways, I am just not ready to love anyone who could set me aside. I'm not brave like you, in that."

     His hand comes up to touch your arm. He clasps it at the bicep, a sympathetic squeeze. An apology for the water that chokes you, when it chokes you. "I am a terrible lover," he says. Not in mechanics, god knows, but literally terrible. Causing fear as much as love. How Machiavelli would have loved him.
     Iowerth steps through the archway, going, he knows, to your chambers, to your bed. He will like there and be held and talk. It is so easy for him to retreat into his work, to all that work, and to all the things that need his attention, to take on that armor of humor and encase his heart in it. You know that better than anyone.
     "I didn't want to let him go, but keeping him here was not an option. How could I, if I love him? I ultimately have to want what's best for him, even if it means we are no longer to be lovers or be in a relationship." Iowerth shrugs slightly. "What else could I have done? He has suffered enough. He has lost everything. And for a couple of months we pretended as if it hadn't already ended. But we knew the truth. It was staring us in the face as soon as his mother was slain and his kingdom was taken. Not really his, mother said. Well... tell him that."
     Periwinkle eyes shimmer as he looks to you. "I have great sympathy for him. He needs to have a life, a soul, all those things that were denied to him. I would be a terrible lover indeed if I did not wish him well. So... I am angry," he nods, admitting it, "....but not at him. I am angry at the situation. And that I could not fix it. If only I were ...egotistic enough to think I should have been reason enough for him to live." He snorts at that. "I am not that arrogant."

     "You are not listening to me," Gwilym counters patiently. He steps through shadows, pulling you with him, an arm going around your waist. "I did not say that you should have kept him here." He turns to you as you and he find the way through. Not directly to one of those shadow-created bedrooms. Instead, it is a midnight garden, filled with all sorts of night-blooming plants. Moonflowers. Cereus. Others as well. A hand lifts, touches to your face with sudden gentleness, and then he pulls away. He moves to a bench, sprawls down on it as if intending to smash it under his weight.
     "You say it has ended. Can lovers never need to find themselves without all things ending? Sometimes things happen, Io. And you cannot always fix those things for others. Sometimes, it takes wandering alone to learn - duw," he snorts, "did I not do just that? Do I not? And I do so, and I did so, without needing to say 'this thing between us, it's over'. I don't know what the two of you concluded," he shrugs, "but it sounds to me like you're being stupid, throwing away good with bad."
     He sits up, straddling the bench and leaning forward. He indicates the plants with a sweep of one arm, the little fountains, the little waterfall. "Make yourself comfortable. Let me know what I can get you. Lemonade, maybe? It sounds to me like the last thing you need is alcohol. And anyway, back to what I was saying," Gwilym stretches, sitting up. "I did not say you should hold him. I said that if I were you, I would go after him, after he's had a bit of time."

     He takes a seat on the grass and then he stretches out on the coolness of the earth. "Running after him proves what? That I do not trust him to make his own conclusions? That what he needs to do for himself is not as important as him being here with me? My going after him might circumvent all that he is attempting to do. It is his life. He has to be content with it. He has to make peace with it. That is not something I can do for him, or that he can even do with me around. I am a distraction." Iowerth lies with one arm crooked beneath his head as a pillow and the other over his forehead. "It is not like he does not know if he wants to be my chamberlain or if he's ready to make a commitment. He literally does not know who he is. He is an empty vessel, Gwilym, that has never been filled. Filled only recently by me. Before this, he was... unbeknownst to us both... simply a tool for the Witch Queen that called herself his mother. None of his thoughts or perhaps even his desires were truly his own. And when she was slain and all the spells on him were removed, there was nothing there. Just .... this shell with a living body but with a blank slate. He loves me... as much as someone who does not know who they are or why they are or what they're supposed to be doing may love anyone. He was so weak after that... I was not sure he would live. And though he lives, he cannot simply be a vessel for my own desires. He has to have his own, Gwilym. And I cannot give him those. I tried, believe me. I gave him titles, jobs, created ways for him to have purpose and fulfillment, and none of them could sustain him. It has to come from him."
     Iowerth turns his head toward you as he hears you sit up. He moves his arm slightly to look at you. "I'm not throwing it away. I'm being realistic. I have to be. I can't pin hopes that he's going to come back, that even if he does we'll feel the same way about one another. I am not saying that when he returns I'm not going to speak with him. I am just saying that the Tiernan I loved ... isn't here anymore, he was a figment then who is trying to become real now. And if he returns I'll meet him for what he is and ... we'll see if it is possible to start over. But it will be starting over."
     Iowerth exhales a mighty breath. He shakes his head. "No lemonade. I don't know what I want, Gwi. Maybe water. Cider. Something. I don't know." He rolls over, giving his chest to the earth, both arms folding under his chin. Tilting his head, he rests it there, exhaling as he closes his eyes. "I could be married by then. If he's on the material plane, he could be gone months there... a year here. So... what am I to do but move as the universe wills it? It is what it is, brother, despite our wishes all the same."

     He listens in silence as you spill out your thoughts, your fears, your beliefs. Listens without comment, without expression, as if you speak to the shadows themselves. "With you it is so all or nothing," he says quietly. "On or off; oes or no. Black, or white. I am in the inconstant shadows, brawd; I ... do not see things the way that you do." He shakes his head. He isn't going to argue with you. Isn't going to push you, to do what he would do. Instead, he rises to his feet, padding barefooted to one of the fountains, thrusting both hands into the frigid depths.
     "Too much realism will kill your heart faster than anything else. It's alright to entertain a little hope, Io." That's all Gwilym says; from Avalon, then, he pulls ciders, bottled in amber and still sealed. He uses the edge of his hand to whack them open, one set in front of you as he holds the other. He takes a long drink, eyes closed.
     "We're looking at the same picture, but we're seeing such different things. I don't know what to tell you, brawd. If your mind is made up, though, then there's no point in my talking. All it'll do is make you dig your heels in deeper, all the more stubborn. So ... I'll do what I'll do, you'll do what you'll do. Have a drink."

     "I am my father's son," he groans. A hand uncurls from beneath his head and he reaches up to take the cider. He lifts up on his elbows, drink cradled in his hands before him. He drinks. "I don't know that I'm allowed the liberty of thinking fanciful thoughts," he watches the bubbles in the bottle. "How ironic, a fairy king who isn't allowed to have fanciful thoughts." He smirks at that, knowing outright he's no bleeding fairy, and only a king in training.
     Iowerth is quiet for a time. He drinks now and again. Mostly he watches the bubbles of carbonation dance in the cider as he settles back down, resting his chin on folded arms. He's brooding, your brother. You know him when he's like that: day is night and blue is red. But rather than digging his heels in (all the way, at least), he turns his head toward you. "What's the picture you see?"
     An elbow to sod, his head resting on his hand, Iowerth leans up a little, high enough to allow him to drink. He looks at you, and then away. If he looks at you too long he'll get too emotional. "How would you assess my situation then?"

     "You love him," Gwilym says simply. There is no jealousy; why would he be jealous? He has more of you than anyone else, perhaps; more, perhaps, than anyone else ever will. "And he loves you. And in our family, when we love, we do not do so by halfway measures, even when one or the other ends up running. Look at mother and papa. Hell, look at da and mum. It's just the way we are, Io."
     He moves to one of the benches, settles on it again. "He needs to figure out who he is, and he doesn't want to do so while riding on your coat tails. That's good; it means he has some self-respect." He grins, but the emerald eyes are serious. "Would you be willing to settle for being a kept man, Io? It sounds to me as if he wants to do this to prove things to himself, oes - but also to prove himself to you. He does this for him, but he does it for you as well. Now, I am guessing only - I did not get to know him so well as that. I did not slip beneath his skin, I never made love to him or held him as you did. But maybe that is why I see this. And maybe I am full of shite." He shrugs. It's possible.
     The bottle is tipped back, cider drunk, and he sighs, an exhale of apples and alcohol. "...I think that he does need to prove himself, to himself, and that he is trying to discover things. But I think that if he is any fit companion for you, any fit vessel for your love, that he is also doing this in order to give you something which he considers worth the giving. Not because you ask or expect it, but because he loves you. And you are feeling bereft because he is not here. And you are so certain that things have changed. He may have been his mother's tool, but he retained enough independence to choose to be with you in the first place; his mother was not so happy about that. And that means that the person who said he loved you was not so blank a cipher as you describe, Io. You are in retrospect doubting everything you have had, because you are hurting. I hold you have not lost anything except his presence - and if you want his presence back sooner, then go to him." He shrugs. "Join him on his travels. He's traveled with you often enough, after all - while papa's been challenging you," the bottle is pointed at your chest, "and you've been discovering yourself."

     "I said it before," Iowerth murmurs, pausing to drink down the cider. "I want him to do what is right for him. What is important for him. What he needs to do. Because I love him. I don't want him to be a kept man. I wanted him to be my Chamberlain. To help me create this thing I've been ... given. To help me choose a wife," he chuckles, "... and he's not going to be here to do that either. I'd rather he would be but not if he's fucking miserable being with me. And he has been since the war. He was miserable, depressed, tired, despondent, unresponsive. So... yes... I want him to be happy. And yes I respect him for knowing it's an issue and trying to solve it for himself. I'm trying to be big about this, Gwi. I'm not sitting around saying 'O woe is fucking me'..."
     That much is true. He's been too busy working. The only self-pity he's allowed himself is out of eyesight of anyone important. He throws himself into sex with whores as a way of exorcizing those particular demons.
     Finishing the cider, Iowerth sighs. He idly spins the bottle on its side in wobbling circles. "I do love him. I care for him. That's why I have to let him do what he's doing, Gwilym. I can't in self pity, because I'm feeling bad or my feelings are hurt, go chasing after him boohooing. And I don't want to risk more than I already have. If I go after him, that could undo what he's trying to accomplish and completely backfire. Even if I had the time, which I don't. I can't stop marriage proceedings or we'll show it off as the partial farce it is."
     The bottle points at you and Iowerth smirks. Ha. Funny. He spins it about again. "It's one thing to learn about yourself in the context of a relationship. Most often, it can be done without breaking up. But if the person doesn't know who they are or why they're even alive, such basic questions, Gwi, then no... I don't believe being in a relationship is advisable. Those are such basic and fundamental questions, upon which all other emotions are based. Maybe he discovers he doesn't really like being fucked by a man, for instance. Maybe that's not who he is now that he's not being controlled by Corruption. Not that I think it's a corruption," he protests before you can, "...but he may consider that it is. Who the fuck knows? That's the problem."

     The look on Gwilym's face says it before you can say it. "You're missing the point. You have the alternative, Io. No, you can't go haring off at a moment's notice, but who has more control over the flow of time between here and there than we do? Not bloody many. But this is what I said : our ways of dealing with this are too different. You take after your father. I take after mine. I can wait it out with an open heart, or I can give chase, in such a case - you, though? You are barricading yourself in." He points at you. Don't deny it!
     He rises to his feet, seldom able to long stay still around you; he is in such contrast to Tiernan in that way (one way of many). "Agh, I want to hit you, brawd! Controlled? You know and I know both that it was passive. It could have been summoned up, but it wasn't. He was made to be able to be puppeted, and that's where the danger lay; not that he was a puppet! He chose you. I saw him with you. I investigated, remember? With your consent, and it wasn't all just hiding under your bed hearing what I shouldn't have!"
     You are given a Look of the sort your mother perfected, and then Gwilym spins on one silent heel, tossing up his hands. "The hell with it," he states. "I said it already; I do not know why we continue to argue this point. You will do what you must. And I? I will do as I must, too."

     He is every bit as infuriating as his father. It's a galling thing to realize you don't have quite as much self-determination as you thought you had. "You're right, you're right," Iowerth sighs, resting his head on one arm as his other spins the bottle around. "I do barricade myself. Like fortifying a village." He snorts at that too. "I swallow the sea until I become the sea."
     His legs idly kick (he has to move around you too, though it is not the usual sort of moving around he does with you) as he remains reclined on the grass. "I guess I am feeling sorry for myself a bit. A bit... put upon. Woe is fucking me," he grunts. "I'm sorry."
     He would barricade himself up so tight as to become an impenetrable tower of stone, mortared with his duty, with the stones of obligations. Until his anger would blow through it and send the stones sky-high.
     He has exhibited that anger recently enough. Ships blown sky-high...
     Iowerth exhales, letting energy pass through him without speaking. He has been angry, frustrated, disappointed, dismayed, disgruntled and down. He lets that just hover around him, he lets it exist as it wishes, the energy moving back and forth, released with each and every breath. "He's not the same, but... maybe some time away from me will let him catch his breath. Maybe it won't last long. I don't know, Gwi. I just know we weren't getting anywhere being together. He wasn't happy. Not over the last month or two."
     With a final breath of that foul energy released, Iowerth sits up, feet on the ground and knees bent. He rests his arms across his knees. "I wish I could see it as you see it. I just feel pressed by the weight of everything... I started turning hard as a diamond." Periwinkle eyes roll. "In more ways than just the usual..."

     "And over the last month or two, Io, how many changes have you been through?" Gwilym wonders quietly. "Have many changes have we been through?" We. Oes, we. With our own strange love, and all the complications it brings to bear on us. "It isn't fair," he says suddenly. "You're getting all the grief, Io. I ... exist so well in the shadows that noone really notices what I am up to. I steal things, but it's part of my identity, so even that doesn't get me in trouble. I'm almost surprised that you don't hate me."
     He moves to you, sits heavily down next to you, an arm slung around your shoulders. "Look," he says quietly, "we make our own destiny, oes? If you want an outcome with Tiernan, then go make it yours. If you leave it up to fate and sit here, pissin' and moanin' about how it's his choice, and all the rest, shite, brawd, sooner or later you are going to kick yourself for not having done. Go and do, ocean. Water wears away rock. And if there is anyone more rocklike than that boy of yours, I have not seen him."
     You are hugged, tightly, fiercely, then released. "I wish I could take the pain for you. I do. But you would not let me, even if I could. But that also means you have to be the one to take the kick in the arse and get on it, Io... before your family starts meddling in your affairs even more than they already do."

     He leans against you as you hug him. "I wish you could too," he smirks out. "But I'm sure you'll have your own to deal with eventually. Unless your string of luck... or is it skill? Continues." Iowerth shrugs. "I'm getting all the grief, I guess, but it comes with the territory, Gwilym." He looks to you. "It would be so easy for me to throw myself in you right now."
     The star burns. It gleams on his skin. Iowerth looks up, then tips his head back. He breathes and concentrates on breathing. In. Out. Deeply. I do love you. Even though you tell me how to run my business and get off scot-free while I'm left hanging the bag as usual. Periwinkle eyes open and slant to you, a corner of his mouth quirking upward.
     "Thanks for the offer, brawd. But the love's mine, and the pain that goes with it is mine too." He doesn't speak anymore about going or waiting. He has to follow his own conscience on this one. And he, as you have repeatedly stated, is not you.
     Iowerth unfolds an arm and reaches to hold your hand. "Diolch, brawd," he whispers. "I appreciate all you've said. I will consider your advice." He may not take it but he does appreciate it, and he respects it. "So... where have you been all this time?" Iowerth deftly changes the subject, his other hand rubbing his eyes. He's been up all night. After his bath with the whore (that followed the relentless shagging), he returned to the palace to sit at the desk where you found him. "I was beginning to get a complex, all my lovers running off and leaving me..."

     I love you, too. His fingers rub through your hair, an attempted soothing. That's not changed. It won't change. His lips brush your forehead, and he releases you, letting his hand be captured by yours. He isn't going to talk about your other lover anymore. What he will or won't do - well, he'll decide that later. But he's not going to talk about it.
     "I had to go get a little less deep, Io. I'm shallow again, now. It helps; if I let myself get too full up of emotion, it hurts too much, and I deal with it the only way I know how. I go do something else until I'm not that deep a person any longer, and then I feel better." He smiles at you, then turns his head to look away; to look up at the stars, rather than at your Star. "Anyway, you could have called me. I am never so far away that you can't reach me if you want to."
     He shrugs slightly. That's all there is to it, really. All he is allowing himself to know, anyway. "I was away in shadows, far from here," Gwilym says softly, "watching worlds change. Killing things, too; tending to my shadow paths, keeping them clear of intruders and doing what maintenance needed to be done. I let it get run down, and then it's all the more work later. Mostly, I just ... let myself forget myself, brawd. Lost myself in shadows until there was only a little of me left. I am not yet altogether back and 'here'."

     "What a relief," Iowerth exhales, "... forgetting oneself must be." Iowerth gives his shoulder to you, leaning his weight (considerable as it is) against you. "I know. I just thought you might need some time to yourself. I was about to call you... well... call out to you. Mom wants you and I to attend your da's festival. She won't be able to go. She's having a really rough time. I've been worried about her, along with everything else. Anyway, she wants us to go. Do you know anything about it?"
     The electricity moves along his skin from you to him. He closes his eyes, merely enjoying it, feeling it. He swims in it as if you were liquid, embracing every surface. "You seem back and here but... I think I know what you mean. When I become the whirlpools in the depth of the sea and swallow ships, it always takes me a while to recover my senses. You are a good brother, a fast friend, and a love I am lucky to have."
     Iowerth sits up then reclines on the grass again, resting his head on his folded arms. "I think a party would be good," he murmurs, starting to drift off. "I could use the frivolity. Maybe... I can forget myself for a while too. That would be nice..."

     "Forget," Gwilym murmurs, his lips moving against your ear. "We'll go to the party, we'll forget, and then you can take me beneath the waves, hm? And you can finish forgetting. I will watch your back, brawd. I'll draw you back if it seems you'll go too deep, lose yourself too far. That is part of my lot in life, isn't it?" He smiles, a secretive, clever sort of look to the smile, openly affectionate but giving nothing away.
     I am your Star, oes? And maybe, just maybe that is part of the problem, Io. Your boy ... you made him your chamberlain, your seneschal. But what is he to you, in that sense? It isn't enough to love, sometimes. Sometimes, it needs to be given a name.
     He leaves those words, then rises to his feet, nudging you to get up. "Let's go to the bath. Your whore bathed you, well, that's well and good, but tonight," he grins with amusement, "I'll be your whore. Only fifty pounds and this too can be yours!" He chuckles, low in his throat, but the look you get is warmer than that; warmer than warm. Heated. You need to be scrubbed clean and made new. Oes? Let me take care of you a bit, and then you can get some sleep. We'll make a new man of you...

Posted by rowan at August 14, 2006 06:23 PM