His twin has been and gone; with all the emotional force and trauma of the hurricane he used to represent. It has left Gwilym profoundly shaken - unsure of what is truth, and which way is up. He has hauled himself up from the floor, and now he looks about the room with the low exhale of a man who has no bloody idea of what to do.
     Io... we are too alike and too different, all at once. I don't know what it is I need. A good kick in the arse, most likely. Gwilym crosses slowly to the table, with its spread of both food and drink. He ignores the food entirely, he has no stomach for it, and instead concentrates on finding a bottle of brandy. It always was his poison of choice. The stopper's pulled out, a jeweled cup worth screaming millions dashed of its contents and clean brandy poured in instead, all without a thought given to the richness of it. The irony would ordinarily entertain him. Right now, he does not even notice.
     Behind him, the shattered wood of the wardrobe remains broken in its accusatory silent testimony; he ignores that less well, shoulders shifting uncomfortably. What am I going to do? Gwilym sighs again, closing his eyes and making his way in blind man's bluff to the window, leaning his forehead against the cool pane of glass. "What the fuck am I anymore? To you, to him, to anyone."

     Fingers lift a splinter, then flick it to the floor, and shadows swiftly heal what they smashed minutes before. He is suddenly congealed of darkness, simply existing HERE where he was not HERE before. "You are as you have always been, my king," Aeron speaks evenly. "You are your brother's brother and your father's son."
     Aeron closes the wardrobe's door as if it had never so much as been disturbed, not even roughly shut. "What you are to me, what you are to him -- your core belief is only shaken because you define yourself externally. You exist," Aeron posits philosophically, "...merely because we think you do, and thus in your reactions," he glances back to the healed wardrobe, "...do you find solidity. You are the shadow of the shadow, brother."
     The even expression -- it could be said to be without emotion were you not so fortunate (is it fortune?) to understand the difference between the cool Aeron and the compassionate Aeron. On the surface, he would seem to be without compassion. But that is as false as any lie ever told about you: that you are not as bright as your brother; that you are cavalier. "But...perhaps you meant it rhetorically," his smooth voice sounds. He draws near you, standing behind you with a hand upon your shoulder.
     "Perhaps the better question, Gwilym, is what do you want? What do you want to be? For, my king, transition and transformation are in your power. And these are questions only you can answer." His mouth parts warmly at your shoulder. He is your raven, your harbinger. "The sea-dragon still has his whirlpools, does he not? And here you are, swimming. All you need to do, brother, is stand up. There is earth beneath you yet."

     You are turned to - and you can read both trepidation and relief in his expression. Despite the rock star exterior, he is uncertain of himself; right now, in particular, and for some reason, the sight of you is something he needs. Your hand is taken, drawn up to his cheek, then to his mouth; open-mouthed, he kissed at your palm.
     "My mind is swimming yet," Gwilym mutters against your skin. He slides an arm around your waist, leaning into you, not daring to pull you close as much as bend towards you. There is emotion in his voice and in his face, openly displayed to you. "If I knew - if I had answers... if I knew a single damned thing in this world or any other, Aeron... it would be so much easier. And I hate it when I break down like this. Even though a part of me recognizes the necessity."
     He is as conflicted as he ever has been; and more conflicted than he has been, than you have seen him, in years. His eyes close, the sweep of red-gold lashes falling against his checks, and he winds his other arm around you as well. I love you. Please - don't go. It is said, without meaning to be said, with a wealth of fear and regret and worries that come tumbling from the back of his mind like hissing geese. Even after twenty years - there is still the part of him, king or no, that expects that one day he will wake, and find you gone. You will have simply run out of time, patience or desire; you will not want to put up with him any longer. It is a jagged scar, a wound long unhealed, picked at sporadically...

     For all his ephemeral shadows, there is nothing as solid as Aeron. It is more than just physical being; it is for you. As you mouth his palm and lean against him, he is there to meet you. His arms enfold you as you surround him likewise. Do not worry, my beloved king. I am with you until Time wishes to be rid of us Both.
     Aeron is taller than you, and though many years younger, his soul seems born of the oldest parts of his father's own. He has confidence -- not swagger (that is Bran's to claim) -- and it fills the chamber and is there in your arms for you to take. He bends his head, and parts your mouth widely. It is not sex, not decadence, not hedonism that is expressed in that claiming, but his heart, and his loyalty, his presence, and his love. He parts, his teeth tugging your lip, delightful pain that comes and goes -- just like Love itself -- soothed with the suckling of his lips.
     "The two of you have always wrecked one another without intending to. At least as long as I've been around to watch. You need one another, love one another, and yet fear the destruction it would surely cause. But I will be here," Aeron speaks against your mouth, his corona gaze fixed on you -- a halo of green around the black, "to brace with you. The rock that is at your back, my king, for you to lean on when the ocean smacks you with a sudden wave." He smiles a little. "You do not need to fear for me, hmm?" An eyebrow slightly lifts. "I tell you now, as I have told you for years, I am yours to love and yours to command. I am yours until you tell me otherwise, and then I am yet yours in defiance. And so, my king, what is there to fear? Truly."
     And I love you. Lest you forget. Holding you, Aeron plucks at your lips in the silence that follows. He holds you. Feel me, his arms say. I am as solid as you. I am here. You are here. We are here. We ARE.
     He is constant, a paradox in his seeming inconstancy. He is everything he purports not to be. "Do not worry, and do not fear," Aeron whispers between you. "You do not swim alone, my brother."

     Gwilym listens to you quietly, his arms still around you - as if still fearing you will turn insubstantial, into shadow and mist and nothing more. You are capable of it, after all. You are not wrong, he assents silently; you hear him, where no one else may. He opens his eyes, and he looks at you, looking up with the slight gasp for your kisses, the tug that may be at his lips but pulls equally at his heart and his groin (in this family, how could it be otherwise that the two are connected). I wish you were, to be honest. It would be refreshing to find you wrong for a change. Or maybe just about this.
     He smiles halfway, eyes again closing. You are real; and it will have to be enough. His troubles are not easily soothed, but he is not ranting, not raving. It is still disconcerting to him, even after so long, that you are larger than he is; but right now, there is none of that momentary nonplussed reaction. There is just his weight leaning into your solidity. "How much... were you here for?" Gwilym wonders quietly. One arm drops from around your waist; he lifts his hand to push through his hair with a gusty sigh. "How much did you hear... how much do you know..." He has to ask. He has to know. You saw the damage in the wake of it; the smashed wood, the obvious chaos.

     Aeron grins. "You know how I enjoy disappointing you, brother king. I live for your looks of reproach and remonstration." He does enjoy it, and about being right. But he takes no more glory in it than that. He does not rejoice in your pain. "I returned as he was first leaving. He returned before I could materialize, not that I would have immediately at any rate. You needed your space. I know I am a spy, but I'm not completely without manners. At least... not where you are concerned. Were it Bran, I'd have ignored it of course. But then, if it were Bran, there would have been a bit more damage. He prefers breaking windows. He likes the sound of crunching glass. As for what I heard... I was trying not to listen. I watched, only. At first, I thought there might be a fight." His eyes gleam in their eclipse colors and he smiles. "I would have broken it up eventually."
     But, no, he didn't listen. In truth, he did not need to. He could see all he needed to see on your face and the High King's. "I am not jealous, Gwilym. I need nothing more than your sighs in the dark as proof of my place within you. What is between you and your brother is between you. All I will say is that my interests are only in your well-being. And if I must go claw to claw with the High King, Our Brother, to ensure that, then I shall."
     Aeron suckles at your lips again, his mouth spreading yours. It is dark, twisting warmth. It reaches within; it tempts without. Teeth tug the tender flesh as he pulls back. "I am just so suddenly glad that the thought of being Bran's lover -- or he mine -- fills me with shuddering revulsion. Could you imagine the horror of that?" He shudders in your grasp and makes a disgusted face.

     He reddens - the color for him rises so easily at the best of times. His hand moves to your hair, his thumb moving against your scalp and then down your cheek. "Your place within me," Gwilym grumbles. "Bah. You are entirely too sure of yourself, brawd. Maybe it's I who should take an absence."
     It is an empty threat; you know it and he knows it, but it is the sort of threat he delights in making, to try to provoke you into reacting in the ways he loves so well. He licks at his lips, reddened by your teeth; he likes that a little too much as well. "You do not need to claw at him. He will claw himself up," Gwilym mutters, "and he will likely find some excuse for us to avoid each other again. Or I will. In truth, maybe I just shouldn't have received him." He both means it and does not; and you know it. It shows too obviously.
     He exhales, pulling back from you, the stirrings in his groin beginning to make his leathers uncomfortable. "I don't know. Bran's pretty cute," Gwilym drawls to you, watching you from under his lashes. "If you want to give a miss, maybe I should..." He ducks.

     It is empty, but he does not correct you. He leaves that to you and your own twin. There is only the even expression, statuesque in its way, with only the lifting of an eyebrow to indicate any sort of reaction. His eyes simmer in green-haloed blackness and finally he smiles. "I am sure of precious little but myself and you. Perhaps you should be less obvious about how my being within you affects you. But then," he sighs theatrically, "...where's the fun in that?"
     You back away, and he reaches forward, fingers latching at the waistband of the leathers. Dark red eyelashes make a veil for his gaze as he looks to where his fingers slip, sneaking against your skin. He tugs you toward him with the smoothest of grins. "You could try," he offers blithely. "Would it help if I used his voice from time to time? Good god," he does a spot-on Bran -- as all ravens are renowned mimics, "why are you still dressed? Shouldn't you have sucked my cock by now? I've been here ten minutes if I've been here five."
     Blink-blink. Grinning darkly, Aeron hooks his fingers into your leathers and tugs you again, pulling you back against him as his hand dives into darkness.

     The tug is enough to make him twitch - parts of him, at least. You pull him to you, and he groans helplessly, eyes rolling back as he melts against you, his back to your chest, your hand where most would say it hasn't any right to be. "Don't use his voice," Gwilym grumbles, though his voice is a little shakier now, breathing a little erratic. "I don't want you to use any voice other than your own."
     And he means it; whether or not it comes as surprise to you. His hands fall to grip your thighs, one hand then rises to thread his fingers in your hair behind him. I want to forget, he tells you. Can you do that? Can you help me forget, brawd? I don't want to think about it, right now. I just - I want to run...

     That's what shadows and secrets are for, my beloved king. He is here for you to disappear in -- he knows you better than all the rest. He knows how much you need it. And he is the only one who can truly give it to you.
     The hand in your leathers grips and rolls while his other arm surrounds you. And in his protection, in his arms, an inky darkness -- a darkness beyond shadow, beyond evening, beyond death -- swallows you both in writhing invisibility.
     In his arms, you may simply be that, be you. You can escape where no one else (no one save him) can find you. You can run and be still all at the same time.
     It is all stripped away: clothing, inhibitions, pain and regret. And in their place, love.

Posted by rowan at January 26, 2009 05:57 PM