always more to learn

the things we hold are always the first to go

One might not expect to find Ronin where the books are at, but (shock, horror) he is actually capable of reading and research when the mood strikes. And since they're doing this whole what's good for the Greatwood thing, he's actually decided to look deeper into the history of the place to best choose what benefit to bring to the forest next.

The Undercroft is warm and quiet and unlike any of the other places he's visited in the Sidhe Village, though, and so... well. He's accidentally fallen asleep, maybe. So whoever comes across the mighty Huntsman will find him bonelessly slouched in a comfortable chair with a book on his face, snoring softly into the pages. It's a very intense study.

the lullaby

You are colors in the sky after forty rains

For better or worse, it's Remi who comes across his husband, dozing in the Undercroft. Pausing just a few feet away, there's a mischievous smile on the Lullaby's lips as he ponders just how best to maximize on this situation. The urge to reach out a tentacle, perhaps holding a feather, and tickle Ronin's nose immediately comes to mind, but he could do that anytime. Hot and cold water for his hands? No, they were still in public. A cheshire smile parts Remi's lips as he slips soundlessly forward, and when he touches Ronin's arm to jostle the Huntsman awake, it will be to fire and flames and a rather terrified looking alchemist.

"Ronin!" Remi bellows. Fire has caught all around them, merrily crackling as it devours the dry books. "I did not mean to, I was reading, and..." The implication of course being that his new shift had taken over and a fire had erupted.

Storm or drought, Surrounded by fire or flood
With You I'm never without

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

the things we hold are always the first to go

Snorting himself awake to find the entire Undercroft in flames, one can't fault Ronin for his quick action. But then again, he did take on a group of Ascended solo, so as he gets to his feet and quickly engages the Aquarius constellation to douse... everything... it's not really much of a surprise. Right? Right. "Remi, get to the middle of the room," he blurts, the book falling to the ground as he erupts to his feet, rubbing at his eyes.

"This isn't a great place to be on fire," he says with a surprising amount of calm, regardless of the fact that maybe he just actually soaked a bunch of very important (nay, priceless) artifacts. "Why did you decide to go all fiery underground in a place full of paper?"

the lullaby

You are colors in the sky after forty rains

Priceless documents are reduced to ash and then further reduced to sludge as Ronin's water douses the heat. Unsure why he's meant to go to the middle of the room—certainly that seems dangerous?—Remi does as he's told, miming panic the entire way. "The books, Ronin, the—" As his husband fails to display the appropriate amount of panic, Remi stops where he is, turning on his heel and folding his arms confrontationally across his chest.

"You know, don't you." He asks, looking disappointed. Without waiting for an answer, Remi sighs dramatically. "You do." He answers for himself, and this time as Ronin snorts himself awake, it will be to see an entirely unburned library and a sulky looking alchemist sitting across from him.

'What gave it away? I could have accidentally caught on the Undercroft on fire. It is a new shift after all."

Storm or drought, Surrounded by fire or flood
With You I'm never without

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

the things we hold are always the first to go

Ronin might have been sleepy and reacting on autopilot though, right? Those odds are pretty good, anyway, at least until Remi is the one to call a halt to the proceedings. And so as the Huntsman snorts himself awake for real, the book sliding into his lap, he can only offer a smug and sleepy smile to his husband. "You would never be so reckless around this stuff," he mumbles. Maybe around a preschool, but books? Nope.

"Also you're really good at controlling your new stuff, now. So there's no way you'd lose it in an enclosed space." He yawns widely, setting the book down and opening his arms so Remi can climb into his lap. "I didn't mean to fall asleep. Welcome home."

the lullaby

You are colors in the sky after forty rains

"Your compliments won't work on me." Remi grumbles, except they absolutely were, reluctant though the alchemist might be to admit it. Giving his shoulders a rough and boyish shrug, he looks around the Undercroft with narrowed eyes, as if wondering how he might have made the flames more realistic. "I was just going to tickle you awake. Maybe I should have done that instead." He huffs as he rises, sinking into Ronin's open arms heedless of the fae milling about.

"I was just coming to return a few things when one of the fae said you were here. Reading anything interesting?" Could he have looked at the book Ronin had just set down? Certainly, he could, but that would mean looking away from his husband's adorably sleepy blue eyes, and while Remi was interested in what Ronin might have been reading, he wasn't interested enough to look away.

Storm or drought, Surrounded by fire or flood
With You I'm never without

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

the things we hold are always the first to go

"I will have to start making better compliments, then," Ronin says, a smile creeping across his face. So what if he manages to make it sound like a threat? Remi will just have to wait and see what he comes up with next time. "Tickling is probably more dangerous," he admits. "Since I kick like a mule when you touch my toes." Grinning now, he sinks more deeply into the chair and winds his arms around the Lullaby to hug him close.

"Mm, I was reading some myths and legends about Ludo's Woods," he explains, even as his fingers sneak up the back of Remi's shirt so he can press his hands against his bare skin. "Do you know, the Fae used to believe that all the trees there would bleed? Like, bleed blood. Not sap. They used to drink it at the Festival of Lights."

the lullaby

You are colors in the sky after forty rains

"Oh?" Hitching in a breath to feel Ronin's sleepy emotions spreading out from his fingers, the alchemist slumps bonelessly, rolling his shoulders like he was trying to get comfortable beneath a warm blanket. "Did they really bleed blood?" Remi wonders, looking suddenly quite interested. "I should ask Ludo about that. I wonder why they stopped." Not that he would advocate ritualistic sacrifice, not even of the trees, but if it got him out of making lanterns for the dead and having to drudge up painful memories of them? Sure, he'd slice a few trees to that end.

"I am quite sure none of Vai's fairytales had bloody trees in them." Remi says thoughtfully, stretching out his arm over the back of the chair so that his fingers might gently tug at Ronin's dishevelled hair. "Speaking of things and the way they used to be..." Today's award for the worst segue goes to...! "I was talking with Mateo about his schoolwork and how...uninteresting he finds it." Remi begins, allowing his fingers to sink against his husband's scalp as if a massage might somehow temper the reaction he later expects from the Huntsman on this topic. "How he has no interested in becoming a dragoon, and how with recent events in Stormbreak that's where all of the focus is." Taking a breath and trying not to be too obvious about it, he continues. "...how maybe staying in school is not the best thing for him.."

Storm or drought, Surrounded by fire or flood
With You I'm never without

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

the things we hold are always the first to go

"Maybe it was a trick," Ronin says with a lazy shrug. "Or maybe Ludo told them to stop. Do you think it would tell you the truth anyway?" he asks, smiling and letting his fingertips trace absent patterns across his husband's lower back. Nuzzling against Remi's cheek, he chuckles softly and tilts his head. "None of her fairytales so far have had bloody trees in them," he corrects.

All but purring at the fingers in his hair, Ronin has closed his eyes again and is only really half listening at first, until he realises the full implication of what the Lullaby is saying. Blinking his eyes open again, he furrows his brow. "I thought Mateo liked school," he murmurs, completely missing the point entirely (of course). "He doesn't have to become a dragoon if he doesn't want to, but the Collegium is still a routine, right? Without it..." Pretty much chaos, just like their lives are now.

the lullaby

You are colors in the sky after forty rains

Considering this for a moment, the alchemist imagines a few scenarios in which the herald is anything but truthful, and shrugs. "Maybe not." He agrees, pulling absently at Ronin's hair as his eyes slip shut. "True, but I think our days of having Vai read us fairytales are behind us." He counters with no small amount of melancholy.

Staring pointedly at a row of books so as not to encourage Ronin's skepticism, Remi shrugs lazily as if this were nothing more than a conversation about Mateo wanting a different pair of shoes. "He did, before school was only about the upcoming war." Remi replies as his fingers massage harder, trying to lull Ronin back into a state of compliant relaxation.

"If we are being honest...is the routine good for Mateo, or is it good for us?" He wonders, genuinely putting the question to them both. "He is old enough now to start questioning things and to start making important decisions for himself. We both grew up in places of war and both know how it felt to be told to carry on if only because that was the easiest thing to do and not because it was actually good for us." Ronin with his training and Remi always on the road. Looking back neither of the men viewed those times particularly fondly.

Storm or drought, Surrounded by fire or flood
With You I'm never without

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

the things we hold are always the first to go

Affectionately snapping his teeth at Remi as his hair is pulled, Ronin nonetheless vows to keep better focus on their conversation, though he does lean in to brush his nose against the Lullaby's. "I bet she would come over and pet our hair and tell us fairytales until we fell asleep if we asked," he counters. "We could even request any stories with bleeding trees in them. We can say it's for science." Well, Remi can say that. Vai would believe it if the alchemist says it.

A shiver runs down the back of his spine at the attention, but compliant relaxation has been fully coaxed away by the subject of their talk, and the Huntsman's fingers still against Remi's back as well. "I didn't realise that the Collegium had changed its curriculum," he says slowly, his emotions colouring a sickly blue-yellow at the realisation that the assault on the Tower had caused such a profound ripple effect. Something he ought to be aware of, right?

Opening his mouth and then promptly closing it again, the colours of his emotions bloom together into a shameful sort of green as the truth of it all begins to dawn on him. "We're really fucking things up with him, aren't we?" he says sadly.

the lullaby

You are colors in the sky after forty rains

"We could do that...although..I am not really sure we have any right to ask much of Vai these days." Vai, their ever-presented adopted parent. Vai, the one raising Remi's twins. Vai, the one they visited far too frequently and almost only when they wanted or needed something.

"Mmmm. Apparently, parents are also expected to pick up their children every day to ensure they get home safely." Remi adds with a twinge of guilt. "How Mateo has managed now to draw attention to the fact that he goes home alone every day, I have no idea. I would be proud of his cunning was this not entirely our fault." He adds, his own palette of emotions now sufficiently soured.

'Yeah.' The agreement is soft but heavy with regret and no small amount of surprised disbelief. "Our dream child...but I think most days he feels as though he has been forgotten, and when he's remembered, it's only as a burden." Remi adds, and though the words are hard to say, if he and Ronin are to have this conversation, better they pull the bandaid all the way off rather than let it linger.

Storm or drought, Surrounded by fire or flood
With You I'm never without

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!

the things we hold are always the first to go

Remi is right about Vai as well, of course, and Ronin's jaw feathers as he realises how taking care of the big picture has caused them to neglect the small, infinitely more important details. Already he is vowing to put together something for the witch and to visit with the intention of hearing about her day and nothing more, when their son (rightly) takes centre stage again in their conversation.

"They what?" he almost whispers, guilty and stunned in equal measure, given that one of Mateo's parents literally runs the city, and the other could probably carry the Collegium on his back if he really wanted to. "Gods, what are we doing?" Already Ronin can feel his eyes starting to prickle, and he leans in to rest his head against Remi's shoulder. "How did this happen? That poor fucking kid..."

Drawing in a long breath, when Ronin pulls back again it's with a sense of shame and chastisement. "Where is he now? We have to do better."

the lullaby

You are colors in the sky after forty rains

Remi feels his own guilt mirrored back at him (or perhaps he and Ronin are simply feeling the same shade of sickly blue). Either way, it has the alchemist sighing and hunching his shoulders forward. "I don't know anymore." He admits with a dry laugh. "We are not even fighting a war. Not yet anyway. And somehow we have just..." The fingers not curled in his husbands hair splay out, as if there was sand blowing through his fingers. "Gods, he..." Feeling a sudden lump in his throat, Remi clenches his jaw and gives his head a small shake. ..he said if he were older, he could help. He finishes silently, biting back tears.

Snuffling in a breath through his nose, Remi tries to clear his throat. "He is in Stormbreak, packing. He..wants to go and see Ever. Apparently they have only exchanged a few letters...we have not taken him, and perhaps not so surprisingly, without any skyships, Ever has not seen Mateo either." Wanting to poke his own eyes out as if that might somehow count as penance, Remi slumps even more bonelessly against Ronin.

'I always thought...' As soon as the thought was formed in his mind, tears began to bite at the back of Remi's eyes. ..with Aoife...Gods Ronin, I thought we were good parents. The bleak and sinking wintery chill that accompanied his emotions said more than his weary words (or thoughts) ever could.

Storm or drought, Surrounded by fire or flood
With You I'm never without

Code blatently stolen from queen of codes, Sky!