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searchingforserendipity25 · 11 months ago

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Knit, Purl, Improvise | Dangeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves. ON AO3

For Lukani, as part of the Yuletide Exchange.

“You have dropped a stitch,” Xenk said helpfully, three days into their long scouting mission.

“Honestly, and this is just a friendly suggestion, feel free to take it, piss off,” Edgin said. And then; “Shit, not the double stitch. I swear double stitches love to be dropped, they’re just dying for it. Where do I -”

“Right there.”

Xenk shifted closer. The sunlight slanting through the firs and elms fell upon his cheeks with intent, as if it were perfectly aware and quite smug about its role in highlighting his beauty. Edgin stared - it was physically impossible not to stare, okay? Even Holga would have stared, and she was very much not into tall guys.

Edgin cursed, fished out the lost stitch, and cursed again when it was clear he had to unravel a whole couple of rows to get it back into shape.

Xenk extended a hand. Long fingers, graceful wrists, calluses like - not like Holga, really. Fighter's hands; good hands. Edgin felt a normal amount, about them. "If I may -"

"Nay, you may not - nuh-huh! Get your hands off, mister. No needle-hogging here, thanks very much. If you wanted something to keep busy you should have brought it yourself, deal with it."

Xenk really was quite - well, not much taller than Edgin, but very present. Edgin was very aware of it, with the way they had sat together on the same cold boulder for hours now, peering down at the ravine below, and the cave where a band of traffickers were bound to show up, sooner or later. It looked like it was going to be a later situation.

Even Edgin found it pretty tasteless to make money off looting graves and selling the mummified corpses of ancient pixie chieftains to the highest bidder, though, and their sponsors paid decently, so he didn’t feel too bad about the bother.

Didn’t mean he hadn’t complained about it, but at least he had offered to share his egg sandwich with Xenk - that was nice, right? He was making nice, the way one made nice with an occasional coworker who did not make conversation and did not like egg sandwiches. Who, Edgin asked, did not like egg sandwiches? And he kept looking disapproving when Edgin stepped on the trails of ants that tried to make off with the crusts. No one made off with Edgin's crusts, only Holga and Kira were allowed to have his crusts.

"I am not needle-hogging," Xenk said, spacing out the vowels carefully. "I am not even touching your needles. Which I suspect, by that logics, makes you the needle-hogger here."

"Am not!"

"I merely wished to offer help where I may."

"Well, don't," Edgin snapped, and got busy tug-tug-tugging the yarn, unravelling his afternoon's work. "I am making a lovely scarf for my lovely daughter, and I am perfectly capable of making it myself."

Edgin sighed loudly. "Of course you knit. I bet you do great socks - fancy stuff, right? Marino shawls, and stuff. No, wait." Edgin narrowed his eyes, framed Xenk's face between his fingers like a pretentious portrait trying to get the sitter's measure. "You do lace knitting, don't you."

"The kindly farmers that took me in were often local champions at the local competition of threading thin shawls through rings," Xenk admitted.

"Flunk you," Edgin repeated, with feeling. Xenk's mouth tilted with a smile, just slightly. "Yeah, laugh it up, local father of one precocious kid edits out a few swear words, funny stuff. I'm doing just fine without a knitting advisory, thanks."

"There is no shame in taking aid when it is offered. Indeed, I was laid down for many moons abed with a wound, while in the care of a kindly family of farmers, when I first was taught the craft of knitting. And I must say," Xenk added, tilting his head in that disconcerting, insightful way that made the fine hairs to the back of Edgin's hair rise with not-unpleasant fright. "I am surprised at the techniques you apply. There are easier ways to undo this error than to start wholly anew."

Edgin bristled. The sun was in his eyes, now - the clouds kept chasing each other across the narrow strip of sky they could see from their spying place. Honestly, it was getting kind of chilly; but of course they couldn't start a fire, and like hell he was asking Xenk to cast a warming cantrip.

Xenk had cast a warming cantrip over their camping site every night so far, but it was the principle of the thing.

"So?"

Xenk considered him. Which was. Certainly an experience. Edgin would like it to be over as soon as possible, but, again: he could not quite look away.

"I believe you to be a man very fond of shortcuts."

"Why, Paladin Xenk, are you calling me a cheater? I am hurt," Edgin said a hand on his chest, nearly stabbed himself in the face, and turned down the needles in a dramatic movement, as if he really had meant to show he was back-stabbed levels of hurt. "Truly."

"I am merely pointing out. As a friendly suggestion. For what it counts, your scarf does look lovely."

Of course it did. Edgin had learned from his Gramps, all the wool-stuff sailors worked at in the quiet of the night, crammed together in miserable bunks by the swaying light of foul-smelling lanterns. Gramps made beautiful cardigans, thick, scratchy, wonderful shirts. So did Edgin.

"Hell yeah it is. Which you only get if you do things properly." Do it proper start to finish, my Ned, and only leave a mistake so the spirits know not to get funny ideas.

Thing was, wool was awfully expensive. Nothing you could make a living out of, really; or at least he'd never managed it. He imagined telling Xenk that, and bit back a shiver: how the hell did people even get through these long waits? How did people get to know each other, even. He had never felt the need to prove himself to Holga - or, well, he did, every day, otherwise he'd have let himself die a thousand times, he cared about her opinion more than anything and sort of built up his identity around her faith in him in a cute, a little codependent way, but. It was different with Xenk.

Whatever - dusk was setting. The ants were going nuts on the bit of crust he had left for them, well away from his blanket - Xenk ought to be happy about that, not that he cared. There were bigger things to worry about. Tonight would be the last one of their watch, he could tell; the air was shivering in the leaves, eager. His neck prickled. Start to finish, and enough mistakes for bad luck to pass through.

Well, Edgin made mistakes aplenty, and the world liked Xenk better than most; between the two of them, they ought to be fine.

"Your stitches are slipping again," Xenk noted.

"Brotherflunker," Edgin cursed, and bent down to work the needles with furious speed, the better to avoid Xenk's eyes, that tilted mouth.

#xenk yendar #dungeons and dragons #edgin darvis #edgin x xenk #dnd honor among thieves #dnd honor among thieves fic #my fics #yuletide #yuletide exchange

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