#i ought to be more rapt and instead i keep drifting away and having to firmly reapply myself. unhappy.

[aeide-thea]

still making my way thru a restless truth and, predictably, simultaneously enjoying hawthorn and thinking about how a female hawthorn would just be, like, a bitch, and wouldn't get sympathy or credit for her complexity...

[rebrandedbard]

The Chain

Slightly horny drabble. Geralt has a thing for Jaskier’s neck and a chain he wears around it. Reverse bath shenanigans. Non-explicit.

WC: 1900

-

Geralt had noticed it on many occasions: on hot days when Jaskier opened his chemise a little wider than usual, when Jaskier stripped for a dip in a river or tub, when he stripped for the night and bundled himself into bed. It was unusual considering the ornaments Jaskier usually hung himself with, shiny rings with etchings, engravings, and gemstones. But these were for parties and grand affairs. Day to day, he did not primp and preen like a peacock with a fat purse. He wore only his signet ring. It was a tool as much as an accessory, though it was still something with detail.

The thin chain around his neck served no purpose. It was not silver, nor iron, which at least would offer some barest form of protection. It had no enchantments. It could not even be said to bring luck. It was dull, unfashionable, and did not have so much as a single charm hung from it. It was just … there. A short, barren chain wrought of plain steel.

Perhaps it was the fact that it was so plain, so thin, flimsy, and pointless that drove Geralt to distraction. At the very least, Jaskier might put something on it. If there were a locket or a pendant, something for the eye to focus on, that would be enough. But leaving the chain bare only seemed to draw attention to Jaskier’s neck itself. It was … a handsomely long neck. When Jaskier turned his head, the muscle stood out in an attractive line. Objectively.

Geralt wished he’d put something on the damn chain. Before he volunteered his own teeth to the task. It was a fantasy that had come to him one night. Jaskier had a rather distracting habit of nibbling the ends of his shirt laces. The chain was too short for him to reach. But Geralt could. And he nearly had before he’d come to his senses, leaning too close into Jaskier’s space. He clumsily reached past Jaskier to collect his empty bowl from the ground, floundering for an excuse. That had been a week ago when they’d been out in the woods. He’d had plenty of space then to breathe and forget about it.

But now? He was suffocating. Trapped in their little room above the tavern, Jaskier stripped of all his things, sighing as he leaned with his torso above the line of water in the bath, his head dangling back over the rim, neck elongated, exposed, and Geralt saw that damn chain glisten in the firelight. Jaskier had even taken off his ring, but the chain remained.

Jaskier hummed pleasantly, a damp washcloth over his eyes. “You’re awful quiet, even for you,” he said. He lifted the washcloth from his eyes and smiled at Geralt, catching him staring. “Cat got your tongue, witcher?”

Geralt looked away immediately. “I was just thinking,” he grumbled.

“Is that something you’ve learnt to do? Oh, I’m so very proud,” Jaskier teased. He dropped the cloth back over his eyes and put his hands behind his head, sinking further into the water. “Do indulge me. Pray tell, what has those ancient, rusty gears clinking and turning tonight?”

Geralt glared at him, the effect rendered less than effective by the washcloth. “Nothing,” he said. He finished unbuckling the last of his armour and sat to clean it. There was nothing to wipe away but dust. Even so, he was looking for an excuse to stay. To linger. Or perhaps to distract himself, having little else to do but turn in for the evening.

“Hm, that’s the Geralt I know. But come, some thought is rolling around in that head of yours; I heard it clink against the walls just now when you did your curious little head tilt. Won’t you share it with me?”

“You’ve been soaking for nearly twenty minutes,” Geralt replied. “You haven’t even begun to wash up and the water will be getting cold.”

Jaskier waved a hand at him. “So it can be reheated. A little snap-snap of Igni and I’ve got another half hour of relaxing ahead. Besides, cold water is good for the skin.”

“You’ll keep me up all night tending your water if you had your way.”

“Ah, if I only could have it my way,” Jaskier sighed. “I’d have you tend to me hand and foot, hanging on my every word. What fun! Providing hot water would only be the start; I’ve got a long list of things I’d do.” He chuckled fiddling with the chain, twisting a length of it between his fingers where his hands supported his neck.

Geralt tracked the motion with rapt attention. He cleared his throat began to pack his armour up after all. As he walked behind Jaskier, he plucked the cloth from his eyes. “You’d better hurry up and wash. I’m not reheating the water for you and I know you hate when the water gets cold, never mind what good it does your skin.”

He dropped the cloth back down on Jaskier’s face with a wet plop and Jaskier slipped back with an indignant yip, splashing beneath the water’s surface. It was a satisfying sound.

Jaskier wiped his face clear and wrung the cloth out again. He huffed and began to lather the cloth with soap. “Always so gruff,” he complained. “Here I help you selflessly scrub monster guts and foul muck from your hair day in and day out, but you can’t even be bothered to heat up a little tub water to warm my icy bones. By rights, you ought to at least return the favor once in a blue moon. I’m not asking you to scrub me head to toe—I only think a little reciprocation would be nice.” So saying, he scrubbed his face and ears, rinsed, and patted around for his oil.

Geralt sighed. Depositing his armour, he turned back to the tub. He scooped up the oil and pushed away Jaskier’s hand. “Fine,” he said. “Sit up.”

Jaskier beamed at him. He wiped his eyes and turned around. “Will you really? Surely I’ve fallen asleep, dozed in the hot water, and tumbled into some fantastic dream. Who is this courteous stranger before me? You couldn’t possibly be my witcher. My witcher would never!”

The hairs stood on the back of Geralt’s neck, tingling at those words. My witcher. Jaskier said them so often, so casually, and yet they never failed to get a rise out of him.

Geralt turned Jaskier’s head roughly. “Face forward or you’ll get soap in your eyes,” he said.

“O-o-o, so forceful. Always straight to manhandling with you.”

“Give you something to handle,” Geralt grumbled.

“What was that?”

Geralt poured a bit of the oil on his hands. “I said it smells like sandal. Sandalwood.”

Jaskier settled once more against the rim of the tub and tilted his head back. “Got some new supplies. Do you like it?” he asked.

Geralt did, but then he liked most of the scents Jaskier wore. They complimented him. Not that he would ever dignify that with a response. Instead, he simply began to massage the oil into Jaskier’s hair, working his way from the crown of his head down, fingers lightly scratching his scalp the way Jaskier often did.

“Oh, that’s heavenly,” Jaskier sighed. He leaned into the touch, his eyes closed as he relaxed beneath Geralt’s ministrations.

Up close, Geralt had a perfect view of the chain. He watched it shift as Jaskier spoke. The chain reflected the flickering light in an almost hypnotic fashion. Slowly, his hands worked down to the nape of Jaskier’s neck, still massaging as he stared, his mind drifting. Jaskier made an odd little rumble in the back of his throat. Geralt massaged the place harder, hoping to hear that sound again.

“Soap next,” Jaskier said. He passed the cloth to Geralt, not bothering to open his eyes.

They’d never said anything about soaping or scrubbing, but Geralt was in no position to refuse. Not with Jaskier’s neck angled so enticingly, and here, the perfect excuse to reach out and touch. He lathered soap in the cloth. In a moment, it was touching the side of Jaskier’s neck. And yet …

“Your, uh. Your chain,” he said.

Jaskier cracked one eye to look back at him. “Oh. You may remove it. Just be sure to put it back when you’re done.”

Geralt swallowed and set the washcloth on Jaskier’s shoulder a moment. He reached for the chain, only to find no fastening in the back. He had to turn it, had to watch the drag of it against Jaskier’s skin as he searched. The chain was warm and wet and it was difficult to get a solid grip on the clasp when he at last had found it. But it soon came free.

He hesitated. Now that he had it, where could he put it? There was no stool, and it felt improper to put it on the floor. He looked at Jaskier, wondering if he might offer to hold onto it, then he was again distracted by the line of his neck.

He’d been wrong. After wearing the chain so long, it was now, perhaps, more indecent to see his neck without it. Geralt watched a drop of water roll down the side of Jaskier’s neck and felt the impulse to chase it with his tongue. To prevent himself from following through, he succumbed to another impulse which might go unobserved and placed the chain between his teeth.

Jaskier hummed once more as Geralt’s hands returned to their task. It was meditative, Geralt discovered. He moved the cloth in small circles, covering every inch of Jaskier’s neck twice. He cupped water in one hand, let it trickle down and wash the suds away. With gentle fingers, he flicked away a stray bubble, his touch lingering only a moment more to appreciate the soft skin beneath. And then he was washing Jaskier’s shoulders, his hand dipping only a little to feel the breadth of his chest.

“Geralt,” Jaskier said.

But Geralt was distracted. He was busy running the cloth once more between Jaskier’s shoulders, running the tip of his tongue across the links of the chain.

“Geralt,” Jaskier repeated. He reached back, raised a hand up to run along Geralt’s cheek. His fingers touched the end of the chain, slipping against the corner of Geralt’s mouth. He tugged it, pulling it link by link from between Geralt’s teeth. And then Geralt felt something warm and wet lightly touch the opposite corner. A kiss. Just barely.

Geralt’s breath caught in his lungs and his eyes fluttered shut. He felt Jaskier’s teasing touch disappear, fingers curling beneath his chin and sinking once more beneath the water. He opened his eyes and saw Jaskier smiling back at him, the chain dangling in his hand.

“The bath is getting cold,” he said, a salacious tenor to his voice. “Feel like warming me up?”

And before Geralt could answer, Jaskier had a finger curled around the silver chain of his medallion, pulling him in.

Jaskier smirked up at him. He took the washcloth from his hand and replaced it with the chain. “I’ll wear yours,” he whispered, “if you’ll wear mine.”

And now Geralt indulged a new fantasy. Yes, Jaskier’s chain needed something after all, he decided. It needed only one simple ornament to make it complete.

It needed a wolf.

[overlord-off-record]

Looking for something to cheer me up. I’m not sure this is it. Anyway, more of that poison series. 3/?

---

In general, Gil had a tendency to avoid official functions. Perhaps he instinctively shunned the social set that once rejected him. Perhaps he truly preferred the company of the lowlifes of Paris. Perhaps he simply lacked the attention span to tolerate any of it. Whatever the case, when Tarvek saw him decorating Colette's arm, his eyebrows rose in a silent question. She smirked at him. Of course she did.

Tarvek watched Gil meander here and there, chatting with professors, with dignitaries, even with the Master of Paris himself. As though he belonged. As though some of these selfsame people had not treated him cruelly in childhood. Gil behaved as though it had never happened, which made Tarvek's chest ache. He watched Gil charm his childhood bullies, who also acted like they had always been friends. That part made Tarvek angry.

So he sulked in silence, trying not to glare when Gil laughed with a man who had once stolen his books, mocked him, called him nothing but Nameless. Well, the Nameless boy had grown into the Master's pet, and everyone knew at least that much. They would never dare bully him now. Gil no longer needed Tarvek.

"You look like you're chewing a mouthful of burnt coffee grounds."

Tarvek glanced at Colette. Of course she had found him. "Isn't he supposed to be yours for the evening?" he said, gesturing toward Gil. "Maybe you could keep him from setting something on fire?"

"We both know that there's no stopping him when he decides a situation needs a little fire."

Tarvek scoffed. "A little?" he said, and Colette laughed.

"Well, maybe more than a little. What about you?" She gave him an arch look. "Don't tell me you came by yourself. How unfashionable!"

"Worse. I've brought my cousin."

"Which one?" A reasonable note of alarm crept into Colette's voice. Tarvek believed that his family ought to alarm most people.

"Seffie," he said with a grin. "She can't have gone far."

Much to her credit, Colette's stare was steady as stone. "You assume I have something to say to her?"

"Oh, of course not."

"Of course not," Colette echoed, utterly lacking conviction. She patted Tarvek on the arm. "Don't pine all evening. It's terrible for the digestion." With that, she drifted away, leaving Tarvek with little else to do.

He watched Gil perhaps a bit too closely, for otherwise he never would have seen what happened. Gil drifted over to a knot of people, where he set his beverage down beside Seffie's. He talked in an animated manner, gesticulating and bouncing on the balls of his feet. Everyone watched him, rapt until he had finished explaining. Seffie sidled closer to him, but Gil evaded neatly when she made a subtle grab for his arm. He picked up Seffie's glass rather than his own, saluted the assembled company with it, and wandered away.

Tarvek watched Colette slip into the cluster of people around Seffie for just a moment before drifting off to talk to someone else. Then his stare returned to Gil, and he frowned.

Gil wobbled. Then he lifted the empty glass in his hand, frowned at it, and tucked it into a potted pyracantha. Tarvek moved to intercept him.

"You idiot," he hissed as he bumped up against Gil's side. "What was in Seffie's glass?"

"Dunno…" For a moment, his tone sounded like denial. Then he added, "Thought it was poison."

Tarvek processed this information. Stupid, apparently suicidal Gil stared at him, eyes wide and pupils dilated, making his brain turn in several useless circles before accomplishing any reliable thought. Who had attempted to drug Seffie? To what end? Why had Gil caught it instead of Varpa? Frowning, Tarvek glanced around. Where was Varpa, anyway? "Did you see who did it?"

"Oh, yes." Gil nodded in an odd, liquid way, as though his head might slide off his neck. "Can't give chase. A pity."

"Can you name the culprit?"

"Ummm… no." Gil beamed as though he knew Tarvek found his smile adorable. Dammit.

"Describe him," Tarvek said through his teeth.

Gil tried to gesture and succeeded at a loose flailing motion. "Big ugly sod."

"Oh, for pity's sake," Tarvek complained, when Gil added:

"Kinda seemed to like the color purple."

Oh. Of course. Family business. That still didn't clear up who would have tried to drug Seffie, but Tarvek could assume that he himself may also be a target. And Varpa could be incapacitated somewhere nearby, for all he really knew. Tarvek grimaced. "Come on," he said, trying to steer Gil away from the potted plants. "We need to find Colette. Now."

"Nuh-huh." Gil trundled along, yielding to the pressure of Tarvek's hand on his back. "Colette can catch him."

Probably not, but Tarvek didn't say so. "You're hopeless, you know that? I mean, I get why you'd swap glasses, but why would you actually drink it?"

"Seemed like the thing to do," Gil said with a sudden steadiness that Tarvek found unnerving. Then his steps faltered, and he started to hum softly.

"You're an idiot." Spotting Colette, Tarvek propelled Gil toward her. "And you're going to die of your stupidity one day. Mademoiselle Voltaire, forgive me, but I'm going to have to steal your alleged gentleman."

"Permanently, I hope?" Colette's grin faded when she looked at Gil. "Oh, what is it this time?"

Tarvek kept his expression relaxed, though his tone turned grim. "Drugged." He turned to Gil. "You're certain it's not poison?" Briefly, he made a mental list of the antidotes in his pockets.

"Oh, no, this stuff is weird. Psychotropic? I think that's the right word."

Tarvek let Gil lean against him, but he pointed in accusation. "He drank it on purpose. He thought it was poison. That's not just Mad, that's insane!" But he was getting off topic. "This drug, whatever it is, was meant for Seffie. Would you mind—"

"Keeping an eye on her?" Colette nodded. "Consider it done."

"Yes, you're a good egg," Gil said to Colette, grinning. Then he turned his guileless smile on Tarvek. "And you're… structural."

"I suppose that's a compliment," Tarvek grumbled. Colette waved them away.

"Go on. Take him home to sleep it off. I suppose you'll be noble about it."

Tarvek tried to peer down at Gil, who was listing at a precarious angle, sliding downward as he did. In ridiculous slow motion, he ended with his face against Tarvek's neck.

"Structural," Gil mumbled, muffled in Tarvek's collar.

"I'm sure." Tarvek began to doubt whether he could get Gil to walk under his own power. "I'm going to need that empty glass."

"Fern," Gil said with a vague gesture that nearly displaced an entire tray of drinks.

"Pyracantha," Tarvek corrected.

"Whatever."

Colette shook her head at them. "Go," she repeated. Then she craned her neck, looking around for Seffie.

"Look, I think we won't draw too much attention if you just pretend to be drunk. Think you can manage—As a matter of public record," Tarvek interrupted himself, "I need to know: Are you licking me, or are you drooling on me?"

"Mmph," Gil replied. The sound vibrated on Tarvek's skin, and he flinched away.

"Walk." Taking Gil by the shoulders, Tarvek frog-marched him back to the potted plants. "We're arguing because you're drunk again."

"Are we?" Gil gazed at him, eyes wide and a little misty.

Tarvek growled and dragged a hand down his own face in exasperation. "That's our cover," he hissed through his teeth. "Can you manage that?"

"Oh, I'm pretty good at making you yell at me." Gil's head bobbed in that odd, boneless way again. Tarvek wanted to reach out and steady it.

"That's because you're an idiot! It's for your own good."

Gil beamed at him. "Oh, are we playing now?"

While making a noise of frustration, Tarvek reached into the pyracantha and retrieved the empty glass. "We are most certainly not playing. I can't let you embarrass yourself in front of… these people." He slipped the glass into his coat pocket.

"What, them?" Gil made a rude noise and a dismissive gesture.

"Yes, them!" Tarvek felt a wave of genuine irritation. "People I've protected you from before! Or don't you remember?"

Gil went sullen and quiet. "Of course I remember." He stuffed his hands into his pockets and hunched his shoulders, which somehow caused him to list dangerously to one side. Tarvek moved to prop him up.

"So we're leaving. Right now."

Gil yielded like overcooked pasta when Tarvek steered him toward the nearest exit, but he still voiced protests. "I'm fine," he insisted. "I want… wanted them to see me. To see that they don't matter now. That I'm…"

"The Sparkiest Spark they've ever met?"

"Hah, something like that." Gil gave him a small smile. Cool night air rushed over them as they stepped out onto the street.

"That supposes that they've never actually spoken to the Master," Tarvek pointed out. He considered transportation. Anything with a driver would constitute too great a hazard with Gil in this state. Anyway, it was a nice evening for a walk. Gil mumbled something that might have been agreement, and he leaned against Tarvek. Structural. Tarvek tried not to smile.

They walked in silence for a while, with Gil's arm looped somehow beneath Tarvek's coat. Tarvek pretended not to notice. Gil sagged and made small noises, possibly incomprehensible commentary. Tarvek tried to steady him, but they both stumbled, and he had to focus on his own footing. They blundered to a standstill.

"You boys have had too much!" called a pedestrian from across the street. Tarvek waved in acknowledgment of the comment.

"Tell him I'm not drunk," Gil whispered, and Tarvek shook his head. They continued onward. Another two blocks, and Gil's face went white with alarm. "Oh! Don't take me home. I… lost my keys."

"Lost?" Tarvek challenged the transparent lie.

Gil giggled. "Well, they were eaten by a hippo with mechanical legs. It's a long story."

"You are absolutely pathetic."

"Is that an endearment?"

Impaired Gil was growing entirely too savvy. Tarvek scowled at him. "You're an idiot."

"Who isn't?" With that, Gil proceeded to hum a cheery tune for another block and a half. Then he abruptly stopped. "Look, I know you're a terrible sneaky sneak," he said, "but you're a good friend to Colette. I appreciate that."

"Well, I'm not doing it for you," Tarvek scoffed.

"Oh. Um." Gil started to shuffle his feet. "You're not, um… You don't—"

"We're friends," Tarvek interrupted firmly. "No more than than." When Gil looked visibly relieved, he added, "You're not in love with her yourself, are you?" It seemed half of Paris was.

"Me? Oh, no. No," Gil repeated, sounding terribly sad. "I don't think I have the capacity to… to care about somebody in that way."

Trying to crush the wave of despair within him, Tarvek reached into his pocket for his keys. "No? You're probably just too busy trying to die in messy ways."

"Death is always messy," Gil replied, sounding eerily lucid again. Then he tilted his head and peered up the steps ahead of them. "Where are we?"

"My rooms."

"Rooms? Plural? Oh, that's fancy-pants." Gil lurched to the side, and Tarvek had to drag him back.

"I have no idea how you manage to survive without private lab space." If Tarvek could have shied from the hand on the small of his back, he would have. Instead, he used Gil's grip on him for leverage to drag him up the stairs.

Gil's grip on his waistband.

Tarvek fumbled his keys against the lock. How had Gil managed to get his hand beneath a well-fitted waistcoat? A silk shirt was not barrier enough between them. Tarvek tried to pretend it was.

"Having difficulty?" Gil needled.

Absolutely, yes. Without comment, Tarvek unlocked the door and led the way inside, disarming every trap as he went. It really wouldn't do to have Gil setting them off.

"Ooh…" Of course Gil released him and made for the lab equipment.

"Don't break my glassware." Tarvek took the glass from his pocket and swabbed the interior of it. "And don't steal my reagents," he added, snatching a bottle from Gil's hand.

"I'm not stealing." Gil propped his chin on Tarvek's shoulder, watching with rapt attention as he performed a quick analysis of the residue in the glass. His sigh tickled Tarvek's ear. "What… what is that incredible smell? Spice and something… some kind of resin?"

A swift blush burned Tarvek's cheeks, and he felt deep gratitude that Gil could not see his face. "Hair oil. I'm trying out a new formulation."

"It's good."

Tarvek made a small noise of agreement. He hated that Gil could affect him so easily, so carelessly. He hated it, but… Well, even if Gil never mentioned it again, Tarvek decided to keep that particular set of fragrances in his hair oil.

They leaned against one another in silence until Tarvek had the results he sought. "I know this drug," he grumbled, pushing Gil away so he could stand. "It causes brief unconsciousness—twenty minutes to an hour." He arched an eyebrow at Gil. "The dosage was obviously calculated for Seffie's body mass. Then," he continued, "the mark spills his guts for up to four hours, and forgets everything after sleeping it off."

"Huh," Gil said. Very helpful.

"So this must be the part where I get to interrogate you."

He had been joking, but Gil surprised Tarvek by saying, "Oh, no, I'll do the interrogating, thanks."

Tarvek laughed. "Sure, but I'm not the one who's drugged." He dropped himself into a wheeled chair and rolled dramatically away from Gil, arms spread in a gesture of invitation. "Take your best shot."

"Why do you hate me?"

Tarvek blinked at him. "I don't hate you." Not even close. "You frustrate me. You infuriate me." Sometimes even terrify. "But you have yet to inspire true hatred."

Gil bounced in place, which looked wildly unsteady. At least if he collapsed here, Tarvek needn't carry him anywhere. "Do you hate anyone?"

"Loads of people." Almost all of them family.

"Good."

Tarvek chuckled. "You're severely impaired, you know that?"

"I'm asking the questions," Gil objected. "What was I asking?"

"You asked about hate. I can only assume love comes next." Oh, now, why had he said that? Disgruntled with himself, Tarvek glared defiance at Gil.

"Good, yes, good." Gil nodded on every word. "What does love feel like?"

Not the question Tarvek had expected. "Torture," he said, not recognizing the blunder until it was too late.

Gil's eyes narrowed, shrewd and a little too lucid again. Then he resumed smiling. "Surely you of all people enjoy romance. Wine and poetry and flowers and all?"

More like incendiary devices and madcap chases through Paris. Tarvek shook his head. "I assume it's more fun when received with at least a bit of interest," he said, feeling bitter and cagey.

"You're Sparky and royal, and you're well groomed and always fashionable. You must not have confessed your intentions."

If Tarvek had been standing, he would have had to sit. Gil considered him desirable, at least to other people. What an unexpected lift to his self esteem! "You sound entirely too sure of that."

"Come on, there's no reason not to." Gil tried for a challenging stare, but ruined it by wobbling.

There were a thousand reasons not to. Tarvek sighed. "You can't know…"

"I'm sure you can do it," Gil interrupted. "You were brave enough to befriend me once. Just say: 'hey, I fancy you, and I'd like to kiss you.' See what happens."

Tarvek made his expression as blank as he could. "Hey. I fancy you, and I'd like to kiss you."

Beaming, Gil managed to lean in to thump him on the shoulder. "That's the ticket! Now you just need to go and find this—" He frowned. "Girl? Boy? I probably should have asked."

Tarvek swallowed an urge to cry, swallowed every hollow, aching heartbeat. "It doesn't matter," he said, shaking his head. "I'll have to marry someone appropriate, so it's pointless anyway."

"Oho, so Tarvek loves someone beneath his station!" Gil grinned at him. "Good. Most royals are duller than a rubber knife."

"Do you want to get punched?"

"I'm asking the questions," Gil reminded him again, with a glint of glee in his grin.

Tarvek lifted his hands in a gesture of mock surrender. "Ask," he said, though he felt surly and disinclined to answer anything else.

"What's stopping you from confessing your feelings?"

A good question. Tarvek eyed Gil with a wry twist to his lips. "Too many factors." How often had he weighed the warmth of Gil's lips against the dangers from his family? How often had he wondered just how hard Gil would hit him for making any overtures of romance? No, he decided now, Gil would not hit him. Gil would just stare in empty, blank confusion. Would that hurt worse? Probably. He sighed. "I know you can't understand, but it's just not safe."

Gil gestured at himself. "Drugged because of your family," he pointed out, and Tarvek frowned.

"Did I ever say it was family business?" he said, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.

"It-s y'r cousin's drink," Gil slurred. He swayed dangerously far to the left. Then, taking several slow, deep breaths, he righted himself. "Where were we?"

"I cannot believe you're doing this."

"Answer," Gil demanded, Sparky notes creeping into his voice. Tarvek eyed him with curiosity. Did this conversation really matter to him? Even knowing that he would forget everything?

"You think my romantic challenges can be easily resolved." Tarvek arched an eyebrow at Gil. "You're an idiot, but I appreciate that you mean well."

"I like you being honest. Why don't you do that more often?"

"You really want me to get killed, don't you? It's not safe," he said before Gil could chide him for asking another question. "I'm surprised you haven't realized that by now."

"You're better than you think you are." Gil's head bobbed in unstable assurance.

"Not as good as I should be," Tarvek grumbled. In so many ways, he failed his own expectations.

Gil stared at him, head tilting this way and that, somewhat like a bird. "What do you expect of yourself?"

Tarvek looked away. "I don't know… Heroics? Noble character?" He shrugged and shook his head. "To earn my birthright?" Really, it was a good question.

Gil leaned over him, hands clasped behind his back, grinning. He stayed like that until Tarvek scowled.

"What?"

"You're a romantic. One day, when you rule Sturmhalten…" Gil paused for long enough that Tarvek began to hope he might be trying to say something nice. "You'll grow disillusioned with the minutiae of governance and start feeding lawbreakers to the meanest monster you can find," he concluded with a sagely nod.

"What the hell!" Tarvek yelped. "Where would you even get that idea?"

"I've watched it happen. It's tragic. You're doomed." This last Gil delivered with a beatific smile.

"You're an idiot."

"Maybe, but not about this." Gil turned in a slow circle, bobbling as he went. He waved his arms loosely, and he gave a heartfelt sigh. "I really wish you and I were still friends." He stilled and he stared, his head sagged a little to one side.

"We would have ruined it by now anyway," Tarvek said. Probably owing to his own hopeless infatuation.

"Mmh," was Gil's noncommittal reply. He faltered, his leg muscles suddenly going loose like aspic jelly. Stage three. Despite his previous determination to allow this fool to collapse on the floor, Tarvek moved to catch him.

"Look at you. You're a mess." Tarvek looked down at the hand on the center of his chest, and his grip tightened on Gil's arms. No, it wasn't Gil who was a mess here. In this moment, Gil was blameless of everything but hanging on the brink of consciousness.

"Nnuh?" Gil sagged more, and Tarvek tried to consider the logistics of dragging or propelling him to the bed in the next room. Instead, he watched Gil's tongue roll out to moisten parched lips, and he let out an involuntary groan. Gil froze, as much as one could freeze while losing a fight for balance. "Wha's wrong?"

Wrong. There was no way Gil could be that much of an innocent. "I really want to kiss you right now."

"What?" Gil's eyes widened a moment before going unfocused. "Why…?"

He slumped in Tarvek's arms, unconscious.

Well.

Annoyed, Tarvek dragged Gil into the bedroom. "'Why,'" he grumbled, bitterness in every breath. "Because it's you, you complete imbecile. You're heavier than you look, you know. Are you… are you snoring?" He heaved Gil onto the bed. "Of course you are."

He hesitated for a moment before he loosened the fastenings of Gil's clothes. Surely that didn't count as taking advantage. He pulled the blankets up and he tucked them around Gil, who sighed and rubbed his feet together in his sleep. Feet never lie.

"Oh, what the hell." Tarvek leaned down one more time, and he pressed a swift, heartfelt kiss to Gil's forehead. "At least one of us is getting some sleep tonight." As much as it hurt, he turned away.

On the way out, Tarvek put a few drops of his hair oil into a warmer. He knew it was self-indulgent, but he wanted Gil to wake up to the fragrance. He locked up, and he stepped back out into the night.

Without Gil leaning on him, encumbering him, Tarvek quickly retraced his steps. He arrived back at the reception in time to see Seffie and Colette leaving together, laughing about something. The both seemed fine. Relieved, Tarvek skulked in the shadows, watching them. When he thought Seffie was too far to hear, he whistled five soft notes.

Varpa appeared, disgruntled and disheveled. "Your Highness?"

Tarvek rolled his shoulders, affecting an attitude of annoyance to cover his genuine concern. "I have a libertine in my bed right now, sleeping off a dose of Spill-All σ2. He… drooled on my collar. I want to know what happened. A full report by dawn."

Varpa, who looked to have had a rough night so far, tried to disguise exasperation with a small bow. "Sire." With that, the Smoke Knight vanished into the night.

Varpa would tell him. Oh, no, not everything, not even close. But enough that he could start unraveling the threads of this latest intrigue. And if he was exceptionally lucky, Gil might even stay out of the way this time.

Tarvek scoffed at himself. He was never, ever lucky.

[channelnewswire-blog]

When will New Zealand fiction overcome itself?

An essay by author Kirsty Gunn on the insistence of New Zealand fiction to keep harping on about problems of nationwide identity, 'embeded in a rictus of recognized figures and tropes'.

A long time ago now, I wrote an unique about a kid growing up, who likes the sea, enjoys to browse, and who has a day in the middle of summer season when the sea appears to wish to show something to him. That story was soaked in the New Zealand of my past-- with memories of a specific beach, one specific summer season-- it was pure fiction, pure made up stuff of sand and salt and shadows.The novel won

a prize in Scotland-- and, it's real, there were parts of Scotland in the book. My children were little women at the time it was composed and we spent many weekends at a beach about an hour's drive out of Edinburgh where we were based then. I also understood of the surfing scene up in the far north where my sister lives, where the kids browse in wetsuits all year round such is the permeating cold of the cold north sea. So Scotland, yes, remained in the story, for sure, it makes up a huge part of my imagination always.In basic

, however, it was the Wairarapa beaches of Castlepoint and Riversdale that constituted the landscape of that book-- so that it was New Zealand, most likely, that rose clear off its pages to many readers. At the end of the prize event-- I 'd made my speech, I 'd thanked the judges, the celebration was about to begin-- a woman came up to me and stated, "What's an unique like your's doing winning Scottish Book of the Year?"

She was standing actually close, smiling, however not smiling. "It's not a Scottish book at all," she went on. "I do not know what it is, however it's not Scottish."

At the exact same reward ceremony, the late Gavin Wallace, the literature director of Creative Scotland (for Scotland had followed New Zealand's lead by the early 21st century and was no longer The Scottish Arts Council but Creative Scotland-- with all the comparable entailments those modifications brought to both financing bodies) had actually spoken about an "International Scottish Literature", a means of considering how the culture of a nation might be specified as much by all that it gives it, all that is beyond its coasts, as it speaks of its own indigenous colours and tastes and histories.Gavin Wallace was

a motivating and erudite spokesman for such a literature. His unfortunate death in 2013 seemed then, and today, to mark a change in the way Scotland views her novels and narratives and plays. It was Gavin Wallace who introduced a funding stream that would enable books to be translated out of and into the nation-- an intelligent, generous reciprocity of interests that might only broaden and deepen our understanding of Scottish letters. That stream has actually been dammed and now is dry. The literature bursaries that he helped establish are gone-- literature must now take on film and the music company as far as financing by means of Creative Scotland is concerned-- and any books or plays or poems that are made it possible for by grants and awards must be shown to have "advantage", as is specified in the manifesto produced by Creative Scotland in line with ever brand-new directives coming out of The Scottish National Celebration with its targeted, politicised interest in Scottish culture and ideas.Everything needs to be Scottish, for Scotland, about Scotland, and with everyone in Scotland in mind. Noise familiar? It's familiar to me.Familiar due to the fact that

when I think about growing up in New Zealand in the 1970s it was for these type of factors precisely that I wished to leave. Reasons that were to do more with politics, as I saw it, than literature. All those unrelentingly New Zealand very male type of men writing about the land of livestock farms and slaughter, of willing ladies and flagons of beer ... All those endless tales about what it was to be a New Zealander, about how we spoke or might speak, and how we ought to speak if we were to be real to ourselves, if we were to discover our way ... It had to do with nation-building, to my mind, this type of activity, not the imagination; it was pushing away, to state the least.At my girls'school we checked out Mansfield and Janet Frame and Fleur Adcock and Marilynne Duckworth by method of a remedy-- however the flavour of the country was strong. Frank Sargeson and Dan Davin and all who followed had actually developed its tone. Sam Hunt was on the increase in his singlet and with his bottle of red; the tones of Barry Crump had well and genuinely eclipsed the figure and work of his advanced, London domiciled ex-wife-- she barely counted as a New Zealand writer, as I seem to bear in mind; there was the shape of her absence in discussions and media of the time. Even studying American poetry with the urbane Bill Manhire could not rather make me think there was a place for anyone who didn't have the kind of named-town, idiolectic particularity, an "authenticity"( the speech marks are my own but the word was everyone's) that was being put about by method of genuine writing, the honest to goodness New Zealand stuff that would get released. I would send out off my little brief stories to the Listener and Landfall and the rejection notes would return telling me that what I 'd sent wasn't what they were after at all. I even have among them somewhere: A handwritten message on that thrilling Landfall stationery they had at that time stating" It's good, this, but it's not actually a New Zealand story, is it?"

By the time I pertained to the politics and feminism of Fiona Kidman and the gnarly indigenous poetics of Patricia Grace, by the time I had been introduced, by the late Frank MacKay, to the subtle classical and European inflected locales of Vincent O'Sullivan's work, that had actually followed in turn that very same teacher's modernist parsing of James K Baxter (who till then I had foolishly, shamefully, put among those other "blokes") it was too late. I 'd fled. I wished to live somewhere where I might compose whatever I desired in the design I wanted about anything I wanted.The truth that New

Zealand lakes and rivers and watercourses go through my pages, and have done since I initially made my fiction, doesn't change that concept. I could not stay somewhere which felt so willfully detached from other places, so constantly ... nationalist, really, is how it felt, in its top priorities, so fixed on a voice that needs to be permanently talking about what it was to live here, what that signified, and how it might look, identity-- as a sentence on the page-- and how those sentences might include up and sound.To me, all

that was exhausting. For New Zealand to be set on a job to specify itself to the world, as a nation that may exist quite apart from Britain ... On a mission to create itself as an independent area of letters and culture that could drift in glorious isolation in the Pacific sea, not responsing to anybody ... To my mind then-- though I might comprehend it now-- that sort of engagement might only be restricting, to the creativity, imaginative volition, and to the free-and-easy passage of believed itself. When I contemplate the nation that is Scotland in 2018, determining its own form of detachment from a royal Britain, the activities and sensibility follow almost to the letter the state of affairs disputed in New Zealand all those years ago: the literary program simulating the exact same figuring of identity politics, stating itself as an intellectual and cultural endeavour and finding benefit for that in public acknowledgment and award and financial support.I have actually expected

something in both Scotland and New Zealand that felt more like a synthesis, of attempted and tested methods with new techniques, an amalgamation of old tropes with bold, unexpected concepts that come from artists and thinkers and risk takers and that have nothing to do with past requirements that literature may be so responsible for clothes the country in its culture. For it seems to me that the writing I have actually followed from New Zealand since my own leaving, for the many part, from what I have actually seen, has not shifted much from those concerns established at that time when I was a girl.I myself have actually shifted; now on visits back to Unity Books purchasing up whatever I can that has about it the whiff of the pohutukawa tree, the tang of wool, that rings and clatters with the sounds, those cadences of house. My viewpoint has opened that method. On a recent visit to the UK Fiona Kidman gave me Lauris Edmonds' In White Ink, a selection of her life's work, and I read it through in one rapt session, sitting as I remained in my mind in a house above Asian Bay in Wellington with the wind rumbling through the macrocarpas, and the harbour water listed below me dark and large. I can't get enough of Dan Davin and Frank Sargeson now.Yet an evaluation of Vincent O'Sullivan's most current book, All This By Chance, in this year's winter season issue of New Zealand Books is proof of the fact that though I have actually changed, literary politics in New Zealand have not. I'm promoting books, instead of making a case for the poetry of, state, the worldwide phenomena that has actually flown into view by way of young women like Hera Lindsay Bird. Novels are what I understand. And from those I read, and in the publications whose evaluations I follow, and the discussions I have with authors and scholars and critics and literature enthusiasts in New Zealand, it appears all too clear to me that old practices die hard.The chap

may no longer be ranging through the pages of the stories everyone is talking about now (although he is an existence, I do note) however the old cultural identity problem is still out there-- in Polynesian and Māori garb, or in feminist and gender ethics clobber, possibly-- writ large. In a recent review of The Migrant Misconception: New Zealand Writers and the Colonial World by Helen Bones, Simon Hay discussed the need to resolve power structures within New Zealand that would reduce particular sort of social groups, sensibilities, in any introduction of the literature. "If Bones were to swap 'New Zealand culture' for 'bourgeois, white inhabitant New Zealand culture'... I think I would basically concur with her," he wrote. He's referring to a specific period in New Zealand letters, however the belief is up to date. Keep coming to grips with those problems to do with identity and self and for goodness' sake, both book and review are stating: Get the identity right!

Frank Sargeson, Dan Davin, Barry Crump, Sam Hunt

It's the kind of sensibility that is expressed in the evaluation of O'Sullivan's novel, that, in one sweeping, dismissive reading marked down an universe that had actually been carefully put together. Here was a New Zealand that existed as a location both in the imagination of a North London chemist, all sunlight and beaches, and the reality for a family who find themselves split apart and darkened by the atrocities of a past that can barely be articulated. "Yet the words 'Jew' or 'Holocaust' are almost absolutely missing," composed reviewer Ann Beagehole, as though all imaginative product, and ethical and social and moral and spiritual, need to show itself plainly on the tin. What kind of New Zealand story is this, her review appears to recommend, to describe a history that attempts not speak its name?Casting my eyes over the latest wave of modern books-- on both sides of the hemisphere, mind you-- this sort of thinking appears to prevail. The hesitancies of art have been silenced in favour of promoting sure results. Where are the spaces, the occlusions? The locations for reticence, for suggestion? Where is the poetry and poetics in the kind of story that must emerge on the printed page as a 100 %variation of this method of believing or that? The novels that aren't set in a rictus of known figures and tropes? I'm barely stating that Scottish and New Zealand authors are lacking in verve and colour. Only that those down-at-heel outsiders that were once so fresh in the novels of James Kelman have actually now staled into numerous replicas regarding render the story of marginalised metropolitan lives redundant. In the same way that the inheritors of New Zealand's own kind of dirty realism have actually hardened their art into self mindful tales of people like us, like us, like us, over and over, set on limitless repeat.O'Sullivan is one of numerous writers in the country who has constantly withstood such simple compartmentalising, naturally, to the advantage of all who like books and think in literature's power to alter and enlarge our lives. However arts agendas all over the world are simply that-- programs-- and they are powerful. My own thinking has taken me just recently towards research being undertaken at Oxford around the concern of literary credibility-- how a lot of our so-called works of imagination and/or textual and linguistic originality are in fact-- consisting of for a lot of the reasons I have actually detailed here-- variations of a state sponsored programme of letters.It leaves the imagination gasping for air, all this. For in ticking the boxes and showing ourselves to be taking part in what are considered the important arguments of the day we lose raw idea. Trait. Special, and monstrosity.

We lose the lovely wastes of exploration and tentativeness and the topics and figures that may take their location within it, feral and numerous and new.Not everything has to do with the familiar. Unusual animals walk, and are books. We need to keep in mind that culture is protean as much as it is an expression of some set status quo. Let the other locations sound, and silence, sometimes, resonate. Let creativity reveal us what to write, open to fictions that may be as sweet and unforeseen as those revealed by my Wairarapa kid finding himself cleaned up in a marquee at the Edinburgh festival. Worldwide we're occupying now, scarier than ever, to keep repeating what we already understand does not appear to be moving us forward, so may we not instead permit ourselves to be released into a sea of the mind?As the movie writer and public intellectual Michael Wood composed recently, resolving the type of art that is the opposite of certainty, that confuses us and makes us alert, "forms talk to our bewilderment, to everything we can not master. They may recommend too that mastery is not precisely what we need."The Spinoff Review of Books is happily given you by Unity Books.