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[assassin_daddy]

Jᴀᴄᴏʙ Fʀʏᴇ "I'm no criminal. I just do as I please."

 

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Text; Un: Ravens | Post Tumenalia

[chrisisofaith]

How's one of the most handsome men in all of the city fairing this slightly misty morning?

[assassin_daddy]

Thats a very good question, how are you love?

[chrisisofaith]

Been better, I’ll admit

Luckily I have this incorrigible man in my life who I happen to love quite a lot.
He has a way of making me smile
And groan in annoyance, but no one’s perfect

[assassin_daddy]

He sounds like he comes pretty close to perfect.

I'm sorry you're not feeling your best. Need something? I can come by, or send someone out on an errand to you. Whatever you need.

[chrisisofaith]

He is pretty perfect, you’re right. Tell him hi next you’re by a mirror, won’t you?

No, it’s alright, but thank you.
Nate Hawthorne’s left, a good friend and the man who ran the Midnight Theatre. It’s just shaken things up a bit.
I’m alright otherwise so no worries from your handsome head.

[assassin_daddy]

I'm sure he'll want me to send greetings right back.

Oh Chris, I'm sorry. I appreciate you're managing but... come by, alright? When you can. Or spend some time with Jon Sims, and just take a moment.

[chrisisofaith]

Maybe I'll just do both. You two keep my head on straight, valuable when I've got to do same for others hurting more than me.

I've got a few more things to do today and then I can come by? We can take a walk. Maybe let me pet your hair for a bit.

Only vaguely related, I wanted to ask you something.

[assassin_daddy]

I think that would be a great idea. The woods are beautiful this time of year, just wrap up warm.

What's on your mind?

[chrisisofaith]

I’ve a great lovely coat I’ll put on

Some words said to me. I wanted to check their meaning cause they sound but like an oath.

“To have and to hold, for richer or poorer, in sickness and health” do they have meaning? Like a saying?

[assassin_daddy]

Alright. And if we're cold when we get back, I can make us something warm to drink.

They are an oath- wedding vow specifically. At least they are if whoever is using them is from a variation of Earth similar to the one I'm from. Who wants to marry you this time?

[chrisisofaith]

This time, he says! Like there's a line out the door.

[There is not. There's a couple he'd consider, potentially, but only in daydreams.

He hesitates on the next part, the words 'Ravens is typing' running across the screen a few times. Stopping. Returning. Finally he decides on what to say.]

You, but it was twenty years ago and you were delirious with pain and likely infection and quite literally dying in my arms, so I won't hold it against you.

1/2

[assassin_daddy]

there should be, if the rest of this place had any sense.

2/2

[assassin_daddy]

[ It takes Jacob what seems like an equally long time to come back, trying to wade through his own thoughts and feelings, and try to work out what to say, how to say it, and then realising that he can't easily type it out at all. ]

Twenty years ago for me, a month just gone for you.

We should talk. About that. In person, rather than like this.

did you say yes?

[chrisisofaith]

[He reads the words over and takes a breath. They should talk about this, it wasn't kind to have brought up his love's death like this. He deserved better for that. As a death cleric, Chris should have said it better.

No one ever tells you it's harder when it's personal.]

I can be there in the hour. I'll bring some coffee.

[He finishes up what he was doing and makes to head out, slipping on a longer and slightly thicker black leather coat instead of his usual one before setting out on his motorcycle. In this instance, having one that was loud might be nice for drowning out any thought, but he does his best on his own.]

[assassin_daddy]

I've got the whiskey to go in it.

[ But he doesn't open it or help himself to it yet. Instead he finds something to do, something simple to keep his hands busy as his mind works. Cleaning his blades has always worked before, and he sets to it now. It's easy to do, the movement familiar and almost meditative as he thinks about Chris, about what it must have been like for the young man, for Jacob to be dying in his arms, to say something like that- and for Chris not to know the significance of it. Christ.

He doesn't remember what it was like, dying. He doesn't remember being in Chris' arms. He remembers the pain, and the darkness of the tunnels under Lambeth, the bright white light of the Pit, but everything else about it is hazy.

But the thoughts are interrupted not long later, when there's the noise of something outside. Not a motor, but wheels on the gravel road that leads down to the cabin. He's up on his feet, sliding the blades back where they belong in his gauntlet and belt, and in his boot, before he goes to the door.]

[chrisisofaith]

[Chris pulls up outside Jacob's place and retrieves the coffees from where he'd magicked them into stillness inside the storage part under the seat. He's trained his head into a form of anticipatory quiet, at least, setting aside anything else to deal with later.

He hears the front door as he balances the cups in one hand and closes up the bike and when he turns to greet Jacob, it's with a small smile.]

Hello, handsome. Here, as you like it.

[He holds out one of the cups between them, grateful for the moment that his hands are too full to reach out to the other man just yet. He needed to make sure his grip wasn't too tight or too clingy before he tried it.]

[assassin_daddy]

"Brought to me by you, which makes it better."

Jacob takes the cup, not even needing to check that the little boxes on the side are ticked in the familiar order- tea, milk, no sugar- because Chris knows him well enough. And as his fingers brush Chris' own briefly he can feel how they're both holding themselves back, that much both want to close the distance and hold onto each other. It takes half a heartbeat for Jacob to give up on the pretence and to wrap an arm around Chris, pulling him in close. He holds him there, just for a moment, before he lets him go.

He wishes he hadn't laid all that at Chris' door, in those circumstances. He wishes he'd known he'd been the one to say those words, so he could have explained it better. But they're together now, they can talk.

"Shall we walk and talk? I think we've got a fair amount to talk about."

[chrisisofaith]

He doesn't bother masking the small sigh of relief that escapes him when Jacob's arm comes around him and his own free one comes up to return the brief embrace. There still might be rough ground ahead, but that didn't mean they couldn't lean on each other not to trip. That would always matter more to him than anything else.

"Yes. The air's crisp, like there's ice in it already. Some of my favorite, honestly." It reminded him of the chilly lands he was born in, but it always made him feel like he could think clearer.

He steps out towards the back and the woods around the house, his free hand finding a place in the middle of Jacob's back just to touch and trace over his jacket. "I'm sorry, I...I shouldn't have brought up the pit like that. It's my job to have more care in such matters, and not just because you're my boyfriend. As a cleric of death, I shouldn't have been so clumsy."

[assassin_daddy]

Jacob is used to harsh winters, snow banked up in the streets, the rivers topped with ice and every chimney billowing smoke in an effort to make homes warm. He's only had to light the fire in the cabin once or twice so far this winter, who knows what keeps it warm, but there's something in the air, just as Chris says.

"Fresh and clear, good for walking," He agrees, glad he has his own long coat on, and his usual amount of layers. And with a hot drink in hand? It couldn't get better.

When Chris speaks, Jacob looks to him as they head down the path, fallen leaves a thick blanket on the ground, edged with frost.

"The Pit isn't, for me, a problem." Which isn't true, necessarily. It isn't the current problem. It isn't what makes his heart ache right now. "I'm sorry about... what I said. Then. I don't remember it, I was in a bad way, but I shouldn't have... said words like that to you and not explained the meaning. And I shouldn't have been so blasé when I told you what they meant."

He hadn't spared Chris' feelings any thought, but he'd had no idea where Chris had heard the phrase or what context they'd been in. He should have done better.

"I didn't mean to... be so callous."

[chrisisofaith]

The leaves crunch and shift under their feet in a way he's only used to here, there'd never been many fallen leaves in the streets back home. He likes the sound, though.

Chris shakes his head. "You weren't callous. How were you to know? I only gave you context after the fact, for all you knew, I could have simply read them somewhere." His hand slips form Jacob's back to curl around his upper arm instead. "I know you don't recall...think I could tell from the moment I saw you again. I just wasn't sure if I should talk to you about it or leave it, seeing as I think it's a far kinder thing you don't remember it much."

He opens his mouth a moment. Closes it, and then sighs. He hasn't talked to anyone about this. The pit has come up, he's talked about the pain and fear and anger, but there's two moments he remembers with crystal clarity and hasn't breathed a word of them to anyone, including the men they involve. One of them lingers now on the edge of his tongue. Still, he hesitates. Maybe it was kinder to keep that piece himself. A body isn't meant to remember its own demise and, blissfully, Jacob doesn't. That's as it should be.

[assassin_daddy]

"I couldn't have. But I didn't stop ti consider the possibilities. What if Jon Sims had said them to you? He's from a version of my world. I should have... at least talked to you in person. Explained better."

The moment Chris' hand leaves his back in keenly felt, but at least its back a moment later, on his arm. He wishes he could see more easily, but Chris is on his blind side, trusted there, and Jacob has to fully turn his head to see Chris' movements or expression even somewhat.

"We should talk about it. And ypu should talk to me about whatever you're holding back." He says, after Chris' pause goes on too long. He had wanted to talk about them, but Chris needs to talk about this, and Jacob wants to give him every opportunity to do so.

"I know you have your duty. I know you care about it. But please, Chris, do not hold back from saying what you need to say."

[chrisisofaith]

'What if Jon had said them?' That very nearly startles a laugh from him. He couldn't imagine. He'd like to, as much as he'd like to imagine it coming from Jacob, earnest and lucid and said like a promise. But no, he doesn't indulge in either right now, that was better for late nights when the mind was allowed some peace in rest.

For now, he hesitates a moment more before breaking the silent crunch of their path. "You read me too easily." He offers to start, but it frees the rest. "I know what a dead body feels like. I've made enough of them in my time. I know a body gets heavier when its soul chord is cut, leaving nothing but flesh and muscle and none of the person behind. It's...less immediate now, but if I close my eyes and remember that moment, my arms remember the feeling of how your body grew heavier nearly all at once. It's not a scar I can show, but it lingers in my skin and aches as keenly. The way your eyes went dull and stopped seeing me. How your skin cooled under my lips...I-"

His hold tightens on Jacob's arm and he's distinctly grateful in that moment that Jacob can't see him. "That's part of why I want to hold you in them so much now, whether peacefully or in a tangle, I don't want to forget that moment, but I need the reminder you're still with me sometimes. At least until it's healed more." He shakes his head. "I should weather it better, I'm sorry...for all the death around me, it's only been twice that it was someone I loved more than anything else."

[assassin_daddy]

"You've said that before," Jacob replies, amused. "And you do the same to me. You just have to live with the fact you know me and I know you." He doesn't mind that Chris can read him, and guess his thoughts with more accuracy than most. It's good, to feel... known. Understood. He hasn't felt like that with someone for some time. Longer than he'd like to admit.

"I'm sorry I put you through that." He knows what it's like, to hold someone when they die. He knows what it's like to hold someone you love. It's just worse when it's someone you've also had to kill. But he doesn't want to think of Roth, not after so many years. Not when he's with Chris. "I know that I didn't intend to do that. I don't- I don't want to go like that."

Not in any world, not at any time. But he can imagine, being aware it was coming, and feeling safe, loved, wanted in Chris' arms. He doesn't think the cleric would have forced him away.

He shifts, his free hand finding Chris', fingers winding together, so he can squeeze him, send all the support he can that way, turning his head to look at the other man and wanting so desperately to take the pain away, replace it with the warmth of the love between them.

"Does it help, to think that death couldn't hold me back from you? That I came back to find you again?"

[chrisisofaith]

He has, hasn't he? Well, it's still true and leaves him feeling exposed in vulnerable in a way he doesn't abide by my most people. Jacob is not most people. It helps to know he can see him, especially when his thoughts and feelings get tangled and words become difficult.

Jacob says what Chris would have said before he can open his mouth and he doesn't interrupt. Something settles a little more in him, not entirely healed, but a little lighter to bare. There was a part of his mind that still caught him in the quiet of the kitchen some mornings when his thoughts were no where near the pit, and yet suddenly he would be back there, holding Jacob close like he could keep his soul from leaving him in those desperate moments and Chris would come back to himself shaking and eyes burning and needing to breathe. Hopefully talking about it would finally ease some of that.

Jacob threads their fingers together and Chris brings them up so he can kiss each finger and then the back of his hand he held. "Yes. It helps...you told me 'If you love someone, you never say goodbye to them.' So keep doing that for me, alright? I'm selfish...and I'd rather know you'll always come back to find me."

[assassin_daddy]

Jacob smiles slightly at the kisses, the cold air around them means the warmth of Chris' kisses stand out all the more, as if the world is highlighting each and every one to him. They're a gift, a benediction that he should treasure and keep close to his heart.

"I intend to. Trust me." He says, as solemn as a promise. He loves Chris fiercely, intensely, and he isn't about to stop, or let anything come in the way of that.

He squeezes Chris' fingers again, keeping their hands together as they continue down the path. Normally it's warmer amongst trees, so much life gives off heat, but the temperature is still low, the frost in the wind almost tangible.

"The words I said. They really stuck with you?" He doesn't want to make Chris dwell on that time, that pain, but the fact Chris' asked about it, remembered them so clearly, means something.