“More the second, I guess, ” he shrugs. “I suppose it doesn’t have to be me, but it’s gotta be somebody, so it may as well be.” The bug Forsyth had swatted finds a new perch on the tip of his nose, and he scrunches his face in annoyance, attempting to wiggle it away without lifting his sore arms. “Beats bein’ a carpenter or sweepin’ a tavern floor. I ain’t’ got a whole lot of other marketable skills, and food and ale don’t pay for themselves.”
It’s what he’s always said- that he works enough to keep a full belly and a bed under him, and that’s it. It’s not really true anymore- if it was, he probably would be a carpenter, and likely wouldn’t have a still-aching slice out of his arm. It would be an easier life, but monotonous, purposeless. And maybe he doesn’t completely hate that this gives him purpose. He doesn’t respond to Forsyth’s praise, but doesn’t roll his eyes either, just… accepts it, for once.
He lets the final question hang for a moment, finding himself without a ready answer. “I guess so. Not like I have much to compare it to.” And he doesn’t, he realizes- at least not since they were children, and those memories are hazy fragments that at times barely feel real. Has he ever been happy? His final years at home had been miserable, the militia not much better. The Deliverance had been…well, a lot of things, but the constant threat of violent death hadn’t lent itself to feeling especially content. He’s always just carved out bits of happiness where he can find them- in decent food or strong drink, in a warm body for the night, in teaching the village boys a bawdy song or a particularly good prank to play on Clive. In lazing around watching Forsyth train in the early morning, or squishing too close to him around the campfire at night. So much of it came from him.
“Could be happier, but…” He trails off. Forsyth is right- maybe not about “meant to be,” he still doesn’t believe in that- but that things are what they are and will never be perfect. In some ideal world, maybe they would want the same things, but this one isn’t and has never been ideal.
This will have to be enough.
He shakes his head, dislodging both the persistent gnat and his train of thought. The fever is making him maudlin. His lips curl back into their usual smirk. “Be happier if you kissed me.”
Normally, Forsyth would have snapped at that comment - Python, this is serious! - but this time, head heavy with the air in the barn and thoughts half-clouded, he simply smiled. Leaning over, he gave Python a long and lingering kiss, their lips clinging to each other momentarily as he pulled away. He lay his head back on the hay, still clenching Python’s hand and rubbing his thumb across the archer’s roughened palm.
The visions he’d had in his younger days still declined to leave him, haunting his mind like ghosts. They were on horseback, the two of them, clad in the armour of Zofian knights; his horse covered in resplendent green, Python’s a vibrant, sea-coloured blue. In their hands they carried standards graced with the image of the white tree, and they rode out together in search of some evildoers to fight, or a village to save.
It would never happen. But he could still see it, just out of his mind’s eye.
He sighed. “Well, I am glad to hear it, Python. If we had come all this way and you were still unhappy… I admit, I would be somewhat at a loss.”
A bird shrieked noisily outside. Probably a raven, he thought. They had always plagued the village’s crops, even back when they were children. Fitting, he thought, that some things never change.
His mind turned again, and he found himself looking at Python, who was nothing more than a shadow in the near-darkness. “But there will come a time when we can no longer fight,” he continued. “I wonder. What will we do then?”
