into the trees

{ we'll build our altar here }

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr

Viktor bought this sofa specifically to accommodate his very tall son, but Aaron’s feet still hang over the edge at this angle, unsurprisingly. Ciaran raises an eyebrow when the witch makes himself comfortable, curling in between his legs and burying his head against his stomach. Awfully bold.

“What, you think you’re forgiven?” But Ciaran’s fingers card through Aaron’s hair, his thumb digging into the hollow behind his ear. 

Aaron’s mouth quirks. His eyes are closed. 

“Am I not?” 

Ciaran snorts at that, though the dispute--whatever it was--has been insignificant for days. Most of his teasing, cold shoulder routine is done for his own amusement, obviously. He gets needy, too. 

They spend a long time like this. Ciaran scans his book with increasingly numb eyes and passes his free hand across Aaron’s head over and over, to varying little huffs of appreciation from the half-sleeping boy. 

At some point, they realize it’s been dark for hours and they probably have some responsibility in the morning. Aaron stirs at Ciaran’s mention of bed,curling a large hand under his partially exposed thigh. His sweater is long, shapeless, and modest--but when he hikes his leg up at the touch that doesn’t mean shit. 

“Don’t get fresh.”

Aaron just continues to be fresh. He presses a lingering kiss to the slip of skin, cool lips causing goosebumps. Ciaran’s head falls back onto the armrest. He’s too warm in the face, which is just ridiculous because they’re not teenagers anymore and Aaron has done far more reckless things with his mouth. 

Maybe it’s just been a while. Maybe they’re both just strange and hesitant given all the recent events. 

“Mo ghra,” Aaron’s eyes meet his at the old endearment, “not tonight.”

But the boy doesn’t seem disappointed, if that was his intent. He pulls off, scooping Ciar up from the sofa with him in a swift movement. Braced at his hip, Ciar watches his face for a few moments and then bows their foreheads together. Long, long week. Weeks, months. 

“I missed sleeping next to you.” With your hand on my back, with your even breaths like a lullaby.. 

“Maybe if you weren’t such a brat,” Aaron’s nose turns against his, “and you realized that I’ve never done anything wrong, ever.”

“Okay, never mind. Sofa’s all yours.”

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr

Aaron doesn’t get sick often, but he’s completely insufferable when he does--needy, dramatic, and more miserable than he has any right to be. It probably has a lot to do with being seventeen, though, so Ciaran takes it with a grain of salt. 

“Please kill me,” Aaron begs, listing across the bed in his boxers because he’s too hot now, “painfully. Do it.”

He’s been either too hot or too cold all day, so the bed has been in several stages of made, but twenty minutes ago Aaron said he didn’t even want to look at so much as a sheet and it’s bare now save for one pillow. It’s thirty-five degrees out and a fan is blasting air in from the open window. Even Ciaran’s teeth are chattering. 

“Why are you talking if your throat hurts?” It doesn’t hurt enough to not complain, apparently. 

Aaron ignores that, throwing his arm over his eyes like the child that he is, waxy and pale like a wilting youth in an old painting. Somehow, the look works for him. 

“Is that thing almost ready?”

“It has to chill for twelve hours. It’s been four.”

Referring to the brew Ciaran’s father taught him, a cure-all for sore throats, fevers, and the like. He trudged through a lot of vicious undergrowth for some of the ingredients this morning, but of course it’s a little tedious and Aaron doesn’t know how to be patient or grateful. 

“What if I die before then?”

“We can only hope.”

Just a wordless groan in response this time, and then Aaron is mercifully quiet for a little while. Ciaran wants to leave him to his diseased theatrics, but he knows the minute he left the room he would be called back in for something, and that would probably make him a bad boyfriend, regardless. At least this way he can use this loving vigil as fuel in whatever their next argument is. 

“Oh my god, I’m freezing.”

Wait for it.

“Can you come here?”

Ciaran sighs, shuts the fan off, grabs the oversized comforter from the floor and drags it onto the bed with him. He throws it widely over Aaron, then tucks in behind him and worms warm limbs around his. 

Aaron shivers and clings as much as he physically can, like he can somehow fit entirely within Ciaran’s embrace. Ciaran can’t help but kiss his bare shoulder, which earns him another shiver.

“Don’t you dare leave,” thank god, Aaron sounds like he might be falling asleep, “ever.”

“You’re going to make me leave in twenty minutes,” Ciaran runs a hand along his ribcage for now, though, “and turn on the fucking fan again.”

“Shut up. I love you.”

“I’ll love you back in eight hours.”

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr

They’re sixteen. Ciaran is playing with the baby rabbits too young for Aaron to use, nuzzling their little white faces and delicately stroking tiny ears and feet. They’re too young, also, to be afraid. 

Aaron thinks it’s stupid, so he lies on his back in the grass and scowls when Ciaran tries to entice him with one. He’s made a few horrible comments about what he’s going to do to them eventually, which are promptly tuned out. 

He returns them gingerly to their mother when they start to squirm, watches her hop anxiously around them when he closes the hutch again. It’s kind of a shame, really, to know what’s coming to them.

But he casts it from his mind, crawls on hands and knees to where Aaron is dappled in sunlight and kisses his cheek. The boy’s eyes slit open, and he turns his head to catch Ciaran’s mouth, kiss lingering between them just a few moments.

“I have something to tell you,” Ciaran blurts, because sometimes kisses, touches make him feel dishonest, “it’s...weird.”

“Okay?”

Aaron squints, but that’s as much invitation as he’s going to get, It strikes him that ‘weird’ could mean anything, given the lives they’ve led, so this is relatively harmless, right? It could be much worse.

“I don’t feel like a boy all the time.”

He closes his eyes, wishes some past self, confident and unapologetic, noble and proud, would take over his body and let the earth swallow him. It’s hard being a confused teenager when you’re over three hundred years old and probably immortal. 

Aaron turns onto his side, braces himself with his elbow, and looks down at him. There’s something unreadable in his eyes, something maybe like uncertainty. 

“Then what do you feel like?”

Ciaran plucks at a dandelion in the grass while he tries for an answer he really doesn’t have. It’s still so new between them, and Aaron is pretty strictly gay--he’s so afraid to scare him off that his stomach is flipping over and over. 

“I don’t know. Not like a girl, just...something else, I guess. Is that okay?”

Aaron pauses significantly, then snorts. “Yeah, it’s okay. You don’t need my approval for anything.”

“But I wasn’t sure if you--”

He’s being kissed again, somewhat more insistently, with Aaron’s thumb resting on an exposed strip of skin at his stomach. He tastes like spear mint and smells like grass. 

“I still like kissing you, okay?” Aaron’s voice is breathier now, “I don’t care.”

Ciaran stares at him, heart going loud and fast. So Aaron tugs a little at what he’s wearing, one perfect eyebrow raised. 

“You’re wearing a skirt, Ciar. This isn’t really out of the blue.”

Oh, right, the skirt Aaron bought him--one of them, anyway. Ciaran feels like an even bigger idiot, suddenly, but that’s okay.

[ladiosa-jade-deactivated2023120]

[fannylikes]

[maryjblige]

[hella90s]

[forestsatnight-blog]

He really prefers not to do this. No matter what humans do, however heinous it is, somehow a vampire’s retaliation is never justified. He should have just let the guy with the gun full of wooden bullets butcher everyone here, right? That’s what the media will say. 

Ciaran does it anyway. 

It’s like punching through Jell-O, giving in so easily to his strength, and then it’s one very precise tug. The man emits one stunted groan before his body caves, mangled viscera hanging from him as he falls. He might still be alive for a few minutes, but he deserves that. 

His right hand is disgusting, sticky with gore and whatever else, manicure ruined. He holds it away from himself, guilty of just...standing there like he’s waiting for something else to happen, for someone to usher him into a warm bath, for law enforcement to descend from above. 

The scent itself does nothing for him. It’s like rotting fruit, sweet and sour, hints of something like mold. 

“Oh my god, Ciar, are you okay?” Jace comes bounding out of the house, pursued closely by Ash. They were the ones to receive the threat on Twitter, but they probably never imagined anybody would actually show up, or that Ciaran would have a body at his feet for the first time in years. Fun stuff.

“Yes. Call the police.”

“Why are we calling the police?” oh gods, Aaron, “they’ll crucify you.”

This isn’t something he can kick under a rug so Aaron can’t see. He killed a man, brutally and without breaking a sweat--it negates everything he’s done to convince the boy he would never hurt him, that he’s not a killer despite what his body is built to do. Ciaran can’t look at him.

“Because,” he jerks his hand violently, wet bits and pieces slapping to the ground, “it’ll be worse if I don’t. You’ll all be accessories to murder, but if I call it in now I can claim self defense.”

It’s dark, so he must not have seen the carnage before, because when Jace leans in for a closer look he almost immediately skitters back several steps. Friends with vampires and engaged to a werewolf, but he’s always been soft to the darker side of things, almost unable to look at dead things and having a very strange relationship with death itself. 

Aaron makes a strange face and plants himself on the curb while Ash dials 911 and Jace rushes back inside. Ciaran...can’t seem to move, just watches the back of Aaron’s head. 

“I’m sorry you had to see that.”

“I’m fine.”

“I would never hurt you. This is just--”

“I’m fine, Ciar. I wouldn’t be here if I couldn’t handle myself, okay?”

The sirens are distant enough that no human could probably hear them, but he and Ash both lift their heads when they catch notes of it in the otherwise quiet night. Soon, Ash and Jace’s neighbors will pour out to inspect the noise, and Aaron’s father will be called, and Ciaran will be in silver handcuffs along with whatever other vampires were unlucky enough to visit tonight. 

Honestly? Fuck.

[seidhr-blog1]

Aaron is usually the one for actual confrontation instead of a pointed cold shoulder.  The pissy silences are Ciaran’s forte.  But Aaron is going to take a page out of his book this time.  He watches with a sneer as Ciaran takes his phone from his pocket, then turns his attention away, back to the large tome on the table in front of him.

Pale fingers mark the word he left off on.  “That seems like something Jace should know.”  Aaron writes down a word he can’t translate off the top of his head now, frowning deeply.  As he sets to pulling up a few search engines on his computer, he speaks again.  

“So what are we going to do?  Can she break that sort of brainwashing?  Can Solana?” he asks, eyes not lifting from the computer screen.  He’s still so mad ( or maybe it’s more like scared ) that his hands have a fine tremble to them, but his voice is steady.  

If Ciaran doesn’t see the problem with being gone for half a day without bothering to contact Aaron while they all try and figure out how to deal with a threat that incapacitated a goddamn werewolf, and put up enough of a fight to leave Ciaran bruised not long ago…

Well, that’s Ciaran’s business.  He can figure that out on his own while Aaron sniffs haughtily. 

[forestsatnight-blog]

Aaron is upset with him, and maybe he has a right to be, but Ciaran will be damned if he does anything about it right now. Maybe later he’ll apologize, or something. 

“I have no idea. She ushered us out pretty quickly after that--I think Reese had to trade her something for her time.”

In short, she’s probably not going to help them beyond that. Why would she? 

It’s not much, but it’s a hunch more than they had yesterday. It was easier to assume high-powered thugs would do terrible things for a sum of money, because Ciar has seen a lot of the world and he knows it’s not very good or particularly noble. He can’t decide if it’s better or worse that it isn’t their choice, especially since he killed a few of them. 

Okay, definitely worse. As her influence wears off, the morose feeling of the past several days returns in spades. He bridges his nose with forefinger and thumb, watches Aaron make terrible faces at his laptop. Well. 

“If it’s really fae, this is above what Solana can do, I’m sure. Doesn’t Jace know a guy?”

[seidhr-blog1]

Is he really – ??  

Aaron’s brain practically short circuits for a few seconds here, because he was almost sure Ciaran would come in on the defensive already.  He hadn’t forseen having to explain why he was upset.  The fucker just…disappears for eight hours during a very, very volatile time, and just waltzes back into their house like it was nothing.  

He’s the goddamn definition of relaxed, and Aaron is almost as tense as he’s ever been.  It’s not that he doesn’t think Ciaran can take care of himself, of course, but…but Jesus.  It’s just a lot to handle right now with the stakes running as high as they are.  

And also fuck Reese for not letting Aaron know they were alive too.  Is basic goddamn courtesy dead now?  It must be.  That’s the only explanation.  

  “ Oh, I’m sure she was just divine.  Tell me, elskan, just how luxurious was her hair? ”

[forestsatnight-blog]

Ciaran’s head snaps up at the tone, eyes narrowed. He can’t quite see Aaron from this vantage point, though, so he swings his legs back down, replaces them with his arms so he can face him.

“Oh, much more so than yours.”

Actually, she wore it in a severe up-do that made it impossible to tell how luxurious it was. Just for the record. 

“I don’t know what your problem is, but I was going to tell you that she’s convinced he’s using fae to brainwash his thugs.”

The way Reese talked about her--they would not have reached out if they thought there was an alternative, and as admirable as Ciar found her, he can sympathize with that. of course, the woman has to be fae herself, and is by default powerful and unsettling. 

His head is beginning to thaw. His phone is suddenly a notable weight in his pocket, so he turns it on out of instinct. 

Oh. Missed calls, texts--was he really gone that long? Oops.

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr

It’s past spring now, actually warm enough that Ciar could stand to be in the open air for longer than ten minutes. In Boston, no less, where he admittedly has trouble enduring regardless of what temperature it is outside. 

He doesn’t take note of whatever Aaron is doing when he breezes through the front door, past the foyer, to fall leisurely onto the sofa. His bare legs hang over the arm of it, head perfectly cushioned by a conveniently placed pillow, the picture of ease.

It doesn’t occur to him that his phone has been off for roughly eight hours, and he and Reese didn’t tell anyone else where they were going. He is totally unbothered by any confusion/frustration/worry that might have happened as a direct result. 

“Reese introduced me to a very interesting woman today. She thinks she might be able to help us with our...thingie, whatever.”

It’s bizarre, the lingering effect of her presence. He almost recognizes it, the unnatural aura of unaffected bliss, wearing off slowly. It’s a pheromone, engineered to lure and snare prey. He might be dead if she wished it, and isn’t that exciting? 

“Definitely not human. She pulled off...the most incredible amber necklace, you should have seen it.”

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr (slutty vampire garbage)

Ciaran suspects Aaron’s poor neck has suffered enough abuse recently, still tender and purpled from last week, so he needs a new source. Wrists are a good one in a pinch, but not as fun so he’ll save them for another time. 

Aaron’s thigh is quivering a little as Ciar strokes his fingers across the inside of it to feel for a good blood flow. He’s only inches away from where Aaron is always begging to be touched, just separated by a flimsy layer of silk today. Ciar has not, in the years they’ve known each other, indulged him past the feeding itself--the boy generally comes untouched, or uses his own hand--but he might be feeling a little more generous tonight. Maybe.

He finds a vein and kisses it first, laves his tongue where he’s going to pierce it. One hand settles under his calf, and the other cups where the boy is straining and hardening already, ostensibly to brace him down. Aaron inhales sharply. 

“Are you gonna fuck me?” Bold in this moment, always. He’s much more subdued otherwise. 

“No.” Ciaran bites down.

Aaron makes a pitiful noise that he muffles in his arm. No matter how gently he does it, it always hurts in the beginning, always coming with a twinge of guilt. The boy is not new to this, though, and the pain is always over quicker than the last time. He’s so good. 

His tune changes when Ciar slides his teeth back out to lap and suck at the puncture, the sweet, warm blood sating his tongue. His sudden, blissful moan mirrors the boy’s, helpless and unashamed. He loves hearing Aaron, often so demure and sometimes even shy, cry out in want like this. When they do finally fuck, it might actually kill Ciaran--there has never been another human to affect him so thoroughly, and there probably never will be.

He has to stop himself sooner than he normally would, because Aaron just gave him blood last week and it’s not healthy to draw the same amount so soon. Mostly, Ciaran just wanted a small taste, and to feel him fall to pieces again. This is the only way, for now. He moves his thumb over the small wound to stave the bleeding, while his other hand slips underneath Aaron’s slutty scrap of fabric to finish him. It doesn’t take long. 

Aaron twitches, and then his stomach and Ciaran’s hand are coated in sticky warmth. The boy’s breathing is ragged now, his body suddenly slack. Ciar laughs a little and climbs up to where they can see each other. 

“Ciar...” Aaron’s eyes are glassy, licking his lips, “Why did you...?”

“Shh,” Ciaran slips a finger just past them, gently, “clean me up, mo ghra.”

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr

The tree is, admittedly, pretty daunting. It twists up almost forty feet with dubious footholds--nothing for him, obviously, but more of a challenge for the witch below. Aaron has one foot braced at the bottom and a hand clutching a low-hanging branch like he might actually do it, though. 

Ciaran lounges easily across a thicker branch about halfway up. He’s sixteen again and spirited enough to amuse himself in stupid ways like this, climbing trees and taunting Aaron for no good reason. 

“Come on, are you scared?”

Aaron scowls magnificently and almost seems to pull away, but he’s just finding another foothold to hoist himself up a little. Ciaran’s teasing is working; he knew it would, because Aaron generally doesn’t like being accused of things like fear. Although it might just be that he doesn’t feel like it.

“How high do I have to go?”

“I’ll give you something if you can make it to me.”

Aaron blanches a little, suspiciously. Ciaran has been known to give both the best and the worst gifts, so he’s probably weighing the risk versus the reward. What could it be? 

Ciaran closes his eyes, letting the gentle breeze sift through his hair, the sounds of birds chirping above lulling him. He should do this more often, climbing trees. It’s very relaxing. Aaron is taking a pathetically long time to reach him, too careful, but Ciaran won’t dare watch his progress or he might get self-conscious and wind his way back down. 

Aaron curses at least twice, probably sustaining a minor injury or three, possibly doing irreparable damage to his tailored clothing. That’s alright--he’ll probably grow out of those jeans within the month, and the shirt will be too tight under the armpit like all the others. Ciaran has not sprouted an inch since they left seventh grade. 

His witch is only slightly out of breath when they meet, clinging to the branch like he’s afraid of falling to his death or something. Ciaran opens his eyes to him, catches the flush in his cheeks and mouth, the brightness in his eyes. Aaron’s hair is slightly askew, as well, tousled summertime gold. 

“What are you gonna give me?”

Ciaran can’t think of anything but a kiss, so that’s it. Aaron’s lips taste like balm, as always, and there’s a pretty interesting bead of sweat that make them taste like salt, too. His hand instinctively grabs the scruff of Aaron’s shirt, just in case. 

He pulls away, watching the slow flutter of his brown eyelashes opening as he does. Aaron doesn’t have time to focus on him before he’s gone, falling neatly to the ground with a pleasant swoop in his belly, lands on all fours. 

Aaron is still clinging to his branch, now staring down at him with narrowed eyes and a judgmental mouth. Ciaran laughs and shakes a leaf out of his hair.

“Just fall, mo ri. I’ll catch you.”

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr

"You're not my makeup person."

"I'm your makeup remover person," Ciaran decides, "Reese is asleep. Sit down."

"I think I know how to take it off," Aaron always says this, all skeptical eyebrow, but he always gives in, "that's the easy part."

Ciaran doesn't respond to that because he's explained this a thousand times. You can spend twenty minutes burning the skin from your face with drug store wipes and wake up with scaly skin and orange streaks, or you could do it the right way. This is the right way. It involves a lot of Clinique.

Aaron has some of the most delicate skin he's ever come across. It's a pretty picture on screen, but it makes finding product for him difficult, makes this process in particular a very tedious one. Ciaran is not even this careful with his own face, sometimes falls asleep with his cat eye still sharp, gloss still sticky on his lips.

He's gentle when he dabs under his eyes with the cotton ball, framing what he can of his face with his thumb and index finger. He's much too aware of Aaron's  eyes on him, unwavering as always. Bold.

“Is this new?” Aaron’s fingers seek the elaborate choker at his throat, notes of blood and cream with beads dangling to his collarbone, “I like it.”

Ciaran doesn’t wear it often because it’s a very loud piece on it’s own, requiring the simplest of clothing to justify it. Cropped black sweater, black silk shorts, and that’s it. 

“No, my mother gave it to me.”

He lets the cotton balls sift into the small trash can at his feet, reaches back for the moisturizer so he can spread it around Aaron’s eyes and temples because again, scales. 

“Really? You never talk about her.”

Ciar’s mind goes briefly to his mother, beautiful and fierce and terrible. Showing up in his life every few odd years to bestow a gift, maybe, or an ultimatum. Sometimes both. He can’t really hate her, the way you can’t hate an animal for following it’s instinct. 

“Nope.”

That’s all he’s going to say. To elaborate would only conjure up negative feelings and associations he buried years ago, has long since sort of made peace with. It’s whatever, as Reese would say.

He finishes up with one last sweep across his jaw where the foundation is usually heaviest, contoured to emphasize structure in the shadowy lighting on set. Misty Creek is famous for it’s jawlines. Speaking of which--

“How’s Jace?” he only asks to torture him, light teasing to counter the voracious lines of questioning the two actors are met with almost every day, “You guys looked good today.”

Aaron groans probably more exasperatedly than he really needs to, pinching the bridge of his nose like the mere thought of Jace incites a migraine. Ciaran has to wonder if their animosity is mostly for show, so Aaron can feel like his dignity is protected or something.

“Stop. His mouth tasted like sour skittles, it was awful.”

He should be less beautiful without his stage makeup, but Ciaran has long since acquired the taste of Aaron’s unusual face. The veins visible behind his delicate eyelids, the shadows under his eyes, his swollen bruise of a mouth. He looks like a Botticelli angel that doesn’t sleep.

“What does yours taste like?”

He’s is close enough to hear the slight change in his breathing, watch him color a little. Ciaran hasn’t exactly made it a secret that he wants him, and Aaron doesn’t seem disinterested, but he’s stuck with more subtle overtures in waiting for a definite response. It’s been...three years? 

“You’ll have to ask Jace,” his face lights up pink, and Ciaran has to wonder if he gets like that all over. 

“Maybe I will. You’re all done.”

He always does this, pretends it’s just a friendly gesture. Holds the side of his face again, leaves a lingering kiss low on his cheek. The skin is warm, almost too much so. It’s a shame it ends here, always. 

[forestsatnight-blog]

@seidhr

It’s the first time.

They thought they could escape the witch hunt, perhaps by being clever, perhaps because they are mostly young fools to which death is something that happens to everyone else. There wasn’t much they could do to prevent the cull of those just deemed undesirable--non-practicing humans raising suspicion only because they were unmarried women, or darker skinned, or both. The necromancers kept vigil by candlelight for their souls, and that was all that was safe to do. 

One ordinary person with a torch, a pitchfork, is nothing to worry about. He could cut down five of them, even, if it came to that. But a mob, driven by insanity and powered by fear? He’d rather not try. 

And now the first is gone, the girl who touched souls. Taken in the night and sunk with stones to the bottom of the river, without even a trial like some of them got. They were all asleep save for one, the snake who is sometimes a girl child and the one who woke them all frantically at dawn. Too late to save her, only to retrieve her body.

Ciaran thinks shamefully of the way he and Eirikr pressed together by the dying fire only hours previous. That’s not something he wants to regret, but the memory is tainted now.

He’s dripping cold, feeling like her waterlogged corpse is still weighing him down. He left it with her cousin, the doe, and the snake--all of them mad with grief. The cousin can’t be far behind her now. 

Eirikr is writing furiously, ink and blood spattered everywhere. The cut is on the inside of his wrist where he brings it to his mouth to lick it clean. The blankets have been moved and the fire only ash, no trace left of their night together. Not the first, but maybe the last. 

“Eirikr,” he still can’t quite perfect it with his thick tongue, made harder by the salt in his mouth, “we have to leave.”

“We?” It’s cruel. 

“Yes. I promised to be yours forever. What was the point of that if not for this?”

The witch drops his papers, knocking over another inkstand with an angry exhale. Ciaran falls to the floor beside him and grips his shoulder, the other hand on his cheek so he has to look at him. Childish anger will not solve this, or prevent another like it. 

“My love, please,” in the language they both know, tortured and true, “you will die if we stay. There is nothing that important here.”

“And what will happen to you if we stay?”

“I don’t know.” It’s the truth--he doesn’t know the nature of his own body, if he can burn or be torn asunder and be whole again. He doesn’t know the nature of his own soul, if it will leave this plane like theirs does or become something else. He knows he’s not as fragile, knows if he had only himself to worry about that he would likely survive this purge. But there is nothing to survival without Eirikr.

The witch is silent for a few moments, only leaning closer so their foreheads meet, eyes closed and breath unsteady on Ciaran’s cheek. He can’t know what the girl’s death did to him, what his death would do to him. How would he know?

“I have work here,” oh, the mess of a spell on the floor, so dire, “I can’t leave.”

And this is what his promise means, too. That he will stay here with him and watch others die, watch him die probably sooner than he should. Eventually, he will regardless, but Ciaran does not want to see his face cold and still before a single wrinkle touches it. 

“Then your work will kill you. And I will kill myself trying to save you.”

[seidhr-blog1]

Alright, then.  Olive branch redacted.  You look like shit, and it’s a terrible shirt.  Except not even Aaron’s that petty, so he lets it slide.  Ciaran looks nice, and is also not in the mood for compliments apparently.  Probably not in the mood to get checked out either, so Aaron will refrain from that for the rest of the evening too.  

He nods when Ciaran mentions bringing in Solana.  It does seem like the sort of thing she would have a better idea about, but it’s no secret that Aaron words better and more effectively with Ciaran.  Aaron’s got no real problem with Solana, at least.  She’s not Reese, but more importantly, she’s not Jace.  It’s a middle ground that he can live, and work, with.

Contingency plan.  Which means they need an actual plan to start with.  Aaron gives a thoughtful sort of noise, eyes fixed on the counter as he tries to consider this from the different angles.  It worries him, obviously, that even a handful of who this man has working for him were dangerous enough to get Ciaran that banged up; he’s got a strange myriad of pieces in this game he’s playing, and they work together a lot better than their coven.  

He’s reminded of their fight of a few months ago, when Aaron had suggested killing that witch’s familiar to end the confrontation for good.  There’s got to be a heart of this matter to cut to.  A way to avoid a brawl that would end up in need of any sort of contingency plan.  Actually, if he thinks about it for a few seconds, he thinks that maybe Jace is the heart of this.  If Jace was gone, would there be a point?  It’s impossible to know for sure, and even Aaron isn’t actually contemplating killing Jace to end this.  Well, no more than he usually thinks about killing Jace.

“We just need to get to him.  If no one’s paying those people, then I can’t imagine they’re going to fight for him.”  How much is he paying these people?  Aaron couldn’t buy off all of them, but he might be able to buy off one of them for the information that could cut straight to Dick.

“I’m…not saying it’s a bad idea to coordinate with the wolves, but I think it’s a long shot.  And maybe another contingency plan.  But shouldn’t the real plan be to avoid an actual…fist fight?”  Which sounds kind of hypocritical considering just thirty seconds and two strawberries ago he was trying to find a way to funnel more power into an actual fist fight.  But Ciaran’s got Aaron thinking, bless him, and there’s no harm in a few plans, right?  

[forestsatnight-blog]

Aaron’s skills of deduction are brilliant, truly. Ciaran isn’t really in the mood for any of that nonsense, but he’ll still put himself in a position to be checked out because he’s mean and it’s just instinctual at this point.. 

“I’m actually not convinced they’re being paid.”

Jace’s testimony was a lot to absorb in the clearing, but one critical aspect keeps standing out in his mind. He would have no reason to lie about the state of his memories in regards to this man--if nothing else, Jace’s default is honesty. If he was being coerced into doing whatever and then being made to forget about it after the fact, it’s not far fetched to assume there are others suffering the same plight. It comes with a real twinge of guilt, thinking that he might have killed innocents who weren’t in their right mind, but he didn’t bring them into this war. Again, Dick seems to be talented at shifting blame onto everyone but himself. 

That leads into another train of thought. Jace is not a fighter, as evidenced by his clumsy tussle with Aaron, so what was Dick using him for? He can only think it would be for his manipulation of the dead, which still doesn’t quite feel right, doesn’t fit. He’ll have to shelve that for later.

So maybe he’s a powerful telepath, or he has one on hand. It makes Aaron’s sudden desire to avoid a fight, though surprising, incredibly convenient. Ciaran has no qualms about spilling blood under the right circumstances, and at least the perpetrator of this mess deserves it, but he’s no fan of collateral damage. Of course Aaron knows that, given their awful disagreement that still feels fairly recent. 

Ciaran isn’t great at planning that doesn’t involve violence. Internal conflicts are a different story, but outside forces are always unpredictable. Once the threat has already struck, he’s accustomed to handling it in a particular way, usually with his teeth. Still, he’s far more the diplomat than Aaron is, if not quite on par with Imari. 

There are a thousand ways it could go down, almost none of them ideal. If they could just find the real motive, why he needs supernatural creatures on a leash to begin with...that would be an impressive lead, for sure. Jace’s buried memories might also prove useful, should they find a way to retrieve them. 

Ciaran plucks another strawberry and bites into it while he thinks, bringing one leg up to rest his head against it. Aaron impressed him with his last suggestion, but it requires more strategy than just setting things on fire and hoping for the best. They’re witches--how did they ever get in this cycle of violence? This wouldn’t be the first time pacifism has seemed the better alternative, but last time he didn’t fight it was because he’d already lost everything.

“But no, I like that idea better. Nobody else needs to get hurt. I’ll...talk with Imari and see what he thinks. Thank you.”

[seidhr-blog1]

@forestsatnight​

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