As was the manner for all creatures of its ilk, the cat had a habit of going wherever it pleased, with no prior warning to Qilan; whatever mythical quality it should have had as the manifestation of her soulmate’s soul meant very little to a cat. It could disappear for days at a time, and then reappear on her window the next day, batting at the glass to be let in. On other occasions, it would leap into her lap, purring loudly until she scritched its chin or behind its ears, lolling for hours in its new spot.
Qilan, in turn, was content to leave it alone. Chasing the cat would only serve to lose its trust forever. Once, when she was a child, the cat had been more affectionate, more playful; it was a sleek black kitten like a stain of oil that would shadow her steps everywhere she went, clumsy kitten paws that kneaded at her back and mewed until she picked it up. It snuggled with her at night, hissed at the neighborhood bullies for approaching too closely, and licked at her wounds when she scraped her knees running in the forest.
It had been her only companion when she spoke the unknown word and her village disappeared, and she was left alone with nothing but a knife and her own wits to survive. It slept in the curve of her body, warmed her on the cold winter days, and would nibble on scraps of fish she managed to catch off the coast.
Perhaps her relationship with the cat changed the day the kitten started growing and sporting fresh wounds on the daily, a reflection of her soulmate’s own physical body. Each time, she would mop up the blood, bandage the wounds, and stroke its sleek back as it curled up in pain. Eventually, the wounds stopped, but so did the cat’s affections, and she wondered what that meant for her distant soulmate.
Still. Still, the cat was her constant companion, her only friend, and she would not hold it so tight to her that it ran away. No, better to coolly love it a distance, if that was the only way to love it at all. Soulmates were a pretty fantasy; if she were to meet hers, Qilan wasn’t sure she could give them what they wanted if they expected flowers and romance, when she herself didn’t know what love was supposed to feel like anymore. Perhaps if she rolled the word around on her tongue enough, she could call it back to herself, drawing on that dangerous wellspring of power, bubbling deep within her.
But words, as she had learned, were dangerous. To speak was to give them power. To confess was to give something to the world that you could never take back.
For now, it was just her and the cat, who would only creep close to her when she appeared to have fallen asleep at night, emerald eyes gleaming in the darkness as it held watch. Love, but only if you couldn’t call it such, only if it was at such a distance it could be mistaken for something else.
ii. The Swift
The bird never stopped flying.
Chase has long gotten used to the way it swooped and soared, wings beating in an eternal rhythm. Most days, he didn’t even notice it, caught up in a new scheme or spot of mischief, the little thing so far out of sight. But sometimes, sometimes, when he looked up at the endless blue of the sky, it was all he could see.
He never put much stock in soulmates or guardian animals: a connection the One-God gave you, someone destined to love you and to be loved by you, their soul manifesting in an animal to watch over you? It sounded like a load of shit, cooked up by the Autarchy to explain away magical creatures that followed people around. Perhaps the closest he had ever come to believing in it when he was little, out on the open sea, among the spray of salt and wind.
Back then, Chase loved the bird. It flew next to him as he balanced along the mast or hopped his way up the crow’s eye, and if he could keep it in sight, he believed he would be safe. It chirped out little songs for him, and he would pretend it was his soulmate sending him messages. Even then, he couldn’t fully believe in the idea of someone out there, born solely to love him.
Later, the bird felt more like judgment. It watched as he was left behind. It watched as he made his way into the employ of a different father. It watched the blood on his hands. It watched as he made his way back to the sea, and then back to Haven. The bird was his only witness to his gorey past, and through it all, it kept flying.
Soulmates. What a hideous thought. As if he would start letting someone tell him what to do, much less who to love. In defiance, Chase slept with anyone who caught his eye, even when, through the window, he watched the bird soar. He flirted, he dallied, and most of all, he promised himself that if he ran into his soulmate, he wouldn’t love them, if only to spit on the idea that they, a stranger, would somehow be the one for him.
Chase envied the bird sometimes, for its wings and its freedom. The swift was a bird that never stopped flying, even when it slept. Where was his soulmate going? Why did their bird always fly?
What did it matter, though? As long as he could run through the streets of Haven, unbound to anyone but himself, then that would be a type of flying, too.
iii. First Meeting
Her cat bounded along and nipped at her ankles, twining between her legs with an unusual urgency that almost had Qilan trip as she flew down the streets of Haven. Where had the wily thief gone? He had taken her medallion, and without it… if the Inquisitors were to stop her…
Her eyes darted wildly, bouncing from unfamiliar face to unfamiliar face as she sped down narrow alleys until slick cobblestoned streets gave way to the weatherbeaten wood of the wharf and the fresh seabreeze rolling off the piers. Qilan slowed, but her cat did not, and it slammed against the wooden door of one of the nearby warehouses, claws leaving deep grooves.
“What the–” She heard a nearby man say, startled out of his slouching position by the cat’s yowling.
Her cat reacting like that could only mean one thing, but there was no time to think, no time to pause: she called within her and her magic crested, rushing through her as the wooden door exploded inwards.
Both Qilan and the cat slipped in, the man– a guard, she assumed– flustered as he ran in after her.
Smoke. Charred pieces of wood. Confused shouting. A swell of panicked bodies in the aftermath of her spell.
And her cat, dashing through it all, straight at a little fluttering bird. Her cat purred, nuzzling at the bird, their forms melting into the sunlight that fell across the dusty floor.
And behind them, a man, the same insouciant thief who had taken her medallion and ran. He caught her gaze, smiled, but there was no warmth in his eyes. They assessed each other, his eyes snagging over her uniform, the unmistakable glow of the iladrin, the hilt of her dagger. In turn, she noted the ease in which he held himself, belying the tension coiling under his skin, like a predator ready to pounce.
Briefly, Qilan recalled the old Ket superstition that your soulmate was not someone you were supposed to love, but to kill, your greatest enemy.
“You blew up my hideout,” the thief said mildly.
“My apologies. You can bill it to the Shepherds,” she said, not sounding sorry at all. “You stole my medallion.”
The thief tossed the medal in the air casually, a miniature sun glittering, before catching it again with the same hand, all the while never dragging his gaze from hers. Qilan almost relaxed. This, at least, was easier. Violence was a language she could understand: the kiss of cold steel, the dance of two bodies locked in battle like a lover’s embrace.
“Is it?” he asked, still languid. “Are you sure?”
The Ket thought a soulmate was someone who had seized the weakness of your soul, held it captive as a fragile animal. To protect yourself, to keep yourself safe, you had to strike first. Kill before you are killed. Hurt before you are hurt.
“Why don’t you come closer so I can check?” she said innocently, and her smile was all teeth.
As her father had taught her, strike at a vital point. Incapacitate the foe in one swift movement. First blood drawn.
iv. First Crush
Qilan doesn’t fall in love.
She knows the right distance to keep with all her flings, knows how to carefully cool the embers of burgeoning passion before they spark into something real. It’s easier to leave in the night than the morning, disentangling herself from warm limbs, as if she was never there in the first place.
That’s how she prefers it, too. Quick, easy, simple. No time for feelings to bloom, for someone to mistake her courtesy as affection.
Chase, at least, understands this the most out of any of her previous partners. Lust and passion, admiration and flirtation, but nothing more. Bodies are nothing more than bodies, in the end.
But one night, he stays.
It’s an accident. There are always lines they were careful not to cross, but people get careless, especially in the middle of warm, drowsy pillowtalk, of legs playfully entwined, of deep green eyes, catlike and grinning, even in the dark.
She trusts him, as she trusts all of her friends. But maybe she trusts him too much, because when she falls asleep in his arms, he’s still there the next morning.
Qilan doesn’t even have time to be surprised, not with the sun shining gold across his face. His face is open, vulnerable, peaceful. No schemes, no insouciant manner, no tawdry looks. It’s just Chase, not the Prince of Thieves or Captain Trinaeste.
And she smiles to herself, her hand drifting across his forehead to sweep a soft brown curl behind his ear. She could lie here forever, playing with his hair, tracing the curve of his nose with her finger. It’s when her thumb brushes across his lips, no heat, no lust, nothing but naked affection in the gesture, that Qilan freezes.
That’s when she knows she’s fucked.
And then Chase catches her wrist, sly green eyes opening, expertly flipping her hand to brush his lips across her knuckles, asking if she wants to go for another round.
And of course, she says yes, because that’s what their relationship is supposed to be. Playful lust and friendly admiration. No love. Nothing like that.
Thankfully, Qilan has always been a good liar.
v. Second Love
If anyone asks what Chase thought of Qilan, he would feed them stories about the Hero of Haven.
Tales of her exploits, her courageous deeds and boundless wit and charm, and, to wrap it up, a cheeky wink about how he knows her closely and personally. That’s enough to satisfy most people, if not scandalize the rest. That’s what people want to hear, anyways, about myths and legends and people larger than life.
He’s always been one to keep his card to his chest, so no one has yet to figure out that he only talks about Captain Sun, the Hero of Haven, instead of Qilan.
They have a good relationship, and it’s nothing other people need to know about or even understand. He tucks away the memories of her hair, a pink sunset around her head on his pillow, and the way she whispers his name when she has a particularly juicy story to share, and how her eyes light up when she makes some ridiculously complicated academic breakthrough he can barely understand. No, those memories, more precious than the jewels he steals, aren’t meant for other people to know. The people can have the Hero of Haven, but Qilan is his. She’s his friend, the partner he likes to sleep with when they both want to blow off steam. Both of them are good about never spending the night. There’s no fuss, no late-night neediness.
But one night, she stays.
He only intends to rest his eyes a bit, to wait until Qilan had slipped into slumber before jumping out her window. Maybe he’d pretend to doze as she slips off, her steps vanishing down the hallway. But when he next opens his eyes, it’s dawn, and it’s too late for anything but regrets.
She stirs, and he stills as she runs a hand through his hair, traces the planes of his face. This is dangerous, and Chase catches her wrist, her thumb burning on his lips like a confession. He feigns innocence, asks for another round, and she agrees, easily slipping into their familiar routine.
He’s royally fucked, though he can’t admit it yet, not when there’s a chance to escape.
Chase doesn’t fall for people. They fall for him, and he leaves behind a trail of stolen hearts and spurned lovers. It’s dangerous to fall, with no guarantee of safety, no backup plan, no shelter in sight. Because he doesn’t make mistakes like falling in love, not anymore.
If he keeps telling himself it’s not love, then one day, he might be able to believe it.
Does anyone else think about how Chase draws implicit comparisons between him and MC and their respective pasts where, even though they both experienced trauma, betrayal, and intense loneliness, he feels like MC rose above their circumstances to become a hero, whereas he wasn't able to and ended up as a common criminal?
It's not that he's jealous or envious of MC, because he doesn't harbor ill feelings towards MC; in fact, he respects and even admires them on both a personal and professional level, but he doesn't consider himself to be their equal in any way. Of course someone like MC is a hero. They deserve every bit of love and respect they receive, and all he can do is look up at them from below.
There's a mix of guilt and self-loathing but also reverence and the slightest bit of idolization in his feelings. It functions both as a way to put distance from him and MC (he doesn't deserve someone like them), but it's also the same reason he can't stay away from them. Can he confess all his sins to someone so much better than him and still be forgiven? Will it mean anything? Will it mean everything?
