Summary: An aspiring barrister, Hubert has little time for frivolity, let alone /dating./ He only agreed to come out to introduce Asbel to his friend Richard. He definitely didn't intend to drink as much as he did, nor to catch the eye of a certain lifeguard-slash-barman.
Summary: The night after Kurt's death, Malik and Hubert toast old friends, and new.
Notes: Written as a birthday present for my bud VSSAKJ, who got me into this ship. :3
---> read on ao3
You haven't had one proper night's sleep since you came to this miserable country.
Shivering and unhappy, you shuffle out of your ice-locker of a room in your dressing down. You cinch it tighter around you, sinking into the warm glow the cryas boiler set by the bar.
With no power to Forbrannir, you imagine that very soon, the nights will get even colder.
Rubbing some warmth back into your hands over the boiler, you see a distinctly familiar back set to you from across the tavern.
Malik sits across from the window seat, back-dropped by the blizzard. Two drinks are set, but the chair opposite the Captain is empty.
Your curiosity gets the better of you. You leave the warmth of the boiler, crossing your arms, tucking your hands underneath your armpits.
“Expecting someone?”
Malik's eyes, closed in contemplation, open. He smiles from a very far away place.
“Just keeping the ghosts company, tonight,” he says.
You frown. But today has been a long and tiring day for everybody, the Captain in particular, so when he invites you to take the empty chair by the window, you only hesitate a moment.
“Have a drink, Hubert. He wouldn't want it going to waste.”
“I prefer to keep a clear head,” you tell him.
“That's commendable. But one drink isn't going to get you drunk, Hubert. It's hot spiced cider. You look like you could do with a warm up.”
It's the hot part that entices you. Your chilly fingers thank you when you wind them around the warm tankard. You don't drink, though, yet.
“Who's he, anyway?” you ask, although you have already begun to put two and two together.
“Kurt,” Malik says, and the name doesn’t come out easily. “This was once the birthplace of the revolution, if you'll believe me. Drinking, laughing... hushed whispers and plans passed under-table. It was all so exciting back then. I was young and foolish. That excitement faded as our numbers did. By the end of it, there was only Kurt and I.”
The dingy little tavern doesn’t look like much. Two men in thick outwear talk in quiet voices by the bar. Outside the window, the yellow glow of the street lamp illuminates the swirling snow. It never stops snowing in Fendel for long. Beyond the little street lamp: snow, darkness. You can feel the cold crawling in through the glass in chilly tendrils that brush against your back. Malik smiles, without it reaching his eyes. You shiver.
“Feel free to excuse yourself when you wish, Hubert,” Malik says. He rests his head on the back of his knuckle. “I don't imagine I'll be much good company right now. It's a long cold night, all of my friends are dead, and somewhere along the line, I must have got old.”
“You have a perchance for melodrama, Captain Malik,” you say. But you don't move to anywhere. You're a military man: you know death and grief aren't things that can't be run from.
“Allow an old man a little melodrama,” Malik says.
You've just seen the man hike up a mountain without breaking a sweat. “You're hardly old, Captain,” you scoff, and his eyes soften.
“You've a kind heart, Hubert,” he says, and that warms you up, turning you red from your roots. You take a long drink to swallow down your embarrassment, and end up coughing.
“Easy,” says Malik. “You're not used to it.”
No: you're not.
You deflect the conversation away from yourself, to safer territory. “Were you and Kurt friends for a long time?”
Malik turns the drink in his hand, a smile tucked into the corner of his mouth in contemplation. “At the time, I would never said we were friends. Rivals, yes. But death ends that kind of hubris. I knew Kurt since we were boys. He was one of my closest friends, once.”
“Seems foolish to pretend to yourself like that.”
“Oh?” Malik's eyes pierce you. “That's an interesting statement, coming from yourself. When do you intend to tell Asbel you've forgiven him?”
You fumble your drink. “That's--” your voice arcs, sharp and indignant.
“It's alright,” Malik mollifies you, and you settle down. “I do my best to stay out of sibling quarrels. I do have a question, however, if you'll be gracious enough to permit me.”
You're still on edge, shoulders tensed up. “Yes?” you ask, terse.
“How did it feel to return to Lhant, after all those years?”
“Why do you ask?” You return his question to him, passing the ball back into his court with a sharp defensive swing.
Malik, however, leans back on his chair: leaves himself open. “I didn't think about Zavhert for near a decade. Yet now, it feels as though I hardly ever left.”
You gaze at your long fingers, wrapped around your cider. It's still a struggle to get the words out: “Lhant felt the same way, for me.”
Malik leaves an inviting silence open.
You take a drink. It's actually reasonably palatable.
“I didn't want it to feel familiar,” you admit. “Everything was so quaint, so back-woods, compared to Strahta. It was easy to look down on it all from the presidential palace of Yu Liberte. But when I stepped off the boat, it was so damned familiar. It felt as though the only thing that had changed was myself.”
Malik nods, his eyes closed. “I understand how you feel.”
The words make you squirm a little. I understand.
He continues: “I'd convinced myself when I turned tail and ran that there was nothing I could do. Poor, pathetic Fendel would die the death it was slated for. Yet now I'm back, I'm struck by how brightly people live their lives, despite the dark, the cold, the snow. It reminds me why I fought so hard in the first place.”
Arm thrown over the back of his chair, Malik leans back further in his seat, and for a moment you feel as though you're seeing through his eyes. The pub dreary pub is a respite against the cold. The boiler churns cheerfully. Two men at the bar burst into explosive laughter.
But that bright light fades in Malik's eyes.
“I never should have left. Kurt was right: I was a coward.” The sudden viciousness in his voice, in his grimace, makes something twist in your chest.
Instinctive, you reach out, brushing the back of his wrist. “You're no coward, Captain.”
The sudden touch startles him: to be fair, it startles you, too. He pulls back from his stupor. His voice is softer than you've ever heard: “You think so, Hubert?”
You colour, but force your voice to stay strong and even. “Would a coward return to Fendel, after everything you'd endured?” you ask him. “We all have moments of weakness, Captain. They do not define us.”
“Well said,” says Malik, looking rather moved. You drink deeply, rather embarrassed.
“You know, you're more like your brother than you realise, Hubert.”
You damn near cough up your drink everywhere. “What does that mean?”
“Oh, nothing.”
A tree uprooted into new soil is still a tree, you suppose. An oak is still an oak.
“I have to say Hubert, I'm deeply honoured you've come round to trusting me,” Malik says. His eyes are a warm butterscotch; his voice even warmer.
“Even if my misgivings were entirely founded,” you reply.
“Of course,” Malik replies amicably. “It's good the President sent you with us. My story was entirely suspicious, and your brother is entirely too trusting.”
“You're not wrong, there,” you say, but you don't really want to talk about Asbel right now, not while something in your chest feels so light and warm.
Must be the cider.
“It's still a cold night, but I'm gladdened that I was mistaken about being friendless. Would you indulge me a toast, Hubert?”
“To old friends?” you ask.
“And new.” Malik's eyes twinkle. You touch glasses, and drink.
By the time you head for bed, you feel entirely much warmer.
