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#perks of a box baby: 1. free baby to cuddle
where do I get a baby
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worldlxvlys · 2 months
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birthday
dealer! chris x reader
warnings: cursing, it’s kinda short
a/n: HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY @fuckhim-fuckher-fuckyou
“chris! where are you taking me?” i asked, laughing.
his long fingers covered my eyes, leaving me to see nothing but darkness.
“you’ll see, baby” he spoke as his free hand found the small of my back, helping to guide me through my home.
when i first woke up this morning, chris seemed hellbent on getting me out of the house.
he asked me to pick up very specific items from the store, giving me a long list of things to shop for.
i tried not to take it personal, but it was hard not to when it felt like he was trying to get rid of me.
as soon as i got back, he had rushed to help me out of the car, covering my eyes eagerly.
once i realized that he had a surprise planned, i instantly perked up.
he took the bags from my hands, placing them down in the kitchen, before continuing to walk me through the house.
when we got to my bedroom, he removed his hands.
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my eyes widened in surprise as i took everything in.
“chris, what the fuck? how did you do this? when did you get the balloons? how did you hide them? what-?” i asked in shock.
“don’t worry about that, ma. happy birthday” he said as he wrapped his arms around my waist from behind.
“chris, you really didn’t have to do this” i spoke as i felt tears begin to prick at the corners of my eyes.
“i know, but i wanted to. you deserve it” he spoke into my neck.
i turned around to face him, holding his cheek in my hand.
“thank you” i whispered before placing my lips to his.
his hands ran up and down my waist as my lips moved against his slowly. his soft lips slid against mine perfectly, making me smile into the kiss.
after a little while, i pulled away for air. his lips chased after mine immediately, leaving a light peck to them.
i let out a sigh of content, and walked over to the bed, grabbing the box of chocolates.
“want one?” i asked as i opened them.
he nodded his head with a grin, making me laugh at his eagerness.
i unwrapped the gold foil before placing the chocolate in his mouth, then doing the same for myself.
“does this mean i bought all of that food for nothing?” i asked, remembering the groceries that we left in the kitchen.
“nope, we’re gonna bake stuff” he said. “i was gonna make you a bunch of stuff, but i’m terrible at it. so, i figured we could do it together”
“you’re too sweet, chris. i love you”
“i love you too ma. and i love seeing you happy” he said, pressing a kiss to my forehead.
“damn, i’ve turned you into a huge softie” i said, thinking about how different things were when i first started buying from him.
“yeah, just don’t tell anyone. you’re the only person who gets to see it”
“that’s fine by me” i said as i cuddled into his side.
🌸🌸🌸🌸
DWB! CHRIS MASTERLIST.
MAIN MASTERLIST #1.
MAIN MASTERLIST #2.
tag list: @lustfulslxt @flowerxbunnie @sturnssx @mattslolita @its-jennarose @sophssturn @bernardsleftbootycheek @queen161718 @cupidsword @imwetforyourmom @nickmillersn1gf @stramboli4life @mattsneezing @chrisstankyleg @sturniolobltch @ciarasturn1 @bethsturn @bernardenjoyer @mbbsgf @rac00ns-are-c00l4 @ssturniolo @blueeyedbesson @mxqdii @sturniolowhore @heraakayourname @defnotayonna @urmom2bitch @abbie13sworld @starsturniolo @hearts4chriss @theyluv-meee @carolinalikesthings @itzdarling @chrisstopherfilmed @sstvrnioloo @littlebookworm803 @nicksdrpepper @chrisloyalgf @robins-scoop @fandomhopped @chr1sgirl4life @bbglmfao @55sturn @sturniolololover @meg-sturniolo @mattsnymphette @leah-loves-lilies @vanteguccir @ineedchriscock
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snowdice · 4 years
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Big Bang (Sort of) Editing Story [Day 32]
I started writing this fic while editing my Big Bang story, but am going to continue doing it for other things now that Kill Dear is out. I will write and publish 100 words of the story every time I finish doing whatever task I’m doing. If you’d like to block these proceedings, please feel free to block the tag proofread stories. I will reblog this post with the parts of the story I do today. Edited chapters are linked; everything else I’ve done so far is under the cut.
My Master Post Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11
Tomorrow and Friday will be a bit study day as I have a takehome midterm. Therefore, today I am getting my life together. (Or at least attempting to.) So, we’ll be doing this story instead of the study one!
Chapter 12
Logan had needed to spend some time performing royal duties today which left Patton and Virgil alone after breakfast. Patton had started out trying to teach Virgil different board games. He’d seemed intrigued at first, but after a few games of checkers seemed to grow bored. Patton had gotten a blank stare when he’d asked if Virgil had any ideas about what to do for fun, so now he was trying to figure out something else they could do. He cast his eyes around at what Logan had in his bedroom.
“How about I read you a book?” he suggested.
 Virgil seemed very intrigued by that idea. “Sure,” he said.
“Okay!” Patton said cheerfully. “He popped to his feet and glanced through the small shelf of fiction books Logan kept in his room. He decided to choose one of the lighter ones that Logan and he had liked to read when they were younger. “This one is called The Never-ending Garden,” Patton said. “It’s about a group of four children and their adventures in a garden. It’s full of magic and adventure and friendship! Is that alright with you?”
“It sounds good,” Virgil answered.
Patton happily walked back over to sit next to him. “It is!” he said.
 First, he showed Virgil the picture on the cover of a wild looking garden with four kids roaming through it. One of the children was in a little red wagon being pulled by another one wearing a fancy hat. One of the others was walking, looking at a map while the last had a wooden sword. After giving Virgil a couple of moments too look at the picture, Patton cracked it open.
“We start with Lydia’s perspective,” Patton said. “She’s one of my favorites!” He pointed to a picture of a girl in a raincoat at the beginning of the chapter and Virgil leaned slightly closer to see. Then, Patton cleared his voice.
 “It had been raining that day,” Patton began, “but Lydia had been so bored that she still begged her father to go out and play when the storm lightened into a sprinkle. He made her change from the yellow dress she had been wearing into the one she often used to help him garden because he knew she was certain to get herself muddy. Her younger brother Marcus asked if he could come too and though part of her wanted to say no because she wanted to explore on her own without her baby brother slowing her down, her father had taught her to be a good big sister, so she agreed to let him come.”
 Patton watched Virgil out of the corner of his eye as he read about Lydia meeting up with the neighbor boy, Al, and the three children started to explore the garden in Lydia’s backyard. Virgil leaned in slightly to look at the pictures and listen to the story intently as the three children traveled deeper and deeper into the garden, but never made it to the back fence. They’d just made it to the part where they heard rustling behind the blackberry bush which Patton knew was the last main character, Melly, when Patton felt the need to adjust his posture a bit. Virgil moved in kind and ended up leaning further into Patton.
 Without even really thinking about it, Patton brought his arm around to touch the top of his head. Virgil flinched the second Patton made content and Patton drew the hand away immediately. “Sorry,” he said with a wince. Patton was a naturally touching person and he’d been having trouble battling his instincts to cuddle everyone and everything while around Virgil, but he knew most touch was not welcome. The poor thing startled every time Patton went to touch him unannounced and even sometimes when he’d said something before doing it.
“I-it’s okay,” Virgil said.
Patton gave him a tight lipped smiled and turned back to the book.
 He stilled a second later when Virgil leaned back in and their shoulders brushed. He blinked over at him. “Oh,” he said softly. “Do… do you want me to touch your hair?”
Virgil curled up into himself a little bit but then nodded.
“Okay,” Patton said. “I’m going to put my arm around you and do that then, okay?” He drew upon his years and years of convincing easily startled cats to allow him to give them pats as he slowly moved his arm back to where it had been before and gently touched the side of his head. He tensed, but didn’t startle this time, and so Patton gently ran his fingers through the hair a couple of times. Eventually, the tension bled out of him and he sort of slumped against Patton’s shoulder. Patton just barely restrained a coo before going back to reading. He continued to stroke the side of Virgil’s hair as he described the gang meeting up with Melly and them being told she was a fairy that lived in the garden.
 He'd only gotten to the part about them finding the wagon when Virgil started to shift a bit uncomfortably, his neck craned in an awkward angle. Patton kept reading as he brought the hand in his hair down to his shoulder and pushed lightly. There was the slightest bit of resistance as Virgil didn’t know what he was trying to do, but then he allowed Patton to move him. Patton leaned back a bit and picked the book up off his lap before continuing to push him down. Virgil did not help at all, seeming confused about what was going on.
 Patton had to poke him around until he was on his back laying across Patton’s lap. He grinned down at the boy who was looking at him in blatant bewilderment and propped the book up on his chest. He held it there with one of his hands and stretched the other out to resume messing with his hair. Virgil relaxed into the new position after a few minutes of reading, eyes shutting as he enjoyed the attention. His eyes would flicker open every time Patton moved to show him a picture, but other than that, he seemed content to not move.
 Eventually, he stopped responding when Patton moved to show him the pictures.
“Are you asleep?” he asked quietly. When he didn’t get a response, he bookmarked the last picture Virgil had responded to, and then continued reading to himself.
Eventually, there was a knock at the door. It was the one he and Logan had decided on to tell the other one that it was just them and not to panic when the door opened. The door opened to Logan a moment later.
He paused, taking in the sight of the assassin sprawled across Patton’s lap like a sleepy kitten. He shook his head fondly and walked over to them on silent feet. He bent and pressed a hand to the top of Virgil’s hand. Virgil stirred just barely, but didn’t open his eyes, pressing into the touch a bit.
Logan smiled. “He wanted to learn how to make protection charms today. I assume you’d like to join us?” Patton perked up and nodded happily, making Logan chuckle softly. “I will go set it up then. Would you like another book for the time being?”
“Just the one I was reading last night would be nice,” Patton said.
“Of course.” Logan stepped away to grab it and handed it to him. Then, he disappeared into his potion’s lab. Patton smiled down at Virgil’s sleeping face and settled the new book onto his chest to replace the children’s book. He didn’t even stir.
  Chapter 13
Logan was able to quickly set up the station for making protection charms. Patton had always liked making them, though he often used his more as fun accessories than for protection. The one he was going to show Virgil how to make was a very simple low level one used for little more than to keep bugs off of yourself and, in the event of a well made one, alert one to imminent danger by changing temperature. It was a nice thing to hold in the middle of the night if one was frightened by real or imagined threats. It would be warm to the touch when your environment was safe; he thought Virgil might appreciate it.
 He and Patton decided to wait until Virgil woke up naturally which only took about 30 minutes. Then, Logan brought him to his set up supplies. He explained briefly the process for making a protection charm. “I will be the one performing the enchantment for today,” he told Virgil. “I will show you how to make your own later, but I thought seeing how to make them would help with the learning process.”
“Plus, it’s fun!” Patton said.
Logan flashed a smile at him. “And that as well. I’ve prepared a small number of possible pendants for you to choose from. You can choose the shape and color, then we will put on a custom engraving, as well as decorations.”
 “Glitter! Glitter! Glitter! Glitter!”
“Yes, Patton, everyone knows you’re going to choose glitter,” Logan said, amused, “but why don’t we let Virgil decide for his own pendant?”
“Fine,” Patton said, “but mine will be glitter.”
Logan grabbed the box of blank pendants and offered it to Virgil. “Choose whichever one feels right,” he suggested. Virgil moved forward and looked over the box. “You can touch them,” Logan said. “In fact, I would suggest it as it is meant to be held when it’s done and you may as well get a feel for it.”
At his prompting, Virgil did. He reached into the box and shifted a few to the side. Eventually, he started picking a few up. “I like the crescent shape for holding the most he said,” holding a blue one up, but I don’t know.”
“What’s your favorite color?” Patton asked.
“Oh, um,” he mumbled. “I dunno.”
“Well here,” Patton said, reaching for the box. He dug through it and pulled out every single crescent moon shaped pendant and lined them up. “What do you fancy?”
Virgil considered them all for a long moment and then tentatively pointed the purple one out.
“Great!” Patton said. “Then, we’ll use that one.”
Virgil nodded and Patton picked up the pendant to drop it into his hands. His fingers curled over the shape and he seemed satisfied by the choice, so Logan turned to Patton. “Your turn,” he said.
Patton happily grabbed out a heart shaped blue one, but then paused and exchanged it for a purple one. “We match!” he said.
Virgil smiled slightly at his enthusiasm, and Logan dug out a blue crescent moon shape for himself. “Now that you have your base, you get to choose the engraving.” He opened up the instruction book to the correct page and showed it to him.
Virgil looked over the two pages of designs with carful focus. He wavered between the spiral sun and the flames for a moment, but eventually settled on the flames. Patton chose the interlocking hearts design as anticipated; it was his favorite, and Logan chose the spiral sun design for himself.
“Now, I’m going to engrave this design onto yours,” Logan said getting out the thin pen like instrument and dipping it into the slightly glowing bottle of potion he’d set out. “In the meantime, Patton will show you what we have for decorations.”
He was careful to get the symbol as perfect as he could and then started on Patton’s. Patton apparently managed to corrupt the boy because both of them came back with brushes and glitter to add as decoration.
Logan shook his head and handed them their freshly engraved pendants. “Apply the glitter how you like,” Logan said, moving on to his own engraving. Once he was finished, he selected some glow in the dark paint to decorate his own.
 Once he’d finished decorating his own pendant, Logan looked up. “Are you finished?” he asked.
“Yep!” Patton said, shoving his pendant at Logan while Virgil nodded. Virgil had been far less enthusiastic than Patton, having carefully brushed glitter into the flame design only whereas Patton had haphazardly covered his own all over with glitter. Logan took both pendants.
“This,” Logan said, bringing over a different potion, “is used to make sure the decorations never fall off. It basically allows the other substances to become a part of the stone. “It isn’t too dangerous, but I’d suggest you stand back for the moment.”
 Virgil stepped back farther back than was strictly necessary and gave the potion bottle a wary look. Logan moved all three pendants to the prepared surface (else they ran the risk of also getting stuck to the table) and put on gloves, having learned that magically gluing rocks to ones hands was not fun years ago. Then, he carefully drizzled a bit of the potion onto each rock. The rocks fizzled loudly, and Virgil gave off a startled yelp before toppling over flat on his face with his wrist glued to his sides.
“Oh no, honey,” Patton said immediately crouching next to him. “I’m sorry. We should have warned you about the noise.”
Logan wasn’t sure what type of action he’d tried to take when the sound started up, but whatever it was, it had caused him to move his arms fast enough that he’d activated the binding potion and it snapped his wrists to his side, overbalancing him.
 Patton’s hands hovered over the startled boy, but he didn’t touch. After a few moments, it was clear that the magic keeping Virgil’s hands at his side released because his hands slowly crept forward to push himself up, so his face wasn’t planted against the ground. His eyes still looked incredibly startled.
“Are you alright?” Patton asked.
Virgil blinked. “Yeah, I’m fine,” he said.
Logan took his words as permission to move without risking startling him more. Virgil’s eyes bopped back and forth between him and Patton a few times as he crossed to his wall of potions and grabbed one.
 He also selected a clean cloth from a basket on his way over to them. “A light healing potion,” Logan explained as he knelt in front of Virgil. He uncorked it. “May I?”
“I’m fine,” Virgil said with a frown. “I’m not even bleeding. It’s barely anything.”
“Which is why it’s a light healing potion,” Logan said. “You are sure to bruise with the way you hit. This will prevent it and make it stop hurting.”
“Okay,” Virgil agreed after a moment. Logan dribbled a bit out onto the rag. After a moment of thought, he touched the damp part of the cloth with his own finger, just to quash any fears that it would harm him.
 “It will tingle slightly,” Logan warned. Virgil tilted his face to let him dab it onto his nose and the light scrape on his face. His nose scrunched up and he moved to rub the sensation away quickly only to have his arms slam back to his sides.
Patton caught him so the sudden involuntary movement didn’t cause him to fall back, and then giggled when Virgil titled his head to what could only be described as pout back at him.
“Aw, poor thing,” Patton cooed, reaching forward to rub a hand across the top of his nose and then his forehead where the potion had been applied for him.
 “Better?” Patton asked.
“You’re really bad at this being captors thing,” Virgil commenting, willingly leaning back into Patton. Patton just smiled happily.
Logan took the bottle and got to his feet, before returning it, and then glanced at the pendants as Patton helped Virgil to his feet. The pendants had stopped fizzing, so Logan felt okay reaching in and grabbing them all.
He handed both Patton and Virgil their pendants when they walked closer to the table.
“And now for the actual enchantment,” Logan said. “For today, I already prepared the potion up to the last step as it has to sit for a few hours, but I will show you the last step and eventually teach you everything if you are still interested.”
 Virgil nodded, but said. “No more noises?”
Logan smiled. “No more noises,” he confirmed. Then he pushed forward all of the ingredients he was about to put in the pot for Virgil to study one by one before putting them each in it in the correct order. Then he demonstrated how to stir it correctly and told him how many times, though he doubted he’d be able to retain all of the information from this one demonstration. “There,” he said, setting down his spoon. “Now we just all put our pendants into the pot, and they should be ready in 25 minutes.”
 Logan showed Virgil around his potion’s lab while they waited, explaining what certain pieces of equipment did and a bit about his organization system. Virgil followed him around, looking at the things he pointed out curiously. He, however, got very distracted when Logan showed him one of the experiments he’d concocted. It was a thick liquid that was super attracted to itself and would form a small ball that could be disturbed by touching it. He seemed to like the sensation of squishing it down onto a table… over and over and over again.
“We should get him a ball of yarn,” Patton said out of the corner of his mouth. He may have been enjoying watching Virgil play with the substance more than Virgil was enjoying playing with it himself. And that was saying something.
21984
Eventually, however, the pendants were finished, and he dragged Virgil away from his new toy to show him the finished product.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“Is it supposed to be warm?” Virgil inquired.
“Yes,” Logan replied. “It’s temperature changes based on if the magic on it senses a threat or not. Warmer temperatures mean you are safe.
“Oh,” Virgil said softly, hand squeezing around it. “I like it.”
Logan found himself smiling. “I’m glad. It’s yours.”
“Thank you,” he said.
“If you would like, I’m sure Patton has some suggestions if you’d desire a way to keep it attached to your person. He in particular likes to make them into necklaces or clip them to his clothing.”
Virgil looked over at Patton and nodded shyly. Patton immediately perked up. “I’ll go get some supplies!” he said.
  Chapter 14
“So then,” Patton was saying. “We ran to the stables.”
“We went to gazebo first,” Logan cut in.
“Right, we tried to go to the gazebo first,” Patton corrected, “but Mr. Deknis was over there tending to the tomatoes, and we knew he’d tell Mama the second he saw us. So, then we turned around and went to the stables.”
Virgil tilted his head, listening to the story Patton was telling. Patton was not the best storyteller. He tended to get lost in the middle and embellish, though Logan always corrected him. It was still very entertaining to watch though because he got incredibly animated. He’d even toppled himself over in excitement a couple of times.
 Virgil squeezed the small pillow he had in his lap. He… wasn’t 100% sure what was going on. Logan and Patton had settled him on the blanket covered ground near Logan’s bed and proceeded to feed him snacks and talk about a lot of different things. It had started with them talking about what they’d done that day, and when Patton had made reference to something Virgil hadn’t understood, the two of them ended up talking about things from their childhood.
Virgil found himself entranced by their stories about playing in and running around the castle. It was all so different from what Virgil had experienced.
 “…but, right as we were about to get to the ladder to climb up into the hay loft, Logan tripped!” Patton said, arms whipping around him. “He fell into a container of grain for the horses and it spilled all over the place. He tried to get up but grabbed the edge of the water trough and apparently it wasn’t very secure because it fell over and soaked him. So, then he was wet and covered in grain. He looked hilarious.”
“I did not!” Logan protested, but it did not sound like all of the other times he’d corrected Patton’s stories that night.
 Patton looked over at him. “You did! You woke up the cute stable hand and he laughed himself silly at you, and by the time we got you even partially cleaned up, your dad had already found us. That’s how we got caught.”
“I have no recollection of these events,” Logan clearly lied, his cheeks a bit flushed.
“Liar,” Patton claimed. “You complained about picking grain out of your sheets for weeks.”
“No,” Logan growled.
“Yes! It’s okay. It was a good laugh.”
Logan’s eyes narrowed on him, and he looked pissed, but a second later, his expression lightened up. “You know what else was a ‘good laugh’?” he asked.
 There was a second of silence before…
“Don’t you dare Logan.”
Logan looked him directly in the eye. “Patton was thirteen,” Logan started, but was interrupted the next moment when Patton lobbed a pillow at his head. Logan grabbed the pillow and leaned forward to smack Patton back with it. “He was thirteen and had just ‘discovered boys’ as his mother and my father called it when they attempted to explain his behavior to me. The focus of said ‘discovering’ at the time was the son of an ambassador from Lamir” who was staying for the summer, a seventeen-year-old boy by the name Bernardo.”
 Virgil flinched back as Patton suddenly threw himself across the semicircle they’d made with their bodies to tackle Logan to the ground. He watched as they ineffectually wrestled on the ground for a few seconds before Logan, voice strained continued to speak, while battling Patton’s hands away from his mouth.
“Patton’s only knowledge about flirting… ow… at that point was laughing at everything someone said and touching their arms and shoulders.” Logan managed to flip himself onto his stomach which was a horrible move as far as Virgil was concerned. It put him at a disadvantage to get out of the pin. However, Patton just kept reaching for his mouth and didn’t bare down on his neck to try to cut off his oxygen like Virgil expected. So, perhaps it was a rational move. “Our parents were speaking leaving Patton, Bernardo, and I in the garden,” Logan mumbled into the ground. “Bernardo said something ‘funny’ and Patton went to slap his shoulder while laughing, but shoved too hard… Patton did you just lick my face?!”
 “And I’ll do it again if you don’t shut up!” Patton threatened. That was a… weird fighting strategy.
Logan paused to consider his options. “He shoved Bernardo into the fountain and when Bernardo asked him why he did that, he ran away and wouldn’t talk to him the rest of the summer!” Logan rushed out.
Patton reached over and grabbed the nearest pillow, proceeding to whack him viciously in the back of the head. Logan was lucky the nearest object was a pillow and not something any sturdier. “It’s not funny!” Patton yelled, smacking him even more, which was when Virgil realized Logan was laughing despite the pinning and pillow pummeling. “It’s not!” Patton said. “I really liked him!!”
 “He was seventeen!” Logan said. “It was never going to happen!”
Patton groaned and rolled off of Logan to lay on his back and stare at the ceiling. “But he had so many muscles,” Patton said. “He probably could have thrown me 10 yards.”
“And that is… a benefit?” Logan asked, rolling over onto his side to face him.
“You don’t. Get me.” Patton tilted his head to look at Virgil. “Anyway,” he said. “That is the story of how I died at 13.”
Virgil stared at him, and Patton’s forehead crinkled looking at him.
“Is something wrong, honey?” he asked.
 “What was that?” Virgil asked.
“What was what?”
Virgil just blinked at him. Patton seemed to think for a moment.
“Oh, did you think we were fighting?” Patton asked. “Like, really fighting?”
“You weren’t fighting?” Virgil asked.
“No, sweetie,” Patton said. “We were just playing.” He popped up into a sitting position. “Well, play fighting, but emphasis on play!”
Virgil looked over at Logan for confirmation. “No one is harmed nor was there any intention to harm each other,” he assured.
Patton grabbed the pillow he’d been smacking Logan with. “Like this!” he said. “Bap.” Unlike how he’d smacked Logan ruthlessly, he basically just touched Virgil’s shoulder with it.
 Virgil squinted at him.
“Bap!” Patton said again, smacking him again, this time with a little bit more force and on the cheek. Virgil’s nose scrunched up. “Pillow fight!”
“Pillow fight?”
“You try,” he said, pointing to the pillow in Virgil’s lap.
Virgil glanced down at the bands around his wrist. “Um…” he said. “I don’t think I can?”
“Oh, right,” Patton said with a frown. He bit his lip and glanced over at Logan. “Maybe…”
“Ill-advisable,” Logan said.
“But…” Patton said. “Pillow fight.”
“We would have to be very cautious and make sure there were no weapons in the area.”
“No weapons but pillows!”
 “Fine,” Logan relented to whatever was going on. “Let’s clear the area.” Virgil watched them with mounting confusion as they removed everything within a few meters radius of him except for pillows and blankets.
“There!” Patton said after a minute. “All done!”
“What are you doing?” Virgil said.
“We’re going to have a pillow fight,” Patton said.
“But I…”
“We’ll temporarily allow your restraints to be in the third setting like when you’re in the closet.”
Were they serious? Were they stupid? Virgil could have killed them dozens of times with the second setting and now they were giving him even more range of motion?
 “You have to promise not to try to hurt anyone though,” Patton said. Virgil stared at him dumbly, as Patton held out his pinky finger. “Pinky promise.”
“Pinky promise?”
Patton nodded solemnly. “We lock pinky fingers and make a promise. It’s the most binding promise in the universe.”
Virgil looked at his finger, confused. He’d never heard of that type of deal. “What kind of magic is it?”
“No magic,” Patton said. “Just friendship.” Virgil tilted his head but brought his hand up so Patton could twine their fingers together. “Now, promise you won’t hurt anyone.”
“I promise I won’t hurt anyone,” he said.
“It’s a deal!” said Patton, squeezing Virgil’s finger with his own briefly before drawing away. “I trust you.” Virgil felt a rush of something that was no type of magic he’d ever come into contact before but was definitely far more powerful.
 Logan came over to them and waved his hand over the restraints on Virgil. They buzzed slightly and Virgil looked between them. “So, I just hit you with pillows?”
“Try not to hit too hard near the face, and Lo and I should probably take off our glasses before we start, but yeah,” Patton said, taking his glasses off as he said it. It was yet another foolish move on his part. “It’s fun, and it doesn’t hurt.”
“Okay…” Virgil said.
“I will demonstrate,” Logan said as he took a pillow and smacked Patton in the stomach.
“Hey! No fair!” Patton giggled. “We haven’t started yet!” This did not deter Logan however, as he continued to smack Patton with a pillow.
“On the contrary,” he said. “It has started, and we’re getting you first.”
 “No,” Patton whined, but the way he crumpled to the ground under the onslaught seemed far too staged to make Virgil worry. He didn’t even try to curl up into a ball or to protect his head, just taking the hits and giggling.
Logan looked up at Virgil and motioned with his head. Virgil inched over and looked down at Patton. Logan slowed for a few moments. “Go on,” he urged.
Virgil bit his lip and reached forward to smack Patton lightly with his pillow which seemed to do nothing to him but renew his peels of giggles. From there, it was easy to continue. Logan picked up the pace of his strikes and he and Virgil proceeded to ‘fight’ Patton until he couldn’t breath through his laughter and pushed the pillows away, curling up on his side to recover.
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“No what?” Virgil asked when Patton sat up.
“Now I get vengeance!” Patton said, popping to his feet and smacking Logan in the face. “Help me Virgil!” So, Virgil turned on Logan and he and Patton gave the prince the same treatment. Then, because it was only fair, it was Virgil’s turn, though they were a lot more careful with him then they’d been with each other, and really Patton spent more of the time checking in on Virgil then actually hitting him with the pillow. It was nice. Fun. And when Virgil pushed them away, they pulled back. Then, it was Patton’s turn again and they went around teaming up on each other and sometimes just smacking at each other at random.
  Eventually, they slowed, and all ended up laying near each other on the floor.
“Well, that made me hungry,” Patton said, sitting up and stretching. “I asked Mama to make us a bunch of mini sandwiches with different flavors. I’ll go get them.”
He hopped to his feet to walk over to where they’d stored the food earlier in those little glowing magical balls Logan had for food preservation.
Logan and Virgil sat up too, and Virgil offered him his wrists.
“Right,” Logan said with a blink. He made a motion and Virgil could feel the magic weighing down his hands once again. He’d almost forgotten, Virgil thought with an internal sigh. They’d given an assassin free range of motion, had a pillow fight with him, and almost forgotten to restrain him again. What was Virgil going to do with these idiots?
  Chapter 15
Patton strolled up to the doors to the royal wing, his arms crossed casually around his middle.
Kalani raised an eyebrow as he approached and gave her the most innocent expression he could. “Whatcha got there, Pat?” she asked.
“Hmm?” he asked, as his sweater squirmed. “What do you mean?”
She considered him for a moment. “Well, I see nothing suspicious here,” she said. “Do you Owen?”
“Nothing,” he replied without hesitation.
Patton grinned at them both.
Kalani leaned in like she was going to tell him a secret. “Who is it?”
Patton made a show of glanced around like he was hiding it from anyone passing by. Then he shifted around to pull up just the bottom of his sweater.
 A small black paw reached out from the depths of his sweater and swatted at the air.
“Ah, I see,” Kalani said, reaching out to touch the little paw. “Hello, Mittens.”
Patton giggled as Owen poked the cat’s stomach gently through the sweater, making her wiggle a bit and try to bite him.
“Well,” Patton said. “I better be off with my totally normal sweater.”
Kalani nodded and stepped to the side, and Patton was free to head down the hallway to Logan’s room. Patton knocked on the door with their new extra secret knock and Logan all but ripped open the door. “I’m late. I have to go,” he said, darting past Patton.
 Patton smiled, happy that his plan to be running a little late to come watch Virgil had worked so well, even though he felt a little bit guilty about it. He hoped Logan wasn’t late to his meeting, but he also knew that if Logan had noticed Mittens, he wouldn’t have let her into the room.
Virgil was already out of the closet, sitting on one of the chairs. Patton came in and smiled at him. Unlike Logan, Virgil’s attention was immediately drawn to the oddly shaped lump in Patton’s sweater.
“You’re not very good at hiding things,” Virgil said.
 “It worked on Logan,” Patton defended himself.
“Logan was about to rocket into space if you didn’t show up in 5 seconds,” Virgil pointed out. Patton just shrugged, and Virgil tilted his head. “What do you have?”
Patton grinned wide and carefully pulled Mittens out of his sweater. She did not resist this maneuver at all, simply purring. He held her up for Virgil to see. “Ta da!”
“A cat?” Virgil said.
“This is Mittens,” Patton said. He then turned to Mittens. “Mittens, this is Virgil. I thought I’d introduce the two of you!”
Virgil blinked at the cat. Mittens blinked back. Patton thought maybe he should have let them sniff each other from under a door before doing this.
 He didn’t need to worry though, as Mittens started purring after a moment. “You can pet her,” Patton offered. Virgil looked up at him. “Just…” he said.
“She likes chin scratchies!” Patton prompted.
Virgil reached out a hand to scratch under her chin and that was the end of it. Mittens stretched out her chin happy to get the attention and Virgil’s eyes widened at how soft her fur was. It was a work of minutes before Virgil was sitting down on the floor and Mittens was happily kneading his thighs and spinning around in circles to make sure he pet every inch of her.
“I did not understand why people like cats,” Virgil commented. “All I’ve seen of cats is people coming back with bloody scratches from trying to pet them, so I never even tried.”
“Well,” Patton said. “Cats are just like people. If you’re nice to them, they’re more likely to be nice to you.”
 Virgil’s hand paused briefly on the cat’s head, but then continued with the petting a moment later. Patton wondered what he was thinking about, but didn’t press.
“She seems to like you,” Patton said.
“Don’t know why.”
“Hey, don’t be mean.” Patton scolded.
Virgil hands jerked away from the cat he’d been petting and then were forced abruptly to his side in reaction. Mittens meowed, seemed very unhappy with the jostling as well as the sudden lack of petting.
“Sorry,” Virgil said, eyes wide. “What did I do wrong. I didn’t mean to be mean to her.”
It took Patton a moment to sus out what he was talking about and felt a pang in his chest when he did. “Oh, no honey. You didn’t do anything wrong. I meant don’t be mean to yourself.”
 Virgil gave him a confused look. Mittens bumped her head against his chin and with a blink, he cautiously went back to petting her.
“Of course, she likes you sweetie, you’re a good boy.”
“I came here to kill the king. I’ve killed before.”
Patton smiled sadly. “I don’t think you ever wanted to,” he said. Virgil seemed to grow very interested in mitten’s ears. Patton scooted over so he was sitting beside him and carefully brought a hand up to touch the top of his head. Virgil sort of curled into him, pressing his face against Patton’s shoulder, but continuing to pet the cat.
 “It’s fine. You’re going to be okay now,” Patton said softly.
Virgil shook his head against Patton’s shoulder.
“Yes,” Patton insisted. “You’ll be okay. You won’t have to go back.”
Virgil didn’t respond for a long moment. “You can’t keep me in Logan’s closet forever,” he said softly. “When his dad comes back, you’re going to have to turn me in.”
Well, that was true, but… “It’ll be okay. No one will hurt you.”
“The kings would be assassin?” Virgil asked skeptically.
“Thomas is nice. He’ll understand.”
“He’s nice to you. He’s nice to Logan. Maybe he’s even nice to the people he rules over, but what am I? An enemy assassin who would have slit his throat if I hadn’t gotten the wrong room.”
 It…it did sound bad when he put it like that, but, but… “Thomas will understand,” he promised, hugging him tight. “He will, and we’ll keep you safe and I’ll introduce you to every single cat in the castle. In fact, we’ll get you a cat to keep as a pet if you want and he or she can snuggle you as much as you want. I’ll show you all around the gardens and introduce you to Mama and help you figure out what your favorite type of cookie is. You’ll never have to hurt anyone again and no one will ever hurt you again.”
 Virgil drew away a bit and shot him a half smile. He clearly didn’t believe him, and it made Patton’s stomach twist a bit. Patton knew. He knew Thomas would be nice. There was no way he’d hurt Virgil. Virgil was just a kid and with Logan and Patton on his side, there was no way anything bad would happen to him. He could see it from Virgil’s perspective though.
“I like her feet,” Virgil said, touching Mittens’ little black paw that contrasted her otherwise white coat. Mittens purred and began kneading his legs again with those paws. “I’m guessing that’s why she’s named Mittens?”
“Yeah,” said Patton softly. “‘Cause she looks like she’s wearing mittens.” Virgil leaned forward to kiss her little head and that little action made Patton’s heart ache for him. He deserved so many kitten kisses. So many.
Patton was determined to make sure he got them.
  Chapter 16
“Well done,” Logan complimented when Virgil looked up at him for approval. It was the first time Virgil was trying to make the protection charms without Logan’s instructions. Logan was of course still in the room in case he had questions and the boy had a written set of instructions next to him, but for the most part Virgil was doing it on his own.
“Now,” Virgil said squinting down at the paper next to him, “we wait for 35 minutes.”
“Fifty actually,” Logan corrected offhand, focused on his own potion.
“Oh, yeah, right,” Virgil said. He grabbed the timer and set it for the appropriate time.
 Then, he stepped away from Logan’s nontoxic potion station. Logan saw him edge a bit closer to peak at what Logan was working on, though he was careful to maintain a distance. Logan wasn’t sure if this was because he’d been warned of the possible harmful substances Logan sometimes used at his experiment table or because he was worried Logan might not want him to approach.
Logan looked up at him. “You can come closer. Nothing here is very dangerous.”
Virgil nodded and walked over to peer at the boiling pot. “What are you making?” he asked.
“I am once again attempting to invent a potion that will reliably remove cat hair from surfaces,” Logan said, glancing over at Patton.
 Patton looked up from the bracelet he was making and stuck his tongue out at Logan.
“I can never seem to find an adequate solution,” Logan said.
“The solution is to accept all parts of kitty love!” Patton insisted.
“Or maybe the solution is to exile you from my room for the rest of time,” Logan muttered. Patton chose to ignore him and go back to working on the bracelet.
“Do you want any help?” Virgil offered Logan.
Logan smiled at him. “I’m actually almost finished with this step and there isn’t much left to do but thank you.”
Virgil nodded. “Oh, okay,” he said. He shifted back and forth a few times.
 “You’re well on your way to mastering this potion,” Logan said. “I was thinking that next I could teach you how to make a tracking charm. I marked a passage about it in the book on that shelf.” He gestured to one near the station Virgil had been working at. “Why don’t you go ahead and read that while you wait?”
“The…” Virgil said. “The green book?”
“Yes,” Logan said. “I left a bookmark in the correct page.”
“Um… yeah, sure. I’ll go… read that.”
Logan nodded and turned back to put the finishing touches on his own potion as Virgil walked away.
 Logan finished up his potion up after a few minutes and covered it to let it simmer. He looked over to see that Patton had flopped onto his back, still working on the bracelet and Virgil had sat near to him with the book on his lap open. Logan walked over to them.
“What do you think?” Logan asked.
Virgil glanced up at him. “Erm,” he said. “Looks good.”
“Which option do you like better?”
“…The second one.”
“Really?” Logan asked, surprised.
“Uh… yes?”
“I’m surprised,” Logan commented. “I figured you would shy away from the ones that required a blood sacrifice.”
Virgil’s eyes widened. “Oh,” he said. “I… didn’t notice that. I would like to not do that one, please.”
“You didn’t notice?” Logan asked. “Half of the entire first page is dedicated to a discussion of it.”
There was a beat of awkward silence.
“Virgil,” Logan said. “Can you read the first paragraph on that page?”
 He grimaced.
“You can’t read?!”
“Logan, tone,” Patton snapped when Virgil flinched.
Logan took a breath. “I am not upset that you cannot read, but what have you been doing for the past week when I have given you written instructions for the protection charm potion?”
“Not… read it.”
“How have you been making the potion?” Logan asked.
“I just remember the steps, and if I’m not sure I ask. You’re usually distracted enough that you barely notice.”
“If I had known this, we would have done a completely auditory explanation.”
“Sorry.”
Logan sighed. “You didn’t need to pretend, Virgil.”
 Virgil blinked up at him. “Sorry.”
Logan just shook his head. “There is nothing for you to be sorry for. In fact, you are the one who is owed apologies from many people in your life for a multitude of reasons.” He knelt down to take the book from him. “Here,” he said. “For now, I will read this passage to you while we wait for the potions to finish brewing. Later we can talk about changing my lesson plans in reference to the potions as well as adding reading lessons into your schedule.”
“You… want to teach me how to read?” Virgil asked.
 “If you are willing,” Logan replied. “It’s a useful skill to have and opens up many doors.”
“I don’t know if I’ll be any good at it,” Virgil said with a frown.
“If you can memorize an entire potion recipe from start to finish with inadequate vocal instructions, I’m sure you can learn the alphabet perfectly well.”
“Okay,” he replied sounding a bit doubtful.
“And once we get you to an appropriate level, I’ll let you read a book about stars I enjoyed in my youth.” He seemed pleased with that prospect, and Logan smiled at him. “For now though, let’s read this together.”
 “Okay,” Virgil said. Logan opened the book in his lap and started to read. He noticed that Virgil was leaning over to look at the page despite the fact that he couldn’t read it, and so he began to point to the words as he read. His reactions to the words on the page were honestly quite funny when Logan caught them. His nose would scrunch up in confusion every time he thought an instruction nonsensical, and he’d squint his eyes at the words as though willing the sounds and letters to connect in his head. Logan wouldn’t be surprised with his memory if he had parts of it memorized by the end.
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After a few minutes of reading, a light weight descended on Logan’s shoulder. Virgil had settled his chin on Logan’s shoulder to peer at the words. Logan did his best not to draw attention to this fact and shot a glare at Patton when he clearly noticed, sitting up to smile widely at them. Luckily the boy was sensible enough not to squeal as he oh so clearly wanted to. Logan pointed out a picture while explaining what the caption said and then giving a personal antecedent. Virgil touched the page curiously and asked a question about the story before laying his head back down on Logan’s shoulder. They continued in this way until the potion was finished.
  Chapter 17
Virgil’s suspicion was growing. Logan and Patton seemed to have something planned. Luckily, whatever it was didn’t seem to be malicious, at least, Virgil hoped it wasn’t. He truly didn’t think that Patton had it in him to be so clearly excited about anything cruel. He also didn’t think Logan had it in him to be cruel, he was just was better at masking his excitement.
“What?” Logan asked innocently when Virgil gave him a pointed look the second Patton left to do ‘something’. Virgil would almost believe he truly wasn’t planning anything if it wasn’t for the way his lips twitched just a bit at the corners. Virgil glared harder.
 Logan dared to laugh lightly at the expression on his face. “Come here,” he requested. “Patton wanted me to make you pick out a book for him to read to you tonight since, I quote ‘You’ve gotten to read him all sorts of stories the last few days.’ I attempted to explain that it was not purely for fun, but he insisted.”
Virgil grumbled, but wandered over to look over at the books laid out on Logan’s bed, settling his chin on Logan’s shoulder. “What do they say?” he asked.
Logan pointed to each in turn. “Five Dragons and a Flame. The End of May. A Stone in the Meadow. Or you can continue to read The Never-ending Garden.”
 “I want to finish The Never-Ending Garden,” Virgil decided.
“Good choice.”
“Now will you tell me what you’re doing?” Virgil asked.
Logan just chuckled. Honestly, it was like he didn’t know that he had an assassin right next to his carotid artery. “Why do you think something is happened?”
“Patton’s a shit liar.”
“Be careful,” Logan said. “I might just have to tell him you said that.”
“Then I’ll tell him what you said when you accidently dropped the lavender into that potion,” Virgil threatened back.
“Hmm,” Logan said. “Truce?”
“On that,” Virgil agreed, “but you still need to tell me what’s going on.”
 “It is a surprise. A nice surprise,” Logan informed him. He looked at Virgil’s face. “Don’t pout at me.”
Virgil had not been aware that what he was doing was pouting, but he did whatever it was harder.
“Patton would murder me,” Logan claimed, “but I suggest you try that on him the next time you have a chance. You will certainly get whatever you want.”
Virgil sighed and gave up, figuring he’d learn whatever the surprise was soon enough. He chose to flop down on top of the pile of pillows on the floor that had been laid out already. It was his fourth ever slumber party and the first had only been a week ago. He did not know much about slumber parties, but that felt like a lot.
 Goodness, it had already been two weeks. He looked up at the ceiling. He felt safe here. He felt like he didn’t need to watch Logan’s every move as he organized things in his room, but it wasn’t going to last, was it? The king was set to be back in a week. Virgil needed to actually attempt to escape soon. He hated that fact. He didn’t want to leave, and he certainly didn’t want to go back. Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d figure something else out, but no mater what, he did have to escape, and soon. He looked over at Logan who was slotting the books Virgil hadn’t picked back into place on the bookshelf. Not tonight.
 There was a knock on the door in a familiar pattern, and Logan walked over to open it for Patton. Virgil sat up to shoot a confused look at the giant thing that Patton rolled in.
“Ta da!” Patton said excitedly.
Virgil blinked at him.
“It’s food,” Logan explained.
Virgil perked up immediately. That must be a lot of food if he needed that to carry it.
“I know you haven’t gotten a chance to try a lot of different foods, so I asked Mama if I could use the kitchen earlier today and made a bunch of different type of food samples for you to try.”
 That sounded like literally the best idea in the universe. These people were very good at surprises and Virgil would not question them again ever for the rest of his life (or, well, the next couple of days he was around them before he tried to escape and either managed it or died a bloody and painful death).
Patton seemed to feed off of Virgil’s excitement, practically vibrating himself as he gestured to different parts of the cart. “We have a bunch of types of cheese and crackers, mini sandwiches, different smoked meats, six types of pasta, and every leftover I could find on this shelf. On this shelf, we have things with hot sauce, things with spicy dry rubs, curries, and things with a lot of peppers. I’ve ordered them by spiciness level so we can what you can handle, and we’ll only go as far as you want. Then this shelf is a bunch of types of cookies, mini cakes, pies, and ice cream!”
 “We are not starting with the sweets,” Logan said firmly.
“But Lo!” Patton whined.
“We do not want to make him sick, do we?” Logan asked.
Patton pouted. Virgil honestly had no preference. All food was good food in his experience.
“Fine,” Patton said. “We’ll start with the cheese.”
They had him sit back in the center of the blanket pile and handed him little portions of things. Some of the cheese tasted weird at first and Patton would giggle at the faces of surprise he made, but Virgil managed to if not like, then tolerate almost all of them.
 Then came the different sandwiches, some hot and some cold and all of the pasta and leftovers. Virgil eyed the plate of fettuccine alfredo long after they had moved on.
“You can have some more at the end if you still have room,” Logan promised with a fond smile. Virgil frowned at him. “You want to try all of the food, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then you can’t eat an entire plate of fettucine alfredo.”
“Maybe you can’t,” Virgil said darkly.
Logan just rolled his eyes and passed him another plate.
Eventually they moved on to the next shelf full of what was deemed ‘spicy food.’
“Part of this is figuring out what level of spiciness you can handle,” Patton said. “So, tell us when it gets to be a bit too much and we’ll move on two the deserts. Also, milk helps wash the spicy stuff that so drink some if you need to!”
Virgil nodded and accepted the first dish on that rack.
Virgil, it turned out, liked what they called “spicy” food even though some of it made his nose run a little bit. It was kind of fun to eat them, honestly. Some of them hurt a tiny bit, but they also tasted really good. It was strange.
“I am impressed and horrified,” Logan said when he finished that shelf. “Do you… have nerve endings in your mouth?”
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evqnbuckley · 3 years
Text
Chapter 1: Hopeless
Okay so i wrote my thoughts on what I wanted the finale to be and this got out of hand...this is like almost if not 6k and i’m not even finished. If this is popular enough I’ll continue to post on here but I’m gonna continue to update on ao3! @princesscas
Sam awakens from his nightmare, disoriented. The visions of seeing himself grow old, having a family and dying feel all too real. The beginning of his nightmare is fading and somewhat fuzzy but he remembers Dean making an appearance. He remembers seeing himself fight alongside his brother, killing some vampires, a normal hunt. Then his memory clears and the image of his brother impaled against a wooden pole catches his breath.
He wipes a hand across his face, trying to erase the images of Dean saying goodbye, of Dean's hand dropping as he took his last breath, and the image of lighting his own brother's pyre.
Sam pulls the covers off and walks toward the kitchen for a glass of water. The bunker is quiet, peaceful even. He still hasn't gotten used to calling it home, not really. The thing about a home is, four walls don't constitute it. Family is similar. It's not based on who you're related to but who loves you and has your back. Family, a home, whatever they are things you build around you. He had learned that long ago.
The wooden floors creak as he walks through the library. The silence is deafening yet comforting. It's a reminder that, for once, the world isn't ending. The linoleum sends shivers down his spine as he enters the kitchen. Sam replays the nightmare in his head while he downs a glass of water from the sink. The images slowly become distorted and misplaced in his memory. He eventually cannot picture it in his mind.
Sighing, Sam places the glass in the sink and walks back to his room. His feet make a pit-pat noise, approaching the hallway. Dean's door is cracked open slightly with faint light seeping through. Sam turns toward the door and peers in. His face softens, taking in the scene. Dean is cuddling a pillow adorned with a worn, rough, blue pillow case. The light emits from a lone lamp on his desk. Some type of paper for a mechanic position sits atop a few books from the library. Sam eyes the paperwork, puzzled. Dean never told me he got a job. Underneath, one of the books has a bookmark in three different places. There are a few crumpled up papers on and around the floor. Sam picks one up and unravels it.
Cas I know you're in the empty and you probably can't hear me….why did you do it? Why didn't you tell me about the deal before? I know I messed up and Billie was about to kill us both but….we could have died together found another way.
Why didn't you tell me?
Sam picks up another one. This time it's the one closest to the trash can. The markings are a bit sharper than the paper before. Almost more angry. It appears some words are smudged but still legible.
I try to move on and put on a brave face for Sammy. He needs to know now that Chuck is gone we can move on. We have to. I have tried to find a way to bring you back Cas. None of the books are fucking useful. I can't read Enochian. I don't even know if Enochian text is the key to saving you. I've tried contacting Rowena but i think she's busy. I'm at my wits end. I haven't gotten much sleep to be honest. As I'm writing this I have looked through 28 books all based on portals to other dimensions, hell, sacrificial rituals and reverse rituals. Even Astral projecting. I don't know what to do….
Sam swallows past the dry lump caught in his throat. He glances at Dean, making sure he's still asleep. Dean briefly shifts, pulling the pillow closer. Sam relaxes and picks up one more crumpled up paper. This one appears fresh, as if Dean wrote it tonight.
I tried praying to the angels. They didn't listen. No one is listening. Jack isn't even listening. He took himself out of the story, I know but this is you I'm talking about. How can he just sit by while you're suffering. I guess I'm on my own.
Why did you say that now?
The last sentence confuses Sam. He burrows his eyebrows as he studies the three entries. Dean is searching for a way to save Cas. To bring him back. And he didn't tell me? Sam quietly crunches the papers back up and places them back where he found them. Dean doesn't move. As Sam switches the lamp off, he feels the heaviness of the dark engulf him. I have to talk to Dean tomorrow.
Dean rolls over as the aroma of burnt bacon fills his room. He rubs the sleep from his eyes as he sits up. Realizing that Sam is about to burn the bunker down, he slips on his robe and jogs to the kitchen.
"What the hell are you doing in my kitchen?"
"Well good morning to you too," Sam replies a bit offended. He's flipping bacon as Dean yanks the tongs out of his grip. "What- I am making breakfast. Can I not make breakfast?"
"I don't know what you think you're making but it definitely, definitely ain't breakfast," Dean smarts. He trashes the burnt bacon and starts a new batch. "Sit. No, why don't you make some coffee."
"Already did. Here ya go," Sam slides Dean's mug across the island, "your highness," Sam says under his breath.
"What was that?"
"Nothing. I actually wanted to talk to you about something."
"Yeah, me too," Sam perks up. "I think I found something that screams our kinda thing. We should head there after we eat breakfast. It's not too long of a drive." Dean finishes as he places the cooked bacon on some paper towels and grins from ear to ear. Sam just watches as his brother starts on some scrambled eggs. This might be more challenging than I had hoped.  
"So when you said our sorta thing you meant pie?"
"I meant pie," Dean confirms with a satisfied smirk. "Now, I'm gonna go eat me some of that pie."
"Didn't we-Dean we just had breakfa- nevermind," Sam gives in and follows Dean through the crowd.
Several families are participating in the pie fest. Some are gearing up to find out who can eat the most pie, who makes the best pumpkin pie, and some are just making whip cream pies and pieing each other. Sam observes those around him with a small smile. A life he desperately wants someday but knows he can't have. Or can I?
Dean approaches Sam with a big box and almost runs into some bystander. "Hey, watch it."
"What is that?" Sam raises an eyebrow.
"I couldn't pick just one! Come on, Sammy we're at a pie fest. What do you take me for?"
"An idiot."
Dean ponders his answer and let's it slide. He picks up one of the pies and offers it to his brother. Sam declines. "Dude, you gotta at least try it."
"No, really I'm good."
"Alright, what is it? What's got you so down today?"
"Nothing. I'm fine," Sam replies.
"No, see I know my baby brother. So I know that is your sad Sam face. Fess up, what's wrong?"
"I'm not-" Sam begins, but Dean gives him a look.
"I don't know. I'm just thinking about Cas, about Jack."
Dean's expression falls. He looks down and places the pie back in its spot. "Yea me too. I think about them too. Every day. But we have to move on, Sam. Live our lives. Or else that sacrifice, it will all be for nothing," Dean looks at Sam. "So help me finish this pie."
Dean reaches down for the same pie again but his face is met with a cold surface. Sam smothers the pumpkin pie in Dean's face, laughing. "You know what, I do feel better!"
Sam shakes his hand to free the whip cream, watching Dean rake the remainder of the pie off his chin with his fork. Suddenly, Sam's temples begin pulsing painfully and he has an immense sense of deja vu. His smile falters and he feels out of place. Almost, as if he's reliving this moment. It's similar to the feeling he had this morning.
"Hey, Sam. You okay?"
"Uh, yeah." He's not honestly sure if everything is okay.
Sam texts Eileen and tells her he wants to make up for the date they missed months ago. She agrees it has been too long and tonight would work for her. Sam doesn't want to make promises, as the day is still young, but they plan for their date tonight at 7. Dean teases Sam about it even though the two are already a couple. Saying things like, "don't do anything I wouldn't do" or "make sure you use protection." Sam just sighs and shakes his head.
It's 6:35 pm and nothing has come across the wire. Social media is quiet, so Sam texts Eileen that the date is a go. She replies five minutes later, ready to go and excited to see Sam. Dean offers to let Sam take the Impala out to pick Eileen up. For once in a long time, Sam is excited. When he reaches the garage door, Sam glances back at his brother and sees him nursing a brand new whiskey bottle. Sam frowns at the sight. Dean deserves to feel excited, to be happy. Sam will go on this date with Eileen, tell her about Cas, and they will come back to help Dean. Help Dean get his best friend back. Our best friend back .
Dean waves his brother off and slumps into the chair in the library. It's not very comfortable. In fact, the wooden back is digging into his thoracic spine and causing some pain. But it's better than the alternative. The alternative of thinking about what he's lost, who he's lost, and how he lost them. That pain will never go away. Right now I can focus on this acute pain and center my thoughts on it. Keep myself from sinking into the dark hole of nothing I've been trying to climb out of since I lost - since I lost
Dean finishes the whiskey bottle before Sam gets home and he's still not drunk enough. He rises from the chair and walks to the liquor cart. All the bottles are half empty or nothing but drops of whiskey, gathering at the bottom of the glass. He picks up one empty glass bottle and stares at it for several moments. His vision becomes distorted from the small glass textures, his left ear begins to ring from the silence as he falls into a trance like state. Then, a glint of sapphire reflects in the textured glass. It catches his eye; Dean swallows. Suddenly, he's thinking of Castiel. Cas. He's thinking of "I love you's" and "Goodbye, Dean" and black goo. He's thinking of how the image of his best friend disappearing into a black mass of nothing is seared in his memory forever. He's thinking of how he didn't get to say goodbye, or anything really, and now he never will.
He grimaces at the bottle, squeezes the neck so hard his knuckles blanche, and throws it across the room, into the kitchen. It lands by the island, shattering to pieces, with a deafening crash. Dean feels his eyes burning and hot tears gathering at the corners. Before he realizes, Dean is grabbing all the glass bottles and throwing them into the kitchen. In his fit of rage, Dean throws one bottle too high and it shatters against the side of the kitchen table. Glass spreads across the floor. He doesn't even register the intensity of the mess until one bottle knocks off another, shattering it at his feet. He stops throwing the bottles, breaking from his trance.
"I tried everything! I can't save you! There's nothing left! How could you do this to me, you son of a bitch," Dean cries. He places his hands on either side of his head, thinking. "Jack! How can you just leave us? We need you. Cas needs you! Fuck this all powerful, all knowing God bullshit. We're family!" Dean tosses the cart over. "Isn't that enough?" He pauses and glances around for a moment. Nothing. "Dammit, Jack. Why won't you answer my prayers? I need some help!" He cries out and slowly sits down. "I can't do this on my own," he whispers between his sniffles. He begs over and over again please please please in his head for a few moments. But he's met with silence like every other time. Dean accepts this and wipes his tears away, picks the cart up, grabs the broom and dustpan from the kitchen and picks up his mess. He can't have Sam see what a hypocrite he truly has become.
Dean cuts himself on a few lone pieces of glass, but it's nothing he can't handle. In fact, for a brief moment, the pain gives him something to focus on. He mindlessly watches the crimson slowly drain down the sink as he holds his palm under the running water. He wonders what it feels like to float down the water, through the pipes, through the darkness, into nothing. What is wrong with me? But that's where Cas is right now. A bunch of nothing. Dean grabs a hand towel and wraps it around his left hand before returning to the broom. The kitchen is just about clean. Within about 5 minutes, all the glass and spilled whiskey is gone. Almost as if it never happened. Dean places the broom and dustpan back in the corner and trudges through the hallways.
There is a secret stash of whiskey in his man cave that Dean hid for emergencies. And this constitutes an emergency. He walks to the wall, removes a Star Wars poster from the fifth movie, and pulls out a few bricks, revealing the beautiful brown bottle of Jack Daniel's. Not his favorite but Dean was in a rush when he bought it a couple of weeks ago before they defeated Chuck just in case anything went sideways. Also, in case Sam found his stash at least it wouldn't be his good whiskey. Popping the cap off, Dean takes a long swig as he stumbles toward the couch. Sam should be home soon. I'll be done with this bottle by then and be able to forget anything blue for a while. Except all he dreams of is blue.
Bright blue swirls fill his dreams as he drifts off. He feels immense warmth as the blue wraps around him like a large ribbon and he floats above the grass. The ribbon caresses Dean like a soft, silk cloud, holding him in place. A slight breeze causes the ribbon to ripple in harmony and alternate between hues of blue. The colors circulate between indigo to azure to cobalt to cerulean to teal and finally midnight blue effortlessly. Dean sees dark angels wings above and feels safe. He flies higher as the ribbon ascends toward the wings. Flashes of cerulean eyes skip by, sad and yearning, before Dean is pulled down into dark azure ocean water by the wings. The ribbon of blue dissolves into nothing. Dean feels alone. In dreams, people don't usually have their sense of smell, but Dean swears he smells hints of sandalwood, a campfire, and honey. Then, he sees Castiel materialize before him with his wings extended, long and wide. Beautiful. They're untouched with no sign of rebellion or impurities. Just as Dean had first seen them. Before he met me. Before he rebelled and lost everything for me. I cursed you, Cas. Green eyes lock with blue and Castiel smiles at Dean. Then suddenly, Castiel's wings begin to dissipate and burn away. He appears to scream in pain. Dean reaches out just as soon as the water darkens and swarms around Castiel. He thrashes against the thick water but cannot break free. Dean is frozen in the water and at once cannot breathe. He screams out to Castiel but no sound comes out. He, instead, inhales the water. Castiel disappears within the black, thick water just as soon as he appears. He's gone.
Dean's eyes slowly open. This is a recurring nightmare he's had since Castiel sacrificed himself. Since he left. Dean had hoped the alcohol would impair his subconscious enough to avoid the nightmare. Beer hasn't been strong enough, nor tequila, or vodka. Whiskey is his last resort and apparently it does jack-shit. I need something stronger, if I am to get any sleep. Although the whiskey does not keep the nightmares at bay it does keep him numb. That is enough to continue drinking. He reaches for the bottle and misses. I may be seeing double. After a few tries, Dean successfully retrieves the bottle and downs the remaining third of the whiskey. His head feels heavy and his chest feels hot. Dean can feel his fingers tingling and toes numbing against his socks. This is the sweet spot of feeling drunk, he thinks.
Sam returns from his date, unnoticed, and walks into the room, seeing Dean spread out on the couch. He eyes the empty whiskey bottle on the coffee table and sighs. Sam remembers the other whiskey bottle left on the library table. The same one Dean had been nursing before Sam left. Dean is on a bender again. Eileen shuffles up next to Sam and glances at the couch. She looks at Sam with a sad look. At dinner, he filled her in with everything he knows about Castiel and his sacrifice for Dean. But Eileen didn't realize it would affect Dean this badly. She walks over to Dean and pulls the blanket from on top of the couch and covers Dean. He's passed out again and is slightly twitching. His eyes are racing back and forth.
"We will regroup tomorrow and discuss Plan SOC," Sam whispers while signing.
"I'm still not sure about the code word," Eileen signs with a grimace.
"We'll work on it," he signs with a shrug.
The next morning Dean wakes to his Jack Daniel's replaced with three ibuprofen pills and a glass of water. Grateful, he slowly takes them one at a time due to the agonizing headache. Usually he doesn't have headaches or hangovers but the nightmares don't give him much rest. He really isn't able to sleep off the alcohol. Pressing the heel of his hands into his eyes to push back the headache, Dean sighs with exhaustion. He doesn't even know what time it is. His watch reads 4:32 but Dean is unsure if it's AM or PM.
Suddenly, he feels his stomach growl and Dean realizes he hasn't eaten since about noon today. Yesterday? He sloppily rises up and makes his wake toward the kitchen. Nothing really sounds appetizing except for some string cheese. Only, they don't have string cheese. Of course. So, Dean settles for the two day old pepperoni pizza in the fridge. Not too bad, and he will never say no to pizza. Dean isn't sure how long he was passed out but the effects of the whiskey have certainly worn down a bit. He can't walk a straight line, but his vision is more clear. He clumsily carries the pizza box over to the library table next to his laptop and sits it down. Quietly, he pulls the chair out and takes a seat. The hunter in him wants to make sure everything is quiet out in the world. The clock on his laptop confirms its 4:38 AM.
A few clicks and searches show there's a local mysterious killing. Our kinda thing. Dean smiles, knowing that this case will help keep his mind busy. And he will be able to save someone. At least this way he will feel like his life was worth saving. Ironic. I feel like I've said that before. Why do people feel the need to jump at any chance to save me? I don't deserve saving. Dad sold his soul for me and now Cas. I don't deserve it. He shakes his head and munches down on cold pizza in silence.
Dean finishes the last three slices of pizza, underestimating how hungry he had been. He watches a few dumb YouTube videos for a while, to keep his mind off things, waiting for Sam to wake up. Dean is tempted to grab a beer from the fridge but decides against it. He needs to be as sober as possible for the hunt, for Sam. If Dean were to go alone, he would not care. Not at this moment anyway.
Dean has realized his mood swings are ridiculous lately. At one moment, he's super depressed and doesn't care about anything. He honestly doesn't care if he lives or dies.  The next moment he can't wait to see what life has to offer. It's as if his brain doesn't know how to comprehend what Castiel's sacrifice means to him. His thoughts can become so tangled and incoherent Dean doesn't know how to act - what to say. That's why he started writing down some of his thoughts, and then thought how much of girl that made him and crumpled the papers up. Right now, he can really use a moment to write down his thoughts.
He grabs the notepad and pen on the table and scribbles away. I hate this feeling. What am I supposed to feel? Anger? Sadness? Relief? Emptiness? Frustration? All of the above? Others? You left me with so many unanswered questions and I left you with nothing in return. How am I supposed to go on knowing this? Cas, how can I go minute to minute, hour to hour, knowing what I know now? I fucked up. I had a chance to say what I've been wanting to say for a while and I couldn't. I didn't. Did you even know? I mean do I even fucking know? I can't even hate you to make myself feel better. I can't bring myself to say I hate you for doing this to me. Because I could never hate you. The paper becomes wet with a few tear drops. I will find you, Cas. Just wait for me.
Dean places the pen next to the notepad after a moment. He wipes his nose with his flannel sleeve. Not many tears fell but his nose is running pretty good. Out of all of his thought entries, this one felt the most cathartic. He sometimes pretends that Castiel can hear him read the words to himself or even hear him as Dean writes the words. Just as Castiel heard his prayer in Purgatory. But he doesn't. He won't. The empty is a dark and torturous place. My prayer and words will be the last things he'd focus on.
Dean lays his head on the table from exhaustion, but doesn't shut his eyes. He won't risk falling asleep. Instead, he focuses on counting the books on each shelf to his right. Then, once he's done with those he counts the ones on his left. Dean notices some of these books, he nor Sam even use. He doesn't know half of the content in these books. Unfortunately, Dean underestimated how counting can cause drowsiness no matter the subject at play. His eyes begin to drift when Sam walks in with loud footsteps.
Yawning, Sam says, "What are you doing in here? You should be in bed."
Dean jerks up, shaking his head from thoughts of sleep. "I found us a case," he replies.
"Mhm. Is that all you were looking for during the early morning?" Sam asks, eyeing the covered notepad. Dean notices and quickly turns it over.
"Sam," he warns. "mind your business."
"Good morning," Eileen joins the boys in the library.
Dean isn't too surprised to see her here but is happy for Sam nonetheless. "Morning, Eileen. I hope sasquatch here didn't take up the whole bed."
Eileen blushes and laughs at Dean. "I don't kiss and tell," she winks at Sam as she kisses him on the cheek. "Who wants breakfast?"
"Yes, please!" Sam signs.
Sam joins Dean at the table and a long beat passes between them. Sounds in the kitchen of water running, the clinking of plates, and banging of pans fill the silence instead. Dean repositions himself in the chair, still not making eye contact with Sam. Sam, however, is studying Dean. He appears disheveled, bags under his eyes, day old stubble and crust around his lips from dried whiskey. He's a wreck.
"So this case-" "We need to talk-" They start simultaneously.
Dean glances up for the first time. "You first."
"I know about Cas." Dean's eyes widen slightly. "At least I know there's more to the story. You didn't tell me everything and I know whatever happened is eating away at you." Dean gestures to dismiss Sam. "Dean, I know you. I can see it. I know when you get like this it's because of something close to you." Sam pauses. "I also read some of your crumpled up papers." A dark look crosses Dean's face. Almost like he wants to punch Sam.
"You did what?" Dean says.
Sam continues, ignoring Dean's comment. "I know you're trying to bring Cas back. I want to help," Sam offers.
Dean sighs, looking to the side. He knows the many dead ends and how disappointing it is trying to save Cas. He doesn't want to subject his brother to the very same thing. "It's no use, Sam. Everything is a dead end. I've tried everything I can think of. Cas is gone," Dean resigns, defeated. "All we can do now is save people, hunt things, and live our lives. It's what Cas would want. It's what everyone, who we have lost, would want."
"Dean," Sam starts. "You're giving up way too easily. There is always another way. Don't you always say that?" Dean doesn't respond. "I know how it may seem hopeless but we have options. We have the resources to continue the search to save him. You can't give up now, Dean. This is Cas."
"I've tried everything I can think of, Sam. Everything! Praying, research, calling Rowena. She doesn't answer. Jack is off grid. I've tried! There's nothing. He's gone!" Dean's voice cracks. He swallows down the pain. "We have to accept that. And however I deal with it is my business. So don't give me those judgy eyes like you are now." Dean says pointedly.
"But, Dean-"
"I said no Sam."
Dean gets up, signaling he's done with this conversation and takes the notepad with him. He doesn't even acknowledge Eileen as she brings breakfast to the library. "The case is pulled up on my laptop. I'm going to get ready." Dean turns the corner and is gone before Sam can reply.
Eileen's face falls as she holds a plate of french toast, bacon, sausage, and lots of syrup. Then one plate of regular scrambled eggs with toast for Sam. She sits the plates on the table and watches Dean leave. "Is he not hungry? I made his favorite." She says.  
"It's not that, he's dealing with some, he's just-" Sam doesn't seem to know how to finish his sentence, or fully explain his brother's behavior.
"Cas?" Eileen offers. Sam nods.
Sam reads the case on Dean's laptop and begins to feel nauseated. He has a bad feeling. He, again, has a sense of deja vu. Two days in a row, it can't be a coincidence. It's like there is an itch at the back of his brain, crawling to the surface, wanting to show him something. He feels a headache come on and the pain is similar to when he used to get visions as a young adult. The pain grows stronger as the itch continues, pulling toward his frontal lobe.
Then, a flash of images of Sam and Dean dressed in their normal FBI threads quickly blink by. Another image of them at an abandoned barn fighting some strange, masked creatures. Sam recognizes the mask from Dad's journal. And then a burst of images, showing Sam and Dean fighting these creatures appear. They're vampires! The brothers are winning, slicing the vamp's heads off one after another. The last image shows Dean pushed against something sharp and… Oh no, Dean Sam thinks.
He grabs his head and shakes the images away. Groaning in pain, he sees he's on the floor. He must have fallen while the vision took over. Eileen is at his side, freaked out. She's signing, "Are you okay?" over and over again.
Slowly, Sam regains his thoughts and tells Eileen he's okay. Dean rushes by Sam's side by this point after hearing the loud thud from his fall. Dean places his hand on Sam's shoulder, in concern.
"Dude, what the hell happened? Say something. You alright?" Dean glances over Sam, and around the bunker, checking for any intruders.
"Yea, yea. I'm fine. I feel like I just got hit by a freight train. Like how my visions used to feel." He pauses. "I actually think I just had a vision." Sam looks at Dean with bewilderment and Dean returns the look.
"I'm sorry. Did you just say you had a vision?"
"Yea." Sam breathes.
"You haven't had one of those since you were like in your twenties and yellow eyes was after you. Why the fuck now?"
"I-I don't know. I thought it was a nightmare, but last night the same images played in my mind. I went all day yesterday feeling a sense of deja vu. The pie fest, reading the case, even eating breakfast."
All three are silent for quite a while. Their breakfast grows cold but no one pays it any mind. "What if it's a sign?" Eileen questions.
"Like from God, uh, Jack?" Sam offers.
Dean huffs in response. He knows damn good and well Jack is staying out of everyone's business. There isn't any possibility Jack is interfering. "I doubt it."
"It's possible," says Sam. "Maybe he has taken himself out of the narrative, but what if he's helping us still by guiding us through this vision?"
"He hasn't answered any of my damn prayers since two months ago. Why would he start now?"
"I don't know, change of heart?" Sam offers, half-heartedly.
Dean stands and laughs with a bitter shake of his head. "You honestly believe that? Come on, Sam. The kid has a new sense of almighty. We, you, me and Cas, we are now left in the dust. He said so himself. You're just having some freak migraine."
Sam stands, with Eileen in tow. She helps him up by the arm. "You're wrong. I know he's not like Chuck, and stays away, but he still cares. I know he sent me this vision to help us. All of us," Sam stares at Dean's glare of hopelessness. "I have faith, Dean."
"How can you be so sure? How can you be so positive that this is from Jack and he's trying to help us? Doesn't make a lot of sense that out of all the times I've asked for his help, to save Cas, or help me bring him back, he's now warning you of an ordinary hunt?" Dean says frustrated.
"Because in this hunt you die, Dean," Sam blurts out. Dean stays quiet. "You die and I have to go on without you. You leave me and I have to live a life without my brother."
Dean's gaze falls to the floor. He's quiet for a moment, processing this information. "You live a happy life?" He barely says.
"What?"
"After I die, do you go on having the whole white picket fence, apple pie life with the 2.5 kids?" Dean clarifies, calmly.
Sam searches Dean's face for any kind of sign of self actualization or will to live. "Why does it matter? I can still strive for that with you alive. We both can," he adds.
Dean smiles, that tired, sad smile. "No, Sammy. You and I both know as long as I'm alive you will always be in this life." He looks at Eileen. "You two will never have a chance at a happy, normal life with me around. Besides, hunting is what I do. There is nothing else for me. Not anymore.”
"That's not true," Eileen says, with tears in her eyes. She reaches out and places her hand on Dean's cheek, pleading for him to understand how wrong he is.
"It is. I'm the one that dragged you back into this life, Sam. I'm the only one keeping you here. Let me give you an out."
"Stop. Okay just stop. We are not going on this hunt. If you want to be suicidal, fine, but I'm keeping you out of danger. You are always so quick to jump in front of a gun or blade. Do you still care that little about yourself, Dean?" Sam searches his brother's eyes. "What about that job paperwork on your desk? You must have cared at some point. Wanted to live!" Dean is quiet. Sam sighs. "Cas wouldn't want you to die. He died to save you, remember? So, what I am going to do is bring Cas back. Are you going to help me?"
Dean ponders Sam's offer for a moment. "What about the people that will die, if we don't save them?"
"I'll call some hunters and give them a heads up on what to look out for when they go there. It'll be taken care of," Sam reassures.
Dean glances between Eileen and Sam. Fiddling with a loose string on the end of his flannel sleeve, he sighs. On one hand, he'd love to see Castiel again. He'd do anything- to hug him and tell him all the things he didn't get to say. But on the other hand, he's so tired. So very tired. There are no leads. And he's lost all faith in his search to save Castiel.
"Dean?" Sam starts.
"Okay. Let's bring Cas home."
33 notes · View notes
sixmapleleafs · 4 years
Text
party favours // frederik andersen
Warnings: Smut. Smut. Smut.
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Summary: After your best friends bachelorette party you’re sent home with a rather interesting party favour.
The champagne had been flowing since breakfast as you and your friends spent the day laying by the pool, before heading back to your rooms to get ready for a night of clubbing. You were all in Vegas for your friends bachelorette party, she was engaged to some big shot lawyer who had surprised her with the whole trip and she immediately grabbed the three of you and dragged you onto the plane with her.
It was a four day trip over the weekend and it was nice to get away from life in Toronto, luckily it was the middle of summer so you were able to get away with no problem, one of the perks of being an elementary school teacher.
One downside was that you had to leave before your boyfriend Freddie would get back from his week long training session in California, meaning it would be even longer before you got to see him again. You’d been together for just over 10 months but you’d only started having sex in the last few weeks. When you met Freddie you were a virgin and when you told him he was really sweet and waited until you were ready, since that night he’d barely been able to keep his hands off you. Which made this time away from each other rather challenging for him, you’d received many pics and videos that had made you clench your thighs to soothe the tingling feeling that would arise, you’d even had one night of phone sex which led to Auston banging on Freddie’s hotel room door telling him to shut up.
“Y/n are you ready?” You heard your friend ask as she came out of the bathroom. You smiled and nodded looking down at your phone to see a message from Fred telling you to have a good time and that he loves you. You send him back a quick text saying you love and miss him too, it was your last night so you were planning to party hard which you’d told him earlier.
“They want us to meet them in their room, apparently y/f/n isn’t ready yet” she said rolling her eyes and laughing. You laughed along with her, looking over yourself once more in the mirror before the two of you made your way over to the room your other two friends were sharing.
“Hey ladies, are you ready to partay?” The bride to be said opening the door to their suite, she had clearly had a few more drinks than everyone else but she was having a good time and that’s all that mattered. She handed you both shots of tequila and you downed it quickly, ignoring the slight burn as you handed the glass back to her.
“Oh, before I forget I have gifts for all of you” she said as she disappeared for a second, the three of you looked at each other confused.
“This is your bachelorette weekend, aren’t we supposed to be the ones buying stuff for you” your friend said from her place in front of the vanity mirror. The future bride came back with three gift bags in her hands, handing one to each of you. You stared at the pink bag in your hand, there was white tissue paper on the top and it was quite heavy. You all eyed her suspiciously but she just urged you all to open them.
The three of you threw the paper out of the bags and all pulled out the first items at the same time, they were matching tiaras and you all burst into laughter as you placed them in your hair. Next you pulled out a sash that had the words BRIDAL PARTY written in glitter, you put it on over your dress and smiled when you saw the bride-to-be had pulled out her own tiara and sash that said BRIDE TO BE instead. Next there were Prosecco gummies and at the bottom of the bags was a silk robe with your name written across the back, you pulled it out saw that all three of you had matching robes.
“I thought you could wear them on the wedding day, whilst we’re getting ready” she said as you all engulfed her in a hug. “Wait there’s one more thing in the bags”. You looked down and pulled out the small white box at the bottom, before setting the bag down on the ground.
“Oh my God, is that a vibrator?” Your friend said in shock as you and the others burst out laughing.
“Why did you give us vibrators?” She said in between laughs of her own.
“To be honest, I was drunk when I bought them” the bachelorette said as you all laughed, “but I stand by my drunken decision, I’ve heard stories about your sex lives and you lot need to spice things up a little”.
“Ha not y/n, her and her hockey lover boy have been sexting non stop” your friend and temporary roommate said with a scoff.
“We have not been sexting” you said as a blush covered your cheeks.
“I’ve witnessed all the giggles and the late night snapchats over the past few days, and I don’t even want to imagine what goes on behind closed doors”. All the girls laughed as you just blushed even more.
“Do you think he would be into it?” One of them asked once they’d recovered from their laughing fit.
“Um I actually have no idea”.
“You should ask him” she said giving you a wink. You brushed them off and eventually you were able to get out of the suite and into the car to the club.
-
The flight back to Toronto was long and tortuous, flying hungover wasn’t something you would recommend so you were glad to finally be back in your own town and in Freddie’s arms when he picked you up from the airport.
Once you made it back to the apartment, you almost instantly passed out on Freddie’s bed, he made dinner and woke you up when it was time to eat. When you had finished your food you both went back into his room to cuddle and watch tv, you opened up your suitcase to pull out some pyjama shorts and Freddie handed you his T-shirt as he got changed into some sweats for bed.
“What’s this?” He asked as the gift bag fell from your suitcase in front of him. He picked it up and handed it back to you.
“Oh it’s just some gifts y/f/n gave us” you said as you pulled out the robe to show him, he held it up and smiled when he saw your name across the back. Freddie pulled the prosecco gummies, or rather the wrapper, since they’d been eaten when you got back to the room last night and raised his eyebrow as a smirk made its way onto his face.
“What? I got hungry” you said taking the wrapper from him making him chuckle lightly as he reached back into the bag.
“What’s this?” He said as the white box came into view. You were pretty sure your jaw had hit the floor.
“Um, it’s nothing” you said trying to grab it from him, but he was too fast and he moved the box higher with another smirk. He opened the box and raised an eyebrow when he saw the bullet lying on the pink tissue paper. You were bright red and though he was now looking at you, you refused to look him in the eye at all.
“Was this part of the gift?” You nodded in response, finally looking at him. His eyes had darkened and the look he was giving you made that tingly feeling return to the pit of your stomach.
“Have you used it?” His voice had dropped lower and it sent a shiver down your spine.
“No, I was going to wait for you” the words came out softer than you intended and it made you sound kind of innocent in a way that made Freddie’s pants tighten and a groan escape his mouth. He picked up the bullet before dropping the box onto your opened suitcase. His free hand pulled you into a kiss and he quickly slipped his tongue into your mouth, you moaned into the kiss and he smiled against you as he pulled back slightly.
He guided you back towards his bed, you fell gently against the soft sheets and he crawled on top of you, still clutching the bullet in his right hand. Your hands quickly got tangled into his hair as you continued to make out, his left hand slowly made its way up your leg and landed on your thigh before he began to rub soft circles into the skin there. You shifted yourself slightly so that his crotch was pressed against your core and you let out an almost porn worthy moan when your clit grazed against the tip of the tent that was starting to rise in his sweats.
His lips moved to your jaw then down your neck until he found your sweet spot, the one that had you whimpering beneath him since your first night together. You pouted slightly when he pulled away and he smiled as his hands found the fabric of his shirt that was covering your upper half.
“You have to be patient princess” those words had haunted you since day 1, he was always making you slow down and he made sure to really build up your orgasm so that in the end you were screaming and writhing beneath him every time.
The fabric was pulled from your body and he laid you back down gently before he continued his assault on your neck. He trailed the kisses down your collarbone and in between your boobs, his large hand cupped your left boob as he brought his mouth down to your nipple. Your back arched a little as he moved over to the right one giving it just as much love.
“You’re so beautiful elskede” his voice still low and his eyes only growing darker. “I hope you know that”.
You pulled him up reattaching your lips in a kiss that was much rougher than the last. He pulled back motioning for you to move up to rest against the pillows as he quickly tried to figure out the controls on the vibrator. Once it buzzed to life in his hands your pussy clenched in anticipation and you could almost visibly see his cock harden in his sweats as he swore under his breath. You shared a far from innocent smile as he connected his lips with yours once more.
You practically jumped when you felt the vibrations rippling through your left nipple and the moan you let out only seemed to urge Freddie on.
“Is that good, baby?” He asked, his mouth by your ear as he focused his attention on your sweet spot once more. You nodded enthusiastically, suddenly not being able to find your words even though he was only playing with your nipples. His warm mouth closed around it as he pulled the vibrator away, throwing it down beside you as his hands started to tug on your pyjama shorts. He pulled back to pull them off as you lifted your hips to help him, which left you completely naked beneath him.
His large hands spread your legs for him and he groaned when he saw how wet you were, he looked up to your eyes silently asking for permission and when you gave him a small nod he ran his fingers down your slit, spreading your wetness up to your clit before bringing his hand to his mouth.
“Taste so good princess” his words sent another shock to your core.
“Freddie...” you whined and he smirked as he grabbed the bullet again. He moved so his head was between your legs but the bullet was still vibrating in his hand, he left small kisses down your thighs and when his warm mouth finally enclosed your clit you let out a moan at the sensation you hoped would never get old. His tongue flicked against your clit before he slowly slipped his tongue into your entrance, you were so caught up in the feeling that you didn’t even notice his hand sneaking up until the bullet made contact with your clit.
The sound you made was far from anything you’d ever made before and you were so loud that you were worried Freddie’s neighbours would be knocking on the door. He kept up his motions, slowly fucking you with his tongue and holding the vibrating bullet against your clit until you were a writhing mess beneath him.
“Freddie...” you managed to let out “I’m so close...I-I’m...oh fuck...I’m gonna cum”. He didn’t let up or even slow down just kept holding it there with his tongue delving so deep he could feel the vibrations from inside you. You came with a scream of his name, falling back against the sheet panting as you came down, pushing your hips away from him when you became too sensitive to take anymore.
He pulled himself off wiping your cum from his face and turning the vibrator off before connecting your lips in a slow kiss.
“That was so hot” he said as he planted small kisses on your face whilst you tried to recover from no doubt the best orgasm you’ve ever had.
“You think you can go again?”
-
Part 2? I’m sorry this was so bad but it’s 2 am and I had this idea in the shower earlier and I wanted to get it written and posted tonight so I didn’t forget about it. Let me know if there’s any mistakes and if you want a part 2 because I will definitely be up for writing it...
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blankdblank · 3 years
Text
Hobbit Soulmate Pt 38
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‘Mate Rings, new fashion trend? Jaqi Pear, newly named to be added to the King Kong epic directed by Peter Jackson due to be filming soon and star of Beast of Bards in which she is opposite her Mate Richard Armitage, on their latest project a mini series called North and South for BBC have been spotted with matching emerald rings. Myself personally, I love the trend, we should see more of this.’
“Oh my goodness,” you murmured smoothing your hands over your face listening to the gossip news playing through the wardrobe trailer for the Van Helsing film. Behind you the makeup woman was readying your blonde wig for your maid/villager role.
David Wenham however from the doorway said, “Not a clue the lot of them,” the words turning your head with grin creeping out in his crossing the room to give you a hug, “Glad to see you sweetheart, how have you been?”
In his lean back against the makeup counter already in full costume Hugh came in smiling as well, “I want to see this ring,”
Giggling softly your arm extended and he came over taking your hand admiring the ring, “Rich found them in a cabinet we bought he promised to fix up for me.”
David, “You told us about that, that looks crazy expensive.”
“It does, and he won’t tell me what it was appraised at either. So, fifteen bucks for the both of them.”
Hugh chuckled and came in for his own hug, “You are well worth the funds no matter the worth.”
The makeup woman asked, “Is that legal? Keeping them?”
Her bashful smile when you glanced her way was answered with a smile, “He found some receipts in the cabinet and tracked down the family and they signed a paper saying he could have them. Spent the whole day tracking them down and planning a meet up to return them. He thought the same thing and didn’t expect for them to say he could keep them.”
That had her chuckling in relief, “Sorry, parents are contract lawyers, second nature.”
You giggled shaking your head, “Oh no, I get it, my dad insisted I take a course on contract law too so when he found a music box and expensive pens and gloves in there too I was glad to hear he hunted them down, ‘cus those can go for thousands to collectors.”
Hugh, “At least there was a receipt there, had a friend who got taken to jail for trying to have a necklace he found on the beach to be reset to a necklace when it was reported stolen. That can go mad so fast.” He said watching while the woman got to braiding your hair back for the wig cap to go over. “Did you get enough sleep?”
“Ya, off yesterday since we’re switching back to day shifts for me in a few days, you?”
“Yes,” the pair smiled in replying remaining there for your basic makeup to add some exhaustion to layer the role of living in such a dangerous place. Simple wardrobe was added with your things locked up for you to be driven to the right town set. A sharp whispered “Yes,” had David chuckling at the Director stating he wanted you and David to have a steamy kiss after his request to sleep with your character.
Lowly he said, “You are not happy about this when I’m next to Hugh,”
To that you turned to Hugh teasing, “I get to kiss David and you don’t!” Sticking your tongue out leaving the pair chuckling in your split to head to your marks for the start of the scene.
From the inside of the home Van Helsing and Carl acting as Maid to the village scenes fleeing away the most fun of your week did come in the teasing line before the amorous and slightly comical kiss to the post coital scene to follow. Your giggles brightened the mood for those watching after the grueling fleeing and fight scenes filling the day when David exited in a sleeping gown. He came over to fix the couch up to be joined by you in a under shirt and skirt with corset over with a stunning lack of stockings hinting that it was just your under things to be removed in this cold town. Smiles and chuckles filled the talks on the right cuddling position before Carl would leap out of the post coital nest of blankets sending the couch flipping over for you to roll off onto the mat laid out behind it finishing off your blip in the film.
.
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To be honest when all was said and done from the final butterfly inducing station kiss scene Richard milked as long as he could for several ‘options’ to end off the North and South Series and back to the beginning. Back when John and Margaret are just being intermingled through her father’s lessons with him the Mate Ring rumor did seem to be the best angle as you were told by his Agent at least. True it was best to seem available to an extent and to have a bond to his Mate while being presumed available did grant Richard some freedom for his image and even more so for yours. Which once you thought about it only enforced that you both could manage to keep your relationships somewhat private compared to other public couples. Both Jens and Naomi, the latter who just jumped from a relationship with Heath Ledger to Liev especially you could see just blasted across the news back home. True babies would one day give it away but there were always ways of trying to bolster that security by utilizing your camouflaging family if you had to.
On the eve of your arrival back in Canada once in bed you hung up the phone having heard that in your flight out of England Beast of Bards had over its opening weekend in Eastern Europe and Asia broke out $33 million in earnings adding even more to the grand title for the last stretch of it being in theaters. A fact that through Peter had bolstered hopes in his production team for King Kong even more that you could pull off something of this magnitude since the indy film had earned more than ten times the 15 million put in it to shoot it and was still gaining.
Wonderfalls beckoned you back again to set with a weekend pop by to drop in on the X2 premier that Lee would join you at while Richard tried to find a way to slip another trip back out to Canada into his schedule between is next few auditions. Nice and cuddly Richard soaked in all he could as for time with you and his family together eager as ever to have the big day come. Where all the relief came in just asking the question the gaping canyon of possibilities as for what the ceremony might be one day no one could tell, especially should you take hints from the fellow big name actors you had befriended with plans brewing for their own ceremonies. No matter what you had truly wished for deep inside he knew it would be something special between the pair of you without pomp or fanfare for the guests emptying the ceremony’s true meaning. The pair of you didn’t like to be the center of attention outside of character, but for one day who really knows what plans might come up.
.
Nearly tackled by Tracy in glee at your news the show was off on a roll again with Lee prouder than ever to tug you close to his side soaking up all the time with you he had until his work and your work tugged you in opposite ends of the world again. Easily melting back into the show to get to the more absurd episodes even bringing you into the path of some exotic birds you loved to get a closer look at on the episode you had to pretend one of them attacked you. That had to be one of your favorite ones to lead up to as the zoo that you were to film in gave you all a private tour, and even seeing the same animals a million times there was just something about a zoo that brought out your inner child. Right up there with museums and aquariums and planetariums you frequented on their discount and free days out in New York whenever possible.
Guest stars began to roll in and with the day you were filming a debacle between two women each claiming to have gone over the falls some decades prior a bout of unplanned rain had given you all an early afternoon off. Once changed again your eyes lingered on your ring and Tracy smirked moving closer saying, “Saw that. Admiring it again? It is stunning, if I got a ring like that I’d stare at it for a few days minimum.”
With a chuckle you replied, “Rich said when he got the rings the shop he got our rings cleaned at said I could drop by to pick out a wedding band.”
“Ooh, I smell a shopping trip,” she said with a smile making your creep out, “Come on, we’ll grab Lee and have some fun adoring some shiny things.”
Her arm looped in yours and together with the surprisingly excited Lee you were off to the expensive brand of jewelers. Where Richard had been mistaken as a non-earning slob right away your face had the two suited men perking up, even the woman currently helping another woman choose a necklace. The focus right off triggering your smile reflex on the stroll through the amply lit shop full of cases holding tons of shiny things, all of which you stole glances at along the way. “Miss Pear, welcome, how might we assist you today?”
“Well, some months back by fiancé brought our rings in to be cleaned up and while he was waiting the topic of wedding bands came up. He was told I could drop by to browse a bit on styles.”
Salesman 1 with a buzz cut, “You are welcome to look through any of our selection, any time.”
The Manager crept over asking, “Did you have any hint of what you might be looking for?”
“Yes, my cousin for her wedding band has an eternity band with hearts and I was thinking of one with emeralds, and maybe an onyx one to match his ring a bit.”
In the move of your hand to the top of the case between you the Manager drew in a quick breath recognizing the ring right away and smiled offering his palms upwards to accept your hand, “Yes, I remember this masterpiece.” Smiling wider in tilting it side to side seeing it was still well taken care of, “An eternity band will suit it perfectly.” He released your hand and asked, “Have you had any thoughts to carat size?” gesturing your group to the next row of cases that he walked around his to enter that ring of glass walking right to the section of eternity bands.
With a key ring he opened the case to bring out a row of options, after a quick inhale you replied, “Not really, I’ve never been very, attentive I guess, to jewelry and all that till I met my fiancé. He actually got me my first bracelet that wasn’t made from string, so very new to this.”
The Salesman snuck in asking, “Well this would not be the first time a man wants to bring his love to a better livelihood.”
Lee almost said something until you said, “Not so much that, just most of my money went into my University studies while he’d already graduated when we met.”
The Manager smiled saying, “As it should be, and now you have your name in lights and require something lovely to flash to the cameras. How the world took this as anything but an engagement ring I have no clue.”
Tracy said, “All in all her and her guy outside of characters love their privacy so this way the plans won’t be hounded by cameras.”
Lee grinned as you said, “If anything we could always run off and elope in a horse costume.”
Lee, “Oh we could do better than a horse for you.”
The Manager said, “We do not have any colored heart eternity bands in store however we can order anything you like to custom.” The first row of rings was lifted for you and he said, “We have open designs, or full stones.”
Tracy said, “My mom loves open rings like that.”
Lee in a reach over shifted your hand for his view saying, “Might be a bit big.”
You nodded and said, “Also, I don’t think it would match to have all the metal visible around the stones.”
The Salesman smiled saying, “Very true observation your stones are seamless.”
Luring the Manager to bring over the next row while the Salesman put that one away, alternating directions the hearts on the next ones in sizes from large to small. Beside those came a selection with hearts on bands all upright and a third with them laid sideways. “I really like the sideways ones, my cousin picked the up and down alternating style.” Unlike the alternating hearts these hearts were formed of three stones each, a square and two rounded off squares upping the carat weight but keeping the size from being ridiculous.
Tracy, “I think the small one is a bit too small,”
Lee pointed at the one in the middle, “I think that size would work,”
The Manager lifted the ring out and passed it to you smiling as you did ease it on and the duo around you joined you in eyeing the ring in comparison to your engagement ring. “Doesn’t match,” you muttered to yourself.
The Manager said, “I do believe this one would fit the best myself.” Accepting the ring you took off trading it for the largest one. “A nice one point seven five carat for each heart set to go with your eight and single carat stone ring.”
“I do like this one.”
You said and with nods your friends agreed with Lee asking, “Were you thinking green, white or groups of colors to fit the black?”
On a diagram sheet from the Salesman the Manager showed you a few options while you eased off the band to not forget you were wearing it while the Salesman hurried off with a lift of his finger. Back to you he brought a choice of bracelets of round stones in various combinations of emeralds, onyx and diamonds, “Just for the color schemes.”
Tracy asked, “Were you thinking more emeralds?”
“I think maybe more diamonds and onyx.”
Lee tapped one, “I like this one,” he said tapping the bracelet with three diamonds next to three onyx stones, “Maybe pop an emerald in the middle of the onyx.”
“I like that idea, nice pattern.”
The Manager said, “Very lovely choice. And with this size the pricing will be fitting, four grand for stones will be a fine partner to its $800k engagement ring. Now to choose metals, I will get the samples.” Hurrying off while the Salesman took the bracelets back Lee’s brows furrowed in the drop of his and Tracy’s jaw while you subtly gripped the belt on his side.
Barely above a whisper you asked, “$800k? That’s over my whole check for the show!”
Tracy whispered, “That’s a house, two houses down south.”
“And four cars. You could probably buy a plane for that! I have house, plane and cars on my finger.”
Lee looked you over murmuring, “How do you do that? First Porn Man stash, then you found that cabinet for under twenty bucks.”
Tracy, “You’re taking me furniture shopping after this.”
“It’s not every time.”
Lee cut in as you let go of his belt, “There was two hundred in the cushions on the lounges you picked for me.”
Tracy, “How do you know? Is there like a glow? Because this role for you is seeming perfect if you have a voice telling you to buy this stuff.”
“It’s,” you sighed at her brows arched up curiously, “My uncles call me money bunny.”
Lee, “Why? They refused to explain.”
“I used to be the one to find lost wallets or keys since I was three. No glow or anything, even found a lost watch my gramps lost in the fields gathering the sheep in a storm. Dad’s the same way.”
Tracy, “After this,”
The Manager returned and choosing 24 karat white gold to match the other ring he got to finalizing the order sheet for the now 5.5k ring and the more he filled out the more your heart raced having picked all this out without Richard. He did tell you to browse and see if you could think up what you wanted but you sure hoped he wouldn’t feel left out of the designing process where you might not have felt the weight you were feeling now to have to dip into your savings to pay for this right away. Though the Manager said with a smile, “This ring should take five weeks to complete, if you would give us a number to contact you at when it is complete.” His grin crept wider, “Normally we ask for a deposit but for our elite clientele we waive that restriction and have much better terms for credit when the pieces are ready to be picked up or delivered.”
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It all was a bit awkward to simply leave with a receipt slip for the walk to the second hand shop. Through the aisles you wandered until you stopped at a jewelry display. And from the selection between two boxes you pulled open a hanging display case to find a necklace of nine strands of what looked to be jade flat beads secured by a golden clasp you lifted and turned to show Tracy like the bloodhound she and Lee had been treating you like. Seeing you had brought something to show them the pair turned and Tracy lifted the ends of the necklace that parted her lips. After stealing a glance towards the shop owner behind the distant counter she leaned in whispering, “Is this real jade?”
Mid shrug you said, “You said see what I end up picking. It’s something.”
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Lee and her shared a glance and he found the price tag saying, “7 bucks, and it’ll pop on you against your skin, for the premier of the show, could be nice.”
She nodded and pointed to you, “I know you, there’s something to this. I’m buying it.” She led the way to the registers, a few feet away your hand reached out for a butterfly shaped decoration out of painted wood you picked up and brought over to set beside the necklace she decided to wear out once the tag was cut off. Food was picked up on the way back to your place where she’d planned to get a taxi to get back in time for a late brunch with her parents that had flown in to visit her. “So are you gonna tell me-,” gripped around the waist she was tugged out of the way by Lee behind you with a loose dog that you turned and ducked to grip the collar of for the massive hockey player chasing the peppy husky. Off to the side her arm swung and open mouthed she gawked at the bag that collided with the brick building behind her while you tried to calm the husky now bounding around and between your legs wiggling for attention from his new friend. “My butterfly,” she murmured as the man came to a stop in front of you.
“I am so sorry about Leap Frog. Just took off out of the car, his first road trip.”
Shaking your head you giggled saying, “No problem, my cousins puppies were all the same way.” You said handing over the leash while he all but paled realizing who you were.
“Thank you,” he murmured again and turned to head back to his car with the dog where his friends were waiting for him.
Inside the bag Tracy peered and open mouthed she eyed the broken pieces of the butterfly then looked at you, “You have got to be kidding me.” You looked from her to the bag she pulled a folded wad of cash out of and you simply shrugged and she shook her head dropping it back into the bag before anyone else could see it. “You got skills. Like able to sway millions of cult followers skills.”
“Oh ya, come on up to my place, I got some kool-aid.” That had her rolling her eyes through your shard giggle, “When we die we get a whole bushel of golden geese and a bunch of mountaintop villas with a one of those terrifying pools that drops into a waterfall with a hele-pad and all the frills as our place as Kings of all the universes and dimensions.”
Teasingly she replied, “I got plans, so I’m gonna have to rain check on the kool-aid.”
“Missing out,” Lee teased while you smirked saying, “Have fun looking into that jade.”
.
“So how’s your day going?” Richard hummed through the line while soaking in the bath washing off a long muggy day of auditioning for some more ridiculous commercials and a spot on another tv show as yet another stunning adulterer.
“Had to call it early for rain and Lee and Tracy came with me to that jewelry shop you mentioned.”
“You saw what I mean then? Right in the door judging.”
“Oh yes and pushy. Which is what I was getting to,” you said seated while stirring your food up into a jumble waiting for it to cool.
“You picked out what you wanted?”
“Yes, and before I could say I’d come back with you later they wrote up the ring to be made.”
“Just determined for commission aren’t they.”
“And that’s the thing, five and a half grand total and they let me walk out without a deposit, apparently I’m elite clientele now fitting for their credit. Don’t know me from Adam, but it’ll be done in five weeks is what they said.”
“Good, should be there in three.”
“I don’t think it works like that.”
Lowly he chuckled, “I’ll be there in three, Dearest.”
“Oh, oh, you got a ticket back?” You squeaked our happily smiling at your empty apartment and muted tv.
“Yes, just for two and a half weeks but I get to see you before you fly out to New Zealand for Peter. Then when my shows are done I can fly out there with you for the tail end of that maybe take him up on his offer as a doomed extra.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, now, details about this stunner you drafted up, my Dearest Love.”
“Ok,” you smiled repeating the details of the ring warming his heart even more at the symbol of marriage you would be wearing sometime in the future that was coming up to being planned.
“Simply fantastic choice, and don’t worry on the price I have it and the Bard should be out of theaters soon so we can set part of that aside for any possible other nuptial plannings or purchases you feel up to.”
“What else, oh right, a dress and all that.”
Again he chuckled saying, “If need be pick a few options and if funds run thin I’ll pick the most forgiving to wear myself.” That had you laugh through his chuckle and he added, “I’d wear anything to marry you.”
“If I did have spares I’d make my cousins wear them. Go for traditional, confuse those demons after us.” Widening his smile imagining what you might want to wear for the distant big day.
“Any weird roles today?”
“There is one where I’m dancing with limes.”
“Wow,”
“Floor cleaners, odd ones, are you doing well otherwise?”
“Weird dream I saved William Shatner from drowning and then he turned into a llama and hopped into a convertible and drove off with Burt Reynolds.”
“Wow,”
“So weird. Just an odd day, and Tracy had me take her furniture shopping thanks to finding out I have a house, airplane and five cars on my finger.”
“They told you the price?! Oh Love, you deserve it you know that.”
“I, know, just, I’ll handle the price tag when I get over my heart attack of a paycheck for Kong and whatever Bard is going to be with our two percent box office check. Gran called and the managers are thrilled, said that it’s climbed to over $200 million, so whatever that stops at-,”
“I love you, clearly they didn’t expect you to turn a phenom and blow this out of the water like this.”
“As if your brooding didn’t have anything to do with it Mr Blue Eyes.” Making him chuckle again. “You are going to be quite famous ya know when this is on disc and everyone can see your face on movie shelves instead of just at the theaters. Not to mention when they see you as Mr Thornton.”
“I prefer you being the famous one and I just happen to be talented enough to have producers pick me to have your name attached as hey we hired Miss Pear’s Boy Toy.” Again he chuckled through your giggle knowing he was beaming proudly at the still lingering title. “Has your dad talked to you about his plan yet?”
“Plan?”
“About the brownstone the Landlord has out there?”
“I mean, I know about it, but, he has a plan with it? Like an actual plan?”
Again he chuckled lowly, “I love you, you know that. I suppose it was meant to be a surprise then when he dropped by again. Said he wanted to take you out there, Landlord had the wiring, plumbing, water heater and ac updated for it. Plaster should be redone when you get back as well.”
“How, do you feel about that?”
“I think it would be a home for you to own that I could cuddle up to you in. I do like the idea, we stay in mine out here and I want you to have a place where when we’re all there in New York with tons of space. It sounds amazing I know we can make it a home and there’d be tons of space for all your stuff from the apartment there and ours in Canada. Plus, Lee’s been having it rough with rent.”
“Ya,” you chuckled out, “I fronted him some cash on his place here he forgot Will had a card on his account and he ordered some ‘really rad sneakers’.” Making Richard chuckle, “Rules have been set, lesson learned on both ends. He is doing well though his parents are pleased he’s still alive.”
“Have you told him yet about the place?”
“Not really, I mentioned it that Dad had talked to the Landlord about it. He was flipping through our fuzzy channels at the time for something recognizable.”
“I am going to love cuddling with you to that cable, no lies, you will too. Just imagine those romances you love without z shaped heads on the lovers.” Luring a giggle from you.
“Imagine that, all those actors actually having heads.”
.
Spenser Breslin was the latest famous guest to drop in and on one of your night shoots this week between takes of a dinner between your on screen love interest and the Russian mail order bride who made him and you food the bag you’d tucked in the cupboard of your trailer began to ring. “Oh shit,” you said easing up out of your chair to the Director’s chuckle, “Thought I shut it off.”
You said about your phone and from the bag nestled between his and hers you pulled the phone to silence it only to mutter, “Why is she calling me? She never calls me.”
The Director said glancing at the teen seated on the couch bench you had left reading a book he’d brought, “Go ahead, we have to shift lights for Spence’s entrance.”
Answering the call from your cousin all eyes shot to your phone you pulled from your ear at the loud shrieking sea of obviously more than one of your cousins. “Bell,” You said easing the phone closer to your mouth but not your ear. “Not a dolphin.”
Muffled in a group the group shouted, “UNCLE’S ... NOMINATED!!!”
Their shouts died down and you brought the phone closer to your ear trying to make out the gist of what they all were saying. “I got ‘nominated’ and ‘uncle’, which uncle?”
A collective throat clearing was had and they said, “OUR UNCLE!!”
“Oh, your, my dad got nominated for something? What?”
One apparently chosen cousin said excitedly, “Uncle Joe got a letter today from MTV that he’s been nominated for the Best Villain Award!”
“No! Where is he?”
“We tackled him when he read it, so he’s hiding in the barn.” They all giggled out making your smile creep wider.
“When is it?”
“End of the week out in New York.”
“Least it’s not in LA, he want to go?”
“He has to! And he’s got a plus one!”
“Well I wasn’t gonna send him alone.” You glanced over at the still staring group smiling as you said, “Actually on set, but I’ll call him after I get off and love you guys try not to drive him up a tree.”
Giggles followed and they shouted, “LOVE YOU TOO BUNNY!!” Then promptly hung up making you shake your head and shut off the phone you put away again.
Joining the others with an excited squeak to your voice for a moment you said, “Dad got nominated for best villain from MTV.”
“Oh that’s awesome!” Rippled around while you took your seat again.
“Yes, his first award on acting sure he’s thrilled once my cousins stop swarming him.”
Spencer joked, “Well I’d be scared too if I had dolphins in my family.”
That had you giggle, “They don’t mean to be like that, just happens when they’re excited. “Quads, about your age.” You said bumping Spenser’ arm.
Love interest asked, “Quads?”
“Four babies at once.”
“How-?” He asked with voice trailing off in astonishment.
“I have a lot of cousins, mostly twins or higher.”
The mail order bride asked, “Scared to ask how many siblings you have.”
“Just me, lost mom when I was little. I don’t think her parents could have handled more than one of me. Got a bit of her unruly streak they battled with for years in her till she ran off with dad.”
She said with a smile, “Ooh, sounds whirlwind and like a fairy tale.”
That made your smile grow and you nodded, “Met when they were young and her parents didn’t want her running off with some rancher from Texas, she danced in the Bolshoi Ballet.” Parting their lips, “Which my grandparents have been on the board for since they retired and she chose the guy they said wasn’t good enough and it was a fairy tale for a little while, even had me. Hasn’t been that bad from them since they wanted to get involved, my schooling helped studying abroad they got to drop in and out when it was easiest for them. And Babu gets to try and spoil me with traveling and shopping funds he pretends to be very cross with me when I don’t spend it all.”
Spencer asked, “You went to a school in another country all alone? Why didn’t your dad go with you?”
Catching his eye you smiled answering, “He took a job on an oil rig to help me pay the difference on my tuition after my scholarships.”
“Weren’t you scared?”
That had your smile creep wider, “Absolutely, and I had terrible stage fright. And I was in England and when I got a job waiting tables everyone saw me as the sore thumb for my accent and my eyes. And I just didn’t talk to people past my Professors till I got locked out of my dorm one too many times studying past curfew and some guys let me bunk with them in their flat. They were from Chelsea all the way out alone in Oxford and I found some more sore thumbs to hang out and bunk with, that helped a bit.”
The guy said, “I thought Lee said you went to Julliard with him and Tracy.”
“I did both, Oxford for my Drama and Science degrees, Daddy said I needed a back up plan. Did that for a year then Julliard accepted me so his friend who owns apartment buildings got me a place and kept an eye on me for fall to spring between summers back in Oxford.”
She said, “I don’t like to fly how can you fly so often?”
You shrugged and love interest asked, “So when did your dad start acting?”
“Few years back, he was going to be an extra with me on the Lord of the Rings got put as an Uruk-hai after his rig got hit in a storm and they had to evacuate it. Been helping him to get work on film since so he didn’t have to go back, and I’ve graduated now so he’s just got baby fever waiting for grand babies to watch after while I work. He didn’t dream of being an actor now he’s got an award he must be so excited. I hope he wins.”
Spencer asked, “Which film did he play the villain in that he’s getting the award for?”
“Beast of Bards.”
That had his jaw drop, “The villain was your dad?! That guy was huge!”
Making you giggle, “Well he’s 6 ft 9,” dropping the love interest’s jaw too, “got his hair and eyes but I got my mom’s travel sized stature.”
The Director gave the signal that the lights were ready and Spencer added his book with the others on your shelf in the trailer and wiggled past your lifted legs to go outside to take his own mark while you readied to be the irritated third wheel and storm to the sink where love interest would come cuddle behind you. Right in front of the tiny window where the camera with a hat standing in for Spencer on this shot would see you and grow jealous enough to try and frame love interest for beating him up.
.
On his way to his car to take him to his hotel Spencer caught a moment at your side again and asked, “Hey Jaqi?” Getting a kind smile in return, “I got a question, you have all that family back home. Why would you want to act if it means you don’t get to be there with them and you have to be alone?”
“Well, my Mate said something to me once when he was switching from musical theater to drama school to act traditionally. If you can picture yourself doing anything else and still being happy you shouldn’t act. But if you can only see yourself content while being an actor and living with the rough times, the dry spells between roles, the rejections and bad reviews but you still couldn’t do anything else then you should stick in there and put in the work. Back in school they tell us it takes ten years on average to be an overnight success. And the way I figure it I could always call, we mail tapes all the time. So ya I miss home and my family but I have all these amazing stories to tell my little cousins, and if you could just see New Zealand, that trip alone could have fed my fire for a decade alone and I get to go back again for King Kong, with my favorite Director and crew that feels like family. Roles are hit and miss, but I wouldn’t be happy behind a microscope in a job to be back home by nightfall. And my Mate acts too along with most of my friends so we all sort of mesh in together on our own adventures. You’re still a kid, you don’t have to iron it all out now, just see where the road takes you.”
Sheepishly he said, “I do like music. But my agent says I don’t have a look for musical films.”
You scoffed at that, “You think the big bands before the 90’s got universal approval on their looks? No, they had a killer voice and a sound no one could touch, and doesn’t matter what you look like if you got a song in you no one has heard yet you go and belt it out. Someone’ll turn their head. Keep working on your music too, hone your craft. Never hurts to have some versatility. Ten years, you got tons of time.” Making his smile creep out in his nodding turn for the car that pulled up with his dad and manager inside talking about his next plans for travel for another role.
Once inside the taxi a crew member had guided you to they called you pulled out your phone calling your dad with a smile. “Hey Daddy, congratulations.”
“They swarmed me.”
You giggled hearing the sounds of the sheep he was clearly still hiding with to pretend he was busy to go back in again. “I heard. We’re all just so proud of you. Can’t wait to go with you, we going fancy or casual?”
“No way we can’t go fancy. Gonna be in front of people. What if I have to give a speech? I don’t know what to say. It’s different with a camera there’s no reaction from a camera but I’ve seen those shows and there’s a crowd.”
“Well a simple thank you might be ok, I mean-,”
“I didn’t even talk that much on film, and it was mainly to you.”
“Well Anthony Hopkins wasn’t all talk in Silence of the Lambs, had his silent intimidation moments. It doesn’t have to be long. Loads of villains are silently intimidating.”
“I’ll figure it out.”
“Uncle Joe!” You heard faint through the line making you smile wider.
“Oh they found me.”
“Love you, Daddy.”
“I’ll get Jim to help me write something. He talks all the time at his job. Love you Pumpkin, see you in New York.”
Pt 39
Hobbit – Soulmate - @evyiione​​, @deepestfirefun, @rhaenaatargaryen, @anastasialovers
X all Rich. A - @abiwim​, @deepestfirefun​, @thestorybookmistress
X Lee P - @tigereyesf​
All –
@himoverflowers​, @theincaprincess​​, @aspiringtranslator​​, @thegreyberet​​, @patanghill17​​, @jesgisborne​​, @curvestrology​​, @alishlieb​​, @jogregor​​, @armitageadoration​​, @fizzyxcustard​​, @lilith15000​​, @marvels-ghost​​, @catthefearless​​, @imjusthereforthereads​​, @c-s-stars​​, @otakumultimuse-hiddlewhore​​, @mariannetora​​, @shes-a-killer-kween​, @ggbbhehe4455
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bunysliper · 4 years
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Castle Ficlet: Treasured part 2
Kay, so the 1/1 on my double drabble from the other day ended up being a little bit of a fib, thanks to @thefifthsister for suggesting a part 2 yesterday! ;) (Sadly, I wasn’t able to finish the ficlet then, but here it is!)
Treasured Part 2
Read part 1 here
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 "Mommy, you gotta cwose your eyes."
 She does just the opposite, looking up from watching her son nurse to make eye contact with her daughter. Lily has been awake since before dawn, greeting Kate with a bright smile and the same frenzied energy that she had displayed for the arrival of Santa at Christmas, only submitting to being cuddled between her parents for a short amount of time before she tugged Rick out of bed and insisted they get started on "fings." So far, she shows no signs of slowing down.
 "I do?" she asks, tilting her head. "Why baby?"
 Lil heaves herself onto the bed once again, giving Jake a careful look on her way closer. He's reclining in his boppy pillow, easy and content having just had his turn for breakfast. The baby kicks his feet as she nears, his eyes widening with joy.
 "Hi Jakey," she chirps, rubbing his belly. "S'Momma's Day, did you know it?"
 Jake grins, babbling in response. Lily offers a serious nod. "Uh huh. Dat's wight. S'gotta be special for Mommy."
 A gentle smile touches her lips. "It already is special for me, Little Flower," Kate murmurs, freeing a hand from under Reece to brush Lily's hair off her cheek. Rick had no doubt tried, but Lily obviously had other ideas; the ponytail holder is still in her hair, it just isn't holding much of the girl's hair at this point. "I have you and Daddy, and Peanut Butter and Jelly."
 Lily leans into the affection, offering a skeptical look after a moment. "Ya, but s'not pwesents."
 "I think you are," Kate says, leaning over to kiss Lily's nose. "But I do love presents, so if you have more, I'm okay with that, too."
 Her daughter beams, nodding quickly. "Ya! But you gotta cwose your eyes."
Kate laughs. "Let me finish feeding Reece first, okay?" she asks, checking her son's face. He blinks up at her, his fingers curling against her breast. "That way I have both hands to open my goodies."
 Lily sighs, lowering her chin and offering Kate an exaggerated pout. She does agree, though, bouncing onto her knees and leaning over Jake.
 "Don't wowwy, Jakey, I helped pick a pwesent fo' you to give Mommy, too."
 "That was very kind of you, Lily."
 Lily leans on her hand, tilting her head. "Daddy 'gested it."
 Kate nods, pressing her lips together to keep from laughing. "Well, I appreciate it, even if Daddy was the one to suggest it. The boys are still too little to pick things out on their own, and it's very sweet of you to help them."
 "I know."
 This time, she snickers. Well, she doesn't have to worry about Lily knowing the value of her contributions.
 A few minutes later, Reece releases his latch on her breast and stretches in her arms. Kate lifts him to her shoulder, giving his back gentle pats until he belches in her ear.
 Lily giggles. "Eww. 'scuse you."
 Kate laughs. "We'll teach him to say excuse me when he burps."
 Lily hides another giggle behind her hand, nodding. A moment later, she perks up. "Oh, he's done! Pwesent time!"
 She scrambles off the bed without another word, tearing out of the room and toward the kitchen where Rick has been for entirely too long not to be going overboard making food. Kate settles Reece on her thigh, looking between her sons and shaking her head.
 "What are we going to do with your crazy sister and your crazy Daddy, boys? What are we going to do with them?"
 Her sons squeak, clapping their hands in response. Her belly flutters with affection; she's biased beyond belief, but they really are getting cuter every day as their personalities have started to shine.
 "Yeah, I think we'll just have to keep them, too."
 "Well, I'd certainly hope so," Rick says from the doorway. He offers her a sly, lopsided grin before twisting to let Lily pass. "Careful, Sprout. Walk slowly."
 Lily grins over the top of a large wrapped box, taking measured steps toward Kate. She manages to get the box to the bed without incident, hauling it onto the comforter with a mighty grunt. It wobbles a bit, but Lily shoves it toward the center of the bed until it bumps Kate's knee.
 "S'fwom me. Daddy has the others," she explains, climbing onto the bed once again. Kate nods, splitting her attention between her squirming daughter and her husband. Rick takes that as his cue to move closer, balancing the tray of food – oh, so much food – and the aforementioned wrapped gifts on his way to the bed.
 "Wow," she breathes. Lily squirms closer, draping over Kate's leg in an odd little rendition of a hug (one that involves bony elbows and the possibility of bruises, but it's still sweet). "This is a lot for me, guys."
 Her husband's smile deepens. "Don't worry, Beckett, we'll help with the smorgasbord."
 She snorts. "You'd better."
 "But firs'," Lily says, lifting her head. "My pwesent!"
 Castle chuckles. "Remember, Sprout, it's a present from you, for Mommy."
 "I know dat, Daddy," she says, trading an exasperated look with Kate. "M'just escited for Mommy ta open mine."
 "I'll open yours first, sweetheart. Just let me have just one sip of coffee," Kate murmurs, holding out a hand for one of the mugs Castle has on the tray. Her husband nods but puckers, indicating that they'll be trading a kiss for the coffee. His lips curve against hers when she calls him a cheat.
 "Opportunist, Kate, not a cheat," he says, helping her maneuver the mug around their daughter without disturbing Reece in her other arm. The boy seems happy enough to be jostled just a little, giggling when she pitches from side to side with him.
 Once they're settled, Rick leans over to lift Jake into his arms. "Don't want you feeling left out, Jelly," he murmurs, pressing kisses to their son's hair.
 Kate watches with soft eyes as Rick gets Jake settled. He's so good with them, with all of them – her included.
 "Mommy, nooow?"
 A laugh slips out before she can stop it. She makes a show of setting the coffee down on the tray once more. "Yes, yes, Little Flower, noooow."
 Lily sits up, pulling the box toward them. "Happy Mommy Day!"
 Her heart stammers in her chest. No matter how long it's been, no matter how many sleepless nights she has, or tears they cry, sometimes it still takes her by surprise: this is her life. These are her babies; her kooky, bright girl, her giggly, sweet boys. She is their mom.
 "Thank you, baby," Kate whispers, clearing her throat.
 Lily grins, grabbing Kate's hand and setting it on a bumpy edge of the paper. "Now, wip it!"
 Across from them, Rick chuckles. "Yeah, Kate. Really tear into it."
 "I'm savoring it," she murmurs, just a little bit haughty.
 "That's boring," her husband and her daughter say as one, sharing gleeful smiles afterward. So alike, it's scary.
 She just grins, pressing a kiss to Reece's hair. "Wanna help me? You and Lily can help me."
 That's enough for Lil; with permission fully given, her daughter starts to tear haphazard wrapping paper strips from the box, exposing the plain brown cardboard enough for Kate to slide a nail under the flap and lift the tape covering the flaps.
 Reece grabs for the bubble wrap the moment he spots it, whining at Kate's quick reflexes to snatch it from his hand before the plastic can make it to his mouth.
 "Oh no you don't. Bubble wrap is not for gumming."
 Lily giggles. "Jus' poppin'!"
 "Right," she agrees, handing the sheet over to her daughter to poke at the bubbles. Lily beams, nudging her to continue looking in the box.
 A brightly colored, wound handle catches her eye first, but the glazed ceramic teapot she pulls from the box takes her breath away.
 "Lil, this is beautiful," she breathes.
 "S'a elphant, Mommy!" Lily chirps, abandoning the bubble wrap to beam up at her. "'Cause, 'cause, 'cause you lub 'em."
 Kate blinks, clearing away the prick of tears from her eyes. "I do love them, baby. Thank you." She takes a moment to lower the teapot, careful not to bump the delicate piece, before pulling Lily into a gentle hug. "You know, your grandma – my mommy – loved elephants, too. And I started to love them because of her. That's why I have the elephants that were hers on my desk in my office," she explains, resting her cheek on Lily's head.
 "But as much as I loved them before, I love them even more now, because I have one from you."
------
Thank you for reading! If you’d like to read the entire thing in one go, read it here.
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snowdice · 3 years
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Big Bang (Sort of) Editing Story [Day 34]
I started writing this fic while editing my Big Bang story, but am going to continue doing it for other things now that Kill Dear is out. I will write and publish 100 words of the story every time I finish doing whatever task I’m doing. If you’d like to block these proceedings, please feel free to block the tag proofread stories. I will reblog this post with the parts of the story I do today. Edited chapters are linked; everything else I’ve done so far is under the cut.
My Master Post Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11
Let’s do this!
Chapter 12
Logan had needed to spend some time performing royal duties today which left Patton and Virgil alone after breakfast. Patton had started out trying to teach Virgil different board games. He’d seemed intrigued at first, but after a few games of checkers seemed to grow bored. Patton had gotten a blank stare when he’d asked if Virgil had any ideas about what to do for fun, so now he was trying to figure out something else they could do. He cast his eyes around at what Logan had in his bedroom.
“How about I read you a book?” he suggested.
 Virgil seemed very intrigued by that idea. “Sure,” he said.
“Okay!” Patton said cheerfully. “He popped to his feet and glanced through the small shelf of fiction books Logan kept in his room. He decided to choose one of the lighter ones that Logan and he had liked to read when they were younger. “This one is called The Never-ending Garden,” Patton said. “It’s about a group of four children and their adventures in a garden. It’s full of magic and adventure and friendship! Is that alright with you?”
“It sounds good,” Virgil answered.
Patton happily walked back over to sit next to him. “It is!” he said.
 First, he showed Virgil the picture on the cover of a wild looking garden with four kids roaming through it. One of the children was in a little red wagon being pulled by another one wearing a fancy hat. One of the others was walking, looking at a map while the last had a wooden sword. After giving Virgil a couple of moments too look at the picture, Patton cracked it open.
“We start with Lydia’s perspective,” Patton said. “She’s one of my favorites!” He pointed to a picture of a girl in a raincoat at the beginning of the chapter and Virgil leaned slightly closer to see. Then, Patton cleared his voice.
 “It had been raining that day,” Patton began, “but Lydia had been so bored that she still begged her father to go out and play when the storm lightened into a sprinkle. He made her change from the yellow dress she had been wearing into the one she often used to help him garden because he knew she was certain to get herself muddy. Her younger brother Marcus asked if he could come too and though part of her wanted to say no because she wanted to explore on her own without her baby brother slowing her down, her father had taught her to be a good big sister, so she agreed to let him come.”
 Patton watched Virgil out of the corner of his eye as he read about Lydia meeting up with the neighbor boy, Al, and the three children started to explore the garden in Lydia’s backyard. Virgil leaned in slightly to look at the pictures and listen to the story intently as the three children traveled deeper and deeper into the garden, but never made it to the back fence. They’d just made it to the part where they heard rustling behind the blackberry bush which Patton knew was the last main character, Melly, when Patton felt the need to adjust his posture a bit. Virgil moved in kind and ended up leaning further into Patton.
 Without even really thinking about it, Patton brought his arm around to touch the top of his head. Virgil flinched the second Patton made content and Patton drew the hand away immediately. “Sorry,” he said with a wince. Patton was a naturally touching person and he’d been having trouble battling his instincts to cuddle everyone and everything while around Virgil, but he knew most touch was not welcome. The poor thing startled every time Patton went to touch him unannounced and even sometimes when he’d said something before doing it.
“I-it’s okay,” Virgil said.
Patton gave him a tight lipped smiled and turned back to the book.
 He stilled a second later when Virgil leaned back in and their shoulders brushed. He blinked over at him. “Oh,” he said softly. “Do… do you want me to touch your hair?”
Virgil curled up into himself a little bit but then nodded.
“Okay,” Patton said. “I’m going to put my arm around you and do that then, okay?” He drew upon his years and years of convincing easily startled cats to allow him to give them pats as he slowly moved his arm back to where it had been before and gently touched the side of his head. He tensed, but didn’t startle this time, and so Patton gently ran his fingers through the hair a couple of times. Eventually, the tension bled out of him and he sort of slumped against Patton’s shoulder. Patton just barely restrained a coo before going back to reading. He continued to stroke the side of Virgil’s hair as he described the gang meeting up with Melly and them being told she was a fairy that lived in the garden.
 He'd only gotten to the part about them finding the wagon when Virgil started to shift a bit uncomfortably, his neck craned in an awkward angle. Patton kept reading as he brought the hand in his hair down to his shoulder and pushed lightly. There was the slightest bit of resistance as Virgil didn’t know what he was trying to do, but then he allowed Patton to move him. Patton leaned back a bit and picked the book up off his lap before continuing to push him down. Virgil did not help at all, seeming confused about what was going on.
 Patton had to poke him around until he was on his back laying across Patton’s lap. He grinned down at the boy who was looking at him in blatant bewilderment and propped the book up on his chest. He held it there with one of his hands and stretched the other out to resume messing with his hair. Virgil relaxed into the new position after a few minutes of reading, eyes shutting as he enjoyed the attention. His eyes would flicker open every time Patton moved to show him a picture, but other than that, he seemed content to not move.
 Eventually, he stopped responding when Patton moved to show him the pictures.
“Are you asleep?” he asked quietly. When he didn’t get a response, he bookmarked the last picture Virgil had responded to, and then continued reading to himself.
Eventually, there was a knock at the door. It was the one he and Logan had decided on to tell the other one that it was just them and not to panic when the door opened. The door opened to Logan a moment later.
He paused, taking in the sight of the assassin sprawled across Patton’s lap like a sleepy kitten. He shook his head fondly and walked over to them on silent feet. He bent and pressed a hand to the top of Virgil’s hand. Virgil stirred just barely, but didn’t open his eyes, pressing into the touch a bit.
Logan smiled. “He wanted to learn how to make protection charms today. I assume you’d like to join us?” Patton perked up and nodded happily, making Logan chuckle softly. “I will go set it up then. Would you like another book for the time being?”
“Just the one I was reading last night would be nice,” Patton said.
“Of course.” Logan stepped away to grab it and handed it to him. Then, he disappeared into his potion’s lab. Patton smiled down at Virgil’s sleeping face and settled the new book onto his chest to replace the children’s book. He didn’t even stir.
  Chapter 13
Logan was able to quickly set up the station for making protection charms. Patton had always liked making them, though he often used his more as fun accessories than for protection. The one he was going to show Virgil how to make was a very simple low level one used for little more than to keep bugs off of yourself and, in the event of a well made one, alert one to imminent danger by changing temperature. It was a nice thing to hold in the middle of the night if one was frightened by real or imagined threats. It would be warm to the touch when your environment was safe; he thought Virgil might appreciate it.
 He and Patton decided to wait until Virgil woke up naturally which only took about 30 minutes. Then, Logan brought him to his set up supplies. He explained briefly the process for making a protection charm. “I will be the one performing the enchantment for today,” he told Virgil. “I will show you how to make your own later, but I thought seeing how to make them would help with the learning process.”
“Plus, it’s fun!” Patton said.
Logan flashed a smile at him. “And that as well. I’ve prepared a small number of possible pendants for you to choose from. You can choose the shape and color, then we will put on a custom engraving, as well as decorations.”
 “Glitter! Glitter! Glitter! Glitter!”
“Yes, Patton, everyone knows you’re going to choose glitter,” Logan said, amused, “but why don’t we let Virgil decide for his own pendant?”
“Fine,” Patton said, “but mine will be glitter.”
Logan grabbed the box of blank pendants and offered it to Virgil. “Choose whichever one feels right,” he suggested. Virgil moved forward and looked over the box. “You can touch them,” Logan said. “In fact, I would suggest it as it is meant to be held when it’s done and you may as well get a feel for it.”
At his prompting, Virgil did. He reached into the box and shifted a few to the side. Eventually, he started picking a few up. “I like the crescent shape for holding the most he said,” holding a blue one up, but I don’t know.”
“What’s your favorite color?” Patton asked.
“Oh, um,” he mumbled. “I dunno.”
“Well here,” Patton said, reaching for the box. He dug through it and pulled out every single crescent moon shaped pendant and lined them up. “What do you fancy?”
Virgil considered them all for a long moment and then tentatively pointed the purple one out.
“Great!” Patton said. “Then, we’ll use that one.”
Virgil nodded and Patton picked up the pendant to drop it into his hands. His fingers curled over the shape and he seemed satisfied by the choice, so Logan turned to Patton. “Your turn,” he said.
Patton happily grabbed out a heart shaped blue one, but then paused and exchanged it for a purple one. “We match!” he said.
Virgil smiled slightly at his enthusiasm, and Logan dug out a blue crescent moon shape for himself. “Now that you have your base, you get to choose the engraving.” He opened up the instruction book to the correct page and showed it to him.
Virgil looked over the two pages of designs with carful focus. He wavered between the spiral sun and the flames for a moment, but eventually settled on the flames. Patton chose the interlocking hearts design as anticipated; it was his favorite, and Logan chose the spiral sun design for himself.
“Now, I’m going to engrave this design onto yours,” Logan said getting out the thin pen like instrument and dipping it into the slightly glowing bottle of potion he’d set out. “In the meantime, Patton will show you what we have for decorations.”
He was careful to get the symbol as perfect as he could and then started on Patton’s. Patton apparently managed to corrupt the boy because both of them came back with brushes and glitter to add as decoration.
Logan shook his head and handed them their freshly engraved pendants. “Apply the glitter how you like,” Logan said, moving on to his own engraving. Once he was finished, he selected some glow in the dark paint to decorate his own.
 Once he’d finished decorating his own pendant, Logan looked up. “Are you finished?” he asked.
“Yep!” Patton said, shoving his pendant at Logan while Virgil nodded. Virgil had been far less enthusiastic than Patton, having carefully brushed glitter into the flame design only whereas Patton had haphazardly covered his own all over with glitter. Logan took both pendants.
“This,” Logan said, bringing over a different potion, “is used to make sure the decorations never fall off. It basically allows the other substances to become a part of the stone. “It isn’t too dangerous, but I’d suggest you stand back for the moment.”
 Virgil stepped back farther back than was strictly necessary and gave the potion bottle a wary look. Logan moved all three pendants to the prepared surface (else they ran the risk of also getting stuck to the table) and put on gloves, having learned that magically gluing rocks to ones hands was not fun years ago. Then, he carefully drizzled a bit of the potion onto each rock. The rocks fizzled loudly, and Virgil gave off a startled yelp before toppling over flat on his face with his wrist glued to his sides.
“Oh no, honey,” Patton said immediately crouching next to him. “I’m sorry. We should have warned you about the noise.”
Logan wasn’t sure what type of action he’d tried to take when the sound started up, but whatever it was, it had caused him to move his arms fast enough that he’d activated the binding potion and it snapped his wrists to his side, overbalancing him.
 Patton’s hands hovered over the startled boy, but he didn’t touch. After a few moments, it was clear that the magic keeping Virgil’s hands at his side released because his hands slowly crept forward to push himself up, so his face wasn’t planted against the ground. His eyes still looked incredibly startled.
“Are you alright?” Patton asked.
Virgil blinked. “Yeah, I’m fine,” he said.
Logan took his words as permission to move without risking startling him more. Virgil’s eyes bopped back and forth between him and Patton a few times as he crossed to his wall of potions and grabbed one.
 He also selected a clean cloth from a basket on his way over to them. “A light healing potion,” Logan explained as he knelt in front of Virgil. He uncorked it. “May I?”
“I’m fine,” Virgil said with a frown. “I’m not even bleeding. It’s barely anything.”
“Which is why it’s a light healing potion,” Logan said. “You are sure to bruise with the way you hit. This will prevent it and make it stop hurting.”
“Okay,” Virgil agreed after a moment. Logan dribbled a bit out onto the rag. After a moment of thought, he touched the damp part of the cloth with his own finger, just to quash any fears that it would harm him.
 “It will tingle slightly,” Logan warned. Virgil tilted his face to let him dab it onto his nose and the light scrape on his face. His nose scrunched up and he moved to rub the sensation away quickly only to have his arms slam back to his sides.
Patton caught him so the sudden involuntary movement didn’t cause him to fall back, and then giggled when Virgil titled his head to what could only be described as pout back at him.
“Aw, poor thing,” Patton cooed, reaching forward to rub a hand across the top of his nose and then his forehead where the potion had been applied for him.
 “Better?” Patton asked.
“You’re really bad at this being captors thing,” Virgil commenting, willingly leaning back into Patton. Patton just smiled happily.
Logan took the bottle and got to his feet, before returning it, and then glanced at the pendants as Patton helped Virgil to his feet. The pendants had stopped fizzing, so Logan felt okay reaching in and grabbing them all.
He handed both Patton and Virgil their pendants when they walked closer to the table.
“And now for the actual enchantment,” Logan said. “For today, I already prepared the potion up to the last step as it has to sit for a few hours, but I will show you the last step and eventually teach you everything if you are still interested.”
 Virgil nodded, but said. “No more noises?”
Logan smiled. “No more noises,” he confirmed. Then he pushed forward all of the ingredients he was about to put in the pot for Virgil to study one by one before putting them each in it in the correct order. Then he demonstrated how to stir it correctly and told him how many times, though he doubted he’d be able to retain all of the information from this one demonstration. “There,” he said, setting down his spoon. “Now we just all put our pendants into the pot, and they should be ready in 25 minutes.”
 Logan showed Virgil around his potion’s lab while they waited, explaining what certain pieces of equipment did and a bit about his organization system. Virgil followed him around, looking at the things he pointed out curiously. He, however, got very distracted when Logan showed him one of the experiments he’d concocted. It was a thick liquid that was super attracted to itself and would form a small ball that could be disturbed by touching it. He seemed to like the sensation of squishing it down onto a table… over and over and over again.
“We should get him a ball of yarn,” Patton said out of the corner of his mouth. He may have been enjoying watching Virgil play with the substance more than Virgil was enjoying playing with it himself. And that was saying something.
21984
Eventually, however, the pendants were finished, and he dragged Virgil away from his new toy to show him the finished product.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“Is it supposed to be warm?” Virgil inquired.
“Yes,” Logan replied. “It’s temperature changes based on if the magic on it senses a threat or not. Warmer temperatures mean you are safe.
“Oh,” Virgil said softly, hand squeezing around it. “I like it.”
Logan found himself smiling. “I’m glad. It’s yours.”
“Thank you,” he said.
“If you would like, I’m sure Patton has some suggestions if you’d desire a way to keep it attached to your person. He in particular likes to make them into necklaces or clip them to his clothing.”
Virgil looked over at Patton and nodded shyly. Patton immediately perked up. “I’ll go get some supplies!” he said.
  Chapter 14
“So then,” Patton was saying. “We ran to the stables.”
“We went to gazebo first,” Logan cut in.
“Right, we tried to go to the gazebo first,” Patton corrected, “but Mr. Deknis was over there tending to the tomatoes, and we knew he’d tell Mama the second he saw us. So, then we turned around and went to the stables.”
Virgil tilted his head, listening to the story Patton was telling. Patton was not the best storyteller. He tended to get lost in the middle and embellish, though Logan always corrected him. It was still very entertaining to watch though because he got incredibly animated. He’d even toppled himself over in excitement a couple of times.
 Virgil squeezed the small pillow he had in his lap. He… wasn’t 100% sure what was going on. Logan and Patton had settled him on the blanket covered ground near Logan’s bed and proceeded to feed him snacks and talk about a lot of different things. It had started with them talking about what they’d done that day, and when Patton had made reference to something Virgil hadn’t understood, the two of them ended up talking about things from their childhood.
Virgil found himself entranced by their stories about playing in and running around the castle. It was all so different from what Virgil had experienced.
 “…but, right as we were about to get to the ladder to climb up into the hay loft, Logan tripped!” Patton said, arms whipping around him. “He fell into a container of grain for the horses and it spilled all over the place. He tried to get up but grabbed the edge of the water trough and apparently it wasn’t very secure because it fell over and soaked him. So, then he was wet and covered in grain. He looked hilarious.”
“I did not!” Logan protested, but it did not sound like all of the other times he’d corrected Patton’s stories that night.
 Patton looked over at him. “You did! You woke up the cute stable hand and he laughed himself silly at you, and by the time we got you even partially cleaned up, your dad had already found us. That’s how we got caught.”
“I have no recollection of these events,” Logan clearly lied, his cheeks a bit flushed.
“Liar,” Patton claimed. “You complained about picking grain out of your sheets for weeks.”
“No,” Logan growled.
“Yes! It’s okay. It was a good laugh.”
Logan’s eyes narrowed on him, and he looked pissed, but a second later, his expression lightened up. “You know what else was a ‘good laugh’?” he asked.
 There was a second of silence before…
“Don’t you dare Logan.”
Logan looked him directly in the eye. “Patton was thirteen,” Logan started, but was interrupted the next moment when Patton lobbed a pillow at his head. Logan grabbed the pillow and leaned forward to smack Patton back with it. “He was thirteen and had just ‘discovered boys’ as his mother and my father called it when they attempted to explain his behavior to me. The focus of said ‘discovering’ at the time was the son of an ambassador from Lamir” who was staying for the summer, a seventeen-year-old boy by the name Bernardo.”
 Virgil flinched back as Patton suddenly threw himself across the semicircle they’d made with their bodies to tackle Logan to the ground. He watched as they ineffectually wrestled on the ground for a few seconds before Logan, voice strained continued to speak, while battling Patton’s hands away from his mouth.
“Patton’s only knowledge about flirting… ow… at that point was laughing at everything someone said and touching their arms and shoulders.” Logan managed to flip himself onto his stomach which was a horrible move as far as Virgil was concerned. It put him at a disadvantage to get out of the pin. However, Patton just kept reaching for his mouth and didn’t bare down on his neck to try to cut off his oxygen like Virgil expected. So, perhaps it was a rational move. “Our parents were speaking leaving Patton, Bernardo, and I in the garden,” Logan mumbled into the ground. “Bernardo said something ‘funny’ and Patton went to slap his shoulder while laughing, but shoved too hard… Patton did you just lick my face?!”
 “And I’ll do it again if you don’t shut up!” Patton threatened. That was a… weird fighting strategy.
Logan paused to consider his options. “He shoved Bernardo into the fountain and when Bernardo asked him why he did that, he ran away and wouldn’t talk to him the rest of the summer!” Logan rushed out.
Patton reached over and grabbed the nearest pillow, proceeding to whack him viciously in the back of the head. Logan was lucky the nearest object was a pillow and not something any sturdier. “It’s not funny!” Patton yelled, smacking him even more, which was when Virgil realized Logan was laughing despite the pinning and pillow pummeling. “It’s not!” Patton said. “I really liked him!!”
 “He was seventeen!” Logan said. “It was never going to happen!”
Patton groaned and rolled off of Logan to lay on his back and stare at the ceiling. “But he had so many muscles,” Patton said. “He probably could have thrown me 10 yards.”
“And that is… a benefit?” Logan asked, rolling over onto his side to face him.
“You don’t. Get me.” Patton tilted his head to look at Virgil. “Anyway,” he said. “That is the story of how I died at 13.”
Virgil stared at him, and Patton’s forehead crinkled looking at him.
“Is something wrong, honey?” he asked.
 “What was that?” Virgil asked.
“What was what?”
Virgil just blinked at him. Patton seemed to think for a moment.
“Oh, did you think we were fighting?” Patton asked. “Like, really fighting?”
“You weren’t fighting?” Virgil asked.
“No, sweetie,” Patton said. “We were just playing.” He popped up into a sitting position. “Well, play fighting, but emphasis on play!”
Virgil looked over at Logan for confirmation. “No one is harmed nor was there any intention to harm each other,” he assured.
Patton grabbed the pillow he’d been smacking Logan with. “Like this!” he said. “Bap.” Unlike how he’d smacked Logan ruthlessly, he basically just touched Virgil’s shoulder with it.
 Virgil squinted at him.
“Bap!” Patton said again, smacking him again, this time with a little bit more force and on the cheek. Virgil’s nose scrunched up. “Pillow fight!”
“Pillow fight?”
“You try,” he said, pointing to the pillow in Virgil’s lap.
Virgil glanced down at the bands around his wrist. “Um…” he said. “I don’t think I can?”
“Oh, right,” Patton said with a frown. He bit his lip and glanced over at Logan. “Maybe…”
“Ill-advisable,” Logan said.
“But…” Patton said. “Pillow fight.”
“We would have to be very cautious and make sure there were no weapons in the area.”
“No weapons but pillows!”
 “Fine,” Logan relented to whatever was going on. “Let’s clear the area.” Virgil watched them with mounting confusion as they removed everything within a few meters radius of him except for pillows and blankets.
“There!” Patton said after a minute. “All done!”
“What are you doing?” Virgil said.
“We’re going to have a pillow fight,” Patton said.
“But I…”
“We’ll temporarily allow your restraints to be in the third setting like when you’re in the closet.”
Were they serious? Were they stupid? Virgil could have killed them dozens of times with the second setting and now they were giving him even more range of motion?
 “You have to promise not to try to hurt anyone though,” Patton said. Virgil stared at him dumbly, as Patton held out his pinky finger. “Pinky promise.”
“Pinky promise?”
Patton nodded solemnly. “We lock pinky fingers and make a promise. It’s the most binding promise in the universe.”
Virgil looked at his finger, confused. He’d never heard of that type of deal. “What kind of magic is it?”
“No magic,” Patton said. “Just friendship.” Virgil tilted his head but brought his hand up so Patton could twine their fingers together. “Now, promise you won’t hurt anyone.”
“I promise I won’t hurt anyone,” he said.
“It’s a deal!” said Patton, squeezing Virgil’s finger with his own briefly before drawing away. “I trust you.” Virgil felt a rush of something that was no type of magic he’d ever come into contact before but was definitely far more powerful.
 Logan came over to them and waved his hand over the restraints on Virgil. They buzzed slightly and Virgil looked between them. “So, I just hit you with pillows?”
“Try not to hit too hard near the face, and Lo and I should probably take off our glasses before we start, but yeah,” Patton said, taking his glasses off as he said it. It was yet another foolish move on his part. “It’s fun, and it doesn’t hurt.”
“Okay…” Virgil said.
“I will demonstrate,” Logan said as he took a pillow and smacked Patton in the stomach.
“Hey! No fair!” Patton giggled. “We haven’t started yet!” This did not deter Logan however, as he continued to smack Patton with a pillow.
“On the contrary,” he said. “It has started, and we’re getting you first.”
 “No,” Patton whined, but the way he crumpled to the ground under the onslaught seemed far too staged to make Virgil worry. He didn’t even try to curl up into a ball or to protect his head, just taking the hits and giggling.
Logan looked up at Virgil and motioned with his head. Virgil inched over and looked down at Patton. Logan slowed for a few moments. “Go on,” he urged.
Virgil bit his lip and reached forward to smack Patton lightly with his pillow which seemed to do nothing to him but renew his peels of giggles. From there, it was easy to continue. Logan picked up the pace of his strikes and he and Virgil proceeded to ‘fight’ Patton until he couldn’t breath through his laughter and pushed the pillows away, curling up on his side to recover.
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“No what?” Virgil asked when Patton sat up.
“Now I get vengeance!” Patton said, popping to his feet and smacking Logan in the face. “Help me Virgil!” So, Virgil turned on Logan and he and Patton gave the prince the same treatment. Then, because it was only fair, it was Virgil’s turn, though they were a lot more careful with him then they’d been with each other, and really Patton spent more of the time checking in on Virgil then actually hitting him with the pillow. It was nice. Fun. And when Virgil pushed them away, they pulled back. Then, it was Patton’s turn again and they went around teaming up on each other and sometimes just smacking at each other at random.
  Eventually, they slowed, and all ended up laying near each other on the floor.
“Well, that made me hungry,” Patton said, sitting up and stretching. “I asked Mama to make us a bunch of mini sandwiches with different flavors. I’ll go get them.”
He hopped to his feet to walk over to where they’d stored the food earlier in those little glowing magical balls Logan had for food preservation.
Logan and Virgil sat up too, and Virgil offered him his wrists.
“Right,” Logan said with a blink. He made a motion and Virgil could feel the magic weighing down his hands once again. He’d almost forgotten, Virgil thought with an internal sigh. They’d given an assassin free range of motion, had a pillow fight with him, and almost forgotten to restrain him again. What was Virgil going to do with these idiots?
  Chapter 15
Patton strolled up to the doors to the royal wing, his arms crossed casually around his middle.
Kalani raised an eyebrow as he approached and gave her the most innocent expression he could. “Whatcha got there, Pat?” she asked.
“Hmm?” he asked, as his sweater squirmed. “What do you mean?”
She considered him for a moment. “Well, I see nothing suspicious here,” she said. “Do you Owen?”
“Nothing,” he replied without hesitation.
Patton grinned at them both.
Kalani leaned in like she was going to tell him a secret. “Who is it?”
Patton made a show of glanced around like he was hiding it from anyone passing by. Then he shifted around to pull up just the bottom of his sweater.
 A small black paw reached out from the depths of his sweater and swatted at the air.
“Ah, I see,” Kalani said, reaching out to touch the little paw. “Hello, Mittens.”
Patton giggled as Owen poked the cat’s stomach gently through the sweater, making her wiggle a bit and try to bite him.
“Well,” Patton said. “I better be off with my totally normal sweater.”
Kalani nodded and stepped to the side, and Patton was free to head down the hallway to Logan’s room. Patton knocked on the door with their new extra secret knock and Logan all but ripped open the door. “I’m late. I have to go,” he said, darting past Patton.
 Patton smiled, happy that his plan to be running a little late to come watch Virgil had worked so well, even though he felt a little bit guilty about it. He hoped Logan wasn’t late to his meeting, but he also knew that if Logan had noticed Mittens, he wouldn’t have let her into the room.
Virgil was already out of the closet, sitting on one of the chairs. Patton came in and smiled at him. Unlike Logan, Virgil’s attention was immediately drawn to the oddly shaped lump in Patton’s sweater.
“You’re not very good at hiding things,” Virgil said.
 “It worked on Logan,” Patton defended himself.
“Logan was about to rocket into space if you didn’t show up in 5 seconds,” Virgil pointed out. Patton just shrugged, and Virgil tilted his head. “What do you have?”
Patton grinned wide and carefully pulled Mittens out of his sweater. She did not resist this maneuver at all, simply purring. He held her up for Virgil to see. “Ta da!”
“A cat?” Virgil said.
“This is Mittens,” Patton said. He then turned to Mittens. “Mittens, this is Virgil. I thought I’d introduce the two of you!”
Virgil blinked at the cat. Mittens blinked back. Patton thought maybe he should have let them sniff each other from under a door before doing this.
 He didn’t need to worry though, as Mittens started purring after a moment. “You can pet her,” Patton offered. Virgil looked up at him. “Just…” he said.
“She likes chin scratchies!” Patton prompted.
Virgil reached out a hand to scratch under her chin and that was the end of it. Mittens stretched out her chin happy to get the attention and Virgil’s eyes widened at how soft her fur was. It was a work of minutes before Virgil was sitting down on the floor and Mittens was happily kneading his thighs and spinning around in circles to make sure he pet every inch of her.
“I did not understand why people like cats,” Virgil commented. “All I’ve seen of cats is people coming back with bloody scratches from trying to pet them, so I never even tried.”
“Well,” Patton said. “Cats are just like people. If you’re nice to them, they’re more likely to be nice to you.”
 Virgil’s hand paused briefly on the cat’s head, but then continued with the petting a moment later. Patton wondered what he was thinking about, but didn’t press.
“She seems to like you,” Patton said.
“Don’t know why.”
“Hey, don’t be mean.” Patton scolded.
Virgil hands jerked away from the cat he’d been petting and then were forced abruptly to his side in reaction. Mittens meowed, seemed very unhappy with the jostling as well as the sudden lack of petting.
“Sorry,” Virgil said, eyes wide. “What did I do wrong. I didn’t mean to be mean to her.”
It took Patton a moment to sus out what he was talking about and felt a pang in his chest when he did. “Oh, no honey. You didn’t do anything wrong. I meant don’t be mean to yourself.”
 Virgil gave him a confused look. Mittens bumped her head against his chin and with a blink, he cautiously went back to petting her.
“Of course, she likes you sweetie, you’re a good boy.”
“I came here to kill the king. I’ve killed before.”
Patton smiled sadly. “I don’t think you ever wanted to,” he said. Virgil seemed to grow very interested in mitten’s ears. Patton scooted over so he was sitting beside him and carefully brought a hand up to touch the top of his head. Virgil sort of curled into him, pressing his face against Patton’s shoulder, but continuing to pet the cat.
 “It’s fine. You’re going to be okay now,” Patton said softly.
Virgil shook his head against Patton’s shoulder.
“Yes,” Patton insisted. “You’ll be okay. You won’t have to go back.”
Virgil didn’t respond for a long moment. “You can’t keep me in Logan’s closet forever,” he said softly. “When his dad comes back, you’re going to have to turn me in.”
Well, that was true, but… “It’ll be okay. No one will hurt you.”
“The kings would be assassin?” Virgil asked skeptically.
“Thomas is nice. He’ll understand.”
“He’s nice to you. He’s nice to Logan. Maybe he’s even nice to the people he rules over, but what am I? An enemy assassin who would have slit his throat if I hadn’t gotten the wrong room.”
 It…it did sound bad when he put it like that, but, but… “Thomas will understand,” he promised, hugging him tight. “He will, and we’ll keep you safe and I’ll introduce you to every single cat in the castle. In fact, we’ll get you a cat to keep as a pet if you want and he or she can snuggle you as much as you want. I’ll show you all around the gardens and introduce you to Mama and help you figure out what your favorite type of cookie is. You’ll never have to hurt anyone again and no one will ever hurt you again.”
 Virgil drew away a bit and shot him a half smile. He clearly didn’t believe him, and it made Patton’s stomach twist a bit. Patton knew. He knew Thomas would be nice. There was no way he’d hurt Virgil. Virgil was just a kid and with Logan and Patton on his side, there was no way anything bad would happen to him. He could see it from Virgil’s perspective though.
“I like her feet,” Virgil said, touching Mittens’ little black paw that contrasted her otherwise white coat. Mittens purred and began kneading his legs again with those paws. “I’m guessing that’s why she’s named Mittens?”
“Yeah,” said Patton softly. “‘Cause she looks like she’s wearing mittens.” Virgil leaned forward to kiss her little head and that little action made Patton’s heart ache for him. He deserved so many kitten kisses. So many.
Patton was determined to make sure he got them.
  Chapter 16
“Well done,” Logan complimented when Virgil looked up at him for approval. It was the first time Virgil was trying to make the protection charms without Logan’s instructions. Logan was of course still in the room in case he had questions and the boy had a written set of instructions next to him, but for the most part Virgil was doing it on his own.
“Now,” Virgil said squinting down at the paper next to him, “we wait for 35 minutes.”
“Fifty actually,” Logan corrected offhand, focused on his own potion.
“Oh, yeah, right,” Virgil said. He grabbed the timer and set it for the appropriate time.
 Then, he stepped away from Logan’s nontoxic potion station. Logan saw him edge a bit closer to peak at what Logan was working on, though he was careful to maintain a distance. Logan wasn’t sure if this was because he’d been warned of the possible harmful substances Logan sometimes used at his experiment table or because he was worried Logan might not want him to approach.
Logan looked up at him. “You can come closer. Nothing here is very dangerous.”
Virgil nodded and walked over to peer at the boiling pot. “What are you making?” he asked.
“I am once again attempting to invent a potion that will reliably remove cat hair from surfaces,” Logan said, glancing over at Patton.
 Patton looked up from the bracelet he was making and stuck his tongue out at Logan.
“I can never seem to find an adequate solution,” Logan said.
“The solution is to accept all parts of kitty love!” Patton insisted.
“Or maybe the solution is to exile you from my room for the rest of time,” Logan muttered. Patton chose to ignore him and go back to working on the bracelet.
“Do you want any help?” Virgil offered Logan.
Logan smiled at him. “I’m actually almost finished with this step and there isn’t much left to do but thank you.”
Virgil nodded. “Oh, okay,” he said. He shifted back and forth a few times.
 “You’re well on your way to mastering this potion,” Logan said. “I was thinking that next I could teach you how to make a tracking charm. I marked a passage about it in the book on that shelf.” He gestured to one near the station Virgil had been working at. “Why don’t you go ahead and read that while you wait?”
“The…” Virgil said. “The green book?”
“Yes,” Logan said. “I left a bookmark in the correct page.”
“Um… yeah, sure. I’ll go… read that.”
Logan nodded and turned back to put the finishing touches on his own potion as Virgil walked away.
 Logan finished up his potion up after a few minutes and covered it to let it simmer. He looked over to see that Patton had flopped onto his back, still working on the bracelet and Virgil had sat near to him with the book on his lap open. Logan walked over to them.
“What do you think?” Logan asked.
Virgil glanced up at him. “Erm,” he said. “Looks good.”
“Which option do you like better?”
“…The second one.”
“Really?” Logan asked, surprised.
“Uh… yes?”
“I’m surprised,” Logan commented. “I figured you would shy away from the ones that required a blood sacrifice.”
Virgil’s eyes widened. “Oh,” he said. “I… didn’t notice that. I would like to not do that one, please.”
“You didn’t notice?” Logan asked. “Half of the entire first page is dedicated to a discussion of it.”
There was a beat of awkward silence.
“Virgil,” Logan said. “Can you read the first paragraph on that page?”
 He grimaced.
“You can’t read?!”
“Logan, tone,” Patton snapped when Virgil flinched.
Logan took a breath. “I am not upset that you cannot read, but what have you been doing for the past week when I have given you written instructions for the protection charm potion?”
“Not… read it.”
“How have you been making the potion?” Logan asked.
“I just remember the steps, and if I’m not sure I ask. You’re usually distracted enough that you barely notice.”
“If I had known this, we would have done a completely auditory explanation.”
“Sorry.”
Logan sighed. “You didn’t need to pretend, Virgil.”
 Virgil blinked up at him. “Sorry.”
Logan just shook his head. “There is nothing for you to be sorry for. In fact, you are the one who is owed apologies from many people in your life for a multitude of reasons.” He knelt down to take the book from him. “Here,” he said. “For now, I will read this passage to you while we wait for the potions to finish brewing. Later we can talk about changing my lesson plans in reference to the potions as well as adding reading lessons into your schedule.”
“You… want to teach me how to read?” Virgil asked.
 “If you are willing,” Logan replied. “It’s a useful skill to have and opens up many doors.”
“I don’t know if I’ll be any good at it,” Virgil said with a frown.
“If you can memorize an entire potion recipe from start to finish with inadequate vocal instructions, I’m sure you can learn the alphabet perfectly well.”
“Okay,” he replied sounding a bit doubtful.
“And once we get you to an appropriate level, I’ll let you read a book about stars I enjoyed in my youth.” He seemed pleased with that prospect, and Logan smiled at him. “For now though, let’s read this together.”
 “Okay,” Virgil said. Logan opened the book in his lap and started to read. He noticed that Virgil was leaning over to look at the page despite the fact that he couldn’t read it, and so he began to point to the words as he read. His reactions to the words on the page were honestly quite funny when Logan caught them. His nose would scrunch up in confusion every time he thought an instruction nonsensical, and he’d squint his eyes at the words as though willing the sounds and letters to connect in his head. Logan wouldn’t be surprised with his memory if he had parts of it memorized by the end.
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After a few minutes of reading, a light weight descended on Logan’s shoulder. Virgil had settled his chin on Logan’s shoulder to peer at the words. Logan did his best not to draw attention to this fact and shot a glare at Patton when he clearly noticed, sitting up to smile widely at them. Luckily the boy was sensible enough not to squeal as he oh so clearly wanted to. Logan pointed out a picture while explaining what the caption said and then giving a personal antecedent. Virgil touched the page curiously and asked a question about the story before laying his head back down on Logan’s shoulder. They continued in this way until the potion was finished.
  Chapter 17
Virgil’s suspicion was growing. Logan and Patton seemed to have something planned. Luckily, whatever it was didn’t seem to be malicious, at least, Virgil hoped it wasn’t. He truly didn’t think that Patton had it in him to be so clearly excited about anything cruel. He also didn’t think Logan had it in him to be cruel, he was just was better at masking his excitement.
“What?” Logan asked innocently when Virgil gave him a pointed look the second Patton left to do ‘something’. Virgil would almost believe he truly wasn’t planning anything if it wasn’t for the way his lips twitched just a bit at the corners. Virgil glared harder.
 Logan dared to laugh lightly at the expression on his face. “Come here,” he requested. “Patton wanted me to make you pick out a book for him to read to you tonight since, I quote ‘You’ve gotten to read him all sorts of stories the last few days.’ I attempted to explain that it was not purely for fun, but he insisted.”
Virgil grumbled, but wandered over to look over at the books laid out on Logan’s bed, settling his chin on Logan’s shoulder. “What do they say?” he asked.
Logan pointed to each in turn. “Five Dragons and a Flame. The End of May. A Stone in the Meadow. Or you can continue to read The Never-ending Garden.”
 “I want to finish The Never-Ending Garden,” Virgil decided.
“Good choice.”
“Now will you tell me what you’re doing?” Virgil asked.
Logan just chuckled. Honestly, it was like he didn’t know that he had an assassin right next to his carotid artery. “Why do you think something is happened?”
“Patton’s a shit liar.”
“Be careful,” Logan said. “I might just have to tell him you said that.”
“Then I’ll tell him what you said when you accidently dropped the lavender into that potion,” Virgil threatened back.
“Hmm,” Logan said. “Truce?”
“On that,” Virgil agreed, “but you still need to tell me what’s going on.”
 “It is a surprise. A nice surprise,” Logan informed him. He looked at Virgil’s face. “Don’t pout at me.”
Virgil had not been aware that what he was doing was pouting, but he did whatever it was harder.
“Patton would murder me,” Logan claimed, “but I suggest you try that on him the next time you have a chance. You will certainly get whatever you want.”
Virgil sighed and gave up, figuring he’d learn whatever the surprise was soon enough. He chose to flop down on top of the pile of pillows on the floor that had been laid out already. It was his fourth ever slumber party and the first had only been a week ago. He did not know much about slumber parties, but that felt like a lot.
 Goodness, it had already been two weeks. He looked up at the ceiling. He felt safe here. He felt like he didn’t need to watch Logan’s every move as he organized things in his room, but it wasn’t going to last, was it? The king was set to be back in a week. Virgil needed to actually attempt to escape soon. He hated that fact. He didn’t want to leave, and he certainly didn’t want to go back. Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d figure something else out, but no mater what, he did have to escape, and soon. He looked over at Logan who was slotting the books Virgil hadn’t picked back into place on the bookshelf. Not tonight.
 There was a knock on the door in a familiar pattern, and Logan walked over to open it for Patton. Virgil sat up to shoot a confused look at the giant thing that Patton rolled in.
“Ta da!” Patton said excitedly.
Virgil blinked at him.
“It’s food,” Logan explained.
Virgil perked up immediately. That must be a lot of food if he needed that to carry it.
“I know you haven’t gotten a chance to try a lot of different foods, so I asked Mama if I could use the kitchen earlier today and made a bunch of different type of food samples for you to try.”
 That sounded like literally the best idea in the universe. These people were very good at surprises and Virgil would not question them again ever for the rest of his life (or, well, the next couple of days he was around them before he tried to escape and either managed it or died a bloody and painful death).
Patton seemed to feed off of Virgil’s excitement, practically vibrating himself as he gestured to different parts of the cart. “We have a bunch of types of cheese and crackers, mini sandwiches, different smoked meats, six types of pasta, and every leftover I could find on this shelf. On this shelf, we have things with hot sauce, things with spicy dry rubs, curries, and things with a lot of peppers. I’ve ordered them by spiciness level so we can what you can handle, and we’ll only go as far as you want. Then this shelf is a bunch of types of cookies, mini cakes, pies, and ice cream!”
 “We are not starting with the sweets,” Logan said firmly.
“But Lo!” Patton whined.
“We do not want to make him sick, do we?” Logan asked.
Patton pouted. Virgil honestly had no preference. All food was good food in his experience.
“Fine,” Patton said. “We’ll start with the cheese.”
They had him sit back in the center of the blanket pile and handed him little portions of things. Some of the cheese tasted weird at first and Patton would giggle at the faces of surprise he made, but Virgil managed to if not like, then tolerate almost all of them.
 Then came the different sandwiches, some hot and some cold and all of the pasta and leftovers. Virgil eyed the plate of fettuccine alfredo long after they had moved on.
“You can have some more at the end if you still have room,” Logan promised with a fond smile. Virgil frowned at him. “You want to try all of the food, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then you can’t eat an entire plate of fettucine alfredo.”
“Maybe you can’t,” Virgil said darkly.
Logan just rolled his eyes and passed him another plate.
Eventually they moved on to the next shelf full of what was deemed ‘spicy food.’
 “Part of this is figuring out what level of spiciness you can handle,” Patton said. “So, tell us when it gets to be a bit too much and we’ll move on two the deserts. Also, milk helps wash the spicy stuff that so drink some if you need to!”
Virgil nodded and accepted the first dish on that rack.
Virgil, it turned out, liked what they called “spicy” food even though some of it made his nose run a little bit. It was kind of fun to eat them, honestly. Some of them hurt a tiny bit, but they also tasted really good. It was strange.
“I am impressed and horrified,” Logan said when he finished that shelf. “Do you… have nerve endings in your mouth?”
 Virgil shrugged. “Well,” Patton said, sounding pleased. “Now it’s time for the best part! Assuming you still have room.” Virgil nodded immediately and Patton handed him a plate he’d covered with chunks of cookies he’d torn off. He ate every single one of those and then went through the rest of the deserts. Everything was fantastic and he’d like to investigate a few of the cakes once more, but…
He pointed insistently at the fettuccine alfredo.
Logan shook his head but handed it over. “How many stomachs do you have?”
Virgil did not care to respond, choosing instead to shove his mouth full of pasta.
 When he was done with that, he laid back to relax and digest the food, feeling very content. Logan and Patton had also eaten a bit of the different dishes and were finishing up themselves.
“You good there?” Patton asked after a moment of Virgil just laying with his eyes closed.
Virgil nodded.
“Did you like your surprise?”
“Uh huh.”
“It seems he will not be doing any of the other planned activities for a little while at least,” Logan said. “So now might be a good time for you two to read,” he suggested. “I’ll get the rest of the food stored in case we want something more later.”
 “Okay,” Patton agreed. Virgil didn’t open his eyes, but felt Patton settle next to him. Virgil rolled slightly, so his head rested against the side of Patton’s leg. A hand touched softly down on the top of Virgil’s head and Virgil heard a page flip. “So, let’s see. I’m not sure when exactly you fell asleep last time, but how about we start at the Troll Bridge?”
Virgil hummed his ascent.
“Okay,” Patton agreed as he started to read. “‘Melly stepped onto the bridge backwards while sticking her tongue out at Al, but Lydia’s eyes widened as a large looming figure stepped up behind her….’” Virgil listened happily to him read about the four children. He liked this book. He hoped they managed to finish reading it before Virgil had to go.
  Chapter 18
They made it all the way to the big blowout between Al and Melly where Melly got mad and left the group to their fate in the magical garden by the time Virgil awakened completely from his food coma (he’d never actually fallen asleep, or at least he always responded when Patton asked) and squirmed around for a bit before sitting up.
Logan hadn’t been particularly interested in the story he’d heard many times before and was reading a book of his own on Patton’s other side, but he put a bookmark in his book when Virgil sat.
“Want to take a break from reading?” Patton asked. “We can do a bit more later, but we have more than just food and books planned for tonight.
 “Okay,” Virgil agreed easily.
“Great!” Patton said clapping his hands. “We’re going to introduce you to the most fun sleepover party event ever!”
Virgil tilted his head.
“Dress up!” Patton said. “Also make-overs. We’ll do you first and then we’ll help you learn how to help pick out other people’s outfits and make-up. If you want to, of course.”
“Sure,” Virgil said with a shrug.
“Yay!” Patton hopped to his feet. “You stay here. Lo and I will get everything ready.”
He pulled Logan to his feet and over to the chair that was the perfect height for doing make-up.
 They set up what they’d need for make-up and then Patton instructed Logan to grab the clothes of his they usually used for this sort of thing out the closet that Virgil wasn’t set up in while he grabbed the pieces he himself had brought upstairs and strew them over the bed so they could see anything.
Smiling happily, Patton looked over at Virgil who had stood up in the giant pile of pillows and blankets to watch him with intense eyes. He looked like he was memorizing every action Patton took as though expecting a test at the end. He was so adorable. A rush of affection and a touch of mischief hit him suddenly.
 “Hey Virgil,” Patton said. Virgil looked over at him. “Can I tackle hug you into that pile of pillows?”
“Tackle hug?” he asked.
“I run over and hug you so hard that we fall into the blankets. I do it to Logan all the time without warning, but I didn’t want to confuse you.”
Virgil considered the offer for a couple of seconds. “Okay,” he finally decided.
“Great!” Patton did a little hop before launching himself across the room. He slammed into Virgil, who apparently had very good balanced because they didn’t immediately fall backwards, but then he seemed to remember that he was supposed to let Patton slam him into the pillows, and so he fell back on his own power.
 Patton giggled when they hit the ground and drew back to look at his face. “I got you!” He leant forward to kiss him on the nose. “Oh wait! I should let you fight back.” He propped himself up on one arm and held out the other hand. “Pinkie promise not to hurt anyone if I let you use the 3rd setting again?”
“Pinkie promise,” he agreed with a grin, linking their pinkies.
“Great!” Without hesitation, Patton did the hand motion to allow the restraints to be in the third setting.
Patton was on his back almost instantly, but he didn’t even have a chance to think about worrying before Virgil pressed a kiss to his nose in a mirror of what Patton had done a moment before. “I got you,” he said proudly.
 “So, you do,” Patton agreed with a laugh. He reached up on of his hands to card it through Virgil’s hair. Virgil leaned into the touch and then practically melted on top of him. “Virgil,” Patton laughed. “It isn’t nap time.”
He grumbled something unintelligible into Patton’s neck making Patton giggle more.
“Sweetie, please.”
Thankfully Logan saved him from the unrelenting cuddling by poking Virgil in the side. “I have finished preparing the stations for the makeover and dress up. You need to get up now.”
Virgil made a noise that sounded like a growl, but he did roll off of Patton.
 Patton hopped to his feet and helped Virgil up before pulling him over to the piles of clothes. “We pick the outfit first, but you don’t put it on. Then, we do your make-up and hair based on it. Then, we get you dressed and do touch ups. Okay? Pick anything you want.”
Virgil looked over the options, eyes going a bit wide. “It…” he said. “It all looks really fancy and expensive. Are you sure you want me to touch any of it?”
“We wouldn’t be offering anything we didn’t want you to touch,” Logan said gently. “In fact, I insist you touch all of it. Beyond just appearance, making sure the texture of the fabric is agreeable is a large part of this activity.”
 Patton picked up one of the pieces of fabric he knew was very soft and offered it to him. He touched it with careful fingers, his eyes lighting up at the feel of it. They had to continue nudging him into feeling the different fabrics, and he hesitated when they asked him to pick his favorite at the end, but eventually he shyly pointed at a dark purple dress.
Patton clapped. “Great! Ooo, I already have some ideas for make-up that will go with that.”
Virgil let Patton pull him over to the chair they’d set up and settled down on it.
29009
Patton hummed. “I think silver and purple make-up mostly?” he said.
Logan nodded and they grabbed a few things from the make-up kit. Logan let Patton do most of the make-up as he tended to be better at the more creative parts, but Logan was the one who gave him the fancy winged eye liner with purple sparkles because he was really good at them.
“You look fantastic!” Patton squealed when they were done. He held up a hand mirror for Virgil who studied himself in it for a long few moments. “Do you like it?”
“It’s really nice,” Virgil confirmed. Patton smiled and hugged him.
“Next hair. We have a lot of accessories. I’ll let you pick from the purple ones.”
 He and Logan sorted through the jewelry box full of different hair accessories for the royal family and ended up finding three purple ones. Patton hesitated a bit over one of them, but Logan picked it up and set it in front of Virgil for him.
“Your choice from these three,” he said.
One was a purple feather with little hooks to braid into hair, one was a smattering of purple and silver stars that would weave through the back of someone’s hair, and the last was a string of silver leaves with purple tips that would wrap up the back of a person’s head from a bun.
Virgil thought for a moment and then pointed to the one made of leaves.
 Patton glanced at Logan who took the hairpiece. “I’ll do your hair right for that one,” he said. “I know how it fits.”
He grabbed the brush and carefully ran it through Virgil’s hair. Virgil seemed to like the attention, leaning into the touch, and a smile flickered over Logan’s face. Logan started gathering the hair together to make the low bun that would be the base of hair arrangement. Patton honestly did not expect him to speak, but then he did as he started to secure the piece with pins.
“This was my Pa’s favorite hairpiece,” Logan said. “Not the father you came here for, but my other one. He died when I was six.���
Virgil went shock still. “I don’t have to...”
“I wouldn’t have let it be offered if I wasn’t okay with you using it,” Logan said.
 Virgil didn’t move as he finished securing the hairpiece. “There,” Logan said when he was done. He picked up the hand mirror and positioned it so Virgil could see. “It suits you.”
“I…” Virgil said. His eyes were wide, and he clearly didn’t know what to say.
“Now,” Logan said. “I believe there are some other pieces of jewelry that would match this very well in the other room. I…” he turned away. “If you will excuse me.”
He turned away and exited through his bedroom door into the hallway. Patton watched him go and then turned to Virgil. “I’m going to go make sure he’s okay, okay?” Patton asked. “You didn’t do anything wrong, there’s just a lot of emotions.”
“I can take it out…” Virgil said.
“No,” Patton said. “I think he likes that you’re wearing it.” Virgil bit his lip. “He never really moved on,” Patton felt inclined to say. “This is… a lot for him, but I think it’s good too.” He leaned forward to kiss the top of his head, being careful not to mess up his artfully done hair. “I’ll be right back.”
He turned to follow Logan out of the room.
  Chapter 19
Thomas sighed in relief as the door to the royal wing finally came into sight. He was exhausted from his journey to Lamir for many reasons. Beyond just the physically taxing journey, he’d also had to deal with the emotions of loosing someone he had thought of as a friend while also trying to help her young daughter who had just had the crown thrust upon her.
Now he just wanted to see his own child and curl up into bed. He smiled at Owen and Kalani as he approached. “Is Logan here?” he asked.
Owen nodded. “The prince and his royal advisor are having a slumber party.”
Thomas smiled. “Of course, they are,” he said.
 He said goodnight to the two guard as they’d be getting off duty soon even if he did manage to drag himself out of his room again tonight and walked past them into the hall.
He walked past the room where they kept the jewels, though was unsurprised to see that the room was unlatched as Patton loved playing around with the different jewelry and had probably left it open when he grabbed them. He was however surprised when his son’s room’s door was thrown open, as Logan usually couldn’t stand for the thing to be open with or without him in it.
 Thomas didn’t think much of it however, and simply walked over to look inside. He was surprised when he didn’t see his son or Patton and instead saw that the only person in the room was a young boy that Thomas did not recognize. He was seated in one of Logan’s chairs and had his head tilted looking at himself in the mirror. He seemed to be trying to get a look at the ornament on the back of his head, and Thomas felt his heart seize a little bit when he recognized the hairpin.
He hadn’t recovered from that gut punch when the boy’s eyes drifted and met his in the mirror. There were a couple of long seconds where the two of them stared at each other in silence.
“Hello?” Thomas finally managed to get out.
Panic. There was suddenly horribly intense panic in the child’s eyes, the likes of which Thomas had never seen before. Thomas could only blink dumbly as he hopped to his feet like his seat was suddenly made of hot coals and then threw himself across the room to the opposite side from Thomas.
He looked around himself, back to the wall and considered Thomas with wildly spooked eyes. Clearly, he realized that he was pinned in Logan’s room by Thomas being in the door.
The boy dropped suddenly and disappeared under Logan’s bed.
 “Uh,” Thomas said, confused and shocked and still a bit in pain from seeing that piece of jewelry in use. He crossed slowly over to the bed and bent down to look under it, moving the bed skirt slightly to the side. He saw a small shaking blob curled up into itself under the bed. “Um, hi,” he said softly.
The blob did not respond except to continue shaking.
Thomas frowned and settled himself onto the floor. “It’s okay,” he said softly. Had he been here stealing things? Thomas had to wonder as he wasn’t sure why someone here for legitimate reasons would be acting so terrified of being caught. Though, that posed the question of how he’d gotten past the guards, and why Logan hadn’t noticed him. “I’m not mad,” Thomas said. “You’re fine.”
The boy looked up briefly from his knees looking terrified. Thomas tried to smile at him gently, but that just made him hunch into himself more, his breathes coming faster. That wasn’t good.
“No, shh,” Thomas said softly. “It’s okay. I promise it’s okay.” He did not seem to believe him, and Thomas winced. What was he supposed to do? He couldn’t just leave him here but trying to talk him down himself didn’t seem to be working.
Luckily, a familiar voice spoke from behind him then. “Dad?” Logan asked.
Thomas looked back at him. Both Logan and Patton were standing at the door, a couple of pieces of jewelry in their hands. They seemed very surprised to see him.
“You… seem to have a guest,” Thomas informed them.
 “I…” Logan said, beginning to edge into the room like he was expecting something to blow up at any moment. “Yes.” He got to Thomas and squeezed himself between him and the bed, putting a physical barrier between Thomas and the boy. Confused, Thomas took a couple of steps away without challenge. “That,” Logan glanced behind him. Patton had moved to the opposite side of the bed from Logan and Thomas and had gotten to his knees to look under it. “That is Virgil.”
Thomas blinked at him. “Virgil?” he asked.
“He’s… new to the castle,” Logan explained. Patton started speaking softly the boy, but Thomas could not make anything he said out. “Patton and I… invited him to a sleepover.”
“The guards didn’t mention anything,” Thomas said, sure that they would have warned him if there was a stranger in the royal wing.
“Uh, well, Virgil is… shy and we didn’t think you’d be back for another week. So, we snuck him past them.”
“Shy?” Thomas asked doubtfully. That was a lot more than shy.
“Particularly of adults,” Logan said.
Thomas took a moment to let that sink in. “Oh.” He was… scared of adults. Thomas could imagine many reasons why that might be the case and none of them set well. “I see.”
“Hey, no, sweetie, stop that,” Patton said, sounding distressed. Patton had managed to draw Virgil out from underneath the bed, though they were both still mostly hidden behind it and Thomas had no question in his mind that if he went to step towards them, Virgil would be back underneath it in a moment. Currently the boy seemed to be clawing at his own head. “No, baby shh,” Patton said, trying to stop him from tearing the pinned in hairpiece out, Thomas realized. “I’ll get it out,” Patton promised him. “Just calm down and let me do it.” He sounded close to tears, and Thomas couldn’t particularly blame him with the way the boy was acting. “You’re hurting yourself, baby.”
He must know, Thomas realized. If Logan had known he was here, then he must have allowed him to use that hairpiece. He’d probably even told Virgil that it belonged to his dead father. Now he was probably terrified that Thomas would be mad at him for touching it, especially when he’d come in to find Virgil alone without Logan to explain.
Patton managed to get all the pins undone and placed the piece delicately on the bed before wrapping himself protectively around the boy and hushing him.
Logan was looking back at them as well. He looked between the puddle of upset on the floor and Thomas. “Could…” he said. “Could I maybe come and see you in a few minutes, Dad?”
“Of course,” Thomas said. “Of course, I’ll go wait in my room. Take as much time as you need.”
He was careful to move slowly as he stepped towards the door, so the poor thing didn’t notice him move and mistake it for him approaching. He closed Logan’s bedroom door softly behind him feeling even more drained than he’d been before as well as anxious and a bit sickened. He went to his own bedroom to wait for Logan.
  Chapter 20
Logan let out a slow breath as his father closed the door behind him. That could have been very, very bad. He turned his attention to Virgil and Patton. Patton had curled himself around Virgil as much as physically possible and had tucked the boy’s head under his chin.
Logan slowly rounded the bed and knelt in front of them. “It’s alright,” Logan said, cautiously moving to put a hand on his shoulder. Virgil didn’t pull away. “I asked him to leave. It’s alright.”
Virgil tilted his head slightly too look at him. Logan rubbed a circle into his back as he slowly got control of his breath.
 Logan smiled softly at him and reached out to touch his cheek with a gentle hand. “You… didn’t hurt him. You didn’t even try to hurt him.”
Virgil shook his head.
“Why not?” Logan asked curiously. “It was a perfect opportunity.”
“Promised Patton,” Virgil mumbled, and the idea that perhaps the thing that had saved his father’s life was a pinky promise just about gave Logan a migraine, but then Virgil ducked his head. “And it would make you sad.”
“I see,” Logan said, heart in his throat.
Virgil kept looking towards the floor, his eyes starting to fill with tears again. “Are you going to turn me in now?”
 He was shaking and barely holding back a fresh wave of tears. Logan knew of course that no one would hurt him here if he turned him in to his father and the guards, but he also knew that Virgil would be terrified if he did so. He was already terrified. Logan didn’t want to know what he thought the fate Logan would be condemning him to.
“No,” Logan said before he could even truly think it through. “No, I’m not.”
“You’re not?” Virgil asked.
“Well, there wouldn’t really be a point, would there?” Logan asked. “The reason we planned to turn you when father got back in is because you posed a danger to him, but you have just demonstrated that is no longer an issue.”
 “Really?” Virgil asked, sniffling a bit and Logan saw Patton’s arms tighten even more around him.
“We will have to figure out a better cover for you than just that you’re new to the castle, but I believe it will work fine. No one besides the two of us would ever guess your origin anyway.”
“S-so I can stay?” Virgil asked, “and you won’t throw me into prison or execute me?”
“I promise you were never going to be executed Virgil,” Logan said. “Even if we turned you in, but yes you can stay with us. We’ll figure out a backstory for you that doesn’t involve assassinations and you’ll have to keep up the lie, but I doubt anyone will question it.”
 “I’ll do whatever you want,” Virgil said, chocked up. “Thank you. I really didn’t want to go.”
“Well, you’re our friend now so there will be no going anywhere,” Patton said kissing him on the cheek. Virgil relaxed back into his hold, pleased with the affection.
Logan smiled at them both. “Can I see your wrists, Virgil?”
Virgil blinked but offered them and Logan tapped the restraints doing a quick incantation. They popped off after a moment.
“You’re letting me go?” Virgil asked, eyes wide.
“Of course,” Logan said. “We’re not just going to keep you prisoner for no reason.”
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snowdice · 4 years
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Big Bang (Sort of) Editing Story [Day 31]
I started writing this fic while editing my Big Bang story, but am going to continue doing it for other things now that Kill Dear is out. I will write and publish 100 words of the story every time I finish doing whatever task I’m doing. If you’d like to block these proceedings, please feel free to block the tag proofread stories. I will reblog this post with the parts of the story I do today. Edited chapters are linked; everything else I’ve done so far is under the cut.
My Master Post Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11
Going to clean my apartment, edit, and do this. I’m hoping to do a couple of votes that will mater in this one, so stay tuned!
Chapter 12
Logan had needed to spend some time performing royal duties today which left Patton and Virgil alone after breakfast. Patton had started out trying to teach Virgil different board games. He’d seemed intrigued at first, but after a few games of checkers seemed to grow bored. Patton had gotten a blank stare when he’d asked if Virgil had any ideas about what to do for fun, so now he was trying to figure out something else they could do. He cast his eyes around at what Logan had in his bedroom.
“How about I read you a book?” he suggested.
 Virgil seemed very intrigued by that idea. “Sure,” he said.
“Okay!” Patton said cheerfully. “He popped to his feet and glanced through the small shelf of fiction books Logan kept in his room. He decided to choose one of the lighter ones that Logan and he had liked to read when they were younger. “This one is called The Never-ending Garden,” Patton said. “It’s about a group of four children and their adventures in a garden. It’s full of magic and adventure and friendship! Is that alright with you?”
“It sounds good,” Virgil answered.
Patton happily walked back over to sit next to him. “It is!” he said.
 First, he showed Virgil the picture on the cover of a wild looking garden with four kids roaming through it. One of the children was in a little red wagon being pulled by another one wearing a fancy hat. One of the others was walking, looking at a map while the last had a wooden sword. After giving Virgil a couple of moments too look at the picture, Patton cracked it open.
“We start with Lydia’s perspective,” Patton said. “She’s one of my favorites!” He pointed to a picture of a girl in a raincoat at the beginning of the chapter and Virgil leaned slightly closer to see. Then, Patton cleared his voice.
 “It had been raining that day,” Patton began, “but Lydia had been so bored that she still begged her father to go out and play when the storm lightened into a sprinkle. He made her change from the yellow dress she had been wearing into the one she often used to help him garden because he knew she was certain to get herself muddy. Her younger brother Marcus asked if he could come too and though part of her wanted to say no because she wanted to explore on her own without her baby brother slowing her down, her father had taught her to be a good big sister, so she agreed to let him come.”
 Patton watched Virgil out of the corner of his eye as he read about Lydia meeting up with the neighbor boy, Al, and the three children started to explore the garden in Lydia’s backyard. Virgil leaned in slightly to look at the pictures and listen to the story intently as the three children traveled deeper and deeper into the garden, but never made it to the back fence. They’d just made it to the part where they heard rustling behind the blackberry bush which Patton knew was the last main character, Melly, when Patton felt the need to adjust his posture a bit. Virgil moved in kind and ended up leaning further into Patton.
 Without even really thinking about it, Patton brought his arm around to touch the top of his head. Virgil flinched the second Patton made content and Patton drew the hand away immediately. “Sorry,” he said with a wince. Patton was a naturally touching person and he’d been having trouble battling his instincts to cuddle everyone and everything while around Virgil, but he knew most touch was not welcome. The poor thing startled every time Patton went to touch him unannounced and even sometimes when he’d said something before doing it.
“I-it’s okay,” Virgil said.
Patton gave him a tight lipped smiled and turned back to the book.
 He stilled a second later when Virgil leaned back in and their shoulders brushed. He blinked over at him. “Oh,” he said softly. “Do… do you want me to touch your hair?”
Virgil curled up into himself a little bit but then nodded.
“Okay,” Patton said. “I’m going to put my arm around you and do that then, okay?” He drew upon his years and years of convincing easily startled cats to allow him to give them pats as he slowly moved his arm back to where it had been before and gently touched the side of his head. He tensed, but didn’t startle this time, and so Patton gently ran his fingers through the hair a couple of times. Eventually, the tension bled out of him and he sort of slumped against Patton’s shoulder. Patton just barely restrained a coo before going back to reading. He continued to stroke the side of Virgil’s hair as he described the gang meeting up with Melly and them being told she was a fairy that lived in the garden.
 He'd only gotten to the part about them finding the wagon when Virgil started to shift a bit uncomfortably, his neck craned in an awkward angle. Patton kept reading as he brought the hand in his hair down to his shoulder and pushed lightly. There was the slightest bit of resistance as Virgil didn’t know what he was trying to do, but then he allowed Patton to move him. Patton leaned back a bit and picked the book up off his lap before continuing to push him down. Virgil did not help at all, seeming confused about what was going on.
 Patton had to poke him around until he was on his back laying across Patton’s lap. He grinned down at the boy who was looking at him in blatant bewilderment and propped the book up on his chest. He held it there with one of his hands and stretched the other out to resume messing with his hair. Virgil relaxed into the new position after a few minutes of reading, eyes shutting as he enjoyed the attention. His eyes would flicker open every time Patton moved to show him a picture, but other than that, he seemed content to not move.
 Eventually, he stopped responding when Patton moved to show him the pictures.
“Are you asleep?” he asked quietly. When he didn’t get a response, he bookmarked the last picture Virgil had responded to, and then continued reading to himself.
Eventually, there was a knock at the door. It was the one he and Logan had decided on to tell the other one that it was just them and not to panic when the door opened. The door opened to Logan a moment later.
He paused, taking in the sight of the assassin sprawled across Patton’s lap like a sleepy kitten. He shook his head fondly and walked over to them on silent feet. He bent and pressed a hand to the top of Virgil’s hand. Virgil stirred just barely, but didn’t open his eyes, pressing into the touch a bit.
Logan smiled. “He wanted to learn how to make protection charms today. I assume you’d like to join us?” Patton perked up and nodded happily, making Logan chuckle softly. “I will go set it up then. Would you like another book for the time being?”
“Just the one I was reading last night would be nice,” Patton said.
“Of course.” Logan stepped away to grab it and handed it to him. Then, he disappeared into his potion’s lab. Patton smiled down at Virgil’s sleeping face and settled the new book onto his chest to replace the children’s book. He didn’t even stir.
  Chapter 13
Logan was able to quickly set up the station for making protection charms. Patton had always liked making them, though he often used his more as fun accessories than for protection. The one he was going to show Virgil how to make was a very simple low level one used for little more than to keep bugs off of yourself and, in the event of a well made one, alert one to imminent danger by changing temperature. It was a nice thing to hold in the middle of the night if one was frightened by real or imagined threats. It would be warm to the touch when your environment was safe; he thought Virgil might appreciate it.
 He and Patton decided to wait until Virgil woke up naturally which only took about 30 minutes. Then, Logan brought him to his set up supplies. He explained briefly the process for making a protection charm. “I will be the one performing the enchantment for today,” he told Virgil. “I will show you how to make your own later, but I thought seeing how to make them would help with the learning process.”
“Plus, it’s fun!” Patton said.
Logan flashed a smile at him. “And that as well. I’ve prepared a small number of possible pendants for you to choose from. You can choose the shape and color, then we will put on a custom engraving, as well as decorations.”
 “Glitter! Glitter! Glitter! Glitter!”
“Yes, Patton, everyone knows you’re going to choose glitter,” Logan said, amused, “but why don’t we let Virgil decide for his own pendant?”
“Fine,” Patton said, “but mine will be glitter.”
Logan grabbed the box of blank pendants and offered it to Virgil. “Choose whichever one feels right,” he suggested. Virgil moved forward and looked over the box. “You can touch them,” Logan said. “In fact, I would suggest it as it is meant to be held when it’s done and you may as well get a feel for it.”
At his prompting, Virgil did. He reached into the box and shifted a few to the side. Eventually, he started picking a few up. “I like the crescent shape for holding the most he said,” holding a blue one up, but I don’t know.”
“What’s your favorite color?” Patton asked.
“Oh, um,” he mumbled. “I dunno.”
“Well here,” Patton said, reaching for the box. He dug through it and pulled out every single crescent moon shaped pendant and lined them up. “What do you fancy?”
Virgil considered them all for a long moment and then tentatively pointed the purple one out.
“Great!” Patton said. “Then, we’ll use that one.”
Virgil nodded and Patton picked up the pendant to drop it into his hands. His fingers curled over the shape and he seemed satisfied by the choice, so Logan turned to Patton. “Your turn,” he said.
Patton happily grabbed out a heart shaped blue one, but then paused and exchanged it for a purple one. “We match!” he said.
Virgil smiled slightly at his enthusiasm, and Logan dug out a blue crescent moon shape for himself. “Now that you have your base, you get to choose the engraving.” He opened up the instruction book to the correct page and showed it to him.
Virgil looked over the two pages of designs with carful focus. He wavered between the spiral sun and the flames for a moment, but eventually settled on the flames. Patton chose the interlocking hearts design as anticipated; it was his favorite, and Logan chose the spiral sun design for himself.
“Now, I’m going to engrave this design onto yours,” Logan said getting out the thin pen like instrument and dipping it into the slightly glowing bottle of potion he’d set out. “In the meantime, Patton will show you what we have for decorations.”
He was careful to get the symbol as perfect as he could and then started on Patton’s. Patton apparently managed to corrupt the boy because both of them came back with brushes and glitter to add as decoration.
Logan shook his head and handed them their freshly engraved pendants. “Apply the glitter how you like,” Logan said, moving on to his own engraving. Once he was finished, he selected some glow in the dark paint to decorate his own.
 Once he’d finished decorating his own pendant, Logan looked up. “Are you finished?” he asked.
“Yep!” Patton said, shoving his pendant at Logan while Virgil nodded. Virgil had been far less enthusiastic than Patton, having carefully brushed glitter into the flame design only whereas Patton had haphazardly covered his own all over with glitter. Logan took both pendants.
“This,” Logan said, bringing over a different potion, “is used to make sure the decorations never fall off. It basically allows the other substances to become a part of the stone. “It isn’t too dangerous, but I’d suggest you stand back for the moment.”
 Virgil stepped back farther back than was strictly necessary and gave the potion bottle a wary look. Logan moved all three pendants to the prepared surface (else they ran the risk of also getting stuck to the table) and put on gloves, having learned that magically gluing rocks to ones hands was not fun years ago. Then, he carefully drizzled a bit of the potion onto each rock. The rocks fizzled loudly, and Virgil gave off a startled yelp before toppling over flat on his face with his wrist glued to his sides.
“Oh no, honey,” Patton said immediately crouching next to him. “I’m sorry. We should have warned you about the noise.”
Logan wasn’t sure what type of action he’d tried to take when the sound started up, but whatever it was, it had caused him to move his arms fast enough that he’d activated the binding potion and it snapped his wrists to his side, overbalancing him.
 Patton’s hands hovered over the startled boy, but he didn’t touch. After a few moments, it was clear that the magic keeping Virgil’s hands at his side released because his hands slowly crept forward to push himself up, so his face wasn’t planted against the ground. His eyes still looked incredibly startled.
“Are you alright?” Patton asked.
Virgil blinked. “Yeah, I’m fine,” he said.
Logan took his words as permission to move without risking startling him more. Virgil’s eyes bopped back and forth between him and Patton a few times as he crossed to his wall of potions and grabbed one.
 He also selected a clean cloth from a basket on his way over to them. “A light healing potion,” Logan explained as he knelt in front of Virgil. He uncorked it. “May I?”
“I’m fine,” Virgil said with a frown. “I’m not even bleeding. It’s barely anything.”
“Which is why it’s a light healing potion,” Logan said. “You are sure to bruise with the way you hit. This will prevent it and make it stop hurting.”
“Okay,” Virgil agreed after a moment. Logan dribbled a bit out onto the rag. After a moment of thought, he touched the damp part of the cloth with his own finger, just to quash any fears that it would harm him.
 “It will tingle slightly,” Logan warned. Virgil tilted his face to let him dab it onto his nose and the light scrape on his face. His nose scrunched up and he moved to rub the sensation away quickly only to have his arms slam back to his sides.
Patton caught him so the sudden involuntary movement didn’t cause him to fall back, and then giggled when Virgil titled his head to what could only be described as pout back at him.
“Aw, poor thing,” Patton cooed, reaching forward to rub a hand across the top of his nose and then his forehead where the potion had been applied for him.
 “Better?” Patton asked.
“You’re really bad at this being captors thing,” Virgil commenting, willingly leaning back into Patton. Patton just smiled happily.
Logan took the bottle and got to his feet, before returning it, and then glanced at the pendants as Patton helped Virgil to his feet. The pendants had stopped fizzing, so Logan felt okay reaching in and grabbing them all.
He handed both Patton and Virgil their pendants when they walked closer to the table.
“And now for the actual enchantment,” Logan said. “For today, I already prepared the potion up to the last step as it has to sit for a few hours, but I will show you the last step and eventually teach you everything if you are still interested.”
 Virgil nodded, but said. “No more noises?”
Logan smiled. “No more noises,” he confirmed. Then he pushed forward all of the ingredients he was about to put in the pot for Virgil to study one by one before putting them each in it in the correct order. Then he demonstrated how to stir it correctly and told him how many times, though he doubted he’d be able to retain all of the information from this one demonstration. “There,” he said, setting down his spoon. “Now we just all put our pendants into the pot, and they should be ready in 25 minutes.”
 Logan showed Virgil around his potion’s lab while they waited, explaining what certain pieces of equipment did and a bit about his organization system. Virgil followed him around, looking at the things he pointed out curiously. He, however, got very distracted when Logan showed him one of the experiments he’d concocted. It was a thick liquid that was super attracted to itself and would form a small ball that could be disturbed by touching it. He seemed to like the sensation of squishing it down onto a table… over and over and over again.
“We should get him a ball of yarn,” Patton said out of the corner of his mouth. He may have been enjoying watching Virgil play with the substance more than Virgil was enjoying playing with it himself. And that was saying something.
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Eventually, however, the pendants were finished, and he dragged Virgil away from his new toy to show him the finished product.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“Is it supposed to be warm?” Virgil inquired.
“Yes,” Logan replied. “It’s temperature changes based on if the magic on it senses a threat or not. Warmer temperatures mean you are safe.
“Oh,” Virgil said softly, hand squeezing around it. “I like it.”
Logan found himself smiling. “I’m glad. It’s yours.”
“Thank you,” he said.
“If you would like, I’m sure Patton has some suggestions if you’d desire a way to keep it attached to your person. He in particular likes to make them into necklaces or clip them to his clothing.”
Virgil looked over at Patton and nodded shyly. Patton immediately perked up. “I’ll go get some supplies!” he said.
  Chapter 14
“So then,” Patton was saying. “We ran to the stables.”
“We went to gazebo first,” Logan cut in.
“Right, we tried to go to the gazebo first,” Patton corrected, “but Mr. Deknis was over there tending to the tomatoes, and we knew he’d tell Mama the second he saw us. So, then we turned around and went to the stables.”
Virgil tilted his head, listening to the story Patton was telling. Patton was not the best storyteller. He tended to get lost in the middle and embellish, though Logan always corrected him. It was still very entertaining to watch though because he got incredibly animated. He’d even toppled himself over in excitement a couple of times.
 Virgil squeezed the small pillow he had in his lap. He… wasn’t 100% sure what was going on. Logan and Patton had settled him on the blanket covered ground near Logan’s bed and proceeded to feed him snacks and talk about a lot of different things. It had started with them talking about what they’d done that day, and when Patton had made reference to something Virgil hadn’t understood, the two of them ended up talking about things from their childhood.
Virgil found himself entranced by their stories about playing in and running around the castle. It was all so different from what Virgil had experienced.
 “…but, right as we were about to get to the ladder to climb up into the hay loft, Logan tripped!” Patton said, arms whipping around him. “He fell into a container of grain for the horses and it spilled all over the place. He tried to get up but grabbed the edge of the water trough and apparently it wasn’t very secure because it fell over and soaked him. So, then he was wet and covered in grain. He looked hilarious.”
“I did not!” Logan protested, but it did not sound like all of the other times he’d corrected Patton’s stories that night.
 Patton looked over at him. “You did! You woke up the cute stable hand and he laughed himself silly at you, and by the time we got you even partially cleaned up, your dad had already found us. That’s how we got caught.”
“I have no recollection of these events,” Logan clearly lied, his cheeks a bit flushed.
“Liar,” Patton claimed. “You complained about picking grain out of your sheets for weeks.”
“No,” Logan growled.
“Yes! It’s okay. It was a good laugh.”
Logan’s eyes narrowed on him, and he looked pissed, but a second later, his expression lightened up. “You know what else was a ‘good laugh’?” he asked.
 There was a second of silence before…
“Don’t you dare Logan.”
Logan looked him directly in the eye. “Patton was thirteen,” Logan started, but was interrupted the next moment when Patton lobbed a pillow at his head. Logan grabbed the pillow and leaned forward to smack Patton back with it. “He was thirteen and had just ‘discovered boys’ as his mother and my father called it when they attempted to explain his behavior to me. The focus of said ‘discovering’ at the time was the son of an ambassador from Lamir” who was staying for the summer, a seventeen-year-old boy by the name Bernardo.”
 Virgil flinched back as Patton suddenly threw himself across the semicircle they’d made with their bodies to tackle Logan to the ground. He watched as they ineffectually wrestled on the ground for a few seconds before Logan, voice strained continued to speak, while battling Patton’s hands away from his mouth.
“Patton’s only knowledge about flirting… ow… at that point was laughing at everything someone said and touching their arms and shoulders.” Logan managed to flip himself onto his stomach which was a horrible move as far as Virgil was concerned. It put him at a disadvantage to get out of the pin. However, Patton just kept reaching for his mouth and didn’t bare down on his neck to try to cut off his oxygen like Virgil expected. So, perhaps it was a rational move. “Our parents were speaking leaving Patton, Bernardo, and I in the garden,” Logan mumbled into the ground. “Bernardo said something ‘funny’ and Patton went to slap his shoulder while laughing, but shoved too hard… Patton did you just lick my face?!”
 “And I’ll do it again if you don’t shut up!” Patton threatened. That was a… weird fighting strategy.
Logan paused to consider his options. “He shoved Bernardo into the fountain and when Bernardo asked him why he did that, he ran away and wouldn’t talk to him the rest of the summer!” Logan rushed out.
Patton reached over and grabbed the nearest pillow, proceeding to whack him viciously in the back of the head. Logan was lucky the nearest object was a pillow and not something any sturdier. “It’s not funny!” Patton yelled, smacking him even more, which was when Virgil realized Logan was laughing despite the pinning and pillow pummeling. “It’s not!” Patton said. “I really liked him!!”
 “He was seventeen!” Logan said. “It was never going to happen!”
Patton groaned and rolled off of Logan to lay on his back and stare at the ceiling. “But he had so many muscles,” Patton said. “He probably could have thrown me 10 yards.”
“And that is… a benefit?” Logan asked, rolling over onto his side to face him.
“You don’t. Get me.” Patton tilted his head to look at Virgil. “Anyway,” he said. “That is the story of how I died at 13.”
Virgil stared at him, and Patton’s forehead crinkled looking at him.
“Is something wrong, honey?” he asked.
 “What was that?” Virgil asked.
“What was what?”
Virgil just blinked at him. Patton seemed to think for a moment.
“Oh, did you think we were fighting?” Patton asked. “Like, really fighting?”
“You weren’t fighting?” Virgil asked.
“No, sweetie,” Patton said. “We were just playing.” He popped up into a sitting position. “Well, play fighting, but emphasis on play!”
Virgil looked over at Logan for confirmation. “No one is harmed nor was there any intention to harm each other,” he assured.
Patton grabbed the pillow he’d been smacking Logan with. “Like this!” he said. “Bap.” Unlike how he’d smacked Logan ruthlessly, he basically just touched Virgil’s shoulder with it.
 Virgil squinted at him.
“Bap!” Patton said again, smacking him again, this time with a little bit more force and on the cheek. Virgil’s nose scrunched up. “Pillow fight!”
“Pillow fight?”
“You try,” he said, pointing to the pillow in Virgil’s lap.
Virgil glanced down at the bands around his wrist. “Um…” he said. “I don’t think I can?”
“Oh, right,” Patton said with a frown. He bit his lip and glanced over at Logan. “Maybe…”
“Ill-advisable,” Logan said.
“But…” Patton said. “Pillow fight.”
“We would have to be very cautious and make sure there were no weapons in the area.”
“No weapons but pillows!”
 “Fine,” Logan relented to whatever was going on. “Let’s clear the area.” Virgil watched them with mounting confusion as they removed everything within a few meters radius of him except for pillows and blankets.
“There!” Patton said after a minute. “All done!”
“What are you doing?” Virgil said.
“We’re going to have a pillow fight,” Patton said.
“But I…”
“We’ll temporarily allow your restraints to be in the third setting like when you’re in the closet.”
Were they serious? Were they stupid? Virgil could have killed them dozens of times with the second setting and now they were giving him even more range of motion?
 “You have to promise not to try to hurt anyone though,” Patton said. Virgil stared at him dumbly, as Patton held out his pinky finger. “Pinky promise.”
“Pinky promise?”
Patton nodded solemnly. “We lock pinky fingers and make a promise. It’s the most binding promise in the universe.”
Virgil looked at his finger, confused. He’d never heard of that type of deal. “What kind of magic is it?”
“No magic,” Patton said. “Just friendship.” Virgil tilted his head but brought his hand up so Patton could twine their fingers together. “Now, promise you won’t hurt anyone.”
“I promise I won’t hurt anyone,” he said.
“It’s a deal!” said Patton, squeezing Virgil’s finger with his own briefly before drawing away. “I trust you.” Virgil felt a rush of something that was no type of magic he’d ever come into contact before but was definitely far more powerful.
 Logan came over to them and waved his hand over the restraints on Virgil. They buzzed slightly and Virgil looked between them. “So, I just hit you with pillows?”
“Try not to hit too hard near the face, and Lo and I should probably take off our glasses before we start, but yeah,” Patton said, taking his glasses off as he said it. It was yet another foolish move on his part. “It’s fun, and it doesn’t hurt.”
“Okay…” Virgil said.
“I will demonstrate,” Logan said as he took a pillow and smacked Patton in the stomach.
“Hey! No fair!” Patton giggled. “We haven’t started yet!” This did not deter Logan however, as he continued to smack Patton with a pillow.
“On the contrary,” he said. “It has started, and we’re getting you first.”
 “No,” Patton whined, but the way he crumpled to the ground under the onslaught seemed far too staged to make Virgil worry. He didn’t even try to curl up into a ball or to protect his head, just taking the hits and giggling.
Logan looked up at Virgil and motioned with his head. Virgil inched over and looked down at Patton. Logan slowed for a few moments. “Go on,” he urged.
Virgil bit his lip and reached forward to smack Patton lightly with his pillow which seemed to do nothing to him but renew his peels of giggles. From there, it was easy to continue. Logan picked up the pace of his strikes and he and Virgil proceeded to ‘fight’ Patton until he couldn’t breath through his laughter and pushed the pillows away, curling up on his side to recover.
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“No what?” Virgil asked when Patton sat up.
“Now I get vengeance!” Patton said, popping to his feet and smacking Logan in the face. “Help me Virgil!” So, Virgil turned on Logan and he and Patton gave the prince the same treatment. Then, because it was only fair, it was Virgil’s turn, though they were a lot more careful with him then they’d been with each other, and really Patton spent more of the time checking in on Virgil then actually hitting him with the pillow. It was nice. Fun. And when Virgil pushed them away, they pulled back. Then, it was Patton’s turn again and they went around teaming up on each other and sometimes just smacking at each other at random.
  Eventually, they slowed, and all ended up laying near each other on the floor.
“Well, that made me hungry,” Patton said, sitting up and stretching. “I asked Mama to make us a bunch of mini sandwiches with different flavors. I’ll go get them.”
He hopped to his feet to walk over to where they’d stored the food earlier in those little glowing magical balls Logan had for food preservation.
Logan and Virgil sat up too, and Virgil offered him his wrists.
“Right,” Logan said with a blink. He made a motion and Virgil could feel the magic weighing down his hands once again. He’d almost forgotten, Virgil thought with an internal sigh. They’d given an assassin free range of motion, had a pillow fight with him, and almost forgotten to restrain him again. What was Virgil going to do with these idiots?
  Chapter 15
Patton strolled up to the doors to the royal wing, his arms crossed casually around his middle.
Kalani raised an eyebrow as he approached and gave her the most innocent expression he could. “Whatcha got there, Pat?” she asked.
“Hmm?” he asked, as his sweater squirmed. “What do you mean?”
She considered him for a moment. “Well, I see nothing suspicious here,” she said. “Do you Owen?”
“Nothing,” he replied without hesitation.
Patton grinned at them both.
Kalani leaned in like she was going to tell him a secret. “Who is it?”
Patton made a show of glanced around like he was hiding it from anyone passing by. Then he shifted around to pull up just the bottom of his sweater.
 A small black paw reached out from the depths of his sweater and swatted at the air.
“Ah, I see,” Kalani said, reaching out to touch the little paw. “Hello, Mittens.”
Patton giggled as Owen poked the cat’s stomach gently through the sweater, making her wiggle a bit and try to bite him.
“Well,” Patton said. “I better be off with my totally normal sweater.”
Kalani nodded and stepped to the side, and Patton was free to head down the hallway to Logan’s room. Patton knocked on the door with their new extra secret knock and Logan all but ripped open the door. “I’m late. I have to go,” he said, darting past Patton.
 Patton smiled, happy that his plan to be running a little late to come watch Virgil had worked so well, even though he felt a little bit guilty about it. He hoped Logan wasn’t late to his meeting, but he also knew that if Logan had noticed Mittens, he wouldn’t have let her into the room.
Virgil was already out of the closet, sitting on one of the chairs. Patton came in and smiled at him. Unlike Logan, Virgil’s attention was immediately drawn to the oddly shaped lump in Patton’s sweater.
“You’re not very good at hiding things,” Virgil said.
 “It worked on Logan,” Patton defended himself.
“Logan was about to rocket into space if you didn’t show up in 5 seconds,” Virgil pointed out. Patton just shrugged, and Virgil tilted his head. “What do you have?”
Patton grinned wide and carefully pulled Mittens out of his sweater. She did not resist this maneuver at all, simply purring. He held her up for Virgil to see. “Ta da!”
“A cat?” Virgil said.
“This is Mittens,” Patton said. He then turned to Mittens. “Mittens, this is Virgil. I thought I’d introduce the two of you!”
Virgil blinked at the cat. Mittens blinked back. Patton thought maybe he should have let them sniff each other from under a door before doing this.
 He didn’t need to worry though, as Mittens started purring after a moment. “You can pet her,” Patton offered. Virgil looked up at him. “Just…” he said.
“She likes chin scratchies!” Patton prompted.
Virgil reached out a hand to scratch under her chin and that was the end of it. Mittens stretched out her chin happy to get the attention and Virgil’s eyes widened at how soft her fur was. It was a work of minutes before Virgil was sitting down on the floor and Mittens was happily kneading his thighs and spinning around in circles to make sure he pet every inch of her.
“I did not understand why people like cats,” Virgil commented. “All I’ve seen of cats is people coming back with bloody scratches from trying to pet them, so I never even tried.”
“Well,” Patton said. “Cats are just like people. If you’re nice to them, they’re more likely to be nice to you.”
 Virgil’s hand paused briefly on the cat’s head, but then continued with the petting a moment later. Patton wondered what he was thinking about, but didn’t press.
“She seems to like you,” Patton said.
“Don’t know why.”
“Hey, don’t be mean.” Patton scolded.
Virgil hands jerked away from the cat he’d been petting and then were forced abruptly to his side in reaction. Mittens meowed, seemed very unhappy with the jostling as well as the sudden lack of petting.
“Sorry,” Virgil said, eyes wide. “What did I do wrong. I didn’t mean to be mean to her.”
It took Patton a moment to sus out what he was talking about and felt a pang in his chest when he did. “Oh, no honey. You didn’t do anything wrong. I meant don’t be mean to yourself.”
 Virgil gave him a confused look. Mittens bumped her head against his chin and with a blink, he cautiously went back to petting her.
“Of course, she likes you sweetie, you’re a good boy.”
“I came here to kill the king. I’ve killed before.”
Patton smiled sadly. “I don’t think you ever wanted to,” he said. Virgil seemed to grow very interested in mitten’s ears. Patton scooted over so he was sitting beside him and carefully brought a hand up to touch the top of his head. Virgil sort of curled into him, pressing his face against Patton’s shoulder, but continuing to pet the cat.
 “It’s fine. You’re going to be okay now,” Patton said softly.
Virgil shook his head against Patton��s shoulder.
“Yes,” Patton insisted. “You’ll be okay. You won’t have to go back.”
Virgil didn’t respond for a long moment. “You can’t keep me in Logan’s closet forever,” he said softly. “When his dad comes back, you’re going to have to turn me in.”
Well, that was true, but… “It’ll be okay. No one will hurt you.”
“The kings would be assassin?” Virgil asked skeptically.
“Thomas is nice. He’ll understand.”
“He’s nice to you. He’s nice to Logan. Maybe he’s even nice to the people he rules over, but what am I? An enemy assassin who would have slit his throat if I hadn’t gotten the wrong room.”
 It…it did sound bad when he put it like that, but, but… “Thomas will understand,” he promised, hugging him tight. “He will, and we’ll keep you safe and I’ll introduce you to every single cat in the castle. In fact, we’ll get you a cat to keep as a pet if you want and he or she can snuggle you as much as you want. I’ll show you all around the gardens and introduce you to Mama and help you figure out what your favorite type of cookie is. You’ll never have to hurt anyone again and no one will ever hurt you again.”
 Virgil drew away a bit and shot him a half smile. He clearly didn’t believe him, and it made Patton’s stomach twist a bit. Patton knew. He knew Thomas would be nice. There was no way he’d hurt Virgil. Virgil was just a kid and with Logan and Patton on his side, there was no way anything bad would happen to him. He could see it from Virgil’s perspective though.
“I like her feet,” Virgil said, touching Mittens’ little black paw that contrasted her otherwise white coat. Mittens purred and began kneading his legs again with those paws. “I’m guessing that’s why she’s named Mittens?”
“Yeah,” said Patton softly. “‘Cause she looks like she’s wearing mittens.” Virgil leaned forward to kiss her little head and that little action made Patton’s heart ache for him. He deserved so many kitten kisses. So many.
Patton was determined to make sure he got them.
  Chapter 16
“Well done,” Logan complimented when Virgil looked up at him for approval. It was the first time Virgil was trying to make the protection charms without Logan’s instructions. Logan was of course still in the room in case he had questions and the boy had a written set of instructions next to him, but for the most part Virgil was doing it on his own.
“Now,” Virgil said squinting down at the paper next to him, “we wait for 35 minutes.”
“Fifty actually,” Logan corrected offhand, focused on his own potion.
“Oh, yeah, right,” Virgil said. He grabbed the timer and set it for the appropriate time.
 Then, he stepped away from Logan’s nontoxic potion station. Logan saw him edge a bit closer to peak at what Logan was working on, though he was careful to maintain a distance. Logan wasn’t sure if this was because he’d been warned of the possible harmful substances Logan sometimes used at his experiment table or because he was worried Logan might not want him to approach.
Logan looked up at him. “You can come closer. Nothing here is very dangerous.”
Virgil nodded and walked over to peer at the boiling pot. “What are you making?” he asked.
“I am once again attempting to invent a potion that will reliably remove cat hair from surfaces,” Logan said, glancing over at Patton.
 Patton looked up from the bracelet he was making and stuck his tongue out at Logan.
“I can never seem to find an adequate solution,” Logan said.
“The solution is to accept all parts of kitty love!” Patton insisted.
“Or maybe the solution is to exile you from my room for the rest of time,” Logan muttered. Patton chose to ignore him and go back to working on the bracelet.
“Do you want any help?” Virgil offered Logan.
Logan smiled at him. “I’m actually almost finished with this step and there isn’t much left to do but thank you.”
Virgil nodded. “Oh, okay,” he said. He shifted back and forth a few times.
 “You’re well on your way to mastering this potion,” Logan said. “I was thinking that next I could teach you how to make a tracking charm. I marked a passage about it in the book on that shelf.” He gestured to one near the station Virgil had been working at. “Why don’t you go ahead and read that while you wait?”
“The…” Virgil said. “The green book?”
“Yes,” Logan said. “I left a bookmark in the correct page.”
“Um… yeah, sure. I’ll go… read that.”
Logan nodded and turned back to put the finishing touches on his own potion as Virgil walked away.
 Logan finished up his potion up after a few minutes and covered it to let it simmer. He looked over to see that Patton had flopped onto his back, still working on the bracelet and Virgil had sat near to him with the book on his lap open. Logan walked over to them.
“What do you think?” Logan asked.
Virgil glanced up at him. “Erm,” he said. “Looks good.”
“Which option do you like better?”
“…The second one.”
“Really?” Logan asked, surprised.
“Uh… yes?”
“I’m surprised,” Logan commented. “I figured you would shy away from the ones that required a blood sacrifice.”
Virgil’s eyes widened. “Oh,” he said. “I… didn’t notice that. I would like to not do that one, please.”
“You didn’t notice?” Logan asked. “Half of the entire first page is dedicated to a discussion of it.”
There was a beat of awkward silence.
“Virgil,” Logan said. “Can you read the first paragraph on that page?”
 He grimaced.
“You can’t read?!”
“Logan, tone,” Patton snapped when Virgil flinched.
Logan took a breath. “I am not upset that you cannot read, but what have you been doing for the past week when I have given you written instructions for the protection charm potion?”
“Not… read it.”
“How have you been making the potion?” Logan asked.
“I just remember the steps, and if I’m not sure I ask. You’re usually distracted enough that you barely notice.”
“If I had known this, we would have done a completely auditory explanation.”
“Sorry.”
Logan sighed. “You didn’t need to pretend, Virgil.”
 Virgil blinked up at him. “Sorry.”
Logan just shook his head. “There is nothing for you to be sorry for. In fact, you are the one who is owed apologies from many people in your life for a multitude of reasons.” He knelt down to take the book from him. “Here,” he said. “For now, I will read this passage to you while we wait for the potions to finish brewing. Later we can talk about changing my lesson plans in reference to the potions as well as adding reading lessons into your schedule.”
“You… want to teach me how to read?” Virgil asked.
 “If you are willing,” Logan replied. “It’s a useful skill to have and opens up many doors.”
“I don’t know if I’ll be any good at it,” Virgil said with a frown.
“If you can memorize an entire potion recipe from start to finish with inadequate vocal instructions, I’m sure you can learn the alphabet perfectly well.”
“Okay,” he replied sounding a bit doubtful.
“And once we get you to an appropriate level, I’ll let you read a book about stars I enjoyed in my youth.” He seemed pleased with that prospect, and Logan smiled at him. “For now though, let’s read this together.”
 “Okay,” Virgil said. Logan opened the book in his lap and started to read. He noticed that Virgil was leaning over to look at the page despite the fact that he couldn’t read it, and so he began to point to the words as he read. His reactions to the words on the page were honestly quite funny when Logan caught them. His nose would scrunch up in confusion every time he thought an instruction nonsensical, and he’d squint his eyes at the words as though willing the sounds and letters to connect in his head. Logan wouldn’t be surprised with his memory if he had parts of it memorized by the end.
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After a few minutes of reading, a light weight descended on Logan’s shoulder. Virgil had settled his chin on Logan’s shoulder to peer at the words. Logan did his best not to draw attention to this fact and shot a glare at Patton when he clearly noticed, sitting up to smile widely at them. Luckily the boy was sensible enough not to squeal as he oh so clearly wanted to. Logan pointed out a picture while explaining what the caption said and then giving a personal antecedent. Virgil touched the page curiously and asked a question about the story before laying his head back down on Logan’s shoulder. They continued in this way until the potion was finished.
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snowdice · 4 years
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Big Bang (Sort of) Editing Story [Day 32](Part 2)
I started writing this fic while editing my Big Bang story, but am going to continue doing it for other things now that Kill Dear is out. I will write and publish 100 words of the story every time I finish doing whatever task I’m doing. If you’d like to block these proceedings, please feel free to block the tag proofread stories. I will reblog this post with the parts of the story I do today. Edited chapters are linked; everything else I’ve done so far is under the cut.
My Master Post Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11
First one was getting long so I’m going to switch over here.
Chapter 12
Logan had needed to spend some time performing royal duties today which left Patton and Virgil alone after breakfast. Patton had started out trying to teach Virgil different board games. He’d seemed intrigued at first, but after a few games of checkers seemed to grow bored. Patton had gotten a blank stare when he’d asked if Virgil had any ideas about what to do for fun, so now he was trying to figure out something else they could do. He cast his eyes around at what Logan had in his bedroom.
“How about I read you a book?” he suggested.
 Virgil seemed very intrigued by that idea. “Sure,” he said.
“Okay!” Patton said cheerfully. “He popped to his feet and glanced through the small shelf of fiction books Logan kept in his room. He decided to choose one of the lighter ones that Logan and he had liked to read when they were younger. “This one is called The Never-ending Garden,” Patton said. “It’s about a group of four children and their adventures in a garden. It’s full of magic and adventure and friendship! Is that alright with you?”
“It sounds good,” Virgil answered.
Patton happily walked back over to sit next to him. “It is!” he said.
 First, he showed Virgil the picture on the cover of a wild looking garden with four kids roaming through it. One of the children was in a little red wagon being pulled by another one wearing a fancy hat. One of the others was walking, looking at a map while the last had a wooden sword. After giving Virgil a couple of moments too look at the picture, Patton cracked it open.
“We start with Lydia’s perspective,” Patton said. “She’s one of my favorites!” He pointed to a picture of a girl in a raincoat at the beginning of the chapter and Virgil leaned slightly closer to see. Then, Patton cleared his voice.
 “It had been raining that day,” Patton began, “but Lydia had been so bored that she still begged her father to go out and play when the storm lightened into a sprinkle. He made her change from the yellow dress she had been wearing into the one she often used to help him garden because he knew she was certain to get herself muddy. Her younger brother Marcus asked if he could come too and though part of her wanted to say no because she wanted to explore on her own without her baby brother slowing her down, her father had taught her to be a good big sister, so she agreed to let him come.”
 Patton watched Virgil out of the corner of his eye as he read about Lydia meeting up with the neighbor boy, Al, and the three children started to explore the garden in Lydia’s backyard. Virgil leaned in slightly to look at the pictures and listen to the story intently as the three children traveled deeper and deeper into the garden, but never made it to the back fence. They’d just made it to the part where they heard rustling behind the blackberry bush which Patton knew was the last main character, Melly, when Patton felt the need to adjust his posture a bit. Virgil moved in kind and ended up leaning further into Patton.
 Without even really thinking about it, Patton brought his arm around to touch the top of his head. Virgil flinched the second Patton made content and Patton drew the hand away immediately. “Sorry,” he said with a wince. Patton was a naturally touching person and he’d been having trouble battling his instincts to cuddle everyone and everything while around Virgil, but he knew most touch was not welcome. The poor thing startled every time Patton went to touch him unannounced and even sometimes when he’d said something before doing it.
“I-it’s okay,” Virgil said.
Patton gave him a tight lipped smiled and turned back to the book.
 He stilled a second later when Virgil leaned back in and their shoulders brushed. He blinked over at him. “Oh,” he said softly. “Do… do you want me to touch your hair?”
Virgil curled up into himself a little bit but then nodded.
“Okay,” Patton said. “I’m going to put my arm around you and do that then, okay?” He drew upon his years and years of convincing easily startled cats to allow him to give them pats as he slowly moved his arm back to where it had been before and gently touched the side of his head. He tensed, but didn’t startle this time, and so Patton gently ran his fingers through the hair a couple of times. Eventually, the tension bled out of him and he sort of slumped against Patton’s shoulder. Patton just barely restrained a coo before going back to reading. He continued to stroke the side of Virgil’s hair as he described the gang meeting up with Melly and them being told she was a fairy that lived in the garden.
 He'd only gotten to the part about them finding the wagon when Virgil started to shift a bit uncomfortably, his neck craned in an awkward angle. Patton kept reading as he brought the hand in his hair down to his shoulder and pushed lightly. There was the slightest bit of resistance as Virgil didn’t know what he was trying to do, but then he allowed Patton to move him. Patton leaned back a bit and picked the book up off his lap before continuing to push him down. Virgil did not help at all, seeming confused about what was going on.
 Patton had to poke him around until he was on his back laying across Patton’s lap. He grinned down at the boy who was looking at him in blatant bewilderment and propped the book up on his chest. He held it there with one of his hands and stretched the other out to resume messing with his hair. Virgil relaxed into the new position after a few minutes of reading, eyes shutting as he enjoyed the attention. His eyes would flicker open every time Patton moved to show him a picture, but other than that, he seemed content to not move.
 Eventually, he stopped responding when Patton moved to show him the pictures.
“Are you asleep?” he asked quietly. When he didn’t get a response, he bookmarked the last picture Virgil had responded to, and then continued reading to himself.
Eventually, there was a knock at the door. It was the one he and Logan had decided on to tell the other one that it was just them and not to panic when the door opened. The door opened to Logan a moment later.
He paused, taking in the sight of the assassin sprawled across Patton’s lap like a sleepy kitten. He shook his head fondly and walked over to them on silent feet. He bent and pressed a hand to the top of Virgil’s hand. Virgil stirred just barely, but didn’t open his eyes, pressing into the touch a bit.
Logan smiled. “He wanted to learn how to make protection charms today. I assume you’d like to join us?” Patton perked up and nodded happily, making Logan chuckle softly. “I will go set it up then. Would you like another book for the time being?”
“Just the one I was reading last night would be nice,” Patton said.
“Of course.” Logan stepped away to grab it and handed it to him. Then, he disappeared into his potion’s lab. Patton smiled down at Virgil’s sleeping face and settled the new book onto his chest to replace the children’s book. He didn’t even stir.
  Chapter 13
Logan was able to quickly set up the station for making protection charms. Patton had always liked making them, though he often used his more as fun accessories than for protection. The one he was going to show Virgil how to make was a very simple low level one used for little more than to keep bugs off of yourself and, in the event of a well made one, alert one to imminent danger by changing temperature. It was a nice thing to hold in the middle of the night if one was frightened by real or imagined threats. It would be warm to the touch when your environment was safe; he thought Virgil might appreciate it.
 He and Patton decided to wait until Virgil woke up naturally which only took about 30 minutes. Then, Logan brought him to his set up supplies. He explained briefly the process for making a protection charm. “I will be the one performing the enchantment for today,” he told Virgil. “I will show you how to make your own later, but I thought seeing how to make them would help with the learning process.”
“Plus, it’s fun!” Patton said.
Logan flashed a smile at him. “And that as well. I’ve prepared a small number of possible pendants for you to choose from. You can choose the shape and color, then we will put on a custom engraving, as well as decorations.”
 “Glitter! Glitter! Glitter! Glitter!”
“Yes, Patton, everyone knows you’re going to choose glitter,” Logan said, amused, “but why don’t we let Virgil decide for his own pendant?”
“Fine,” Patton said, “but mine will be glitter.”
Logan grabbed the box of blank pendants and offered it to Virgil. “Choose whichever one feels right,” he suggested. Virgil moved forward and looked over the box. “You can touch them,” Logan said. “In fact, I would suggest it as it is meant to be held when it’s done and you may as well get a feel for it.”
At his prompting, Virgil did. He reached into the box and shifted a few to the side. Eventually, he started picking a few up. “I like the crescent shape for holding the most he said,” holding a blue one up, but I don’t know.”
“What’s your favorite color?” Patton asked.
“Oh, um,” he mumbled. “I dunno.”
“Well here,” Patton said, reaching for the box. He dug through it and pulled out every single crescent moon shaped pendant and lined them up. “What do you fancy?”
Virgil considered them all for a long moment and then tentatively pointed the purple one out.
“Great!” Patton said. “Then, we’ll use that one.”
Virgil nodded and Patton picked up the pendant to drop it into his hands. His fingers curled over the shape and he seemed satisfied by the choice, so Logan turned to Patton. “Your turn,” he said.
Patton happily grabbed out a heart shaped blue one, but then paused and exchanged it for a purple one. “We match!” he said.
Virgil smiled slightly at his enthusiasm, and Logan dug out a blue crescent moon shape for himself. “Now that you have your base, you get to choose the engraving.” He opened up the instruction book to the correct page and showed it to him.
Virgil looked over the two pages of designs with carful focus. He wavered between the spiral sun and the flames for a moment, but eventually settled on the flames. Patton chose the interlocking hearts design as anticipated; it was his favorite, and Logan chose the spiral sun design for himself.
“Now, I’m going to engrave this design onto yours,” Logan said getting out the thin pen like instrument and dipping it into the slightly glowing bottle of potion he’d set out. “In the meantime, Patton will show you what we have for decorations.”
He was careful to get the symbol as perfect as he could and then started on Patton’s. Patton apparently managed to corrupt the boy because both of them came back with brushes and glitter to add as decoration.
Logan shook his head and handed them their freshly engraved pendants. “Apply the glitter how you like,” Logan said, moving on to his own engraving. Once he was finished, he selected some glow in the dark paint to decorate his own.
 Once he’d finished decorating his own pendant, Logan looked up. “Are you finished?” he asked.
“Yep!” Patton said, shoving his pendant at Logan while Virgil nodded. Virgil had been far less enthusiastic than Patton, having carefully brushed glitter into the flame design only whereas Patton had haphazardly covered his own all over with glitter. Logan took both pendants.
“This,” Logan said, bringing over a different potion, “is used to make sure the decorations never fall off. It basically allows the other substances to become a part of the stone. “It isn’t too dangerous, but I’d suggest you stand back for the moment.”
 Virgil stepped back farther back than was strictly necessary and gave the potion bottle a wary look. Logan moved all three pendants to the prepared surface (else they ran the risk of also getting stuck to the table) and put on gloves, having learned that magically gluing rocks to ones hands was not fun years ago. Then, he carefully drizzled a bit of the potion onto each rock. The rocks fizzled loudly, and Virgil gave off a startled yelp before toppling over flat on his face with his wrist glued to his sides.
“Oh no, honey,” Patton said immediately crouching next to him. “I’m sorry. We should have warned you about the noise.”
Logan wasn’t sure what type of action he’d tried to take when the sound started up, but whatever it was, it had caused him to move his arms fast enough that he’d activated the binding potion and it snapped his wrists to his side, overbalancing him.
 Patton’s hands hovered over the startled boy, but he didn’t touch. After a few moments, it was clear that the magic keeping Virgil’s hands at his side released because his hands slowly crept forward to push himself up, so his face wasn’t planted against the ground. His eyes still looked incredibly startled.
“Are you alright?” Patton asked.
Virgil blinked. “Yeah, I’m fine,” he said.
Logan took his words as permission to move without risking startling him more. Virgil’s eyes bopped back and forth between him and Patton a few times as he crossed to his wall of potions and grabbed one.
 He also selected a clean cloth from a basket on his way over to them. “A light healing potion,” Logan explained as he knelt in front of Virgil. He uncorked it. “May I?”
“I’m fine,” Virgil said with a frown. “I’m not even bleeding. It’s barely anything.”
“Which is why it’s a light healing potion,” Logan said. “You are sure to bruise with the way you hit. This will prevent it and make it stop hurting.”
“Okay,” Virgil agreed after a moment. Logan dribbled a bit out onto the rag. After a moment of thought, he touched the damp part of the cloth with his own finger, just to quash any fears that it would harm him.
 “It will tingle slightly,” Logan warned. Virgil tilted his face to let him dab it onto his nose and the light scrape on his face. His nose scrunched up and he moved to rub the sensation away quickly only to have his arms slam back to his sides.
Patton caught him so the sudden involuntary movement didn’t cause him to fall back, and then giggled when Virgil titled his head to what could only be described as pout back at him.
“Aw, poor thing,” Patton cooed, reaching forward to rub a hand across the top of his nose and then his forehead where the potion had been applied for him.
 “Better?” Patton asked.
“You’re really bad at this being captors thing,” Virgil commenting, willingly leaning back into Patton. Patton just smiled happily.
Logan took the bottle and got to his feet, before returning it, and then glanced at the pendants as Patton helped Virgil to his feet. The pendants had stopped fizzing, so Logan felt okay reaching in and grabbing them all.
He handed both Patton and Virgil their pendants when they walked closer to the table.
“And now for the actual enchantment,” Logan said. “For today, I already prepared the potion up to the last step as it has to sit for a few hours, but I will show you the last step and eventually teach you everything if you are still interested.”
 Virgil nodded, but said. “No more noises?”
Logan smiled. “No more noises,” he confirmed. Then he pushed forward all of the ingredients he was about to put in the pot for Virgil to study one by one before putting them each in it in the correct order. Then he demonstrated how to stir it correctly and told him how many times, though he doubted he’d be able to retain all of the information from this one demonstration. “There,” he said, setting down his spoon. “Now we just all put our pendants into the pot, and they should be ready in 25 minutes.”
 Logan showed Virgil around his potion’s lab while they waited, explaining what certain pieces of equipment did and a bit about his organization system. Virgil followed him around, looking at the things he pointed out curiously. He, however, got very distracted when Logan showed him one of the experiments he’d concocted. It was a thick liquid that was super attracted to itself and would form a small ball that could be disturbed by touching it. He seemed to like the sensation of squishing it down onto a table… over and over and over again.
“We should get him a ball of yarn,” Patton said out of the corner of his mouth. He may have been enjoying watching Virgil play with the substance more than Virgil was enjoying playing with it himself. And that was saying something.
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Eventually, however, the pendants were finished, and he dragged Virgil away from his new toy to show him the finished product.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“Is it supposed to be warm?” Virgil inquired.
“Yes,” Logan replied. “It’s temperature changes based on if the magic on it senses a threat or not. Warmer temperatures mean you are safe.
“Oh,” Virgil said softly, hand squeezing around it. “I like it.”
Logan found himself smiling. “I’m glad. It’s yours.”
“Thank you,” he said.
“If you would like, I’m sure Patton has some suggestions if you’d desire a way to keep it attached to your person. He in particular likes to make them into necklaces or clip them to his clothing.”
Virgil looked over at Patton and nodded shyly. Patton immediately perked up. “I’ll go get some supplies!” he said.
  Chapter 14
“So then,” Patton was saying. “We ran to the stables.”
“We went to gazebo first,” Logan cut in.
“Right, we tried to go to the gazebo first,” Patton corrected, “but Mr. Deknis was over there tending to the tomatoes, and we knew he’d tell Mama the second he saw us. So, then we turned around and went to the stables.”
Virgil tilted his head, listening to the story Patton was telling. Patton was not the best storyteller. He tended to get lost in the middle and embellish, though Logan always corrected him. It was still very entertaining to watch though because he got incredibly animated. He’d even toppled himself over in excitement a couple of times.
 Virgil squeezed the small pillow he had in his lap. He… wasn’t 100% sure what was going on. Logan and Patton had settled him on the blanket covered ground near Logan’s bed and proceeded to feed him snacks and talk about a lot of different things. It had started with them talking about what they’d done that day, and when Patton had made reference to something Virgil hadn’t understood, the two of them ended up talking about things from their childhood.
Virgil found himself entranced by their stories about playing in and running around the castle. It was all so different from what Virgil had experienced.
 “…but, right as we were about to get to the ladder to climb up into the hay loft, Logan tripped!” Patton said, arms whipping around him. “He fell into a container of grain for the horses and it spilled all over the place. He tried to get up but grabbed the edge of the water trough and apparently it wasn’t very secure because it fell over and soaked him. So, then he was wet and covered in grain. He looked hilarious.”
“I did not!” Logan protested, but it did not sound like all of the other times he’d corrected Patton’s stories that night.
 Patton looked over at him. “You did! You woke up the cute stable hand and he laughed himself silly at you, and by the time we got you even partially cleaned up, your dad had already found us. That’s how we got caught.”
“I have no recollection of these events,” Logan clearly lied, his cheeks a bit flushed.
“Liar,” Patton claimed. “You complained about picking grain out of your sheets for weeks.”
“No,” Logan growled.
“Yes! It’s okay. It was a good laugh.”
Logan’s eyes narrowed on him, and he looked pissed, but a second later, his expression lightened up. “You know what else was a ‘good laugh’?” he asked.
 There was a second of silence before…
“Don’t you dare Logan.”
Logan looked him directly in the eye. “Patton was thirteen,” Logan started, but was interrupted the next moment when Patton lobbed a pillow at his head. Logan grabbed the pillow and leaned forward to smack Patton back with it. “He was thirteen and had just ‘discovered boys’ as his mother and my father called it when they attempted to explain his behavior to me. The focus of said ‘discovering’ at the time was the son of an ambassador from Lamir” who was staying for the summer, a seventeen-year-old boy by the name Bernardo.”
 Virgil flinched back as Patton suddenly threw himself across the semicircle they’d made with their bodies to tackle Logan to the ground. He watched as they ineffectually wrestled on the ground for a few seconds before Logan, voice strained continued to speak, while battling Patton’s hands away from his mouth.
“Patton’s only knowledge about flirting… ow… at that point was laughing at everything someone said and touching their arms and shoulders.” Logan managed to flip himself onto his stomach which was a horrible move as far as Virgil was concerned. It put him at a disadvantage to get out of the pin. However, Patton just kept reaching for his mouth and didn’t bare down on his neck to try to cut off his oxygen like Virgil expected. So, perhaps it was a rational move. “Our parents were speaking leaving Patton, Bernardo, and I in the garden,” Logan mumbled into the ground. “Bernardo said something ‘funny’ and Patton went to slap his shoulder while laughing, but shoved too hard… Patton did you just lick my face?!”
 “And I’ll do it again if you don’t shut up!” Patton threatened. That was a… weird fighting strategy.
Logan paused to consider his options. “He shoved Bernardo into the fountain and when Bernardo asked him why he did that, he ran away and wouldn’t talk to him the rest of the summer!” Logan rushed out.
Patton reached over and grabbed the nearest pillow, proceeding to whack him viciously in the back of the head. Logan was lucky the nearest object was a pillow and not something any sturdier. “It’s not funny!” Patton yelled, smacking him even more, which was when Virgil realized Logan was laughing despite the pinning and pillow pummeling. “It’s not!” Patton said. “I really liked him!!”
 “He was seventeen!” Logan said. “It was never going to happen!”
Patton groaned and rolled off of Logan to lay on his back and stare at the ceiling. “But he had so many muscles,” Patton said. “He probably could have thrown me 10 yards.”
“And that is… a benefit?” Logan asked, rolling over onto his side to face him.
“You don’t. Get me.” Patton tilted his head to look at Virgil. “Anyway,” he said. “That is the story of how I died at 13.”
Virgil stared at him, and Patton’s forehead crinkled looking at him.
“Is something wrong, honey?” he asked.
 “What was that?” Virgil asked.
“What was what?”
Virgil just blinked at him. Patton seemed to think for a moment.
“Oh, did you think we were fighting?” Patton asked. “Like, really fighting?”
“You weren’t fighting?” Virgil asked.
“No, sweetie,” Patton said. “We were just playing.” He popped up into a sitting position. “Well, play fighting, but emphasis on play!”
Virgil looked over at Logan for confirmation. “No one is harmed nor was there any intention to harm each other,” he assured.
Patton grabbed the pillow he’d been smacking Logan with. “Like this!” he said. “Bap.” Unlike how he’d smacked Logan ruthlessly, he basically just touched Virgil’s shoulder with it.
 Virgil squinted at him.
“Bap!” Patton said again, smacking him again, this time with a little bit more force and on the cheek. Virgil’s nose scrunched up. “Pillow fight!”
“Pillow fight?”
“You try,” he said, pointing to the pillow in Virgil’s lap.
Virgil glanced down at the bands around his wrist. “Um…” he said. “I don’t think I can?”
“Oh, right,” Patton said with a frown. He bit his lip and glanced over at Logan. “Maybe…”
“Ill-advisable,” Logan said.
“But…” Patton said. “Pillow fight.”
“We would have to be very cautious and make sure there were no weapons in the area.”
“No weapons but pillows!”
 “Fine,” Logan relented to whatever was going on. “Let’s clear the area.” Virgil watched them with mounting confusion as they removed everything within a few meters radius of him except for pillows and blankets.
“There!” Patton said after a minute. “All done!”
“What are you doing?” Virgil said.
“We’re going to have a pillow fight,” Patton said.
“But I…”
“We’ll temporarily allow your restraints to be in the third setting like when you’re in the closet.”
Were they serious? Were they stupid? Virgil could have killed them dozens of times with the second setting and now they were giving him even more range of motion?
 “You have to promise not to try to hurt anyone though,” Patton said. Virgil stared at him dumbly, as Patton held out his pinky finger. “Pinky promise.”
“Pinky promise?”
Patton nodded solemnly. “We lock pinky fingers and make a promise. It’s the most binding promise in the universe.”
Virgil looked at his finger, confused. He’d never heard of that type of deal. “What kind of magic is it?”
“No magic,” Patton said. “Just friendship.” Virgil tilted his head but brought his hand up so Patton could twine their fingers together. “Now, promise you won’t hurt anyone.”
“I promise I won’t hurt anyone,” he said.
“It’s a deal!” said Patton, squeezing Virgil’s finger with his own briefly before drawing away. “I trust you.” Virgil felt a rush of something that was no type of magic he’d ever come into contact before but was definitely far more powerful.
 Logan came over to them and waved his hand over the restraints on Virgil. They buzzed slightly and Virgil looked between them. “So, I just hit you with pillows?”
“Try not to hit too hard near the face, and Lo and I should probably take off our glasses before we start, but yeah,” Patton said, taking his glasses off as he said it. It was yet another foolish move on his part. “It’s fun, and it doesn’t hurt.”
“Okay…” Virgil said.
“I will demonstrate,” Logan said as he took a pillow and smacked Patton in the stomach.
“Hey! No fair!” Patton giggled. “We haven’t started yet!” This did not deter Logan however, as he continued to smack Patton with a pillow.
“On the contrary,” he said. “It has started, and we’re getting you first.”
 “No,” Patton whined, but the way he crumpled to the ground under the onslaught seemed far too staged to make Virgil worry. He didn’t even try to curl up into a ball or to protect his head, just taking the hits and giggling.
Logan looked up at Virgil and motioned with his head. Virgil inched over and looked down at Patton. Logan slowed for a few moments. “Go on,” he urged.
Virgil bit his lip and reached forward to smack Patton lightly with his pillow which seemed to do nothing to him but renew his peels of giggles. From there, it was easy to continue. Logan picked up the pace of his strikes and he and Virgil proceeded to ‘fight’ Patton until he couldn’t breath through his laughter and pushed the pillows away, curling up on his side to recover.
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“No what?” Virgil asked when Patton sat up.
“Now I get vengeance!” Patton said, popping to his feet and smacking Logan in the face. “Help me Virgil!” So, Virgil turned on Logan and he and Patton gave the prince the same treatment. Then, because it was only fair, it was Virgil’s turn, though they were a lot more careful with him then they’d been with each other, and really Patton spent more of the time checking in on Virgil then actually hitting him with the pillow. It was nice. Fun. And when Virgil pushed them away, they pulled back. Then, it was Patton’s turn again and they went around teaming up on each other and sometimes just smacking at each other at random.
  Eventually, they slowed, and all ended up laying near each other on the floor.
“Well, that made me hungry,” Patton said, sitting up and stretching. “I asked Mama to make us a bunch of mini sandwiches with different flavors. I’ll go get them.”
He hopped to his feet to walk over to where they’d stored the food earlier in those little glowing magical balls Logan had for food preservation.
Logan and Virgil sat up too, and Virgil offered him his wrists.
“Right,” Logan said with a blink. He made a motion and Virgil could feel the magic weighing down his hands once again. He’d almost forgotten, Virgil thought with an internal sigh. They’d given an assassin free range of motion, had a pillow fight with him, and almost forgotten to restrain him again. What was Virgil going to do with these idiots?
  Chapter 15
Patton strolled up to the doors to the royal wing, his arms crossed casually around his middle.
Kalani raised an eyebrow as he approached and gave her the most innocent expression he could. “Whatcha got there, Pat?” she asked.
“Hmm?” he asked, as his sweater squirmed. “What do you mean?”
She considered him for a moment. “Well, I see nothing suspicious here,” she said. “Do you Owen?”
“Nothing,” he replied without hesitation.
Patton grinned at them both.
Kalani leaned in like she was going to tell him a secret. “Who is it?”
Patton made a show of glanced around like he was hiding it from anyone passing by. Then he shifted around to pull up just the bottom of his sweater.
 A small black paw reached out from the depths of his sweater and swatted at the air.
“Ah, I see,” Kalani said, reaching out to touch the little paw. “Hello, Mittens.”
Patton giggled as Owen poked the cat’s stomach gently through the sweater, making her wiggle a bit and try to bite him.
“Well,” Patton said. “I better be off with my totally normal sweater.”
Kalani nodded and stepped to the side, and Patton was free to head down the hallway to Logan’s room. Patton knocked on the door with their new extra secret knock and Logan all but ripped open the door. “I’m late. I have to go,” he said, darting past Patton.
 Patton smiled, happy that his plan to be running a little late to come watch Virgil had worked so well, even though he felt a little bit guilty about it. He hoped Logan wasn’t late to his meeting, but he also knew that if Logan had noticed Mittens, he wouldn’t have let her into the room.
Virgil was already out of the closet, sitting on one of the chairs. Patton came in and smiled at him. Unlike Logan, Virgil’s attention was immediately drawn to the oddly shaped lump in Patton’s sweater.
“You’re not very good at hiding things,” Virgil said.
 “It worked on Logan,” Patton defended himself.
“Logan was about to rocket into space if you didn’t show up in 5 seconds,” Virgil pointed out. Patton just shrugged, and Virgil tilted his head. “What do you have?”
Patton grinned wide and carefully pulled Mittens out of his sweater. She did not resist this maneuver at all, simply purring. He held her up for Virgil to see. “Ta da!”
“A cat?” Virgil said.
“This is Mittens,” Patton said. He then turned to Mittens. “Mittens, this is Virgil. I thought I’d introduce the two of you!”
Virgil blinked at the cat. Mittens blinked back. Patton thought maybe he should have let them sniff each other from under a door before doing this.
 He didn’t need to worry though, as Mittens started purring after a moment. “You can pet her,” Patton offered. Virgil looked up at him. “Just…” he said.
“She likes chin scratchies!” Patton prompted.
Virgil reached out a hand to scratch under her chin and that was the end of it. Mittens stretched out her chin happy to get the attention and Virgil’s eyes widened at how soft her fur was. It was a work of minutes before Virgil was sitting down on the floor and Mittens was happily kneading his thighs and spinning around in circles to make sure he pet every inch of her.
“I did not understand why people like cats,” Virgil commented. “All I’ve seen of cats is people coming back with bloody scratches from trying to pet them, so I never even tried.”
“Well,” Patton said. “Cats are just like people. If you’re nice to them, they’re more likely to be nice to you.”
 Virgil’s hand paused briefly on the cat’s head, but then continued with the petting a moment later. Patton wondered what he was thinking about, but didn’t press.
“She seems to like you,” Patton said.
“Don’t know why.”
“Hey, don’t be mean.” Patton scolded.
Virgil hands jerked away from the cat he’d been petting and then were forced abruptly to his side in reaction. Mittens meowed, seemed very unhappy with the jostling as well as the sudden lack of petting.
“Sorry,” Virgil said, eyes wide. “What did I do wrong. I didn’t mean to be mean to her.”
It took Patton a moment to sus out what he was talking about and felt a pang in his chest when he did. “Oh, no honey. You didn’t do anything wrong. I meant don’t be mean to yourself.”
 Virgil gave him a confused look. Mittens bumped her head against his chin and with a blink, he cautiously went back to petting her.
“Of course, she likes you sweetie, you’re a good boy.”
“I came here to kill the king. I’ve killed before.”
Patton smiled sadly. “I don’t think you ever wanted to,” he said. Virgil seemed to grow very interested in mitten’s ears. Patton scooted over so he was sitting beside him and carefully brought a hand up to touch the top of his head. Virgil sort of curled into him, pressing his face against Patton’s shoulder, but continuing to pet the cat.
 “It’s fine. You’re going to be okay now,” Patton said softly.
Virgil shook his head against Patton’s shoulder.
“Yes,” Patton insisted. “You’ll be okay. You won’t have to go back.”
Virgil didn’t respond for a long moment. “You can’t keep me in Logan’s closet forever,” he said softly. “When his dad comes back, you’re going to have to turn me in.”
Well, that was true, but… “It’ll be okay. No one will hurt you.”
“The kings would be assassin?” Virgil asked skeptically.
“Thomas is nice. He’ll understand.”
“He’s nice to you. He’s nice to Logan. Maybe he’s even nice to the people he rules over, but what am I? An enemy assassin who would have slit his throat if I hadn’t gotten the wrong room.”
 It…it did sound bad when he put it like that, but, but… “Thomas will understand,” he promised, hugging him tight. “He will, and we’ll keep you safe and I’ll introduce you to every single cat in the castle. In fact, we’ll get you a cat to keep as a pet if you want and he or she can snuggle you as much as you want. I’ll show you all around the gardens and introduce you to Mama and help you figure out what your favorite type of cookie is. You’ll never have to hurt anyone again and no one will ever hurt you again.”
 Virgil drew away a bit and shot him a half smile. He clearly didn’t believe him, and it made Patton’s stomach twist a bit. Patton knew. He knew Thomas would be nice. There was no way he’d hurt Virgil. Virgil was just a kid and with Logan and Patton on his side, there was no way anything bad would happen to him. He could see it from Virgil’s perspective though.
“I like her feet,” Virgil said, touching Mittens’ little black paw that contrasted her otherwise white coat. Mittens purred and began kneading his legs again with those paws. “I’m guessing that’s why she’s named Mittens?”
“Yeah,” said Patton softly. “‘Cause she looks like she’s wearing mittens.” Virgil leaned forward to kiss her little head and that little action made Patton’s heart ache for him. He deserved so many kitten kisses. So many.
Patton was determined to make sure he got them.
  Chapter 16
“Well done,” Logan complimented when Virgil looked up at him for approval. It was the first time Virgil was trying to make the protection charms without Logan’s instructions. Logan was of course still in the room in case he had questions and the boy had a written set of instructions next to him, but for the most part Virgil was doing it on his own.
“Now,” Virgil said squinting down at the paper next to him, “we wait for 35 minutes.”
“Fifty actually,” Logan corrected offhand, focused on his own potion.
“Oh, yeah, right,” Virgil said. He grabbed the timer and set it for the appropriate time.
 Then, he stepped away from Logan’s nontoxic potion station. Logan saw him edge a bit closer to peak at what Logan was working on, though he was careful to maintain a distance. Logan wasn’t sure if this was because he’d been warned of the possible harmful substances Logan sometimes used at his experiment table or because he was worried Logan might not want him to approach.
Logan looked up at him. “You can come closer. Nothing here is very dangerous.”
Virgil nodded and walked over to peer at the boiling pot. “What are you making?” he asked.
“I am once again attempting to invent a potion that will reliably remove cat hair from surfaces,” Logan said, glancing over at Patton.
 Patton looked up from the bracelet he was making and stuck his tongue out at Logan.
“I can never seem to find an adequate solution,” Logan said.
“The solution is to accept all parts of kitty love!” Patton insisted.
“Or maybe the solution is to exile you from my room for the rest of time,” Logan muttered. Patton chose to ignore him and go back to working on the bracelet.
“Do you want any help?” Virgil offered Logan.
Logan smiled at him. “I’m actually almost finished with this step and there isn’t much left to do but thank you.”
Virgil nodded. “Oh, okay,” he said. He shifted back and forth a few times.
 “You’re well on your way to mastering this potion,” Logan said. “I was thinking that next I could teach you how to make a tracking charm. I marked a passage about it in the book on that shelf.” He gestured to one near the station Virgil had been working at. “Why don’t you go ahead and read that while you wait?”
“The…” Virgil said. “The green book?”
“Yes,” Logan said. “I left a bookmark in the correct page.”
“Um… yeah, sure. I’ll go… read that.”
Logan nodded and turned back to put the finishing touches on his own potion as Virgil walked away.
 Logan finished up his potion up after a few minutes and covered it to let it simmer. He looked over to see that Patton had flopped onto his back, still working on the bracelet and Virgil had sat near to him with the book on his lap open. Logan walked over to them.
“What do you think?” Logan asked.
Virgil glanced up at him. “Erm,” he said. “Looks good.”
“Which option do you like better?”
“…The second one.”
“Really?” Logan asked, surprised.
“Uh… yes?”
“I’m surprised,” Logan commented. “I figured you would shy away from the ones that required a blood sacrifice.”
Virgil’s eyes widened. “Oh,” he said. “I… didn’t notice that. I would like to not do that one, please.”
“You didn’t notice?” Logan asked. “Half of the entire first page is dedicated to a discussion of it.”
There was a beat of awkward silence.
“Virgil,” Logan said. “Can you read the first paragraph on that page?”
 He grimaced.
“You can’t read?!”
“Logan, tone,” Patton snapped when Virgil flinched.
Logan took a breath. “I am not upset that you cannot read, but what have you been doing for the past week when I have given you written instructions for the protection charm potion?”
“Not… read it.”
“How have you been making the potion?” Logan asked.
“I just remember the steps, and if I’m not sure I ask. You’re usually distracted enough that you barely notice.”
“If I had known this, we would have done a completely auditory explanation.”
“Sorry.”
Logan sighed. “You didn’t need to pretend, Virgil.”
 Virgil blinked up at him. “Sorry.”
Logan just shook his head. “There is nothing for you to be sorry for. In fact, you are the one who is owed apologies from many people in your life for a multitude of reasons.” He knelt down to take the book from him. “Here,” he said. “For now, I will read this passage to you while we wait for the potions to finish brewing. Later we can talk about changing my lesson plans in reference to the potions as well as adding reading lessons into your schedule.”
“You… want to teach me how to read?” Virgil asked.
 “If you are willing,” Logan replied. “It’s a useful skill to have and opens up many doors.”
“I don’t know if I’ll be any good at it,” Virgil said with a frown.
“If you can memorize an entire potion recipe from start to finish with inadequate vocal instructions, I’m sure you can learn the alphabet perfectly well.”
“Okay,” he replied sounding a bit doubtful.
“And once we get you to an appropriate level, I’ll let you read a book about stars I enjoyed in my youth.” He seemed pleased with that prospect, and Logan smiled at him. “For now though, let’s read this together.”
 “Okay,” Virgil said. Logan opened the book in his lap and started to read. He noticed that Virgil was leaning over to look at the page despite the fact that he couldn’t read it, and so he began to point to the words as he read. His reactions to the words on the page were honestly quite funny when Logan caught them. His nose would scrunch up in confusion every time he thought an instruction nonsensical, and he’d squint his eyes at the words as though willing the sounds and letters to connect in his head. Logan wouldn’t be surprised with his memory if he had parts of it memorized by the end.
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After a few minutes of reading, a light weight descended on Logan’s shoulder. Virgil had settled his chin on Logan’s shoulder to peer at the words. Logan did his best not to draw attention to this fact and shot a glare at Patton when he clearly noticed, sitting up to smile widely at them. Luckily the boy was sensible enough not to squeal as he oh so clearly wanted to. Logan pointed out a picture while explaining what the caption said and then giving a personal antecedent. Virgil touched the page curiously and asked a question about the story before laying his head back down on Logan’s shoulder. They continued in this way until the potion was finished.
  Chapter 17
Virgil’s suspicion was growing. Logan and Patton seemed to have something planned. Luckily, whatever it was didn’t seem to be malicious, at least, Virgil hoped it wasn’t. He truly didn’t think that Patton had it in him to be so clearly excited about anything cruel. He also didn’t think Logan had it in him to be cruel, he was just was better at masking his excitement.
“What?” Logan asked innocently when Virgil gave him a pointed look the second Patton left to do ‘something’. Virgil would almost believe he truly wasn’t planning anything if it wasn’t for the way his lips twitched just a bit at the corners. Virgil glared harder.
 Logan dared to laugh lightly at the expression on his face. “Come here,” he requested. “Patton wanted me to make you pick out a book for him to read to you tonight since, I quote ‘You’ve gotten to read him all sorts of stories the last few days.’ I attempted to explain that it was not purely for fun, but he insisted.”
Virgil grumbled, but wandered over to look over at the books laid out on Logan’s bed, settling his chin on Logan’s shoulder. “What do they say?” he asked.
Logan pointed to each in turn. “Five Dragons and a Flame. The End of May. A Stone in the Meadow. Or you can continue to read The Never-ending Garden.”
 “I want to finish The Never-Ending Garden,” Virgil decided.
“Good choice.”
“Now will you tell me what you’re doing?” Virgil asked.
Logan just chuckled. Honestly, it was like he didn’t know that he had an assassin right next to his carotid artery. “Why do you think something is happened?”
“Patton’s a shit liar.”
“Be careful,” Logan said. “I might just have to tell him you said that.”
“Then I’ll tell him what you said when you accidently dropped the lavender into that potion,” Virgil threatened back.
“Hmm,” Logan said. “Truce?”
“On that,” Virgil agreed, “but you still need to tell me what’s going on.”
 “It is a surprise. A nice surprise,” Logan informed him. He looked at Virgil’s face. “Don’t pout at me.”
Virgil had not been aware that what he was doing was pouting, but he did whatever it was harder.
“Patton would murder me,” Logan claimed, “but I suggest you try that on him the next time you have a chance. You will certainly get whatever you want.”
Virgil sighed and gave up, figuring he’d learn whatever the surprise was soon enough. He chose to flop down on top of the pile of pillows on the floor that had been laid out already. It was his fourth ever slumber party and the first had only been a week ago. He did not know much about slumber parties, but that felt like a lot.
 Goodness, it had already been two weeks. He looked up at the ceiling. He felt safe here. He felt like he didn’t need to watch Logan’s every move as he organized things in his room, but it wasn’t going to last, was it? The king was set to be back in a week. Virgil needed to actually attempt to escape soon. He hated that fact. He didn’t want to leave, and he certainly didn’t want to go back. Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d figure something else out, but no mater what, he did have to escape, and soon. He looked over at Logan who was slotting the books Virgil hadn’t picked back into place on the bookshelf. Not tonight.
 There was a knock on the door in a familiar pattern, and Logan walked over to open it for Patton. Virgil sat up to shoot a confused look at the giant thing that Patton rolled in.
“Ta da!” Patton said excitedly.
Virgil blinked at him.
“It’s food,” Logan explained.
Virgil perked up immediately. That must be a lot of food if he needed that to carry it.
“I know you haven’t gotten a chance to try a lot of different foods, so I asked Mama if I could use the kitchen earlier today and made a bunch of different type of food samples for you to try.”
 That sounded like literally the best idea in the universe. These people were very good at surprises and Virgil would not question them again ever for the rest of his life (or, well, the next couple of days he was around them before he tried to escape and either managed it or died a bloody and painful death).
Patton seemed to feed off of Virgil’s excitement, practically vibrating himself as he gestured to different parts of the cart. “We have a bunch of types of cheese and crackers, mini sandwiches, different smoked meats, six types of pasta, and every leftover I could find on this shelf. On this shelf, we have things with hot sauce, things with spicy dry rubs, curries, and things with a lot of peppers. I’ve ordered them by spiciness level so we can what you can handle, and we’ll only go as far as you want. Then this shelf is a bunch of types of cookies, mini cakes, pies, and ice cream!”
 “We are not starting with the sweets,” Logan said firmly.
“But Lo!” Patton whined.
“We do not want to make him sick, do we?” Logan asked.
Patton pouted. Virgil honestly had no preference. All food was good food in his experience.
“Fine,” Patton said. “We’ll start with the cheese.”
They had him sit back in the center of the blanket pile and handed him little portions of things. Some of the cheese tasted weird at first and Patton would giggle at the faces of surprise he made, but Virgil managed to if not like, then tolerate almost all of them.
 Then came the different sandwiches, some hot and some cold and all of the pasta and leftovers. Virgil eyed the plate of fettuccine alfredo long after they had moved on.
“You can have some more at the end if you still have room,” Logan promised with a fond smile. Virgil frowned at him. “You want to try all of the food, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then you can’t eat an entire plate of fettucine alfredo.”
“Maybe you can’t,” Virgil said darkly.
Logan just rolled his eyes and passed him another plate.
Eventually they moved on to the next shelf full of what was deemed ‘spicy food.’
 “Part of this is figuring out what level of spiciness you can handle,” Patton said. “So, tell us when it gets to be a bit too much and we’ll move on two the deserts. Also, milk helps wash the spicy stuff that so drink some if you need to!”
Virgil nodded and accepted the first dish on that rack.
Virgil, it turned out, liked what they called “spicy” food even though some of it made his nose run a little bit. It was kind of fun to eat them, honestly. Some of them hurt a tiny bit, but they also tasted really good. It was strange.
“I am impressed and horrified,” Logan said when he finished that shelf. “Do you… have nerve endings in your mouth?”
 Virgil shrugged. “Well,” Patton said, sounding pleased. “Now it’s time for the best part! Assuming you still have room.” Virgil nodded immediately and Patton handed him a plate he’d covered with chunks of cookies he’d torn off. He ate every single one of those and then went through the rest of the deserts. Everything was fantastic and he’d like to investigate a few of the cakes once more, but…
He pointed insistently at the fettuccine alfredo.
Logan shook his head but handed it over. “How many stomachs do you have?”
Virgil did not care to respond, choosing instead to shove his mouth full of pasta.
 When he was done with that, he laid back to relax and digest the food, feeling very content. Logan and Patton had also eaten a bit of the different dishes and were finishing up themselves.
“You good there?” Patton asked after a moment of Virgil just laying with his eyes closed.
Virgil nodded.
“Did you like your surprise?”
“Uh huh.”
“It seems he will not be doing any of the other planned activities for a little while at least,” Logan said. “So now might be a good time for you two to read,” he suggested. “I’ll get the rest of the food stored in case we want something more later.”
 “Okay,” Patton agreed. Virgil didn’t open his eyes, but felt Patton settle next to him. Virgil rolled slightly, so his head rested against the side of Patton’s leg. A hand touched softly down on the top of Virgil’s head and Virgil heard a page flip. “So, let’s see. I’m not sure when exactly you fell asleep last time, but how about we start at the Troll Bridge?”
Virgil hummed his ascent.
“Okay,” Patton agreed as he started to read. “‘Melly stepped onto the bridge backwards while sticking her tongue out at Al, but Lydia’s eyes widened as a large looming figure stepped up behind her….’” Virgil listened happily to him read about the four children. He liked this book. He hoped they managed to finish reading it before Virgil had to go.
  Chapter 18
They made it all the way to the big blowout between Al and Melly where Melly got mad and left the group to their fate in the magical garden by the time Virgil awakened completely from his food coma (he’d never actually fallen asleep, or at least he always responded when Patton asked) and squirmed around for a bit before sitting up.
Logan hadn’t been particularly interested in the story he’d heard many times before and was reading a book of his own on Patton’s other side, but he put a bookmark in his book when Virgil sat.
“Want to take a break from reading?” Patton asked. “We can do a bit more later, but we have more than just food and books planned for tonight.
 “Okay,” Virgil agreed easily.
“Great!” Patton said clapping his hands. “We’re going to introduce you to the most fun sleepover party event ever!”
Virgil tilted his head.
“Dress up!” Patton said. “Also make-overs. We’ll do you first and then we’ll help you learn how to help pick out other people’s outfits and make-up. If you want to, of course.”
“Sure,” Virgil said with a shrug.
“Yay!” Patton hopped to his feet. “You stay here. Lo and I will get everything ready.”
He pulled Logan to his feet and over to the chair that was the perfect height for doing make-up.
 They set up what they’d need for make-up and then Patton instructed Logan to grab the clothes of his they usually used for this sort of thing out the closet that Virgil wasn’t set up in while he grabbed the pieces he himself had brought upstairs and strew them over the bed so they could see anything.
Smiling happily, Patton looked over at Virgil who had stood up in the giant pile of pillows and blankets to watch him with intense eyes. He looked like he was memorizing every action Patton took as though expecting a test at the end. He was so adorable. A rush of affection and a touch of mischief hit him suddenly.
 “Hey Virgil,” Patton said. Virgil looked over at him. “Can I tackle hug you into that pile of pillows?”
“Tackle hug?” he asked.
“I run over and hug you so hard that we fall into the blankets. I do it to Logan all the time without warning, but I didn’t want to confuse you.”
Virgil considered the offer for a couple of seconds. “Okay,” he finally decided.
“Great!” Patton did a little hop before launching himself across the room. He slammed into Virgil, who apparently had very good balanced because they didn’t immediately fall backwards, but then he seemed to remember that he was supposed to let Patton slam him into the pillows, and so he fell back on his own power.
 Patton giggled when they hit the ground and drew back to look at his face. “I got you!” He leant forward to kiss him on the nose. “Oh wait! I should let you fight back.” He propped himself up on one arm and held out the other hand. “Pinkie promise not to hurt anyone if I let you use the 3rd setting again?”
“Pinkie promise,” he agreed with a grin, linking their pinkies.
“Great!” Without hesitation, Patton did the hand motion to allow the restraints to be in the third setting.
Patton was on his back almost instantly, but he didn’t even have a chance to think about worrying before Virgil pressed a kiss to his nose in a mirror of what Patton had done a moment before. “I got you,” he said proudly.
 “So, you do,” Patton agreed with a laugh. He reached up on of his hands to card it through Virgil’s hair. Virgil leaned into the touch and then practically melted on top of him. “Virgil,” Patton laughed. “It isn’t nap time.”
He grumbled something unintelligible into Patton’s neck making Patton giggle more.
“Sweetie, please.”
Thankfully Logan saved him from the unrelenting cuddling by poking Virgil in the side. “I have finished preparing the stations for the makeover and dress up. You need to get up now.”
Virgil made a noise that sounded like a growl, but he did roll off of Patton.
 Patton hopped to his feet and helped Virgil up before pulling him over to the piles of clothes. “We pick the outfit first, but you don’t put it on. Then, we do your make-up and hair based on it. Then, we get you dressed and do touch ups. Okay? Pick anything you want.”
Virgil looked over the options, eyes going a bit wide. “It…” he said. “It all looks really fancy and expensive. Are you sure you want me to touch any of it?”
“We wouldn’t be offering anything we didn’t want you to touch,” Logan said gently. “In fact, I insist you touch all of it. Beyond just appearance, making sure the texture of the fabric is agreeable is a large part of this activity.”
 Patton picked up one of the pieces of fabric he knew was very soft and offered it to him. He touched it with careful fingers, his eyes lighting up at the feel of it. They had to continue nudging him into feeling the different fabrics, and he hesitated when they asked him to pick his favorite at the end, but eventually he shyly pointed at a dark purple dress.
Patton clapped. “Great! Ooo, I already have some ideas for make-up that will go with that.”
Virgil let Patton pull him over to the chair they’d set up and settled down on it.
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Patton hummed. “I think silver and purple make-up mostly?” he said.
Logan nodded and they grabbed a few things from the make-up kit. Logan let Patton do most of the make-up as he tended to be better at the more creative parts, but Logan was the one who gave him the fancy winged eye liner with purple sparkles because he was really good at them.
“You look fantastic!” Patton squealed when they were done. He held up a hand mirror for Virgil who studied himself in it for a long few moments. “Do you like it?”
“It’s really nice,” Virgil confirmed. Patton smiled and hugged him.
“Next hair. We have a lot of accessories. I’ll let you pick from the purple ones.”
 He and Logan sorted through the jewelry box full of different hair accessories for the royal family and ended up finding three purple ones. Patton hesitated a bit over one of them, but Logan picked it up and set it in front of Virgil for him.
“Your choice from these three,” he said.
One was a purple feather with little hooks to braid into hair, one was a smattering of purple and silver stars that would weave through the back of someone’s hair, and the last was a string of silver leaves with purple tips that would wrap up the back of a person’s head from a bun.
Virgil thought for a moment and then pointed to the one made of leaves.
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snowdice · 4 years
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Big Bang (Sort of) Editing Story [Day 33]
I started writing this fic while editing my Big Bang story, but am going to continue doing it for other things now that Kill Dear is out. I will write and publish 100 words of the story every time I finish doing whatever task I’m doing. If you’d like to block these proceedings, please feel free to block the tag proofread stories. I will reblog this post with the parts of the story I do today. Edited chapters are linked; everything else I’ve done so far is under the cut.
My Master Post Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11
Not sure how much I’ll do, but we get a little more of this tonight.
Chapter 12
Logan had needed to spend some time performing royal duties today which left Patton and Virgil alone after breakfast. Patton had started out trying to teach Virgil different board games. He’d seemed intrigued at first, but after a few games of checkers seemed to grow bored. Patton had gotten a blank stare when he’d asked if Virgil had any ideas about what to do for fun, so now he was trying to figure out something else they could do. He cast his eyes around at what Logan had in his bedroom.
“How about I read you a book?” he suggested.
 Virgil seemed very intrigued by that idea. “Sure,” he said.
“Okay!” Patton said cheerfully. “He popped to his feet and glanced through the small shelf of fiction books Logan kept in his room. He decided to choose one of the lighter ones that Logan and he had liked to read when they were younger. “This one is called The Never-ending Garden,” Patton said. “It’s about a group of four children and their adventures in a garden. It’s full of magic and adventure and friendship! Is that alright with you?”
“It sounds good,” Virgil answered.
Patton happily walked back over to sit next to him. “It is!” he said.
 First, he showed Virgil the picture on the cover of a wild looking garden with four kids roaming through it. One of the children was in a little red wagon being pulled by another one wearing a fancy hat. One of the others was walking, looking at a map while the last had a wooden sword. After giving Virgil a couple of moments too look at the picture, Patton cracked it open.
“We start with Lydia’s perspective,” Patton said. “She’s one of my favorites!” He pointed to a picture of a girl in a raincoat at the beginning of the chapter and Virgil leaned slightly closer to see. Then, Patton cleared his voice.
 “It had been raining that day,” Patton began, “but Lydia had been so bored that she still begged her father to go out and play when the storm lightened into a sprinkle. He made her change from the yellow dress she had been wearing into the one she often used to help him garden because he knew she was certain to get herself muddy. Her younger brother Marcus asked if he could come too and though part of her wanted to say no because she wanted to explore on her own without her baby brother slowing her down, her father had taught her to be a good big sister, so she agreed to let him come.”
 Patton watched Virgil out of the corner of his eye as he read about Lydia meeting up with the neighbor boy, Al, and the three children started to explore the garden in Lydia’s backyard. Virgil leaned in slightly to look at the pictures and listen to the story intently as the three children traveled deeper and deeper into the garden, but never made it to the back fence. They’d just made it to the part where they heard rustling behind the blackberry bush which Patton knew was the last main character, Melly, when Patton felt the need to adjust his posture a bit. Virgil moved in kind and ended up leaning further into Patton.
 Without even really thinking about it, Patton brought his arm around to touch the top of his head. Virgil flinched the second Patton made content and Patton drew the hand away immediately. “Sorry,” he said with a wince. Patton was a naturally touching person and he’d been having trouble battling his instincts to cuddle everyone and everything while around Virgil, but he knew most touch was not welcome. The poor thing startled every time Patton went to touch him unannounced and even sometimes when he’d said something before doing it.
“I-it’s okay,” Virgil said.
Patton gave him a tight lipped smiled and turned back to the book.
 He stilled a second later when Virgil leaned back in and their shoulders brushed. He blinked over at him. “Oh,” he said softly. “Do… do you want me to touch your hair?”
Virgil curled up into himself a little bit but then nodded.
“Okay,” Patton said. “I’m going to put my arm around you and do that then, okay?” He drew upon his years and years of convincing easily startled cats to allow him to give them pats as he slowly moved his arm back to where it had been before and gently touched the side of his head. He tensed, but didn’t startle this time, and so Patton gently ran his fingers through the hair a couple of times. Eventually, the tension bled out of him and he sort of slumped against Patton’s shoulder. Patton just barely restrained a coo before going back to reading. He continued to stroke the side of Virgil’s hair as he described the gang meeting up with Melly and them being told she was a fairy that lived in the garden.
 He'd only gotten to the part about them finding the wagon when Virgil started to shift a bit uncomfortably, his neck craned in an awkward angle. Patton kept reading as he brought the hand in his hair down to his shoulder and pushed lightly. There was the slightest bit of resistance as Virgil didn’t know what he was trying to do, but then he allowed Patton to move him. Patton leaned back a bit and picked the book up off his lap before continuing to push him down. Virgil did not help at all, seeming confused about what was going on.
 Patton had to poke him around until he was on his back laying across Patton’s lap. He grinned down at the boy who was looking at him in blatant bewilderment and propped the book up on his chest. He held it there with one of his hands and stretched the other out to resume messing with his hair. Virgil relaxed into the new position after a few minutes of reading, eyes shutting as he enjoyed the attention. His eyes would flicker open every time Patton moved to show him a picture, but other than that, he seemed content to not move.
 Eventually, he stopped responding when Patton moved to show him the pictures.
“Are you asleep?” he asked quietly. When he didn’t get a response, he bookmarked the last picture Virgil had responded to, and then continued reading to himself.
Eventually, there was a knock at the door. It was the one he and Logan had decided on to tell the other one that it was just them and not to panic when the door opened. The door opened to Logan a moment later.
He paused, taking in the sight of the assassin sprawled across Patton’s lap like a sleepy kitten. He shook his head fondly and walked over to them on silent feet. He bent and pressed a hand to the top of Virgil’s hand. Virgil stirred just barely, but didn’t open his eyes, pressing into the touch a bit.
Logan smiled. “He wanted to learn how to make protection charms today. I assume you’d like to join us?” Patton perked up and nodded happily, making Logan chuckle softly. “I will go set it up then. Would you like another book for the time being?”
“Just the one I was reading last night would be nice,” Patton said.
“Of course.” Logan stepped away to grab it and handed it to him. Then, he disappeared into his potion’s lab. Patton smiled down at Virgil’s sleeping face and settled the new book onto his chest to replace the children’s book. He didn’t even stir.
  Chapter 13
Logan was able to quickly set up the station for making protection charms. Patton had always liked making them, though he often used his more as fun accessories than for protection. The one he was going to show Virgil how to make was a very simple low level one used for little more than to keep bugs off of yourself and, in the event of a well made one, alert one to imminent danger by changing temperature. It was a nice thing to hold in the middle of the night if one was frightened by real or imagined threats. It would be warm to the touch when your environment was safe; he thought Virgil might appreciate it.
 He and Patton decided to wait until Virgil woke up naturally which only took about 30 minutes. Then, Logan brought him to his set up supplies. He explained briefly the process for making a protection charm. “I will be the one performing the enchantment for today,” he told Virgil. “I will show you how to make your own later, but I thought seeing how to make them would help with the learning process.”
“Plus, it’s fun!” Patton said.
Logan flashed a smile at him. “And that as well. I’ve prepared a small number of possible pendants for you to choose from. You can choose the shape and color, then we will put on a custom engraving, as well as decorations.”
 “Glitter! Glitter! Glitter! Glitter!”
“Yes, Patton, everyone knows you’re going to choose glitter,” Logan said, amused, “but why don’t we let Virgil decide for his own pendant?”
“Fine,” Patton said, “but mine will be glitter.”
Logan grabbed the box of blank pendants and offered it to Virgil. “Choose whichever one feels right,” he suggested. Virgil moved forward and looked over the box. “You can touch them,” Logan said. “In fact, I would suggest it as it is meant to be held when it’s done and you may as well get a feel for it.”
At his prompting, Virgil did. He reached into the box and shifted a few to the side. Eventually, he started picking a few up. “I like the crescent shape for holding the most he said,” holding a blue one up, but I don’t know.”
“What’s your favorite color?” Patton asked.
“Oh, um,” he mumbled. “I dunno.”
“Well here,” Patton said, reaching for the box. He dug through it and pulled out every single crescent moon shaped pendant and lined them up. “What do you fancy?”
Virgil considered them all for a long moment and then tentatively pointed the purple one out.
“Great!” Patton said. “Then, we’ll use that one.”
Virgil nodded and Patton picked up the pendant to drop it into his hands. His fingers curled over the shape and he seemed satisfied by the choice, so Logan turned to Patton. “Your turn,” he said.
Patton happily grabbed out a heart shaped blue one, but then paused and exchanged it for a purple one. “We match!” he said.
Virgil smiled slightly at his enthusiasm, and Logan dug out a blue crescent moon shape for himself. “Now that you have your base, you get to choose the engraving.” He opened up the instruction book to the correct page and showed it to him.
Virgil looked over the two pages of designs with carful focus. He wavered between the spiral sun and the flames for a moment, but eventually settled on the flames. Patton chose the interlocking hearts design as anticipated; it was his favorite, and Logan chose the spiral sun design for himself.
“Now, I’m going to engrave this design onto yours,” Logan said getting out the thin pen like instrument and dipping it into the slightly glowing bottle of potion he’d set out. “In the meantime, Patton will show you what we have for decorations.”
He was careful to get the symbol as perfect as he could and then started on Patton’s. Patton apparently managed to corrupt the boy because both of them came back with brushes and glitter to add as decoration.
Logan shook his head and handed them their freshly engraved pendants. “Apply the glitter how you like,” Logan said, moving on to his own engraving. Once he was finished, he selected some glow in the dark paint to decorate his own.
 Once he’d finished decorating his own pendant, Logan looked up. “Are you finished?” he asked.
“Yep!” Patton said, shoving his pendant at Logan while Virgil nodded. Virgil had been far less enthusiastic than Patton, having carefully brushed glitter into the flame design only whereas Patton had haphazardly covered his own all over with glitter. Logan took both pendants.
“This,” Logan said, bringing over a different potion, “is used to make sure the decorations never fall off. It basically allows the other substances to become a part of the stone. “It isn’t too dangerous, but I’d suggest you stand back for the moment.”
 Virgil stepped back farther back than was strictly necessary and gave the potion bottle a wary look. Logan moved all three pendants to the prepared surface (else they ran the risk of also getting stuck to the table) and put on gloves, having learned that magically gluing rocks to ones hands was not fun years ago. Then, he carefully drizzled a bit of the potion onto each rock. The rocks fizzled loudly, and Virgil gave off a startled yelp before toppling over flat on his face with his wrist glued to his sides.
“Oh no, honey,” Patton said immediately crouching next to him. “I’m sorry. We should have warned you about the noise.”
Logan wasn’t sure what type of action he’d tried to take when the sound started up, but whatever it was, it had caused him to move his arms fast enough that he’d activated the binding potion and it snapped his wrists to his side, overbalancing him.
 Patton’s hands hovered over the startled boy, but he didn’t touch. After a few moments, it was clear that the magic keeping Virgil’s hands at his side released because his hands slowly crept forward to push himself up, so his face wasn’t planted against the ground. His eyes still looked incredibly startled.
“Are you alright?” Patton asked.
Virgil blinked. “Yeah, I’m fine,” he said.
Logan took his words as permission to move without risking startling him more. Virgil’s eyes bopped back and forth between him and Patton a few times as he crossed to his wall of potions and grabbed one.
 He also selected a clean cloth from a basket on his way over to them. “A light healing potion,” Logan explained as he knelt in front of Virgil. He uncorked it. “May I?”
“I’m fine,” Virgil said with a frown. “I’m not even bleeding. It’s barely anything.”
“Which is why it’s a light healing potion,” Logan said. “You are sure to bruise with the way you hit. This will prevent it and make it stop hurting.”
“Okay,” Virgil agreed after a moment. Logan dribbled a bit out onto the rag. After a moment of thought, he touched the damp part of the cloth with his own finger, just to quash any fears that it would harm him.
 “It will tingle slightly,” Logan warned. Virgil tilted his face to let him dab it onto his nose and the light scrape on his face. His nose scrunched up and he moved to rub the sensation away quickly only to have his arms slam back to his sides.
Patton caught him so the sudden involuntary movement didn’t cause him to fall back, and then giggled when Virgil titled his head to what could only be described as pout back at him.
“Aw, poor thing,” Patton cooed, reaching forward to rub a hand across the top of his nose and then his forehead where the potion had been applied for him.
 “Better?” Patton asked.
“You’re really bad at this being captors thing,” Virgil commenting, willingly leaning back into Patton. Patton just smiled happily.
Logan took the bottle and got to his feet, before returning it, and then glanced at the pendants as Patton helped Virgil to his feet. The pendants had stopped fizzing, so Logan felt okay reaching in and grabbing them all.
He handed both Patton and Virgil their pendants when they walked closer to the table.
“And now for the actual enchantment,” Logan said. “For today, I already prepared the potion up to the last step as it has to sit for a few hours, but I will show you the last step and eventually teach you everything if you are still interested.”
 Virgil nodded, but said. “No more noises?”
Logan smiled. “No more noises,” he confirmed. Then he pushed forward all of the ingredients he was about to put in the pot for Virgil to study one by one before putting them each in it in the correct order. Then he demonstrated how to stir it correctly and told him how many times, though he doubted he’d be able to retain all of the information from this one demonstration. “There,” he said, setting down his spoon. “Now we just all put our pendants into the pot, and they should be ready in 25 minutes.”
 Logan showed Virgil around his potion’s lab while they waited, explaining what certain pieces of equipment did and a bit about his organization system. Virgil followed him around, looking at the things he pointed out curiously. He, however, got very distracted when Logan showed him one of the experiments he’d concocted. It was a thick liquid that was super attracted to itself and would form a small ball that could be disturbed by touching it. He seemed to like the sensation of squishing it down onto a table… over and over and over again.
“We should get him a ball of yarn,” Patton said out of the corner of his mouth. He may have been enjoying watching Virgil play with the substance more than Virgil was enjoying playing with it himself. And that was saying something.
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Eventually, however, the pendants were finished, and he dragged Virgil away from his new toy to show him the finished product.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“Is it supposed to be warm?” Virgil inquired.
“Yes,” Logan replied. “It’s temperature changes based on if the magic on it senses a threat or not. Warmer temperatures mean you are safe.
“Oh,” Virgil said softly, hand squeezing around it. “I like it.”
Logan found himself smiling. “I’m glad. It’s yours.”
“Thank you,” he said.
“If you would like, I’m sure Patton has some suggestions if you’d desire a way to keep it attached to your person. He in particular likes to make them into necklaces or clip them to his clothing.”
Virgil looked over at Patton and nodded shyly. Patton immediately perked up. “I’ll go get some supplies!” he said.
  Chapter 14
“So then,” Patton was saying. “We ran to the stables.”
“We went to gazebo first,” Logan cut in.
“Right, we tried to go to the gazebo first,” Patton corrected, “but Mr. Deknis was over there tending to the tomatoes, and we knew he’d tell Mama the second he saw us. So, then we turned around and went to the stables.”
Virgil tilted his head, listening to the story Patton was telling. Patton was not the best storyteller. He tended to get lost in the middle and embellish, though Logan always corrected him. It was still very entertaining to watch though because he got incredibly animated. He’d even toppled himself over in excitement a couple of times.
 Virgil squeezed the small pillow he had in his lap. He… wasn’t 100% sure what was going on. Logan and Patton had settled him on the blanket covered ground near Logan’s bed and proceeded to feed him snacks and talk about a lot of different things. It had started with them talking about what they’d done that day, and when Patton had made reference to something Virgil hadn’t understood, the two of them ended up talking about things from their childhood.
Virgil found himself entranced by their stories about playing in and running around the castle. It was all so different from what Virgil had experienced.
 “…but, right as we were about to get to the ladder to climb up into the hay loft, Logan tripped!” Patton said, arms whipping around him. “He fell into a container of grain for the horses and it spilled all over the place. He tried to get up but grabbed the edge of the water trough and apparently it wasn’t very secure because it fell over and soaked him. So, then he was wet and covered in grain. He looked hilarious.”
“I did not!” Logan protested, but it did not sound like all of the other times he’d corrected Patton’s stories that night.
 Patton looked over at him. “You did! You woke up the cute stable hand and he laughed himself silly at you, and by the time we got you even partially cleaned up, your dad had already found us. That’s how we got caught.”
“I have no recollection of these events,” Logan clearly lied, his cheeks a bit flushed.
“Liar,” Patton claimed. “You complained about picking grain out of your sheets for weeks.”
“No,” Logan growled.
“Yes! It’s okay. It was a good laugh.”
Logan’s eyes narrowed on him, and he looked pissed, but a second later, his expression lightened up. “You know what else was a ‘good laugh’?” he asked.
 There was a second of silence before…
“Don’t you dare Logan.”
Logan looked him directly in the eye. “Patton was thirteen,” Logan started, but was interrupted the next moment when Patton lobbed a pillow at his head. Logan grabbed the pillow and leaned forward to smack Patton back with it. “He was thirteen and had just ‘discovered boys’ as his mother and my father called it when they attempted to explain his behavior to me. The focus of said ‘discovering’ at the time was the son of an ambassador from Lamir” who was staying for the summer, a seventeen-year-old boy by the name Bernardo.”
 Virgil flinched back as Patton suddenly threw himself across the semicircle they’d made with their bodies to tackle Logan to the ground. He watched as they ineffectually wrestled on the ground for a few seconds before Logan, voice strained continued to speak, while battling Patton’s hands away from his mouth.
“Patton’s only knowledge about flirting… ow… at that point was laughing at everything someone said and touching their arms and shoulders.” Logan managed to flip himself onto his stomach which was a horrible move as far as Virgil was concerned. It put him at a disadvantage to get out of the pin. However, Patton just kept reaching for his mouth and didn’t bare down on his neck to try to cut off his oxygen like Virgil expected. So, perhaps it was a rational move. “Our parents were speaking leaving Patton, Bernardo, and I in the garden,” Logan mumbled into the ground. “Bernardo said something ‘funny’ and Patton went to slap his shoulder while laughing, but shoved too hard… Patton did you just lick my face?!”
 “And I’ll do it again if you don’t shut up!” Patton threatened. That was a… weird fighting strategy.
Logan paused to consider his options. “He shoved Bernardo into the fountain and when Bernardo asked him why he did that, he ran away and wouldn’t talk to him the rest of the summer!” Logan rushed out.
Patton reached over and grabbed the nearest pillow, proceeding to whack him viciously in the back of the head. Logan was lucky the nearest object was a pillow and not something any sturdier. “It’s not funny!” Patton yelled, smacking him even more, which was when Virgil realized Logan was laughing despite the pinning and pillow pummeling. “It’s not!” Patton said. “I really liked him!!”
 “He was seventeen!” Logan said. “It was never going to happen!”
Patton groaned and rolled off of Logan to lay on his back and stare at the ceiling. “But he had so many muscles,” Patton said. “He probably could have thrown me 10 yards.”
“And that is… a benefit?” Logan asked, rolling over onto his side to face him.
“You don’t. Get me.” Patton tilted his head to look at Virgil. “Anyway,” he said. “That is the story of how I died at 13.”
Virgil stared at him, and Patton’s forehead crinkled looking at him.
“Is something wrong, honey?” he asked.
 “What was that?” Virgil asked.
“What was what?”
Virgil just blinked at him. Patton seemed to think for a moment.
“Oh, did you think we were fighting?” Patton asked. “Like, really fighting?”
“You weren’t fighting?” Virgil asked.
“No, sweetie,” Patton said. “We were just playing.” He popped up into a sitting position. “Well, play fighting, but emphasis on play!”
Virgil looked over at Logan for confirmation. “No one is harmed nor was there any intention to harm each other,” he assured.
Patton grabbed the pillow he’d been smacking Logan with. “Like this!” he said. “Bap.” Unlike how he’d smacked Logan ruthlessly, he basically just touched Virgil’s shoulder with it.
 Virgil squinted at him.
“Bap!” Patton said again, smacking him again, this time with a little bit more force and on the cheek. Virgil’s nose scrunched up. “Pillow fight!”
“Pillow fight?”
“You try,” he said, pointing to the pillow in Virgil’s lap.
Virgil glanced down at the bands around his wrist. “Um…” he said. “I don’t think I can?”
“Oh, right,” Patton said with a frown. He bit his lip and glanced over at Logan. “Maybe…”
“Ill-advisable,” Logan said.
“But…” Patton said. “Pillow fight.”
“We would have to be very cautious and make sure there were no weapons in the area.”
“No weapons but pillows!”
 “Fine,” Logan relented to whatever was going on. “Let’s clear the area.” Virgil watched them with mounting confusion as they removed everything within a few meters radius of him except for pillows and blankets.
“There!” Patton said after a minute. “All done!”
“What are you doing?” Virgil said.
“We’re going to have a pillow fight,” Patton said.
“But I…”
“We’ll temporarily allow your restraints to be in the third setting like when you’re in the closet.”
Were they serious? Were they stupid? Virgil could have killed them dozens of times with the second setting and now they were giving him even more range of motion?
 “You have to promise not to try to hurt anyone though,” Patton said. Virgil stared at him dumbly, as Patton held out his pinky finger. “Pinky promise.”
“Pinky promise?”
Patton nodded solemnly. “We lock pinky fingers and make a promise. It’s the most binding promise in the universe.”
Virgil looked at his finger, confused. He’d never heard of that type of deal. “What kind of magic is it?”
“No magic,” Patton said. “Just friendship.” Virgil tilted his head but brought his hand up so Patton could twine their fingers together. “Now, promise you won’t hurt anyone.”
“I promise I won’t hurt anyone,” he said.
“It’s a deal!” said Patton, squeezing Virgil’s finger with his own briefly before drawing away. “I trust you.” Virgil felt a rush of something that was no type of magic he’d ever come into contact before but was definitely far more powerful.
 Logan came over to them and waved his hand over the restraints on Virgil. They buzzed slightly and Virgil looked between them. “So, I just hit you with pillows?”
“Try not to hit too hard near the face, and Lo and I should probably take off our glasses before we start, but yeah,” Patton said, taking his glasses off as he said it. It was yet another foolish move on his part. “It’s fun, and it doesn’t hurt.”
“Okay…” Virgil said.
“I will demonstrate,” Logan said as he took a pillow and smacked Patton in the stomach.
“Hey! No fair!” Patton giggled. “We haven’t started yet!” This did not deter Logan however, as he continued to smack Patton with a pillow.
“On the contrary,” he said. “It has started, and we’re getting you first.”
 “No,” Patton whined, but the way he crumpled to the ground under the onslaught seemed far too staged to make Virgil worry. He didn’t even try to curl up into a ball or to protect his head, just taking the hits and giggling.
Logan looked up at Virgil and motioned with his head. Virgil inched over and looked down at Patton. Logan slowed for a few moments. “Go on,” he urged.
Virgil bit his lip and reached forward to smack Patton lightly with his pillow which seemed to do nothing to him but renew his peels of giggles. From there, it was easy to continue. Logan picked up the pace of his strikes and he and Virgil proceeded to ‘fight’ Patton until he couldn’t breath through his laughter and pushed the pillows away, curling up on his side to recover.
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“No what?” Virgil asked when Patton sat up.
“Now I get vengeance!” Patton said, popping to his feet and smacking Logan in the face. “Help me Virgil!” So, Virgil turned on Logan and he and Patton gave the prince the same treatment. Then, because it was only fair, it was Virgil’s turn, though they were a lot more careful with him then they’d been with each other, and really Patton spent more of the time checking in on Virgil then actually hitting him with the pillow. It was nice. Fun. And when Virgil pushed them away, they pulled back. Then, it was Patton’s turn again and they went around teaming up on each other and sometimes just smacking at each other at random.
  Eventually, they slowed, and all ended up laying near each other on the floor.
“Well, that made me hungry,” Patton said, sitting up and stretching. “I asked Mama to make us a bunch of mini sandwiches with different flavors. I’ll go get them.”
He hopped to his feet to walk over to where they’d stored the food earlier in those little glowing magical balls Logan had for food preservation.
Logan and Virgil sat up too, and Virgil offered him his wrists.
“Right,” Logan said with a blink. He made a motion and Virgil could feel the magic weighing down his hands once again. He’d almost forgotten, Virgil thought with an internal sigh. They’d given an assassin free range of motion, had a pillow fight with him, and almost forgotten to restrain him again. What was Virgil going to do with these idiots?
  Chapter 15
Patton strolled up to the doors to the royal wing, his arms crossed casually around his middle.
Kalani raised an eyebrow as he approached and gave her the most innocent expression he could. “Whatcha got there, Pat?” she asked.
“Hmm?” he asked, as his sweater squirmed. “What do you mean?”
She considered him for a moment. “Well, I see nothing suspicious here,” she said. “Do you Owen?”
“Nothing,” he replied without hesitation.
Patton grinned at them both.
Kalani leaned in like she was going to tell him a secret. “Who is it?”
Patton made a show of glanced around like he was hiding it from anyone passing by. Then he shifted around to pull up just the bottom of his sweater.
 A small black paw reached out from the depths of his sweater and swatted at the air.
“Ah, I see,” Kalani said, reaching out to touch the little paw. “Hello, Mittens.”
Patton giggled as Owen poked the cat’s stomach gently through the sweater, making her wiggle a bit and try to bite him.
“Well,” Patton said. “I better be off with my totally normal sweater.”
Kalani nodded and stepped to the side, and Patton was free to head down the hallway to Logan’s room. Patton knocked on the door with their new extra secret knock and Logan all but ripped open the door. “I’m late. I have to go,” he said, darting past Patton.
 Patton smiled, happy that his plan to be running a little late to come watch Virgil had worked so well, even though he felt a little bit guilty about it. He hoped Logan wasn’t late to his meeting, but he also knew that if Logan had noticed Mittens, he wouldn’t have let her into the room.
Virgil was already out of the closet, sitting on one of the chairs. Patton came in and smiled at him. Unlike Logan, Virgil’s attention was immediately drawn to the oddly shaped lump in Patton’s sweater.
“You’re not very good at hiding things,” Virgil said.
 “It worked on Logan,” Patton defended himself.
“Logan was about to rocket into space if you didn’t show up in 5 seconds,” Virgil pointed out. Patton just shrugged, and Virgil tilted his head. “What do you have?”
Patton grinned wide and carefully pulled Mittens out of his sweater. She did not resist this maneuver at all, simply purring. He held her up for Virgil to see. “Ta da!”
“A cat?” Virgil said.
“This is Mittens,” Patton said. He then turned to Mittens. “Mittens, this is Virgil. I thought I’d introduce the two of you!”
Virgil blinked at the cat. Mittens blinked back. Patton thought maybe he should have let them sniff each other from under a door before doing this.
 He didn’t need to worry though, as Mittens started purring after a moment. “You can pet her,” Patton offered. Virgil looked up at him. “Just…” he said.
“She likes chin scratchies!” Patton prompted.
Virgil reached out a hand to scratch under her chin and that was the end of it. Mittens stretched out her chin happy to get the attention and Virgil’s eyes widened at how soft her fur was. It was a work of minutes before Virgil was sitting down on the floor and Mittens was happily kneading his thighs and spinning around in circles to make sure he pet every inch of her.
“I did not understand why people like cats,” Virgil commented. “All I’ve seen of cats is people coming back with bloody scratches from trying to pet them, so I never even tried.”
“Well,” Patton said. “Cats are just like people. If you’re nice to them, they’re more likely to be nice to you.”
 Virgil’s hand paused briefly on the cat’s head, but then continued with the petting a moment later. Patton wondered what he was thinking about, but didn’t press.
“She seems to like you,” Patton said.
“Don’t know why.”
“Hey, don’t be mean.” Patton scolded.
Virgil hands jerked away from the cat he’d been petting and then were forced abruptly to his side in reaction. Mittens meowed, seemed very unhappy with the jostling as well as the sudden lack of petting.
“Sorry,” Virgil said, eyes wide. “What did I do wrong. I didn’t mean to be mean to her.”
It took Patton a moment to sus out what he was talking about and felt a pang in his chest when he did. “Oh, no honey. You didn’t do anything wrong. I meant don’t be mean to yourself.”
 Virgil gave him a confused look. Mittens bumped her head against his chin and with a blink, he cautiously went back to petting her.
“Of course, she likes you sweetie, you’re a good boy.”
“I came here to kill the king. I’ve killed before.”
Patton smiled sadly. “I don’t think you ever wanted to,” he said. Virgil seemed to grow very interested in mitten’s ears. Patton scooted over so he was sitting beside him and carefully brought a hand up to touch the top of his head. Virgil sort of curled into him, pressing his face against Patton’s shoulder, but continuing to pet the cat.
 “It’s fine. You’re going to be okay now,” Patton said softly.
Virgil shook his head against Patton’s shoulder.
“Yes,” Patton insisted. “You’ll be okay. You won’t have to go back.”
Virgil didn’t respond for a long moment. “You can’t keep me in Logan’s closet forever,” he said softly. “When his dad comes back, you’re going to have to turn me in.”
Well, that was true, but… “It’ll be okay. No one will hurt you.”
“The kings would be assassin?” Virgil asked skeptically.
“Thomas is nice. He’ll understand.”
“He’s nice to you. He’s nice to Logan. Maybe he’s even nice to the people he rules over, but what am I? An enemy assassin who would have slit his throat if I hadn’t gotten the wrong room.”
 It…it did sound bad when he put it like that, but, but… “Thomas will understand,” he promised, hugging him tight. “He will, and we’ll keep you safe and I’ll introduce you to every single cat in the castle. In fact, we’ll get you a cat to keep as a pet if you want and he or she can snuggle you as much as you want. I’ll show you all around the gardens and introduce you to Mama and help you figure out what your favorite type of cookie is. You’ll never have to hurt anyone again and no one will ever hurt you again.”
 Virgil drew away a bit and shot him a half smile. He clearly didn’t believe him, and it made Patton’s stomach twist a bit. Patton knew. He knew Thomas would be nice. There was no way he’d hurt Virgil. Virgil was just a kid and with Logan and Patton on his side, there was no way anything bad would happen to him. He could see it from Virgil’s perspective though.
“I like her feet,” Virgil said, touching Mittens’ little black paw that contrasted her otherwise white coat. Mittens purred and began kneading his legs again with those paws. “I’m guessing that’s why she’s named Mittens?”
“Yeah,” said Patton softly. “‘Cause she looks like she’s wearing mittens.” Virgil leaned forward to kiss her little head and that little action made Patton’s heart ache for him. He deserved so many kitten kisses. So many.
Patton was determined to make sure he got them.
  Chapter 16
“Well done,” Logan complimented when Virgil looked up at him for approval. It was the first time Virgil was trying to make the protection charms without Logan’s instructions. Logan was of course still in the room in case he had questions and the boy had a written set of instructions next to him, but for the most part Virgil was doing it on his own.
“Now,” Virgil said squinting down at the paper next to him, “we wait for 35 minutes.”
“Fifty actually,” Logan corrected offhand, focused on his own potion.
“Oh, yeah, right,” Virgil said. He grabbed the timer and set it for the appropriate time.
 Then, he stepped away from Logan’s nontoxic potion station. Logan saw him edge a bit closer to peak at what Logan was working on, though he was careful to maintain a distance. Logan wasn’t sure if this was because he’d been warned of the possible harmful substances Logan sometimes used at his experiment table or because he was worried Logan might not want him to approach.
Logan looked up at him. “You can come closer. Nothing here is very dangerous.”
Virgil nodded and walked over to peer at the boiling pot. “What are you making?” he asked.
“I am once again attempting to invent a potion that will reliably remove cat hair from surfaces,” Logan said, glancing over at Patton.
 Patton looked up from the bracelet he was making and stuck his tongue out at Logan.
“I can never seem to find an adequate solution,” Logan said.
“The solution is to accept all parts of kitty love!” Patton insisted.
“Or maybe the solution is to exile you from my room for the rest of time,” Logan muttered. Patton chose to ignore him and go back to working on the bracelet.
“Do you want any help?” Virgil offered Logan.
Logan smiled at him. “I’m actually almost finished with this step and there isn’t much left to do but thank you.”
Virgil nodded. “Oh, okay,” he said. He shifted back and forth a few times.
 “You’re well on your way to mastering this potion,” Logan said. “I was thinking that next I could teach you how to make a tracking charm. I marked a passage about it in the book on that shelf.” He gestured to one near the station Virgil had been working at. “Why don’t you go ahead and read that while you wait?”
“The…” Virgil said. “The green book?”
“Yes,” Logan said. “I left a bookmark in the correct page.”
“Um… yeah, sure. I’ll go… read that.”
Logan nodded and turned back to put the finishing touches on his own potion as Virgil walked away.
 Logan finished up his potion up after a few minutes and covered it to let it simmer. He looked over to see that Patton had flopped onto his back, still working on the bracelet and Virgil had sat near to him with the book on his lap open. Logan walked over to them.
“What do you think?” Logan asked.
Virgil glanced up at him. “Erm,” he said. “Looks good.”
“Which option do you like better?”
“…The second one.”
“Really?” Logan asked, surprised.
“Uh… yes?”
“I’m surprised,” Logan commented. “I figured you would shy away from the ones that required a blood sacrifice.”
Virgil’s eyes widened. “Oh,” he said. “I… didn’t notice that. I would like to not do that one, please.”
“You didn’t notice?” Logan asked. “Half of the entire first page is dedicated to a discussion of it.”
There was a beat of awkward silence.
“Virgil,” Logan said. “Can you read the first paragraph on that page?”
 He grimaced.
“You can’t read?!”
“Logan, tone,” Patton snapped when Virgil flinched.
Logan took a breath. “I am not upset that you cannot read, but what have you been doing for the past week when I have given you written instructions for the protection charm potion?”
“Not… read it.”
“How have you been making the potion?” Logan asked.
“I just remember the steps, and if I’m not sure I ask. You’re usually distracted enough that you barely notice.”
“If I had known this, we would have done a completely auditory explanation.”
“Sorry.”
Logan sighed. “You didn’t need to pretend, Virgil.”
 Virgil blinked up at him. “Sorry.”
Logan just shook his head. “There is nothing for you to be sorry for. In fact, you are the one who is owed apologies from many people in your life for a multitude of reasons.” He knelt down to take the book from him. “Here,” he said. “For now, I will read this passage to you while we wait for the potions to finish brewing. Later we can talk about changing my lesson plans in reference to the potions as well as adding reading lessons into your schedule.”
“You… want to teach me how to read?” Virgil asked.
 “If you are willing,” Logan replied. “It’s a useful skill to have and opens up many doors.”
“I don’t know if I’ll be any good at it,” Virgil said with a frown.
“If you can memorize an entire potion recipe from start to finish with inadequate vocal instructions, I’m sure you can learn the alphabet perfectly well.”
“Okay,” he replied sounding a bit doubtful.
“And once we get you to an appropriate level, I’ll let you read a book about stars I enjoyed in my youth.” He seemed pleased with that prospect, and Logan smiled at him. “For now though, let’s read this together.”
 “Okay,” Virgil said. Logan opened the book in his lap and started to read. He noticed that Virgil was leaning over to look at the page despite the fact that he couldn’t read it, and so he began to point to the words as he read. His reactions to the words on the page were honestly quite funny when Logan caught them. His nose would scrunch up in confusion every time he thought an instruction nonsensical, and he’d squint his eyes at the words as though willing the sounds and letters to connect in his head. Logan wouldn’t be surprised with his memory if he had parts of it memorized by the end.
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After a few minutes of reading, a light weight descended on Logan’s shoulder. Virgil had settled his chin on Logan’s shoulder to peer at the words. Logan did his best not to draw attention to this fact and shot a glare at Patton when he clearly noticed, sitting up to smile widely at them. Luckily the boy was sensible enough not to squeal as he oh so clearly wanted to. Logan pointed out a picture while explaining what the caption said and then giving a personal antecedent. Virgil touched the page curiously and asked a question about the story before laying his head back down on Logan’s shoulder. They continued in this way until the potion was finished.
  Chapter 17
Virgil’s suspicion was growing. Logan and Patton seemed to have something planned. Luckily, whatever it was didn’t seem to be malicious, at least, Virgil hoped it wasn’t. He truly didn’t think that Patton had it in him to be so clearly excited about anything cruel. He also didn’t think Logan had it in him to be cruel, he was just was better at masking his excitement.
“What?” Logan asked innocently when Virgil gave him a pointed look the second Patton left to do ‘something’. Virgil would almost believe he truly wasn’t planning anything if it wasn’t for the way his lips twitched just a bit at the corners. Virgil glared harder.
 Logan dared to laugh lightly at the expression on his face. “Come here,” he requested. “Patton wanted me to make you pick out a book for him to read to you tonight since, I quote ‘You’ve gotten to read him all sorts of stories the last few days.’ I attempted to explain that it was not purely for fun, but he insisted.”
Virgil grumbled, but wandered over to look over at the books laid out on Logan’s bed, settling his chin on Logan’s shoulder. “What do they say?” he asked.
Logan pointed to each in turn. “Five Dragons and a Flame. The End of May. A Stone in the Meadow. Or you can continue to read The Never-ending Garden.”
 “I want to finish The Never-Ending Garden,” Virgil decided.
“Good choice.”
“Now will you tell me what you’re doing?” Virgil asked.
Logan just chuckled. Honestly, it was like he didn’t know that he had an assassin right next to his carotid artery. “Why do you think something is happened?”
“Patton’s a shit liar.”
“Be careful,” Logan said. “I might just have to tell him you said that.”
“Then I’ll tell him what you said when you accidently dropped the lavender into that potion,” Virgil threatened back.
“Hmm,” Logan said. “Truce?”
“On that,” Virgil agreed, “but you still need to tell me what’s going on.”
 “It is a surprise. A nice surprise,” Logan informed him. He looked at Virgil’s face. “Don’t pout at me.”
Virgil had not been aware that what he was doing was pouting, but he did whatever it was harder.
“Patton would murder me,” Logan claimed, “but I suggest you try that on him the next time you have a chance. You will certainly get whatever you want.”
Virgil sighed and gave up, figuring he’d learn whatever the surprise was soon enough. He chose to flop down on top of the pile of pillows on the floor that had been laid out already. It was his fourth ever slumber party and the first had only been a week ago. He did not know much about slumber parties, but that felt like a lot.
 Goodness, it had already been two weeks. He looked up at the ceiling. He felt safe here. He felt like he didn’t need to watch Logan’s every move as he organized things in his room, but it wasn’t going to last, was it? The king was set to be back in a week. Virgil needed to actually attempt to escape soon. He hated that fact. He didn’t want to leave, and he certainly didn’t want to go back. Maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe he’d figure something else out, but no mater what, he did have to escape, and soon. He looked over at Logan who was slotting the books Virgil hadn’t picked back into place on the bookshelf. Not tonight.
 There was a knock on the door in a familiar pattern, and Logan walked over to open it for Patton. Virgil sat up to shoot a confused look at the giant thing that Patton rolled in.
“Ta da!” Patton said excitedly.
Virgil blinked at him.
“It’s food,” Logan explained.
Virgil perked up immediately. That must be a lot of food if he needed that to carry it.
“I know you haven’t gotten a chance to try a lot of different foods, so I asked Mama if I could use the kitchen earlier today and made a bunch of different type of food samples for you to try.”
 That sounded like literally the best idea in the universe. These people were very good at surprises and Virgil would not question them again ever for the rest of his life (or, well, the next couple of days he was around them before he tried to escape and either managed it or died a bloody and painful death).
Patton seemed to feed off of Virgil’s excitement, practically vibrating himself as he gestured to different parts of the cart. “We have a bunch of types of cheese and crackers, mini sandwiches, different smoked meats, six types of pasta, and every leftover I could find on this shelf. On this shelf, we have things with hot sauce, things with spicy dry rubs, curries, and things with a lot of peppers. I’ve ordered them by spiciness level so we can what you can handle, and we’ll only go as far as you want. Then this shelf is a bunch of types of cookies, mini cakes, pies, and ice cream!”
 “We are not starting with the sweets,” Logan said firmly.
“But Lo!” Patton whined.
“We do not want to make him sick, do we?” Logan asked.
Patton pouted. Virgil honestly had no preference. All food was good food in his experience.
“Fine,” Patton said. “We’ll start with the cheese.”
They had him sit back in the center of the blanket pile and handed him little portions of things. Some of the cheese tasted weird at first and Patton would giggle at the faces of surprise he made, but Virgil managed to if not like, then tolerate almost all of them.
 Then came the different sandwiches, some hot and some cold and all of the pasta and leftovers. Virgil eyed the plate of fettuccine alfredo long after they had moved on.
“You can have some more at the end if you still have room,” Logan promised with a fond smile. Virgil frowned at him. “You want to try all of the food, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then you can’t eat an entire plate of fettucine alfredo.”
“Maybe you can’t,” Virgil said darkly.
Logan just rolled his eyes and passed him another plate.
Eventually they moved on to the next shelf full of what was deemed ‘spicy food.’
 “Part of this is figuring out what level of spiciness you can handle,” Patton said. “So, tell us when it gets to be a bit too much and we’ll move on two the deserts. Also, milk helps wash the spicy stuff that so drink some if you need to!”
Virgil nodded and accepted the first dish on that rack.
Virgil, it turned out, liked what they called “spicy” food even though some of it made his nose run a little bit. It was kind of fun to eat them, honestly. Some of them hurt a tiny bit, but they also tasted really good. It was strange.
“I am impressed and horrified,” Logan said when he finished that shelf. “Do you… have nerve endings in your mouth?”
 Virgil shrugged. “Well,” Patton said, sounding pleased. “Now it’s time for the best part! Assuming you still have room.” Virgil nodded immediately and Patton handed him a plate he’d covered with chunks of cookies he’d torn off. He ate every single one of those and then went through the rest of the deserts. Everything was fantastic and he’d like to investigate a few of the cakes once more, but…
He pointed insistently at the fettuccine alfredo.
Logan shook his head but handed it over. “How many stomachs do you have?”
Virgil did not care to respond, choosing instead to shove his mouth full of pasta.
 When he was done with that, he laid back to relax and digest the food, feeling very content. Logan and Patton had also eaten a bit of the different dishes and were finishing up themselves.
“You good there?” Patton asked after a moment of Virgil just laying with his eyes closed.
Virgil nodded.
“Did you like your surprise?”
“Uh huh.”
“It seems he will not be doing any of the other planned activities for a little while at least,” Logan said. “So now might be a good time for you two to read,” he suggested. “I’ll get the rest of the food stored in case we want something more later.”
 “Okay,” Patton agreed. Virgil didn’t open his eyes, but felt Patton settle next to him. Virgil rolled slightly, so his head rested against the side of Patton’s leg. A hand touched softly down on the top of Virgil’s head and Virgil heard a page flip. “So, let’s see. I’m not sure when exactly you fell asleep last time, but how about we start at the Troll Bridge?”
Virgil hummed his ascent.
“Okay,” Patton agreed as he started to read. “‘Melly stepped onto the bridge backwards while sticking her tongue out at Al, but Lydia’s eyes widened as a large looming figure stepped up behind her….’” Virgil listened happily to him read about the four children. He liked this book. He hoped they managed to finish reading it before Virgil had to go.
  Chapter 18
They made it all the way to the big blowout between Al and Melly where Melly got mad and left the group to their fate in the magical garden by the time Virgil awakened completely from his food coma (he’d never actually fallen asleep, or at least he always responded when Patton asked) and squirmed around for a bit before sitting up.
Logan hadn’t been particularly interested in the story he’d heard many times before and was reading a book of his own on Patton’s other side, but he put a bookmark in his book when Virgil sat.
“Want to take a break from reading?” Patton asked. “We can do a bit more later, but we have more than just food and books planned for tonight.
 “Okay,” Virgil agreed easily.
“Great!” Patton said clapping his hands. “We’re going to introduce you to the most fun sleepover party event ever!”
Virgil tilted his head.
“Dress up!” Patton said. “Also make-overs. We’ll do you first and then we’ll help you learn how to help pick out other people’s outfits and make-up. If you want to, of course.”
“Sure,” Virgil said with a shrug.
“Yay!” Patton hopped to his feet. “You stay here. Lo and I will get everything ready.”
He pulled Logan to his feet and over to the chair that was the perfect height for doing make-up.
 They set up what they’d need for make-up and then Patton instructed Logan to grab the clothes of his they usually used for this sort of thing out the closet that Virgil wasn’t set up in while he grabbed the pieces he himself had brought upstairs and strew them over the bed so they could see anything.
Smiling happily, Patton looked over at Virgil who had stood up in the giant pile of pillows and blankets to watch him with intense eyes. He looked like he was memorizing every action Patton took as though expecting a test at the end. He was so adorable. A rush of affection and a touch of mischief hit him suddenly.
 “Hey Virgil,” Patton said. Virgil looked over at him. “Can I tackle hug you into that pile of pillows?”
“Tackle hug?” he asked.
“I run over and hug you so hard that we fall into the blankets. I do it to Logan all the time without warning, but I didn’t want to confuse you.”
Virgil considered the offer for a couple of seconds. “Okay,” he finally decided.
“Great!” Patton did a little hop before launching himself across the room. He slammed into Virgil, who apparently had very good balanced because they didn’t immediately fall backwards, but then he seemed to remember that he was supposed to let Patton slam him into the pillows, and so he fell back on his own power.
 Patton giggled when they hit the ground and drew back to look at his face. “I got you!” He leant forward to kiss him on the nose. “Oh wait! I should let you fight back.” He propped himself up on one arm and held out the other hand. “Pinkie promise not to hurt anyone if I let you use the 3rd setting again?”
“Pinkie promise,” he agreed with a grin, linking their pinkies.
“Great!” Without hesitation, Patton did the hand motion to allow the restraints to be in the third setting.
Patton was on his back almost instantly, but he didn’t even have a chance to think about worrying before Virgil pressed a kiss to his nose in a mirror of what Patton had done a moment before. “I got you,” he said proudly.
 “So, you do,” Patton agreed with a laugh. He reached up on of his hands to card it through Virgil’s hair. Virgil leaned into the touch and then practically melted on top of him. “Virgil,” Patton laughed. “It isn’t nap time.”
He grumbled something unintelligible into Patton’s neck making Patton giggle more.
“Sweetie, please.”
Thankfully Logan saved him from the unrelenting cuddling by poking Virgil in the side. “I have finished preparing the stations for the makeover and dress up. You need to get up now.”
Virgil made a noise that sounded like a growl, but he did roll off of Patton.
 Patton hopped to his feet and helped Virgil up before pulling him over to the piles of clothes. “We pick the outfit first, but you don’t put it on. Then, we do your make-up and hair based on it. Then, we get you dressed and do touch ups. Okay? Pick anything you want.”
Virgil looked over the options, eyes going a bit wide. “It…” he said. “It all looks really fancy and expensive. Are you sure you want me to touch any of it?”
“We wouldn’t be offering anything we didn’t want you to touch,” Logan said gently. “In fact, I insist you touch all of it. Beyond just appearance, making sure the texture of the fabric is agreeable is a large part of this activity.”
 Patton picked up one of the pieces of fabric he knew was very soft and offered it to him. He touched it with careful fingers, his eyes lighting up at the feel of it. They had to continue nudging him into feeling the different fabrics, and he hesitated when they asked him to pick his favorite at the end, but eventually he shyly pointed at a dark purple dress.
Patton clapped. “Great! Ooo, I already have some ideas for make-up that will go with that.”
Virgil let Patton pull him over to the chair they’d set up and settled down on it.
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Patton hummed. “I think silver and purple make-up mostly?” he said.
Logan nodded and they grabbed a few things from the make-up kit. Logan let Patton do most of the make-up as he tended to be better at the more creative parts, but Logan was the one who gave him the fancy winged eye liner with purple sparkles because he was really good at them.
“You look fantastic!” Patton squealed when they were done. He held up a hand mirror for Virgil who studied himself in it for a long few moments. “Do you like it?”
“It’s really nice,” Virgil confirmed. Patton smiled and hugged him.
“Next hair. We have a lot of accessories. I’ll let you pick from the purple ones.”
 He and Logan sorted through the jewelry box full of different hair accessories for the royal family and ended up finding three purple ones. Patton hesitated a bit over one of them, but Logan picked it up and set it in front of Virgil for him.
“Your choice from these three,” he said.
One was a purple feather with little hooks to braid into hair, one was a smattering of purple and silver stars that would weave through the back of someone’s hair, and the last was a string of silver leaves with purple tips that would wrap up the back of a person’s head from a bun.
Virgil thought for a moment and then pointed to the one made of leaves.
 Patton glanced at Logan who took the hairpiece. “I’ll do your hair right for that one,” he said. “I know how it fits.”
He grabbed the brush and carefully ran it through Virgil’s hair. Virgil seemed to like the attention, leaning into the touch, and a smile flickered over Logan’s face. Logan started gathering the hair together to make the low bun that would be the base of hair arrangement. Patton honestly did not expect him to speak, but then he did as he started to secure the piece with pins.
“This was my Pa’s favorite hairpiece,” Logan said. “Not the father you came here for, but my other one. He died when I was six.”
Virgil went shock still. “I don’t have to...”
“I wouldn’t have let it be offered if I wasn’t okay with you using it,” Logan said.
 Virgil didn’t move as he finished securing the hairpiece. “There,” Logan said when he was done. He picked up the hand mirror and positioned it so Virgil could see. “It suits you.”
“I…” Virgil said. His eyes were wide, and he clearly didn’t know what to say.
“Now,” Logan said. “I believe there are some other pieces of jewelry that would match this very well in the other room. I…” he turned away. “If you will excuse me.”
He turned away and exited through his bedroom door into the hallway. Patton watched him go and then turned to Virgil. “I’m going to go make sure he’s okay, okay?” Patton asked. “You didn’t do anything wrong, there’s just a lot of emotions.”
“I can take it out…” Virgil said.
“No,” Patton said. “I think he likes that you’re wearing it.” Virgil bit his lip. “He never really moved on,” Patton felt inclined to say. “This is… a lot for him, but I think it’s good too.” He leaned forward to kiss the top of his head, being careful not to mess up his artfully done hair. “I’ll be right back.”
He turned to follow Logan out of the room.
  Chapter 19
Thomas sighed in relief as the door to the royal wing finally came into sight. He was exhausted from his journey to Lamir for many reasons. Beyond just the physically taxing journey, he’d also had to deal with the emotions of loosing someone he had thought of as a friend while also trying to help her young daughter who had just had the crown thrust upon her.
Now he just wanted to see his own child and curl up into bed. He smiled at Owen and Kalani as he approached. “Is Logan here?” he asked.
Owen nodded. “The prince and his royal advisor are having a slumber party.”
Thomas smiled. “Of course, they are,” he said.
 He said goodnight to the two guard as they’d be getting off duty soon even if he did manage to drag himself out of his room again tonight and walked past them into the hall.
He walked past the room where they kept the jewels, though was unsurprised to see that the room was unlatched as Patton loved playing around with the different jewelry and had probably left it open when he grabbed them. He was however surprised when his son’s room’s door was thrown open, as Logan usually couldn’t stand for the thing to be open with or without him in it.
 Thomas didn’t think much of it however, and simply walked over to look inside. He was surprised when he didn’t see his son or Patton and instead saw that the only person in the room was a young boy that Thomas did not recognize. He was seated in one of Logan’s chairs and had his head tilted looking at himself in the mirror. He seemed to be trying to get a look at the ornament on the back of his head, and Thomas felt his heart seize a little bit when he recognized the hairpin.
He hadn’t recovered from that gut punch when the boy’s eyes drifted and met his in the mirror. There were a couple of long seconds where the two of them stared at each other in silence.
“Hello?” Thomas finally managed to get out.
Panic. There was suddenly horribly intense panic in the child’s eyes, the likes of which Thomas had never seen before. Thomas could only blink dumbly as he hopped to his feet like his seat was suddenly made of hot coals and then threw himself across the room to the opposite side from Thomas.
He looked around himself, back to the wall and considered Thomas with wildly spooked eyes. Clearly, he realized that he was pinned in Logan’s room by Thomas being in the door.
The boy dropped suddenly and disappeared under Logan’s bed.
 “Uh,” Thomas said, confused and shocked and still a bit in pain from seeing that piece of jewelry in use. He crossed slowly over to the bed and bent down to look under it, moving the bed skirt slightly to the side. He saw a small shaking blob curled up into itself under the bed. “Um, hi,” he said softly.
The blob did not respond except to continue shaking.
Thomas frowned and settled himself onto the floor. “It’s okay,” he said softly. Had he been here stealing things? Thomas had to wonder as he wasn’t sure why someone here for legitimate reasons would be acting so terrified of being caught. Though, that posed the question of how he’d gotten past the guards, and why Logan hadn’t noticed him. “I’m not mad,” Thomas said. “You’re fine.”
The boy looked up briefly from his knees looking terrified. Thomas tried to smile at him gently, but that just made him hunch into himself more, his breathes coming faster. That wasn’t good.
“No, shh,” Thomas said softly. “It’s okay. I promise it’s okay.” He did not seem to believe him, and Thomas winced. What was he supposed to do? He couldn’t just leave him here but trying to talk him down himself didn’t seem to be working.
Luckily, a familiar voice spoke from behind him then. “Dad?” Logan asked.
Thomas looked back at him. Both Logan and Patton were standing at the door, a couple of pieces of jewelry in their hands. They seemed very surprised to see him.
“You… seem to have a guest,” Thomas informed them.
 “I…” Logan said, beginning to edge into the room like he was expecting something to blow up at any moment. “Yes.” He got to Thomas and squeezed himself between him and the bed, putting a physical barrier between Thomas and the boy. Confused, Thomas took a couple of steps away without challenge. “That,” Logan glanced behind him. Patton had moved to the opposite side of the bed from Logan and Thomas and had gotten to his knees to look under it. “That is Virgil.”
Thomas blinked at him. “Virgil?” he asked.
“He’s… new to the castle,” Logan explained. Patton started speaking softly the boy, but Thomas could not make anything he said out. “Patton and I… invited him to a sleepover.”
“The guards didn’t mention anything,” Thomas said, sure that they would have warned him if there was a stranger in the royal wing.
“Uh, well, Virgil is… shy and we didn’t think you’d be back for another week. So, we snuck him past them.”
“Shy?” Thomas asked doubtfully. That was a lot more than shy.
“Particularly of adults,” Logan said.
Thomas took a moment to let that sink in. “Oh.” He was… scared of adults. Thomas could imagine many reasons why that might be the case and none of them set well. “I see.”
“Hey, no, sweetie, stop that,” Patton said, sounding distressed. Patton had managed to draw Virgil out from underneath the bed, though they were both still mostly hidden behind it and Thomas had no question in his mind that if he went to step towards them, Virgil would be back underneath it in a moment. Currently the boy seemed to be clawing at his own head. “No, baby shh,” Patton said, trying to stop him from tearing the pinned in hairpiece out, Thomas realized. “I’ll get it out,” Patton promised him. “Just calm down and let me do it.” He sounded close to tears, and Thomas couldn’t particularly blame him with the way the boy was acting. “You’re hurting yourself, baby.”
He must know, Thomas realized. If Logan had known he was here, then he must have allowed him to use that hairpiece. He’d probably even told Virgil that it belonged to his dead father. Now he was probably terrified that Thomas would be mad at him for touching it, especially when he’d come in to find Virgil alone without Logan to explain.
Patton managed to get all the pins undone and placed the piece delicately on the bed before wrapping himself protectively around the boy and hushing him.
Logan was looking back at them as well. He looked between the puddle of upset on the floor and Thomas. “Could…” he said. “Could I maybe come and see you in a few minutes, Dad?”
“Of course,” Thomas said. “Of course, I’ll go wait in my room. Take as much time as you need.”
He was careful to move slowly as he stepped towards the door, so the poor thing didn’t notice him move and mistake it for him approaching. He closed Logan’s bedroom door softly behind him feeling even more drained than he’d been before as well as anxious and a bit sickened. He went to his own bedroom to wait for Logan.
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