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starlitangels · 1 year

Text

Letters

Have some sweeter fluff as an apology for yesterday’s pain. Forgive me? 2.4k words

(I’ve been imagining the ship as an impossible combination of the starship Enterprise, the Serenity from Firefly, and a pirate galleon so... yeah that’s why descriptions of the ship I write probably don’t make any sense)

—

“Devlin, can I borrow these?” I asked, hefting two tablets up into my arms.

“Of course. What are you going to use them for?”

“I’d… rather… not say. But nothing bad, I promise.”

Devlin scrunched his eyebrows. “Alright…”

I smiled. “Thanks. I’ll come back up to the bridge in a bit.” I moved to leave—and paused in the doorframe. “By the way… have you seen Albus?”

Devlin glanced at the ceiling with fluttering eyelids and gestured vaguely. “He’s probably doing something I’m going to have to patch up later. Last I saw him, he was in the canteen doing a handstand against the wall.”

“… Huh. Alright,” I said.

“Why?”

“When I haven’t seen or heard from him in a couple hours I get worried that he’s doing something he shouldn’t.”

“You and me both, sister,” Devlin said, sounding tired.

I sighed. “Hey, why don’t you put the ship on auto-pilot for a while and go get some rest?”

He shook his head. “I can’t. I have too much to do.”

I raised a brow and narrowed my eyes in a stern glare. “Devlin York,” I warned. He whipped his head to look at me, looking a bit startled. “Promise me you’ll take a break and get some rest.”

He blinked rapidly. “I… I will.”

I smiled with self-satisfaction. “Good! See you later!” I strode off the bridge.

Wandering the ship, I peered into every room in passing, looking for Albus. The tablets were meant to be carried by crew members and weren’t particularly big or heavy—but two stacked on top of each other were a bit unwieldy. They kept trying to slide against each other and fall out of my arms.

I finally found Albus where Devlin said he’d been—in the canteen. But instead of doing a handstand against the wall, he was holding onto one of the metal trusses that supported the ceiling and was pulling himself up, lowering back down, and going up again. Facing away from me with his ankles crossed.

And conspicuously missing a shirt. Which was draped over a chair bolted to the floor near him. I made a face and went over to the table nearest him. Pretending not to notice and making a pointed effort not to look.

“Hey there, faithful,” Albus said in that voice he always used when he was flirting. “Come to take in the view?”

“Not on your life,” I retorted. I set one of the tablets on the table in front of the chair where his shirt was, and set mine down on the chair next to it on the round table. “Come sit.” I indicated the chair with his shirt.

“What for?”

“I did your stupid fighting lessons. Now I’m going to teach you something.”

Albus chuckled where he was still dangling off the truss. “And what could you possibly teach me that I don’t already know?”

I sat in my chair and indicated his again. “Sit,” I snapped.

He dropped off the truss and scooped up his shirt. “Okay, okay. Don’t get your knickers in a twist.”

“Say that again and I’m going to hit you,” I threatened.

He smirked. “I’d like to see you try. Have I mentioned you’re hot when you’re angry?”

“Once or twice. Now sit. Down.”

He pulled his shirt on lazily, covering the dark Bastard Mark on his chest, and plopped down into the chair. “Alright. I’m sitting down. What is it? What do you think you can teach me?”

I took the stylus out of the casing of the tablet I’d borrowed and wrote on the screen. With a flick of the wrist, I slung the words from my tablet screen onto his.

Albus’ dark eyes narrowed. When they looked up at me, he looked a bit miffed. “Faithful—you know I can’t read.”

“That’s the point,” I said. I scooted on my chair so I was closer to him and tapped the top of the first letter I’d written. “This is the letter A. We use it to denote a few different sounds. Ay, ah, aw. It’s actually the first letter of the alphabet.”

“Okay…?”

I tapped the next letter. “This is the letter L. It makes the ul sound.” I moved to the next one. “This is B. It makes the buh sound.” The next. “This is the letter U. We usually use it for the uh and oo sounds.” The last of the first word. “This is S. It makes the ss sound.”

“And all of this is relevant to what?”

“Shut up and let me finish.” I tapped the first letter of the next word. “This is Y. At the beginning of the word, it makes a yuh sound. At the end of a word, it’s usually an ee sound.” The next letter. “This is the letter O. It makes several sounds too. Oh, aw, uh sometimes. If there’s two together it makes the oo sound.” I moved to the next one. “This is R. It makes the er sound.” And the last. “This is a K. It makes the kuh sound.”

Albus blinked slowly, owlishly. Looking from my eyes to the tablet screen and back again. “Why do I care?”

I sighed and leaned closer to his tablet screen. “A-L-B-U-S Y-O-R-K. Albus—” I underlined the first word. “—York.” I underlined the second. He stared at the letters. “That’s your name. This is how to spell your name.”

He looked up and met my eyes again. “Faithful…”

“I don’t think I can fully teach you to read in the time we’ll have together. It’s hard and a lot of the rules don’t make sense when it comes to spelling. But the least I can do is teach you how to spell and sign your own name.” I gave him an encouraging smile and pulled the stylus out of his tablet’s casing, holding it out for him. “Go on. Give it a try?”

He took the stylus from me. “This doesn’t feel right.”

“It’s not a sin to know how to write your own name. And besides, when have you cared about things like that anyway?” I looked down at my own tablet screen and scribbled my own name on it. “Try copying my letters on the line below. Or trace right over them. Whichever feels best for you.”

Albus narrowed his eyes at his screen.

I added Devlin’s name to my tablet, but mostly watched Albus. He was tracing my letters.

“Hang on,” I said.

“What?”

“Holding the stylus in a fist isn’t an efficient way to write. It slows you down—and it hurts after a while.”

“Faithful, I’m a warrior. Holding my hand in a fist for a long time is what I do.”

I scoffed and rolled my eyes. “That’s not what I meant,” I said. I copied how he was holding his stylus. “See how this lifts your arm so far off the table? That puts a lot of strain on your forearm muscles. So when you’re writing for a long time, they get really sore.” I held both hands out toward his hand. “May I?”

He huffed out his nose in almost a sigh and set his hand in both of mine. I readjusted the stylus and reconfigured his hand and fingers around it, showing him how I held it.

“Sorry we’re doing this on tablets. It’s a little more difficult this way. I couldn’t find any paper on board. Plenty of writing utensils, but no paper. Which is an oversight I’m sure Devlin will be very grumpy to hear if I point it out to him.”

That actually earned me a chuckle. “Eh. Vinny’s always happiest when he’s grumpy about something.”

I glanced at Albus’ face. “Something you have in common, then,” I said.

He opened his mouth to protest, thought for a moment, and pursed his lips in what was almost a smile before looking back down. “This feels weird,” he said instead, nodding at the stylus.

“I’m sure it takes getting used to.”

“Why do you say it like you’re not sure?”

“Because I learned to hold a pencil or a stylus like that a long time ago. I remember learning but I don’t remember getting used to it. I already… just… am used to it.” I finished configuring his hand. “There. Try writing that way. Rest your arm on the table. It’ll ache less after a while.”

Albus grunted and followed my instructions, going back to tracing over my letters. He did that a few times before moving down to the area below mine and copying them.

“Why are you watching me?” He sounded grumpy. As usual.

“Just monitoring.” I bit the inside of my cheek between my molars for a moment. “And I never noticed how you scrunch up your nose when you’re concentrating.”

Albus’ ears turned red and his neck went blotchy. “Shut up. I do not,” he grumbled, finishing the K of York and starting over on the next line. I’d spelled everything with capital letters. I doubted he would understand different casings of letters yet, and I doubted we’d ever get to a point where he’d need to learn that—for some arbitrary ancient reason—we used two forms for the same sounds.

I suppressed a smile as best I could and looked down at my tablet, writing something else on its screen before flicking it over to his.

“Recognize any of those letters?” I asked.

He studied it. “The, uh… the A. The… what’s this one called again?”

“U.”

“The U. And… the L.”

I let my grin tug on my face properly. “That’s faithful,” I said. “Seemed easier than teaching you my full name.”

“What are the other letters?”

I leaned closer to his tablet again. “That’s an F. It makes the ff sound. You know A. The one next to it is I. Putting the A and the I together is what makes the ay sound in faith. The letters after that are T and H. On their own they make the tt and hh sounds, but together they make the th sound. Apparently back on Ancient Earth there was once a separate letter for that sound called thorn but it got phased out of use.” I moved to tap the next letter with my stylus. “Then the F again. And you recognize U and L. F-A-I-T-H-F-U-L. Faithful.”

He glanced up and looked at me. I met his gaze. His eyes were so dark. A pair of unfathomable bottomless abysses. I couldn’t quite read his expression. He opened his mouth as though to say something. My eyebrows twitched upward, expecting to listen.

One of the double doors to the canteen whirred open. “What are you two up to?” Devlin asked.

The silence—and the silent tension—shattered immediately.

Albus covered his tablet screen. “None of your business,” he said. The blotches on his neck darkened. I slid my hand under his arms and tapped the clear button on the notes screen we’d been using before clearing my own. Devlin gave me a look with knitted brows.

I shook my head and got up, holding out a hand for Albus’ tablet. He passed it over immediately, along with its stylus, which I tucked away before putting the one I’d been using away and scooping it up. I met Devlin’s gaze. “Is something wrong, Devlin?” I asked, raising my eyebrows expectantly.

His eyes were still narrowed. “N… no. I’m just checking in on everything.”

“Mother henning over faithful now, eh?” Albus joked, getting out of his chair and pulling his shirt back off before jumping to catch the ceiling support truss again.

“No,” Devlin retorted with a roll of his eyes. “This ship is meant to be crewed by a minimum of twelve people and I’m trying to do it on my own as best I can. Which means doing safety sweeps by myself.”

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” Albus said. I pointedly kept my eyes away from him as I moved to leave the canteen.

“Need a hand, Devlin?” I offered.

“If you’re willing to offer one, sister, I would be grateful.” He followed me out of the canteen.

“Have fun, you two!” Albus called sarcastically.

Devlin moved as though to flip him off, cast a quick glance at me, and dropped his arm.

The doors to the canteen whirred shut behind us. Devlin fell into step beside me. “So… are you going to tell me what that was about or would you rather not?”

I took a deep breath. “Albus can’t read,” I said quietly.

“I’m aware. Most bastards aren’t taught. Especially when they become warriors.” He still looked confused.

I shrugged. “He made me do some fighting lessons with him. I figured I’d show him how to write his own name.” I leveled a glare at Devlin. “But don’t tell him I told you.”

Devlin’s eyes widened. “I won’t. I swear.”

“Good.”

“Sister, if I may ask… where do you find compassion for him? He’s vulgar and violent and brutish and—”

“And he’s still human,” I interrupted. I sucked in a breath. “Look. I met him because one of the higher-ranking sisters at my temple decided I needed to be taught a lesson in caring for everyone no matter who they were. He came to us injured. I patched him up. I asked him to come with me on my journey. And this mission… I finally understood the lesson that sister was trying to teach me.” I met Devlin’s eyes. “He’s not a monster, Devlin,” I added quietly. “And I’ve come to wonder why your father was the one that committed the sin yet Albus is the one to suffer because of it. He was innocent of the sin. His birth wasn’t his fault. So why is he the one getting punished?” I shrugged. “Worth the thought.”

“Sister…”

“What do you need from me for the safety sweep?” I interrupted before he could say anything more.

“Oh. Well, um… follow me.” He turned at a junction of corridors and I followed.

—

Tagging my GB peeps: @palilious @gwenifred @halscafe @ryn-halo26 @staplesmainbitch @dollscircus @miloeveryday38 @zozo-01

#Good Boy Audios #GoodBoyAudios #fic #GBA BW #GBA Bastard Warrior #GBA Faithful #GBA Albus #GBA Devlin #Starlit Fic #YES this is the fic I thought of last night and stayed up way too late writing

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