Tracou woke up cold. Groaning, he sat up, unhindered by stray limbs. Mirthal had rolled himself all the way to the edge of the bed.
This initially did not bother him. Tracou went about his day, flitting about outside before settling in with Serpouhi to hash out wedding logistics. When he returned home for dinner, he tried several times to chat with Mirthal, but he couldn't hold his attention long enough to keep a conversation going. Mirthal kept retreating into himself. The glassy look in his eyes frustrated Tracou, but he decided that he and Pendaer must have worked particularly hard that day and had let it go.
Maybe Mirthal needed a break. Tracou wanted one, too, so they could take one together. Better to do something now rather than wait for snow.
Before, Tracou had told Mirthal about the ocean and he had been interested. Traveling there would be cumbersome and require about a day to get there and another day to get back, but they could stay the night. The fishermen in Ergakan lived both in Ergakan and by the port, meaning that they left shacks behind when they returned to the village for the winter. Tracou and Mirthal could stay in one of them.
Again, Tracou awoke with Mirthal huddled on the other side of the bed. Often he let Mirthal sleep, but if they got ready now and left before Pendaer woke up, maybe they wouldn't have to bring him along.
After a lengthy effort, Tracou got Mirthal to open his eyes. He flinched when he saw Tracou and averted his gaze.
"What time is it...?"
"Early."
"...Why?"
"I was thinking we could go see the ocean today."
Slowly, Tracou's words hit Mirthal's brain. At first, his eyes lit up. Good! If he had been impressed by that waterfall, then the ocean would bowl him over!
But that light soon dimmed and Mirthal shook his head.
"Will we go swimming?"
"Do you want to? I can heat up part of the water enough for it."
Mirthal finally looked at Tracou, his brown eyes landing on his torso before he ripped them away.
"I don't want to swim."
"Okay... Well, we can just look at it."
"I don't think we should go."
Tracou's eyebrows furrowed. "Why?"
"I'm tired."
"You'll wake up soon."
"Ngh... Aren't you busy today?"
"I decided we should do something instead. If we don't do this now, I'll be too busy to go for at least a week and it might start snowing then. And aren't you tired of training with Pendaer all the time? We can leave him here—especially if we go early. We'll leave a note for him so he doesn't rip Ergakan apart looking for you."
Then again, maybe going to the sea together, without Pendaer, would be a bad idea. It would amount to a lot of time alone together. Time where Tracou would be able to look at Mirthal, to look at his awed expression as he took in the expanse of water in front of him.
Mirthal had been distant yesterday. Tracou should let that continue so he could stop hoping. A smarter man would have suggested that Pendaer and Mirthal shared the larger bed through the winter, so he could feed the gap between himself and Mirthal. But he hadn't.
Frowning, Mirthal rolled onto his back on the edge of the bed and stared up at the ceiling.
"I don't want to go," he said, with a finality that smacked Tracou in the face.
"...Oh."
The Mirthal of a week ago would have jumped at this chance. He would have been pleased to trail behind him as he did boring, Dezmerian-only work, but he hadn't looked him in the eye at all this morning.
"Are you okay, Mirthal? Are you sick?"
Tracou reached over toward Mirthal's forehead, intent on checking for a fever. Upon seeing the hand approach, Mirthal jerked, heaving himself off the bed. He fell onto his back with a whump.
"Mirthal?!"
"Ugh..."
"Are you okay?" Tracou asked again, peering down at him from the edge of the bed.
Mirthal grunted. "I'm fine."
"Are you sure?"
"If you're worried, let me go back to sleep."
Tracou recoiled as if he had been slapped. "Sorry," he mumbled, rushing off of the bed and out of the room.
What a disaster. Had his attempt been flawed from the start? Maybe suggesting something so early in the morning had been the problem. Or maybe Mirthal had no interest in the ocean—despite the way he had briefly woken up when Tracou had first mentioned it.
Entering the hall, Tracou ran face first into Pendaer and bounced off of him, squeaking in fright.
"Pendaer!"
"Shh!" Pendaer rolled his eyes. "Honestly. Come, let's speak outside."
Anything Pendaer said could and, ultimately, must be met with suspicion. Tracou eyed him, baffled by the demand coated in almost pleasant words coming from someone like Pendaer. Not having expected such a reaction, Pendaer glared at him.
"Come. Let's. Speak. Out. Side," he tried again, spitting out each syllable.
"I don't know what you want, but I don't like it."
Pendaer threw his hands up and made for the front door. "Just follow me, dezmek."
Carefully, as though Pendaer had laid traps on not only the floor, but the walls and the door, too, Tracou inched along after him. But Pendaer continued on through the door and didn't stop, making his way down the hill. Tracou frowned, trotting after him until his progress finally halted out on the dirt road that lead into the village.
"I want to talk to you about the Prince. Make sure he can't hear us."
About Mirthal. This could either be something Tracou had heard day in and day out from Pendaer or it could be important information. While Pendaer usually added nothing valuable to Tracou's Mirthal musings, he might this time. So Tracou did as Pendaer asked, restricting the sound around them.
"Well?" he prompted.
Pendaer cleared his throat. "The Prince has been listless recently. I know you've noticed."
Tracou nodded.
"I believe he is homesick. Before we arrived in this backwater, we had a goal we were working toward which likely kept his mind off of things. But now... well, he has nothing to do. We can only train for so many hours in a day and what does that leave him? Following you around? Anyone would tire of that."
Despite the fact that these words had exited Pendaer's mouth, they seemed almost reasonable. Being away from Ergakan for so long had bothered Tracou, so Mirthal, who had never been away from his home before, must miss the Elven Kingdom badly.
"Not to mention other things. The food is different, he can only talk to two people, and now he has no goal other than waiting."
"I tried to invite him to see the ocean. Shouldn't he have liked that?"
"Perhaps normally. But he's been having trouble looking at you..."
A wave of ice brushed against his limbs. Someone else had noticed—that meant that at least one of Tracou's fears was real.
"I wonder why that is," Pendaer said, eyes toward the sky. The corner of his lip twitched. "He used to insist on accompanying you everywhere, but now he thinks nothing of sending you away. Maybe he's come to his senses or... he's merely tired of you. I've seen it happen before—he is a prince, after all."
Mind blank, Tracou could only stare up at Pendaer. Even he saw it as a rejection. Cold and firm, Mirthal wanted nothing to do with him.
But this was Pendaer. Pendaer! He couldn't be trusted! Though he validated the nervous voice in Tracou's mind, Pendaer was still Pendaer. He had to be wrong.
"We'll see," Tracou said. He couldn't do much better, not now. Later he would come up with a better retort. Releasing his magic, he marched off, leaving Pendaer behind.
As the sun climbed the sky, Tracou wandered around the village. He hadn't planned on doing anything today, but he couldn't spend time in the manor only for Mirthal's eyes to slide over him. So he walked, darting this way and that without purpose for hours.
Finally, around noon, he spotted a small group of people in the road. In the center stood... Mirthal, facing away from him.
He had entered the village on his own. Why? Maybe he was looking for him. Maybe he wanted to go to the ocean after all!
A crowd of village children encircled Mirthal. They craned their necks backward to get a good look at him, tittering away at each other. Mirthal, his shoulders hunched, turned his head to look at each of the children in turn. How often had Mirthal dealt with children? Tracou hadn't seen any in the Frosted Castle, so maybe Mirthal's palace had been similarly devoid of kids.
"His hair's yellow!"
"Why's he so big? I bet he's taller than a cow's long."
"He's got dog eyes!"
"Think he's got a tail, too?"
A girl with front teeth too large for her mouth made her way forward. The others quieted as she pointed to her ears in an attempt to communicate something with Mirthal.
"Can you move them?" she asked in Dezmerian.
Mirthal tilted his head. From behind, Tracou couldn't see his expression, but he could picture the apologetic smile that he must have adopted.
Grunting in annoyance, the girl grabbed her ears and moved them back and forth. Then she pointed at Mirthal.
This he understood.
He wiggled his ears and the children erupted into shrieking laughter. When he stopped, they demanded he do it again. The tone of their voices carried all the information Mirthal needed and he did as they wished, which pleased the children just as much as it had the first time.
The girl gestured for Mirthal to move down, which he did. The instant he was low enough to the ground, the girl stepped forward and grabbed his ear. Mirthal flinched.
"It's real!" she announced to the others, feeling at it.
The children surged toward Mirthal. Before they could reach him, Tracou had his wand in hand and held each of them at bay. They couldn't hurt him, not really, but Tracou couldn't allow them to treat Mirthal like he was a toy.
"It's Lord Vartanian!" one squealed, squirming in Tracou's magical grip.
"Is he mad we touched his elf?"
"You're in trouble now, Karina!"
With his hands on his hips, Tracou towered over the group.
"We don't touch other people without their permission," he declared.
"He didn't fight back!" the lead girl, Karina, said.
"That's because he's much stronger than you or even me. He might hurt you and that would make him sad."
A boy, with so many freckles on his face that they had merged, spoke up. "How strong?"
"Strong enough to carry me around."
An impressed murmur went through the children.
"Really? But you look heavy!"
Tracou huffed. "I'll show you." He turned on his heel to look at Mirthal, who didn't quite meet his gaze. "Mirthal, pick me up. They want to see how strong you are."
Cheeks coloring a faint pink, Mirthal hesitated. "Um... Are you sure you want to?"
"Yes? You used to like doing it, so I thought you wouldn't mind."
"I... I don't mind..."
And yet, Mirthal approached Tracou as if he expected a blow. Instead of bending down to sweep one hand under Tracou's knees, Mirthal stayed upright. His hands went to Tracou's armpits and he lifted him that way, holding him aloft as though Tracou was a child who wanted 'upsies.' Limp with surprise, Tracou gawked down at him.
Below, the children let out a chorus of impressed gasps, but Tracou couldn't hear them. A sense of dread swelled in his stomach.
Something had changed. Whatever it was had changed so severely that Mirthal couldn't stand to touch him anymore.
Maybe he had tired of him.
"Mirthal, what exactly are you doing?" he asked, voice brittle.
He set Tracou down and took a step backward. "I picked you up."
"...Yeah..."
Biting his cheek, Tracou took in a deep breath through his nose. This was only to be expected. If anything, it should have happened earlier. He might as well come to terms with it.
"Why did you come out to the village?"
Mirthal shrugged his shoulders. "Wanted to take a walk."
So he hadn't wanted to find Tracou. Forcing an unaffected mask on his face, Tracou stood still. The more the moved, the more he might give away.
"W-Well," he said, "why don't you go back to the manor? I'm going to be busy in the village."
A moment of hesitation from Mirthal. Then—
"With Serpouhi?"
"Yes, I suppose so."
Mirthal nodded once, turned around, and headed back to the manor without as much as a goodbye.
Tracou watched him, his body suddenly twice as heavy.
All this and snow had yet to fall. Above him hung a clear, freezing sky—a sky that seemed to be hanging by a thread, ready to crash down upon him at any moment.