What is Hidden [Aurin]

[Torin Kilvin]

2 Ash, 122

Aurin was sitting on the small anvil Torin kept in the magical side of his forge for use in adjusting pieces if the heat off the magical elements became strong enough to cause minor warping or other deformities that needed to be corrected mid-forging. It also served as a useful chair for the fox like man when he spent time observing his boy at work.

At that moment Torin was checking the progress on the set of throwing knives that he was only adding durability to so they would never lose their edge, nor need sharpening. It was work that had become second nature to the smith but it put him in mind of the last time the redhead had been in his forge to do with with him.

It had been early in Searing, just after Kala had returned from her journey, her quest, following the dictates of gods. Her desire to keep what she had gained a secret made perfect sense to Torin and, once he understood her need, he'd set aside all other work and begun to forge her cloak immediately. Having to hide from society for the number of days it would take him to complete would already be difficult to explain without him adding to the time by delaying the work.

It required Masquerade, which was why he had turned, happily to the man he called 'Master', who was a master in his use of the rune as well. For the first time the young smith had also used the power of his own rune in the forging itself, rather than only as an aid to his craft. Thought he saw the redhead nearly every day anyway, having set times in which he knew they would be together, working together, was very pleasant. It made him want to begin making more items that required that runes his Master carried so they could continue to have the time.

Unfortunately, most of his work for his patron House involved the crafting of weapons and armor for the defense of their lands. It made sense, and he was proud to work for a family that put so much of their income into protecting their people, but it had meant that, since he'd finished the exquisite cloak, he hadn't had an excuse to have Aurin working with him.

Today the man was there, listening to Torin give his report of the information he gleaned, mostly from his Semblance now, but still, once in a while, simply by listening with his human ears.

[Aurin]

Perhaps because of his own Semblance trick, Aurin found himself remembering the making of that cloak and how he enjoyed being able to give his boy things he needed. Of course, there were other master illusionists out there, but Aurin saved him money and it gave him an excuse to spend time observing his boy at work. Even now as he did the same, he liked knowing he could demand those throwing knives and they would be given to him without question, but he wouldn't because he also took pride in Torin's career and the smith kept him in weapons and other useful artefacts. All the same, it made him smirk to think about it.

"Excellent work, my boy," he said when Torin came to the end of his report. "You know... in the wee hours of the morning, I came upon a Lysanrin-looking sort of man. Well, actually, he was tailing me. But I confronted him and I'm actually going to give him a chance to work for me. Skulking on rooftops and the like. I might send him down to the Midden from time to time since Elwes doesn't like to come up for air and I can't get down there as often anymore. I tricked him out to look like a human version of himself and that ought to last him a couple of weeks, but I was thinking we might eventually make him one of those cloaks or something similar. If he's working for me, I'd just do the masquerade work for you to reduce the price for him. If he doesn't work out, though, it could be a full-price deal."

He was, after all, always looking out for new income for Torin, and he figured the smith might want another go at a previous project. He seemed always to have new ideas as soon as he was finished with a thing.

[Torin Kilvin]

Torin smiled at the praise, closing the door to the aether forge and moving to the kiln to check the raw viscerite he had melting down. The swirling energies were something he could now see without needing to open the doors or use the aether glass he still kept around in case someone who knew how to use them wished to, and on the chance that he might, someday, have an apprentice.

When the chance meeting was mentioned he half turned to listen more carefully. He knew next to nothing about the race, and what he had heard he could tell, now that he was an adult, had been mostly racism. They were despised and feared (seemingly despised because they were feared) all throughout the continent and beyond for their ability to summon the Dread Mists. He had seen a few in the city and, with the exception of the odd incident that had occurred in Searing, there had been no issues with the Mists.

The idea of one sulking on rooftops and following people did not really go far in negating their reputation of being tricksters with ill-intent, but the smith trusted his master's judgement in all things. He nodded at the notion of making another cloak. Now that they'd done it once, copying the process would go smoothly.

The difficulty in contacting some of Aurin's contacts was a problem Torin had considered and come up with an idea for that he had, till that moment, forgotten to mention.

"I should make more communication pendants. They felt so challenging when they were my Journeyman project but they seem simple now." He reached up and fingered the amulet under his shirt. The use of them was not as required now that the two men could spend as much time together as they chose and they saw each other nearly every day, but Torin still liked knowing they had them and used them to reach out whenever he was thinking about the redhead and couldn't get to him at that moment.

The thought that he could simply give the one around his own neck to any of Aurin's other employees did not occur to him even though they would have worked as well for another.

"I could expand the fields on any new ones, make them work much further than these would." It was a matter of fact that he was more powerful now than he had been a year and a half ago. Thinking about it for a moment he leaned over the marble table that served as both runeforging bench and desk for schematics, looking through his stack of them until he found the original for the pendants.

"I could actually make you a master pendant that could contact any number of others so you could just have the one and be able to speak to any of us. With enough viscerite, and maybe some traversion I could make the connections stay open for much longer as well. Hmm."

He hummed to himself as his eyes scanned over the detailed drawing, then he looked back over his shoulder at Aurin to see how he was reacting.

"I think it would probably be smart, particularly if any of us finds very time sensitive information for you, or if we're in trouble."

[Aurin]

When Torin's eyes sought him out, they found Aurin smiling—perhaps a bit smugly. He appreciated how it was second nature now for Torin to find a problem that he could creatively fix for Aurin, always trying to make life and work better, easier. The fox didn't want to get soft, but having Torin felt like a luxury all the same.

"A master pendant," he began, putting strange emphasis on master, "would be helpful. And improvements on future pendants. I know you won't mind if I keep wearing this one for sentimental value."

His fingers toyed with his own pendant, visible against his breastbone between the loose laces of his shirt.

"I would give you my blood if you wanted a compass for yourself." He paused, considering the ramifications of that. While he did want his boy to be able to find him whenever necessary, such an artefact existing could put Aurin at risk. He supposed it was a risk he was willing to take for Torin's peace of mind. Despite his best efforts, there were people he felt responsible for now—Torin, Arry, Ashoka, Elwes, Yshvold, Jacq and the Whispers, the covens of Zaichaer; fuck!—and there were ties he couldn't bring himself to cut and run from.

"You know you have my tricks at your disposal. Even Semblance if it would be easier for me to provide that so you can focus on your runeforging and scrivening and all that. Speaking of which... can you help me figure some scriving to help make my glamours more durable, and my inversions as well?"

Aurin rarely asked for help, but he knew that Torin thrived on that occasional need he could fulfill. It helped to cement the thing between them.

[Torin Kilvin]

It shouldn't be arousing to be offered the blood of the man he loved, but it was. Torin had no desire to cause pain or require the sorts of sacrifices that he wanted to be required of him, it was nothing to do with that. It was the trust, he knew. Aurin didn't trust easy or light, and that he would give into the hands of a master runesmith his life, it was a lot.

If he hadn't been in the middle of trying to calculate the complex weaving the new set of pendants would require he might have turned and tried to kiss his gratitude and affection into the redhead's mouth with an abandoned that had been inaccessible to the blond only a year before.

"I was thinking I could make the original fit into the front of the master pendant, as sort of a back up if someone attacks the piece as a whole."

Enchantments could be broken by powerful enough magic, but if he set up the fields carefully he could deflect an attack away from the lesser magic so the attacker would feel the greater breaking and believe Aurin unable to contact any of his people while leaving the lesser pendant working.

"If someone took you without the compass I could use it to find you, with your blood. I figured you'd build up a store of little bottles for anyone you might need to track. Adding your own to it, or leaving it hidden in the basement compartment would make me feel safer when you went on your trips."

The basement was concealed by several charms and protected by Negation, but the hidden door inside it was capable of wiping memory in addition to being twice hidden. Torin kept any money more than a handful of gold down there, as well as his contract with House Leukos and any dragonshards of value that he wasn't currently working on.

"I've been meaning to ask if, when you have time, I know you're busy, we could work on another safety-net big enough for the whole yard? Being able to just stop people from getting into the whole property would be useful. It wouldn't need to be fancy like the one I made for Sivan, just a physical barrier that can be turned on and off so I can secure everything if we need to."

Now that Torin felt truly settled his mind was moving in the direction of protecting what he and the people who loved him had built. Finishing with the calculation for the moment he set his charcoal pencil down and turned so he was leaning back against the marble on both his palms behind him. The pose was just a little intentional, though he would not be able to engage in anything too athletic until the forging he was still observing with his Semblance was set. His chest was a little out, the position pulling the muscles of his arms to show while tucking his tight belly in. His feet were just far enough apart that a tiny space was made between his thighs.

"I'll need a number for how many paired pendants you'd want, and if you want them able to contact others. I can do specific others or have them all connected. Hmm." His gaze moved to the sealing as he considered what would be possible, "I can play around with being able to let the master pendant connect with more than one of the others at once, sort of a three-or-more-way connection." He hummed again as he tried to imagine it. Scrivening would certainly be involved.

He smiled when Aurin mentioned the use of his second major world magic at almost the same moment he thought of it.

"I can do that, either myself or I can teach you to trace the symbols from memory. It'd be easier if it was drawn onto the subject in something that lasted as long as you wanted the enchantment to last. Carved into wood or stone, though, not a person I guess. A tattoo or other form of permanent mark would work best, you'd have to refresh it only rarely, but I don't know if the one you have in mind would want something like that."

The smith's Scrivening was good enough now that he would have been able to start making a living from it on his own, had it been his primary profession, he could understand everything Kala talked about even when he didn't have the symbols she referenced memorized.

[Aurin]

Aurin nodded along with Torin's brainstorm for the amulets. He understood what the smith said when he explained things, but he didn't understand the process of enchantment well enough to know what exactly was possible, and so he tended to defer unless he had some specific ideas or requests. He hadn't yet been disappointed in anything he had been given.

"I will," he said of the compass and leaving it when he went abroad. Once things settled into whatever shape they would in Zaichaer, he intended to travel by airship to several places where he had done business, the better to memorize the slipspace around them so he could travel at will. If he was going to be a Railrunner, he was going to be the best Railrunner. Idly, he wondered if Valencia would ever visit him here in Kalzasi.

"I'm here often enough," he said with a smirk. "Just tell me when you need to milk me for my magic and I'll figure out how to be here for it. And then I'll milk you for other things later..." The smirk stretched through the time, but when Torin finally recovered his aplomb enough to speak to the scrivening, Aurin was a bit more neutral again. He nodded. "Thanks, boy. Ought to learn enough to make my tricks trickier." He still refused to consider himself a mage, though he was a full-fledged member of several covens and even strangers called him magus with some degree of respect or awe.

"Seems as though somebody looted the stores of the Order of Reconciliation in Zaichaer, or died trying. Couldn't find anything where the blast marks the spot it used to be. I'd hoped to bring you back some baubles to study or tomes or something of value, but I was more focused on getting people out." He wrinkled his nose. Perhaps he was rethinking the value of human life in the face of personal gain. "Oh... have you noticed if any of my kids who might have a knack for your work? I've got them all in jobs and some schooling for the younger ones, keeping them out of trouble, but you could use an apprentice with the Semblance trick, especially if Timon's focusing on the logistical side of things."

[Torin Kilvin]

"If you need it for your work, take it, that's the other reason I made it. But if not, yeah, it'd be nice to know I can come after you."

The idea that he should learn Traversion himself just so he could always keep a proverbial string tied to the redhead as he ran towards danger had occurred to the smith, but, after the trauma for both of them that had come with receiving his first rune, he was willing to let it wait.

"Maybe I should just make a second one that is keyed only to you. You never know when you might need to find someone quickly when you're away." The chances that he would have that person's blood were highly variable but Aurin was nothing if not resourceful.

"How is your Traversion coming along? I have this idea, for making travel between different parts of the city easier for all of us, and safer. If another situations like the Mists coming down on us happens, I'd rather no one be stuck and in danger. Between the new pendants and the ability to get around, I'd feel safer."

Safety was more or less always Torin's default. He wasn't sure where his mind would go once he had made everything he thought they needed. Maybe he would always come up with new ways, but maybe it would turn it's creative juices elsewhere. The offer of use of Aurin's runes whenever he might need them was greatly appreciated.

"If you help with things that I'm going to sell I'm really going to have to start paying you for your time. It wouldn't be fair not to, especially not when I'm paying Renault full time now." The argument he was prepared to have was shuttered away when Aurin's smirk and teasing came up to shove it back and he blushed but nodded, subconsciously, or perhaps consciously, spreading his thighs a little wider, making the space between them an invitation. One he didn't really expect to have accepted at that moment, but an open one regardless.

"I have a few books on Scrivening in the house now, you can always take what you want or read while you're here. That he might have been given artifacts from another culture to study had never entered his imagination (outside of his ongoing childhood fantasy about searching the ruins of the Clockwork Empire, but that wasn't really stealing at this point). The seeking sounded very dangerous and he was partly glad there had been no reason to look further than the entrance.

Torin thought about the Whispers for moment, biting his lip and running his tongue over it in thought. The whole group, except for the oldest girl, had been all but silent in their stay in his house before Aurin returned to collect them, but he'd been able to have a few quiet conversations with Jaqc and it felt like a friendship might be forming there. They both understood that talking wasn't required to be companions sometimes. The whole group had been fascinated when he'd worked his runeforge, aether kiln, or any of the other truly magical parts of his craft. The younger ones had taken to sitting in the grass outside the forge area watching him as though he were a show or a shiny bauble they couldn't quite take their eyes off. One of the younger boys had seemed to understand more of what was going on, though he didn't speak any more than the others. He'd held his breath when Torin had been weaving something particularly complex and gasped audibly when the lines of aether had finally fallen together from the tangles web he wove into perfect symmetry.

"Maybe." He said, sounding thoughtful but more definite as he went on to explain what he'd observed and what it might mean. After he said,

"How are they? Timon asked about them yesterday, wants to know if any of them will every come back just to hang out. I think he liked having other people near his age around. He took care of them a sight more than I did, that's for sure."

[Aurin]

"I would be comfortable if you had something similar that was keyed to me that only you could use..." And he let that idea settle into Torin's mind; the smith could figure out how to make it a reality in the confines of his own imagination. "Ah, rather well, I think? Valencia was a good teacher. Well, only teacher I've ever really had, but she kept me safe in the Aetherium, taught me the skills, and then I've had to use it a lot ever since. Blinking is easy, and I've started mapping the slipspace wherever I am so I can get back to anywhere I've been. I can grab things and bring them to me. I can vault farther and farther. I have figured out how to open little windows to spy... and I can project myself out of my body... not back into the Aetherium, but another way to scout. I think I'm going to figure out how to take people with me soon, which will make me a real Railrunner, I suppose." He paused. "I'd like to be the one you rely on for the tricks I have. I want you to need me in more ways..." He smirked a little, though he was deflecting attention from his own need to be needed.

"Anyway, you probably need someone more skilled than me for those gates you were telling me about, unless by the time you need the trick I've gotten strong enough with it..." He shrugged. It was up to Torin, really. There were things he would decide for the smith without a second thought, but he wanted him to thrive and so he often deferred to Torin when appropriate, as well. He didn't need to be a tyrant all the time; or, rather, he was a benevolent dictator.

Concentrating, he opened a little portal and reached through to take hold of what Torin offered, offering it a bit of a promise for later before he retreated and let the portal disperse.

He chuckled darkly. "Aye, I'll start reading your books. Ask your lady if she has any that might be of use. Wouldn't be a lie to say it would help you with your work on her behalf after all."

Aurin considered.

"They're all fucked up," he admitted. "Like, I don't know. Not as badly as I was, but none of them had happy lives before Jacq took them under his wing, and he's barely holding it together. I think... I think having me is making him... well, he can rely on me, so he is crumbling a little. I hope he can pick up the pieces, though. They don't trust me like they trust him, but I'm going to have them spend more time here, I think. I'm paying them, so I might as well have them be useful when they aren't with their tutors or doing something I specifically need 'em for. If any of them do show a knack for your art, feel free to take 'em on as an apprentice. We might have to talk to Jacq about it so he can sell them on the idea, though."

[Torin Kilvin]

Torin was listening, nodding along, until the mention of 'little windows to spy' was mentioned. The smith's eyes got wider and his mouth parted slightly, and Aurin was certainly clever enough, between the words and the Semblance information passing between them to catch on to the idea that his boy was having. Aurin 'spying' on him when he was bathing or other, more intimate things was hot. He was just beginning to realize that things that aroused him weren't on just a single sliding scale, so one thing was hotter than another and that was that. He had several types of sexual needs, all of which were tangled in his emotions and his head. So, while Aurin hurting him was very high on one of the scales, Sivan finishing on his chest and face was probably just as high on a different one. Not many of the scales were compatible with both his lovers, but the one that was how he liked to be watched, to be seen, did.

By the time he pulled his brain back up out of his pants he realized he'd missed some of what had been said and felt guilt edging in to the arousal. Which made him feel more guilty, since he'd actually done something rude and it wasn't the playful way Aurin sometimes chose to make him feel guilty or ashamed. He was relieved to find the words were still stored in his short term memory and he was able to pull them back up and listen to them properly, but the process meant he sort of paused too long once Aurin was finished so he murmured,

"Sorry, I got distracted, but I am listening." Not pressing forward in response to being told Aurin wanted to be needed, pressing them together and telling his fox that he needed him in every way and always would was hard, and harder for the fact that, despite his wordless self chastisement, he was visibly interested. The conversation kept up though, so he was able to pull himself back into his business mind, however reluctantly his body allowed it.

"I can hire someone to work on the first part, that will take some time, months, really, and then I'll start working on the location specific stones. If you would like to try then I'm happy to experiment. You could also be around when I'm working with the Master Traversionist, I dunno if you would learn anything, but you might. Before that though, if I have someone with your skills it would make creating the new communication pendants easier, they would work from further away even than I can do on my own. It would help to have you there for some of the other parts of making them too, since the master pendant that all the others are connected to will be keyed to you. I was thinking I could add something that would give you an awareness of the health of everyone wearing one of the lesser ones, so long as they were willing to donate a little blood. I thought that I could use some of yours and make my own lesser pendant give me the same information and also point me in your direction?"

He was perfectly capable of doing that enchantment, and Aurin was offering, but it still felt right to both explain and wait for permission.

As the conversation turned back to the set of orphans that had come tumbling through the portal that had offered Torin his only glimpse of understanding as to what had happened in Zaichaer it was at least enough to send the last of his wayward blood back upwards. He bit the inside of his lip and nodded, eyes a little far away. Wanting to help people that he felt a kinship with was difficult when he knew they wouldn't automatically feel the same way about him. They had grown less standoffish and jumpy as they'd spent the days with him and Timon before Aurin had returned to collect them. The way Aurin was describing how Jacq was reacting to having the redhead was all too familiar but the young smith knew that if someone had come to him when he'd first began to lean on Aurin and tried to form a friendship out of the experience it would have put him off immediately. Letting Aurin do what Torin knew he was was of his primary skills, letting someone break when they needed to, helping them do it, was just how Torin would have to accept supporting; by doing nothing.

He hoped, in time, he could become friends with Jacq specifically. The little they'd spoken of concerning the single rune that both of them had the more interested Torin had become in sharing their uses with each other. Additionally, the quiet that sat on the leader of the little coven like a cloak was so familiar to Torin it made him wonder when, and how, he himself had taken it off.

"They're welcome whenever, the forge and house are always warm now that they're properly insulated and you know Timon always cooks too much once it gets cold. I could test to see if any of them have a natural knack for the forge, either of them. If they do I'll tell you before anyone else, let you decide how best to present it."

After a short pause he turned back to his desk and closed his schematic book and carefully corked his ink bottle. When he turned back around he said,

"Sivan ran into some sort of minor deity or mystic in the forest and got gifted the Animus rune yesterday. That's why he isn't here working today. I went this morning to check on him when he didn't show up and I said I'd be back tonight with food and to check on him. He seems fine, just really tired."

Taking a step closer to Aurin, a little pleading slipping into his voice he explained his offering of this information with,

"So, can you please take me into the house and upstairs? I'm done with this work and have an hour or so before I need to go and..." He lowered his eyes but brought them back up because he wanted to see Aurin more than he wanted to hide, "I need you."

[Aurin]

"Whatever you decide, Master Runesmith," he said with mock deference, though he was truly in awe of his boy's talent and skill. "I will help when you require. But perhaps make them so things can be rekeyed... then, perhaps, I can lend the master pendant to you or someone else should the need arise. I wouldn't want all your work to be irrevocably tied to me. Artefacts should outlast us, hey?"

But he wasn't planning to die or anything so morbid. He just wnated Torin's magical legacy to survive.

"Good. Thank you. I'll have Jacq and Vivi bring them by more regularly. Perhaps we can even have dinners where the Whispers report to me, and you can report to me as well. Make them feel like it's a business thing so they know... what's going on. Then perhaps they will feel comfortable enough to relax here. Hm, perhaps a master pendant for Jacq someday with charms for his coven so he can keep track of them, as well. I don't know... He's lost people before, but Rick was..." He frowned. Torin had seen.

Thankfully, the conversation moved on and Aurin's brows rose with interest.

"Deity? Animus? Huh." He considered, then said in all seriousness, "Let me know if I can help in any way." But he was soon smirking and hoisting himself lazily to standing.

"All right, boy. Run upstairs and take off anything you don't want ripped off." He loomed; it was threatening in its way. "But don't get mad at me if you're too exhausted to visit him when I'm through with you."