Legend of Ransera

An amused pair of hazel eyes peered down at him. Trousers were all he was wearing at the moment, not because he had company, but because sometimes the breezes just weren't in his favor and his little cottage got far too hot for comfort. It wasn't terrible today, but his windows weren't catching enough air and so he was barefoot and bare-chested. It wasn't the first time Arry had knelt between his knees, but their occasional couplings had become an increasingly regular thing until they had just stopped altogether. He missed the sex, of course. He missed Arry in his arms afterward more, the flickers of himself that were entirely without artifice, and even when he seemed to swerve too hard into his Arvalyn role and Aurin had to laugh.

"Filching my mail again?" he asked, then stepped aside. "C'mon in."

Something was the matter, but if Arry wasn't going to bring it up, Aurin certainly wasn't. At least, not if Arry seemed to be doing well, seemed more or less happy. The elder man didn't know if Arry would ever be content. If he became a star of the Golden Peacock, invited to royal balls, there might always be something missing, something else he wanted. There was no judgment attached to the thought. It was good that Arry was ambitious. It would get him more and hopefully keep him healthy and whole.

He swung the door wildly back and forth once Arry had crossed the threshold, trying in vain to get a little air moving. Sometimes he wished he had the elemental trick, so he could make his own damned breezes when the weather wouldn't cooperate.

The place was as spartan as it had been when Arry had first arrived on his doorstep, half-starved and exhausted from the long journey from Antiris. He had been a pickpocket, then a project, and only later a mentee, or a little brother, which eventually made the sex feel wrong — in good ways and bad ways, at least by the estimation of an admittedly bad man — and now he didn't know what they were. Friends, he hoped, if Arry had grown weary of being his lover. He was still carefully optimistic that he might be able to finagle his way into a position at the Peacock and give Arry another hand up the ladder toward where he wanted to be.

"The ice has melted, but the tea's still cool if you'd like some." This had been Arry's home, too, so he didn't play host or anything. He just offered.

Aurin smirked at Arry's cover story, but it was a good-natured smirk. Arry understood the subtle versions of the same on his face better than most. The ginger had a difficult time with uncomplicated things like smiles, like joy, and like their relationship. It wasn't anyone's fault that was complicated — it wasn't a problem; it was a challenge.

"Aye, hot as balls," he agreed. He hadn't resorted to talcum powder, but there might be a day or two of Searing that was truly searing and while some of the courtesans were content to mask odors with perfumes, Aurin was more worried about functionality. He left the door open, hoping another avenue of egress would make the air move or perhaps some citizen of the far south would finally find him and just put him out of his misery.

Pleased that Arry made himself at home, Aurin sprawled out on the rug just before the bed, limbs akimbo. This was what he had been doing anyway, being still and creating as much surface area for the air to wick excess heat away. So far, so good, though if Arry had come for a tumble, they would be dehydrated by the end. Too blissful to care, perhaps, but thirsty in a new way.

"Work is hard," he admitted, letting his head loll to the side so he could look at the pretty elf who thrived at least in part because he had made choices that proved he wasn't that bad. "At the Cabaret, I mean. I've scented something better and it makes me want more, you ken? And it's still up in the air. I mean, the odds are still in our favor, I'd say, but I wish the possibility of something better wasn't making everything else seem... not enough. I suppose you've felt that way a bit..." He hazarded as much, curious as to what was going on behind that golden façade. "With a shot at the Peacock... A break-out performance with your new partner... The Cabaret must feel restricting."

A part of him felt bad every time things didn't go the way Arry wanted them to, as though the hand he had offered long ago in Antiris had been in bad faith, as if he should have done more to elevate Arry out of the life and into the life he dreamed about. After all, a part of what had made him reach out in the first place was the hare-brained idea that he could help someone like himself before it was too late for him. Sex work was just work, but he knew it wasn't what Arry wanted. They both recognized that it was a path to the stage, however. And Aurin might have pushed harder on Arry's behalf, but the returns would not have been certain and it would have created a lot of bad blood for the both of them. Part of why Aurin was as successful as he was at the Cabaret was that he was fair-minded and stuck to his lane unless he saw a sure opportunity that was win-win for all involved.

A few months ago, he would've rolled his eyes and told Arry to strip down, whether he was angling for sex or not, but now it seemed safer to walk on eggshells around him. Something seemed the matter, but he wasn't in the habit of interrogating Arry too hard. He never quite knew where the line was that would send him storming off, but this time never to return. Even though that would likely end up the best-case scenario for the scamp, it would be bittersweet for Aurin.

"Aye, Lunaria had me in the back office counting her money, but I came out to watch," he said. "I'm glad you didn't see me grinning like a fool..." He grinned now, his hands behind his head. "Saw you duck out with the minstrel, so I ducked back into the office. But people were talking. Good things all."

An eyebrow rose as he glanced over at the sprawl of pretty elf on his bed. For all his time spent around artists, he argued he was no connoisseur. He could tell when someone had it, but the creation of art and its true appreciation felt beyond him. Sometimes things made him introspective, but often that was uncomfortable.

"The two of you sounded great together. Seems like a real simpatico." He had already had to explain to a lusty patron that Arvalyn was not taking new clients and the minstrel wasn't a proper employee of Madame Lunaria. "Oh, you know me. I'm just trying to make the place less shitty than where we came from."

"That's exciting," he said of the impending date. Absent was his usual snark for all things. A part of him worried after Arry's heart, of course, as he had seen courtesans give up the sexual services aspect and pin their hopes on one person for romance and seen it end terribly until they figured out how to exist in a world where their sexual services weren't up for the highest bid. But all he had heard of the minstrel was positive, and he would be there to pick up the pieces if things went poorly.

"I don't suppose you've come to hear about the birds and the bees?" There was the snark, but it was gently teasing, not malicious. Arry ought to be able to tell the difference by now, at least when Aurin was speaking. Then again, Aurin hadn't been the best at communicating with Arry recently — or perhaps ever. They did seem to keep fighting about the same things.

But he had asked after Torin, similarly without his usual snark, so Aurin tried to answer similarly.

"I haven't seen him since our joint supper," he admitted. Torin had fashioned a means to communicate daily, of course, though not for very long at all. It was nice to check in, he found. Especially when his mind was in the mode of managing the various employees of the Cabaret, he could put his worry for one person to rest so he could focus on everyone else. "He's doing well, though. Working hard to make his own solo debut next season." There had been some little talk of that at the supper, but he didn't know if Arry had been paying much attention beyond being blinded by potential limelight in his own future. This didn't bother Aurin — he had tried to encourage practical self-interest in Arry; that was how one survived the rigors of life, after all.

Uncertain whether Arry's words carried backhanded meaning, Aurin made the choice to take his words plainly and speak plainly in return. Everyone was always playing a role, but he wasn't sure he liked where his ward was going with this. If he had taken Arry into his bed, it hadn't been just to get his rocks off. The boy had wanted experience before he made it a bit of a career. It had felt good to be closer to him, and Aurin wasn't going to apologize. He frowned. He tried not to find barbs hidden in Arry's words. They might be there, but fuck if he was going to be caught like a fish on a line.

Apparently, that was how he saw his pretty minstrel.

"A lot of people want the courtesan to fall in love with them," he said, reiterating a conversation they had certainly had before now. "I don't know him. I don't know if he didn't call on you because he wanted to be professional about your songwriting collaboration or for some other reason, but unless you're going to try to devil it out of him, you ought to just let it rest or you'll torture yourself with it." He bit back a joke about the clients who enjoyed watching a bit of self-flagellation. "I don't know shit about that music, but if you wrote that song together, seems as though there's already some genuine intimacy there. Lean into that. You still work at the Velvet Cabaret for the time being and he's taking you out on the town.

"If you think he just wants to fuck a courtesan for free..." He paused, shook his head. "No, you'd've sussed that out before now. Apparently, he likes you." There was a lilt of teasing in that last bit, but he didn't go for the throat as they often did in their banter. "Perhaps he can see the mask of Arvalyn and Arry underneath and be all right with both of them. Perhaps soon you won't have to be Arvalyn... or you can... I don't know, find a way to be yourself.

"I mean," he paused, laughing with self-derision, "the conventional wisdom is that relationships depend on honesty and being oneself."