pennysheets | Swept into Faerie for @punched

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Swept into Faerie for @punched_hitler

The realms of faerie love their frivolity. Great gatherings with music and food and dancing and chatter. Soldier doesn't know which great fae lord this is; it isn't like it matters. He's not here to kill any of them. He's here to prevent anything from happening to his own master, so he keeps his attention on him, as is only appropriate.

Though he does find his gaze drifting from his master to the swirl of movement and color from the ballroom floor, from time to time. There are flashes of leaves and talons and raven wings among the dancers, in cloths and hair and eyes, but the rhythm is engaging, the melody is pleasant, and he knows the steps. His feet itch to move, even though he knows he could probably never keep up with the true faerie dancers, and might lose what little he has left of himself if he tries. He still kind of wants to.

He knows he mustn't ask. But apparently his master can tell what he wants, because he finds the cool eyes on him when his gaze wanders back where it belongs. He straightens up, guilty and afraid, but the old fae just smiles indulgently.

"Go on, pet," he says. "I am safe enough for now."

Soldier goes. He doesn't have the same grace as most of the people on that dance floor, as heavy as he is with the metal growing out of his bones, but he has some value as a dancer still. He spins the real fae around to the beat as it picks up in response to the newcomer, strange steps from another life that they manage to pick up with laughter and chattering amongst themselves-- not for him, never for him, but still pleasant to have around him-- and feels almost happy enough to smile. It won't last, it never lasts, and he might come away from the dance with new fangs hooked into his mind, but he doesn't care. He wants to dance.

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Steve glances at Soldier, something passing over his face - something like tenderness and gratitude, maybe, though it's chased by determination.

"I'm not going to leave you to do it all just so I don't have to," he says. "We're in this together." He doesn't know if Soldier enjoys hunting, though maybe not. Either way, Steve's got his back. He's not sure any of these other fae would. He has seen the way they treat humans, after all - generally as little more than animals, albeit sometimes as intelligent ones.

Sometimes not.

"You're very valuable to your master," he says, as they walk; more an observation than a question.

Soldier has seen those emotions before. Only they weren't for him. Never for him. That doesn't make any sense at all.

So he ignores it. It's the only safe response when he doesn't understand something that doesn't require an actual answer. He looks away from this weird fae's weird expressions and focuses on the forest around them, listening for the hounds flushing their prey further into the trees, watching the faerie on their steeds just within sight ahead of them, Pierce among them.

Easier to ignore when the fae gets to the point not much later. Maybe this is what he wanted to talk about, probe into Pierce's doings. Soldier just shrugs. "I have a purpose. I keep him safe." That makes him about as valuable as his castle walls, maybe, or a really good sword.

"As his Soldier," Steve recalls, though the way he says it makes it sound a bit like he's saying as his slave.

Because he remembers what Soldier told him: He doesn't know how long he's been doing it. He doesn't know anything before he was here. And Steve doesn't like the sound of that.

"He seems like the kind of lord who only keeps things around if they have a purpose."

What do you think mortals are to most fae, Steve, c'mon. Soldier doesn't miss the subtext but he also doesn't see what the big deal is. He's useful. He is valuable. That means the only one who can mess with him is his own master.

So he agrees simply, "He is. If I stopped being useful I would stop being his Soldier." And maybe this isn't the best life he could have... but what is he going to do? Want something different?

Steve nods, though he's quiet for a moment more, looking pensive. "Having a purpose is good," he finally says, quietly, eyes on the path ahead as they follow the larger dedicated hunting party. It's not like he can say otherwise - he's always wanted a purpose. Wanted to feel useful. Even though he so rarely has. In a way, part of him envies Soldier that.

"But people aren't only what they're useful for. Not everything in life is useful, and I think it's important to remember that, too."

Maybe he's not making any sense. But he looks at Soldier, at the way he's clearly Pierce's tool even more than his pet, and it's - sad. It makes him sad, and angry, and he wants more for this man, who doesn't seem to know to want it for himself.

"Does he have any other soldiers?" he asks, quietly, not sure which answer he wants to hear more.

Soldier eyes this weird fae warily. That's some radical talk, there. "I would rather be useful than sit around to look pretty," he states firmly. The humans who are kept just to be pretty are, in his experience, either too heavily enchanted to understand what's going on, or are bored out of their minds. At least he's given tasks, limited freedom, and the protection of a lord.

The question is almost predictable. Gathering intel. Soldier probably shouldn't even answer it, but he does: "None like me." He's the only human, for one thing. Probably not the only assassin, but he knows he's the best one.

Steve can't help the way he smiles at that response. It's a good one - one that matches his own strongly held opinions. And it only makes him like Soldier more, despite the fact that the man is being forced into that usefulness.

Steve knows a little about that, too.

He nods, because, "I've never seen any other soldiers like you." Which certainly doesn't mean they don't exist, because Steve hasn't seen a lot of the world, but it's true for the parts of it he has.

The answer does also tell him more about Lord Pierce, though it isn't surprising.

"He is a very powerful lord," he says - nothing new to either of them. "I have to assume I'm not putting you in danger, by... befriending you?"

He hopes that's what he's doing. The befriending part. He can't promise never to put this man in danger, because part of him already wants to. He's trying to tamp down on it, though.

Is that what this is? Soldier is not entirely sure that's what this really is. (It might be nice, though. He's never had a friend before. He doesn't know what that would be like. Or what he would even do with a friend.)

The question is a serious one, though, and he considers it seriously. "I don't know. You might be more in danger than me, if he disapproves." Soldier can only be punished, he won't be killed, he's too useful. This fae might not be so lucky.

It's what Steve would like it to be; he does recognize that real friendship goes both ways, but he's also willing to be the one to stick his neck out to prove his intentions.

Perhaps literally, though oddly, Soldier's words actually make him smile (albeit with some measure of relief, though only some. There are worse things than death, after all).

"I can handle being in danger," he says, almost cheerfully. "And popularity has never been high on my list of priorities. Besides. Some things are worth risking your skin over."

The heavily implied part of that sentence is that Soldier is one of those things.

He gets a look that actually verges on skeptical, there. He is not worth risking anyone's skin over. Maybe an underling or something, because he is not easily replaceable, but not a true, free fae's skin.

But. Also. He doesn't like the idea. He doesn't like the idea of anyone getting hurt for him. "Do not risk your skin," he says after a pause, sounding more earnest. "He might break it. How can you. Befriend me. Or anyone. If you are dead."

"Skin heals," is Steve's not-so-helpful offhand response, at first.

But he's not so dense as to be unable to see there's some concern there that doesn't entirely seem to stem from Soldier's nonexistent opinion of himself as a person deserving of friends.

But there is plenty of that, too, Steve thinks.

"A fair point," he finally concedes, as they walk. "But like I said - some things are worth the risk. I have to be willing to stand for something, to decide it's worth a high price. Why not friendship?"

The Soldier makes a frustrated little noise. He can't help it. He doesn't understand this stupid merrow. "You don't even know me. You danced with me once. Are you always this. This. This quick to get attached?" It can't be friendship. Even putting aside that he is his masters Soldier and thus really shouldn't have friends, you can't be friends with someone you only met once. Can you?

Steve's response is to grin, if a little self-consciously. "Yes," is the simple, honest reply. "I'm afraid I do."

Because you can absolutely be friends with someone you only met once.

Of course, "You do it too, though, don't you? Not with friendship. But you can look at someone and know whether they're a threat. And what kind."

That is, after all, what soldiers do.

"What if I said you could be a threat," Soldier says flatly. It's true. He still doesn't really trust that there's not an ulterior motive, here.

But he's starting to think the threat is more to this merrow than from him. Unless he is playing some kind of long game to try and get him off guard and-- what, seduce him, maybe? He's had fae try to seduce him before. It doesn't usually look like this.

Steve looks at him, his blue eyes honest, open, unapologetic when he says, "You'd be right."

Maybe not in the way Soldier is thinking, exactly. But Steve is strong. He's a fighter. He can be a threat.

But not to his friends. For his friends.

"But do you think I'm a threat to you?" he asks - honest, and curious.

There's a frustrated-sounding pause, with the only sound the leaves of the trees rustling and some distant baying hounds. "I don't know," Soldier finally says, and he's more honest than he should be, because if he said this to Pierce he'd be punished severely. "I don't understand you. You might be a threat. But you might just be very strange and a little stupid."

That makes Steve laugh a little, even if that might be even more strange, to Soldier.

"I am a very strange and a little stupid," he admits, freely, "but I promise, I'm not a threat to you. At least, not directly." Because, "I don't want to bring your lord's ire down on you, for befriending me." Assuming, of course, that Soldier wants to be his friend in return.

"But I realize Lord Pierce is - the way he is," he says, after a slight pause, because Steve might want to say exactly what way Lord Pierce is, but even he has learned there can be ears in places one wouldn't think they ought to be. And he is being honest when he says he doesn't want to be a threat to Soldier.

Well. Up to the point where he absolutely will befriend the human, because, clearly.

He lets out a breath, because there are things he'd like to discuss, but he doesn't want to be overheard. And he's still not sure how open Soldier would be to hearing them, in the first place. Steve's not good at being patient, but he can try.

"Yes," Soldier says simply. "He is." He knows. He's not stupid. He's his Lord's assassin, his tool, his Soldier, of course he knows. But he also doesn't remember anything else, and it's not as if most of the other fae he's met are any better.

He looks back at the merrow with a frown. "Why aren't you?" he asks, brows together. He's not like any fae he's ever actually met.

Steve's eyebrows go up. "Why am I not - the way he is?" he finally decides is the question.

Well. It is a very reasonable question, from most angles.

He falls silent a moment, less because he doesn't have an answer and more because he wants to make sure he give it in a way that might make sense to Soldier.

"Because someone like your master has always been as he is now. In the position he's in. Or close enough. He wants to hold onto it." And will do anything to do just that.

"I - haven't. So I don't know how to be like that, and still be myself."

Nor does he want to, he doesn't say, but it's clear on his face, for someone like Soldier to read.

He laughs a little, to try to lighten things, and adds, "Fae are very bad at change." Some kinds, anyway. The deep kinds.

Even the smallest and weakest of faerie is still superior to a mortal. This is something he knows deeply, has been taught thoroughly. He's never met a fae before who didn't reinforce this. So Soldier is skeptical.

Unless-- "You have not always been fae?" he guesses, and for a wild moment he feels something almost like hope. He doesn't know why or what for, if he would hope to be someday equal to the masters himself, or just for someone who might understand what it's like living among them while being separate from them, and yet not quite human anymore either.

He's never met a male merrow before - and definitely not this male merrow.

Steve makes a face, which is somehow both apologetic and unapologetic, at the same time. "No, I have been," he admits, not looking at Soldier for a moment, eyes going to the path they're walking, then the grain of the wood of his spear handle, then the wicked point of it.

His voice is strangely nonchalant, quiet and understated, with a little twist to his lips when he says, very much intending it for Soldier's ears only, "I just haven't always been powerful."

The hope fades. A fae who isn't powerful is still more than a human. This is what he's been taught, time and again. "And now you are," he reiterates.

Still, he does have a point. Fae are not good at change. "What were you like before you were powerful," he asks, keeping it quiet as well. If this merrow doesn't want it to be heard beyond the two of them, he will follow that cue.

That might be what Soldier had been taught - but what he has been taught is not a universally held belief.

But Steve focuses on the question he was asked.

"Weak," he says, simply, his eyes flicking to Soldier and then away again. He hopes his brutal honesty can be another olive branch to the human, but that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt him, still, to offer it. He always was prideful.

"Small. Undesirable and overlooked. I was - nothing. No one - well," he finally laughs, a little self-deprecating. "I'm not much of anyone, now. But it's a little harder for anyone to look over me, at least."

"There is nothing wrong with being small," Soldier says, not quite a protest or a scold, but... verging on one. "Or weak. If you have someone to protect you or a good brain or a talent to make up for it." Though they have both agreed that this merrow is a little stupid, so maybe he didn't even have that. "You were overlooked because you were small?"

"Small, weak," he confirms. "Male." Male merrows are rare, and that does not make them desirable. "Merrows don't really do protection." Well. None but him; he tries. "And they prefer human men." Whether they have to leave the sea to get them, or enchant them to lure them under the waves. "They didn't have any use for anyone like me, no matter what else I might have had to offer."

He's trying to sound lighthearted, but there's a small, soft note in there somewhere that can't help but come across as bitter.

Then a soft laugh, as he tries to regroup. "I am still male, these days," he points out, in case that needs pointing out.

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