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He thinks of the assassin glumly.
He hadn't even managed to get a name out of him, and now, staring at the mirror that had terrified him beyond measure, he wishes he had an ounce of that resolve. He's a patient man, of course, he has to be, but when faced with this- this-
He shudders at the thought of the word alone.
Viren sighs, running his fingers over the language carved into the gold. It must be old- old enough that humans didn't bother to keep records because they still lived among them then. Or new enough that it hadn't reached their spies yet. He's not going to ask. It's not like Aaravos would give him a straight answer.
He also knows that he should tell Harrow of this.
He won't. But the guilt of lying to his... to his best friend is still there, certainly.
“You look distressed.” But then when isn't he.
“You wouldn't understand.” He says like a petulant child. Because that might as well be all that he is.
“Of course.” Aaravos bows his head, hood slipping just a little bit when he straightens up again. “Serving the king must be demanding.”
“Obviously.” He hisses, stepping behind the mirror proper, running his hand on the smooth cold metal.
“But you are a loyal servant. I'm certain you can persevere.”
“What do you know of servitude?” Viren steps back into view.
“I serve you.” The elf says, and there is that damnable smile again. If Viren could touch him, he is certain his hands would be firmly planted around Aaravos' throat. Anything to wipe that grin off- anything.
“Of course.” He says with an air of attempted calm. Who knows if it translated. Aaravos doesn't say anything- settling to nod instead. “Fine- servant.” Viren locks eyes with him- if only to keep from staring at the rest of the elf when he asks. “Relax me.”
“Is that any way to ask?” But still, Aaravos' long fingers push his hood back, and he runs his hands through his hair.
Viren swallows and tries not to think about how soft it must be- it certainly looks soft. Silken.
“Aaravos.”
“Yes?”
“Give me a spell that will take the migraine and exhaustion away.”
Aaravos nods and Viren is treated to the rare sight- rare as far as he's concerned- for his month of conversing with the secret mirror elf, he'd only seen him do it once – of Aaravos putting his hair up. He undoes a thin ribbon around the sleeve of his cloak and bunches his hair up behind him. The skin of his shoulders are paler. Viren watches with- why dance around it really- with desperation. Waiting for Aaravos to turn around so that he could spy the nape of his neck.
Viren, royal advisor, seduced by the enemy.
He should be ashamed.
He is- he is, obviously, he is- but that doesn't make him tell Harrow. Doesn't make him tell any other living person.
And there is that word again, reading it's ugly ugly head.
Temptation.
He has so many things outside of this that he should spend his time on, but the second Aaravos turns on his heel, silent, like he glides across the floor, like walking is too below him, Viren stares at the stars clustered along his spinal column.
Commits the constellations to memory.
He turns his back to the mirror and stares at shackles on the wall.
He can only imagine what other secrets the assassin had- or maybe he had none at all, and it was all posturing. It's not like he succeeded after all. Harrow was still alive and well, running after his two sons even though he whined about his bad back over dinner. As if he was still just thirties.
He turns to glance at Aaravos, already having retrieved whatever books he needed.
Viren does have such a dreadful habit for finding men he could never have attractive.
The fact that he loved the king, loved him more than his own wife, was an old wound that reopened every time Harrow would smile at a sunset. Familiar.
The elf was- the voice of the elf alone was enough to cloud his better judgment. For all he knows it might be some dangerous form of hidden magic- literally clouding his mind, turning his brain to mush.
“Here.” Aaravos stands in front of the mirror, holding the book up for Viren to see. “Satisfactory?”
“You know I can't read it.”
“Ah-” Aaravos smiles again- “It slipped my mind.”
He's grateful for the assassin of course.
He has no idea where else he would find elf horn on such short notice otherwise.
…
The dream is hazy for a while- the edges of his vision cloudy even when his eyes focus.
Aaravos' study looks oddly large now that he's standing inside of it.
He had followed the instructions to the letter and only now does he realize that he's been lied to- not a migraine cure at all. The horn he had ground to dust was turned into a paste, and the paste was pressed into a point between his eyes before bed.
He takes a few moments to let the anger come and go until he realizes- his 'servant' must be here somewhere- certainly. The only question was if Aaravos knew- rather- if Aaravos cared if Viren wandered through the chambers in search of him.
Probably.
Viren would be mad if Aaravos just appeared in the castle.
But then, as he thinks it over he's almost certain Aaravos would do as he pleased regardless of Viren's opinions on the matter.He finds him in the bath after a fair bit of wondering and getting distracted at any piece of writing. All of it reversed and inverted, just as if he was reading from the mirror. Useless venture on his part- he honestly wasn't sure he was hoping for, considering.
Regardless- he finds him literally in a bath. The room is hot, and Viren's clothes stick to his skin almost immediately. There are a few pools and steam rises from almost all of them.
The water is milky and hides most of the elf from him. Most, being the key word. The stars on his shoulders and arms are so close to him he could reach out and touch them- run his fingers over them and-
“Are you relaxed?” The elf's voice makes Viren jump. Aaravos hasn't turned to look at him. “Perhaps you would join me?”
“What is this?”
“You were distressed. And in doubt of my abilities.” Aaravos draws the word distressed out like that's enough of an explanation.
“So you lied to me?”
“Did I? Does a migraine still ail you?” There never was one, to begin with. Viren suspects this was known information.
“No.” He says slowly. “Thank you for your service.”
“Ah- but it is not over.”
“It wouldn't be, would it?”
He stands up, and Viren turns to look away. It's not anything about modesty or indigence. It's just everything about his own mental well being, and how is he going to look Aaravos in the eye if he knows how many stars are on his-
“The hot water will help you relax. Minerals.” He says as if that's enough of an answer. “Let me undress you.”
“I can undress myself.” He says, and his fingers fly to get his coat off. Aaravos sinks back under the water slowly. “I'm not a child.”
Aaravos gives the tiniest shrug, head cocked to the side ever so lightly. A suit yourself kind of a motion if he's ever seen one. Viren unbuckles his trousers and watches long legs slowly descend back into the water from the corner of his eyes.
Temptation Temptation Temptation.
But then- He swallows slowly and kicks of his small clothes. This is obviously a dream, right?
And what are dreams for if not indulging in bad choices?
The water is hot- past warm certainly- and it stings in that way that almost makes him pull his foot back out. He grits his teeth and force his body to live through the shock of it. He feels eyes on himself and tries his best to be dignified.
Respectable.
The heat almost burns. His skin isn't having the best time of it- neither is the rest of him.
“There.” Aaravos drags the word out again- until Viren is sitting on the raised stone along the sides opposite of him- “Do you not feel your worries draining away?”
He feels something draining away, and he's fairly certain it's his resolve.
“Yes.” He mumbles. Now that he's across from the elf, there's so little stopping him staring. The water is not as opaque now- and even for all of the steam, he can count stars all the way down to Aaravos' ankles. “Certainly.”
His calves- his thighs- Viren doesn't know what he wants to touch more. Are the starts just patterns on skin or are they something more- and the blackened spot on his chest, is it a hole or just darkened skin- what does he feel like- what does he taste like-
“You can sit closer you know,” Aaravos tells him, and Viren does. Moving makes the water burn again- but he settles just a few feet away from the elf. Now if he wants to look at him, he has to actively turn his head to drink him in, and Viren isn't sure if he could bring himself to do that. Dream or not.
Before he has a chance to make that choice, Aaravos inches closer until their legs are touching.
The elf closes his eyes and leans his head back until it rests on the cool floor behind them.
“Are you-”
“Fine.” It comes out like a sigh.
This must be a dream then. He's never heard anything like that come out of real Aaravos' mouth.
“Yes,” Viren says with the bravado of someone who absolutely isn't prepared for any repercussions the following words might have. “You certainly are.”
The elf cracks an eye open to look at him slowly.
“Shall we drop pretenses then?” His hair is still up, Viren notices belatedly.
What do they have left, if not pretense?
Aaravos moves smoothly, even in the water, and not a drop of it goes spilling over the edge of the pool when he climbs into Viren's lap. The elf's legs curl around his waist, resting on the step, and the rest of him presses forward, chest on Viren's chest, head resting on Viren's shoulders.
“What-”
“Put your arms around me.” Whispered in his ear like almost every other sentence was, it shouldn't make him as flustered as it does. But he does as he's told, hugging him around Aaravos' ribs. “Good.”
“W-what-”
“Just hold me,” Aaravos says in a tone that's only sort of pleading. It must be the heat- or the dream- whatever. “Be a good human and hold me.”
Viren is stunned into silence, which hasn't historically happened a lot- but then he's never really needed to touch an elf before. Even with the assassin, there was no need for physical contact when he could spin dark magic to do the work for him across the room.
He's heavier then Viren thought he would be, for some reason. He's broader and taller with horns and more hair, and still, Viren thought he wouldn't weigh an ounce. He does though. At least a few. And he's cool- even in the steaming water. And so much bigger then Viren, even now.
The elf's horn scratches against the side of Viren's head, and Viren almost wants to move his hand up to adjust both of them but if he does it feels like whatever this moment is will evaporate into thin air.
Whatever this moment is.
It's a unique angle if nothing else. The stars twinkle brighter, from the heat or from his touch he's not sure, but now that he's so close he can tell- they do twinkle. Faintly. There is light on his hands- barely there but there none the less. Viren fans his palms out, and it gets another pleased sigh out of Aaravos.
“Am I here for my benefit or yours?”
“Are they not the same?”
“I-” Viren opens his mouth and closes it again.
Even the nudity- skin on skin- all of this steam- the situation that he thought was clearly going to be erotically charged isn't. And it's a little disorientating at first. He would be lying if he said it wasn't- if he didn't think-
But instead, he just does as he's told.
They sit there for what must be hours, Aaravos just sighing contentedly, doing something that, if Viren were a braver man, he would call nuzzling, but Viren isn't brave, historically. Never has been. Aaravos moves his body occasionally, adjusting in a way that drags skin on more skin.
If Viren didn't know any better, he would say that it's neediness.
Or loneliness.
Centuries or however long alone?
Anytime Viren shifts, the arms around his shoulders stiffen just a little bit, and the legs around his waist tighten, almost as if the elf is scared to be alone again.
Viren's sure that can't be it though.
…
He wakes up with pain in his neck, and his mood is soured for the rest of the day.
Washing off the paste between his eyes takes longer then it should have.
He shares breakfast with the king, and while Harrow smiles and laughs at whatever thing Ezran has done today, Viren stares straight ahead and tries not to turn his head too sharply. A long day of advisement later, he descends down into his private dungeons, and into the room with the mirror.
Aaravos has his hair down, book in hand, waiting. He might even actually be reading whatever tome he's holding.
He looks- like he always looks.
“Did the spell work?” He asks, and Viren holds his gaze. “Did the migraines recede? Are you still exhausted?”
He hesitates to answer because really, what if it all was just an odd dream.
“Not well enough.” He says, and Aaravos looks at him with what could be called mild surprise. “I'll try it again tonight. Maybe it's a build up situation.”
“Maybe.” Odd dream or not, he's hard pressed to say that he wouldn't want to have it again. “I will search for a better remedy for you.”
“That's fine. I mean-” He waves a hand. “You're fine. I'll suffer through it. As humans suffer through a great many private agonies.”
“Yes,” Aaravos says with an air of hesitation that's new and rare and interesting. “Of course.”
Of course.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Despite what must be the sensible thing to do, Viren keeps having the dreams.
He calls them dreams because the reality of transporting his sleeping body to another realm for a night to hold what could only be a monster for hours is just too much for him to consider. It's treason, to start, morally reprehensible, to end, and a decent amount of bad choices spread between the two options.
He sits in his bedroom after a long- miserably long- day of negotiations with the other kingdoms. He was not allowed into the pentarchy meeting- because he is not a royal and probably would never be one- but he was allowed the luxury of dining with them.
At Harrow's side, he stares with a sense of disbelief at the child sitting at the opposite end of the table, keeping pace. She was the smartest person at the table- after Harrow and himself of course. And she wore Duran crown with ease.
And he was Harrow's servant.
“Difficult.” The elf nods, when Viren tells him about his day through gritted teeth. “Your frustration must be unimaginable.”
“To have a child- a child- do you know what children look like?”
“I'm familiar.”
“She couldn't see over the table!” He yells. The only thing there is to knock over is the chair he brought in for when Aaravos taught him longer ritual magic, and it was already lying next to a wall. “They had to bring her three cushions.”
“Three. What injustice.” If Viren didn't know any better, he would say that the elf was mocking him. It's delivered in the same deep voice- with a light expression on his face. Just like everything else.
“If I was king-” And Viren stops, hand flying up to his mouth.
Aaravos makes the play of looking around his study and then pressing himself up against the mirror to look in the cell. There's a moment of silence. Viren takes his hand away from his mouth and stares at the floor.
“If you were king?” He prods lightly.
His breath fogged the mirror in a tiny spot.
“If I were king-” He whispers. “I-” He can't bring himself to say it.
Cavorting with an elf- a probably criminal elf- he could explain away. The dark magic, the dungeons, the lying, the stealing, he could- he could cover somehow. There's-
There's no covering talking about the removal of the king. No scapegoats, no apologizes good enough to speak the words he's been thinking for years upon years upon years. Every since Harrow's marriage, ever since Viren's divorce, ever since the death of the Queen.
He feels like a joke- or like his entire life has been nothing but one great cosmic failure.
For a second- a second he regrets as soon as it passes- he imagines letting the assassin drive his blades through Harrow's chest and picking up his crown band as it rolls on the floor with that satisfying ringing clatter.
The shackles sit on the wall, and he knows within his heart that he should be hanging from them.
“Lost your will?” Aaravos asks. When Viren looks up the elf is away from the mirror- looking over papers at his desk.
The tone is clear, he thinks.
Coward.
And he is, isn't he?
Now he sits on his bed and dips his fingers into the paste like he has every day for the past two weeks before stopping. He rubs his fingers back on ridges of the jar and wipes his hand clean, setting it back on the shelf with the rest of his tinctures.
Why?
Why has he been doing this for two weeks?
Aaravos was a master, certainly, but now that Viren is pressed to think about it, he's never seen the elf's fingers spark the pale purple of what he thinks his magic should be. What if it's all been compulsion- what if it's all been nothing but a carefully tailored act to get him to-
To-
To get him to do what?
He goes to bed and when he wakes the next morning with no memory of a dream and a full night of rest he decides with some sense of finality that he's going to take a break. Leave Aaravos to his mirror and to his whispering and stay out of the dungeons.
At least for a while.
…
When he comes down to the dungeons for the first time in three weeks, Aaravos isn't standing at the mirror.
He supposes now that that's' to be expected. He didn't assume Aaravos only waited on him, he's sure the elf had better things to do. So he knocks on the glass, and he waits.
And waits.
And waits.
“Hello?”
Nothing.
Viren spends an hour waiting, staring at his empty study.
The panic he feels rushes through his body- cold sweat, shaking hands, short breathing – is he dead?
Is he hurt?
Was he ever real?
Viren leaves the dungeon, almost running up to his chambers and telling the guards that no one disturbs him until morning. He doesn't know why he's panicking- why he's panicking so much either-
He smears the paste down between his eyes, and before his head is even on the pillow he's there again-
“Aaravos?” He thought it would come out as a yell- it doesn't. Barely whispered, he has to clear his throat and do it again. Aaravos' prison is silent. That's rare, in the weeks he's dreamt of coming here. So he passes through the rooms slowly, one after the other.
The study, the kitchen, the atrium, the observatory, the sitting room, the baths- he's never been anywhere else and now Viren stands in front of the only door he's not opened in all the time spent- spent doing whatever it is- whatever this is with him.
His hand hovers over the door handle.
He should have a strategy before he barges into whatever this room is- apologize- no. That's weakness, that's never the best foot forward. Come up with a trip- that's even worse. And he's certain Aaravos would see through it in an instant. Claim the revelation he had lead to him telling the king- no. Bringing Harrow up here seems like asking for a nightmare.
He opens the door before he has a chance to decide that this isn't what he wants because-
It's a dark room, no windows, no lights. His eyes could go to anything, but they go to the bed.
“To what do I owe the luxury of being graced with my master's presence.” The elf doesn't bother turning over to look at him.
“I was-” He expects some sort of cut off. Aaravos yelling or some magic being thrown at him, and instead, there's nothing. “Busy.” He says like an idiot.
There's a shift- minuscule- and an arm reaches out from the blankets, the brightest thing in the room by far.
“I'm not interested in being a toy for a bored child to play with.” His fingers crackle with magic, vibrant red sparks illuminate the room around him.
Maybe an apology is the best idea after all.
Before he gets set on fire.
“I've had my doubts-” He starts and stops as quick as Aaravos sits up, blankets falling off of his body and the soft glow illuminates the rest of the bed. His shoulders are low as he cracks his neck and raises his other arm to begin arcing a sigil. “I'm sorry.”
“Not an ounce of sincerity in you, is there?” Aaravos finally turns to look at him.
“I am-”
“Sorry, I'm not content to sit and wait and rot?” He stands- glides off of the bed really- until he's on the floor. Until he's in front of Viren and the red glow between them is almost blinding.
“No-”
“Sorry, I'm not greeting you in supplication?”
“No- Aara-”
“And now you whisper my name in my chambers without an ounce of conviction in your voice.” The spells drops, and it takes his eyes a moment to adjust. “You dream of being king, and you can not even beg forgiveness properly?”
Hearing the words spoken out loud so starkly brings his mind to a halt.
“Yes.” It comes out without thinking, and Aaravos makes a noise of dismissal.
He turns and returns to his bed, drawing the blankets around him again.
“That's all royalty is, really.” The elf says, and his disappointment is almost palpable. Like he's a bad investment. “Begging for forgiveness from the right people.”
No, Viren wants to say. It isn't, he wants to say. That's not how Harrow does it, he wants to say. And then he remembers what Harrow was going to do because of Duran and Viren thinks maybe, yes it is and he's a fool for ever thinking otherwise.
“I'm not really made for that sort of thing.”
There's a noise that can only be described as a loud and resounding obviously, even if the word isn't said.
“You can leave.” The elf tells him, again it feels like.
He doesn't, though.
He should.
He doesn't.
He pulls his boots off and walks to the bed. Aaravos is faced away from him which is the only reason he has any spine to speak off when he gets on the bed and wraps his arms around his midsection.
He thinks for a moment Aaravos might turn around and kill him right there, point blank, with something especially violent and excessive.
Just really obliterate him.
The only thing that happens is that the elf's shoulders sag with a weirdly familiar exhaustion.
Viren doesn't dare close his eyes when Aaravos sighs slowly, shaking his head just a little bit, before stilling again. He's glad he can't see the elf's face.
He doesn't move- no intention of moving for quite a while at least- and he's unsure how long he sits there unmoving before there's a minuscule tremor in Aaravos' shoulders. Viren does him the courtesy of feigning ignorance. In his selfish, confused desires, he had entirely forgotten that Aaravos was getting something out of their continued interactions too.
Viren nudges him gently, mostly leading with his own weight, until they're both on their sides, no longer sitting, and he takes a deep breath before reaching up and petting Aaravos' hair out of the way.
“I won't do that again.” He says quietly.
“See that you don't. I will not be so kind.” Aaravos' voice comes out quietly, and Viren can see the glow from his fingers while he pulls the blankets up around him. “I don't speak lightly.”
“Of course.”
He does not doubt him for a moment.
They grow quiet again. Time passes- hours or minute or seconds, Viren can't tell.
“I've grown complacent.” The sound of his voice shocks him for a moment, and it's barely above a whisper, in the quiet of this room. “Too expectant on you.”
“It's not as if I've been any better.”
Aaravos makes a sound and moves in his grasp until he's face down and in much the same position Viren found him when he first entered the room.
“Do you want me to keep-”
“Yes.”
...
Viren doesn't move until he wakes up in his own room, face pressed into the sheets with a horrible numbness in his arm where Aaravos had spent most of the night. He gets changed and passes Harrow in the hallways without so much as a good morning before rushing down to the dungeons.
He's there, smirking at Viren for being out of breath.
“Sleep well?” The elf asks, and Viren, between his panting, finds a moment to sigh in relief.
“Fantastically.”
They're not dreams, obviously, because Aaravos looks distinctly too well rested, too smug for it to just be in his mind.
“Always lovely to hear.”
“Yes.” He says because what else is there.
“Where were we?” Aaravos asks, stepping deeper into his study to retrieve the last spell book they had poured over.
Viren sits down and tries to shake sensation back into his hand.