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In the dark of night, when the two of them are alone and doing what lovers do, Cyno likes to bite.

Tighnari’s throat, his shoulders. His arms, sometimes. If the situation allows it, the ridge of his hipbones, the soft inside of his thighs. And Tighnari does not mind this—comes to enjoy it, even. But as time passes and he becomes used to having bruises on his skin, he forgets that most other people would likely be unnerved by such a display. And so one day, when he has to take off his sweater because it is simply much too hot otherwise, he almost renders Collei unconscious with shock and distress.

“Oh my gods!” she wails, almost on the verge of tears. “Master Tighnari, what did this to you?” 

“What are you—” And then Tighnari turns, catches sight of his shoulders, the numerous bruises and bite marks scattered across his bare skin. “Oh,” he says. “That.”

It takes ten minutes to calm down Collei, to assure her that he is fine, and that no, he hadn’t been injured somehow and hiding his pain. It takes another ten to explain to her that the activities that had produced the marks were consensual. Needless to say, the conversation is sufficiently awkward. Tighnari hadn’t known that Collei could get so red. 

“I just—” Collei fidgets with her hair. “This… person you’re seeing. You’re sure they know not to hurt you? Like, for real?”

Her concern is touching. Tighnari smiles. “Yes, I’m sure,” he says. “Dont worry. Cyno wouldn’t do anything I didn’t want him to.”

It takes them both a moment to register his slip of the tongue. Tighnari fairly sees the gears turning in Collei’s head, and she blinks very rapidly a couple of times. 

“The—the General Mahamatra,” she says. “He did that… to you.”

Well, Tighnari thinks dryly, the cat’s out of the bag. “Yes.”

“I see,” says Collei. “I see.” She looks like she did when Tighnari had tried to explain a particularly difficult concept from her botany textbook. “I—so, he—you—”

“We don’t have to talk about this anymore,” Tighnari says kindly. 

“Oh, thank goodness,” Collei says, sighing with relief, and they finish the rest of the patrol as they normally would. 

“So I might have… told Collei about us.”

Cyno does not seem bothered by Tighnari’s confession. The two of them are sitting under the shade of a large tree near Gandharva Ville. He holds some Ajilenakh nut candy up to Tighnari’s lips, and Tighnari takes a bite. 

“I thought she knew already,” Cyno says.

Tighnari swallows, shrugs. “Well, she definitely knows now.”

“How’d she take it?”

“Fairly well, I suppose? Considering that—well, considering that she found out from these.” Tighnari gestures at his neck. 

“Oh.” Cyno blinks, looking a little unsettled. “That must’ve been uncomfortable,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

Tighnari frowns. “It’s not your fault.”

“Nobody else put those marks on you.”

“Yes, and I like it that way.” Tighnari exhales and lies back, laying his head on Cyno’s lap. The canopy above them is saturated with sunlight. “It was only a matter of time, anyways.” 

“I don’t mind,” Cyno says. “People knowing, I mean.”

“Me neither,” Tighnari says, and yawns. “Should we make a public announcement, then? Put some message boards in the city to use?” 

Cyno looks a little stressed. “If you—if you really want to—”

Tighnari laughs. “I’m just joking,” he says, reaching up to touch Cyno’s cheek gently. “Don’t worry. I think it’ll be enough just to tell the truth if anyone asks.”

“Okay,” Cyno says. Wordlessly, he leans down and presses a kiss to Tighnari’s smile. When they break apart, he licks his lips. “Tastes like candy,” he says. 

Tighnari smiles lazily. “So do you.” He closes his eyes. “Wake me up in half an hour, will you?” 

Cyno takes his hand, laces their fingers together. “Alright.” 

The world they live in is an uncertain one, Tighnari knows. And they’ve both seen the cruelty, the harshness of it. But here, under the sun, in this secret place that belongs only to the two of them, life is sweeter and more golden than honey. 

It’s been almost half a year since Cyno had come to Tighnari’s house for dinner as usual, and confessed his love over a game of Genius Invokation. 

“I have feelings for you,” he’d said in the middle of his turn, as straight-faced as usual. “I’d like us to be together, if you’re willing.” 

He’d spoken so casually that at first, Tighnari almost hadn’t registered the meaning of his words. 

“You want us to be together,” he echoed. 

“Yes. As lovers.”

Tighnari hadn’t really been too surprised. He’d felt them heading in a certain direction, lately. He just didn’t know they’d speak about it so soon. 

“Can I think about it?” he’d asked. 

“Of course,” Cyno said. And then, gesturing at the cards in front of them, “It’s your turn.” 

Lovers. Tighnari tried to focus. Lovers. 

He’d lost the game anyways. 

Truth be told, Tighnari had almost said no.

Not for any lack of feeling, though. He would’ve been a liar if he said that he wasn’t especially fond of Cyno, that his heart didn’t flutter when Cyno touched him, that he never imagined what it would feel like to sleep with him. But—well, before everything, Cyno was his dearest friend. Tighnari had become used to their easy camaraderie, the safety and familiarity of it. And so he’d wondered: was it really worth it to venture into deeper waters when the shallows were already so lovely? Because as beautiful as the unknown might be, it could be just as devastating. If, perhaps, he said yes, only for them to fall apart like so many others did; if, perhaps, they never spoke to each other again—

It did not bear thinking about. So Tighnari had decided on his answer, and resolved to tell Cyno the morning after dinner. But then he’d awoken before dawn, only to see Cyno tending to Tighnari’s potted garden. 

“I remember you said it’s best to water before the sun rises,” Cyno said, standing amongst the flowers. Padisarah, Sumeru rose, Kalpalata lotus. All waiting for morning, for the sun. “But you were sleeping so well, I didn’t want to wake you.” 

Tighnari blinks. He indeed had been sleeping soundly, just as he always did when Cyno was here. 

“Don’t worry,” Cyno said, taking Tighnari’s silence as concern. “I followed your notes on how much water to give each of them. I do think you could probably adjust the amount for the Sumeru roses, though. The soil’s a little too wet—”

And Tighnari realised that he’d been defeated. That there had never really been the smallest possibility of him denying his heart, of saying no to this. 

“Cyno,” he said.

“Yes?” 

“I’m going to kiss you now. Okay?” 

Cyno blinked, taken aback for a moment before his features softened with joy. “Okay,” he’d said, almost shyly. 

So Tighnari had kissed him. And Cyno had kissed him back. And on the horizon, dawn spilled over the land, bringing light to the world and all its flowers. 

So here they are now. New lovers, doing their best. Stumbling a bit along the way, as new lovers are wont to do. But always learning, learning. About each other and themselves and everything in between.

Tighnari does not mind. After all, he has always loved to learn. 

When he was very young, Tighnari had often been called expressionless. Hard to read. He’s not very expressive, his teacher had said to his parents, concerned. Even some of his friends had thought the same. 

But it wasn’t like he’d been solemn and quiet on purpose. It’d taken him time to realise that many of the ways he expressed himself—for example, waving his tail, flattening his ears—were lost on others. So he’d learned to use his face more, to smile and laugh and frown on top of everything else, and from then onwards, nobody had ever called him expressionless again. But he’d also realised: just as he’d communicated differently back then, so too must many others. A smile may not always mean joy, just as a lack of one may not always mean displeasure. 

Perhaps this is why he gets on so well with Cyno, has never been afraid of him. Because even though Cyno may not smile or laugh often, nor raise his voice when he is upset, this does not mean he is not expressive. And so as the three of them sit at the dinner table, it is painfully obvious to Tighnari that Cyno is bothered by Collei’s uncharacteristic silence: the tapping of his fingers against his thigh, his lips slightly pressed together. 

“Collei,” Cyno finally says. 

“Yes?” Collei squeaks. She nearly drops her food. 

“Are you—” Cyno pauses. “You know, there was once a man who was terrified of Kameras.” Tighnari sighs inwardly—here we go again . “They’d make him shudder.”

Collei stares, probably too nervous to even fake her laughter.

“Not funny?” Cyno asks.

“I mean, it was—”

“I have another one, then. What do you call a tiger without—”

Tighnari reaches out and covers Cyno’s mouth with his hand. “Collei,” he says. “Spare us from this. Just tell us what’s wrong.” 

“Nothing’s—nothing’s wrong!” Collei says. She’s a terrible liar.

“Do you not like me being with Tighnari?” Cyno asks, moving Tighnari’s hand away. “Is that it?”

“No… no!” Collei looks shocked. “No, of course not. It makes me happy, really.” Her gaze falls to the table. “But—aren’t I in your way now? I mean, it’s only natural if you want to spend time alone, so…” Her voice is quiet when she speaks again. “You don’t have to force yourselves to include me, is what I’m saying.” 

Tighnari opens his mouth to protest, but Cyno beats him to it. “Collei,” he says. “Have Tighnari or I said or done anything to make you think we don’t want you here?”

“No,” Collei says. “Not at all, but—”

“If we wanted to be alone,” Cyno continues, “we would say so. But right now, we want to eat with you because we like you and care about you. What is between the two of us doesn’t change that.” He does not smile, but there is something gentle about his expression. “Do you understand?”

Collei looks like she is tearing up. “Yes,” she says quietly. 

“Now, please,” Cyno says. “Say something, or I will tell every joke I’ve learned since I was twenty, and Tighnari will be forced to strangle me.”

At this, Collei bursts into laughter. “Well, we can’t have that,” she says, grinning.

And just like that, the house is filled with conversation again, with warmth and laughter and all that is good and human. It stands there, its light like a star in the dark of evening. 

“You were very mature back there,” Tighnari says, after Collei has left.

Cyno looks up from polishing his spear. “Am I usually not?” he asks dryly. 

“Well, more so than usual, then,” Tighnari says.

“Hm. Do you like that?”

He sounds almost playful. Tighnari smiles and pulls him in for a kiss. “Yes,” he says. 

“How much?”

Another kiss, this time a little deeper. “How about I show you?” 

Tighnari stills remember the first time they’d slept together: remembers the excitement, the apprehension, both of them wide-eyed and gasping into each other’s mouths—terrified, in a way, of the pleasure, of their own bodies that felt suddenly foreign to them. And yet chasing it all nonetheless, holding onto each other as if for dear life, so tightly that the morning would bring bruises on their skin. Afterwards, they’d lain there, sweaty and entwined, and Tighnari had thought, ah. So that’s why everyone is obsessed with this.

They’re better at this now, more confident and less nervous. But despite the familiarity, it is lovely and thrilling still, and so Tighnari finds himself gasping Cyno’s name into the night, finds himself insatiable and wanting. When they are both close, Cyno presses an open-mouthed kiss to Tighnari’s shoulder, and bites down, down, down.

Tighnari inhales sharply from the pain, and yet his body sings with it. Perhaps, he thinks, this is the secret language of canines. Of foxes and dogs and jackals and wolves and everything in between. Something that his ancestors had known and later forgotten, and that he is only now relearning. Teeth, teeth, love. 

“Harder,” Tighnari murmurs, and his voice is a breathless thing. He brings his hand to rest on Cyno’s nape. “Harder.” 

Cyno makes a desperate sound of pleasure and obeys. Tighnari feels it inside when he comes, feels his own pleasure take him over in tandem.

When they return to themselves, Cyno is still on top of him, looking concerned. 

“You cried,” Cyno says quietly. 

“Just teared up a bit,” Tighnari says. “I’m fine.” 

Cyno leans down to press his lips to Tighnari’s tears. “Salty,” he says. 

“Well, it would be.” Tighnari smiles. He raises his head to meet Cyno’s lips with his own. “Are you tired?” 

“A little,” Cyno says. “But I want it again.”

“That’s good,” Tighnari says, smiling. “So do I. But I need some rest first.”

Cyno nods and rolls off of him, exposing him to the night air, and Tighnari shivers. But then Cyno reaches out and holds him close, presses a kiss to his forehead. It is such an innocent gesture, and yet it makes Tighnari blush all the way down to his neck. His heart is racing. He’s grateful that it’s dark tonight, that the moon isn’t out. 

It is hard, sometimes, to be a lover. 

Cyno leaves in the mornings, after they’ve had breakfast together and when the sun rises partway into the sky. In the golden light, his profile is almost regal, mythological. Beauty from a past era. Tighnari gazes at him, and envies the sun for suiting him so well, for being able to travel with him wherever he goes. 

“You’re staring,” Cyno says.

Tighnari smiles. “I was just thinking,” he says, “that you’re very handsome.” 

Cyno might be blushing. “You’ve seen me a thousand times,” he says. 

“All the same,” says Tighnari. “My handsome general.” Cyno looks so flustered, he laughs. 

Cyno scowls. “You’re teasing me.” 

“Well, I’m telling the truth, too,” Tighnari says. 

They share a kiss at the doorway, and then Cyno leaves, just as he always does. Tighnari does not watch him go. Instead, he opens his notebook, and reads the entries he’s made for his experimental garden. Padisarah, Sumeru rose, Kalpalata lotus. 

He has become just like them, in a way. A creature waiting for the return of warmth, of light. And until then—well, there is nothing else to do but keep living.

They don’t fight often, but as they say, nothing is perfect. 

Neither of their occupations are completely safe, and this is something they’ve both accepted. So when a few of the village children get lost in a withering zone, Tighnari doesn’t think twice about charging in and bringing them home. Unfortunately, this also leaves him bedridden for more than a week.

“Don’t tell Cyno,” he tells Collei, who sits loyally at his bedside.

“Are you sure?” Collei asks, looking uncertain. 

Tighnari nods. Cyno returns to Gandharva Ville not a day later.

“Ah,” Tighnari says. Collei is conspicuously absent. “Did I get sold out?” 

“You actually told Collei not to tell me?” 

Cyno’s voice is as calm as ever, but Tighnari can tell that he is furious. His anger, just like his love, just like everything about him, is as fierce as it is quiet. 

“I didn’t want to worry you.”

Cyno’s eyes flash. “You didn’t want to worry me?” he says.

“I know your work is important,” Tighnari says evenly. “I’ll be up in a few days, anyways. You didn’t have to come all this way.”

“You are ridiculous,” Cyno hisses. “Of course I did. I did, because you’re important to me, and you’ve been ill for a week, and you didn’t think I even needed to know—”

He bows his head; his shoulders are shaking.

“Cyno,” Tighnari says, his heart dropping. “Are you crying?” 

Cyno does not respond, but when he raises his head the tears in his eyes are answer enough. 

“Cyno,” Tighnari says, taking Cyno’s face in his hands. He has never seen Cyno cry; it breaks his heart in a way he never knew it could be broken. “I’m sorry, Cyno, I’m sorry. Please don’t cry.”

Cyno wipes his tears away almost aggressively. “You don’t—you don’t know how much you mean to me,” he says, voice breaking. “Please, Tighnari. If you are ever hurt, send for me. I beg of you.” 

“Okay,” Tighnari says, and kisses him. “I will. I’m sorry.” He holds Cyno close. “I will.” 

Cyno takes a deep, shuddering breath. “You promise?”

“I promise.”

Slowly, Cyno’s breathing evens out. He embraces Tighnari gently. “I missed you,” he says.

Tighnari closes his eyes, breathes him in. “I missed you too, Cyno.” 

Time passes: sun following rain following sun. And yet in a way, it feels like nothing has really changed. 

“I don’t know about that,” Cyno says. He closes his eyes as Tighnari brushes his hair with a fragrant wooden comb. “My knees definitely feel different.”

He will be twenty-seven this year. Tighnari, twenty-four. Still young, most would say. Tighnari doesn’t quite agree—after all, this is the oldest he’s ever been. 

“Well, you aren’t particularly kind to them,” Tighnari says. 

“You’re one to talk. Careful with that shoulder.”

Tighnari laughs. “We sound like old men,” he says. 

Cyno hums, amused. He turns to Tighnari. “Your turn, now,” he says. 

Tighnari’s hair doesn’t need much combing. Cyno focuses on brushing and oiling his tail, which he does quickly and efficiently. He’s had a lot of practice, after all.

Tighnari swallows. “When it’s all over,” he says, “would you like to live here? With me?”

“Yes,” Cyno says, and meets his eyes. He looks happy. “I would.” 

Tighnari cannot help the relief that washes over him. He’d been nervous, truly nervous. It’d taken him almost a week to muster up the courage to ask, unlike Cyno who’d asked Tighnari to be his lover without so much as blinking. 

“What do you mean?” Cyno says. “I was terrified. I really was. I couldn’t even look at you.” 

Well, what do you know. Guess they’re pretty alike, after all.

Tighnari has never been presumptuous enough to dismiss love the way some other scholars did. It’s just a hodgepodge of chemical reactions in the brain, one of his classmates had once said derisively. Biologically driven—meaningless, really. 

Tighnari disagreed. Just because something comes from a biological impulse doesn’t make it any less integral to being human, nor any less valuable, he’d argued. In writing off love, you may as well be dismissing hunger—and what are we without hunger? 

So Tighnari had never underestimated love, but nor had he realised how strong it would actually be. One night, he wakes up next to Cyno, and feels such a fierce, immense surge of affection that he almost doesn’t know what to do with it, how to contain it. It nearly brings tears to his eyes.

Somehow, Cyno wakes as well. “Tighnari?” he whispers, reaching for him. His hands are warm and lovely—if a pair of hands could hold the sun, it would be his. “Are you alright?”

Somehow, the comfort makes Tighnari’s heart ache all the more. “I’m fine,” he says, swallowing. He lays his head against Cyno’s chest, listens to the beat of his heart. “I’m okay. It’s okay.”

Tighnari closes his eyes. So this is love, he realises. This, and everything leading up to it, and everything that will come after. And—really, what kind of idiot could call even a single second of it meaningless?

Tighnari eventually brings Cyno to meet his family. 

“This is Cyno,” he says. He does not say I am madly in love with him. But then again, he doesn’t quite have to. He’s sure they can tell. He has never brought anyone else to meet them, after all. 

His parents are pleased, of course—excited and trying not to show it. Cyno, on the other hand, is so formal and polite that he seems stiff. Tighnari almost laughs. 

His grandmother takes Cyno’s hand. “Don’t be so nervous, child,” she says. “This isn’t a test.” 

“I’d like to pass, anyways,” Cyno says solemnly, and she laughs. 

The meal is pleasant and lighthearted. Cyno fits in surprisingly well, and it warms Tighnari’s heart to see all his loved ones like this, together and joyful. The beautiful mundane, as it were. This, he thinks, is what people go to war to protect. 

Tighnari’s father, ever the passionate entomologist, ends up speaking about an isolated population of honeybees that live in a certain desert oasis, which have apparently survived there for hundreds of years, all on their own.

“Wow,” Cyno says, “that’s unbeelievable,” and Tighnari’s father fairly chokes on his wine; he laughs so hard. Even his mother and grandmother are chuckling. 

Cyno blinks, stunned for a moment at the veritable sound of laughter, and then looks like he has finally found his promised land. He glances at Tighnari: can I? And Tighnari sighs, but he smiles. Who is he to deny anyone else their laughter? 

“Go for it,” he says. 

Cyno is almost vibrating when he turns to the rest of them. “I have another one,” he says. “Would you like to hear it?”

“Please,” Tighnari’s father says. “But give me a moment, or I really will choke.” 

“Do you think they liked me?” Cyno asks, when they have returned home. 

“Of course,” Tighnari says.

Cyno exhales. “I was nervous.”

“I could tell,” Tighnari says, smiling. “For the record,” he adds, “even if they didn’t like you, it wouldn’t make a difference. Because I like you terribly.”

Cyno kisses the tip of his ear. “I know,” he says. “But I’m glad they do, all the same.” 

“Me too,” Tighnari says. “Maybe we can visit again next month. If you’d like.”

Cyno’s expression brightens. “I would,” he says. “I have so many more jokes I haven’t told them yet.”

“Gods have mercy,” Tighnari says, but he is smiling, and his heart is full.

The inevitable happens, and Cyno injures himself while on duty. 

Thankfully, it’s nothing too serious—he just has to rest for a few weeks while his ankle mends, but it takes him out of commission, anyways. During this time, he stays with Tighnari at Gandharva Ville. His spear leans against the wall of the house, at rest, blending in with the potted plants and terrariums and scrolls. 

Cyno is restless. He’s not the type to be taken care of, to sit back while others are busy. And so he tries to help with everything—cooking, cleaning, anything else—limping here and there. 

Finally, Tighnari has enough. When he sees Cyno trying to get up again, he sits on his lap, straddling him. 

“Stop it already,” Tighnari orders. “Rest.” 

“I don’t want to,” Cyno says, stubborn as ever. “I’m not tired.” 

Tighnari does not budge. “How about I tire you out, then?”

“What do you—”

Tighnari kisses him filthily, and Cyno fairly moans into his mouth. When they break apart, his face is scarlet. 

“That’s cheating,” he says. 

“Is that a no?”

“No, it’s not,” Cyno says, his hands coming to wander under Tighnari’s shirt, and kisses him. When they stop for breath, he sighs, and buries his face in Tighnari’s chest. 

“I just—I don’t want to be a burden,” he murmurs. “Especially not here.”

“You’re never a burden here,” Tighnari says, running his fingers through Cyno’s hair. It’s long now, almost to his waist. “Idiot.”

Cyno makes a sound that could be a chuckle. His hands begin to wander again, and Tighnari feels hot under his skin. He is struck with a sudden impulse.

“Cyno,” he says, and Cyno raises his head. “Open your mouth.” 

Cyno obeys immediately. Without question. 

Tighnari uses two fingers, probes his mouth almost clinically at first. He presses down lightly on Cyno’s tongue, and then moves to his teeth, traces their ridges and valleys. Absently, he wonders how many imprints they’ve left on his skin by now. He feels Cyno’s sharp intake of breath, feels him straining under him. It is intoxicating, dizzying. 

After a moment, he withdraws his fingers. Cyno looks disappointed, but then Tighnari reaches behind himself, and lifts his hips. 

“Now, stay still,” he says, “and be good.” 

Cyno’s eyes are wide. Silently, he swallows and nods. 

Afterwards, they hold each other tightly, still breathing hard, warm with the afterglow. And Cyno meets Tighnari’s gaze, his expression so tender and vulnerable Tighnari almost shivers. 

“It can only be you,” Cyno says. “Until I die. It can only be you.” 

Had he heard this from anyone else, Tighnari would have dismissed it as an empty proclamation. Sweet nothings, said in the heat of the moment, as meaningful and lasting as melting sugar. But Cyno has never, never made an empty promise. Every word of his comes from the heart; he speaks no untruths. And so Tighnari responds to honesty with honesty. 

“It’s the same for me,” he says, and presses their foreheads together gently. “You. Only you.” 

Cyno exhales soft and shaky against his lips. Without a word, he brings up a hand to cradle Tighnari’s cheek. And then he smiles, small and secret and the most beautiful thing in the world. 

Long ago, Tighnari had attended the wedding of one of his Akademiya classmates. It’d been a lovely, traditional celebration, if much too loud for his sensitive ears. There’d been so many people, too. And while he’d enjoyed himself then, he knows that such a ceremony would suit neither him nor Cyno. And yet to do nothing feels amiss as well. So where does that leave them? He’s a little at a loss, until he speaks to his grandmother. 

There is an archaic ritual among their people, she tells him, that’s a little obscure now. Rarely done. A simple act of lifelong devotion: marking and being marked by your partner with nothing but teeth. Biting deep and hard enough to scar permanently. Like this, you carry your beloved with you not only in your heart, but on your body too. 

Tighnari listens, and he wonders at the coincidence. It is almost as if they’ve come full circle. Teeth and love and teeth. 

Before he leaves, his grandmother stops him. “You can’t erase a scar, Tighnari,” she says. “You must be very, very sure that you want him with you for as long as you live. So I ask you—are you sure?”

“I am,” says Tighnari. 

“This is all we need to do?” Cyno asks. 

They sit facing each other on Tighnari’s bed, cross-legged. On the table next to them, Tighnari has laid out an herb poultice and bandages for dressing wounds. 

Tighnari nods. “It’s nothing complicated,” he says. “Just make sure you break skin and bite hard enough. Or the mark won’t last.”

“Okay,” Cyno says. “You should probably come closer. So I can reach you.” 

Tighnari moves to climb into Cyno’s lap, and they hold each other close, almost on instinct. Arms around each other, gentle, like in a normal embrace. He’s nervous, and he knows Cyno is too, so it helps to be with each other like this. 

“Close enough?” Tighnari says, and smiles down at Cyno. 

Cyno’s cheeks are pink. “Yes.” 

“Ready?” 

“When you are.” 

“Alright, then. On three. One, two, three—”

Cyno’s teeth on him, at the juncture of his neck and shoulder. Cyno’s skin under his own teeth. A familiar feeling, until it grows more and more intense, and then it becomes something altogether foreign. 

Everything is excruciating and exhilarating. Tighnari feels himself tear up, feels a cry build in the back of his throat. But he ignores all of this, and bites down harder, harder, tasting the metal and salt of blood. 

It reminds him of Cyno kissing his tears—salty, he'd said. And then he thinks of their first kiss under the dawn, then their first time, the sweetness and naïveté of it. Of waking up to each other, of playing Genius Invokation late into the night. Of their dinner table, which has now bore the weight of a thousand shared meals, which has heard hundreds of Cyno’s terrible jokes. And he thinks of the distant future, of when their youth will be nothing but a memory and they will finally have to cede their posts to today’s children, and when they will sit together quietly in this same little house in Gandharva Ville, two old men watching the sun set slowly on the world. 

Tighnari thinks of all this and more, and the pain slowly becomes something other than pain, becomes something beautiful. When they release each other, he mourns it. 

It is like coming out of a trance, almost. Cyno’s face is flushed; Tighnari feels hot up to the tips of his ears, as if they’ve done something indecent. For a moment, they cannot speak. And then Tighnari catches sight of the wound he’s made, lovely and deep and undoubtedly painful, and snaps out of it. 

“Are you alright?” Tighnari says, quickly taking the poultice and applying it to the bite, bandaging it efficiently. Cyno tilts his head, gives him more space to work. 

“I’m fine,” Cyno says. “It really hurt, though.”

“It did, didn’t it?” Tighnari says, smiling. He reaches for his own bandages. Cyno brushes his hand away. 

“Let me,” he says.  

His hands are gentle as they dress Tighnari’s wound. Under his touch, the bite stings beautifully. When he finishes, they fairly fall into each other’s arms, loose-limbed, finally relaxed after all their tension. 

“Is it done?” Cyno says. He buries his face in Tighnari’s neck, careful to avoid the wound.

Tighnari runs a hand through Cyno’s hair. “Yes.”

Cyno exhales, shaky. “Good,” he whispers. “You’re mine.” His breath is hot against Tighnari’s skin, a desert wind. “You’re mine,” he says again.

“Yes,” Tighnari says. “I’m yours.” His hand travels downwards, down Cyno’s nape to his back, between his shoulder blades. Behind his heart, which is beating like the wings of a bird. “But remember—you’re mine, too.”

At this, Cyno smiles. Wide and bright, almost like a child. Tighnari has never seen him so happy. 

“I’ll be back in a week,” Cyno says. “I’ll miss you.”

Today, too, the sun is rising. Today, too, Cyno leaves. But it’s different this time, somehow, less bitter and more sweet. 

“I’ll miss you too,” Tighnari says, and lets Cyno kiss him against the wall. “Be well,” he says. “Be good.” 

Another kiss, this time to his ear. “You too.”

“I’m always good.” 

Cyno smiles and sets off. This time, Tighnari watches him leave. He no longer feels as restless as he once did on these occasions. When Cyno reaches the bottom of the hill, he turns around and waves; Tighnari smiles and waves back. 

The bite on his shoulder aches gently, a lovely feeling.