[open post for real]

[onthewillowsthere]

When the burning stopped he found himself alone. His memory of what happened is hazy -- aren't all his memories hazy? -- but he remembers the light and the fire, the way his hands and mouth were blazing, and even if he didn't remember the scorching on his blue tunic would tell a tale.

He remembers enough.

He can't seem to get warm now, despite the perfectly pleasant climate, and he builds a fire in one of the mansion's many sitting rooms with fireplaces, and then he huddles in front of it, his knees clasped to his chest.

Crowley couldn't make him Galahad again, but he doesn't feel like Damien any more. He remembers enough to know what he had wanted to escape -- whatever purpose it was that made him like this, capable of subsuming into flame or holding a brand-new weapon like a familiar part of his body -- but not enough to know why he's like this, and not enough to be the person Claudius is waiting for. He feels like stone, but a stone that has lost all the earth's heat.

If Crowley, who changed him in the first place, can't change him back, then can he be changed back? It seems to him from what Lan Wangji said that this is all there is now. He's incapable of being loved, incapable of knowing himself, incapable of the lit path that Lan Wangji exhorted him towards.

He stares into the fire, his fixed blue stare that might as well be a stranger's, and wishes he had been rendered in his own bonfire.

Comments

[onthewillowsthere]

He nods.

[timebethine]

Laertes moves just a little closer and wraps his arm around Damien's shoulders. When his fingers encounter scorched fabric, he swallows, but doesn't flinch away. "Whoever thou wert before, thou art now my friend Damien. If the pages of thy life are blank, thou'lt scribe new illuminations on every page hereafter."

[onthewillowsthere]

His body is stiff, tension on tension. "Thou sawst how I held thy sword. That is what I am, a sword."

[timebethine]

"An thou wert a sword, thou might'st be beaten into a plowshare yet; wert thou a spear, into a pruning hook," says Laertes--and perhaps there is a fragment of memory lurking there, too, of the same words in an older tongue. "We know what we are, but know not what we may be. Even steel, howsoever it be honed and sharpened, can at times be forged anew."

[onthewillowsthere]

"For the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath spoken it," he whispers, but he also lifts his hand and reaches out for the flame in the fireplace.

[timebethine]

"Easy," says Laertes, and reaches with him to fold Damien's hand in his. He doesn't pull him back--but if Damien should try to put his hand in the flame, he will put Laertes's in with it.

[onthewillowsthere]

He does exactly that. The fire in the fireplace, unlike the one that manifested in his body, hurts, and he jumps like a startled hart, snatching their fingers back.

[timebethine]

Laertes snatches his hand back with an inarticulate yell, swearing and sucking his fingers. "Damien," he says, and the anguish in his voice is only partly physical.

[onthewillowsthere]

He stares down at his own blistering fingers as if in wonder.

[timebethine]

"Why?" Laertes asks. "Why hurt thyself like this?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"I didn't know I could."

[timebethine]

That answer startles a laugh out of him. Still nursing his wounded hand, holding it close to his mouth to blow on the blistered skin, Laertes says, "Let me unseal thy memory a little: knives cut, lightning strikes, and fire burns."

[onthewillowsthere]

This has stirred him somewhat from his despair, and he sits up a little more and plunges his hand back into the fire, holding it for as long as he can bear.

[timebethine]

Laertes dives to wrestle Damien away from the flames, holding him with all the terror of a brother who has known his whole life that he is responsible for someone small. "Damien, sweet, please," he whispers. Tears spring up in his eyes, and he rocks with Damien in his arms. "Please, thou art not broken. Fire will not mend thee."

[onthewillowsthere]

His body is stiff and unyielding at first, but it seems as though Laertes has finally awoken him from some stupor, and he turns to Laertes, reaching up to stroke his hair.

[timebethine]

"Thou'lt hurt thyself," says Laertes, and tries to take Damien's other hand to rest it against his hair.

[onthewillowsthere]

"I have already hurt myself."

[timebethine]

"Thou canst be hurt again," says Laertes. "Pain is not a single foe, that once met is vanquished; it has a thousand brothers, each eager to hurt thee anew. And I would not have thee hurt."

[onthewillowsthere]

He flexes and turns the fingers of his burned hand, gazing at his injuries. "It's meet I should remember. Fire burns."

[timebethine]

"We'll yet mend thy wounds," says Laertes. "There are learned folk here, and some who wield great magics; even a mountebank may have some salve or potion--let's go, and find some aid for thee." At the very least, leaving this room will get Damien away from the fire.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Wait-- I'm cold." This is certainly true; beneath the sleeves of his scorched tunic his skin is cool to touch.

[timebethine]

"If thou wilt come with me, I'll keep thee warm," Laertes promises. He lays his uninjured palm against Damien's arm, letting Damien feel the warmth of his body. "Here--there's life in me still."

[onthewillowsthere]

A hesitation, then: "All right."

When he gets to his feet it's much more obvious that something has happened to him. Where before his body moved easily, there's weight on his shoulders now, and all his clothes are burnt. He keeps forgetting that his hand is hurt and using it: he brushes off his knees without thinking and breaks one of the blisters.

[timebethine]

Laertes only narrowly avoids making a low sound of distress. He thinks of healing salves and poultices, bandages and dressings, trying to reach out to whatever capricious spirit decided to give them a place for dancing on a better day--with the hand not linked with Damien's, he throws open doors on sitting rooms and libraries and bedrooms. As desperation begins to sink in, he flings back the door on an elaborate bath with a sunken tub large enough to seat six or more.

It will have to do.

"We'll wash thy hand in cold water," he says, and paws at the taps until water flows. "Here. Let it ease thy hurts a little."

There's a little box beneath the sink with the words First Aid printed on it in red, and for lack of any better option, Laertes pries it open.

[onthewillowsthere]

The while he's followed Laertes almost placidly, making no comment, going where he's led. He sits down on the edge of the bath and puts his burned hand under the water, with a hissed little intake of breath.