Chapter 43
Previously:
Arthur takes a deep breath to get himself back into a better frame of mind- at least, apparently, there’s suddenly a mini-holiday on the horizon if he makes it through the rest of the week. An exciting mini-holiday!
He squeezes Quincy’s hand, grateful for the contact- despite Radu now being his fiancé, and clearly being territorial about it, Quincy insists on still being close with Arthur, and that… means a lot to him. So, yes- time to finally head on that family walk!
~
When they walk into Darcy’s office like that, all hand in hand, Art raises an eyebrow, gives the mug of coffee standing on the desk a look. Maybe he should have asked for something harder, or maybe it was too much and he’s hallucinating. But John is giving the chain one look before chuckling and getting up, punches Quincy on the shoulder closer to Arthur, standing as far away from Radu as he can, before grinning.
“Looks like you are at capacity, Molly. More of Darcy for me.”
~
“In your tamest dreams is this capacity for me, darling! Now put those rugged arms of yours to better use and carry a picnic basket, we all need airing out,” Quincy quips back immediately, then adds: “And fetch Mariam, too, she can’t hide from Moonshine all the time.”
That solved, he gives Radu a look up and down, decides that while he likes him in the clothes he gave him, if they are playing territorial then fine, he’ll get him into one of his own shirts. Let’s see if the voivode’s nose does the same thing as Darcy’s did when he and John started sharing some clothes.
Sending Arthur along with John to have Mariam plan out a nice walking route so that his vampire is spared the worst of the very bright English sun, he ushers Radu back to his own room to play another round of dress up with him.
~
“A picnic basket? When we have a voivode along?” Arthur asks, more to John and Art as Quincy bustles Radu back out the door. “That strikes me as a bad idea…”
“I’m trying to decide if he wants an excuse to fuss over Radu, or if we’re supposed to just have tea.” John chuckles while Art downs the rest of his coffee.
“Bring some sweets, too. It’s the smell. As long as we stick to things that don’t smell much and sit downwind from him, it’ll be fine.” Then he snorts. “Should I be worried about my brain on too little sleep, because I just wondered if I need to tell him to make sure to brush his teeth before he gets lovey-dovey with Radu afterwards?”
John snorts and elbows him. “You are too nice.”
“Hey, excuse me for wanting to avoid any chance of upsetting the insane voivode. Lucy smacked me the first time I made that mistake. I don’t want to know what an unthinking smack from Radu looks like,” is Art’s excuse, before he finishes up with the thing they’ve been working on so he doesn’t need to work himself back into it after the outing.
~
“…Best to be avoided,” is Arthur’s opinion on that unthinking smack. “Okay, tea and non-smelly sweets, I like that idea. Let’s get Mariam something to plan.” He looks at John. “Do you know where she is?”
~
“Probably in her room.”
John walks past Arthur, he trusts Art to get this finished up before they all apparently are going for a stroll with the voivode. With the so obviously smitten voivode it is somewhat ridiculous, but after seeing Quincy glitter and literally float, John thinks there’s not much that would phase him. Also, he got his tattoo, he got a contract, and he’s feeling pretty fucking laid back since that. Which makes it a bit harder for him to empathise with Mariam.
“Molly’s not wrong. She’s totally hiding from Radu.”
“Yes, he’s a few calibres over the weirdness level she’s used to be concerned with, from what she said,” Arthur agrees. “Not that I can blame her…”
With a shrug and a “Meh,” John walks over to her room, because even if it’s weird or just the magic at play, nope, not worried one fucking bit. “Molly’s got him on a leash. It’ll be fine.”
“Agreed,” Arthur says.
“You’d know. Boyfriend.”
Bumping his shoulder into Arthur’s, John chuckles, not feeling worried about that, either. He might quip, but honestly, any man that Quincy pulls in as anything but a friend is one less point of competition. He’s Quincy’s bro, what does he care about boyfriends, fiances, and flings?
Clearly, the teasing still works, looking at the slight blush on Arthur. “Are you saying he’s got me on a leash, too?” he snarks back nonetheless, and, hey, John likes to see him come out of his shell. Obviously, Molly is doing his usual number on the kid.
“Safety harness.” Knocking on Mariam’s door, John grins sideways at Arthur before relaying to Mariam what she’s supposed to plan out for them, food included, because he refuses to be in charge of that.
~
Mariam does not mind being in charge. At all. It is the only way she can get herself to be anywhere close to Radu.
Although, even she has to confess that he looks somewhat less scary with how he keeps flicking his eyes between the ground and Quincy. He is so obviously feeling somewhat off balance between the fancy wide-brimmed hat Quincy put on him and holding Quincy’s hand in front of everybody.
~
Now, Mariam can try keeping her distance best she can, John lacks any such insecurity. This is going to be fun! He falls in next to Quincy and makes sure to look the flustered voivode up and down.
“It looks adorable on you, but isn’t that Darcy’s hat?”
Of course he knows it’s Darcy’s hat. He’s seen it before, but the giggle from Quincy and Radu’s widening eyes, the way he pulls the brim down to give it a slight sniff, combined with him only looking more flustered, is fucking worth it. He got that one good.
~
For just a moment, Art has the worst urge to smirk at the ‘kids’, that gaggle of teenagers with their usual antics. Then he remembers again that one of them is centuries old, and now he feels weird about it.
~
They left the horses and carriage behind, Radu advising to not trust any fae creature. So Arthur, feeling backed up in his suspicion, wonders out loud, for the benefit of any fae audience, if it would be too much of a walk to go to the closer heather field, the view is so nice.
Although Quincy jokes about his poor dainty feet and John tells him that he’s not carrying him, they all set out in that direction.
Going on a walk with everyone is… not something Arthur’s ever done? But he likes it? Yes, Radu is new, and Mariam is relatively new, but it still feels oddly good. He has people to go with somewhere? A group to belong in?
Once outside the wards, Quincy scoffs in the direction of the castle, and starts explaining what he and John discussed with his sister earlier.
She confirmed that Darcy must be at least alive; after all, Lucy Jr.’s contract with her is still in effect.
~
Quincy says it with such obvious jealousy and fury that Radu squeezes his hand slightly, nuzzles his drac close, and reassures him that all that means is that Darcy will be able to tell the difference between those inferior contracts and the one he’s sure Quincy will offer her.
“Also, if I may be so racist, you have started a blood bond. There truly is no deeper contract than that.”
Much as Radu cherishes the grin of agreement his words garner him, it is the needy look at him, the way he can see the grin show fang and the short glance at his own neck that sends a jolt of confused excitement through him. His drac isn’t sure if it should be scared. A man, looking at him like that. But it is Quincy, no, no he schools it to behave. They are safe, they are sheltered, and truly he wants to listen to what further Quincy is saying.
~
Lucy Jr believes that even with access to the nexus, they still will need to negotiate for safe passage. Which should be easy enough, given that they have a key that the spring fae would rather did not exist. She offered her services to help negotiate for them.
John grunts in agreement, he was there, she seemed pretty convinced that she could do it. Not that he has a clue if that says anything with fae. But he did spot another problem.
“Yeah, so we think we can get in and around. Problem is: we have nothing to bargain with to learn where she is.”
“It’s more than we had a week ago. One step at a time,” Art comments, and John is nearly surprised that it’s their resident worrier, that’s not hard to notice, who is going tactical here. Maybe Mariam is working on a grand plan, she sure is updating her notes something fierce.
And then, hilariously to John, wow, he really feels a bit amused by most anything now, doesn’t he? Anyway, then it’s Radu who agrees with the hunter: “Gaining access to the possibility to find information is often half the battle won.”
“The best source of initial information would be Llew, wouldn’t it?” Arthur offers. “I mean, he went there- wherever there is, with her. Otherwise, the only clue we have is… something about winter fae? Isn’t that who were offended by their tiara being stolen?”
“Winter and summer court. He stole two things,” John interjects, not really feeling enthused by those prospects, (so much for his perpetual sunshine disposition,) but Radu takes the optimistic approach. Good for that one, right, Moonshine, eh, more like ray of sunlight here. Okay, that was a terrible pun. John should keep it together a bit.
“That halves the number of courts we need to check, which is a good start. As is having one specific fae’s name. I am sure I can get some information out of him.”
That smile is perfectly pleasant, if a bit fanged, and John snorts, because can he ever see Quincy swoon.
Yeah, his bro has a total thing for having that powerhouse on his leash, fucking fae power trip. But hey, now that it’s clear that those two are making cutesy eyes at each other, he’s feeling a lot better about it. Means he doesn’t need to worry about losing his best friend. He can deal with ‘romantic competition’ because that’s totally not his competition at all.
Come to think of it, fuck, John was being an arse to Arthur without noticing, he didn’t ever take him as competition for bro status. Now John wonders if he didn’t take the boyfriend thing seriously, either. Did he classify Arthur as a stress stray, he knows what his bro normally gets up to, after all? Okay, have got to be nicer, culver would want him to. He’ll keep that in mind.
“Do we know anything about Faerie geography?” Arthur asks. “Like… Does each court live in one corner and we can go there? Or are they spread out?”
~
Art looks at Radu, because that is far beyond his hunter knowledge. Hunters don’t really go after fae, which is just another piece of hypocrisy, really. Probably some kind of old agreement, because where else would they get the blood for the dhampir vials that turns their hair white?
Inclining his head slightly, Radu sighs. “My apologies, I have not found a reason to gain that knowledge up until now.”
From behind them, Mariam speaks up, and frankly, Art was just waiting for it. He’s worked with her for a week on the barony and listened to her note summaries on the research. That one is bright and likes nothing better than order. If they are lucky, she spotted some pattern the rest of them overlooked.
“There was a passage in one of the books I read. From what I understood, the Courts are more than a political organization system, so while there are lands around the most powerful queens of each court that could be seen as their domains, large stretches are intermixed courts with individual landowners.”
“Well, that makes things a lot more complicated for us- unless Radu can get some decent information on where he went with Darcy out of Llew,” Arthur observes.
Huffing and showing fangs Quincy declares that Radu, of course, will, really, it’s absolutely weird, but Art can see the way Quincy takes pride in Radu, the same way any caring partner should. Is he cheering for them here? But there’s also hurt, Mina’s brat is kind of growing on him and he doesn’t want him to clearly be still jittery about his right to his other partner.
“And if there is nothing in that idiot’s head to pull out, then we’ll still find her, and if I have to overpower each one of those interfering fae!”
“So…” Arthur says, glances at Mariam. “What’s our concrete battle plan? Step 1: See if we can get our hands on Llew without him glittering off before Radu can have a look at the contents of his head?”
~
“That’s step 2. First, we need to have a stable situation with our coming and going into Faerie. It won’t help anybody if Eluned slams the door shut behind the next people we send in there.”
Tapping her pen on her notebook, Mariam is tempted to suggest just sending Radu, because she doesn’t care if he gets trapped and lost. But she doesn’t need to so much as remind herself of the way him and Quincy are holding hands to know that nobody would approve of that plan. Very well, personal bias aside, there are some logical choices here.
“Quincy has the key, his sister the lawyer experience, Radu the highest power potential. They should establish our landing point. After that we can decide what teams we can deploy to the different courts and in search of Llew.”
“Good point,” Arthur agrees, looks at Radu. “I don’t suppose you’d know any more sources of research material on the fae than the Court library? It’s interesting and there’s a good bit, but none of it is written by fae, it’s all outside observation, and mostly about individual characteristics- nothing I’ve seen so far about how their magic works, for example, or what Faerie looks like in detail, or who the current fae queens are, or anything like that. Just pretty general information on them.”
~
Remembering the questionable comment, Radu tenses slightly, immediately feels Quincy’s drac, then sighs.
“I may be able to convince Felodiau to…”
That’s as far as he gets before Quincy hisses.
“You are not going near that one without me! He can keep his filthy summer nails off of my drac! If we need something from that windbag of false promises I will go with you, you’ll keep the Court off of me. I trust you can do that, and I’ll keep him off of you!”
Is his beloved aware that his eyes are flickering back and forth between red and yellow? Or the way his claws are tight on Radu’s hand?
Radu hardly registers the pain of those exquisite claws because, angels, he is cursed to a constant blush now, is he not? Quincy trusts him to keep the entire Court away from him? Quincy knows, must know, how dangerous the Court is for him, and still, he puts his life into Radu’s hands with such vehemence?
Radu can see the dracial territoriality so clearly. He’s well aware that it is a terrible vampire romance trope, but he’s not immune to the implications, to what it means for the depth of Quincy’s emotions for him. Looking at Quincy from underneath his eyelashes, he smiles.
“As you wish. If I set stipulations for our bond, then it is only fair that you may impose them on me.”
~
The formulation makes John grin and Art raise an eyebrow.
There’s no way… Is there?
Well, damn, now that he’s looking closer, that doesn’t look like Quincy’s normal eye colour. Can he be sure there’s no enthralling going on here? Not really, but what more than hope can he do? Also, John seems very comfortable and unconcerned, if anything he looks smug. Art suspects he’s missing a lot of info here, but okay, trust the kids on this one, he supposes, because clearly, Radu is listening to Quincy’s wishes.
“Soooo…” Arthur asks slowly, “Felodiau as source of information, yes or no? Any chance you can meet him away from the Court? Because I’d really rather do without Vampire Crisis The Second wherein whoever decides to hunt down the dhampir…”
Art grumbles his agreement, then offers to send Lucy.
“She can make an appointment with Felodiau so that Quincy and Radu can meet him on neutral ground. Everybody in favour of that compromise?”
Art has seen it a lot lately, the way Jack’s eyes go unfocused, or even Mina’s, when there’s mental discussions going on, oh yes, he can see that Quincy is debating with Radu before he finally nods.
“I’ll allow Felodiau to see us at one of Radu’s holdings. Moonshine will bring me over, no teleporters needed. That keeps me completely out of the public eye.”
“I’m definitely in favour of that,” Arthur agrees. “So, Steps 1a and 1b: landing point negotiations and Felodiau negotiations? Are there any payment considerations we need to do? Lucy Jr. is our lawyer and works for money, though clearly we’ll need to expect scheduling delays. Is Felodiau just going to be helpful again?” Arthur sounds dubious- that is a fae, after all, and Art couldn’t agree more.
“In all the years that I have known Felodiau, I have not seen him ask for payment from any Heads of Houses, or me.” Radu shakes his head. “With the leaders that is understandable, he has them in a strict contract, but me? I confess to rather cherishing Quincy’s insistence not to leave me alone with him.”
There is a slight shudder going through Radu, Art thinks, and the way Quincy immediately steps in closer confirms that. Damn, they are so close that their sides are touching with every movement and Radu looks so relieved about that.
“Better Draculya than Lucy,” Art mumbles, then finds himself looking at Radu, of all people, with compassion. It’s hard not to see the signs when Art has been around so many abused people. And he’s glad for him seemingly finding so much solace in Quincy, if one ignores how utterly surreal the situation is and how questionable those two apparently being together is.
Then again, he shouldn’t complain, he’s married to the woman with the biggest scandal fetish in all of England, so he can only win here if this is real.
“He… seems to have a weird kind of interest in you- or you and Quincy, yes…” Arthur offers, his expression saying how much he isn’t sure whether that’s a good or a bad thing.
~
Quincy doesn’t have to think about this one, he’s huffing and his drac snarling territorially in an instant.
“Which fae wouldn’t want at Radu’s drac?!”
That seems to fluster Radu terribly, but Quincy stands by his words, tries not to step even closer, because then he’d really be cuddled in full broadside, (he wants to!) but it’s John bursting out in laughter and daring to elbow him that catches his attention.
“You got it bad!”
Oh come on! That’s a mean tease with how hard it is for Quincy to fall in love, and John knows that. Still, he can feel his rising blush even while he swats at him. Of course John teases, that is what they do with each other.
He doesn’t ‘have it’, though, does he?
~
Arthur decides he’s staying out of that teasing… but John really seems to be doing a lot better than he did the last few days- Before the accidental contract. He’s certainly in a much better mood, which Arthur is glad to see. And he doesn’t seem to be missing emotions as such.
~
Art can’t believe he’s saying this, but here he goes with the dad duty, no matter which people are involved: “Boys, behave yourselves. John, leave the two sweethearts be. Can’t you see you’re making Radu uncomfortable? A man respects boundaries.”
~
Is Mariam ever glad she has her fan ready to hide that she’s having a hard time not to snicker as she watches John duck and apologize. Seriously, England’s most scandalous bachelor indeed. Art is absolutely impossible to stop from dadding, no matter what. Well, as the only woman here, she clearly needs to rein all this testosterone in.
“Yes, so as we were saying: Lucy can set up a meeting with Felodiau; Quincy is in charge of haggling out information about Faerie. Then we return to Lucy Jr for making an appointment to bring her to Eluned to haggle out safe passage. Radu, you are in charge there.
“Meanwhile, Arthur and I will compile the new information and begin to make plans for establishing contact with the courts and Llew. After that, we start the full operation of getting Darcy back. Art and I will be in charge of the barony. John, as the only remaining official heir to the barony, will have to be the public figurehead until we can go public with our engagement or we have Darcy back. That leaves Arthur, Radu, and Quincy to be our Faerie task force.
“Everybody clear on what they have to do?”
~
Arthur, who was distracted there for a moment trying to figure out if Art just included Radu in the ‘boys’ comment, looks surprised at Mariam for the conclusion, points at himself.
“I’m in the Faerie task force?”
“You are our mage, yes.”
Mariam snaps her notebook shut before looking at him again.
“You’ll be the brain on the team. Research or defensive skills, whatever is more needed at the specific moment.” Then she starts smirking. “And I’m not a boy, so Art didn’t tell me to behave, and I’ll just point out that I don’t trust Radu and Quincy not to get side-tracked if we leave them all alone. So you get chaperoning duty for your boyfriend.”
~
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