Chapter Text
Mildmay
Csevet'd always been smart, quick, ambitious. Bright-eyed even lying on the floor, panting after a beating. He'd disappeared couple of indictions before his second septad – gone, just like that. Keeper had been spitting mad – he'd been one of her best. I'd figured he got to be alive, along of no one dead being that good at hiding, but that was me.
Half septad later, he turned up on my doorstep. I took in his bloodied face, the shaky way he stood, the Mirador courier uniform. 'Fuck me sideways 'til I cry,' I said, and stood aside to let him in.
Csevet
'Thank you,' I said, then, at his expression, dropped the flash accent. I must've been worse than I'd thought to speak like that – or spent too much time listening very carefully to what my betters were saying than was good for me. 'Thanks,' I said, as we headed upstairs.
The next decad the Winter Fever had my body, but something – someone – worse haunted my mind. I wasn't sure why I'd come here. Mildmay shouldn't have let me in, let alone stay this long.
Every night, delirious, I remember babbling about foxes. When my fever broke neither of us mentioned it.