Long after the Absolute, long after dealings with mind flayers and goth, long after the Revealer—Fray of the Gate sighs, again, and tries to tuck himself more deeply into his chair by the fire. As it is the third time he has done so in the minutes, he does not get far. When this does not work, he tries to bring his focus back to his work. “Work”—that is, the wretched little pad of paper and uncooperative quill that sit in his lap. The Flaming Fist want his opinion on something again, as if it’s worth having. He suspects that it isn’t; he suspects that having the signature of one of the people that saved the city of Baldur’s Gate is all they really want, something to add more weight to whatever petition for funding they’re on about this time.
At least they’ve stopped trying to get him to appear in person.
But his brain slides off it every time he tries, and so Fray sets the things on the arm of the chair and stands. It’s natural as breathing, of course, getting to his feet. As the years roll by, his polymorphed body only grows more comfortable: he likes the feeling of the muscles in his ankles stretching to support the delicate, narrow shape of his hooved feet, how his tail automatically flicks and makes little adjustments to keep him balanced. Small blessings, he thinks as he makes idly for the kitchen pantry.
What he hasn’t quite gotten used to is the Gate itself. Heroism comes with its rewards, among them a beautiful piece of property in the monied part of the city. For Fray, who had spent long nights fretting over what would become of him when he became welcome no longer at home, it was a relief.
Right was a harder sell. Is, really. Right does not like a spotlight, for obvious reasons. They feel just as out-of-place in Baldur’s high society as Fray does. They just aren’t so stupid as to try to grin and bear it. This is not to say they avoid him or his home; it’s just that it is very much his home. Not their home.
It gets lonely, though.
It’s been lonely this week. The housekeeper Fray employs (for there isn’t a chance he could keep up with a place this size by himself) is away visiting family, and he’s felt disinclined to call upon his small social circle. He knows what he wants: his partners, the people he can be silent with and close to. But Karlach is gone, and Right—
The pantry is open, and a familiar gray-green tail twitches idly just past the door. Fray stops short in surprise. It’s not odd for Right to simply appear without announcement, but it’s not something they’ve done for a long while.
He’s sure they’ve already heard them, but he quietly raps his knuckles on the wall nearby anyway. The tail-twitching stops long enough for Right to lean back and peer at him, a few sticks of jerky in one hand and a freshly bitten apple in the other. They make a few noisy chews and swallow before saying, “Where’s the food? Not like you to have a bare cupboard.”
“Is it?” Fray answers. His voice is soft, hard to hear even to his own ears. Unlike his body, he is still unused to his voice. Unused to having full command of it. No longer does he stutter or trip over his own words, and yet it feels like a tremendous effort each time to get the words out. He braces, without fail, for pain that never comes. He steps forward instead, craning his neck to see past Right. “Let me see…”
It’s bare indeed. Calico had picked up groceries and fussed at him to eat well in their absence, and he has been. Maybe too well. “Guess I should go to market,” he says more to himself than Right. “Maybe tomorrow.”
Right hums in answer, taking another bite of apple. The two of them stand there in a vague sort of silence. Fray does a bit of mental arthimetic. “Three weeks, yeah?” he says presently. “Glad to see you. Was it good?”
“Ugh,” says Right, good-naturedly. “It was not worth the trip.”
“To the fair, you mean?”
“Mmm. For me, at least. Glee caught a few eyes, a few sales.”
Well. Glee is always catching eyes. “Not for you?” Fray asks, and makes as if to snatch the apple away. Right gives it up without fuss. “Would’ve thought journeyman firearm work…”
“Oh, I sold a few pieces,” Right says with a shake of their head. “But it was all at auction, so I hardly even needed to be there.”
Fray nods, and wishes he had something more to say. Anything he reaches for seems to slip away from him before he can put it to words. But Right has never minded silence, and so in silence they stand there, thinking their separate thoughts. By the time the apple has passed between them another few times, and is bitten down to the core, Right exhales and stretches. “Not busy, are you?” they ask.
Fray shrugs. Busy is relative. There’s always something he ought to be doing. It’s just a matter of if he’s going to let it bother him. Today he can’t find it in him to care. “Not terribly.”
“Good,” says Right, slipping past him, toward the stairs that lead to his room. They catch his hand as they do, tugging gently. “I want somewhere quiet, and I want you.”
Warmth, pleasant if brief, ebbs down Fray’s spine as he lets himself be pulled up the stairs. It is one thing to be wanted by the Flaming Fist or the Harpers or whatever other thing that wants to leverage his name and skills. It is another entirely to be wanted by Right.
It’s a familiar affair by now. Fray can’t even remember how it started—as a joke, maybe, that clothes were strictly forbidden in their bedroom. (His bedroom.) However it began, it stuck. Right is shedding their jerkin and belt before Fray’s even through the door. He follows suit, and shuts the door. There’s no one else here to find them, but it makes Right feel better, and Fray will do almost anything if it improves Right’s situation.
By the time he’s begun to wrestle his own clothes off, Right has found their perch on the chaise lounge by the glass doors of the veranda. It looks over the city, the stunning view of the Gate from on high. Fray appreciates it for its beauty, and feels strange about it in every other respect. Maybe that’s why Right won’t claim their spot on the manor’s title. It’s easier to enjoy a sight like that if you know you aren’t waking up to see it every morning.
“No show?” Right says blandly, their eyes now on Fray as he slips off trouser and smallclothes. It’s a joke, a tease, hard to identify if you don’t know them well. (Sometimes hard to identify even if you do.) Fray snorts, flicking his wrist, and his smallclothes land in their lap. “Hmm. Souvenir. Think they’d fit me?”
“If you try it, you’ll buy me the next pair,” says Fray wryly. Another joke. Right’s hindquarters are easily size and a half larger than his own, dense with muscle (to say nothing of how much thicker their tail is as the base). It’s one of Fray’s favorite things about them, how much power and deftness is hidden in that compact body. It’s a different sort of strength from Karlach’s raw muscle or his own wiry build—though the latter has suffered with his unofficial retirement. Still, it makes him feel safe, that difference in size as he sinks down next to Right and leans into them. Funny, how that’s something he craves now.
A few minutes creep by. A gull lands on veranda and waddles around with a skeptic’s air, sticking its skinny beak into potted plants from Fray’s aborted attempt to nurture something. His hands aren’t very good at nurturing, it turns out. At least he doesn’t need to be.
When Right speaks, it’s a bit of a startle. “Well,” they say, drawing him from his bird-shaped meditating, “it’s been five minutes and you haven’t groped me once, so you know I have to ask what’s wrong.”
Fray feels his cheeks heat. “That obvious?” he asks with a weak smile. Right just looks at him with quiet intent, quiet study. “I mean, I’d be glad to, if you’d like.”
“I don’t mind either way,” says Right, “but you haven’t seen me in three weeks, and that usually means I can expect to be molested the moment you see me.” Flat again, emotionless again. It would make Fray’s stomach clench in anxiety if he did not know better. You had to know that, about Right. “What’s on your mind?”
Nothing, Fray wants to say, because it feels like what he ought to say. Nothing’s gone particularly sideways recently, the mild irritant of the Fist notwithstanding. Nothing’s consumed him mind and body the way his darker moments sometimes can. But for as accurate as it is, nothing doesn’t feel like the truth, and Fray has long since learned not to try to lie to Right. Not even by omission. So when he says, “I don’t know,” it is the raw truth. “Feeling … sluggish, I guess. No one’s been around. Hard to motivate myself to anything.”
Right makes a sound of acknowledgement.
“It might not be good for me,” Fray goes on after a moment’s thought. “Being alone, I mean. In an empty place like this.”
He feels bad the moment he says it, second-guessing his own intentions. Does he mean to guilt Right into staying? Some partner. He longs to backpedal, scratch it out—
“It probably isn’t,” Right says, candid as ever. There is no hint of Fray’s fear of pressuring them in the words. “You’re not exactly a lone wolf type.”
“Aren’t wolves social, anyway?”
“You’re asking the wrong person. Come here, lonely.” Right tugs on his arm, and Fray allows himself to be guided up and over them, until he’s sat in their generous lap, front to front. It would be sensual in another context, perhaps even erotic, but as Right folds their arms around his middle and he lets himself sink against the softness of their body, Fray can only feel relief. He tucks his face against their neck, luxuriating in the contact. Right is the perfect size and shape and temperature to lose himself against. “Better?” Right asks as he settles.
“I think so.”
“Good.” Their fingers thread through his hair. Fray wishes he could purr. “I missed you, too.”