What should have been a quick project took three weeks. Ivor had never had a customer as involved as Silas, who insisted on being present through every step of creation. If he was visited in the morning they worked on designs, while evenings were for forging and placement. Brief sun rises and long nights became their norm, and Ivor realized near the end he had become too attached.
He had friends, of course, but they were all in the same vein. An antique dealer, a scroll keeper, a traveling poet; they all had blood to magic, and were alive by mercy. It was a calling they could never answer, the only remedy for their longing hearts being the old trades they found, and others who held the same ache for something unattainable.
Ivor first wondered if Silas was of his scorned kin. Exorcism was spiritual in foundation but ritual in practice. It was also a taboo topic under many roofs. But Silas walked in the light with his title, despite how Ivor heard many stories from the exorcist how even choirmen could hardly withhold their disdain for his work.
No one would ever say a practice in the faith was magic.
Ivor was hoping that it was.
Like his other friends, Ivor felt comfortable around Silas, and was certain the other man felt the deep undercurrent that pulled their likeness together. Silas was full of conversation, stories, spiritual theory; and for a man who worked to serve the public, he was more spiteful and instigative to them than helpful. Then when they sat in silence, Silas watching him work, Ivor felt his passion heard.
Ivor rarely got to see his friends. Maybe a few times a year, at most, but even their brief cheer didn't revive him like this. The workshop had become softer with Silas' presence every other day, and his art felt renewed in a way he hadn't experienced since apprenticeship. The athame he crafted, that they crafted, was a perfect ornate piece unlike anything he'd ever made. A blade of swooping curves and edges that rivaled the allure of obsidian. The cross-guard plated in gold, a handle smooth to touch but with the pattern of rosebush thorns, and a scabbard as black as it's blade with an engraving from the dead language of psalms.
As Ivor looked at the athame his heart swelled with a soaring happiness. The look on Silas' face when he presented it to him made Ivor nearly fly apart.
As the exorcist gently lifted the blade from his hands in awe, Ivor's being was struck down. He felt the weight of his empty hands and ached deeper than he ever had before.
X
"I thought you'd been joking."
"And I thought you were joking when you wouldn't let me pay you properly."
Ivor was fighting himself more then he was fighting Silas.
"Your payments were excessive."
"But my invitation is nonnegotiable."
Ivor sighed, his arms leaning against the drafting table. He'd already cleaned up for the day but hadn't been expecting Silas to actually arrive tonight. As always, the other man burst in the workshop with no notice. When he saw Ivor wasn't dressed in a jacket, he barged into his sleeping quarters, too.
"Do you not have any club hats?"
"You're being very insistent on something I didn't agree to."
"Your presence at the Bell Lounge tonight is compulsory," Silas said coming out with his good shoes and green summer breasted coat. "How do you wear your hair to services?"
"I, uh, don't really. I tuck it beneath my collar."
Silas hummed. He tossed Ivor his coat, which he obediently put on, sensing there was no winning this argument. But then Silas manifested behind him, and Ivor froze to his sudden touch.
"I know a fashionable way to hold long hair, here."
Silas bunched his hair at the nape of neck, his fingers grazing the top of his head. It was a splendid feeling, his hair pulled back into strands and woven briskly together. He ended up with one large braid in the middle, and two smaller ones by his ears that came together in a tight bun.
"There, I think it suits you well."
Ivor felt aglow in his chest. "If you say so."
"Now come on."
He couldn't shake a spurt of anxiety as he followed Silas to the lounge. He seemed out of place immediately against the well dressed men sipping whiskey and playing cards. All these things he enjoyed in good leisure, but not with these types, who quaffed at politics and mocked the plights of every folk. It was almost like watching a painting. He was not a part of the decorated reality before him, only an observer lucky enough to make the price of admission.
Silas put a drink in his hand and sat them in a circle of plush chairs and chatting. Ivor became grim as the faces around him blurred and he heard words coming out mouths but couldn't process full sentences. In one splash his drink was gone, allowing Ivor to excuse himself to the bar. For himself he ordered a beer. He thought about getting something for Silas, his cheeks suddenly heating. He didn't know what the other man drank. Probably shouldn't be ordering for him, either. So, Ivor got two beers, both for himself.
One bottle was empty, the other half way there when Silas slipped into the seat beside him.
"Not social even with spirits on your tongue?"
"I don't do mixing," Ivor said into his beer.
"How about dividing?"
Ivor turned to give an eyebrow raise. Whether it was from the drinks or night, Silas had the smile of a devil on him, and Ivor had no chance against that look. He felt the touch of a smirk on his own lips. "What do you have in mind?"
They joined the card table. Well, he joined the card table. Silas seemed content enough to sit behind his shoulder and watch. The men around the circular red velvet had their own dealer and wages before them. Ivor wondered if he should back out, not used to betting with solid coin, but then Silas sat a purse in front of him.
"Deal him in."
He wasn't sure how he earned this confidence from the other man to be any good at cards. They'd never played before, never spoke of any games, either. But just from the look on Silas' face as he sat on a stool directly behind him, Ivor was going to prove him damn right on his bets.
X
"I've never seen Sir Carval's face look so red," Silas laughed in the street.
They had stayed out far later than Ivor would have expected, but then again, he also hadn't expected to enjoy himself. He played cards until closing, probably against every man in the lounge before they left. The coin purse had to be ten times its weight before the start of the evening.
Walking back to the shop, the night was lit by half a moon, but they hardly noticed. Ivor tried to laugh quietly, but Silas nearly barked in tears from their tipsy conspiracy. Ivor would hush him, remind him how late it was, but then they would start laughing again.
It was when they strode up the stoop, the door to the workroom shutting behind them, that their merriment blew out like the wisp of a candle. They stood close to one another in the absolute darkness of the doorway with no light between them. Their hands brushed against one another. The pads of Silas' fingers ever so gently touched his own. It felt like they had created their own version of time, as their thumbs began to stroke slow circles along the backs of each other's hands.
Ivor could feel how they were turned towards one another, how their chests were a slip apart. No other part of him felt real, though, except for his and Silas' hand. Something rested heavy between them. Ivor looked the slightest bit down to where he felt Silas' eyes looking the smallest bit up at him, and couldn't breathe. He felt like he was vibrating with tension and want. He longed for something to pop the current moment he stood in into something new.
But the moment did not pop. Instead, Silas slid from his fingers and out the door like smoke, the moment fading away.
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