2020-02-25 - In a Dry Land

August is alone at his cabin this evening, because he's wanted time to sit in quiet contemplation with the disguise glasses and the packet of soup. But that's for later, with some bourbon; right now, he's just finished getting the animals inside and is moving to check on the saplings, contemplating what to throw together for dinner. There's some sausage left over from the other day; that'd do for sausage and peppers. Easy enough to whip up.

The aspens aren't much more than tall, white sticks with bony fingers right now, awkward the way a human toddler is. He runs a hand over each one, feeling their health as they sleep. Though it's going to be another cold night, winter's bitter hold is finally loosening. It won't make it into the twenties. He can feel in the way his bones don't ache quite so fiercely that spring's in the distance. Overhead the sky is just shading from pale blue to indigo, and the moon sits, a dark disk of Earthshine.

He pauses to look over them in the failing light, his unusual progeny. Alexander did good work moving them; if August is judicious with his use of the Art, he can have them to a safe size by this summer, and they should be okay to grow in their own from then on out.

The crackle and crunch of tires on gravel-strewn dirt can be heard, just as the light starts to fail and the crispness of frostfall can be tasted on the air. Highbeams switched down as they wash over August's drive, and the truck draws to a halt some short distance away from where August's vehicle is parked. Then a shudder of the ignition being killed, and someone climbs out. Not too hard to guess who; aren't too many people around here who drive a recent model chevy, and move like he does. Like he's on the hunt for something, and he's caught the scent of it on the air.

Something's fished out of the glovebox before his boots find dirt, followed by the door being slammed, and his slow, prowlish approach.

August's head half-tilts down when he hears the truck. He only knows two trucks, and as much as he's not a car person, Itzhak's doesn't sound like this. Still, he reaches out, the lightest flick of a touch, mind to mind to double-check.

He can't say he's surprised.

He stays where he is, but turns to face the man on the approach, breath frosting the air. He feels about for the gun--guns?--he knows Ruiz will have, ready to crush them, but not acting pre-emptively. Maybe a mistake, but he knows it'll just antagonize him.

"The lizard, huh?" He can't help a small laugh. "Clever."

Oh, it's de la Vega all right. His mental signature's unmistakeable. Bright, blindingly bright, the heat of him's nearly too much. The bitterness of blood and ash and things come to ruin, blown on a whisper of a breeze through August's still forest.

He comes to a halt some fifteen or twenty feet away, hip cocked ever so slightly, hands shoved into the pockets of his jacket. One needn't check him to know he's carrying a weapon; he never leaves his vehicle without it. "I don't know what the fuck you're talking about, Roen," is his even-keeled response. Drained of its usual snarl, his tone is a flat murmur into the near-dark.

The forest is still and dark, hunkered down defensively. No sign of the raven-stag; the river runs quiet. It's the long-dead volcano caldera that echoes the strongest in that ping, its blasted out side a barren landscape of mud and rock and skeletal, dead trees choking the lake like a mass of bones.

"Of course you don't," August allows with an easy nod. He's still a time, but it's there, in how he holds himself, in his stillness. Something is coming. "This is for his arm," he says, and reaches out to mangle that gun so it won't fire.

And with the gates open, so to speak, the wolf is free to roam. Massive paws and bloody, serrated claws that churn up the earth as it moves; and where it treads, things wither and die. Its ribs are cracked and broken on one side, flesh rotted and foul smelling; maggots drip out of it like oil as it prowls the rim of the caldera.

Ruiz, too, is not unscathed; his thigh's been bandaged up, the bulkiness almost visible if one looks carefully. The slight limp, fairly obvious as he paces in closer. The gun, and that sickening sound that accompanies its slide being jammed, is ignored. Dark eyes on August's, tongue slid along his teeth, he encroaches steadily upon his personal space with a look about him like a dog that hasn't eaten in weeks. "He got in my fucking way," is snarled.

A hint of movement out there on the wasteland of the eruption side: the raven-stag, standing among the charred sticks of the forest that once grew there. He's a bit distant, so it's hard to make out what's growing in his antlers today, but there he stands.

August is, perhaps, a little surprised at the lack of concern over the gun. But either way, he had to take it out of the equation. "Yeah, he's like that." He waits, watching Ruiz approach. "But listen--if you came here to start shit? I'm gonna break your fucking legs, and call your boyfriend to come and get you." Will he? It's hard to say. He would like Ruiz to think he will, at the least, and Ruiz has hurt Itzhak, which is one of the only proven ways to get August to physically injure anyone.

But maybe he won't.

It's probably safe to say that Ruiz, himself, cares plenty about his gun being destroyed. Whatever or whomever is inhabiting his head right now? Not so much. He draws the thing from its holster and holds it out to one side, letting it dangle by its trigger guard for a moment. His dark eyes never leave August's, even as he drops it, and it hits the ground with a dull thud.

Still moving, still on the prowl, he closes the gap between them to a few feet, and then stops. Right in the bubble of August's personal space, just a little too close for comfort. "I didn't come here to start shit," he replies, low voiced. His tongue's pushed against the inside of his cheek, like he's thinking about that threat. "And I think you're weak, Roen. You couldn't fucking cut it in Bosnia, and now here you are, hiding in the fucking woods. Telling yourself it's for their own safety. Or is it yours?"

August watches that gun get dumped on the ground, tracks Ruiz as he comes right up close and personal. August takes in a slow breath, lets it out. "I couldn't, and, I am," he agrees, a little sad and tired. "All this, power we have," he looks down at his left hand, runs his fingers together, setting a small trail of blue sparks, "and I couldn't save all those people. Who knows, maybe I didn't even save any of them."

He laughs at the question. "Both," he says, and laughs some more. "Definitely both. Or, maybe not my safety. But definitely my sanity." He tilts his head at Ruiz. "You know how it is--their minds all around you, and sometimes you feel a little too much. And for me it's both. And that's just too much after a while, with the...gunfire, and the shells..." He shrugs. "Some guys can handle that. I can't."

"Yeah," rumbles the other man, low. None of his usual snarliness. None of his heat, none of his bluster. Just a lizard-like flatness in that slow blink of expressionless eyes, and he takes one final step closer - if August doesn't back off - until there's maybe three or four inches between them. Not quite nose to nose, as the arborist is a good few inches taller. But if he hikes his chin up - and he does - he manages to get close. "Yeah," he repeats again. "I hear you. I've just got one question for you, Roen." His own power simmers well below the surface, his whole body a livewire waiting for the circuit to be closed.

If August needed any indication this wasn't Ruiz, the flatness alone would be enough. He's known people like this, but de la Vega isn't one of them. Controlled, sure, if and when he felt like it, but dead-eyed, almost numb? No. That wasn't the man August had watched in battle, had spoken with a handful of times. This was what someone wanted him to be. This was him on someone else's leash.

August doesn't back up, doesn't even lean. He just thinks about the placement of the femur in a person's leg, and the shape of a comminuted fracture. "What's that," he says. Can he, if he needs to? Maybe he's about to find out.

A beat or two in silence. The snow that's been on and off for most of the day is presently on again, and melts on his beard and eyelashes as he levels that steady stare up to the taller man.

Then he smiles, and there isn't a lick of mirth in it. His breath fogs the air when he asks, "Where's Ellie right now?"

The way this conversation will go spirals around in August's mind. 'At home.' 'Are you sure?' And what will Ruiz show him--his phone, a vision in the link, a piece of her hair? (If it's the hair he might just break his neck.)

So he shouldn't say anything. He shouldn't respond. He should break his legs, like he said he would, and text Itzhak to come and lock him in that basement Alexander is always talking about.

"At home," he says with a forced calm he doesn't feel.

"Mm." It's him, and it isn't, the look in his eyes. Like there's a battle going on under the surface, and he's trying to wrest control from Them, but he's just so fucking exhausted. Just so exhausted. He could close his eyes and just stop, and maybe August would snap his neck and it'd be fine. Everything would be fine.

Instead, he finds himself saying, "At home." The smile lingers, mechanical, like someone's standing there holding it in place for him. "You should probably check." His lips purse to one side thoughtfully. "Though how fast do you really think you could get to her, if she were hurt?" His eyes flick away from the other man, and he glances over his shoulder at August's vehicle. There's a BANG as electricity arcs through it, blowing out one of the front tires with a sharp scent of melting rubber.

August blinks in surprise at the damage to the car. And something else surges through the link; a surprise of a different kind.

"You don't know," he says, not actually intending it to be out loud. There's a brief flicker there, in the link: a brilliant red fox standing among the volcanic wasteland.

Eleanor is like Ruiz. August could talk to her right now, if he needed to; there's no distance that could separate them.

He doesn't, though. What he does is form a hand into a fist and gesture down, hauling Ruiz's clothes--and, thus, Ruiz himself--to the muddy, icy ground. "I know you're in there, de la Vega" he says, voice hard and loud in a way it seldom ever is. "So stop blowing up my fucking car and fight back."

You don't know. What doesn't he know? Either he didn't catch that, or he doesn't much care. And if that brief glimpse of something across the link was spotted, he gives no indication of that, either. Just the thud of his not insignificant weight hitting the ground, knocking the wind out of him, and leaving him pinned there in the wet, cold dirt. Chuckling in that empty, completely mirthless way that's nothing like him, he tries to maneuver himself onto his elbows if he can.

"Fight back? Is that what you want, Roen?" He pants harshly, breath fogging the chill air. "You want me to fight you, huh? So, what, you can tell yourself it was only self-defense, when you kill me?" He twists onto one side and tries to dig the heel of his boot into the dirt, to help him maneuver upright. "You'd be a cop killer. And you know what happens to those."

"I know you're in there, and I know you can hear me," August says, keeping out of kicking or grabbing distance, working to hold Ruiz to the ground. It's not going to last--Ruiz is a bit too strong for that, and August isn't like Easton or Itzhak; he can't hold someone like Ruiz down indefinitely. "I know this is Peregrine using you to spew his stupid bullshit. Fight. Back."

With each emphasized word there's a groaning sound; it comes from the trees around them as they all shift in response. August doesn't seem to notice; all his attention is focused on Ruiz.

In the link, the raven-stag calls out in a hearty bellow, a challenge to the rotting wolf. Come and get it, you pathetic excuse for a hunter, has never been more clearly spelled out. You're not half the wolf he was.

There's a flicker of something in his eyes, like a shadow passing behind sheer curtains. His breath gutters into the still, cold air, and with a hiss and a snarl, he wrenches himself free of those mystical bonds and hauls himself back to his feet slowly. Dark eyes fixed on August's, he laughs again. "You think he hasn't tried? You think I don't enjoy it, every time he does, every time he fails? You pathetic fucking excuse for a washed up soldier, what would you know about fighting?" He drags the backs of his muddy knuckles across his mouth, turns and spits into the dirt.

The wolf is a harrowing thing in the kythe, all frayed edges and decay, barely a shadow of its usual roaring inferno. Its dimmed eyes are sunken, blackflies eating away its fur, maggots wriggling around in the ruins of its shattered ribs, gnawing on its exposed intestines. The raven-stag's challenge is met with a low warning growl, its lips pulled back over broken, bloodied teeth.

August keeps his distance, knuckles down and hauls back on Ruiz again, dragging his clothes down. "I've watched little kids play ball knowing a shell might take them out any second. Watched moms dig their babies out from under shelled cars. Watched families burn down their own houses to stay warm in the winter. Believe me, you coward--I know what a fight looks like. And if you think he's going to give up, you've got another think coming."

The raven-stag's horns have changed again; like an animal equipped for war, they're bristling with malevolence vine, tea rose, bittersweet, poison sumac, nettles. Spines and thorns in deep green, black, and purple, white and yellow flowers, dark red berries. These are antlers meant to take out a hunter's eyes, shred its mouth to ribbons, inflame its nose to the point of being unable to function.

He stands out on the barren mudplain, empty forest behind it, a king of earth and ash. <<You're not him. You're weak. Afraid. You won't even come meet me in the open. He'd never hesitate. He knew what he was capable of.>> He paws the ground, sending up a puff of ash and dust. <<You wouldn't know a fight if it bit you in the ass.>>

The other man is forced back down to his knees, and then the rest of his body follows, crashing back into the mud, fingers splayed wide as it seeps between them, soaks into his clothing. Head bowed forward, he continues to laugh, even as a part of him wants to shake with fury. The utter humiliation of this. "Why should I fight, when we're having such a good time. Aren't you having a good time?" He huffs and pants in short bursts, struggling against the hold August has on him. But there's still no attempt to lash out.

The wolf is clearly in no shape for a fight, either. Whatever's been done to his mindform, it's as if a slow rot's infested it, eating it away from the inside. Emaciated and exhausted, it does little more than gaze at the majestic beast that's taunting it, head bowed, breath ragged.

August stands there, drained, exhausted, trembling. He can't keep this up much longer. And They're close; no doubt They've sensed this, his burgeoning shaping Art bucking the reigns, trying to toss him and do what it will; his matter Art faltering, pushed beyond its limits in a way it hasn't been in decades.

The raven-stag starts forward, closing on the wolf. <<You'd rather let us watch him die than risk us taking him back. Wouldn't you.>> He stops at the low point in the crater wall, where the volcano gave way and spilled out. <<We're not letting that happen.>>

Standing there in the snow and mud, August reaches out across the sullen, chilly landscape of Gray Harbor, reaches out for a violin with the voice of the river and the wind in the trees and the taste of ash at the back of his throat.

At that moment, across town, on Elm Street:

Itzhak is butter-side-down on his ancient couch, wearing only boxer briefs, trying to convince himself that he's going to get up any second now. Aaaaany second now. He has things to do. Right? Right. Lots of things. Things more important than moping on his couch and feeling sorry for himself.

The rush of Roen's inner river sighs into his awareness. Itzhak squints. August's asking for connection, but--he doesn't sound so good. The violin of his mental 'voice' sings in return, winding itself into the river and the rustling trees. <<Roen?>>

"Do you really think there's enough left of him, to come back? Do you really think you're even capable?" Ruiz manages to get a booted foot under him, then a hand, then another hand. Teeth gritted together, another flicker of life in his eyes, and this time the spark ignites. He rips himself free of the leaden weight that was pinning him to the ground, and drags himself back to his feet again with a ragged pant. <<They're trying to draw you out, Roen,>> whispers that bell-clear voice across the link. <<So they can make things worse for you. Don't->> And then he goes down for good, hitting the mud and slush like a sack of potatoes, and the wolf disperses into shadow.

There's probably not much need for August to explain to Itzhak what's going on, since he's joined the link just in time to see the rotting wolf scatter apart. <<Ruiz is here. I figured they were trying to get me to kill him. Except...>>

Except for how he just passed out at August's feet. August lets Itzhak sense what he does: the dull pain of the gunshot wound, cleaned and bandaged, but not exactly on the mend. August grimaces, tries to heal it, but he's having trouble focusing. There's a sound coming over the link; a roaring sound, like a swarm of locusts, or the static of a test pattern.

It takes him a second to match it against what Ruiz said before the wolf vanished.

The ash and dirt of the caldera begins to blow around the raven-stag. August says just one thing before he attempts to sever the link with Itzhak he's only just formed, because he's reasonably sure what's happening. <<He's here, injured and passed out.>>

Itzhak bolts to his feet, knocking over the coffee table in the process. Crash! Eyes wide and unseeing, he reaches with both mind and hands, trying to grasp what's ungraspable. <<No! Don't you dare let go!>> His music saws at the strings, wailing. <<Not without me!>> August doesn't get to drop the link. Itzhak's fractals all iterate into their spikiest, sink into the link like burrs.

The raven-stag bellows, at the dust storm choking them or the fractals digging in or both. Probably both, as there's a distinct note of Let go you obstinate jackass, to his voice.

Everything between them grays out, lost in the humming, buzzing, ceaseless roar, choking their throats as thoroughly as their minds. The stand of aspen saplings out front of August's cabin sits empty. The smoking ruins of his car, the smashed gun, Ruiz's truck, and a large, Ruiz-shaped dent in the ground are all that suggest two men were out front just seconds ago.

It takes time for August and Itzhak to awaken and reorient, not the least because they are not themselves.

At the center of a dry lake bed, pale gray and crazed with cracks, lies a unicorn and a raven-stag. The land around them is dead and barren; the plants are withered and brown, the dirt is dusty and brittle, the sky is leaden and dull. When trees have foliage, it's papery and blighted; when they don't, they look like warped skeletons. The lake is at the center of a dead forest; in the distance, a tall, winding tower rises out over the landscape, white and gleaming.

And in the distance, the air shudders with a single howl. The hunter's horn bellowed from afar; the only warning his prey will have, before the beast is upon them.

The unicorn thrashes, surging to its--his--feet. Long gracile legs wobble, cloven hooves dig into the dust. The beast looks around with white-rimmed eyes, ears swiveling. <<Roen.>> Roen is more an impulse of sensation than a name: the feel of thickly glazed stoneware, the scent of snow and woodfire and cedar, the sound of a river. <<What happened? You okay? Is he okay?>> A howl splits the air, and the unicorn's skin shudders.

The raven-elk is slow to get up, grunting in pain much the way August would under such circumstances. His dark gray fur and black feathers are dusted pale by the dry lake's dirt. The thorny plants in his antlers have withered, the flowers wilted. At least the orb weaver is back, a spot of brilliant yellow in the raven-elk's otherwise monochrome shape.

Thunder echoes over the dry land in response to the hunter's horn and the wolf's howl. The raven-elk's feathers ruffle, stand out in response. <<Alive,>> he says of himself. <<He's injured, and I couldn't heal it.>> A twinge of pain accompanies this admission; not being able to is the only thing worse than doing it.

He snorts, eyes the tower. <<I think we go there.>>

Injured or not, the wolf is still a formidable foe. This blasted, wasted wood knows it like one of its kin; it's given its life, much as the once-majestic, flame-wreathed beast has, like to like. As the elk and the unicorn gather their wits about themselves, the hunter stalks from a distance. Which one is weaker? Which of the two should he carve off first, and try to run to the ground? Roen humiliated you, warns the voice that fills its head, suffocating almost all else. Kill him, make him suffer.

The wolf breaks into an easy lope, battered form slipping between the skeletal trees as it stays just out of sight but close on the pair's heels.

The unicorn snorts mightily, pawing up dust. <<I can smell you out there,>> he warns, his ears pinned. <<I'll trample the shit out of you, you mess with me!>> Ruiz should know he'll do it, too. Wouldn't be the first time they brawled it out. He shoves his chest to the raven-elk-creature's flank to hurry him into motion. <<Get a move on.>>

The raven-elk's dark eyes scan the trees, trying to catch sight of the hunter. <<That's what he wants,>> he warns, one ear flicking. Not that he wouldn't put money on the wolf over the unicorn, but he's not sure it's just the wolf. Not here, not in this place. Their place.

He grunts at the shove, shakes himself out and starts to trot, rapidly shifting to a gallop. He's tired and worn down, and this dry land is like sandpaper on his shaping Art, scraping it raw. He's no unicorn, fleet-footed and lean, made for sprinting; yet he's not slow either. Where he walks, the ground looks a little less parched, a little less drained.

Is that laughter on the chill wind? Or just the trees sighing their misery? Every so often, a crackle of movement in the tinder-dry underbrush; a flash of white flank, a glint of eyes or long teeth. The sleek unicorn is tailed first, and then the wolf veers off, bounds out of the trees and into the open, and hits a full-out sprint as it hones in on the galloping elk. It's no match for the wolf's burst of speed; moments later, it lunges for the much larger animal's throat with a snarl.

The unicorn could have been born to run over this land. He's swift and long-legged, his horn a shining bronze saber. He could dance circles around the elk, and in fact, he does, in his urgency to guard him from the lurking wolf. Prancing and crowhopping and generally being a showoff, to prove to the predator that he's more than a match for him.

And he gets his chance to prove it too, as the wolf comes streaking in. The unicorn screams a stallion's challenge and plunges between wolf and elk, horn and hooves slashing. For all his fury, though? The wolf is faster, meaner, just like always.

The unicorn's dancing helps the raven-elk focus on their goal--the spiral tower in the distance--and not the hound at their heels, for all that it's to protect him. He gets lost in the rhythm of their running, the sound of their hooves pounding.

He almost misses the wolf flying at him out of the trees, but then that's why the unicorn was dancing around in the first place. The wolf tears into the unicorn, and the elk cries out like it's the one being injured, turns to knock the wolf loose. He manages to clip the beast, but nothing more.

The beast is ravenous, like it hasn't eaten in weeks. Months. And maybe here, in this Dream, it's been even longer. Kept in this state of not-living, yet unable to die; driven mad by the scent of life-giving prey. Warm blood in their veins, fresh meat for the taking. Its jaws sink into the unicorn's shoulder, a piece torn out of the animal on the heels of a vicious snarl. Then the elk comes flying back in, and the nimbler wolf drops low as it clatters past, literally darting between the bigger animal's legs.

Rather than slow down to make another attempt at leaping up onto the unicorn's back, it goes for one of its tried-and-true moves instead, and hurtles toward the sleek black beast with jaws open. A slash of teeth as it passes, attempting to hamstring the animal and then put some distance between them, in case of a counterattack.

Shrieking in pain and terrified fury, the unicorn bucks madly. The hot gush of his blood perfumes the dead dry air. He wheels to face the wolf, not giving up, never giving up, and then the wolf sweeps past him and severs the hamstring of his near hind leg. Thump the creature goes down in a heap, but immediately he's struggling back to three feet. Sides heaving, his mind cries out hurt hurt hurt hurt!. <<He's taking us apart.>> His mental voice is strained. <<Go, keep going!>>

On the long list of too much, this goes right to the top: the unicorn's scream, the smell of his blood, his pain reverberating over the link. It's a lot like that moment in the prison, where August hit his limit. The orb weaver scuttles off his antlers to hide somewhere in his feathers. The dead and dry plants in his antlers ignite, sending a swirl of a cinders over the elk's head; they grow into a crown of fiery teardrops, flickering faintly violet between the red and orange.

But this is Ruiz, not some nameless, faceless construct of Theirs. He knows this wolf, or some version of him. Which might be why, when the fire takes shape, it doesn't immediately fly after the wolf.

The elk moves to stand between the unicorn and the wolf. <<Not without you.>>

Run. Run and never stop, there is nowhere I won't find you. There is no place you'll be safe. It's as if the withered forest herself has spoken; the words whisper through brittle branches like a foul wind, and -- heedless of the danger posed by the elk's shaping magic -- the wolf stalks a slow circle about the pair. Like it's herding them somewhere, rather than trying to outright kill them. A baring of teeth, a warning snarl if one of them tries to turn back, but no further attempt to maim or injure.

It's almost as if the ferocious soul inside there, the one who Itzhak counts among his lovers, and August.. well, at least among people he'd give the time of day, is finding some roundabout way of calling the shots. As if it's him who wants to show them something.

In the Dream on Halloween night, de la Vega got to see this unicorn-shape lance hellhounds straight through with that horn, then trample them into broken sacks of bone and burst alien organs. This is the way he looked then: eyes on his target, breath coming in hard threatening snorts, horn lowered and tracking along with the predator's movement. Murder in those eyes. His near hind hoof keeps trying to settle in the dust, keeps failing, never quite managing to set down and bear weight. Blood streaks shiny tributaries down his shoulder and his foreleg.

Ruiz has gravely wounded him almost without trying. The land is Peregrine's land. Their land. Itzhak and August have no place here. But there is something...

He steps backwards, limping, crowding against the elk. <<...let him,>> comes the strained violin in the kythe. <<Something's...let him.>> One step. Another. Going where the wolf herds him.

The raven-elk shifts as the wolf does, refusing him any direct line of sight to the unicorn. The crown of destruction over its antlers forms a harsh, brilliant circle around the two, a suggestion of how close the wolf can get before that fire--or worse--comes his way.

He's reluctant to trust the wolfs herding. He knows Ruiz is here somewhere, but where? Here, in this beast? Elsewhere?

<<Fine,>> he allows, reluctant. <<But let me heal you, at least.>> He moves with the unicorn, keeping himself between him and the wolf always. The flames shudder as he dips his head to lick the unicorn's shoulder. It helps some, but it's not his usual power. Not much healing right now, it would seem. The Mustang wants to kick and bite.

He snorts as most of the wounds persist.. <<I'll try again after...after.>> After they get where they're going.

This is what August did, that night they first met. Took every opportunity to interpose himself between de la Vega and the lanky ex-con, as if he somehow knew that little staredown was going to get so very much more involved. It should amuse him, the wolf, if even he's capable of such. But the pale eyes remain impassive, hollowed out and dead. And after a long look at the elk, the emaciated creature turns to follow. Should they start lagging behind, or turn off the path it's decided for them, it'll try to nip at their heels, break into a lope and run alongside, snarling in warning.

If they don't, the trio will find themselves winding away from the lake and deeper into the treeline; all tangled and paper-dry, bone-white limbs and not a single sign of life. In the distance, that tower, featureless and gleaming in the light.

The unicorn curves his long graceful neck to nose at the stag. <<S'okay. I'm all right.>> Liar. <<We're gonna get out of this.>> Also liar. He sets off on a three-legged walk, injured hind leg pawing uselessly at the air. His long tasseled tail whips back and forth like an annoyed cat's. <<I'm gonna be so mad at him,>> he grumbles.

The dead forest is worse than the Dust-Bowl plain. The unicorn leaves smears of blood on paper-white wood and can't help worrying about what it'll feed. He holds the brambles back with his horn, steps limping through, plods onwards. His mind is busy, fractal flares throwing themselves into huge arcs above the ocean of his mind. <<Through hardships,>> he mutters, to himself. <<Was that it? Through hardships...>>

The forest around them is silent, save for the shuffle and crunch of heavy hooves and paws, the occasional labored breath from the unicorn. The firedrops over the elk create long, ghastly shadows in the dry land; they turn and shift with the trio, a shadowplay version of current events. <<Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered.>> His mindvoice is low and absent, his attention fixed on staying focused. His shaping sense is throbbing, and he can't let it distract him.

The tower isn't far, either because they need to get there or because in this uncertain place the dry land makes its own rules. The closer they get, the more they can all feel that this structure is what drew all the life from this place. Even now, anything August's footsteps leave behind vanishes, dragged through the dead ground into it.

Emerging from the treeline, they see it stands on a broad, circular plaza of pearly brick, the colors varying from pale cream to shining alabaster. This is the source of the glow, rather than the tower itself, which is a somewhat dull white.

It's not until they're closer that they can see why: it's made of bones. Thousands upon thousands of bones, some complete skeletons, some random pieces. They've all been carefully placed together in a gruesome mosaic, and if not for the light from the gleaming plaza (which makes some of the rounder pieces cast shadows) it might be hard to tell at a glance in the dull light of the dry land.

And yet, even that's not the most arresting feature. That honor must go to the entrance: a solid, black, double-door with a huge lily gilded in gold.

The raven-elk halts when he realizes what he's looking at, goes rigid. A rock next to one of his hooves cracks apart into fragments.

For my will is as strong as yours.

The wolf slows, then stills completely as they come upon the foot of the tower, bleached bones and gilded door and all. Its head, bowed during the entirety of their trek, comes up gradually, its nose flaring as if to take in the scent of the place. Its breathing is wet sounding, like the disease, the taint, has spread to its lungs. Its dull eyes skim toward its traveling companions briefly, and then it slinks toward the door, skiffs of dust lifting into the air from beneath its great paws as it moves.

And my kingdom is as great.

The sigil on the door responds to the beast's presence almost immediately; it flares briefly brighter, almost too bright to look at directly. Like being caught glancing into the sun. And then there's a heavy clack as of a latch being unfastened, and a deep groan as the massive doors swing open to invite them inside.

You have no power over me.

There's no more pain, no more blood to be let. Not even a growl from the wolf before it pads on through; just a glance, come with me, and then it's gone.

The unicorn snorts, alarmed, ears pinning back. He's tense, he wants to lash out and cavil and rear, display his power and his strength. But he can't. He's hamstrung. All those gleaming, clean, old bones have to sit there and go unreared at. God, the bones! Bones and bones and bones, what were once living creatures and now only exist to decorate some madman's lair. Thousands of them. Tens upon tens of thousands of them. People. Animals. Creatures he'll never see or understand. Dead and desecrated.

<<Through dangers untold,>> he sends, a flare of defiance in the kythe. <<Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered, I have fought my way here to the castle beyond the Goblin City.>>

Then he limps forward, setting his hooves ever so carefully among the slippery surface of all the bones. He follows the wrecked wolf through the horrible lily gate. I'll never let you go.

The raven-elk goes, but only because the unicorn does. Given the choice he'd be tearing the whole structure down, screaming at Peregrine to come and get some. (There's a part of him that suspects Peregrine wants August to kill him, so he knows he shouldn't shout any such thing, but the fire over his antlers trembles with the overwhelming urge to do it anyways.) Like the unicorn he moves carefully, his hooves in no way designed for smooth, slick terrain.

It's silent and cold inside the tower. The interior is lit by candles in alcoves framed by mosaics of dark bronze shell. The light reflected from the alcoves casts odd, writhing shadows among the bones of the tower walls.

The bottom floor is a mosaic of the same lily, here against a background of brown-veined, white marble. There's nothing on the ground floor save for a curving set of stairs, hewn from the same marble, leading up. They are, incongruously, wide enough to accommodate even the elk, though they'll all need to step carefully and move single-file.

Overhead, they hear the sound of two doors opening. Up, something insists. Come and see.

The wolf's presence, of course, is absent from the link. It seems to grow more and more lethargic, the further they tread; the clack of claws on the polished floor becomes stuttering and disjoint as it falters, nearly crashes to its knees, then wills itself to go on. Ash and maggots drip from its emaciated frame as it rounds upon the curved staircase, then beckons the others to follow, and begins to slowly climb.

Up and up, as if it knows what waits for it. And there's nothing left but to seek it out.

<<To take back the man you have stolen.>> The unicorn changes the wording a little, but that's how he does. You change the lyrics, you change the tune, you improvise to create something on the fly that's never been heard before, might never be heard again. The best magic he knows. <<For my will is as strong as yours, and my kingdom as great.>> He climbs.

When the emaciated wolf collapses, he whickers urgently, worriedly, coming up without fear despite the horrific gashes this same wolf put in him. <<Get up. Get up, sweetheart.>> The wolf isn't part of the link, but he doesn't need to be, the way the leggy beast is snuffling and tailtwitching at him. <<Don't give up. Not now. Not when we're so close.>> And he follows him, when at last he gets up, stepping as gently and tenderly as a lover.

The raven-elk groans as the wolf collapses. His sides shudder. <<Fight that asshole. Don't let him fucking win.>> He paws at the ground, scarring the perfect marble in a surly 'fuck you' to the owner. He almost reaches out to heal the two of them, thinks better of it. Who knows what might happen if he does, in here.

It's slow going up the stairs, but eventually they make it up to the first floor. It's really more of a landing, with two doors standing open in the walls, side by side. Theoretically they should simply plunge out of the tower; it doesn't seem wide enough to accommodate rooms. Yet through the first door's frame they see not the dry land and its dull sky, but a park on a lazy summer afternoon. A woman and her husband are on a blanket under a tree, a backpack with water and snacks nearby. She's fast asleep, exhausted after a rough week at work. The husband watches over her and their boy, sipping from a beer.

It's the three of them: Ruiz, Karin, and Emrys. But not the Karin and Emrys who Ruiz encountered in the Dream with Peregrine. No, this is a Karin who's got dark circles under her eyes, ragged fingernails, and a careworn smile. Her hair's a bit frizzy; she's not had time to go to the salon and get it done. They've come out here because Emrys really wanted to come fly his kite. It's not windy enough for that, but he's trying anyways, and being teased by some other kids playing frisbee. It would be easy to think they don't meant much by it, except they're neighborhood kids and they know, instinctively, Emrys is different and will give them a nice fight. which he does.

Ruiz is tired and in pain and really just wants to nap with Karin, but he knew if he didn't watch, something like this might happen, and so it has. He gets up to intervene, gently steering Emrys and his kite away from the other boys, who clam up and back off the second a dad is on the scene. (That Ruiz is active duty military only helps.) Emrys settles, comes back to the blanket with Ruiz. They read The Little Prince together instead of flying the kite. They'll try the kite tomorrow.

It's a good memory. Not an ugly one. Not a perfect one, either, but very little ever is. But there they are--his Karin, his Emrys. A better time, before.

Before. That's the other door. It opens into a bar, after they've been taken from him. It was all over the news for a few days, and there was an article in the paper insinuating all kinds of ugliness. He's Latino, so there's that; he was in the military, so of course, it left him messed up.

Which is what a couple of townies are discussing, and Ruiz, a few shots of tequila in him, can't help but overhear them. (Okay, he can help it, but there's no way he's going to.) The very idea that he would kill Emrys and Karin because of what he went through overseas snaps something in him, and he starts a bar brawl to end all bar brawls.

It's ugly. He winds up in the drunk tank. More than a few cops give him looks like they'd love to resisting arrest him straight into county. But an old friend from the corp posts his bail, and it gets cleared up in the morning. That time. There'll be more. A lot more.

The uglier memory pulls at him, suggests he step on through, this is right where he belongs. The gentler one, well. So what? This is what he really is.

Above them there are more landings, more floors. Another pair of doors creaks open. What will he see there? How much further can he go?

The wolf watches for a while, eyes going glossy at the memory of the park, the kite, the book. The way his boy looked at him when he spoke, and people listened. Did this happen, or does he simply wish it had? There's no indication either way; the beast sends a glance toward the unicorn, then a flick of its ears and slink of its frame as it wends higher with a clack of claws.

Then the scene at the bar. All that rage and grief and nowhere to go. Add to that, the aimlessness and square peg in a round hole of being a combat veteran returned home to a life that had moved on.. the wolf bows its head, and continues on. Panting now, barely able to drag itself up to the next landing.

The unicorn's skin shivers. He turns his magnificent head away. The memories are too private, the wounds too deep. Things Ruiz has never told him, things Itzhak has never asked. He looks at the elk, and although he doesn't say anything, his fury at Peregrine is vivid in the kythe. How dare the man take Ruiz's most intimate thoughts and spread them out like a patient anesthetized on a table?

Itzhak will fight him for that alone. He'll kill him for the rest of it. For my will is as strong as yours, and my kingdom as great.

<<Come on.>> He dips his nose to nudge the wolf, almost more of a carcass than a living being now. The ash smudges his muzzle. Maggots drop to the floor, squirming. <<Come on, krasavets. We got your back.>>

The raven-elk half-turns as well, eyes away from what the doors hold. The fire along his antlers flares in response to the unicorn's fury. What was it Itzhak had said just the other day? Right. <<I'll hold him down.>>

The elk nudges the wolf as well, a gentle push with its nose. <<Keep it up. If I have to carry you up there I'm never letting you hear the end of it.>>

The next landing's doors, like the first, show two scenes from Ruiz's life. Or, something like them; after all, he's not given everything over to his captor. Not just yet.

The first door shows downtown Seattle on a dreary winter day, raining falling from the sky, trees on Capitol Hill obscured by low mist. He's opening a card from someone. It turns out to be a simple thank you card, from a woman whose attacker he helped put away. The note's written in a neat, clean hand, and expresses her thanks, and awareness that his job can't be easy, but that he's done something which helped her sleep better at night.

It flickers to another moment: a man in a coffee shop, who's recognized him. Ruiz helped with the investigation into a drug ring. That ring had been responsible for the of this man's son; he'd become addicted, and was dealing for them on the side. This is the only justice that man can really hope for, that the people who used his son would do time. And they were going to, thanks to Ruiz. And another, a little girl thanking him for catching the people who mugged her father and left him for dead.

The other door, though, is more recent. It's Gray Harbor, and Felix. Felix, and the things Ruiz does at his behest, even though he hates it. Again, this door pulls at him, says who cares if those other memories are real? This is who you are.

And drifting from that second door, they all smell a faint whiff of the golden lilies.

If there's any shame in him, at his memories being flayed open like this, and the innards spread out in full view, there's no hint of it in de la Vega. Or what's left of him, coming apart at the seams like a distant, dying sun. The happier memories are taken in with wet, hazy eyes, some surge of remembrance there. The good he's done, the harm's way he's put himself in again, and again, and again.

That last door, the one with the scent of lilies wafting out, he ignores utterly. Pauses at the threshold of the topmost landing a moment, glances back to the elk and his playful taunt. Gratitude. And then a longer look for Itzhak; that glorious, impossible creature. As long legged and gorgeous in this form as he is in the world they call real. He looks, for a tremulous moment, like he might just trot back over, curl up in the unicorn's shadow, and die there. Adoration.

That, however, isn't how the story ends. The wolf turns instead, and climbs the last few stairs to the top.

These memories, the unicorn watches, devouring them with a hunger that's carnivorous in itself. His lover doing the good he knows he craves doing, despite his own fault lines and weaknesses, despite everything? Yes. Oh yes. That's the man Itzhak loves. The strong protecting the weak, something that resonates in him like a hardinger fiddle. He snorts disdainfully at the visions of Monaghan's work. Fuck that. Even though he's doing it himself--fuck that!

But when the wolf gives him that look, he snorts at him, too. The horn comes down, promising that this gate, he'll guard. <<Don't you fucking dare. Not now.>> Even though his three good legs tremble with the wildness of the emotion that surges in his soul. Love has horns and teeth and claws, a fabulous beast to beat them all. The wolf turns away, and the unicorn follows, step-step-step-hop. He's in tremendous pain and doesn't care.

<<Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered,>> he murmurs, low and fierce. It's keeping him going.

This first door on this landing the raven-elk looks at, because the unicorn is, so he gives himself leave. He makes a soft sound of appreciation as well. This is the de la Vega Itzhak loves.

And, well, so is the other door, but if anyone knows about doing things you shouldn't because you don't know what else to do, it's August.

Except he catches that bit of resonance from Itzhak. And when he realizes what it means, there's a sharp stillness from him in the link, there and gone in a moment. He sets that comprehension aside for later, when they're not all dying of exhaustion.

It goes on like this for some time. Another floor, another pair of moments of Ruiz's life. Tragedy and beauty, grief and joy, with the painful memories beckoning to him, the scent of lilies wafting on the breeze. But as he ascends, the nobler, better memories cling to him, stubbornly refusing to relinquish their hold. You're us too, they insist.

The three beasts reach the top of the tower, exhausted, panting, drooping. The raven-elk's crown of fire is extinguished. He's too tired to keep it going anymore. Here the two doors are on opposite ends of the landing, which encircles the entire level. But now it's not just the wolf which sees. They all see.

In one door is Gray Harbor, with all its blessings and flaws for each of them. Their lives, as they are now, cracked but holding together.

And in the other door...

Itzhak sees himself on a grand concert stage, a full orchestra behind him. He's a soloist, dressed to the nines in a tuxedo, holding a gleaming, professional quality instrument in his hands, playing for a packed audience. They're enthralled, staring at him with wide eyes.

Ruiz sees Karin and Emrys in front of a quaint little house. It's hard to tell where it is, but it's a quiet-looking neighborhood, the streets lined with horsechestnut, the little Craftsman behind Karin and Emrys a pale gray with black and white trim. Emrys is on a swing, Karin is gardening. Ruiz is arriving home on an old Triumph motorcycle, a classic restored to pristine condition.

August sees himself as he'd expected to be when he joined the military: in a career position. Command Sergeant Major, and a Ranger besides, his dress uniform smart, his decorations many. The kind of person who can probably expect to make Sergeat Major of the Army if he plays his cards right. He's leaving a meeting in busy city--Washington DC?--and getting into a car, driving somewhere on a gorgeous spring day.

They sense the tower making an offer. In one door, all they could have wanted. In the other door, the confusing, painful, cracked-and-sloppily-mended lives they live in Gray Harbor. The fallout of what's happened. Maybe de la Vega survives it. Maybe he doesn't.

Or he could give in, go be with Karin and Emrys. Forever. And August and Itzhak could have all they ever wanted too...

The unicorn stops in his tracks, his one good hind leg nearly skidding out from under him. That August picked up something he'd been carefully hiding from him for months goes unnoticed. He's too busy staring, his eyes rolling white, at the image of himself as a concert soloist. As, maybe even, someone as good as the violinist he idolized since he was a kid. The violinist he's not actually named for, but that he tells himself he was, as one of his selfish little fantasies. Perlman. Rosencrantz.

But there's something wrong. Something very wrong. His fingers are bare. This is an Itzhak who never went to prison, who never left classical for folk music, who never was turned away from orchestra work on account of that ink on his hands and the rap sheet in his past. Whose face isn't lined, whose dreams aren't haunted by violence. Maybe even whose father isn't dead. Maybe even whose father sits in that audience.

And August, as a big shot military type? That's wrong. That's just wrong and wrong and wrong. De la Vega as a peaceful family man, well that's less wrong, but his family is gone. That's what's wrong there. All three of them--it's wrong! These visions are of men they could never be.

The unicorn tosses his head, lashes his tail. <<You have no power over me,>> he whispers in the kythe.

The wolf spends a long, long while standing there, looking into the second door. Its head bowed, its body decomposed until there's almost nothing left to carry it forward. Surely Peregrine can sense this in him. How close, how perilously, deliciously close he is to giving in.

You could make this all stop. Forever. You could have everything you ever wanted, and never feel the pull of your tortured nature, ever again.

It wheezes noisily, wetly; ash tumbles from its wasting-away frame as it considers the idyllic scene behind that door. Everything he's ever wanted. Except it isn't. Except the thing about grief, is that while you never forget, you do heal and move on. It becomes a scar to keep and a pain to return to, less and less and less frequently until it's only a caress now and again. Karin. It doesn't move, still. Emrys.

And then it does. Toward the other door, the other life and all its pain. And all its love. No hesitation.

The elk balks at the sight of August like that. <<The kid that joined up, thinking he wanted those things, is dead. He died in Bosnia.>> Like Itzhak, he sees a person who could never be. Not anymore.

As unicorn and the elk hesitate and the wolf considers, the door which offers their best lives shifts subtley. Karin's garden is filled with golden lilies. There's the shadow of someone standing in the house; a man, with a bowler hat. Someone has thrown a bouquet of golden lilies onto the stage at Itzhak's feet. August is stepping out of his car...at a graveyard. Arlington. As he walks among the graves, they can see, each one has a golden lily resting on top of it.

The wolf turns to the door into Gray Harbor, and that shifts to reveal more as well: people among its various imagery. Their friends, their families, their loved ones. In Gray Harbor there's pain, and there's also happiness. There's what They have done, will keep doing, but there's also love, and stubborn survival. In the other door, there's only the numb bliss of surrender.

When the wolf's first foot crosses the threshold into the Gray Harbor door, the tower trembles. Cracking sounds like gunfire surround them, and bones spill from the walls, plunging to the marble floor below and shattering. A candle falls from an alcove, leaving part of the landing in shadow.

The raven-elk groans against the forces trying to tear the tower apart, struggles to keep it in one piece long enough for them to escape. He shoves against the unicorn. <<We need to go. Now.>>

There's pain. There's so, so much pain, pain that eats like acid at his soul, etching strange shapes into his behavior. Pain that keeps him up at night, pain that drives him to despair and to impulse. But the unicorn doesn't hesitate, either. He's ready to go back, and to claim what's his. My kingdom as great. The vision of himself as a soloist is one more burden to bear, but the rewards of turning away are too sweet, and he is too eager to have his lover in his arms again. He's stepping alongside the wolf, when the tower rattles to its foundation, like Babel.

He squeals in alarm, tries to bolt--his cloven hooves skid on the marble floor, and he goes down hindquarters-first. He screams in pain, the awful sound of an equine in agony. But the kythe is amused in a way. Sure, why wouldn't this happen? <<Yeah--well--you know what, Roen? You remind me of the babe!>>

And he slashes his horn down and parts the fabric of the Dream.

<<Pretty sure de la Vega was the babe. Get your ass in gear, Sarah.>> The elk all but pushes the unicorn through. The second he's gone, the entire tower implodes.

It's not a painless escape. Shards of bone rip through the border of reality, tearing at them, slicing their clothes and leaving long, thin cuts. The dry land is sundered with it, blowing away on a roaring wind that stings their lungs.

In the midst of all this chaos, the three of them hear soft, amused laughter. A voice murmurs, See you soon, gentlemen.

In its wake they find themselves in August's yard, the dark moon high overhead. August, dazed and ice cold, aching in every part of himself, clothes sliced to ribbons. Ruiz, in agony from a leg wound he really needs to get tended, exhausted inside and out. Itzhak, mauled by a beast.

But alive.

Mauled by a beast, indeed. A beast named Javier. Or at least, the madman who'd inhabited him for a time. Who still might inhabit him now, for all they know.

He's motionless, 190 pounds of inert (and probably still surly) Mexican when the world tilts and shifts, and they're deposited back in August's front yard. Breathing, very much alive, but also very much out of commission.

Itzhak is mauled all right. He lets out a gurgle of pain. Which hurts more, his leg or his shoulder? Beats him! He can only writhe in the dirt of the garden, bleeding, although August stopped most of that. The moonlight glimmers off the wet meat of the gashes on his shoulderblade (where the unicorn's shoulder sat is different than where a human's sits) and the back of his thigh.

"Fuck you," he gasps breathlessly, in reply to that laughter. He tosses his head, trying to see Ruiz and August. "Roen--Javeleh--"

August sighs, rolls over, and reaches out heal their injuries. He's handled far worse than this. Except his shaping Art decides now is the time to take the bit in its teeth. It spins wildly out of control, drawing a curse from August, and does way more than it should to things he wasn't trying to work on. As a result, Ruiz and Itzhak's wounds are only partially mended; they won't be permanently maimed or dying from infections, but there's plenty of damage that still needs to by bandaged and given time to heal up.

In the meantime, all of the saplings gain a good inch or two, a weakened section of the fence shores up, and August's clothes knit back together, letting him bleed all over them on the inside.

He lays there a second, trying to take in what just happened, decides he doesn't care. "Whatever," he groans. He climbs to his feet with the help of an obliging aspen, staggers towards the cabin. Wood stove still burning. It'll be warm in there. "Come on," he says over his shoulder. "Get your...asses in here. We didn't live through that to die of hypothermia in my fucking yard."

Ruiz, meanwhile, has rejoined the world of the living, and pitches forward on his hands and knees, and empties the contents of his stomach into the grass. Undignified, maybe, but at least he ain't dead. It's followed by a bout of coughing and sputtering, and a look of profound confusion on his face. Like, where the fuck am I and why does everything hurt? He doesn't respond immediately to August's summons, though his dark eyes are drawn inexorably to Itzhak, whom he gazes at steadily for a long while. Should the man return his attention, he'll glance down and away, and start struggling to his feet. Awkward, like he's not entirely sure his legs will support his weight.

Itzhak groans loud and harsh as some of his muscle and vasculature reweaves themselves. Why does it actually hurt worse once Roen heals him some? Now all the nerves are energized, getting decent bloodflow so they can inform him that THIS SHIT HURTS. Thanks nerves. He knows.

He rolls to his knees, one hand braced in the soft dark soil, and lifts his sorry head to see his lover. And it's him, looking at him, his soul back in his dark eyes. Itzhak bites his lip, tearing it bloody, and crawls towards him and wraps his arms around him. They may have to go inside, but... but this first. Ruiz is getting hugged, and dirtied, and bloodied, whether he likes it or not.

His voice a mere sandpaper rasp, Itzhak whispers, "I love you."

August stops--he's only made it a few steps towards the cabin--half-turns to look at the two of them. "Declarations of love and undying devotion happen in there," he points at the cabin, "not out here. But if you wanna carry him in bridal style, be my guest. Otherwise, I will."

"You fucking touch me and I'll break your fingers, Roen," grumbles a rather familiar voice from somewhere buried against Itzhak, and wrapped up in his arms. The surliness, the threat that's mostly bark and (probably) no bite, that's all de la Vega. And honestly probably the surest sign that he's back to himself.

No sentiments are returned to the lanky Jew whose scent he's busy breathing in. Whose warmth he's busy soaking up. Just a brief turn of his face into the other man's neck, his hands bunched in his clothing, and a stuttering exhale filled with chattering teeth. "Deberķamos ir, bebe," he murmurs, rough-voiced. He's not entirely sure of his ability to move unaided at the moment, so puts aside his pride, and leans against Itzhak's shoulder for the trip inside.

Itzhak laughs soundlessly and mashes his head against Ruiz's. "Oh yeah. That's you. ...Roen, I don't know if I can fuckin' walk. I only got one leg now, not three. Give a guy a hand, yeah?" He's shivering from cold and blood loss, and seems like he'd be happy to kneel there in August's garden until the end of time. Or until he passed out. Whichever comes first.

August sighs, turns the rest of the way and moves, stiff like he's made of unbending metal, over to the two of them. "Well, looks like your man just gave me permission to, so cowboy the fuck up." He leans over, and though it's a frivolous use of power he'll sorely regret in a few days, he leans into the matter art to make lifting Ruiz that much easier. "I've got a full medkit. We'll get you two sewn up. And I made...chili. So I hope no one has a proscription against elk. Because that's what's for dinner."

Ruiz is hardly in any shape to be turning down help, even if it galls him. So he permits it, with an epic look of irritation, and in they presumably go.

"Splits hoof, chews cud, sounds great." Itzhak's firmly in the phase of wiseassery-survival. Jokes will save them all! He limps alongside Ruiz, arm still around him, totally using August's power as a crutch. Then he stands around awkwardly in the entranceway. "Aw, jeez, I'm filthy," he mutters, embarrassed of all things, because it wouldn't be Itzhak if he didn't get embarrassed over the stupidest shit.

August grunts at Itzhak's recitation of the provision. "No wonder...Rose...liked to mostly hunt. Easier to keep kosher if you're the one provding the food."

It's so warm inside the cabin compared to outside, that for a time all they'll feel is the heat of the interior slowly drawing the deathly chill of their faces.

He gives Itzhak a sideways glance for that; given how August and Ruiz are also covered with snow and mud, it seems especially ludicrous to him. "Just, take off your shoes, and we'll take turns in the shower. The water heater can take it." He suits actions to words, hauling off his boots, shedding his jacket and gloves. Sure enough, the backs of his hands have long, thin cuts from the shattering tower. "That fucker," he mutters. "He comes within a country mile of me, I'm gonna break his neck."

He makes slow, gradual progress towards the bathroom, pulls out the considerable First Aid kit and sets it on the vanity. "Everything's in there." A trip to the linen closet for extra towels, and then into the kitchen, to...oh yes, he's making a hot toddy. Possibly three.

Once they're inside, de la Vega topples heavily into a chair at August's kitchen table. At least he didn't sully the man's couch with his filthy self. His head is tipped back, grimy hands scrubbed over his face, briefly through his close-cropped hair, then back down again slowly. He doesn't seem inclined to speak much, and he's still trembling ever so slightly despite the house and its ferocious warmth. The other men's voices are a dull hum in the background; he might still be in some state of physical shock at coming back to himself, fully, after effectively being a captive in his own mind.

Itzhak climbs right into Ruiz's lap. August's poor chair does not protest, though it probably should.

He'll be a mess, August had warned him. Itzhak hasn't forgotten. He doesn't know exactly what to do about it, but maybe this is a start, just cramming himself on Ruiz and refusing to be reasonable in any way about anything. Hey, it's worked out so far. Kinda. First aid kit, doing anything practical? Nope. Only trying to prove to Ruiz that all is forgiven, all is well.

August supposes he can't blame Itzhak or Ruiz for not being practical. Honestly in their position he might not be either. But, "What's that? I get the shower first? Outstanding." He focuses on making the drinks, sets them out on the kitchen table in easy reach before he heads into the bathroom with his own.