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Church Source 15
"Yeah." Claude grins at him. "Ashi looks good. I've said it before, but you're a quick study."
--
Gathering everything carefully in his hands, Dimitri places even more care when he goes to gather Claude up in his arms. "You're going through the effort to teach me. Paying close attention is the least I can do." He tucks Claude into the crook of one arm so that he can better put away the tools once they're outside of Ashi's stall.
"And I find it easier when I'm doing it as well, I believe... Things start making sense that aren't as clear from instructions."
--
Claude nods. "I figured as much. Anything I can show you how to do, I'll show you. I think seeing someone do it makes it easier to do yourself...though, of course, that isn't something that can be done for everything."
--
"It would be far too easy if the world were like that..." Dimitri shakes his head a little bit, leaving the stables and making sure everything is carefully closed behind him. He wouldn't want anything to get in there with the horses, after all. Then, back into the cabin, where the fire seems to have worked itself up to a proper flame without them tending to it. Dimitri sets Claude back down to a comfortable pile of cape.
"Preparing fish... Is it similar to how you prepared the animal from last night, or are there differences?" An animal is an animal, true, but, well. Fur and scales are different. Dimitri just isn't sure entirely how different beyond that.
--
"A lot of differences," Claude laughs. "Mostly it's the bones. Fish have a ton of little bones - they can be dangerous, honestly. Depending on the fish, it can be easier to cut filets of fish away from the bones - which is pretty much all spine and ribcage - and cook them that way, to remove the bones as carefully as possible, or to just cook the fish whole and pick the meat off the bones with a fork. Fish meat can have very different textures, depending on the fish, which you might remember from eating it; that last one is better on fish with firm flesh that holds together in chunks than really delicate, flaky fish. Or bigger fish, since bigger bones mean that they're easier to eat around. We may be able to get away with cooking our own bigger fish whole; for the little ones, I think I'll cut them into filets. You can remove the scales either by cutting off the skin or scraping the scales off, but honestly I don't think I'm gonna do either today. If you don't like the skin you can just leave it."
Claude pauses, looking thoughtful. "I'm gonna need a few things. Bowls, an egg, some flour and butter, a lemon, salt and pepper, a plank, and a sharp sliver of wood about as thick as a finger. And my knife, of course, but I've already got that."
The next half hour is a busy one, as Claude directs Dimitri into helping him skewer the large fish by the tail to the plank to prop up and cook near the fire, then breads and fries filets of the smaller fish. Dimitri will have plenty of interest to watch and learn, assuming the smell as the larger fish slowly roasts doesn't drive him insane. At one point Claude flips the bigger fish over to cook the other side, too, burning his fingers - and swearing - only a little.
And then - finally - both kinds of fish are ready to eat. Claude grins at Dimitri as the larger fish, and the plank it cooked on, are transferred to the table. "You know, the irony is that you love cheese at least as much as you've ever liked fish, but cheese and fish don't tend to go together well. Cheese is too strong a flavor for a meat as delicate as fish..."
--
If there's any good news, it's that Dimitri is always eager and interested to learn, especially if that learning can immediately be transferred into helping Claude with whatever is needed. The fish is a temptation for the longest time, with his gaze constantly flicking over to it, but he does an admirable job of staying on focus. Physically, he can ignore a lot of things, honestly.
Still, it'd be a lie to say he's anything but relieved when they're finally done, and Dimitri is rather pleased as he carts Claude last of all to the table after the food is taken. "All cheese?" he asks incredulously. "But there's so many types..." Claude has brought him quite a variety, and he knows there's even more out there in the world.
--
"Almost all of it," Claude agrees. "Fish has a pretty subtle flavor, you know? Even the mildest cheeses can overwhelm it. Some people eat them together anyway, but usually fish and cheese together means you only taste cheese, so there's not that much point to the fish."
--
"Oh." The disappointment is palatable as Dimitri sits down with Claude on his lap again. This is going to be a constant thing, at least until Claude can start walking again. Dimitri will be disappointed by that, too. "The world is truly not perfect...."
They just had a talk on complicated politics and xenophobia, but the cheese and fish problem really does drive it home. Apparently.
--
Claude kisses Dimitri's jaw. "Eat them separately," he advises, with a grin. Then he pulls over the plate he put the fried fish on; he had a feeling they'd be eating like this, so why use more than one plate? "For the big fish, we can just use forks to take what we want off of it."
But before that, Claude is cutting a bite of the fried fish filet he made and offering it to Dimitri on his fork.
--
This is one of a few reasons now why Dimitri was more than interested in keeping Claude on his lap, besides the fact that he's grown to like it rather rapidly in the course of a day. A low rumble of a purr goes through him before he accepts the bite. "Are we always going to have fish after we have sex?" he asks, smiling just a little bit as he takes the fork in turn so that he can get a cut. This time, he won't let Claude spoil him one-sidedly. He's getting in on this as well.
--
Claude laughs. "Do you want to? It might not always be the most convenient thing to arrange, but we could try it." He's also not going to object if Dimitri wants to feed him.
--
"I would like fish at any time, but this seems as though tit has happened twice in a row, now." Having Claude accept a bite seems to cheer him up considerably.
--
Claude pauses, blinking...then laughs. "You're right, I did bring you fish that night, didn't I? I forgot." He brought Dimitri a lot of meals; remembering which he brought when isn't something he kept track of much.
--
"I remember everything you've ever brought me." this is honestly less impressive than it sounds; there wasn't really a lot of competition for Dimitri's memory space. Food and language lessons had plenty of free real estate. "But that was... definitely very memorable." He continues to feed Claude, not inclined to stop until he's told to.
--
Claude takes his next bite, but then leans across the table to dig out a forkful of the roasted fish before settling back against Dimitri's chest to offer it to him. "I definitely remember the stuff I brought you, because I had a lot of fun shopping for you, thinking of what you'd like...but I don't necessarily remember when I brought you each specific thing."
--
Tasting the different ways each fish has been prepared is deeply satisfying, and Dimitri enjoys the flavor much like he did the first time Claude brought him some back in his cage- eyes closed, sighing softly. The first time, it had tasted so much like the home he could only distantly remember being taken from. Now... It feels like he's starting to associate different memories with the food. Good ones, but... different.
"I remembered if only to begin keeping track of time again... It used to not matter how much time had passed." Claude changed that.
--
Claude watches Dimitri with a soft expression that most of his friends would tease him mercilessly for, if they ever saw it. Claude's always been a casual, easygoing person whose emotions are nonetheless extremely difficult to perceive or pin down; to see him so openly besotted would be hilarious to most of the people who know him. Eventually, Claude will probably get more accustomed to the way he feels and the way he gets to be with Dimitri, but for now it's still new and intense. And there are moments, like now, where Claude remembers what Dimitri was like when he first found him, and is able to directly juxtapose that with Dimitri as he is now. Seeing how much happier Dimitri is, and knowing that he himself played a large part in making that happen, is more life-affirming than anything else Claude's ever managed to do.
(Yet.)
"Did you start keeping track to see if I'd show up when I said I would?" Claude had always tried to let Dimitri know exactly when he'd show up again. Not only did he know that Dimitri would think himself abandoned - perhaps even betrayed - by hope yet again if Claude failed to show up when Dimitri might have expected him, but he hadn't been able to bear the thought of disappointing him. Of Dimitri waiting and hoping for him some night, only to feel increasingly dejected and forgotten when Claude didn't show.
Claude had sweated about that. He'd made sure to inform Dimitri of exactly what nights he could come, and what nights he couldn't, and he'd never failed to show on a night he said he would. The alternative was impermissible.
--
Considering the one time he hadn't shown when Dimitri had assumed he would, very early on in the visits between them, and how that lack of stimulation had worked Dimitri up into a restless frenzy to the point that he'd had to check Claude wasn't a hallucination again... The constant updates on when he could appear and when he couldn't, along with sticking to his word, had truly helped Dimitri almost as much as the visits themselves had. Rousing himself out of enjoying the fish, he nods slightly before he realizes just what kind of expression Claude is wearing. Seeing such a soft look...
Putting the fork down, he reaches up to curl his fingers along Claude's jaw. "At first... It was to try and prepare myself. I thought... one of those days, you would lie. One of those days, you wouldn't come... You'd never come again. If I could prepare myself for that inevitability, if I knew it was coming. And soon, the days began to have meaning, even when I fought against it. I didn't want to be happy."
--
Claude leans into that touch. "I knew that's what you'd think. That's why I always told you when I knew I'd be coming, and when I knew I wouldn't...or, if I wasn't sure, that I might not show and you shouldn't read into it too much if I didn't. I didn't ever want you to think I'd abandoned you."
--
"You never broke those promises." His fingers smooth out, cupping Claude's cheek properly. "I want to thank you for that. I was preparing to thank you before, as well... Or at least, I was beginning to have such thoughts. I had planned to make it... before the next execution. Yet I don't have worry about such dates. Not anymore."
--
"I never want to break any promise I make to you." Claude closes his eyes. "I know how important they are. And...I may not be the most trustworthy guy, in fact most people would call me the exact opposite of trustworthy and they'd be right, but I want the people I care about to know they can rely on me. And your trust is more important than anyone else's to me." He opens his eyes, grinning up at Dimitri. "So you don't have to thank me. My reward's the trust I've earned."
--
"No they wouldn't," Dimitri counters immediately, frowning. "You are trustworthy. A person who would risk so much to save another, who wants to stop so much injustice, is trustworthy. Anyone who wouldn't trust you does not know you." That Claude makes himself hard to know is something Dimitri hasn't really seen too much yet, and has only seen in the context of being an asshole to people like Carnius, which is, frankly, well deserved, so, fuck them.
-
"Dimitri," Claude says, laughing, "I'm literally a double agent of sorts within the church. I'm lying to almost everyone I meet, all the time. I'm definitely not trustworthy! Trustworthy isn't the same as good, anyway, the way you're acting like they're synonymous." Claude's eyes twinkle. "Haven't you ever heard of a good liar?"
--
The hand that's been gently cradling Claude's face now uses it to shove at his face every so slightly, matching the annoyed flicking of Dimitri's tail. "You know for a fact that I have not. I do not see what the difference is between trustworthy and good anyway. If you're good, then you should be trustworthy."
--
"You only think that because you're naturally honest," Claude says fondly, patting Dimitri's cheek. "And that's how honest people think. But natural-born bastards like myself know that sometimes the best way to be good is to not be trustworthy." He grins. "Me being completely untrustworthy is why we're both here, now. Don't knock it too much. Being a dyed-in-the-wool liar has its time and place."
--
"You're not a bastard," Dimitri grumbles, eye narrowing while his tail continues to beat a mark into the floor at the rate it's going. Even with the flaws he knows Claude has, to hear such names be directed at Claude even by Claude himself is inexcusable. "And I trust you, so you are trustworthy. If the church does not, then they never deserved any trust in the first place in turn." The church doesn't deserve to even exist, so it's not like there's a lot lower to go.
--
Claude chuckles, reaching up with both hands now to draw Dimitri down into a lingering kiss. When he pulls away, he only does so enough to rest their foreheads together. "I love you," he murmurs. "And I know you love me, which is why you're doing this adorable defending me thing that you're doing. And I know I'm probably a better man than anyone you've had a chance to associate with in decades. But believe me, one day, once you're used to me and you've met more good people, you'll be able to accept that I'm just as flawed as anyone else. And I'm pretty sure - I hope - that you'll still love me anyway."
Has Claude said something like this before? He feels like he's said something like this before. Not surprising, perhaps, since Dimitri reacts like this anytime Claude levels the least amount of self-deprecation at himself (or, in this case, objective fact that can be construed as negative) and Claude always has the same thoughts when Dimitri acts like this.
"But for now, let's enjoy our fish before it goes cold."
--
Claude has most certainly said this kind of thing before... and perhaps, in the future, will have to say it a couple more times, considering how Dimitri tilts his head a little bit in clear indication that he's looking away with a faint frown. It's not something that can be easily taken in, right now... But Claude is right. Only further experience with other people and the whole world in general will help change Dimitri's thoughts and perceptions.
...Still.
"I will never call you a bastard, even if I find other good people," he mutters, not really noticing the subconscious 'if' that worms its way into his sentence. Other people are still an unknown, with the bad outweighing the one good he truly knows. Regardless, he lets go of Claude's face, finally picking up the fork. He's going to beat you to the feeding punch on this one, Claude, although he falls back into a more steady back and forth afterwards until at least one fish is starting to become more bone than meat.
--
Claude chuckles. "That's fair. I'm sure there's things you'll say about yourself that I'll never agree with, either. But for the record, I'm not really coming down on myself much when I say these things. I don't consider being a bastard too much of a bad thing. In fact, sometimes I think being a bastard is the best way to get good and necessary things done..."
And then he's being fed fish, and he has to shut up. Probably just as well; he's not sure if someone as proper as Dimitri will ever quite be able to accept the need for selective bastardry.
--
An important thing to apparently note: Sometimes, the only way to shut up Claude von Reigan is to physically interrupt his ability to talk at all, whether with food or something else entirely.
Dimitri makes sure to keep this important fact stored away in his mind for later.
For now, he focuses on feeding and being fed. When they're both done, he slumps with slightly more content against Claude's back. In the comfortable dimness of the cabin, it.... feels more like the hazy memories he has from his childhood than anything else he's had so far. It's comfortable, in most ways. In other ways, it... only brings up more thoughts and questions, as he's been experiencing ever since Claude helped him leave the walls of that wretched city.
Best he can, he tries not to get swept up in them once again. Instead, he murmurs, "I was going to take you swimming after fishing.... I forgot."
--
Claude hums where he's relaxing against Dimitri's chest. "Maybe it's just as well my lesson waits until I'm less sore. I probably don't need any additional handicaps in that area, you know?" His eyes are closed; it's not so much that he needs sleep, really, since they slept in so late - himself especially - but the cabin is dim and warm, and Dimitri is comfortable, and Claude is almost entirely relaxed. There's only one thing left for him to be tense about...and he brings it up now.
"So when do you think you'll be ready to move on from here? We can spend as much as a week here, if we need to, but...the sooner we can travel, the sooner we can get far enough away from the northern church and its influence that there won't be any danger to you anymore. And the longer we stay here, the more likely it is someone affiliated with the church might show up."
--
"It would be good for that..." Dimitri has a lot of thoughts on swimming right now, but he stores them away for later. He's starting to get an idea for when Claude is gearing up to speak to him, through various little things- most of which he couldn't even explain himself yet if asked. Instinct, really. Patiently, he listens to Claude, and curls his claws along where they're wrapped around his middle.
"...You still need a little time to recover." A tinge of shame accompanies the words; Dimitri feels he really should have been thinking with something that wasn't his dick when he not only had sex with Claude but, well. The amount of marks on his body speaks for themselves, really. "Another day or two.... at the very least."
--
"I'm more worried about you than me. It's just aches, really. You have a lot more to adjust to, being free after so long and learning all these things you didn't have the chance to before." Claude absently rubs his cheek against Dimitri's fur; it's so damn soft. "Our next stop is probably going to be a town a few days' ride from here. We're heading south, away from the church, but even at a big town like the one we're going to, far from the monastery, Intseh aren't too common. The good news is that they're not unheard of, either, even if most of them are just merchants or travelers passing through, so you won't be all that suspicious."
He opens his eyes, glancing up at Dimitri. "But I know being in a town is going to be a big change for you...and since you'd stand out too much in a village, we can't even start you small. So I want to make sure you're adjusting okay before we leave for that."
--
Claude rubbing his face against his chest is both endearing and a funny little feeling that he thinks he could get used to. Unfortunately, the sensation takes something of a back seat compared to the topic he's bringing up, and Dimitri looks away from him to focus on some unimportant spot along the table. Already, underneath Claude's body, he's slowly starting to tense up. Not enormously, not even anything he consciously could pick up... but definitely tensing up regardless.
"I... will do what is necessary." He made his way through the city when Claude helped him escape just fine, didn't he? That he can barely remembers a lot of it, that it had all been a blur with him following Claude more than anything else, and the city had been dark and empty... Well. Dimitri doesn't think too hard on that.
--
"I'm sorry," Claude murmurs. "We're not quite out of the woods yet, so it might be stressful for a little while longer. But as soon as we're in lands where Intseh are truly common...then we can take whatever time you need. Not only will you not stand out, but even if anyone did recognize you, they'd have a hell of a time dragging you off without causing an uproar."
---
"They would have a time dragging me off regardless." That much, Dimitri can say with a little more certainty. With the brand disrupted as it is, no longer making him so easy to control... Anyone in the church would find themselves choking on their own blood before their weapons could properly contain or harm him.
Then again, this is probably what Claude is trying to avoid.
Dimitri shifts, looking back towards the fire. "....I'm not sure what I will do. What I should do."
--
"What do you want to do?"
--
Claude chuckles quietly. "We can't get more cheese if we don't."
--
Dammit. Dimitri slumps a little bit, still staring at the fire like a spoiled child. "...I couldn't get more cheese."
--
"You're not curious what kinds there are?" Claude wheedles. "Maybe even getting to pick out what kind you get yourself?"
--
Truly, Claude von Reigan is too clever for his own good. Dimitri's slump makes it almost seem as though he's going to curl up against Claude's back. "I want every cheese. You know what kind of cheese I like."
--
Claude laughs, wrapping his arms around Dimitri. "I know it'll be tough, but you've endured way worse than being part of a crowd. And I'll be with you, okay?"
--
Claude might like shoving his face against Dimitri's warm, furry, soft, muscular chest, but Dimitri clearly has the same thoughts about his hair considering how he buries his face into those curls again. "....With the things I've endured, I know them. I cannot imagine myself with other people, now."
--
"Don't think you know what people are like in general just because you've known the people of the church." Claude grins. "That's like a fish in a pond thinking it understands the ocean. I'm not going to make any sweeping statements about people in general, but I've got a lot of friends who I think you'll like well enough."
--
That makes Dimitri look back at least. "Friends you'd be willing to introduce an executioner you stole from the church?"
--
"What other kinds of friends are worth having?"
--
"I thought.... you had many friends." It's just as Claude has said, after all. He does lie to a lot of people. Most people, in fact, with Dimitri supposedly the exception.
--
"I do," Claude says agreeably. "And they're all friends I'd be willing to introduce you to, because those are the only kinds of friends I'd bother keeping."
--
That's... something, he supposes. Dimitri isn't sure how much he trusts other people (the answer is in fact: zero), but he trusts Claude. If he says they're someone he can trust with a matter such as this... "Then... I will look forward to meeting them." A beat. "I think."
Although now that they're speaking of travel, Dimitri is left with questions of his own. "There will be others on the road, won't there? Especially while we are still near to the monastery, and I will be looked for. Is it fine for me to be riding on Ashi....?"
--
Claude hums thoughtfully. "Honestly, I haven't considered that too much. If it happens, though, I'll deal with it somehow. Maybe we'll outride anyone who looks like they might question us...or I can bluff us past. I'll kill if I have to, but I'd rather not have it come to that."
--
"I could kill, if it is needed," Dimitri offers. This is probably not something he should volunteer so easily to do... And the quiet vein of vengeful vindictive pleasure in his tone isn't helping matters. It might even take away slightly from his next point of, "If they do not know of your involvement in my escape, then it would be better for one of theirs to look killed by my claws instead of your arrows."
--
"Not at all," Claude replies idly. "For one thing, a person obviously killed by Intseh claws doesn't just point to you - it paints you as a potential danger to humans, and makes the church seem justified in hunting you down. But an arrow...that's more anonymous. It could've been bandits. And it doesn't necessarily have any connection to a runaway Intseh executioner. I don't blame you for wanting to kill them, but unless we can easily hide the body of someone we kill on the road without being caught - which we can't - my way is safer."
--
"Tch." That definitely gives away some of Dimitri's more selfish intentions, and there's a light thwap of his tail hitting the floor. "That counts even with your particular type of arrows?" Dimitri has no idea how common that kind of weapon magic is, or if it's something more in line with what the church uses.
--
"Sure. The magic doesn't last long, so the arrow itself will dissipate. Depending on how familiar they are with the wounds left by light arrows, they may not even recognize them as arrow wounds at all - they might think it's something like a stab wound from a rapier or lance. Or maybe a thin dagger."
--
"....Fine." There's no hiding his disappointment; Dimitri isn't even trying to. "It still seems as though, in most cases, unless we kill them, we'll be recognized. Should I at least ride a distance away from you?"
--
"No way," Claude says firmly. "Whatever trouble we get into from now on, we're in it together." He pats Dimitri's shoulder. "Besides, we might be able to pull it off. If you're wearing your cloak with the hood up, people might not even be able to tell you're an Intseh. Granted, I'll have to do some very smooth talking to avoid anyone even trying to get a look under the hood, but I think I can pull it off."
--
This argument feels equal measures heartwarming and frustrating, and Dimitri is inclined towards the latter right now. With a flat stare, he gestures downwards to- "The cloak can't hide my feet, Claude." When he's walking, Dimitri supposes he has the benefit of the cloak covering up the vast majority of his body so that anyone who'd see him wouldn't be inclined to look any further down simply thanks to assumptions. He's fairly certain that won't work so well when he's riding Ashi.
--
Claude blinks, then laughs a little sheepishly, running a hand through his hair. "Good point. Well, they can't all be winners. We'll just have to take it as it comes, then."
--
Dimitri gives a low growl. "I don't like it. I know I am already burdening you as it is, with the risks that are at stake, but I do not like to do so now, for something so important, where you would prefer to have my claws tied as well."
--
"It's not necessarily about what I prefer, Dimitri; it's about what's going to work the best. What's going to serve our plans the best, keep us safest." Claude takes one of Dimitri's hands. "But if it comes to that...I'd prefer if you didn't ever have to kill anyone else. Yes, even if you want to. It'd be more of the church's forcing you to stain your hands when you never should have been put in that position by them in the first place.
"You don't want to kill people from the church because you like killing; you want to kill them because of the things they did to you. Because they're the monsters. And I can't blame you for that...but killing them doesn't actually help you. It doesn't undo anything you've gone through. It's just more fallout of what they did to you, and I want to get you away from that." He meets Dimitri's gaze with a clear, firm one of his own. "But like I said - that's just how I feel about it, not why I'm making this call. I don't want you to kill people on the road because it'll make you easier for them to find, and give them more excuses for why people should help them run you to ground. I'm not going to give them those weapons."
--
The growl is escalating, now, fang showing past his lips, and Claude will be able to feel Dimitri shaking slightly underneath him. "If this is about what is to work best, then I should not be riding alongside you!" His hand curls, claws pressing further into Claude's side again. "Because I will not be the one to put you in danger.
"Either I will keep you out of it to start with, or I'll slaughter them whether you like it or not, but I will not let anyone living person get back to the church and tell them that you are traveling with their escaped executioner! Because that is what would happen if we attempted to outride anyone- they would still know."He doesn't address Claude's other points, about his need for vengeance, about how violence is tied in him. If he does.... If he does....
Dimitri doesn't want to think about it too much. If he argues it, he feels as though he might lose... and he doesn't want that. Not right now.
--
"And I'm supposed to be too far away to help you if you end up in danger?" Claude asks sharply. "That's what you're asking me to do, you know. Face a danger that you don't deserve to be in, that's not your fault, on your own if it comes. I know why you don't want to put me in danger, Dimitri, but breaking you out in the first place was my choice. Any danger that comes with that, I signed up for."
He reaches up and cups Dimitri's face in his hands, not intimidated by those fangs or that growl. "And remember, Dimitri - it's not about whether they know I've turned against them. It's whether or not they can do anything about it. They aren't going to be able to follow us even if they figure out who I'm with, not when we're going to a major city that they can't easily track us in. And anyone who wants to report us to the church would have to not only not chase us, but ride in the opposite direction, maybe for days if they can't find any of the church's hunters between them and the monastery, to pass on the news. By that time we'd be impossible to find, and impossible to catch up to. And once we're out of lands under their influence, especially once we reach Devan-Intseh, they can't just drag you off for being an escaped slave, or me for helping you."
He sits back. "In any case, I think you misunderstood me when I said 'outride'. I was thinking that, if we see anyone on the road behind us, we can kick the horses into a gallop and avoid the pursuit entirely - so that they never get close - and if we see anyone on the road in front of us, we kick the horses into a gallop and blow past them before they even get a chance to see who we are at all. Not exactly the most sophisticated plan either way, but riding fast on the roads isn't a crime. They might chase us, just on the basis of the galloping being suspicious, but they might just decide it's long odds and not worth the trouble of playing them, too. It's not as risky as you think."
--
Touch anchors him. Touch tugs him into the present, into something solid, something still so new and rare in a lot of ways. His face is still contorted, growl shaking throughout his body, but he keeps it low. He doesn't fight against it. He just stays in Claude's hands, kneading into his skin gently.
"I hate this." His voice is hoarse, uneven. The growl isn't entirely letting up. "I hate my existence putting you into danger like this. That I can do nothing against it but run, that I will have to assume and pray it will work."
--
"It's not your existence," Claude murmurs, green eyes boring into a single blue one. "It's the church. The church is what's putting us both in danger, all right? It's not you. I'll make you repeat those words if I have to."
He rests his forehead against Dimitri's. "And listening to me, doing what's best for both of us - that's pretty big, considering how much you hate the church. Don't think that isn't helping, or that it isn't the same as 'doing something'. A body found to have been obviously killed by an Intseh, that points the church in our direction? That puts me in danger too, maybe more than I'd ever be in facing them down on the road. They could catch up to us without warning, in numbers, if they know where to look for you. This way we can pick our battles, and avoid their knowing anything at all. You're fighting against all your instincts and your feelings to do what's best for me - for both of us - and nobody could ask for more than that."
--
He sinks against Claude, wanting more of the touch he gives him so freely, needing more of it. Bit by bit, his fangs are hidden again, but the quiet tremble of his body is a little more difficult to ease down so much. "Just because you do not ask for more," he finally says, voice still wound tight, "does not mean more could not be asked." He wants to do more, wishes he could offer more to Claude immediately instead of having to wait for so long as he figures out even basic tasks.
His eye falls shut. "I... am so tired." Holding himself back takes all of his energy and attention, all the moreso considering how sharply he had gone from quietly content to upset.
--
Claude leans in to press a soft kiss to his mouth. "I'm sorry," he murmurs. "I wish I could make things easier than this. I wish I could give you the life you've always deserved to have faster than this. But all I can do is promise that it's not always going to be like this. Things are already better than they've been for you, pretty much ever, right? I know it's still hard, and it's going to be hard for a few weeks longer...but then, Dimitri, you're going to be free. Things are only going to get better from here. The church won't have any hold over you anymore. Whatever challenges come after that - because life's never perfect - at least they'll be different ones. And probably a lot less unpleasant."
--
And then he'll be free. Funny. He thought all of this- being able to sleep in a bed, running around out of a cage and out of an execution ring, allowed to touch someone, love someone- he thought that was him being free. But freedom... seems to be so much more than merely being out of a cage.
"Will I actually be free?" he asks quietly, finally smoothing his fingers over Claude's skin. He's almost guaranteed to have more marks on his body now, after all of that. "After everything...."
--
Claude smiles, somewhat ruefully. "Well...there's given values of freedom, aren't there? Right now, you have the freedom of no longer being locked up. The freedom I want for you, that all of this is aimed to giving you, is for the church to no longer have any direct influence over your life. The freedom to not be affected by the church at all anymore, subconsciously or emotionally...that might take years. And the freedom to be the person you would have been if the church had never touched you...they robbed you of that, and there's no way to give that back to you.
"So I guess, to answer that question...it depends on what you mean by 'free'."
--
He rather figured that was going to be the answer, or something like it. Dimitri closes his eye again.
The day has... felt like too much. The morning brought with it a sense of awe, an unreality, that he could ever get to be out and see the full expanse of a forest ever again, along with a kind of choking misery that his own kin had missed out on such chances because of such a trite thing as luck. It'd been followed by rage, a despairing sort, where he'd wanted to tear everything in the world down to the ground and see it burn, because if it were all ashes at his feet, maybe it would be worth it. Excitement, next, so much so that he had felt the least like himself he'd ever been in all his years alive....
Love. An aching love. A fluttering love. Shy, adoring. Arousing. Wanting. Possessive.
And now, he feels as though he's come full circle, with the full weight of... everything bearing down on him, his wrath brought back down to shimmering embers waiting to ignite again while, in the meantime, everything else is just... ashes.
A part of him... feels like him again. The worst part of him, locked behind bars, a long and slow death.
"I want to go to sleep," is all he says, quietly.
--
There's pain in Claude's eyes; he can tell that Dimitri's mood has been brought low, and that there's nothing he can do, nothing he can promise, to fix it. He can't make this any easier than it's going to be, and it'd be immoral for him to act like he can. He'd be lying to Dimitri in the face of the trust that it's so important for him to keep.
But gods, he aches to. He wants to tell Dimitri that everything will be all right. That he's going to heal from this, and be as good as new. But those aren't things he can promise. They're just things he can work and hope for, alongside him...and the work they both have to do is hard, and unfair, and neither of them should have ever had to do it, and he can't change that either.
"Okay," he murmurs, voice barely audible. Carefully, he shifts himself off of Dimitri's lap, bracing himself on the table as he stands. "I'm gonna clean up."
He thinks he can stand on his own, by now. It's painful, he's going to have an absolutely embarrassing limp, but honestly the pain is kind of welcome right now. It feels a bit like a punishment, and a lot like a distraction, and he craves more than a little of both.
--
Possibly something that never helps is that, as low as Dimitri ever is, he'll always put himself lower when it comes to priorities, because he looks up when Claude rises up onto his feet. "You're still hurting," he says, getting up onto his own feet as well. "I'll take care of the things we used. Take a bath." He can go to sleep afterwards. Who knows? Perhaps the effort will even help spur his own exhaustion into something that will put him unconscious.
--
"So are you," Claude says gently. "I'll manage, Dimitri. I've handled worse than this. Go to bed; your day's been longer than mine." And he means that in several senses.
--
A fragile and bitter sort of smile crosses his face, all jagged glass. "I am always hurting," he replies. Even free, he's starting to realize that much. Despite whatever dreams he might have had as a child, or even as a teenager, becoming free isn't enough to soothe those hurts. Funny, how freedom seemed so much clear cut in his daydreams.
Still, he can recognize when they'll both get stubborn, so he offers, "At least with just one thing."
--
Dimitri's not the only one who'd daydreamed Dimitri's freedom as being simpler than this. Granted, Claude's an intelligent man and he'd thought he'd tempered his expectations to reality, he'd known it was never going to be simple or easy or painless, but apparently this is the kind of thing that's impossible to accurately predict without having lived it.
He never thought he'd be forced to helplessly watch Dimitri suffer ever again. He'd always known his friend would hurt beyond his cage, but he'd thought he'd always be able to do something about it now. The reality is a knife to the gut.
Claude gives Dimitri a strained smile. "It's not like I can force you, you know. Or like I would."
--
"For all you talk of taking advantage of me, perhaps it is the other way around." Still, Dimitri hesitates a moment before he raises his hand, cradling Claude's face. He doesn't know what to say, or what he can say. It feels as though, whenever he forgets to look, their linked past is hurting them again. Leaving them aching, silently and invisibly bleeding out, until they're both tired like this. Their moment in the stables had been a hint of it... but it can get worse, apparently.
Then again, he supposes he knew that from the start. That's the thing, about living a life with its peaks and valleys, a life that isn't a plain of dull misery. Things can always get worse, now.
Eventually, he pulls his hand down, and goes to get the various little ingredients that Claude had used in cooking the fish. It's not a lot, just flour and butter, what's left of a lemon, but they're all things that should go back down into the pantry... and with how Claude is, Dimitri finds it better to do it himself.
--
Claude, meanwhile, focuses on what's left of the roasted fish, which is what he's really worried about - anyone who's ever let fish spoil never wants to smell it again. He painfully makes his way over to the door, to take the head and bones outside to dispose of.
--
When Claude comes back from disposing of the fish, he'll find Dimitri's head poking out from the pantry cellar, ears tilted back. "...You're limping."
--
"Yeah?" Claude's not exactly sure why this is a surprise to Dimitri. That's why he's been carried all day, isn't it?
--
"Claude." It's one thing to know that Claude should be carried. It's another to see him actually limping as a consequence. "Please let me take care of everything else."
--
"I don't enjoy feeling useless any more than you do, you know," Claude replies, even as he makes his way over to the table while doing his best to disguise the limp. Or at least downplay it. "Maybe I can't make things better for you, or make them go faster for you...but I can at least make them a little easier for you. Even if it's just in mundane ways."
--
"You have been doing that ever since you first met me." And then met him again, some decades later. Dimitri drags himself out of the pantry, closing the door securely. "How do you start a fire?"
--
"Huh?" Claude blinks, glancing over to the fire which hasn't died down that much yet. "Why do you want to know?"
--
"I want to start up the bath for you."
--
That gets another blink, and then a slight smile. "Are you coming with me?"
--
"I was in the lake, so I think I am clean enough..." Because that's the same thing as a proper shower and bath, right? Dimitri's standards of cleanliness are truly and well fucked. "But..." He glances towards the table. "...If you would want me to."
--
"I always want you." It would sound flippant, downright flirtatious, said in another tone of voice, but it sounds soft and warm instead. "Besides, I could argue that I'm clean because I got rinsed off after sex, right? So I'm not sure this is about cleanliness here."
Claude doesn't consider swimming in the lake to be the same as washing in filtered water at all, but he doesn't think he'll need to resort to that argument.
--
"....True." He has to admit that cleanliness definitely wasn't on his mind when he asked, and Dimitri runs his fingers back into his hair. "But when I was sore after riding Ashi... It felt better to be in there. The same should apply to how you feel. So.... how do I do it? I will make do with instructions."
--
Claude chuckles. "Well, it's easier if I show you, so let's at least go in there so I can point at the things I'm talking about, okay?" And he limps for the bathroom.
--
Gathering everything carefully in his hands, Dimitri places even more care when he goes to gather Claude up in his arms. "You're going through the effort to teach me. Paying close attention is the least I can do." He tucks Claude into the crook of one arm so that he can better put away the tools once they're outside of Ashi's stall.
"And I find it easier when I'm doing it as well, I believe... Things start making sense that aren't as clear from instructions."
--
Claude nods. "I figured as much. Anything I can show you how to do, I'll show you. I think seeing someone do it makes it easier to do yourself...though, of course, that isn't something that can be done for everything."
--
"It would be far too easy if the world were like that..." Dimitri shakes his head a little bit, leaving the stables and making sure everything is carefully closed behind him. He wouldn't want anything to get in there with the horses, after all. Then, back into the cabin, where the fire seems to have worked itself up to a proper flame without them tending to it. Dimitri sets Claude back down to a comfortable pile of cape.
"Preparing fish... Is it similar to how you prepared the animal from last night, or are there differences?" An animal is an animal, true, but, well. Fur and scales are different. Dimitri just isn't sure entirely how different beyond that.
--
"A lot of differences," Claude laughs. "Mostly it's the bones. Fish have a ton of little bones - they can be dangerous, honestly. Depending on the fish, it can be easier to cut filets of fish away from the bones - which is pretty much all spine and ribcage - and cook them that way, to remove the bones as carefully as possible, or to just cook the fish whole and pick the meat off the bones with a fork. Fish meat can have very different textures, depending on the fish, which you might remember from eating it; that last one is better on fish with firm flesh that holds together in chunks than really delicate, flaky fish. Or bigger fish, since bigger bones mean that they're easier to eat around. We may be able to get away with cooking our own bigger fish whole; for the little ones, I think I'll cut them into filets. You can remove the scales either by cutting off the skin or scraping the scales off, but honestly I don't think I'm gonna do either today. If you don't like the skin you can just leave it."
Claude pauses, looking thoughtful. "I'm gonna need a few things. Bowls, an egg, some flour and butter, a lemon, salt and pepper, a plank, and a sharp sliver of wood about as thick as a finger. And my knife, of course, but I've already got that."
The next half hour is a busy one, as Claude directs Dimitri into helping him skewer the large fish by the tail to the plank to prop up and cook near the fire, then breads and fries filets of the smaller fish. Dimitri will have plenty of interest to watch and learn, assuming the smell as the larger fish slowly roasts doesn't drive him insane. At one point Claude flips the bigger fish over to cook the other side, too, burning his fingers - and swearing - only a little.
And then - finally - both kinds of fish are ready to eat. Claude grins at Dimitri as the larger fish, and the plank it cooked on, are transferred to the table. "You know, the irony is that you love cheese at least as much as you've ever liked fish, but cheese and fish don't tend to go together well. Cheese is too strong a flavor for a meat as delicate as fish..."
--
If there's any good news, it's that Dimitri is always eager and interested to learn, especially if that learning can immediately be transferred into helping Claude with whatever is needed. The fish is a temptation for the longest time, with his gaze constantly flicking over to it, but he does an admirable job of staying on focus. Physically, he can ignore a lot of things, honestly.
Still, it'd be a lie to say he's anything but relieved when they're finally done, and Dimitri is rather pleased as he carts Claude last of all to the table after the food is taken. "All cheese?" he asks incredulously. "But there's so many types..." Claude has brought him quite a variety, and he knows there's even more out there in the world.
--
"Almost all of it," Claude agrees. "Fish has a pretty subtle flavor, you know? Even the mildest cheeses can overwhelm it. Some people eat them together anyway, but usually fish and cheese together means you only taste cheese, so there's not that much point to the fish."
--
"Oh." The disappointment is palatable as Dimitri sits down with Claude on his lap again. This is going to be a constant thing, at least until Claude can start walking again. Dimitri will be disappointed by that, too. "The world is truly not perfect...."
They just had a talk on complicated politics and xenophobia, but the cheese and fish problem really does drive it home. Apparently.
--
Claude kisses Dimitri's jaw. "Eat them separately," he advises, with a grin. Then he pulls over the plate he put the fried fish on; he had a feeling they'd be eating like this, so why use more than one plate? "For the big fish, we can just use forks to take what we want off of it."
But before that, Claude is cutting a bite of the fried fish filet he made and offering it to Dimitri on his fork.
--
This is one of a few reasons now why Dimitri was more than interested in keeping Claude on his lap, besides the fact that he's grown to like it rather rapidly in the course of a day. A low rumble of a purr goes through him before he accepts the bite. "Are we always going to have fish after we have sex?" he asks, smiling just a little bit as he takes the fork in turn so that he can get a cut. This time, he won't let Claude spoil him one-sidedly. He's getting in on this as well.
--
Claude laughs. "Do you want to? It might not always be the most convenient thing to arrange, but we could try it." He's also not going to object if Dimitri wants to feed him.
--
"I would like fish at any time, but this seems as though tit has happened twice in a row, now." Having Claude accept a bite seems to cheer him up considerably.
--
Claude pauses, blinking...then laughs. "You're right, I did bring you fish that night, didn't I? I forgot." He brought Dimitri a lot of meals; remembering which he brought when isn't something he kept track of much.
--
"I remember everything you've ever brought me." this is honestly less impressive than it sounds; there wasn't really a lot of competition for Dimitri's memory space. Food and language lessons had plenty of free real estate. "But that was... definitely very memorable." He continues to feed Claude, not inclined to stop until he's told to.
--
Claude takes his next bite, but then leans across the table to dig out a forkful of the roasted fish before settling back against Dimitri's chest to offer it to him. "I definitely remember the stuff I brought you, because I had a lot of fun shopping for you, thinking of what you'd like...but I don't necessarily remember when I brought you each specific thing."
--
Tasting the different ways each fish has been prepared is deeply satisfying, and Dimitri enjoys the flavor much like he did the first time Claude brought him some back in his cage- eyes closed, sighing softly. The first time, it had tasted so much like the home he could only distantly remember being taken from. Now... It feels like he's starting to associate different memories with the food. Good ones, but... different.
"I remembered if only to begin keeping track of time again... It used to not matter how much time had passed." Claude changed that.
--
Claude watches Dimitri with a soft expression that most of his friends would tease him mercilessly for, if they ever saw it. Claude's always been a casual, easygoing person whose emotions are nonetheless extremely difficult to perceive or pin down; to see him so openly besotted would be hilarious to most of the people who know him. Eventually, Claude will probably get more accustomed to the way he feels and the way he gets to be with Dimitri, but for now it's still new and intense. And there are moments, like now, where Claude remembers what Dimitri was like when he first found him, and is able to directly juxtapose that with Dimitri as he is now. Seeing how much happier Dimitri is, and knowing that he himself played a large part in making that happen, is more life-affirming than anything else Claude's ever managed to do.
(Yet.)
"Did you start keeping track to see if I'd show up when I said I would?" Claude had always tried to let Dimitri know exactly when he'd show up again. Not only did he know that Dimitri would think himself abandoned - perhaps even betrayed - by hope yet again if Claude failed to show up when Dimitri might have expected him, but he hadn't been able to bear the thought of disappointing him. Of Dimitri waiting and hoping for him some night, only to feel increasingly dejected and forgotten when Claude didn't show.
Claude had sweated about that. He'd made sure to inform Dimitri of exactly what nights he could come, and what nights he couldn't, and he'd never failed to show on a night he said he would. The alternative was impermissible.
--
Considering the one time he hadn't shown when Dimitri had assumed he would, very early on in the visits between them, and how that lack of stimulation had worked Dimitri up into a restless frenzy to the point that he'd had to check Claude wasn't a hallucination again... The constant updates on when he could appear and when he couldn't, along with sticking to his word, had truly helped Dimitri almost as much as the visits themselves had. Rousing himself out of enjoying the fish, he nods slightly before he realizes just what kind of expression Claude is wearing. Seeing such a soft look...
Putting the fork down, he reaches up to curl his fingers along Claude's jaw. "At first... It was to try and prepare myself. I thought... one of those days, you would lie. One of those days, you wouldn't come... You'd never come again. If I could prepare myself for that inevitability, if I knew it was coming. And soon, the days began to have meaning, even when I fought against it. I didn't want to be happy."
--
Claude leans into that touch. "I knew that's what you'd think. That's why I always told you when I knew I'd be coming, and when I knew I wouldn't...or, if I wasn't sure, that I might not show and you shouldn't read into it too much if I didn't. I didn't ever want you to think I'd abandoned you."
--
"You never broke those promises." His fingers smooth out, cupping Claude's cheek properly. "I want to thank you for that. I was preparing to thank you before, as well... Or at least, I was beginning to have such thoughts. I had planned to make it... before the next execution. Yet I don't have worry about such dates. Not anymore."
--
"I never want to break any promise I make to you." Claude closes his eyes. "I know how important they are. And...I may not be the most trustworthy guy, in fact most people would call me the exact opposite of trustworthy and they'd be right, but I want the people I care about to know they can rely on me. And your trust is more important than anyone else's to me." He opens his eyes, grinning up at Dimitri. "So you don't have to thank me. My reward's the trust I've earned."
--
"No they wouldn't," Dimitri counters immediately, frowning. "You are trustworthy. A person who would risk so much to save another, who wants to stop so much injustice, is trustworthy. Anyone who wouldn't trust you does not know you." That Claude makes himself hard to know is something Dimitri hasn't really seen too much yet, and has only seen in the context of being an asshole to people like Carnius, which is, frankly, well deserved, so, fuck them.
-
"Dimitri," Claude says, laughing, "I'm literally a double agent of sorts within the church. I'm lying to almost everyone I meet, all the time. I'm definitely not trustworthy! Trustworthy isn't the same as good, anyway, the way you're acting like they're synonymous." Claude's eyes twinkle. "Haven't you ever heard of a good liar?"
--
The hand that's been gently cradling Claude's face now uses it to shove at his face every so slightly, matching the annoyed flicking of Dimitri's tail. "You know for a fact that I have not. I do not see what the difference is between trustworthy and good anyway. If you're good, then you should be trustworthy."
--
"You only think that because you're naturally honest," Claude says fondly, patting Dimitri's cheek. "And that's how honest people think. But natural-born bastards like myself know that sometimes the best way to be good is to not be trustworthy." He grins. "Me being completely untrustworthy is why we're both here, now. Don't knock it too much. Being a dyed-in-the-wool liar has its time and place."
--
"You're not a bastard," Dimitri grumbles, eye narrowing while his tail continues to beat a mark into the floor at the rate it's going. Even with the flaws he knows Claude has, to hear such names be directed at Claude even by Claude himself is inexcusable. "And I trust you, so you are trustworthy. If the church does not, then they never deserved any trust in the first place in turn." The church doesn't deserve to even exist, so it's not like there's a lot lower to go.
--
Claude chuckles, reaching up with both hands now to draw Dimitri down into a lingering kiss. When he pulls away, he only does so enough to rest their foreheads together. "I love you," he murmurs. "And I know you love me, which is why you're doing this adorable defending me thing that you're doing. And I know I'm probably a better man than anyone you've had a chance to associate with in decades. But believe me, one day, once you're used to me and you've met more good people, you'll be able to accept that I'm just as flawed as anyone else. And I'm pretty sure - I hope - that you'll still love me anyway."
Has Claude said something like this before? He feels like he's said something like this before. Not surprising, perhaps, since Dimitri reacts like this anytime Claude levels the least amount of self-deprecation at himself (or, in this case, objective fact that can be construed as negative) and Claude always has the same thoughts when Dimitri acts like this.
"But for now, let's enjoy our fish before it goes cold."
--
Claude has most certainly said this kind of thing before... and perhaps, in the future, will have to say it a couple more times, considering how Dimitri tilts his head a little bit in clear indication that he's looking away with a faint frown. It's not something that can be easily taken in, right now... But Claude is right. Only further experience with other people and the whole world in general will help change Dimitri's thoughts and perceptions.
...Still.
"I will never call you a bastard, even if I find other good people," he mutters, not really noticing the subconscious 'if' that worms its way into his sentence. Other people are still an unknown, with the bad outweighing the one good he truly knows. Regardless, he lets go of Claude's face, finally picking up the fork. He's going to beat you to the feeding punch on this one, Claude, although he falls back into a more steady back and forth afterwards until at least one fish is starting to become more bone than meat.
--
Claude chuckles. "That's fair. I'm sure there's things you'll say about yourself that I'll never agree with, either. But for the record, I'm not really coming down on myself much when I say these things. I don't consider being a bastard too much of a bad thing. In fact, sometimes I think being a bastard is the best way to get good and necessary things done..."
And then he's being fed fish, and he has to shut up. Probably just as well; he's not sure if someone as proper as Dimitri will ever quite be able to accept the need for selective bastardry.
--
An important thing to apparently note: Sometimes, the only way to shut up Claude von Reigan is to physically interrupt his ability to talk at all, whether with food or something else entirely.
Dimitri makes sure to keep this important fact stored away in his mind for later.
For now, he focuses on feeding and being fed. When they're both done, he slumps with slightly more content against Claude's back. In the comfortable dimness of the cabin, it.... feels more like the hazy memories he has from his childhood than anything else he's had so far. It's comfortable, in most ways. In other ways, it... only brings up more thoughts and questions, as he's been experiencing ever since Claude helped him leave the walls of that wretched city.
Best he can, he tries not to get swept up in them once again. Instead, he murmurs, "I was going to take you swimming after fishing.... I forgot."
--
Claude hums where he's relaxing against Dimitri's chest. "Maybe it's just as well my lesson waits until I'm less sore. I probably don't need any additional handicaps in that area, you know?" His eyes are closed; it's not so much that he needs sleep, really, since they slept in so late - himself especially - but the cabin is dim and warm, and Dimitri is comfortable, and Claude is almost entirely relaxed. There's only one thing left for him to be tense about...and he brings it up now.
"So when do you think you'll be ready to move on from here? We can spend as much as a week here, if we need to, but...the sooner we can travel, the sooner we can get far enough away from the northern church and its influence that there won't be any danger to you anymore. And the longer we stay here, the more likely it is someone affiliated with the church might show up."
--
"It would be good for that..." Dimitri has a lot of thoughts on swimming right now, but he stores them away for later. He's starting to get an idea for when Claude is gearing up to speak to him, through various little things- most of which he couldn't even explain himself yet if asked. Instinct, really. Patiently, he listens to Claude, and curls his claws along where they're wrapped around his middle.
"...You still need a little time to recover." A tinge of shame accompanies the words; Dimitri feels he really should have been thinking with something that wasn't his dick when he not only had sex with Claude but, well. The amount of marks on his body speaks for themselves, really. "Another day or two.... at the very least."
--
"I'm more worried about you than me. It's just aches, really. You have a lot more to adjust to, being free after so long and learning all these things you didn't have the chance to before." Claude absently rubs his cheek against Dimitri's fur; it's so damn soft. "Our next stop is probably going to be a town a few days' ride from here. We're heading south, away from the church, but even at a big town like the one we're going to, far from the monastery, Intseh aren't too common. The good news is that they're not unheard of, either, even if most of them are just merchants or travelers passing through, so you won't be all that suspicious."
He opens his eyes, glancing up at Dimitri. "But I know being in a town is going to be a big change for you...and since you'd stand out too much in a village, we can't even start you small. So I want to make sure you're adjusting okay before we leave for that."
--
Claude rubbing his face against his chest is both endearing and a funny little feeling that he thinks he could get used to. Unfortunately, the sensation takes something of a back seat compared to the topic he's bringing up, and Dimitri looks away from him to focus on some unimportant spot along the table. Already, underneath Claude's body, he's slowly starting to tense up. Not enormously, not even anything he consciously could pick up... but definitely tensing up regardless.
"I... will do what is necessary." He made his way through the city when Claude helped him escape just fine, didn't he? That he can barely remembers a lot of it, that it had all been a blur with him following Claude more than anything else, and the city had been dark and empty... Well. Dimitri doesn't think too hard on that.
--
"I'm sorry," Claude murmurs. "We're not quite out of the woods yet, so it might be stressful for a little while longer. But as soon as we're in lands where Intseh are truly common...then we can take whatever time you need. Not only will you not stand out, but even if anyone did recognize you, they'd have a hell of a time dragging you off without causing an uproar."
---
"They would have a time dragging me off regardless." That much, Dimitri can say with a little more certainty. With the brand disrupted as it is, no longer making him so easy to control... Anyone in the church would find themselves choking on their own blood before their weapons could properly contain or harm him.
Then again, this is probably what Claude is trying to avoid.
Dimitri shifts, looking back towards the fire. "....I'm not sure what I will do. What I should do."
--
"What do you want to do?"
--
Claude chuckles quietly. "We can't get more cheese if we don't."
--
Dammit. Dimitri slumps a little bit, still staring at the fire like a spoiled child. "...I couldn't get more cheese."
--
"You're not curious what kinds there are?" Claude wheedles. "Maybe even getting to pick out what kind you get yourself?"
--
Truly, Claude von Reigan is too clever for his own good. Dimitri's slump makes it almost seem as though he's going to curl up against Claude's back. "I want every cheese. You know what kind of cheese I like."
--
Claude laughs, wrapping his arms around Dimitri. "I know it'll be tough, but you've endured way worse than being part of a crowd. And I'll be with you, okay?"
--
Claude might like shoving his face against Dimitri's warm, furry, soft, muscular chest, but Dimitri clearly has the same thoughts about his hair considering how he buries his face into those curls again. "....With the things I've endured, I know them. I cannot imagine myself with other people, now."
--
"Don't think you know what people are like in general just because you've known the people of the church." Claude grins. "That's like a fish in a pond thinking it understands the ocean. I'm not going to make any sweeping statements about people in general, but I've got a lot of friends who I think you'll like well enough."
--
That makes Dimitri look back at least. "Friends you'd be willing to introduce an executioner you stole from the church?"
--
"What other kinds of friends are worth having?"
--
"I thought.... you had many friends." It's just as Claude has said, after all. He does lie to a lot of people. Most people, in fact, with Dimitri supposedly the exception.
--
"I do," Claude says agreeably. "And they're all friends I'd be willing to introduce you to, because those are the only kinds of friends I'd bother keeping."
--
That's... something, he supposes. Dimitri isn't sure how much he trusts other people (the answer is in fact: zero), but he trusts Claude. If he says they're someone he can trust with a matter such as this... "Then... I will look forward to meeting them." A beat. "I think."
Although now that they're speaking of travel, Dimitri is left with questions of his own. "There will be others on the road, won't there? Especially while we are still near to the monastery, and I will be looked for. Is it fine for me to be riding on Ashi....?"
--
Claude hums thoughtfully. "Honestly, I haven't considered that too much. If it happens, though, I'll deal with it somehow. Maybe we'll outride anyone who looks like they might question us...or I can bluff us past. I'll kill if I have to, but I'd rather not have it come to that."
--
"I could kill, if it is needed," Dimitri offers. This is probably not something he should volunteer so easily to do... And the quiet vein of vengeful vindictive pleasure in his tone isn't helping matters. It might even take away slightly from his next point of, "If they do not know of your involvement in my escape, then it would be better for one of theirs to look killed by my claws instead of your arrows."
--
"Not at all," Claude replies idly. "For one thing, a person obviously killed by Intseh claws doesn't just point to you - it paints you as a potential danger to humans, and makes the church seem justified in hunting you down. But an arrow...that's more anonymous. It could've been bandits. And it doesn't necessarily have any connection to a runaway Intseh executioner. I don't blame you for wanting to kill them, but unless we can easily hide the body of someone we kill on the road without being caught - which we can't - my way is safer."
--
"Tch." That definitely gives away some of Dimitri's more selfish intentions, and there's a light thwap of his tail hitting the floor. "That counts even with your particular type of arrows?" Dimitri has no idea how common that kind of weapon magic is, or if it's something more in line with what the church uses.
--
"Sure. The magic doesn't last long, so the arrow itself will dissipate. Depending on how familiar they are with the wounds left by light arrows, they may not even recognize them as arrow wounds at all - they might think it's something like a stab wound from a rapier or lance. Or maybe a thin dagger."
--
"....Fine." There's no hiding his disappointment; Dimitri isn't even trying to. "It still seems as though, in most cases, unless we kill them, we'll be recognized. Should I at least ride a distance away from you?"
--
"No way," Claude says firmly. "Whatever trouble we get into from now on, we're in it together." He pats Dimitri's shoulder. "Besides, we might be able to pull it off. If you're wearing your cloak with the hood up, people might not even be able to tell you're an Intseh. Granted, I'll have to do some very smooth talking to avoid anyone even trying to get a look under the hood, but I think I can pull it off."
--
This argument feels equal measures heartwarming and frustrating, and Dimitri is inclined towards the latter right now. With a flat stare, he gestures downwards to- "The cloak can't hide my feet, Claude." When he's walking, Dimitri supposes he has the benefit of the cloak covering up the vast majority of his body so that anyone who'd see him wouldn't be inclined to look any further down simply thanks to assumptions. He's fairly certain that won't work so well when he's riding Ashi.
--
Claude blinks, then laughs a little sheepishly, running a hand through his hair. "Good point. Well, they can't all be winners. We'll just have to take it as it comes, then."
--
Dimitri gives a low growl. "I don't like it. I know I am already burdening you as it is, with the risks that are at stake, but I do not like to do so now, for something so important, where you would prefer to have my claws tied as well."
--
"It's not necessarily about what I prefer, Dimitri; it's about what's going to work the best. What's going to serve our plans the best, keep us safest." Claude takes one of Dimitri's hands. "But if it comes to that...I'd prefer if you didn't ever have to kill anyone else. Yes, even if you want to. It'd be more of the church's forcing you to stain your hands when you never should have been put in that position by them in the first place.
"You don't want to kill people from the church because you like killing; you want to kill them because of the things they did to you. Because they're the monsters. And I can't blame you for that...but killing them doesn't actually help you. It doesn't undo anything you've gone through. It's just more fallout of what they did to you, and I want to get you away from that." He meets Dimitri's gaze with a clear, firm one of his own. "But like I said - that's just how I feel about it, not why I'm making this call. I don't want you to kill people on the road because it'll make you easier for them to find, and give them more excuses for why people should help them run you to ground. I'm not going to give them those weapons."
--
The growl is escalating, now, fang showing past his lips, and Claude will be able to feel Dimitri shaking slightly underneath him. "If this is about what is to work best, then I should not be riding alongside you!" His hand curls, claws pressing further into Claude's side again. "Because I will not be the one to put you in danger.
"Either I will keep you out of it to start with, or I'll slaughter them whether you like it or not, but I will not let anyone living person get back to the church and tell them that you are traveling with their escaped executioner! Because that is what would happen if we attempted to outride anyone- they would still know."He doesn't address Claude's other points, about his need for vengeance, about how violence is tied in him. If he does.... If he does....
Dimitri doesn't want to think about it too much. If he argues it, he feels as though he might lose... and he doesn't want that. Not right now.
--
"And I'm supposed to be too far away to help you if you end up in danger?" Claude asks sharply. "That's what you're asking me to do, you know. Face a danger that you don't deserve to be in, that's not your fault, on your own if it comes. I know why you don't want to put me in danger, Dimitri, but breaking you out in the first place was my choice. Any danger that comes with that, I signed up for."
He reaches up and cups Dimitri's face in his hands, not intimidated by those fangs or that growl. "And remember, Dimitri - it's not about whether they know I've turned against them. It's whether or not they can do anything about it. They aren't going to be able to follow us even if they figure out who I'm with, not when we're going to a major city that they can't easily track us in. And anyone who wants to report us to the church would have to not only not chase us, but ride in the opposite direction, maybe for days if they can't find any of the church's hunters between them and the monastery, to pass on the news. By that time we'd be impossible to find, and impossible to catch up to. And once we're out of lands under their influence, especially once we reach Devan-Intseh, they can't just drag you off for being an escaped slave, or me for helping you."
He sits back. "In any case, I think you misunderstood me when I said 'outride'. I was thinking that, if we see anyone on the road behind us, we can kick the horses into a gallop and avoid the pursuit entirely - so that they never get close - and if we see anyone on the road in front of us, we kick the horses into a gallop and blow past them before they even get a chance to see who we are at all. Not exactly the most sophisticated plan either way, but riding fast on the roads isn't a crime. They might chase us, just on the basis of the galloping being suspicious, but they might just decide it's long odds and not worth the trouble of playing them, too. It's not as risky as you think."
--
Touch anchors him. Touch tugs him into the present, into something solid, something still so new and rare in a lot of ways. His face is still contorted, growl shaking throughout his body, but he keeps it low. He doesn't fight against it. He just stays in Claude's hands, kneading into his skin gently.
"I hate this." His voice is hoarse, uneven. The growl isn't entirely letting up. "I hate my existence putting you into danger like this. That I can do nothing against it but run, that I will have to assume and pray it will work."
--
"It's not your existence," Claude murmurs, green eyes boring into a single blue one. "It's the church. The church is what's putting us both in danger, all right? It's not you. I'll make you repeat those words if I have to."
He rests his forehead against Dimitri's. "And listening to me, doing what's best for both of us - that's pretty big, considering how much you hate the church. Don't think that isn't helping, or that it isn't the same as 'doing something'. A body found to have been obviously killed by an Intseh, that points the church in our direction? That puts me in danger too, maybe more than I'd ever be in facing them down on the road. They could catch up to us without warning, in numbers, if they know where to look for you. This way we can pick our battles, and avoid their knowing anything at all. You're fighting against all your instincts and your feelings to do what's best for me - for both of us - and nobody could ask for more than that."
--
He sinks against Claude, wanting more of the touch he gives him so freely, needing more of it. Bit by bit, his fangs are hidden again, but the quiet tremble of his body is a little more difficult to ease down so much. "Just because you do not ask for more," he finally says, voice still wound tight, "does not mean more could not be asked." He wants to do more, wishes he could offer more to Claude immediately instead of having to wait for so long as he figures out even basic tasks.
His eye falls shut. "I... am so tired." Holding himself back takes all of his energy and attention, all the moreso considering how sharply he had gone from quietly content to upset.
--
Claude leans in to press a soft kiss to his mouth. "I'm sorry," he murmurs. "I wish I could make things easier than this. I wish I could give you the life you've always deserved to have faster than this. But all I can do is promise that it's not always going to be like this. Things are already better than they've been for you, pretty much ever, right? I know it's still hard, and it's going to be hard for a few weeks longer...but then, Dimitri, you're going to be free. Things are only going to get better from here. The church won't have any hold over you anymore. Whatever challenges come after that - because life's never perfect - at least they'll be different ones. And probably a lot less unpleasant."
--
And then he'll be free. Funny. He thought all of this- being able to sleep in a bed, running around out of a cage and out of an execution ring, allowed to touch someone, love someone- he thought that was him being free. But freedom... seems to be so much more than merely being out of a cage.
"Will I actually be free?" he asks quietly, finally smoothing his fingers over Claude's skin. He's almost guaranteed to have more marks on his body now, after all of that. "After everything...."
--
Claude smiles, somewhat ruefully. "Well...there's given values of freedom, aren't there? Right now, you have the freedom of no longer being locked up. The freedom I want for you, that all of this is aimed to giving you, is for the church to no longer have any direct influence over your life. The freedom to not be affected by the church at all anymore, subconsciously or emotionally...that might take years. And the freedom to be the person you would have been if the church had never touched you...they robbed you of that, and there's no way to give that back to you.
"So I guess, to answer that question...it depends on what you mean by 'free'."
--
He rather figured that was going to be the answer, or something like it. Dimitri closes his eye again.
The day has... felt like too much. The morning brought with it a sense of awe, an unreality, that he could ever get to be out and see the full expanse of a forest ever again, along with a kind of choking misery that his own kin had missed out on such chances because of such a trite thing as luck. It'd been followed by rage, a despairing sort, where he'd wanted to tear everything in the world down to the ground and see it burn, because if it were all ashes at his feet, maybe it would be worth it. Excitement, next, so much so that he had felt the least like himself he'd ever been in all his years alive....
Love. An aching love. A fluttering love. Shy, adoring. Arousing. Wanting. Possessive.
And now, he feels as though he's come full circle, with the full weight of... everything bearing down on him, his wrath brought back down to shimmering embers waiting to ignite again while, in the meantime, everything else is just... ashes.
A part of him... feels like him again. The worst part of him, locked behind bars, a long and slow death.
"I want to go to sleep," is all he says, quietly.
--
There's pain in Claude's eyes; he can tell that Dimitri's mood has been brought low, and that there's nothing he can do, nothing he can promise, to fix it. He can't make this any easier than it's going to be, and it'd be immoral for him to act like he can. He'd be lying to Dimitri in the face of the trust that it's so important for him to keep.
But gods, he aches to. He wants to tell Dimitri that everything will be all right. That he's going to heal from this, and be as good as new. But those aren't things he can promise. They're just things he can work and hope for, alongside him...and the work they both have to do is hard, and unfair, and neither of them should have ever had to do it, and he can't change that either.
"Okay," he murmurs, voice barely audible. Carefully, he shifts himself off of Dimitri's lap, bracing himself on the table as he stands. "I'm gonna clean up."
He thinks he can stand on his own, by now. It's painful, he's going to have an absolutely embarrassing limp, but honestly the pain is kind of welcome right now. It feels a bit like a punishment, and a lot like a distraction, and he craves more than a little of both.
--
Possibly something that never helps is that, as low as Dimitri ever is, he'll always put himself lower when it comes to priorities, because he looks up when Claude rises up onto his feet. "You're still hurting," he says, getting up onto his own feet as well. "I'll take care of the things we used. Take a bath." He can go to sleep afterwards. Who knows? Perhaps the effort will even help spur his own exhaustion into something that will put him unconscious.
--
"So are you," Claude says gently. "I'll manage, Dimitri. I've handled worse than this. Go to bed; your day's been longer than mine." And he means that in several senses.
--
A fragile and bitter sort of smile crosses his face, all jagged glass. "I am always hurting," he replies. Even free, he's starting to realize that much. Despite whatever dreams he might have had as a child, or even as a teenager, becoming free isn't enough to soothe those hurts. Funny, how freedom seemed so much clear cut in his daydreams.
Still, he can recognize when they'll both get stubborn, so he offers, "At least with just one thing."
--
Dimitri's not the only one who'd daydreamed Dimitri's freedom as being simpler than this. Granted, Claude's an intelligent man and he'd thought he'd tempered his expectations to reality, he'd known it was never going to be simple or easy or painless, but apparently this is the kind of thing that's impossible to accurately predict without having lived it.
He never thought he'd be forced to helplessly watch Dimitri suffer ever again. He'd always known his friend would hurt beyond his cage, but he'd thought he'd always be able to do something about it now. The reality is a knife to the gut.
Claude gives Dimitri a strained smile. "It's not like I can force you, you know. Or like I would."
--
"For all you talk of taking advantage of me, perhaps it is the other way around." Still, Dimitri hesitates a moment before he raises his hand, cradling Claude's face. He doesn't know what to say, or what he can say. It feels as though, whenever he forgets to look, their linked past is hurting them again. Leaving them aching, silently and invisibly bleeding out, until they're both tired like this. Their moment in the stables had been a hint of it... but it can get worse, apparently.
Then again, he supposes he knew that from the start. That's the thing, about living a life with its peaks and valleys, a life that isn't a plain of dull misery. Things can always get worse, now.
Eventually, he pulls his hand down, and goes to get the various little ingredients that Claude had used in cooking the fish. It's not a lot, just flour and butter, what's left of a lemon, but they're all things that should go back down into the pantry... and with how Claude is, Dimitri finds it better to do it himself.
--
Claude, meanwhile, focuses on what's left of the roasted fish, which is what he's really worried about - anyone who's ever let fish spoil never wants to smell it again. He painfully makes his way over to the door, to take the head and bones outside to dispose of.
--
When Claude comes back from disposing of the fish, he'll find Dimitri's head poking out from the pantry cellar, ears tilted back. "...You're limping."
--
"Yeah?" Claude's not exactly sure why this is a surprise to Dimitri. That's why he's been carried all day, isn't it?
--
"Claude." It's one thing to know that Claude should be carried. It's another to see him actually limping as a consequence. "Please let me take care of everything else."
--
"I don't enjoy feeling useless any more than you do, you know," Claude replies, even as he makes his way over to the table while doing his best to disguise the limp. Or at least downplay it. "Maybe I can't make things better for you, or make them go faster for you...but I can at least make them a little easier for you. Even if it's just in mundane ways."
--
"You have been doing that ever since you first met me." And then met him again, some decades later. Dimitri drags himself out of the pantry, closing the door securely. "How do you start a fire?"
--
"Huh?" Claude blinks, glancing over to the fire which hasn't died down that much yet. "Why do you want to know?"
--
"I want to start up the bath for you."
--
That gets another blink, and then a slight smile. "Are you coming with me?"
--
"I was in the lake, so I think I am clean enough..." Because that's the same thing as a proper shower and bath, right? Dimitri's standards of cleanliness are truly and well fucked. "But..." He glances towards the table. "...If you would want me to."
--
"I always want you." It would sound flippant, downright flirtatious, said in another tone of voice, but it sounds soft and warm instead. "Besides, I could argue that I'm clean because I got rinsed off after sex, right? So I'm not sure this is about cleanliness here."
Claude doesn't consider swimming in the lake to be the same as washing in filtered water at all, but he doesn't think he'll need to resort to that argument.
--
"....True." He has to admit that cleanliness definitely wasn't on his mind when he asked, and Dimitri runs his fingers back into his hair. "But when I was sore after riding Ashi... It felt better to be in there. The same should apply to how you feel. So.... how do I do it? I will make do with instructions."
--
Claude chuckles. "Well, it's easier if I show you, so let's at least go in there so I can point at the things I'm talking about, okay?" And he limps for the bathroom.