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fae-redux · 4 years

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rules of the game: ch. 5 - my kind’s your kind

Story Summary:

The Evergreen and Imagi were never quite in peacetime. Roman’s just trying to figure out how to survive and succeed his mother. Logan wants to live long enough to use his magic however he wants. Patton is coasting while repressing everything, still trying to figure out what feelings are.

Virgil doesn’t want to change the world.

Luckily, it isn’t up to him.

first | ao3 | prev

Chapter Summary: Dee and Virgil are both of the Evergreen. They don’t already know this.

Word count: 2658

Pairings: future lamp, platonic anxceit

~|~

When he finds Dee sitting innocently at his dining table with nothing but a cup of tea and a saucer in front of him, Virgil knows he knows.

“Did you know,” Dee starts, not looking up from his tea (Virgil can feel his barely contained glee from where he stands), “that Queen Valerie received quite the surprise this morning?”

He’s smirking like Virgil should already know. “No,” he attempts to shrug casually because it’s not technically a lie, “What surprise?”

“The queen certainly did not acquire a child,” His eyes light up, “And she really didn't get the twin fae child of the one you just cursed, no, she did not.” He laughs and practically spins out of his seat to get a good look at Virgil, effectively cutting off his path to his room. “Why didn’t you invite me on your hunt? We wouldn’t have had any fun together! There’s always something as good as some classic bonding, cursing unsuspecting humans, stealing children, you know!”

Virgil exhales a long breath through his nose, trying to move around the fae. “You are way too excited about this.”

“Well, it’s only what I haven’t wanted for years,” Dee tilts his head forward facetiously, an arm blocking his exit again, “Horrible of you to give me an early birthday present.”

Virgil gives up trying to get to his room and takes the seat Dee vacated, but then his brain catches up with what Dee just said. “Wait, I didn’t curse the kid, I cursed the queen.”

“According to the Seelie that just came from the outskirts, you definitely did not get the kid, and your magic is super stable,” Dee shrugs, moving his cup to the sink, practically fluttering his hands in joy. “The kid’s a bad mark, and if he grows up anything like his mother, you’ll be sorry you did it.”

Virgil looks at Dee, who is still grinning, genuinely ecstatic for the first time since Virgil’s met him, and thinks, maybe this isn’t the worst thing. If the queen does raise the child herself, he doesn’t have that much hope for the kid, and with King Cromwell under her thumb, it’s unlikely the kid will know what life outside the citadel looks like.

“I can see it now,” He says. The deal is composed of a thick cord that holds strong. Even tugging on it now, he feels the prince, crying alone in a nursery, and can’t believe he didn’t feel it before, “I should probably break it.”

“Sure, if you don’t want the death of a child on your hands. Magic doesn’t come with backlash.” Dee raises an eyebrow, and he hastily takes his hand back from the rope. “Besides there have been plenty of instinctive magic curses in fae history. It’s not like we don’t have the theory to even begin going about breaking it without killing you or the kid.”

He shakes his head and resolves to ignore the thing.

Dee is happy. It’s a shame, Virgil thinks. If what Virgil can recall about what he said is right, the young prince has twenty years to live, and nothing he does will affect the curse or change its course. It’s all up to Adelaide.

He doesn’t dwell on the seed of guilt that starts to grow in his stomach.

He doesn’t.

~|~

As much as he likes to focus on his misfortune, Virgil knows that when he can’t fix all his problems, it’s best to start with the ones he can handle.

The thing is, Dee’s right. His magic is unstable in that he doesn’t know what he already did with it or how to use it, and if he can’t learn to put some sort of a leash on it, he’ll be reliant on Dee forever, which isn’t ideal.

On the bright side, Dee seems delighted by the turn of events that is Virgil asking for magic lessons. They’ve started to learn to live with each other in the past couple weeks, Dee accommodating Virgil and teaching him how to do things around the estate, and Virgil carefully staying out of the way of Dee’s clients. This really is an extension of their preexisting lessons.

Dee starts them off by trying to figure out what sort of fae Virgil is. It would be going better if the only things he could talk about weren’t the way the plants lead him to Dee’s hide-away home in the Evergreen and the whole “curse” incident.

“How did you get away from a full ballroom of knights and iron? The queen wouldn’t have been extra careful with the presence of a child,” Dee has about seven books open trying to figure out what Virgil’s fae history is made of.

He shrugs, letting his shoulders slump in a little more, taking another bite of his food and ducking behind his bowl a little as Dee tosses another book to the side. “I heard the sound of breaking glass behind me? It sounded like your illusion breaking that first night we met, so I assume it was some kind of illusion magic. I just remember thinking I didn’t want them to see me leave. Illusions and plant-based magic are two very different things, though, so I don’t really understand how I would have both.”

Dee snorts, putting his own bowl down. “Even for a novice, you’ve got a horrible understanding of magic.” He brushes through his history of plant fae grimoire while frequently glancing from Virgil to the book. He turns the book so Virgil can see, “Match?”

Virgil looks at the portrait in the book of a fae with a wide face and a stubby nose and shakes his head. “I read a lot in the castle so I know a lot about magic. My mother’s collection told me about fae magic, but Adelaide’s collections taught me other kinds of magic. I moved most of her spellbooks and grimoires to my room, so even if the queen decides to go book burning, those would probably be safe. She probably doesn’t remember that I used to live in the west tower.”

The ache that comes with thinking about his old home isn’t new but he almost wishes the bittersweet feeling would go away. The castle always used to have the best view of the sunset and the most wonderful view of the full moon in the sky. Jam tarts were always a bonus too, especially when they got the ones with the special red jam. Those were things that made it really feel like home.

Dee turns the book around again. “This one?”

Virgil stops thinking about the castle.

The portrait shows an eager lady with sharp ears and elongated incisors and long silver blonde hair, about to pounce off the page. Her grin looks the same as his mother’s did before she hatched a plan to get them both in trouble. The manor staff used to hate that smile.

“That one,” he swallows down and clenches his fists to hold back the tremors he feels coming on, but it just sends sharp stings of pain through his palms. No one had told him about being part fae. No one even suggested it before Dee. If the queen knew, she surely wouldn’t have allowed Romulus to take him in. “Well, we know why about the plants now, though I’m not really sure how diluted my ancestry is,” He fiddles with the sleeves of his hoodie, and the hollow feeling in his chest persists. Enough fae blood to be fully realized by a deal gone awry, but not enough to affect him for the first 17 years of his human lived life.

Dee waves a hand and begins to put books away. “The real problem is that we know exactly why you have illusion powers like me,” The muttering increases as Virgil just sits at the table, head leaning against his palm watching as Dee pulls random books out at will, only to look through two or three pages and return them to the shelf. “Your existence as a fae makes complete sense.”

Today has already been too much, but at the very least they have a hint. “Thanks,” he replies dryly. “It’s not as though anyone told me there was a fae in my family tree somewhere. I would go back and look for the documentation if it didn’t mean getting captured and tortured for eternity for daring Adelaide.”

The scowl on Dee’s face makes him use an arm to cover the lower half of his face and stifle his snicker.

“Yes, you could go back, and all my hard work, gone, just like that?” The sarcasm is evident in his voice, as he shoots his judgmental gaze towards Virgil, “Stunning idea.”

“Nah, I think you like me too much to let me do that anyways,” Virgil openly smiles at the fae as he huffs and returns his attention to the shelves. “You do.”

“If the universe had not given you to me as a gift,” The light from the window glances off his yellow scales, making them glow, “You wouldn’t be dead right now. You would do well not to remember that.”

“Yeah,” Virgil rounds the table and plucks Dee’s bowl from where it sits, heading to the sink, “You like me.”

He doesn’t interrupt him, lets the grumbles fill the air, the only noises Dee can make without outright lying or telling the truth in the way he does.

Dee is a lot easier to understand than whatever the queen had going on, and they got on fairly well. Virgil doesn’t think it would be the worst thing to stick around for a while.

~|~

Watching Dee set up his tools for their first illusions lessons shouldn’t be as funny as it is. He left early that morning after breakfast with a cementing potion, tubes of sticking potion, and a basket of things he hadn’t let Virgil peak at.

When he’s finally allowed outside, he sees the monstrosities that Dee made in all their glory. There are trinkets of every sort pulled together from various places in the house that appear to be fashioned together into odd amalgamations. One is made up completely of porcelain doll legs in the shape of a duck and another is made up of small duck statues that have been organized into the shape of a person.

Ridiculous sculptures aside, Dee’s efforts come with a long lecture that Virgil only manages to absorb parts of.

“These won’t do for now, but the basis of this is you needn’t be able to maintain the same image in your head as the one you want to project as an illusion. It’s not like making the image in your head and turning it out of your brain to appear in the real world. Make sense?” Dee is looking very intently at the ducks while Julep watches amused from the sidelines.

Virgil frowns. “Is the correct answer yes?” He stares at the sculptures as if they will help him figure it out. “Because no.”

Sighing, Dee points at one of the ruinous creations, “When you look at that, what are you thinking about?”

“I’m thinking about how weird it is that you own enough dolls to make a large duck out of their legs and how fucking weird you are for doing this. Why, what’s the point?”

He looks like he’s going to facepalm in a very undignified way for a moment. “Can you think of anything else besides the thing you’re looking at?”

Blinking at the creation, he thinks for a moment. How could anyone who had that in front of them not think about it? Then it hits him. That’s why he made these insane things. “You’re trying to improve my concentration on what I want the actual illusion to be.”

“You mustn't hold your concentration, or this won’t work. Try to focus on the statues, not an open field with flowers. Anything not like that.”

From where he sits with his eyes closed, he can feel the grass pulling up between his fingers and in the breeze. Imagining an empty field, he tries to picture what he thought of being in front of him. After a full minute of intense focus, he peeks one eye open, and Dee just waits, not saying anything. Nothing happened.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing,” He huffs, frustrated. He picks the dirt and grass out from under his nails, a wrinkle in his brow. “Turn the image, what does that even mean?”

“Don’t picture it in your head first,” Dee sits next to him and puts down the dangling chicken bone mobile he created. His back is straight and he rests his palms facing up on his knees. “Don’t take a deep breath, and forget to concentrate.” He moves his hands to the ground in front of him, “Now, don’t shift the image, like it's on a wheel from your mind, in front of your eyes.”

Virgil watches as between blinks, the things vanish from sight. He raises a hand to tap the illusion, then hesitates and looks to Dee for permission.

“Please don’t touch, it’s just so fragile,” Dee smirks and examines his nails.

The tap sounds exactly like tapping a glass of water or on a window. A bright sound rings out, but the illusion doesn’t break. More confident now, Virgil knocks on the glass, and the prairie scene stays playing in front of him.

“Honey, you’re gonna have to try softer than that to break it,” Dee picks up the shovel he brought with him to build his structures. “Watch and don’t learn a thing!” The fae laughs as he swings it full force at the illusion, spinning with the momentum of the turn.

The sound of breaking glass echoes through the field with his laughter, and Virgil can’t help his flinch, looking away so his eyes don't get hit with any of the glass. Nothing that comes his way feels like it hits him. In fact, the bits that do appear to hit him just vanish on impact. Curious, he runs his fingers along the edge of a piece that landed near him and startles as it melts into nothing the second he would have made contact with it.

Behind the illusion, a single duck falls off its structure from the hit of the shovel, but otherwise, the creations are unharmed by Dee’s magic.

“Illusions are weak until they are broken. You won’t learn in your own time,” Dee looks disappointed at the duck that fell off and tucks it in his pocket, though what for Virgil doesn’t know. “Not your turn!”

Virgil looks at the spot Dee had put his hand down and takes a deep breath, just like Dee told him. It’s hard not thinking about the statues in the yard, but he manages to make some sort of image in his head of an empty field. The wheel behind his eyes pulls the image over the image of the current field.

The turn feels strange but there’s something there. It leaks into his arms as he tries to put the image in front of him, and it feels like water running over his arms, uncomfortably smooth. He blinks his eyes open, and he’s completely dry, but he’s looking at an empty field. Well, a version of an empty field, anyways.

Dee clicks his tongue happily. The illusion is clearly the wrong time of day, the black of a night sky curling at the edges with sunlight, and as Dee flicks it with two fingers, it shatters. “For a first try, terrible.” It’s silly, but Dee grins just like Thomas would when he scored well on his chemistry assessments. “Now don’t do it again.”

Virgil puts his hands to the ground more confidently. He can do this however many times it takes to get it right.

#sanders sides #ts virgil #ts janus #virgil sanders #janus sanders #i thought we could take a break from adelaide to focus on whats really important #and thats developing virgil and dees family vibes #because i want some fluff thats why #we can get back to in universe politics later ok #sanders sides fanfiction #awen writes #rules of the game au

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