The Sweetest Thing

Their meetings were never arranged, but they became a rhythm.

The glade and surrounding wood became familiar to them both with the time they spent there. The brook where Nuada caught a fish with his bare hands and looked stupidly proud while Lasair laughed joyfully. The rock cluster where Lasair hopped barefoot from stone to stone while reciting poetry in a language not of this world. The low oak with the hollow where they kept a few secret things… the brighids crosses they’d weaved together, a beltane ribbon, a poem Lasair wrote on birch bark.
Nuada made sure to always travel a different path when he met him, and he kept the visits as scarce as possible.. Or he tried to. But he hadn’t known laughter before, or comfort, and even on the days he didn’t visit, he gravitated to the forest's edge, and would watch its border from a distance. In vigilance, but in something else.  He could name it, but had never felt before, and was afraid to… so he protected it like something too precious and holy to utter. Too pure to be made real.

“Can you tell me another story, please?” Nuada asked on his next visit, the new moon stars reflecting brightly in his grey eyes.

They were sharing constellations, lying in the grass, heads next to each other, bodies spread out in opposite directions.

“Sure!” Lasair replied happily, tapping his hands idly on his chest. “What kind of story do you want to hear?”
“I don’t think I mind.” Nuada said. It was so easy to be open in Lasairs’ company. “I just… like it when you tell stories.

Lasair did tell stories, often, and with grandeur, and once Nuada found he could see the stories painted in streaks of light as Lasair spoke them.
“That’s wondrous…” Nuada said in awe, “...but, terrifying.”
Lasair frowned. “Why? How?”
“It’s beautiful how you’re using it… but you could really confuse and hurt someone with that.”
“I would never!”
“But mightn’t other sídhe?”
“What about your swords and fires?”
Nuada was pensive. “Some wield weapons to harm, others to defend, and a torch can burn as well as illuminate.” His eyes were distant as he worked through it. He tilted his head to look at Lasair. “Thank you.”
He said it simply, but Lasair blushed, and Nuada's pulse stumbled. His throat went tight and he couldn’t keep Lasairs gaze. “I should probably go.” He said, rising suddenly. “It’s getting late even for me to excuse wandering alone.”
“Okay!” Lasair said unbothered.

Just as Nuada reached the edge of the thrush, Lasair called to him. “Bring more ribbons, next time!” His voice was carefree. “I’d love you to braid some into my hair.”
Nuada didn’t sleep at all that night, but he wasn’t tossing and turning. He was just lying on his back, with the gentlest smile, his arms behind his head, staring at the ceiling, picturing the stars behind it, reliving the stories of the constellations Lasair had shared with him in glee. Nuada felt like his heart was thawing, and he had never even known it was frozen. It was safe.

…It felt safe.