Work Text:
Sometimes beginnings aren't so simple.
Sometimes goodbye's the only way.
(Shadow of the day, by Linkin Park).
That situation was kind of weird. It still felt like that for them both, and due to many different reasons. The room they were in, four modest and ancient walls that one knew very well as it was his own while the other man had never had any real motive to visit or even pass through, was sluggishly illuminated by the light of a candle, almost burning out. Outside of it, a pitch-dark night still lingered on upon all sort of creatures, the magnificent owls screeching in the closeness in their usual hunting; sleepy sentinels standing their guard throughout the whole Sanctuary as the twelfth temples were occupied by most of their respective protectors.
They all were unaware of what just happened between those two men.
In fact, in that secure room, upon that very same bed they were lying together, a deafening silence between them like an invisible partition. One would have liked to talk, actually; satisfying every curiosity he still harbored about his new lover as, he had to admit it, he didn’t know him that well after all. The other man, instead, didn’t have any intention to speak as to the contrary, he had to admit it, he knew just too much about his comrade and of late – Athena help him – lover. Despite everything they would do upon that bed, after the urge of passion erupting from those brand-new overwhelming feelings was placated; after everything that would happen between them on that bed ended, he just wanted to get a hold of himself from that pleasant effort and rest.
Silence restored between them.
Certainly, he did not want for his lover to address him for like anything.
But that night, the Greek whose eyes sparkled of a pure green-blue light could not just comply his lover’s reluctance, as out of nowhere a lost memory popped out and began to spin in his mind insistently like the buzz of an annoying mosquito. He just could not help it: he had to know, he had to ask him. So, mustering all the necessary courage, he slid by his lover’s side. The man was stubbornly turning his back to him, that perfect lean back upon which his long blond hair hung limply. He got closer as slowly as he could and as he did so he could feel the other man shudder, almost startling the moment their bodies were touching again, his arm slipping around his waist pulling him dangerously closer, back against chest.
His lover wasn’t asleep at all.
Aiolos could, at least, say so and not only for the way the other body just reacted to his gesture, but because seconds after lazy fingers were entwining around the hand Aiolos had innocently rested on the other man’s abdomen. The Archer laughed quietly at the man’s bashful response, then let his head sink against his lover’s nape, his nose tickled by strands of golden hair the marine scent of them he deeply inhaled.
Aiolos reached the back of the man’s ear and laid a soft kiss on it.
“I’ve got a memory” Aiolos whispered, after a while.
He spoke so slowly as he was afraid to bother his companion, who did not seem to have the slightest intention to turn and face him, but he felt somehow emboldened by the affectionate gesture of the other who was still holding his hand.
“A memory about what?” asked the man, a touch of surprise clearly heard in his drowsy voice.
“About you, about us. Did we meet in the past, didn’t we?
Those few words whispered against his ear in Aiolos’ low voice brought up an event of his past life he thought he had banished from his mind and soul as he had never given to it that much of relevance. But now that Aiolos mentioned it he knew he was wrong after all, and fragments of his past existence began to rise to the surface knocking at the door of his consciousness to force their way through his remorseful soul. It needed Aiolos simple question for that memory to just flew effortlessly through him, like wind through an open window.
And so, they both remembered.
***
It was a mild late spring day, in a small village located a few miles outside the massive walls which enclosing Sanctuary as a first defense from its many enemies. At that time, he too considered himself one of them. There that day, Aiolos found him alone, as he always was. Visibly shaken and angered as only few minutes before he had, for the thousandth times, fought with his twin brother, the one who was his perfect duplicate, his cursed reflection. Showing up out of nowhere, probably out of Sanctuary searching for his beloved friend, the young Archer had frozen catching sight of his figure. Aiolos stood in that same spot for quite a while, carefully looking at him, studying his features like he was a mirage of some kind, then he began to take some steps in his direction. The more the Archer strutted closer the more the youth could outline a troubled look emerging in those green-blue eyes of his; a visible tension frowning his brow, wrapped by the infamous red band of raw cloth upon which a perfect mess of soft amber curls fell, nonetheless.
At each step taken towards that loner figure, an uncanny sensation of bewilderment had been barging through the Archer, and it was so nagging and disturbing that it had almost halted his steps: in fact, the moment his eyes had met the deep blue irises of that stranger he just knew the one standing before him wasn’t the same person he had been looking for.
Aiolos tried to ignore that feeling and offered to that frightened-like creature, still trembling out of pure rage the reason of which Aiolos ignored, his most welcoming smile as he finally got in front of the youth. And like it was the most natural thing for him to do, Aiolos took the boy in his arms, holding him tight.
The youth did not react, he just abandoned himself into Aiolos’ embrace, arms hanging loosely at his sides. To his surprise he soon detected Aiolos’ Cosmo reaching out to him, the balmy sparkle of that vivid force spreading out right from Aiolos’ soul had the instant effect to quieten his restless spirt, his limbs relaxing as well in the warmth of the Archer’s body.
“It’s ok, you’re safe now” Aiolos kept on whispering into his ear, his voice was so low and pleasant.
They stayed like that for what felt like both an eternity and the briefest of moments, then Aiolos moved away, loosening his hold. They were still so close that Aiolos could finally look right into those puzzling eyes, so he was able to notice for the first time their peculiar shade of blue, so dark yet so bright reminding him of the open sea in a stormy day, when its struggling surface of roaring waves hide the deepest of its placid vastness. He was utterly mesmerized by the sad yet fierce light those eyes conveyed and felt like he would have gladly plunged into them. Transfixed by that mysterious look, he did not even realize he had lifted both his hands up to the youth’s face gently holding it firm; he couldn’t even recall that strange feeling of uneasiness he had felt before, it now was a fading impression at the back of his mind.
Staring right into those magnetic eyes, Aiolos leaned in and kissed the twin’s lips.
The movement had been so slow and cautious the youth could have avoided it, but he did not. The kiss was smooth and felt so tender upon his lips that he felt all his previous rage and old bitterness disappear, a profound calm filling him up instead.
They withdrew in the same instant, eyes opening into eyes.
Aiolos stepped back, smiling even more tenderly at him and then with no spoken farewells he just moved away to go back from where he had come, behind Sanctuary’s huge walls, leaving that boy the same way he had found him earlier, alone.
Knowing all the while the one he was leaving was not the one he had been looking for.
***
“How did you know?” asked Kanon.
The whole memory was put together again, dug out from the most concealed corner of his mind where it had been hiding under layers and layers of painful events, involving not only himself but his brother and the one who, until just some time before, was Saga’s faithful mate: Sagittarius Aiolos, Sanctuary’s hero.
At that time in the past, he was certain nobody knew about him as he used to live in the shadow of Saga, the holy Gemini Saint. And just like a shadow Kanon would infiltrate Sanctuary’s walls, and nobody would suspect who he really was or what he aimed to; thanks to the resemblance with his twin he could enter a land that was forbidden to him, snooping undisturbed the life of that secret world and its inhabitants. He used to hate himself for craving so hard the comradeship he observed in the young apprentices, who trained to become Gold Saint; he would have given anything to just have someone to share the same path made of happiness and pain, laughs and tears; he saw those kids always backing up one another while he was alone, living like an outcast rejected from that very same world his brother belonged to. But thanks to that resemblance, which he ferociously cursed during his many solitary nights, Kanon would cross the otherwise precluded doors of that place where his brother lived, surrounded by admiration and the worship of both young and old; he could pretend to savor a life that would have never been really his.
At that time, nobody suspected who he was, and when they would meet him, they would always bow respectfully in front of his appearance, not because he was devoted to the Goddess - as at that time he harbored purposes of a very evil kind concerning the Goddess - but because what they saw was the image of Saga, his nobler twin. And as much as he would use the image of Saga for its purposes, he couldn’t help it: he hated so much to be mistaken with him.
Nobody ever knew about his identity, or so he had always thought. But now, he found out he was wrong about it, as he was about so many other things he had persuaded himself of during his youth for the sake of surviving. Aiolos, the noble Sagittarius Saint, warrior of the winged Gold cloth, the youth doomed to sacrifice his young life for the Goddess, the one who used to accompany Saga both inside and outside Sanctuary, only Aiolos that day acknowledged he too existed. The very Aiolos he had hated with all his heart and soul for so many reasons, one of them was his closeness to Saga, the one-of-a-kind bond they shared which was another thing Kanon had been denied from.
“I don’t know. I guess I just felt you” was the answer, simple and honest, of the Archer.
“I hated you for that” replied Gemini, as simple and honest too.
Kanon was not able to mince words, in fact he did not even try to, the quirky twin had always been frank and forthright no matter the person he was speaking to was. Although, since when that absurd affair with Aiolos began, he had had quite a few troubles in recognizing himself.
“Yes, I thought so” said Aiolos, who was not surprised at all by what the other man said. He knew he had been Kanon’s object of absolute hatred and grudge, but there was no trace of sadness in that awareness, or at least there wasn’t anymore. There only was a sort of pleased complicity, echoing in the gleeful chuckle with which the Archer covered Kanon’s ear up.
“I’m happy” he said after a while “that I can share with you a memory from our past”.
To that, Kanon could not offer any retort, he could not find any spoken word to reply with as, he had to admit it, he just was not ready to let himself go to that kind of confession, not yet. Maybe it was because of it, his difficulty to express feelings or the likes by ordinary words, that he felt so awkward when silence fell upon them, after everything they did to each other on that same bed would end, after all the moans and gasps and panting breathes they shared while their excited bodies moved in unison to eventually blend in one another, all the while hearing Aiolos’ voice calling, chanting, invoking, crying out his name like it was the most magical of spell as he was only able to ask him for more not even believing it was his own voice to do that. It was because of it if he, then, would always turn his back to Aiolos pretending to sleep, for not being forced to hear the Archer’s tempting voice or meet his eyes forever burning with love and desire; those green blue irises of Aiolos looking into his were still able to intimidate him, and Kanon just couldn’t do anything about that.
So, Kanon just gave in for the moment as really there was anything he could say to reciprocate the implied meaning of what Aiolos just said.
The memory which had suddenly awaken in them was one of the few things they had in common about their complicated past. And although he didn’t give to it so much of importance, now that same memory took the shape of something concrete and completely different: a moment of his past – their past – that now they both knew they consciously shared with each other.
Because it was Kanon the twin Aiolos, that day in their past life, took in his arms and to whom the very same Aiolos stole a chaste kiss from. Aiolos did not mistake him for the nobler Saga, as so many used to at that time, and like Kanon himself wrongly thought that day.
Kanon did not have it in himself to reply to that revelation, he could not just express those groundbreaking feelings with ordinary words, and so he decided to remain silent, at least for the moment. At the same time, though, he tied his fingers up with Aiolos’ a little bit stronger, clenching the Archer’s grip around his waist, to keep him close.
And this, to Aiolos was just enough.
It was worth a thousand of spoken words.
At least for the moment, it was just enough.