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Solitary confinement wasn't all that surprising when he'd been locked in there a couple of times. Inherently speaking, it was two separate things when it came to Klee and anyone else.
With Klee and most of the children, the confinement room was directly next to the Grandmaster's office, and for the others, it was an old office in the very top corner of the headquarters with a single masterkey.
To be frank, the room was pretty decent in Lohen's terms of hygiene, given that his too clean room in the barracks had rubbed off the wrong way when returned to Mondstadt. He'd taken to sleeping on the floor or forcefully rooming with any knight that passed by his room when he'd feel bouts of unease.
Mika had become a frequent victim, but at times, Lohen would get lucky with sleeping in the corner of Albedo’s workstation or alongside a drunk Kaeya after long days. Sometimes it even was Jean, who'd leave her window open for Lohen's arrival, along with some cold tea and a blanket ready for him on the rug. But the majority of the time, it was Varka and the stupid couch in Varka's office.
Thus, a rather cluttered room with hardly anything posh did manage to calm Loren's nerves in a way. But the problem arose when he ended up with nothing to do—he understood the reasoning behind the punishment, he really did—especially when he felt himself start to dissociate more often than not.
He'd been sentenced to confinement for nearly three weeks as per the first verdict, yet he hadn't been privy to hearing the second, as he'd passed out due to blood loss before the hearing could be over. The gist was the same; he wouldn't be moving up in ranks, nor would he be demoted, and with Adorno gone, he'd begun detesting the rank of Vice Captain all the same.
When he'd first been confined, he'd spent the entire day simply replaying the memories of all the happenings in his head whilst opening the wound on his hand until sleep had overcome him steadfastly. Yet he'd arrived at an obvious understanding.
Had he not let the remaining monster get away, none of this would have ever happened. All of it boiled down to his incompetence, yet again, no matter how much he tried to blame it on Diluc's or Theodore’s interference. In fact, Lohen could even say that he killed Adorno himself by being so weak.
It was inherently like karma, he supposed. He dug into his wound until the blood spilled and stained the carpet. Why? Whywhywhywhy? It'd been his karma, why did Adorno have to pay the price?
The second day, he'd taken to finally moving around the room, just to find a small kitchen hidden behind a curtain. He'd spent that day simply making the bubblegum Adorno loved so much.
He didn't cry, as much as he wished he did. No one was watching him, after all, and the only person he had to be strong for had died at his very hands. Yet Lohen found himself wrapping little bits of gum into old wax papers before heading towards the floor where he'd slept the previous night.
By the sixth day, he'd come to the dawning realization that he hadn't really eaten anything other than the pathetic candy. It wasn't because he'd felt hunger, but more so because when he begrudgingly went to wash up after Mika had slipped in once to let him in on some of the current happenings, and had left by telling Lohen to wash up or he'd fall sick to septicaemia, Lohen had seen the outlines of his ribs.
He had a fairly healthy body for most of his time serving as a knight and adventurer, with adequate muscle and a little bit of fat at his thighs, yet as he scanned his body, he found that he'd lost quite a bit of weight.
Perhaps it'd been a steady process for all he knew—after all, he'd been living off lakaberries in the wild and shared meals with the Lightkeepers and Knights back in Nod Krai most of the time. And after arriving in Mondstadt, he hadn't been able to eat unless he was sitting somewhere in the wild or was surrounded by a large group.
On the eighth day, fresh groceries had been delivered to his room, and Lohen had realized that a week had gone by in the blink of an eye—and that the wound on his hand hadn't healed a bit. In fact, it'd grown hot to the touch, unusually so, and the bandages came back wet with something that wasn't blood.
He reasoned that the happenings were probably because he'd been constantly picking at the broken skin. Digging in his fingers into the wound to use the pain to ground himself when he faced another night terror, or sometimes just absentmindedly pulling the scabs away while he was distracted.
The medic had mentioned that the knife had gone clean through his hand, miraculously missing major arteries and only nicking a vein. Lohen didn't find anything truly troublesome with the wound until he brought it to his face to catch a whiff of something faintly sweet. He ran a finger over it, his nail accidentally catching and triggering another trickle of blood.
Lohen stared at the wound for a long time, then he reached for his earring. He removed it and aimed the sharp end of it at his wrist. The blade-esque side went down with the urge to slice through his skin, yet he halted in his actions, eyes widening as he felt a nauseating memory creep up to him.
It hadn't been all that different during his adventurer days; he'd fight with the intent to break free from the throes of his past, and during the night, when he'd be left with nothing to do, he'd resort to picking his father's sharpest arrowhead. Then he'd draw gashes into his skin until the pain turned at least reminiscent of the things they'd done to him in the lab.
Yet, after nearly eight months of slashing himself up nearly every week, Adorno had accidentally walked in while he was shirtless. The rest was something Lohen could hardly remember, yet he recalled the way Adorno had locked the door behind him and looked down at Lohen with such a sad expression.
“Dear child, my, how I wish I could take the pain away from you.”
There had been some crying on Adorno's part as he'd bandaged the wounds Lohen had carved into his hips and thighs, always away from prying eyes. Though all Lohen had done then was sit in a pool of his guilt, unable to bear the sight of having his savior cry over him.
“Lohen, oh, you sweet boy… forgive me, for I can't take away what they've done to you. Forgive my lack of power that prevents me from bringing you soundness. Lovely child, would you promise me not to punish yourself as such?”
Lohen had kept that promise, at least to some degree. If he wanted pain, he'd let himself get beaten around by whatever enemy was up against him, or he'd prolong the healing of wounds by repeatedly opening them or digging his fingers into them until he was salvaged by the pain.
His hand shook as he dropped the earring and stared at his bleeding wound, feeling nothing but a sort of understanding as to why the Knights had decided this punishment would suffice. He couldn't do it. He couldn't break the one thing he'd kept true to.
He bit into the skin of his arm to muffle an irritated cry and only relaxed until he tasted blood. Forgive me, forgive me, forgivemeforgivemeforgiveme. He exhaled slowly as he opened his eyes, wishing he'd simply be able to cry it out, yet to no avail, the tightness in his chest remained like a clock ticking with impending doom.
Lohen let himself lie back down on the ground and stare up at the ceiling in muted wonder. He brought his hand up and squinted one eye shut when the blood dribbled onto his face.
Pathetic indeed, aren't I? Old man?
The next time Lohen woke up, he didn't know what day it was, nor the time, nor the reason why his body felt so hot. There was no way that he'd been out for a day, but the pain in his body was jarring, and it took him a moment to realize that his body had likely woken him up to urinate.
He struggled to stand, and when he did, he nearly tripped all over because he'd grabbed a table with his injured hand. Lohen was used to pain, but this was suddenly a lot worse.
He made his way, stumbling to the bathroom to relieve himself, and when he stepped away to look in the mirror, he looked terrible. In fact, despite the prolonged sleep, he looked like he hadn't slept a wink.
Lohen stared at his hand as he reached to turn the washbasin on. The color of the wound seemed rather gnarly, and within the new stream of blood, Lohen could hardly make out what he was theorizing.
He haphazardly washed his hands with half the intent of cleaning them as a wave of nausea ran through him. He dry heaved into the sink before turning around and stepping back into the room. Hot, hot, it was getting too hot for him to breathe properly.
Lohen fumbled with his clothes, pulling them away from his body until he was down to his undergarments. He dropped down to his knees when sudden dizziness hit him, and heaved onto the ground as he struggled to stay upright. Cold, yeah, that's right, he needed something cold.
He blindly began searching in the first pile of clothes for his vision, only to realize that it'd been confiscated before the trial. “Hah,” Lohen chuckled at his predicament as he stared at his hand, which now bled much faster and seeped into the cracks in the stone. He let himself lie down fully on the stone floor, relishing in the sudden chill he felt down his spine. A part of him supposed this was his actual karma, dying a slow death like this.
Perhaps he didn't mind it either, given that he probably deserved it for most of his crude actions. Lohen shivered as he closed his eyes, desperate in his will to want to go back to sleep and to never wake up.
Suicidal ideation wasn't something far-fetched either, after all, he'd tried on numerous occasions to die, only to be pulled back to the surface one way or the other. Thus, if his time had finally come, Lohen didn't feel like fighting for once.
The weakness from not having eaten to the physical pain eventually knocked him out, leaving him heaving labored breaths as he accepted his fate.
“Lohen, welcome to the Knights of Favonius! You'll be under my Company and will report to me as your captain. With your previous knowledge of bows, I can have you already training the recent recruits, hah!”
“Lohen, I hereby promote your status to that of a Vice Captain. From now on, you'll stand beside me during our battles.”
“Dear child, how old have you grown? I wish nothing more than to retire and watch you flourish into the man you'll be. The title of benevolent knight will be yours for taking when the time is right. Why? What do you mean by 'why?' You simply show benevolence in other ways than the ones people associate the word with!”
“Lohen... The title of "Benevolent Knight," and the 5th Company's captaincy… If you don't want them, just let them go. Be true to yourself, that's all that matters.”
“... I heard everything... You've been helping me cling on, haven't you? It's thanks to both of you that I have this chance... to hug you once again, just like old times… All that's left to say is… It's alright. It's over now.”
“Lohen!”
“Lohen!”
“Lohen!”
Lohen snapped awake and recoiled sharply when he felt someone standing over him. He could hardly make out much except for the fact that his hands were tied up, that he was pinned to the bed, and the scent of antiseptic was tangible.
“Let me go,” Lohen gasped, hardly getting anything across with how hoarse his voice was.
“Stop,” he tried again, struggling to grasp his surroundings as he yanked at the binds that pinned him to the bed. No, no, no, was he back there? He could feel panic lodge itself in his throat. “Get me out of here. Fuck. Let me go, you fucking assholes!”
“He's panicking! Please get Theodore, we can't have him hurt himself anymore!”
Lohen pulled against the binds again, feeling rope dig into his skin painfully. The acute pain in his side felt almost reminiscent of the times he'd been cut open by those scientists just to be stitched back up again and then cut all over again. Breathe, he tried to tell himself. Breathe.
“Lohen?” A voice called.
Lohen searched for it blindly, seeing but not registering half of it until a face came directly into his line of view. Soft green eyes and ginger hair stared down at him with equal parts worry and horror. “Lohen, hey, you're fine.”
Lohen blinked a couple of times as his body began shutting down again, too drained to stay awake after the fight. “Theodore?” he asked quietly.
Theodore’s hand reached for Lohen's uninjured hand over the rope. “Yeah,” the boy said wetly, sniffling afterwards. “Yeah, it's me. It's okay, you're safe. You're in the infirmary, they're healing your nasty infection.”
Lohen stared at Theodore. “Oh.”
Theodore dropped his head onto Lohen's hand. “So please, please get better. I can't lose you, too. Adorno's gone—I, I just can't lose you either! Who else will tell me how pathetic I'm being?”
Lohen hummed softly before he felt his eyes fall shut again.
The next time Lohen woke up, it was because of the sun glinting through stained glass and onto his face. He struggled to recount the previous happenings before his eyes fell on his hand, now heavily bandaged and tied to the bed with a leash of sorts.
“I should commend you for waking up just two days before your solitary confinement period is to be over.”
Lohen looked up to see Varka leaning against the room's doorway. It took him a moment to realize that he was sitting on Varka's cot in the very man's house. “Hello to you too,” Lohen said, only to realize hardly any words had made it across.
Varka crossed the room and filled a glass with water before approaching Lohen. The younger knight instinctively reached for the glass, but Varka pulled it away. “Uh-uh, open your mouth,” he said.
Lohen tried to glare, but he doubted it surmised anything. Instead, he closed his eyes and let Varka tip the glass into his mouth, allowing a slow gush of water that Lohen lapped up like he'd been parched.
And he likely had been. “What did you say?” he asked. Lohen looked down at his body again. He was still shirtless, but someone had put him into loose slacks. All the scars on his body were open for display, and he winced for the sake of the poor souls who'd been forced to see his mangled body. His eyes then trailed over to his injured hand, which now looked like it'd healed a lot more, and then to the leash that attached his wrist to the bed with a metal chain.
Varka sat down on a stool beside the cot and brought his hand to Lohen's forehead. “Mhm, you're still a little warm.”
“How long have I been out?”
“Nearly nine days. I wouldn't say ‘out' of it necessarily, but you've somehow managed to sabotage yourself even whilst being out of it.” Varka glanced at the patterns the stained glass was forming on Lohen's lap, then pointedly at the cuffs that dangled by the cot railings. “Barbara was forced to give you numerous sedatives just so you wouldn't hurt yourself.”
“Oh.”
Varka stayed quiet for an uncomfortably long time after that. Eventually, he swallowed dryly and opened his mouth. “Lohen.”
“I don't want to talk about it, Varka.”
After all, there was nothing left to say. Lohen had merely cheated death yet again. He looked down at his lap, catching glimpses of the gnarly scars that marred the sides of his hips. He felt his fingers twitch at the sight of them.
He’d hidden this sight from Varka and everyone else in the Knights precariously, somehow managing to come unscathed each time through it all. If he ever bedded with anyone, it was almost always that he demanded the lights be turned off, or that parts of his clothes remain on.
It used to be that he often ended up in the beds of other knights when he first joined the ranks, sometimes offering himself up to Kaeya and other times to Albedo, so he could try some of his experiments on him. Twice, he’d been lucky enough to catch Diluc in his net as well.
However, recently, it’d been only Varka. And ‘recently’ could be defined as the past three years. He had always had a hunch that his loosely guarded secret would be ripped open, but Varka had always been respectful of his boundaries. Never asking why Lohen refused to be seen nude in broad daylight when most knights practically lay naked during the summers, or why he preferred bathing during nighttime.
In a way, it was almost predetermined that this was to happen. Lohen clenched his good hand into the blanket he’d been given when he realized a clear runic mark was left on the forearm of his injured hand, marking Albedo’s involvement in his recovery. Or perhaps, the alchemist was the reason Lohen could keep his limbs intact.
“You don't want to talk about how you could have literally died?” Varka questioned, his voice turning borderline desperate. “Yes, it was a punishment, but you are still a knight. You could have called out for help, and anyone would have come for you. Mika hovered outside your door for goodness sake!”
Lohen hummed tiredly. “Yeah. I could’ve.”
He knew, he knew very well that he could have done so much more. His eyes shot open when Varka’s hand grabbed his wrist. “What?”
“You’re clenching your fist,” Varka muttered, his eyes falling to Lohen’s injured hand that had formed a tight fist.
Lohen stared at it for a prolonged period before exhaling softly. “Forgive me for the trouble I must’ve caused.”
“What?” Varka asked, almost taken aback. “That is not what this is about, Lohen!”
“Mhm.”
A part of him hoped Varka would get the message that he simply did not want to have this conversation, but the Grandmaster was truly a force to be reckoned with at times. “Please say something.”
“What is there to say? I fucked up.”
“Lohen—”
“I fucked up, Varka. I couldn’t even, dammit, I couldn’t even survive a goddamn confinement without managing to drag others in!”
“You think you had control over your wound getting infected?” Varka asked in disbelief. “No scratch that, we should’ve known better than to leave you alone—”
“Will you stop that?” Lohen asked under his breath, words sharp enough. “I don’t need others to watch over me like I’m some pathetic—pathetic, I don’t know, screwup! And you know what, I feel fucking amazing, like I’m so so happy to be alive right now!”
His lower lip wobbled as he felt like he’d finally used his mouth after ages of simply talking to himself, and because of his own volume. Varka didn’t deserve his outburst, and the Lohen didn’t deserve the emotional strings that latched both of them together.
He dug his blunt nails into his thigh as he looked down at his lap. “Forgive me. Please leave me be. I can’t let this get any worse than it is.”
Somehow, he simply wished he could cry and get the weird bubble of emotion that was trapped within his throat, weighing him down and tying him to metaphorical confines that had come to be his norm. In fact, when was the last time he cried?
Perhaps it was in front of Adorno again. A week after he’d been returned home post his kidnapping, he remembered hovering around like a ghost, unable to feel or comprehend his surroundings much.
His parents had called for Adorno when Lohen had ended up not eating for a few days, and the knight had simply entered Lohen’s room and had sat on the floor. He hadn’t been comforting, not necessarily, but he’d rambled on about his adventures as a knight until Lohen had slowly dragged himself out from the covers to sit beside the elder.
It’d been odd, really. Adorno hadn’t said anything depressing, nor had he tried to tell Lohen it was okay. He’d simply offered him a hand and had patted his head. “Haschen, must you carry such sadness in your eyes? You should let go, let the endless sea in your eyes run dry for the light to reach you. And if you’re afraid that you’ll drown, I’ll be right here.”
“You’re right, it can’t,” Varka muttered lightly. “Will you let me stay with you?”
Lohen’s lower lip trembled, and he immediately clamped his teeth over it. “I do not diminish my wrongdoings, Grandmaster, but he’s dead.”
Varka stiffened in the corner of his eye, and Lohen shuddered lightly. “He’s dead,” he repeated, feeling immediately nauseous for having mentioned it out loud. “He’s dead. He’s dead, and it’s my fault. Had I… had I gotten that monster in time, had I never indulged Theodore, had things never gotten this bad—”
“Had you died because of an overdose, were you not caught?” Varka asked softly. “Adorno was like a father to you, Lohen. Parents mustn’t bury their children.”
Lohen took a deep breath that didn’t quite reach his lungs. He tried to say anything, but his mouth spoke the same words like a broken record. “He’s dead.”
Varka moved, and Lohen’s brows furrowed in confusion as he noticed Varka removing his boots. The Grandmaster raised his brows. “Move over.” Lohen complied by folding his legs while Varka sat down on the other side of the cot. “Come here?” Varka asked, patting the space next to him. Lohen stared at the space in muted confusion, his brain struggling to catch up.
“Death,” Varka began, once Lohen had settled close to him. He moved his hand and manhandled Lohen’s body like a rag doll until the younger man was resting with his head on Varka’s thigh. “Is something quite unfortunate that it doesn’t strike you until you see it take away someone you love.”
“Lohen,” Varka said quietly as his hand settled in Lohen’s hair. “I’ve lost enough people to various scenarios to tell you that hurting yourself will bring about no good. It will simply hinder your own life with physical reminders.”
Lohen made a small sound as he hid his face in Varka’s palm.
“I was once close with Crepus and Eroch, both names you surely must be aware of. We grew up together, dragged each other out of trouble, and wished for the brightest future. Yet I lost both of them. It hurts, I know that it does. It had ached so terribly when Crepus’ own child called me incompetent before resigning himself to Snezhnaya.” Varka’s hand paused in Lohen’s hair. “For a moment, I had everything. Then nothing.”
His hand trailed down to Lohen’s hip, fingers lightly raking over the scar tissue there. “I don’t want you to forget, nor do I want you to act like you’re fine. You’re not. Besides, mein hasi, pain and love are emotions that make you human, and you mustn’t try ridding yourself of them.”
Lohen inhaled sharply when Varka’s hand reached to move him again, and he let himself go along with pliancy. His eyes fluttered shut when he found himself sitting on Varka’s lap, his ear pressed to the older man’s heart that beat too fast for Lohen’s liking.
He peered up at Varka. “Do you feel guilty?”
“Ah…”
Lohen decided to lay himself bare. “Because I do. All the time. Throughout when Theodore worked on the serums, and now that the old man's gone...” He pressed his forehead against Varka’s chest. “I knew he’d die and I still helped with the experiments. Am I to be convicted for his murder?”
Varka seemed to open his mouth and close it by the short sounds of breathing Lohen heard. He expected some semblance of a verbal reply, but Varka responded by simply pulling Lohen close. Impossibly close to have their hearts beat as one with equal panic for different reasons. Lohen belatedly realized that he probably must be smelling terrible, given he hadn’t washed up for quite a while, but Varka didn’t seem to care.
“Mein hasi, how can you be so cruel to yourself?” Varka asked sadly. “I wish I could take your pain away.”
Lohen could feel something lodge in his throat as he choked out. “Why would you want to do that? That too, for someone like me?”
Varka responded by kissing the crown of Lohen’s head. “How could I not, liebling?” He placed soft kisses on Lohen’s forehead and then trailed them down his cheek until sealing a longer one on his lips. He pulled away and sighed through his nose when he met Lohen’s eyes. “My dear,” he whispered. “How much sorrow you carry in your eyes.”
Lohen could feel his breathing start to pick up as he stared at Varka. Oh, oh. Varka cupped his cheeks gently. “You can let go, I’ll be here to make sure you don’t drown.”
It was a strange feeling. Lohen was used to having explosive emotions, those bouts that had him throwing himself in front of enemy blades, but this felt so much softer.
“Oh,” he whispered under his breath, blinking away vision that had gone terribly blurry. He sniffled and attempted to swallow, but to no avail, choked on his own spit. “Varka, I don’t know—this—”
He gasped openly as he felt tears escape his eyes before he could grasp any control of the situation. Though he didn’t need to, as Varka’s thumbs were wiping them away before his hands were drawing Lohen close to his chest again, holding him tight enough that he promised Lohen that he wouldn’t drown and be swept away by the currents.
“One day, I’ll die, do you know what that means, Lohen?”
“It means that my duty here is done—that I’ve seen you boys grow up into amazing men and have fought for my homeland. Dying doesn’t really mean that I plan to leave you alone now; I’ll always be here, or at least, you can always find smaller pieces of me in others. I do not wish that you grieve for me, my child.”
Lohen sobbed openly against Varka’s chest, struggling to catch his breath as his hand clutched the skin right over his heart, almost as though it wanted to claw it out. “Breathe,” Varka said gently, his hand running down Lohen’s back. “You’re alright.”
Lohen shook his head, feeling his chest vomit out emotions that had been buried and compressed so deeply that he hadn’t a clue how far they went. I want him back, he wished to say petulantly. I want him to forgive me.
Sobs wracked his body in Varka’s grip, but he could feel his own grasp on his composure loosening bit by bit until he was all but goo in Varka’s arms, something so fragile that he was afraid he’d crack right when Varka’s grip on him subsided.
“You’re alright,” Varka said again, kissing Lohen’s forehead. “You’re doing so good.”
Lohen's breath hitched as he tried to wipe the tears away, only for more to pour out just as fast. “Forgive me," he whispered.
When he awoke next, it was on Varka’s chest. The only difference was that a faint blue light was seeping out of the stained glass, indicating the passing of the previous day and likely the dawn of the coming. Lohen touched his forehead, and then Varka’s, before concluding that his fever was gone.
He sat idly, straddling Varka’s lap, eyes slowly adjusting to his surroundings before they settled on Varka again. The older man looked quite at peace in the blue hour, with one of his hands resting on Lohen’s thigh while the other had likely been supporting Lohen.
The memories of the previous night slowly resurfaced as Lohen’s gaze fell on the scars at his hips again. He exhaled softly and let his hand press against his chest. He felt quite… hollow. In a good way for once. It was almost as if his chest had loosened up and was allowing him to breathe much deeper than he had in months.
“Mein liebling,” Lohen whispered, voice hoarse as he shifted closer so that he was lying across Varka’s chest and letting his uninjured hand drop so his fingers could trail across the scar on Varka’s jaw.
Varka exhaled on his fingers and shifted till his arm was across the small of Lohen’s back. He drew Lohen up and closer to him until their faces were just inches apart. Lohen blinked a couple of times, feeling his heart pound loudly in his ribcage as he watched the first gold of dawn fall onto Varka.
Lohen inhaled sharply when the hand on his lower back trailed up to the back of his head and pulled him into a chaste kiss. “You’re awake?” Lohen asked, pulling away in embarrassment.
Varka moved to turn on his side, pulling Lohen into his chest to block the light from reaching him. “Mhm.”
Lohen swallowed and moved his hand to run his fingers across Varka’s stubble. “Lohen.”
“Yeah?”
“I want to apologize.”
Lohen had a faint idea as to what Varka was about to say. “It’s not your fault. I brought this upon myself. Besides, it wouldn’t really be a punishment if you got me out of it, would it?”
“Since when did you get so noble?” Varka asked softly.
“Whatever.”
“Lohen,” Varka murmured, pulling Lohen impossibly closer. “Please come to me whenever you feel this way. Any way. If you’re drowning, I’ll drown with you. If you need saving, I’ll be your salvation. Please just…”
Lohen bit the inside of his cheek hard when he heard a sniffle come from Varka. It was subtle, and he was sure he would have missed it had he not been this close.
“Live. Just live. I almost lost you to that bastard Rerir, and now to grief. Let me be your anchor, mein hasi. Please.”
Lohen let his hand rest on Varka’s jaw. “I’ll try.”
Varka smiled with his eyes closed, almost adamant on not wanting to give away the sadness in his eyes as well. “Thank you.”
“Varka?”
“Mhm?”
“I’d stopped,” Lohen muttered softly. “Long ago, after that old man caught me. I haven’t been doing anything.”
“I see, that is good to hear.”
“Why do you trust me so blatantly?” Lohen questioned.
“By any means, you’re no liar. You might withhold the truth, but you never lie. And even if you do, you are terrible at it.” Varka finally opened his eyes. There were no tears, but Lohen could see a faint wetness clinging to Varka’s lashes.
“I see.”
“Is there anything you wish to ask me?”
Lohen picked one of Varka’s hands and fiddled with the fingers as he lay in thought. “I know my punishment is to last longer. But, I have a request.”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t ask.”
“You don’t have to,” Varka replied as he shifted to get up. “I think you left one of your shirts here the last time you spent the night.”
Lohen stared in surprise as Varka stood up and put on more appropriate pants after stripping out of his sleep slacks. The first rays of the sun escaped through a slit in the glass and landed on Varka as he was tying the laces of his shirt.
Lohen was never an aesthete; he found beauty in odd things, a well-sharpened arrowhead handed to him by the trainees in the fifth company, or the bunnies that appeared deep in the forest when he and other knights would go hunting for boars.
But Varka?
Beautiful wasn’t truly the right word; perhaps it was a sliver of the mass of emotions that tied themselves into a knot in Lohen’s chest and slipped around his heart that made him think this way. He watched as Varka worked the lace into place, his hands moving so carefully, unlike the way Lohen haphazardly tied his own.
“Lohen?”
Lohen’s head snapped away from Varka’s hands to his eyes. “Yeah.”
“C’mon, get up, let’s go before the sun rises fully, and someone sees me being lenient on you again.”
Lohen felt himself smile for the first time. “Afraid you’ll be accused of playing favorites?”
“I’m afraid that’s already the case, leibling,” Varka chuckled, walking over so he could search for Lohen’s mentioned shirt in his almirah. He found it eventually and tossed it to the younger man. “Get ready, let’s go see the old man again.”