Portentum
Victor and Elias held the book together. The pages were so blurry through Elias’s grief.
“This kind of paper is called vellum. The ink is Sumi ink,” Victor murmured. “This book would have lasted a thousand years if it was taken care of properly. How Mr. Sauer let you cut it to pieces, I will never know.”
“I didn’t ask; I just did it. He was so horrified he didn’t even stop me and then cried after,” Elias admitted.
Victor laughed, bright and sweet. “I wish I had more time to know you,” he said.
Elias closed his eyes.
“I have something to ask, and I have walked long to ask it.”
He could feel Victor’s breath on his face. Sugary, like his used to be.
“Your family—”
“It’s okay, I understand. We’ve already—”
“Forgive me,” Elias interrupted, stern and soft, “but you do not. In my village, with my people, justice can be earned with violence. But violence of any kind must be repaid with lifelong penance. And Victor, for all that my heart beats in time with yours, I do not know you. I would not know where to start, so I must ask. For the lives of a mother and a father, a brother and a sister, a caretaker unnamed? What would you have me do?”
Victor was quiet for long, terrible moments.
“They must have been nice to you, the alchemists,” Victor whispered finally.
Elias flinched when Victor touched him but did not open his eyes. Victor’s thin fingers traced the curve of his brow, the arch of his nose, his cheekbones sharp, and jaw strong. Followed the pattern of the scars he’d made until Elias’s skin was humming, sensitive.
“You said you don’t know me, but you are the kindest of anyone I’ve ever known.”
Elias opened his eyes and Victor was looking back at him keenly.
“You would never have been in Switzerland if I hadn’t put you there myself. Their deaths are my violence, a ripple I made in a pond. Elias, my friend, you are just a wave. A current. My wickedness did not change you. You are as you are.”
Elias didn’t feel unchanged. “But—”
“When this is over, I want you to go back to the alchemists and tell them that I suffered. Tell them I learned. I want you to talk about me like you knew me better than you do. They are people with long enough memories to make the trip worth it.
“I have never once been understood and I want them to understand me. Tell them that I made it all the way to you. That I was sorry and ashamed in Russia but happy.”
“You’re happy?” Elias sobbed.
“Can’t you tell?”
It was yellow and bright, like a spoon full of honey and lemon. Warm between them and sweet all the way down.
“Are you ready?” Victor asked.
“No,” Elias confessed.
“You must be. We are strong enough for this.”
He put his hand over Elias’s heart like he had that first night and Elias mirrored him.
“How good is your French?”
“Bad.”
Victor smirked, fond.
“It will have to do.”
Victor read slow and steady, waited for Elias to repeat the lines after him. Elias was not sure what this felt like on the other side, but for him it was a great unraveling.
The cord that bound them snapped in small pieces, one at a time, like rope holding up a bridge with too much weight. Elias could feel his own strength draining and hear Victor’s voice getting more powerful.
Victor paused when they reached the last line. Then he looked up at Elias.
“Oh,” he said.
“What?”
Victor smiled. “Nothing.”
He turned back to the incantation and spoke his last. Elias did not have time to follow him.