Chapter Six
Zyr
Of the three hundred twenty seven books that Zyr possessed on death magic, only five offered the sort of rudimentary information that might be useful to Robin.
Those, Zyr pulled and set out in preparation for Robin’s arrival, along with two texts on the Monarchs’ ascendance, and an early edition of The Psychogenesis of Mental Disease that he thought the human might find diverting.
For himself, he fetched a simple silver ring from among his treasures and slid it on his finger.
It was neither particularly elegant nor unusually rare.
It did, however, protect against the irritation of sensing a soul match.
Zyr would not have either of them distracted by that particular triviality.
He needed Robin near. To see him, learn him, keep him safe. But not because of an accursed bond.
Perhaps he slept, after those tasks were complete. It was evening and then it was morning, and the storm in his head and in his skies roared on until his wards tripped, telling him a human sought entrance to his allotment.
And what human, but Robin, would seek him out?
The knock was sharp. Demanding. The door swung open, revealing Robin’s tall, slim silhouette, lit by lightning flashes.
“Zyr?” That pleasant tenor, brisk and efficient, with no little curiosity.
Zyr strode toward the door, tail twitching. There was no burn of coffee this time, and the only taste of salt was from the sea beyond his mountain. Good. The ring was working.
“Raven-Robin,” he said, breathing in the scent of Robin the man, instead of Robin the potential bond. “You’re alone. I thought the Solstice Kings might escort you. Or that you might not come.”
“I said I would.” Robin stepped inside, then reached into the bag he wore, pulling out something plastic and colorful, which he held out to Zyr. “Everil was concerned about my knowledge about fae stuff more than anything. Bo’s the one who knows about this place, not me.”
“He fears I intend to trap you. I do not.”
“More, he was worried I bartered myself off without you needing to try at entrapment.”
“I would not accept an offer made in ignorance.” Zyr lowered his gaze to the object Robin had handed him. A round circle of paper in a plastic sheath. The wheel that they’d discussed in the kitchen. Emotions written in a neat, precise hand, color coded and broken into ever smaller slices.
He followed each path, committing them to memory, lips moving silently and the wheel turning in his hands. Once he was certain he had it memorized, he looked up again.
“Inquisitive,” he said, selecting an emotion from the outside edge of the wheel. One that fell under ‘happy’ instead of ‘angry’ this time. “And thankful.”
“Curious,” Robin countered. “Thankful for what?”
Curious. Yes, that seemed right. A curious, bright-eyed bird. The Solstice Kings thought he wished to cage the man. But what would be the point in that? What he wanted was to study the patterns of his flight and the song of his calls. Caged, he would lose all that appealed.
“I lost control yesterday,” he said, half extending the wheel, then letting it fall to his side when Robin didn’t reach to take it. “And you still came. Thankful for that.”
“Everyone does. And the cat was being a bastard. Though facing down Everil when he’s looking out for me is bad for, you know, breathing.”
“Breathing is of no great concern. But it wasn’t my intention to offend him.”
The Winter King, with his wary, mannered behavior, reminded Zyr too well of the friends he’d had, all those generations ago.
The unseelie raised to be ‘better’ than their progenitors, taught to loathe their own natures and worship the light.
Death aligned, they called themselves, fearing the stain of the former Winter Court.
That he had shown his teeth for Robin spoke well of both of them.
Robin. Zyr itched to get him into the library, a treasure among treasures. He would look well suited there, this sharp-eyed bird. Angular and lean and self-contained. A slim, hardcover volume, the storm-blue of his eyes. Pages that cut unwary fingers. Yes.
Call it what? Raven-Robin? Too simple. Perhaps a title for each volume of the man. Name one for his hard eyes, another for his imperious affect.
Said Raven-Robin was watching him. He had that look about him, like he’d been waiting for some time. Zyr had gone wandering in his head again, the man’s voice a pleasant background on the stroll. He wasn’t accustomed to having to remain in the present.
“I was trying to determine your title,” Zyr offered. “Sit? And we can discuss whatever you were saying.”
“You zone out a lot?” Robin asked, glancing to the chairs but remaining in the entryway. “Since I was talking about that whole ‘terms for visiting’ thing, and I figured that’d be something you’d be interested in paying attention to.”
He hadn’t intended to ignore him. Needling him over being pushy or with the placement of his boots was one thing. Giving him the impression that he wasn’t important was another.
He made himself focus on Robin and only on Robin.
“I’m bad at time,” he admitted. “And prone to getting caught in the web of my thoughts. It wasn’t intended as a slight. I’m very interested in your terms, Raven-Robin. I’m interested in everything that pertains to you.”
Robin’s gaze remained hard, measuring.
“Got it.” Crisp. Sharp, like so much of the man was sharp. And then a half smile and a shrug. “Well, this will be interesting. A beithir who sucks with time, and a human with issues around being ignored. Alright. Let’s sit and talk.”
Robin settled on a chair, and Zyr took a seat of his own, gaze still carefully fixed on Robin. Making it clear, he hoped, that he was attending. Collecting a person, it turned out, was significantly more challenging than collecting a book. Books didn’t care if he grew distracted.
“You’re here, in part, because you’re difficult to ignore. Yesterday, when we spoke, you made me feel present.” He realized, in the saying, just how true that was. In the dark, with Robin’s hands on him, he had known that he existed. “I don’t know how, but it was novel.”
“Want me to tell you? Not free of charge.” Robin asked with a grin. “Cost is to stay focused like you are now through the explanation.”
Did the man know the difficulty of his ask? No. He couldn’t. Robin was mortal. He could number his age in decades. He was surrounded by other mortals who aged around him, anchoring him in time.
Eyes like storm-tossed waves. An edged grin, sharp as the rest of him. Zyr sat forward, setting the colored wheel on the table, and resting his arms on his knees.
“I’m attending, Raven-Robin. Speak.”
“You were spiraling. I do too, sometimes. Spiral. Panic attacks. I don’t know if you’re prone to them,” Robin said. “Doctors and medication help, but the only meds that stop them without work from you are the ones that make you numb.”
“I don’t know, either,” Zyr answered, his gaze remaining locked on Robin. “Not when I’m alone. And I’m generally alone.”
Yesterday had been unusual. He wasn’t generally called a traitor by a room full of unseelie. That damn cat. Robin. Robin required that he focus on him.
“Crowds can be hard. Especially if you’re not used to them.
The counting and breathing, the cold cloth, those are all grounding techniques.
The rest was…” Robin shifted, the tapping of his fingers hinting at nerves his expression didn’t show.
“Okay, the rest was honestly some of the more common aftercare I’ve done.
It’s also grounding. Supposed to help the person fit in their skin again.
Like you said, exceptionally pushy, and I go with what seems like it might work. ”
“Aftercare?” Zyr asked. “After what?”
“After sex,” Robin answered, with a tight shrug and lifted chin.
“Specifically kinky sex. Though I usually do a ten count for the submissive when they need to breathe back down, not a nine. The nine was for every time you’d have had to kill that cat-sith to ‘make it stick’. He really was a prick, wasn’t he?”
Kinky sex. It wasn’t as if Zyr was ignorant of Robin’s meaning.
Tucked away among his treasures were books by de Sade and Pauline Réage as well as a few intriguing flicker diaries (always anonymous, such a pity).
But Zyr didn’t recall “aftercare” or “breathing back down” in any of those texts.
Though he’d not made an exhaustive study–
He was to attend to Robin. Best not to ask the man to describe his sex life in more detail. Though Robin had brought it up. Sharp, pushy bird acting the–what word to match submissive? Dominant. Acting the dominant.
Fascinating.
“I’m here,” he said, aware that he was allowing the moment to stretch overlong.
“Mostly. I’m not familiar with some of those terms, and I was attempting to decipher them.
” Also, he’d been imagining what it might be like to have Robin tell him to count while wearing rather less, those adept fingers tight about his horns.
“And considering how they applied. The cat is a prick, yes. But so am I.”
“I appreciate you letting me know you’re still here.” Robin’s lips twitched, like he was deciding whether to smile. “Mostly. And difference is, I don’t like the cat. His prickishness is automatically offensive. Yours is interesting. Which terms do you need worked out?”
“I’m familiar with sex,” Zyr said, surprised at the genuine amusement that bled into his tone. “But I wouldn’t think to use ‘submissive’ as a noun. A submissive action, yes. ‘The submissive,’ no.”
“Sex is an important part of the ‘after sex’ part, yeah,” Robin said. “‘The submissive’ is a person who’s submitting during a scene. During sex. Either all the time or that once.”
“And you would call yourself ‘the dominant?’ Or would it be ‘the authoritarian?’ ‘Superior?’” He surprised himself further by smiling. “‘Pushy raven?’”
Robin grinned, quick and full of teeth.
He liked the sharpness of Robin’s smile. He believed it.