Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
Three days later, Jack tried again.
Rehearsal had been going well. Locke was getting more comfortable with his lines, more confident in his movements.
Jack found himself watching from the wings even when he wasn’t in the scene, unable to look away from the way Locke’s face lit up when he got something right, the way he laughed with the other actors, easy and bright.
Jimmy called for a break. The cast scattered with some heading for the snack table, others outside for fresh air. The stage lights stayed on, casting dramatic shadows across the empty space.
Jack saw his chance.
He approached before Locke could leave the stage. “Wait.”
Locke turned, wiping sweat from his forehead. The stage lights made his two-toned eyes even more striking; he could turn his head and have soft golden eyes then turn another way and there was that flash of forest green, both focused on Jack with an attention that made something warm settle within.
“I have something for you.”
Locke’s expression shifted. Wary. Fond. A little exasperated. “Jack, you don’t have to give me anything.”
Jack pulled out the small ornamental box he’d been carrying in his robe pocket all day. The wood was warm from being close to his body, carved with patterns that would mean nothing to Locke but everything to Jack. Symbols from the Loam. Protection. Permanence. Mine. “It’s just a small trinket.”
Locke took it carefully, weighing it in his hands. Then he grinned, that sunshine smile that made Jack’s carefully controlled dignity waver. “Are you proposing to me Jack?”
If Jack could blush, he would have. The carved features shifted, flustered. “Just open the damn box.”
Locke’s grin widened, but he opened it. The smile faded, replaced by something softer. Wonder, maybe. He stared at the seed nestled in silk, glowing gold like captured sunlight. “It’s... a seed?”
“Not just any seed.” Jack moved closer, close enough that he could smell Locke’s sweat and stage makeup and underneath it all, that old magic that called to him. “This is from the first grove that grew in the Loam. When I was still new and the world still remembered what magic was.”
Locke lifted the box toward the stage lights. The seed’s glow intensified, pulsing like a heartbeat. “It’s beautiful. It’s actually glowing.”
Jack’s voice dropped lower, more intimate. The stage suddenly felt very small, just the two of them in this circle of light. “Once it touches soil, it will spring forth a vast forest. As beautiful as you are.”
Locke’s breath caught. His fingers trembled around the box, and he had to blink several times because his eyes were suddenly stinging.
When was the last time someone had given him something that actually mattered?
Not flowers or chocolates or generic gifts, but something meaningful?
This wasn’t about grand gestures or showing off.
This was Jack giving him something from his own realm, something that mattered, something ancient and magical and—
“Jack...”
“You deserve something precious. Something that will last.”
Locke’s throat worked. He looked up at Jack, at that carved pumpkin face that somehow conveyed so much emotion through simple lines. “This is... this is better than the harvest feast. I mean, the food wasn’t bad, but this is—“
“INCOMING! BACKDROP!” Jimmy’s voice echoed from somewhere in the darkness beyond the stage lights.
“This is really—“
Something slammed into Locke’s shoulder. Hard. The crew carrying a massive painted backdrop, not looking where they were going, too focused on not dropping the unwieldy thing. Locke stumbled, the box flying from his hands.
Time slowed. Jack reached for it, but too late. The box tumbled through the air, hit the stage floor, and the seed rolled out straight toward the pile of prop dirt and autumn leaves clustered stage left for the harvest scene.
“Oh no. Oh no no no—“
The seed touched soil.
Magic erupted. Dense smoke billowed outward, thick and orange and smelling like the Loam itself, ancient and wild and alive.
Through it, Jack could see the seed sprouting, growing, expanding impossibly fast into a miniature forest right there on stage the size of the available dirt on the floor.
Small but dense, surrounded by swirling mist.
“Don’t touch it!”
But Locke was already moving, already reaching for it. “I can cover it, maybe if I—“
“Locke, WAIT—“
Too late. Locke’s hand touched the edge of the tiny forest and the world pulled.
Magic yanked at them both. The sensation was like falling upward, reality inverting, space folding in on itself.
Jack grabbed for Locke instinctively, catching him around the waist as the pull intensified.
The stage, the theater, the confused shouts of the crew everything blurred and compressed and then they were…
Inside.
Jack landed on soft moss, Locke stumbling against him.
They stood in a forest that should not exist, could not exist, in any normal understanding of space.
Above them the dense and white clouds slowly dissipated.
Through them, giant faces appeared. The rehearsal crew, peering down at the miniature forest like giants examining a curious toy.
Locke looked up, eyes wide with panic. “We’re INSIDE the forest? Holy fuck Jack! Did they see...do they see us?”
Jack steadied him, hands on Locke’s shoulders. This close, he could feel Locke’s heart racing. “No, trust me. They saw nothing and they can’t see us inside.”
Locke spun around, taking in the impossible space.
Ancient oaks with leaves in shades of gold and crimson rose around them, their branches spreading wide overhead.
The air smelled like autumn incarnate: sweet apples and the ancient-fire smell of burning heartwood and rich earth that had never known human touch.
Soft moss carpeted the ground beneath their feet.
Somewhere nearby, water trickled over stones, a gentle stream that sang with its own quiet magic.
It was beautiful. A piece of the Loam, manifested here. Jack’s realm, compressed into a space small enough to fit on a stage but vast enough to contain forests and streams and centuries of accumulated magic.
“Okay. Okay, this is fine.” Locke’s voice was tight, controlled panic bleeding through. “How do we get out?”
Jack watched the clouds above them continue to dissipate, revealing more of the crew’s confused faces.
From down here, they looked massive, distorted.
He could hear their muffled voices, tinny and distant.
“Do you wish to pop out of a mini forest in front of everyone? Because if you do then I can get us out now.”
“NO WAY!”
“Then we wait until everyone leaves.”
“So we’re stuck in here until rehearsal ends.” Locke ran his hands through his hair, making it stand up in several directions. He looked rumpled and stressed and impossibly young standing there in Jack’s forest.
“Yes.” Jack said it carefully, watching Locke’s face for anger, for blame.
Instead, Locke sighed. Then, to Jack’s surprise, he sat down on the soft moss, leaning back against one of the ancient trees. “Well. At least it’s pretty.”
Jack stood there, frozen. “You’re not angry.”
“I’m getting used to your gestures ending in magical disasters.” Locke paused, wincing slightly. “That sounded meaner than I meant it.”
“No, you’re right. Everything I try goes wrong.” Jack sank down across from him, his robes pooling in the moss. The forest hummed around them, peaceful and ancient. This was his magic, his realm, and Locke was sitting in it like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“Hey. You’re trying. That counts for something.”
Those carved features shifted, softening, opening. The carved mouth curved up, the triangular eyes widening slightly. “Does it?”
“Yeah. It does.” Locke looked around at the impossible forest, golden light filtering through amber leaves, the stream singing its quiet song. “And I’m definitely keeping this forest. It’s going in my room.”
Jack went very still. “Truly?”
“Are you kidding? This is the coolest thing ever. Disaster or not.” Locke picked at the moss, fingers trailing through the soft green. He didn’t quite meet Jack’s gaze. “Why are you doing this Jack?”
The question hung between them. Jack could answer. Could tell him about the 259 years alone, about the desperation, about not wanting to go back to that empty castle. About how Locke’s magic made colors vivid again, made him feel solid and real and present in a way he hadn’t been in centuries.
But not yet. Not until he got one of these gestures right.
“I won’t tell you until it works out.”
Locke chuckled, the sound soft and fond. But underneath it, something else. Something uncertain.
What did that mean? What did it mean to be courted by a deity?
What did a relationship with Jack even look like?
Would it last? Could it? Jack was immortal, powerful, literally a god.
And Locke was just... Locke. A guy who worked in his grandmother’s candle shop.
A guy who couldn’t even hold onto a human boyfriend.
What if Jack got bored? What if Locke wasn’t enough? What if this was just novelty, the first person to summon him in centuries, and once the shine wore off...
Locke pushed the thoughts away. They were trapped in a miniature magical forest. He could spiral about his inadequacy later.
Above them, the clouds finally cleared completely. The crew had gathered around the tiny forest, poking at it, examining it. Someone, Jimmy probably, was gesticulating wildly, no doubt already rewriting the play to include this “amazing special effect.”
Jack and Locke sat in comfortable silence, waiting for everyone to leave, trapped in a piece of the Loam that smelled like autumn and magic and possibilities Locke wasn’t sure he was brave enough to reach for.