Title: Curtain's Fall 13/?
Section: II Dress Rehearsal (2/10)
Author: Magpie and Wolfling
Email: magpie@moracle.co.uk and wolfling@sympatico.ca
Show: Buffy
Rating: NC-17
Category: angst, hurt/comfort
Warnings: spoilers up to the end of Chosen
Pairings: Giles/Ethan
Series: Of Old Mystics, sequel to Charades
Summary: The roles have all been filled and the players move into place.

Author Notes: This is the last story of the Old Mystics Series, sequel to Charades. We expect this to be rather long -- long enough that we've developed it into subsections: I Casting Call, II Dress Rehearsal, III Opening Night, IV Grand Finale, and V Encore. Many thanks to Mad Poetess and Wesleysgirl for betaing :) Previous stories in the series can be found http://www.myarseisnotpansy.co.uk/piedm/mystics.html. Thanks to all the people who have sent us feedback.

Ethan laughed beside Giles as they walked through the meadows in the slight drizzle, watching the dogs chase after non-existent rabbits. "I don't know why the phrase implies a dog's life is something miserable and hard. Seems to me, it's not so bad."

"Seems to me, you're right," Giles agreed, Gwydion and Skunk's antics drawing a smile from him. "It would be nice to live a life without prophecies and destinies always hanging over us, with nothing more to worry about than chasing the next rabbit."

"Carefree," Ethan said wistfully, perhaps remembering a time when he had been, more or less. "Letting tomorrow take care of itself."

"Trusting that there will be a tomorrow," Giles added with his own wistfulness. "Taking that for granted."

Ethan gave him an uneasy look. "Do you think we'll still have any friends when this is over?"

"I'll settle for everyone coming through this alive and sound."

They were both feeling rather glum.

After the distressing revelations in his Grandmother's journals yesterday, the morning had shown no improvement with an early call from Pamela in London, reporting an incident in Stevenage. The BBC was reporting it as 'mass hallucination', possibly caused by a terrorist gas attack. What had really happened, as far as the initial Council investigations could uncover, was a short-term distortion of reality within a small area centred around a tower block estate. There was one fatality and many more injured, all in bizarre and no doubt terrifying ways.

The 'unravelling' predicted by the prophecy had started. Their time of respite was unarguably over.

"The Great Bear," Ethan said suddenly. "Did you notice how your gran confirmed that Vaurtain is the bear in the prophecy?"

"Yes." It was easier to think about that part of what they'd found than... the other. "It all does seem to be falling into place no matter what we do, doesn't it?"

Ethan nodded. "There was that stuff about the labyrinth too, including a prisoner. Didn't Da--" He stopped, swallowed, and tried again. "Didn't Dawn say she thought we'd have to find someone or something in the maze?"

"She did," Giles confirmed, feeling it all close in on them again. As much as they tried to get away from it, even for just the length of a walk with the dogs, it was always there.

"Sorry," Ethan muttered after a few seconds.

Giles shook his head and reached for his lover's hand. "Not your fault. By all rights, we should be hard at work putting together everything we've found out."

"Breaks are important," Ethan insisted. But as they hadn't actually started work since reading the journals yesterday, this wasn't so much a break as a delay. Ethan sighed. "You seemed so tense. I... I'm trying to look after you."

That touched Giles in a way that did push everything else into the background. "I know," he said, turning to Ethan and pulling him against him. "And that does make a difference. Truly."

Ethan wrapped his arms around Giles and gave him a wry look. "On the subject of work, there are books I need -- books that I can only hope still exist within the ravaged Council library. Do I have your permission to call Pammy and ask for a loan?"

"Of course. You don't have to ask me for that."

"Aren't you still my boss?" Ethan managed to drag a coy and flirtatious look out from somewhere.

"Yes, but you have the ability to operate under your own initiative," Giles replied with a smile. "I prefer not to micromanage."

"I never did get my assistant," Ethan said wistfully. "Or my coffee machine."

"Last I checked, you hadn't been fired. We'll be back at the offices when this is all over."

"Now there's something to look forward to." Ethan's tone was dry as dust, but he winked at Giles.

Giles smiled. "We should enjoy the wilderness here while we can."

Ethan nodded and started to look thoughtful. He brought one hand up between them and rubbed it over his mouth. "Hmm."

Giles knew that kind of look. "You're up to something."

"Thinking about it." After kissing Giles softly, Ethan continued, "Remember you said you wanted to be with me when I experimented further with my fox form?"

"I suppose that's as good a way as any to get away from it all for a bit." He still had mixed feelings about Ethan playing with the shapechanging, but he had promised he wouldn't interfere.

Ethan grinned, clearly cheering up at the thought. "I wonder how the dogs will take it."

"Hopefully you won't inspire them to think they're trained for the Hunt."

"Come on." Ethan tugged at Giles. "Let's find some tree cover."

"Feeling bashful about doing this out in the open?" Giles teased, even as they made their way out of the meadow area and up among the trees that encircled it.

"Me?" Ethan laughed, and then admitted, "Maybe."

"Finally found something you want to do in private, eh?" Giles' tone was still teasing, but he made sure to keep it gentle.

It may have still been only February, but some of the trees were already showing signs of going into bud, and the first of the wood anemones were poking up from within the dead leaves of last autumn. Squirrels skipped along branches above them, and Giles thought he caught sight of a jay. All these signs of spring would normally have cheered him, but whenever he saw them now he remembered Ian's words just before Christmas forecasting the rise of the enemy as life woke up once more in the earth.

Once safely away from the fields, Ethan stopped them both and turned to face Giles as he began to strip. He started slow and seductively, but quickly began to shiver. "Bugger that," he muttered, laughing, and took off the rest of his clothes much faster.

"Do you want me to see what I can do about warming...?" Giles asked, disliking Ethan suffering, even if it was just being cold.

Ethan shook his head as he handed his clothes to Giles, and said through slightly chattering teeth, "I'll have a fur coat soon. Skunk!" He called his dog to him, and she came bounding through the undergrowth, her long fur covered in burrs and small pieces of twigs. "I want you to watch this, menace, so that you know it's me. Then you can stop the pit pony trying to eat me." He looked back up at Giles. "Ready, dearheart? We can still talk mentally, remember."

Giles fixed an image of Ethan -- how he looked, how he sounded, how he felt -- firmly in his mind, remembering how he'd had to lead him back to himself the last time, then he nodded.

'It will be all right,' Ethan said in Giles' mind, and then his naked form wavered in front of Giles and fell forward onto hands and knees as it shrunk, leaving an animal not much larger than Skunk behind. Fox-Ethan looked considerably more healthy and glossy-coated than the last time Giles had seen the form. His muzzle opened, revealing small sharp white teeth, and he gave a little bark, which was immediately and ebulliently answered by Skunk, who bounced around the fox, wagging her tail at great speed.

Despite his misgivings, Giles couldn't help but smile from amusement. "I think she likes you better now that you're the right size to play with."

'I'll play with her in a minute,' Ethan sent. He trotted forward and slinked sinuously around Giles' legs. 'Dump my clothes somewhere and pick me up?'

Giles looked around and spotted a nearby fallen log on which he carefully laid Ethan's clothes. Then he looked down at the fox sitting at his feet and apparently grinning up at him. "What do things look like from that perspective?" he asked curiously, even as he bent and got a firm hold around Ethan's torso and lifted.

'Tall,' Ethan told him with a mental chuckle as he wriggled and settled into Giles' arms. He didn't weigh much, and his fur was dense and sleek to the touch. He looked up with his whiteless dark eyes and prodded Giles' cheek with his nose. 'Also colours are different in fox vision. Less vivid, only the really bright hues show as colour at all. And things aren't so clear generally. But that's more than made up for by scent. I can smell what you ate three breakfasts ago.'

"If I recall correctly, that would have been you," Giles replied, absently scratching behind Ethan's ears as he would to Gwydion.

'Ah yes.' Ethan-fox licked Giles' face. 'See, I'm not so terrible like this, am I?'

"I never said you were. I was just worried about you losing yourself in the animal."

'That was a different situation, dearheart. This is not the same. You should let me turn you into a badger; then we could gambol.'

Giles chuckled. "Just like an old folktale?"

'Yes.' There was another foxy kiss on his cheek. 'My hearing's powerful too like this. I could hear that laugh of yours from deep within your chest. I want to go hunt a rabbit.' Ethan's mental voice was becoming increasingly excited and happy, and he was squirming in Giles' arms.

"I seem to recall something about you and rabbits last time," Giles reminded him, shifting his grip so as not to drop him.

'I won't eat it.' Ethan wriggled up and put his forelegs on Giles' shoulder, panting quietly by his ear. 'Much.'

"How about not at all?" Giles suggested. "You don't want rabbit breath later."

A rough animal tongue was pulled up Giles' ear. 'Be a badger with me, and we can both have rabbit breath.'

Giles chuckled. "I'm not sure I want rabbit breath."

'Hmm, maybe badgers don't eat rabbits. Do you fancy a nice crunchy stag beetle instead? Oh, we could be really wicked and have interspecies sex. That'd be something scandalous we've never done before.' Ethan's mental sendings definitely had a different quality to them in this form. It wasn't the words so much as the speed at which they were said, the way he darted between subjects, and how he somehow managed to inject a wild excitement into his tone.

"Even as a fox you have a one track mind," Giles said, amused. "This shouldn't surprise me."

'I'm still me,' Ethan told him happily. Then twitched violently as a loud bark came from behind Giles -- Gwydion, of course. The wolfhound set Skunk off, and for a few very noisy moments, a barking conversation was held. Ethan-fox whined aloud and sent, 'Have I mentioned my sensitive ears?'

"Gwydion." When his dog stopped in mid-bark and looked up at him, Giles told him, "A bit quieter please. Skunk is not several fields away."

The dogs quietened obediently, and Skunk looked up at Ethan attentively. Giles gained the impression that some sort of communication was taking place, an impression increased when Skunk yapped once and then turned and trotted purposefully away from the little glade in which they stood.

"What did you tell her?" he asked Ethan curiously.

'Tell who?'

"Skunk."

'What makes you think I told her anything?' There was far too much humour in Ethan's mental tone for his attempt at innocence to succeed.

"Observation and experience," Giles replied in his driest of tones.

The fox made a strange noise that Giles only realised from Ethan's mental presence was meant to be a chuckle. 'I'm employing her in her working dog capacity.'

Giles could see where this was going. "Tell me you didn't send her after a rabbit for you."

'Ok,' Ethan sent agreeably. 'I won't tell you that.'

"And what makes you think I'm going to let you eat it even if she does catch a rabbit for you?" He noticed Gwydion's head had picked up at the mention of 'rabbit'. "Oh, and you're going to start in as well?" Giles asked the dog.

Gwydion barked hopefully. Ethan said, 'She's merely locating rabbits. We can catch them ourselves. Let me turn you into a badger.'

"You just want to turn me into a badger so I can't stop you from terrorising the local rabbit population." Giles eyed Gwydion warily. "Plus, I'm not sure Gwydion knows the difference between a rabbit and a badger."

'He's a wolfhound, not a badgerhound. Put me down and prepare to pull him off me? Oh, can you talk to him the way I do Skunk? Mentally, I mean, like this. I could see a problem otherwise.' Sharp fox teeth nibbled at Giles' earlobe.

"I don't know," he answered, looking down at Gwydion and trying to ascertain the dog's interest in Ethan the fox. "Ouch," he added absently as Ethan bit his earlobe again.

'You don't say that when I do it with human teeth,' Ethan said, doing it again. Gwydion didn't seem to be paying much attention to Ethan; Giles got the impression his dog was far more interested in the prospect of rabbit.

A sharp pain in his ear where Ethan was nibbling broke Giles' chain of thought. "Ouch!" he said, with much more feeling this time. "You may remember your teeth are a bit sharper now, and I am not a chew toy." Deciding to kill two birds with one stone -- getting Ethan away from his apparently irresistible ears, and checking out Gwydion's reaction to Ethan's fox form -- Giles put Ethan down on the ground.

'Bugger, he's big,' Ethan sent with alarm, looking up at Gwydion, his long ears going back to his head. But Gwydion only briefly sniffed at Ethan-fox, wagged his tail, and then looked back up at Giles expectantly.

"Apparently he can tell the difference between a fox and a rabbit at least," Giles commented, noticing the way Gwydion's eyes seemed to light up again at the mention of 'rabbit.' He sighed. "Oh, fine, be off with you. Go chase rabbits if you want."

Both Gwydion and Ethan immediately turned tail and began to patter away.

"Ethan," Giles called out. "Not you."

After a pause, a comically dejected looking fox slunk back into the clearing. Head down, brush dragging through the leaves -- it would have been very funny were it not a little too reminiscent of a time Giles would rather not recall too vividly.

"Don't," Giles pleaded. "That's not... Just don't, please?"

Ethan-fox immediately perked up. 'Bugger, I'm sorry. I didn't think.' He trotted back to Giles, and the air wavered, and then a naked Ethan was pressing against Giles, holding him tightly.

Giles wrapped his arms around Ethan in return. "It's all right," he said, although the memory of the last time he'd seen Ethan as a fox was still strong in his mind.

"It's not. That was stupid of me. I'm sorry." Ethan kissed the side of Giles' face and neck. "I'll get dressed, and we can make our way home now. I'll stay reassuringly human."

But Giles wasn't ready to go back to the house and all the problems and responsibilities that waited for them there, not when they had been actually enjoying themselves before he'd gone and ruined it. Casting about a way to reclaim that light-hearted mood, he asked, "Turn me into a badger?"

Ethan, who was covered in goose pimples, drew back. "Are you-- are you serious?"

Giles nodded, although he was anything but. "I trust you." That much, at least, was true.

Ethan stared at him for a few seconds; then said, "Ready?" Taking a deep breath, Giles nodded. "Strip then, dear. And perhaps do your globe of warm air thing too while you're at it; I'd rather not be distracted from the process by shivering."

Giles did so, creating a warm sphere before taking off his clothes; he saw no need for shivering himself. "All right," he said when he was fully naked. "Now what?"

"Now we say hello to the girls," Ethan said, waving over Giles' shoulder. "Hello, girls!"

Giles didn't turn, not buying Ethan's words for a minute. "You know I could take away the heated sphere."

Sniggering, Ethan put his hands on Giles' shoulders and kissed him briefly, sobering as he did so. "Right. I don't think you'll feel very much," he said, as he pulled his head back enough to look at Giles. "I certainly don't when I do it to myself. It's just a question of finding the right thread..." Giles' perceptions suddenly performed nauseating acrobatics. "...and pulling it."

Giles felt as it he was sinking rapidly into the earth. He fell forward trying to catch himself and was confronted with a very different world from the one he'd known. A world of strange rustles and smells and large human feet directly in front of him.

He shook his head, trying to get his bearings. "Ethan--" he tried to say but that wasn't what came out of his mouth.

"Speak with your mind, dearheart."

Giles heard, very loudly, the click of Ethan's knees as the man crouched down, yet still he towered over Giles. A hand covered in fascinating smells was placed in front of Giles' nose. 'This is... rather strange...' Giles sent mentally, getting distracted by the cacophony of scents rolling off Ethan's skin. He nuzzled his nose against Ethan's palm, trying to sort them out.

"Have you seen the size of your claws?" Ethan asked. "You could really live up to your nickname if you wanted to." The hand that wasn't under Giles' nose was moving over his back, combing through his, well, fur, he supposed.

It felt... good. Ethan repeated the movement and a strange trilling sound came from Giles' throat in response.

Ethan chuckled, the sound seeming to reach lower registers than normal. He scratched just above Giles' eyes and asked, "Feeling hungry, by any chance?"

'Mm, maybe,' Giles replied, distractedly still fascinated by how different Ethan's laugh had sounded. 'Do that again.'

"What, this?" Ethan scratched above Giles' eyes again.

Giles trilled once more in pleasure. 'Not that, although if you want to keep doing it...'

Chuckling, Ethan asked, "What then?"

Oh. '*That*,' he said, looking up at Ethan's face. 'Laugh.' It was such a warm and complex sound, Giles felt like he could crawl into it and settle down.

"I'm not sure I can force laughter," Ethan said, although he was in fact laughing as he said it, "but I'm sure it will come naturally now and then. So you don't fancy a nice plump rabbit then. Hot blood, bones to crunch..."

Giles peered up at Ethan suspiciously. 'Are you certain you changed yourself back from a fox all the way?'

Another laugh, deep and liquid. "Yes, but I still fancy a bunny hunt, even if we let it go... is that hypocritical of me?"

Giles turned that one over in his mind, trying not to get distracted by all the scents and sounds enticing him. 'I don't know. Would you be as against the hunt if they let the fox go at the end?'

"Yes," Ethan said immediately. "Very well, your point is taken. It's not as if we need the grub. Have you had long enough as a badger for your first experiment or would you like to explore a bit?"

'I...' He found himself reluctant to go back just yet. 'Can we wait a little longer?'

"Of course." There was a movement of air, and then there was another animal in front of Giles. Ethan-fox looked a lot bigger from Giles' current height, and he only now realised just how dull his vision had become. The vibrant red of Ethan's coat was now a faded brown.

Of course, all those delicious Ethan smells were now different and had to be explored all over again. He did so, sliding his muzzle along the line of Ethan's back, taking in and basking in the myriad scents, which in total had already settled in his mind under the label 'Ethan'.

Ethan was sniffing him in turn. 'You're still you,' he sent. 'Still my husband.'

'Yes,' Giles replied serenely. 'Were you expecting someone different?'

'No, I mean, your base pattern's still the same. I've completely changed your body, but it seems we have signature patterns that magic, or at least my magic, can't touch. Unique like fingerprints.' Ethan completed a circuit around Giles and stood before him again. 'It's reassuring.'

'It would have been more reassuring if you'd discovered that before you changed me,' Giles said dryly. Still, it wasn't in him to be worried about that at the moment. This body, although entirely different from his own, felt... right.

At least it did now that the original disorientation was fading.

'I would never have done it if I'd felt there was any danger. ' Ethan poked his nose into Giles' neck and then sneezed, which was for some reason a very amusing sound. 'Shall we take a stroll?'

'Why not? It's a whole different world to explore.' He nuzzled Ethan's fur. 'Which direction?'

Ethan stood straight for a few moments, sniffing the air, and then trotted off into the undergrowth. 'This way.' Giles followed, finding himself instinctively navigating more by sound and scent than sight. It was a strange experience, partially because it didn't feel strange at all. 'Come on, little legs,' Ethan called, getting further ahead. 'Keep up.'

'That's not funny,' Giles declared with as much dignity as he could muster, even as he quickened his pace.

'Made me laugh.' Ethan sounded in high spirits, an impression increased when he suddenly shot vertically into the air several feet, coming down in a pounce within a clump of dock leaves. 'I'll get you, you little crispy coated scuttling thing.'

'I thought Skunk was supposed to be the puppy, not you. Besides you don't even like bugs,' Giles felt obliged to point out. Just then, something shot out of the leaves, right into Giles' path and he instinctively swiped it to the ground with his claws.

'Mine!' Ethan sprang from the greenery to confront Giles, making a wheezy sound in warning. 'My, er, fat nasty looking beetle thing!'

'Why would you want a fat nasty looking beetle thing?' Giles asked, not moving his paw from on top of said beetle thing. 'Besides, I caught it fair and square.'

'I did all the work!' Without warning, Ethan jumped into the air again, coming down on top of Giles and then bouncing a safe distance away . 'Mine!'

Giles felt a warning growl rumble in his throat. 'Have you gone quite mad?'

Ethan stared at him, hackles raised and a snarl starting to form on his muzzle. Then suddenly, he straightened up and did something strange with his shoulders that might possibly have been meant to be a shrug. 'Fine. Eat up then.'

Giles stared at him. 'What? You want me to eat the fat nasty looking... quite probably crunchy and quite tasty... I'm sorry, where was I going with this?'

'Yes, eat it. Don't waste it. You'll find it tastes quite different now. I'll find myself another... something.' Ethan was still watching him. Perhaps he was thinking Giles might be careless enough to let the beetle escape. Which, if true, made Giles wonder if he should be offended. He was a far better... badger than that. To prove it he leaned his head down and bit the head off the beetle.

It tasted... nutty? Salty? Really it wasn't like anything Giles had ever tasted before, but it was definitely moresome.

Ethan chuckled and trotted off around some brambles. 'If you think that's good, wait until you try coney tartare.'

'You're obsessed with rabbits, did you know that?' Giles asked, as he finished the beetle in one more bite before running after Ethan.

'Skunk has found a small warren, you know.'

'Really?'

'Yes. Lots of them, all coming out of their burrows now as evening gets closer, getting fat on the new spring growth. Little fluffy white tails showing as they hop about. Want to go and watch them?' Ethan suddenly appeared in front of Giles again, grinning evilly in that way that foxes -- and Ethans -- seemed to have.

'You want to do far more than just watch them,' Giles pointed out. He ambled closer to Ethan. 'Besides, there's another fluffy tail I'm much more interested in watching.'

Fox-Ethan's head tipped to the side. 'Oh yes?'

Giles started to nod, but stopped as it felt unnatural. 'Yes,' he said, making a sound that was something between a cluck and a chitter deep in his throat that his badger brain insisted was seductive.

Ethan's brush twitched and his forequarters lowered, although his head stayed high. He looked very much like a dog wanting to play . 'Is it physically possible, do you think?'

'I haven't the foggiest idea. But don't you think finding out would be more interesting than chasing some old rabbit?'

***

"You're a nosy old sod, aren't you?" Ethan asked companionably, as he entered the small study he'd finally found Ian in. There was a good-sized fire roaring in the hearth, and it provided the only lighting currently in the room. It was a very dark night outside, heavy rain smearing the windows. Ethan and Rupert had been caught out in the open when the downpour had started hours earlier, still in their animal shapes. Ethan hadn't missed the crow flapping away in the direction of the house as they'd scampered to the log for their clothes. "And a broody one too by the look of things."

"Hello, Ethan," Ian said, voice laced with dry humour. "How nice to see you."

Ethan went over to the large bow windows and pulled the heavy curtains closed against the night. Ian, he'd noticed, was drinking. Ethan found a dusty glass on a small table near the window and cleaned it on his jumper. He looked back at the shape curled up in the shadows of the large armchair by the hearth. "Maybe you'd prefer to see me furry?"

"I would have thought you'd got your fill of that earlier." He couldn't make out Ian's expression in the shadows, but it sounded like he was smiling.

"As you were watching, you should know that my fill was exactly what I didn't get. Not then, anyway." He walked over to stand beside Ian's chair, picking up a half-empty bottle of malt from the floor there. "A friend should never let a friend drink alone," he announced.

He could feel Ian's eyes on him. "If I recall correctly," the older man began, "the last time we drank together, we ended up in the Thames."

"Well, to be pedantic, the last time we drank together was with Rupert, upstairs, naked and full of post-coital buzz. But I take your point." He filled his glass with whisky and raised it to Ian. "To a dry, warm evening."

Ian raised his glass in return. "Speaking of which, where is your Rupert? Didn't misplace the badger, did you?"

"The girls talked him into some official Watcher training time. I've no doubt they're exhausting him as we speak, and he'll be fit for nothing come bedtime." For all his cynical words, Ethan knew exactly why Rupert had agreed, or at least he knew why he would have done, had he been required. The two of them knew something now that no one else did. Something terrible that would make betrayers of them both should it come to pass. Would any of their friends still consider themselves that when this was over?

After refilling his glass to near full, Ethan moved over to the other armchair in the room, pulling it closer to the fire.

"And you are trying to ensure you are in the same state?" Ian asked, eyeing the full glass.

"Just playing catch up," Ethan said peaceably. "You seemed to have had a head start on me."

Ian regarded him for a moment. "I don't suppose you'd accept old bones feeling the chill as an excuse."

"Happy to oblige... if you'd be as kind in return." Ethan attempted to study Ian, seeing more with his pattern sense than his eyes in the flickering firelight. "Unless you feel like talking, in which case, friends are not just for stealing your booze."

"Oh, it's nothing new," Ian assured him, taking a drink himself. "Sometimes pains and worries are around for so long that they start to feel like old friends themselves."

"Things *are* different now though," Ethan reminded. "You've got someone to share them with."

"Were you always this pushy? Or is this something special you've saved for me?"

"Has asking me versions of that question ever helped you in the past?" It was rhetorical. "Might as well surrender now, you know."

Ian smiled. "Yes, but where would the challenge be then?"

"Just try to remember that you don't have to be alone now. Not if you don't want to be. I know we're not *him*, but we're your brothers in this, nonetheless. Break the habit of solitude once in a while, old crow, and come to us?" Ethan chuckled into his glass. "And not just to play peeping Tom."

"Could I help it if I was just innocently flying by while you were getting up to things against the laws of nature?"

"Or rather, failing to. What shape had Derek, or is that a bad question?"

"It's not a bad question, but we never changed together. I didn't learn the knack until after he was gone." Ian's smile turned bittersweet. "But I rather fancy he would've been something quite grand -- a golden eagle or something of the sort."

Something that could fly. Something that wouldn't plummet to its death. Ethan struggled to keep his wince from his face. He wished quite sincerely he'd never read that section of Harriet's journals. "Bit of an aristocrat, was he? I'd like to have known him. Every time you tell me a little something about him, it feels like a gift. The four of us could've been great mates." He had no way of proving that assertion, but it felt like truth.

"London would've trembled in horror before us," Ian agreed, chuckling. "And Derek was as common born as can be. But he had that kind of air that meant he would've fit in with the upper crust effortlessly." He paused. "I was the one born with the pedigree."

Oh, and wasn't that a fascinating new titbit of information. "Exactly how elevated a crust are we talking about here?" Ethan asked cautiously.

"Buckham Hall is a little smaller than the family's summer home."

Ethan slipped out of his chair in order to sit on the arm of Ian's, staring down with a hard look. "Title?"

"Well..."

"Tell me the worst." He might have guessed. How was he meant to be a self-respecting anarchist when his lover and his... brother were both blue-blooded pedigrees?

"Viscount," Ian said, quickly adding, "It's always been more trouble than it was worth."

"Bloody hell," Ethan swore quietly. "I'm sodding surrounded. This comes as a great shock to me, Ian. Or should I say, my lord? I feel let down. Really, I do."

Ian lifted an eyebrow. "Because I had the bad taste to be born with a title?"

"Yes. That's beyond poor taste. Rupert's bad enough, but at least he's not lower ranks royalty. How could you do this to me?"

"I haven't done anything to you. I'm the same as I've always been." Ian sounded exasperated and perhaps a little defensive.

"Yes," Ethan said, not actually agreeing at all. "Another wealthy sodding landowner to my mixed peasant stock. Another fox-hunting, public school blue-blood. Another--"

"Another word and this public school blue-blood is going to undertake a fox hunt right now," Ian growled, reaching out to grasp the wrist of the hand Ethan had been waving around as he spoke. "Bloody hell, you're the last person I would expect to buy into all that class balderdash!" That shut him up. Ethan looked down and said nothing, not trying to take his arm back. He hadn't meant to rant quite so strongly. Ian sighed and let go of his wrist. "Does it really make that much difference to you?" he asked, sounding weary.

Ethan shook his head, feeling guilty. "It's just... old triggers. If I really cared, I'd hardly have married Rupert, would I? I just... It's insecurity, I guess. Feeling--" He snorted, standing up from the chair. "Like peasant scum. Like nobody. I'm sorry, Ian. I was being a prat." He turned to walk towards the window.

"You're not, you know." Ian's pleasant voice followed after Ethan.

"No, I'm somebody. I know. A man of prophecy and... onerous duty. As I said, old triggers." Ethan parted the curtains and watched the raindrops racing down the windowpanes, shivering slightly because the air was chill away from the fire.

"I was referring to the being a prat bit, but yes, that's true as well." Ian got up and crossed the room to stand behind him. "Now being a drama queen on the other hand..."

Chuckling softly, Ethan looked down. "Yes, well, I have to be some kind of nobility with all you titled folk and landed gentry around. My Lord Crow."

Ian snorted. "You're going to make me regret telling you, aren't you?"

Turning around, Ethan grinned. "Oh, most definitely." He reached out and lightly stroked Ian's cheek. "So what happens when nobility is pulled towards the wild? I imagine it causes more of a stir than when a London street kid walks widdershins."

"When they eventually noticed, yes. I was a terror from the start so it took some time for it to come to light when I started really turning to the wild."

"How old were you when you met Derek?" Ethan took Ian's hand and pulled him back towards the fire.

"Fourteen," Ian replied, letting himself be led. He smiled a little. "If I was a wild child in the straitjacket of nobility, then he was the clichéd diamond in the rough. If there were any justice in the universe, Derek would have been the one with title born. He carried himself far more like a Viscount than I ever managed."

"Instant attraction?" Ethan frowned at the single-seater chairs, and before Ian could sit on his, Ethan grabbed the cushion from each, placing them on the floor and kicked the chairs back a little way. "Sit down here with me. It's cosier."

"We have to do something about this fascination you have with sitting on the floor," Ian grumbled good-naturedly as he sat himself down on the cushion besides Ethan.

"I like floors; they're the great levellers. Sitting on them strips formality from an encounter; lends a touch of childlike freedom from care." He grabbed Ian's whisky bottle from where it had been left and offered it to the older man. "Refill?"

"Why not?" Ian took the bottle with a smile and drank from it.

"So tell me about your first meeting. What was it like when you first saw him?" Ethan was aware that his eagerness for romantic details made him seem a trifle... girlish, but hopefully Ian would understand why he wanted to know.

"Like I had been hit by an express train," Ian said, glancing at Ethan. "I suspect you know exactly how that felt."

He nodded eagerly. "I'd known Rupert was out there, had even been expecting I'd meet him that night, but even so, I wasn't even slightly prepared. Does it always take our side of the partnership harder?"

"How can it not? After all, even if we're not fully aware of it, we're reacting to two interlocking pieces of our own Pattern clicking into place."

"Yes." Ethan nodded again. "Yes, of course. Did you talk to him immediately or do what I did and run away to reassess?"

Ian chuckled. "I would've if I hadn't been in the middle of getting the shit kicked out of me."

"Oh!" Ethan put his hand on Ian's leg and squeezed, delighted at what he'd just been told and seeing parallels with his own story. "He rescued you?"

"Actually, he was with the gang that was doing the beating." Ian smiled wryly. "It was a well earned beating -- I used to be quite good at calling down more trouble than I could handle with my mouth."

"Me too, but Rupert became practiced at playing the knight in shining armour while we were together. So it was love at first thump then?" Ethan giggled a little and swallowed some more whisky down.

Ian stretched out his legs in front of him and leant back. "Something like that. For me, at least. For Derek, it was more guilt and pity for the poor beaten-to-a-pulp public school git who couldn't keep his mouth shut."

"I'm sure you made him aware of your charms soon enough. Once you were slightly less pulpy, I imagine." Ethan laughed again. "I stalked Rupert for weeks before daring to make my approach, and even then I didn't actually approach, but set up a suicidal drama he had to rescue me from."

"Oh?" Ian took another drink from the whisky bottle. "Your turn to tell a story."

Ethan grinned. "It was the early seventies, the time of glam rock, and believe me, I know glamour. I set the stage, and when I knew Rupert was paying attention, I joined my fellow actors. They, um, didn't like me very much." He winked at Ian.

"I was right. You are a drama queen."

"Back then I went to extremes. Extremes of extremes. But it doesn't sound like you were much better."

"I got myself into more than my fair share of trouble, yes," Ian confirmed. "Was always trying to get attention."

"Brother," Ethan murmured fondly. Ian was leaning back against his chair, his legs straight and feet pointed at the fire, and Ethan laid his hand on Ian's upper belly, just making contact really. After the things they'd done recently, it didn't seem too intimate. "That's what you are. My older brother." He felt he was almost challenging Ian to deny it.

Ian chuckled, dropping a hand to cover Ethan's. "That would make how we ended our last night out a whole new category of naughtiness, wouldn't it?"

Ethan laughed. "Nothing really all that wrong with a touch of brotherly love. And it's better perhaps than feeling like a narcissist every time I want to kiss you."

"Felt like a narcissist a lot, have you?" Ian asked curiously.

"Just recently." He smirked down at Ian.

"Wicked boy," Ian accused fondly.

"I'm just naturally affectionate," Ethan claimed.

"You're naturally something, all right."

That made Ethan frown. "Do you mind me touching you? I thought after... was I wrong?" He prepared to pull his hand back out from under Ian's.

Ian's grip tightened on his hand, stopping him from moving before he began. "If I minded you touching me, I'm quite capable of moving out of reach."

Ethan smiled at Ian, and feeling the smile was tense, deliberately made himself relax with a sigh. And of course, being perverse, immediately then found himself asking, "How did this morning's news hit you?"

He felt Ian's mood get much more serious. "It's beginning," the older man said with a sigh.

"This is so hard for Rupert," Ethan said after a pause. "He feels responsible for, well, just about everything."

Ian nodded. "He has a rather over-developed social conscience at times, doesn't he?"

"Trained into him from an early age. Normally I'd try whatever works to pull him out of it, but this time... well, it *is* our responsibility, isn't it?"

"The thing about fated roles," Ian began, stretching out into even more of a lounging position, "is that they're pretty much going to happen whether you spend time worrying about it or not."

Ethan thought about Dawn and answered unwisely, "Not necessarily."

That earned him a long look. "Not necessarily?" Ian asked casually.

Bugger. "Oh," Ethan started dismissively, "I just meant that sometimes decisions have to be made."

"Are we talking about any decisions in particular?"

He shrugged and met Ian's eyes. "Oh, you know. When to attack, who to attack with, that sort of thing. Our roles may be pre-destined, but the rest of it still has to be organised the old fashioned way."

Ian looked back at him silently for so long that Ethan began to worry the man knew more than he should. But he couldn't know, could he? At the very worst, Keri might have hinted obliquely. One thing Ethan was sure of, if Ian pushed hard enough, Ethan's resolve would crumble, and then Rupert would be angry with him.

It wasn't as if he couldn't see Rupert's point. The decision regarding Dawn had to be theirs. It wasn't fair to involve anyone else... other than Dawn herself, of course. If it were just up to him, he probably would have told Dawn by now, but he understood why Rupert didn't want to. Not while there was a chance that an alternative could be found.

Ethan let his gaze fall and took his hand back, using the excuse of drinking from the whisky bottle. He wasn't very good at withstanding direct pressure, but he did have a knack for sliding out from beneath. "Well, there's you to start with," he told Ian.

Still watching him with an uncomfortably direct gaze, Ian smiled slightly and asked, "What about me?"

Ethan glanced up uneasily. "You're so convinced you're going to die in the coming battles."

Ian didn't look away, and the smile he gave Ethan then was equal parts sad and kind. "My part in this is almost over. I don't see this as a bad thing, Ethan."

Ethan scowled. "Why not? I bloody do!"

"Oh, my dear boy..." Ian reached out and squeezed his hand. "You know the answer to that, if you think about it. You've voiced it before."

Had he? Well, perhaps. "I know it must be hell to stay, but you've stayed this long, Ian. And I'm trying to make things... well, better than they have been for you. Why give up now?"

"Perhaps because I don't see it as giving up." Ian sighed and sat up. "I don't know if you can understand how this feels to me, Ethan, and frankly, that's good. I wouldn't wish it on you for anything. Staying has been my penance, and it hasn't been all bad, but I've never forgotten that that is what it is. And now, it's almost at an end."

Ethan felt like curling up into a ball and staying like that until Rupert came to comfort him, but he wasn't a child and that sort of behaviour wasn't open to him. He stared at the patterns in the rug. "So the pain is so bad that oblivion is preferable to staying with... To staying." He dared a glance up.

The smile Ian gave him then was totally unexpected and had all the more impact because of that. "Who said anything about oblivion?"

Oh. Ohhh. "You believe that --" Of course he did; hadn't Rupert promised Ethan something much along the same lines. Ethan found himself responding with an uncertain grin. "Derek is waiting for you?"

"He's always been the doggedly patient sort, but I may have pushed him to his limits this time." The fondness in Ian's eyes was a match for his smile, and his entire expression was possibly more peaceful than Ethan had ever seen it.

Spontaneously, Ethan surged forward, gathering Ian into his arms and squeezing tightly. For Ian's sake, he'd allow no doubts into his mind. Derek was waiting for Ian and soon they would be together again, as they should be. "I am going to miss you quite appallingly, old crow, but... but it *is* him you are meant to be with, and I will... I will remember that."

Ian hugged him back just as tightly. "You don't need to start missing me quite yet, I'm still here for a while."

"Does that mean you know when?"

He shook his head. "The patterns will tell when it is time."

Ethan kissed the side of Ian's head softly and pulled back, out of his arms, but he stayed close. "Promise me something?"

"What?"

Ethan could feel what he could only assume was his cheeks blushing, which was amusing, as he'd had no idea he was still capable of such a response. He made himself meet Ian's eyes. "When you're... gone... from here. If it's possible, and I know it probably won't be, but if it is. Let me know that you -- both of you -- are all right, eh?"

Ian grinned at him. "You should know by now, dear boy, that the impossible is where we function the best." He touched Ethan's cheek gently. "I promise."

NEXT