4. The Géas

Though Andrew fell asleep smiling, he woke up screaming. He toppled out of bed, landing heavily on his knee. Fumbling with the clasp of his géas, Andrew ended up snapping the chain and tossing it across his bedroom floor. Gasping, he rubbed his neck, kneeling next to his bed, sounds from the street muffled by the horrified pulsing of his blood in his ears. He staggered to his feet and into his bathroom, flipping on the light to glare at his reflection. There were gray circles under his eyes—worse than usual—and around his neck was a faint rash in the shape of the chain from the géas.

"What the hell," Andrew muttered. "What the—"

Last night.

What…happened? A quick glance out his bathroom door showed no extra shoes by the door across from the kitchen, no extra lights on. Everything was tidy except that it looked like his cat had knocked over his stack of books from the arm of the couch. That culprit sat on the edge of the kitchen island, blinking at him. Arwen Undómeow's fluffy chest rose in a silent meow, her tail flicking where it curled delicately around her feet.

"Save the judgment," he said to her with a growl. "And get off the counter."

She blinked again, ambivalent. Arwen would be hiding if anyone else besides Sam were in the house, so…he was alone.

But he couldn't remember anything after leaving The Squire. Nothing outside except…except lips, and the sickly sweet taste of mulberries, and a warm arm pressing around his waist. The smell of the charged air before a storm was somewhere in his mind's memories as well. Violet eyes fixed on him outside the building in the parking lot, fading into nightfall, but lingering like a thumbprint on Andrew's heart long into the night.

Okay.

So…so Micah kissed him. That had to have been the extent of it, at least. But it should not have felt so fragmented, so feverish in his mind, not after drinking a single Old Fashioned over two hours.

Andrew's knees went weak so suddenly that he slid onto the closed toilet next to the sink, a shiver crawling up his spine.

"Did I get drugged?" he asked his cat. She blinked at him, impassive. "Fucking figures," he spat. "God forbid I have a normal romantic experience." He dropped his head into his hands, cold with anger and burning with humiliation.

And what the hell happened with his géas? He pulled himself back to his feet, peering in the mirror at the irritated skin on his neck, grimacing. It had certainly done something last night, adding to his fear and confusion around what had transpired in the gaps in his memory.

Hurrying back into his bedroom, he went to retrieve his phone off his nightstand, but…the charging cord dangled empty over the edge of the table. Andrew frowned, searching for the jeans he'd been wearing where they were crumpled on the floor by his closet. He dug out his phone from the pocket of his pants.

"Shit," he muttered. "It's noon already." He was always a naturally early riser, sleeping maybe until nine on a luxurious day. Flipping through his notifications brought him little clarity about the previous night. Junk email, work email, work email, several texts from Sam, but that was it. He pulled up his contacts, disappointed but not surprised to find that he hadn't added Micah's number to his phone.

Andrew pulled on the same jeans, which smelled like bar food and alcohol, but he didn't care. Ignoring his unread messages, he sent a text to Sam telling his assistant to stay home. Andrew needed space to think.

Taking several steps toward the door, he paused, looking up into his slightly open closet. Andrew stretched and pulled down his small metal crossbow. The bag of bolts fell out with it; he caught it and stuffed it in the waistband of his jeans. It had been a year or so since his last time practicing with it, but he hadn't forgotten how to use it.

Without eating, without steeping his usual cup of tea, Andrew slipped on his moccasins, locked his apartment behind him, and thumped down the narrow stairwell. The right-hand door led outside to the parking lot. He unlocked the door on his left and let himself into Magic's storefront. He dropped the crossbow and bolts on Sam's chair, and then ran the pad of his thumb over the rune scratched into the doorframe as a way to try to soothe himself. Leaving the lights off, Andrew started to pace, arms crossed, wracking his brain for any details that were skimming in and out of his awareness.

Mulberries.

Mulberries.

A sweet-tasting kiss he barely remembered, coarse bricks snagging on his shirt.

"Come on," groaned Andrew, thumping his fists against his forehead, squeezing his eyes shut. "You're supposed to be problem-solving, not pining."

Lowering his hands, turning toward the front door, Andrew tried to take a long breath. Then a flash of turquoise appeared in the window, a brown face beneath…someone new, here to haunt him.

Micah could hear Andrew yell from outside Magic's storefront. The jolt of fear made him almost drop his phone—and his bubble tea, but he was less concerned about that. He took a small step closer to the window in the door and saw a spark of orange hair inside the shadowy store.

Then Andrew threw open the door, his face bright red as he said sharply, "What are you doing here? Didn't you do enough last night?"

As Micah's brows rose and his lips parted, Andrew jolted with uncertainty. Micah said carefully, "You don't remember that we talked about it?"

Andrew took a stumbling step back into the shop. He was in the same black button-down he wore the night before, and when he rubbed his collar, he exposed a blotchy pink rash ringing his neck. Micah remembered the shock from a necklace Andrew wore the night before, and now it was gone, with a rash in its place. Andrew's nostrils flared, his chest heaving as he looked past Micah toward the trees across the street.

He said without conviction, "You—you did something to me. You must have. I—I don't remember anything after we got outside. Er, I mean, I do—" His ears turned bright red.

He glanced at Micah, whose eyes were wide and dark even though the midday sky reflected within them like a microcosmic world. The man looked even better in daylight than he had the night before. He wore a slim-cut button-down, a bronze leaf necklace poking out from the undone collar, with fitted joggers hugging his muscled thighs. It was almost painful to look at him, to try to marry the way he made Andrew feel with everything that might have happened when he couldn't remember.

Micah's throat bobbed. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I thought something seemed wrong. Outside. We—we did kiss, and I understand if it felt like you—well, with your memory failing—" He trailed off, turning away, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Sorry." His voice quavered. Micah kept thinking about his father, over and over, sweat rising on the small of his back. Pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes, Micah said breathlessly, "Consent is really critical to me, and if you at all feel…" He dropped his hands to steal a look at Andrew, who was frozen like a fox caught in headlights. "If you at all feel like I took advantage of you, I respect that, and I apologize, and…I'll walk away and that'll be that. Okay?" He reached into the pocket of his joggers and pulled out a plastic cup with a vacuum-sealed lid. It was one of those cups you pierced with a straw large enough to suck up tapioca pearls. Boba, or something. "Black tea with a touch of honey. Er, I made it for you, so I—"

Andrew held out a trembling hand toward the tea, but he didn't come any closer.

When Micah took a small step toward him to give him the tea, Andrew's chest tightened, his stomach lurching. He swiped the tea out of Micah's hand and stepped back into the safety of Magic's doorway. "I'm sorry," Andrew said. "I've drank four times that much and remembered it all. It scares me, and I've got some baggage I will definitely admit has made me…paranoid."

Micah nodded. He looked away down the street, frowning. "I should have known better," he finally said.

"What do you mean?"

"I've got baggage, too," said Micah. "Sitting down with you was the first time in years I've tried to connect with anybody. I should have known it wouldn't go well."

Andrew's hands tingled with the temptation to indulge Micah's sharing, to acknowledge how it seemed like they had common ground. But all those visions of the scarlet-eyed faerie stopped his tongue, kept him behind his icy walls. He asked bluntly, "Did you drug me?"

A harsh, breathless laugh slipped between Micah's lips as he scraped his turquoise hair back from his forehead. "No, Andrew, I did not drug you." He turned away from the store, eastward toward West Seventh. "Look, I'm gonna get out of here." Micah glanced back and met Andrew's eyes with moisture clinging to his lower lashes, which were puffy and flushed. "I'm so, so sorry for all of this." Not expecting a reply, Micah started off down the sidewalk as he blinked to clear his swimming vision. He wiped the tears from his eyes with his wrist, grinding his cheek between his teeth, his chest tight, face crumpling. He barely waited for the crosswalk to turn to let him pass before he briskly strode through the intersection.

Micah tapped through his phone and lifted it to his ear. Unsurprisingly, the call went to voicemail. He said into the silence, "Hey, uh, something happened and I—want to bounce some suspicions off you. I know you probably won't wanna, but I'm pretty bummed, and kinda freaked out, and…yeah. You're the only person I feel safe talking to about this. Stop by if you want."

Within the hour, she did.

The night at the Squire became buried by day after mundane day. Six days had passed when Micah stood beside his slightly shorter father in a crowded co-op grocer half a mile from their brownstone. Julian flipped his reading glasses onto his nose and squinted at the label on a package of tofu. Then he sighed noisily, his shoulders sagging and bumping into Micah's chest.

"Micah."

"What?"

Sticking an elbow into Micah's stomach, Julian grumbled, "You're in my bubble. Go pick out a plant or something."

"Trying to get rid of me, Dad?"

"Yes. Nothing is going to happen to me in the produce section." Julian dropped the tofu into his mostly empty cart and then pushed it determinedly away from him.

Shaking his head, Micah slipped his hands into his pockets and went toward the plant display by the registers. The plants at the co-op were always stunning. They were the freshest, greenest, and happiest plants being sold anywhere in the Twin Cities—and Micah had been everywhere. Syabira, the flower vendor for the co-op, was a mentor to Micah, but she wasn't here this late in the day. She liked to flit in and out when even the first shoppers and the cashiers were bleary-eyed.

Her signature chalkboard signage read with a flourish,

There is always

a need for flowers.

Close your eyes

and choose!

With or without her around, her selection was as magnificent as always. He pushed the noise of the shoppers and the beeping of the registers into the background. Eyes closed, he inhaled the perfume of the blossoms balanced by the earthen soil, which loosened the knots in his stomach at once. He picked up a large bromeliad with lemon-yellow leaves growing up in the center, turning it around to inspect the health of the oldest and largest leaves but finding no fault.

Rather than adding it to Julian's cart, which he would insist on paying for using his disability money, Micah went through a self check-out so he could buy the plant himself. He slid the receipt into the space between the soil and the plastic pot and then turned back to the produce section.

A slender man slightly taller than Micah blocked his path, walnut-brown eyes wary and calculating.

Micah jumped. "A-Andrew?"

Fox-faced Andrew stood in front of him, lips pressed together in a skeptical line. He wore a V-neck tee showing his sharp clavicle and the edge of his metal chain necklace.

"Uh," Micah began, heat creeping up his neck, "Hey. It's, er, did I—"

Andrew mercifully cut him off. "I noticed your colorful hair. Curiosity got the best of me." He had a hand basket dangling from his spindly fingers. All that was in it so far was tins of tea.

Over Andrew's shoulder, Micah saw Julian pause with a mango in his hand to watch this interaction like it was one of the dramas they watched together.

Hugging the bromeliad in the crook of his elbow, Micah said, "I—don't wanna say the wrong thing. I'm, er…I'm glad. That we bumped into each other."

Andrew smiled slightly. It looked like his lips weren't used to curving like that. "Me too."

He was embarrassingly delighted to be talking to Andrew again. Things ended so bitterly the morning after The Squire, and he'd tried to just forget about it. But Andrew just kept returning to his thoughts. He passed The Squire when he went to work, and the kiss under the neon lights out front replayed in his head every time. If only…if only it had happened without that razor edge of dread. Dread that everything Micah had been avoiding about himself for twenty years might be slipping back into his life, demanding action. He'd gotten some advice after he'd left Magic's the last time, but the advice…had not been reassuring.

"Look," began Micah, "I want you to know—"

Andrew lifted his hand, quickly and briefly, and Micah fell silent. Bright color rose on Andrew's high, pale cheekbones as he said, "I don't think you assaulted me. I don't think I ever did." His pink tongue flicked out briefly between his teeth. "I was scared. I hadn't kissed anyone in quite a few years, and I didn't want it to be like that."

Micah swallowed. His eyes burned, and he blinked several times.

Andrew frowned. "Are you going to cry?"

Sniffing, Micah quickly shook his head. "Nah, man, who does that?" His voice was thick. "I just feel the same as you, that's all."

Silent, Andrew nodded, chewing on his nail and looking away.

On an impulse, Micah thrust the plant toward Andrew. "Here. It's a bromeliad. Con—consider it an apology gift. It's non-toxic to cats, but mine try to chew on it."

Andrew kept his eyes on the bromeliad. "How do you know I have a cat?"

Micah bit his lip. Then he picked off a short black hair from Andrew's shirt and held it up. "Evidence."

"Ah." Andrew turned crimson. "Yes. Well, um. Thanks. For this. I gotta…run away now." He bobbed like he was bowing and then turned so fast on his heel that his shoe squeaked.

Micah blinked, feeling dazed, like the encounter was a dream. He looked over at Julian, whose expression mirrored his own bewilderment.

"Who do you keep looking for?" Sam asked.

Andrew blinked and looked over at his assistant just as Sam took an enormous bite of his foil-wrapped burrito. A chunk of cilantro lime rice fell out and plopped onto the silver counter.

"You on' usua'y peo'o wa'," said Sam with his mouth full. He swept up the spilled rice with a paper napkin. Andrew stared dryly at him. Chipmunking his food, Sam repeated, "You don't usually people-watch."

It had been a week or two since Andrew ran into Micah at the co-op. And then ran from Micah at the co-op. If that was the last time he saw Micah…Andrew cringed at the thought. He kept thinking about that leaf necklace Micah had on at the co-op; it looked like a real little leaf that had been dipped in copper. He'd had a hunch and ended up looking up what the leaf from a mulberry tree looked like and, sure enough, it had matched the curvy segmented shape that had rested just below Micah's sharp collarbones. The shape had enchanted him so much he'd caught himself doodling the leaf on post-its and order forms several times. "I am not looking for anyone," he lied.

"It must be a boy." Sam beamed.

"You have cilantro in your teeth."

"Don't be embarrassed." Sam used his phone camera to pick at his teeth with a painted fingernail. "You said you haven't dated since college."

"I don't know how. Hookup culture is lost on me," said Andrew. He flipped a piece of lettuce in his taco salad with his fork. "It's just…you remember at The Squire, the guy that was with your rude friend? With the green hair. Micah?" Hoping to avoid Sam's intense look, Andrew turned back on the video on his phone. His favorite swordmaster had released a new video showing a swordplay technique that combined the speed of fighting with a saber with the bold strikes of the Viking seax blade like the one he had.

Sam nudged their elbows together and waggled his eyebrows so they disappeared under the curtain of his hair. "What about him, Andy?"

Eyes firmly on his phone, Andrew, mumbled, "So, that night, we kind of…kissed."

"Andrew!" exclaimed Sam. "How could you not tell me?"

"Because it felt like it wasn't really me, I guess. You know, I was incredibly attracted to him. That wasn't the problem. But for as rarely as I try to get to know people, why did it go that way? It was wrong."

Sam rested his cheek on his fist. "Ah. That makes sense. So you're just waiting to run into him again, huh? Have a sweeter encounter? Andrew's a little smitten."

"I ran into him again at the co-op." Andrew paused his video, stabbed a piece of carnitas and then scraped it off on the side of his bowl.

"Oh my god! Did he give you that plant you have in the shop?"

Andrew's face pinched as he nodded.

"God. No wonder. Here I was worried you were gonna turn into a plant dad."

Andrew ignored the jibe. "It was nice seeing him again. But I wish things had started differently."

Sam remarked with a shrug, "Everything's gotta start somewhere."