Cause I got issues but you got ‘em too

[Rhys McCabe]

"Yeah... I guess they'd have you killed for that."

Rhys saw it happen more than once. People were killed all the time over having feelings. If Rhys wanted to feel anything as he grew into his soulless new existence, he had to do it where nobody else would see. Especially those beneath them. He had to show that he was united with the family.

He thought of his mother, though. Still alive, last he knew. And her wings had never been taken from her. Why? Torture her? Or was it simply impossible to birth a child when there was no feeling? No soul? He shuddered to think what would happen to a person who was born that way. Without a soul.

"Stop talking to me like I'm a child and you're an adult." He moved his knee away from Raphael's hand, irritated by the grandfatherly gesture. "I don't need you patronizing me. And I'll choose what means nothing to me."

It annoyed him--Raphael talking like he knew Rhys was leaving for sure, that he knew for sure everything met nothing. Like he was trying to guilt him into staying or like it was just a foregone conclusion that Rhys would leave to go back to the fairy realm. Either way annoyed him. Like Rhys couldn't think or feel things out for himself.

[Raphael Malai]

He would choose what meant nothing to him... Even that was said in the negative. Not that he would choose what meant something, but that he would choose what meant nothing.

Slowly Raphael pulled back his hand, the one that had offended. It wasn't exactly new, though, to be rebuffed by Rhys. Of course usually there was no annoyance accompanying it; generally Rhys didn't seem to like having people in his personal space, not even the person designated as his companion—and the one who had been with him the longest. But there was never any real emotion tied to any of his actions or words towards Raphael. For much of their lives, Rhys treated Raphael like a servant, and with cold, detached indifference.

He moved to the other end of the couch and drew his feet up onto it, tenting his knees and wrapping his arms around his legs. Raphael rested his chin on top of his knees—something that took quite a bit of contortion, but he was pretty flexible—and looked at Rhys. He really looked at him and he tried to see him as he was in the moment, struggling with newfound feelings, confusing emotions that conflicted with what he had been taught growing up. Raphael knew how he felt; it was so much easier to embrace the known than to explore the unknown. For a long while, he tried to deny his own feelings too but... the beauty and the unfortunate thing about feelings was that they couldn't be ignored forever.

But there was more at stake here than a bad relationship. Death was still a possibility. It was very much a possibility, honestly, given how the King operated. Was love worth it? Raphael thought the answer was yes but did Rhys? Or was he saying those things just because he was told no? Raphael lowered his gaze. He spoke to the section of couch separating them.

"You keep talking like you still want to go back." Talking about removing the wings, about having other brothers out there to corrupt for his father... Those didn't sound like he was planning to stay in the human realm. And besides—how much was a servant worth to him, anyway, over the value of his own life?

[Rhys McCabe]

Yeah, that was more like it. Raphael moved away, stopped touching him, stopped leaning on him. Not that it was what Rhys really wanted but it was the goal in speaking the way he did, in removing himself from the situation. Raphael had all these feelings, true. But Raphael seemingly had time to deal with them. And pushing them onto Rhys was just... sending all kinds of red flags on Rhys' sense of boundaries.

Plus, he was a prince. He had been born not to be touched unless by his manservant, who dressed him and touched him in no other way. And the consorts, of course. They were boring to deal with over time. He had to "teach" them and "train" them how to touch him and what was appropriate and what was allowed. But it also made sex boring. It truly was a chore, just a way to get rid of that uncomfortable feeling in his groin and his balls. Nothing more.

And so what if he talked about going back? Rhys didn't know what else to say. He had been a part of that family, that regime, that lifestyle for so long. Did Raphael think it was easy to just turn his back on everything he knew just to fling himself into something dangerous and uncertain?

So he said nothing because there was nothing to be said. There was no point in arguing because there was nothing to argue about. There was no point in agreeing or disagreeing because Rhys did talk like he was going back. And maybe he would. And maybe he wouldn't. But he didn't know and that meant there was no point in talking about it. He didn't need people making his decisions for him based on their feelings. Rhys didn't even know his own feelings; he didn't want the two mixing up. That would just end up in bad decisions all around.

Taking the blanket that had been draped across him, Rhys pulled it over his shoulders and curled up on the other side of the couch.

[Raphael Malai]

And so, silence. Raphael lowered his head into his arms for a long moment and closed his eyes. He knew from the outset that this... that these feelings he harbored for Rhys didn't have a good chance of going anywhere fast. Rhys was a prince and he was 'the companion' so he was fully dispensable. It was only because he listened to the King's instructions that he survived this long; otherwise he had no delusions that he would have been replaced in the blink of an eye.

Now, he was bucking the reins and that... would not end well. And yet he couldn't be sorry that he defected. He wasn't sorry. Whether or not Rhys followed him, he wasn't sorry that he sought out freedom when the opportunity presented itself. Even if he loved Rhys with all his heart, he knew that he would die if he stayed. His spirit would die; the light inside would snuff itself and in the end, it would be no different than leaving Rhys' side, for him to become just like all the rest of them.

Besides, he had no idea how Rhys felt. The wings were an indication but Rhys himself was so stubborn and so reticent where it came to his feelings. Raphael was trying to find clues, digging down deep through years of brainwashing and training... Even if he could somehow be sure that Rhys had feelings for him, if Rhys himself said nothing and refused to acknowledge anything then... What was the point? He would still be pining after someone who was emotionally closed off and unavailable.

There was still... Wesley Carter, he supposed.

But realistically he knew that he could never feel this way about Wesley, no matter how handsome he was. There wasn't anyone like Rhys, anywhere. Raphael lifted his face from his arms and rested his chin on his forearms, still curled up on the opposite end of the couch. It was only about a foot between them, but the distance felt larger. He swallowed and he kept looking at Rhys, looking for a sign, something to let him know that it wasn't time to give up. Or maybe he was just taking his last, long look at Rhys before Rhys was either rescued by Keith or left of his own accord.