Yeah… Phury didn’t know what got him to the community center. And he didn’t know what helped him through that door and into that basement. And he didn’t know what made him stay.
He did know that when he returned to Rehvenge’s house, he couldn’t go inside.
Instead he sat on the back terrace, in a woven wicker chair, under the stars. There was nothing on his mind. And absolutely everything.
Cormia came out at some point and put her hand on his shoulder, as she always did when she sensed he was deep in his head. He kissed her palm, and then she kissed his mouth and went back inside, likely to get back to work on the plans for Rehv’s new club.
The night was quiet and downright cold. Every once in a while the wind would come and brush through the treetops, the autumnal leaves rustling together with a cooing sound like they enjoyed the attention.
Behind him in the house, he could hear the future. The Chosen were stretching their arms out into this world, learning things about themselves and this side. He was so proud of them, and he supposed he was the Primale of old tradition in that he would kill to protect his females and would do anything for any of them.
But it was a fatherly love. His mated love was for Cormia and her alone.
Phury rubbed the center of his chest and let the hours pass as they would, at their own speed, while the wind gusted as it did, at its own strength. The moon drifted up to its apex in the sky and began its descent. Someone put opera on inside the house. Someone changed it to hip-hop, thank God. Someone started a shower. Someone vacuumed. Again.
Life. In all its mundane majesty.
And you couldn’t take advantage of it if you were sitting on your ass in the shadows…whether that was in actuality, or metaphorically because you were trapped in an addict’s darkness.
Phury reached down and touched the calf of his prosthesis. He’d made it this far with only part of a leg. Living through the rest of his life without his twin and without his brothers… he would do that, too. He had much to be grateful for, and that would make up for a lot.
He wouldn’t always feel this empty.
Someone in the house went back to the opera.
Oh, shit. Puccini this time.
“Che Gelida Manina.”
Of all the choices they had, why pick the one solo guaranteed to make him feel worse? God, he hadn’t listened to La Bohème since… well, forever, it seemed. And the sound of what he had loved so much squeezed his ribs so tightly, he couldn’t breathe.
Phury gripped the arms of the chair and started to stand. He just couldn’t listen to that tenor’s voice. That glorious, soaring tenor reminded him so much of-
Zsadist appeared at the edge of the forest. Singing.
He was singing… It was his tenor in Phury’s ear, not some CD from inside the house.
Z’s voice surfed the aria’s peaks and valleys as he came forward over the grass, moving closer with each perfectly pitched, resonant word. The wind became the brother’s orchestra, blowing the spectacular sounds that breached his mouth out over the lawn and the trees and up into the mountains, up into the heavens, where only such a talent could have been born.
Phury got to his feet as if his twin’s voice, not his own legs, had lifted him from the chair. This was the thanks that had not been spoken. This was the gratitude for the rescue and the appreciation for the life that was lived. This was the wide-open throat of an astounded father, who was lacking the words to express what he felt to his brother and who needed the music to show something of all he wished he could say.
“Ah, hell… Z,” Phury whispered in the midst of the glory.
As the solo reached its zenith, as the tenor of emotions was struck most powerfully, the Brotherhood appeared one by one from out of the darkness, pulling free of the night. Wrath. Rhage. Butch. Vishous. They were all dressed in the white ceremonial robing they would have worn to honor the twenty-fourth hour of Nalla’s birth.
Zsadist sang the last delicate note of the piece right in front of Phury.
As the final line, “Vi piaccia dir!” drifted into the infinite, Z held up his hand.
Waving in the night wind was a tremendous bow made of green-and-gold satin.
Cormia came to stand close at just the right time. As she put her arm around Phury’s waist, she was all that kept him steady.
In the Old Language, Zsadist said, “Wouldst both thou honor my birthed daughter with the colors of thy lineages and the love of thy hearts?”
Z bowed deeply, offering the bow.
Phury’s voice was hoarse as he took the streaming lengths of satin. “It would be the honor of the ages to pledge our colors unto your birthed daughter.”
As Z straightened, it was hard to say who stepped forward first.
Most likely they met in the middle.
Neither said anything while they embraced. Sometimes words didn’t go far enough, the vessels of letters and the ladles of grammar incapable of holding the heart’s sentiments.
The Brotherhood started to clap.
At some point, Phury reached out and took Cormia’s hand, drawing her close.
He pulled back and looked at his twin. “Tell me, does she have yellow eyes?”
Z smiled and nodded. “Yeah, she does. Bella says she looks like me… which means she looks like you. Come meet my little girl, brother mine. Come back and meet your niece. There’s a big empty place on her crib, and we need the two of you to fill it.”
Phury held Cormia close and felt her hand rub the center of his chest. Taking a deep breath, he swiped his eyes. “That’s my favorite opera and my favorite solo.”
"I know.” Z smiled at Cormia and referenced the first two lines, “Che gelida manina, se la lasci riscaldar.” “And now you have a little hand to warm in your own.”
“Same can be said of you, my brother.”
"So true. So blessedly true.” Z grew serious. “Please… come see her-but also, come see us. The brothers miss you. I miss you.”
Phury narrowed his eyes, something sliding into place. “It’s you, isn’t it. You’ve come to the community center. You’ve watched me sit on that swing afterward.”
Z’s voice grew hoarse. “I’m so damned proud of you.”
Cormia spoke up. “Me, too.”
What a perfect moment this was, Phury thought. Such a perfect moment with his twin before him and his shellan beside him and the wizard nowhere in sight.
Such a perfect moment that he knew he was going to remember for the rest of his days as clearly and as poignantly as he lived it now.
Phury kissed his shellan’s forehead, lingering against her, giving thanks. Then he smiled at Zsadist.
“With pleasure. We’ll come to Nalla’s crib with pleasure and reverence.”
“And your ribbons?”
He looked down at the green and the gold, the lovely satin lengths intertwined, symbolizing the union of him and Cormia. Abruptly, she tightened her arms around him, as if she were thinking exactly the same thing he was.
Namely, that the two went perfectly together.
“Yes, my brother. We’re absolutely coming with our ribbons. ” He looked deeply into her eyes. “And, you know, if we have time for a mating ceremony, that would be great because-”
The hooting and hollering and back slapping of the Brotherhood cut off the rest of what he was going to say. But Cormia got the gist. He’d never seen any female smile as beautifully and broadly as she did then while looking up at him.
So she must have known what he meant.
I love you forever didn’t always need to be spoken to be understood.
