Suncog
"I really do like it, you know."
Dozing gently. The firelight. Everything just as it should be.
(Everyone else not quite dead asleep, but also loosely and unobtrusively preoccupied and hazy; so they might overhear, if they liked, and those who might be observed might like that, too. All very fine. No one in danger, of anything at all.)
"Like what?"
Addam scratches absently at a point just under the point of his chin, thinking of something very far away (and then, too, something very close by).
If Minoth needed to give little cue tics like that to an actor playing his prince, would he give soft, noiseless itching? Something else? But no, it does fit. It has to, after all, since it's happening right in front of him. Never look an idiosyncrasy-ponio in the mouth (not one of Minoth's pawns upon the general public). Maybe Addam is a soft itch at his side and in his head, bugging him towards better things and catching him when he can't go.
"'My prince.'"
"Ah." Minoth can't help but smile.
"It's quite..."
How to describe it? Earnest, perhaps. Layered, certainly. Tender, thankfully. Bold and subtle, to outside observers. To what might be called inside observers, it has to make them smile, too. And simultaneously very old and very young, because neither of them are very old, even if they have known each other - what, eight years? Generously. But haven't really known each other, arms in arms, throughout the entirety of that time.
Still a lot of time. Still enough to be staggering.
"Says all the things I can't say."
Can't. Won't. Should. Shouldn't. Have to. Will. Won't. Will. Won't.
Have?
"But aren't you saying them?"
Have.
"By a token." Minoth waves a hand, feeling the crunch of twigs into his reposed hip as his Core Crystal yawns up to the sky, itself faced openly towards Addam. "But it's still cowardice."
"Not at all. When I say your name, would you rather I tack on an 'Oh, how impressive - and handsome - you are!' every time?"
Oh, is that it?
"Am I that transparent?"
"Paper-thin. Sometimes. But wonderful for it."
Minoth almost has to snort. Does he believe it? Maybe he's more apt to heart (and associated eyeballs) on his sleeve than Addam, after all. Who would believe that? But it might actually be true. And by that token...
"Not very pet-nameable, am I? Or pettable, for that matter."
"I say nay and nay. Very much so."
They both know the latter hasn't exactly been avoided. It used to be, but now...now it goes silently and quickly, but it goes. As understatedly as possible, but it does go on.
The former is still more firmly tamed, as yet. "But even you know your limits of corniness, huh?"
"Even I - the farmer!"
The farmer...the farmer, the farmer, the farmer. Minoth supposes that does have to be what he is, even if the winning descriptor - obviously - usually is that of a prince. Farmers, however, can be golden too. Can be sun-weathered, can be loved or perhaps hated, generous or perhaps crotchety; the difference is they know the value of hard work.
"You speak well, for a farmer."
"Ah, well there's an explanation for that: you see, I was raised in a palace!"
"You don't say?" Minoth grins, deciding to play along.
Addam dances fingers towards him in the dirt. The firelight, of course, glints on the gold. "I do say. And it was a lovely palace, too." The target snags at offered bait. "A little cold, but spacious."
"What kind of boy wants to be raised in a cold, spacious palace?" Minoth remarks, somewhat pithily, feeling his second knuckles set in with the firm muscle of Addam's. It's a good feeling. Such a good feeling.
"Not a boy who grows up to be a farmer - though, the spacious part was nice."
But of course. The open air above them cycles delight over delight, passion over pleasure, air in and air out and always available, however much you want to breathe.
However much you want to breathe.
"You were romping about?"
"Not quite. I should say I wasn't raised from a boy in the palace either."
"You don't say!"
All old hat, to Minoth. But fun, to hear, or even rehear, crucial exposition delivered lightheartedly, sometimes. Certainly more sparkling than his own personal exposition has ever been. Anything you can talk about in a manner such as this...well, it can't always be all bad, can it? Even if it's just the weather. But it's not just the weather, which is the point about why it's fine.
"I do say," Addam rejoins. "And that was nice in its own way, but I'm glad to be grown."
"I'm glad to know you," says Minoth honestly - as if he'd been thinking of being any way else.
"You weren't raised in a palace, were you?"
"Something like it, I guess." He shrugs.
"But not quite so grand?"
Depends how you define grandness.
"Oh, so we've got airs, now, have we?"
It's the closest to laughter Minoth wants to get, to disturb the mood.
"Open airs, my love!"
"Ah..." And so accordingly, for the first time, Minoth stills, goes pensive.
"Yes?"
(Should they invent new ones? Should they call each other sunshine, and start to believe it, or dear or honey or sweet or variations upon a heart, which can live inside a house and a home and be boxed and sold and inspected and approved? Should they conventionalize themselves, any more than they already have? Of course it's not a crime; of course there's no inherent virtue in being unreadable or less than affectionate, in bending worlds by melding Human and Blade twice over, and maybe it's a crime for a Blade to love a human at all, but Architect above, can't any of us just be complicit - at least a little bit? in that way?)
"I like that too."
"Good. I'm glad."
"I figured you would be."