Edwyrd moved in for a closer look in the poor light of the room. He hadn’t seen Rupert since he’d changed back, but he quickly spotted what disturbed Jenn. While Rupert still looked unmistakably like Rupert, his hair was a lot curlier, the angles of his face were ever-so-slightly different. He had more freckles. In short he looked a lot more like a young version of Edwyrd than he had before! Edwyrd glared into Rupert’s sweetly smiling, angelic, face.
Edwyrd shut the door to the deck behind him as he marched down the corridor to their cabin. A small oil lamp, carefully protected, gave off enough light for him to see his way down the corridor. He wasn’t sure how he’d survived the remainder of the afternoon. Jenn had spent quite a while checking over Rupert, then Maelen had run his tests. Neither seemed to find anything amiss. Other than the fact that Rupert suddenly looked more like Edwyrd’s little brother than his cousin.
After she’d finished her examination, Jenn had cornered him on that one. He’d babbled something about the special animage healing link bringing them very close together, and temporarily bringing out a stronger family resemblance. He assured her it would pass with time. He wasn’t sure he’d convinced her. Maelen had just looked at him askance when he finished his examination. Thankfully, he hadn’t wanted to question Edwyrd further.
Jenn and Gastropé had then been distracted by the captain. Apparently, he wanted to know if there was anything the wizards could do to speed them on their journey. The loss of one and a half masts was a rather significant impediment to their journey. He’d overheard Jenn say something about maybe trying to increase the wind slightly tomorrow, after she’d had time to rest. For some reason, none of the crew approached Edwyrd with any such questions. In fact they all maintained a rather good distance from him, and an overly respectful attitude.
Obviously they had all seen what he’d done. Thankfully, neither Jenn nor Gastropé had seen him. He was pretty sure they’d have figured out what was going on, especially if they’d seen him in his demon shaped fire manifestation. They’d apparently passed out after launching their combined lightning bolt. When they asked him what happened, he’d just told them that their blow had stunned the wizard long enough for him to get through with fire. That the wizard had tried to defend himself magically and messed something up, and the entire ship had exploded.
It seemed that they didn’t bother to inquire of others on this, and in fact seemed quite willing to believe that a wizard under attack could mess up a spell and blow himself up. Edwyrd had just made that up, but they seemed to accept it with no problem. Apparently, he was getting good at lying these days. Except that he was going to clear up one misunderstanding, now. He was going to have a talk with Rupert.
Thankfully, Gastropé had suggested that maybe it would be better if he didn’t try to crowd in the small cabin also, what with Rupert being in pretty bad shape. Maelen had mentioned a spare bunk in his room and offered it to Gastropé. Edwyrd thus had the evening to straighten things out with Rupert. He wasn’t completely sure just how he would do it, yet, but he was sure he had to.
He opened the door to their room to find Rupert perched on the bunk, gazing out the open window onto the moonlit sea. As Edwyrd entered, Rupert turned around to see him. It was dark in the room, but thanks to the moonlight, Edwyrd could see the smile of pleasure on Rupert’s face as he shut the door absently behind him. This was not going to be easy.
“Rupert, we need to talk.”
“I know,” Rupert said with a smile, “and I’m sorry about the thing with the hair. I just couldn’t help myself.” Rupert gestured to the bunk beside him. Edwyrd sat down, reclining against the windowsill so he wouldn’t bump his head. As he sat down next to the boy, Rupert said, “Will you hold me? Father?” Edwyrd could hear the nervous trepidation in the boy’s voice, fearing rejection.
The kid certainly knew how to make it rough on a person. Not wanting to get off on the wrong foot, in an already touchy conversation, he put his arm around Rupert’s shoulder. Rupert leaned into Edwyrd, resting his head on Edwyrd’s chest. Edwyrd sighed, no, this was not going to be easy.
“Do you know how long it’s been since someone held me?”
“Uh, no...”
