Archive of Our Own

Grian’s eyes were blue, before.

Well. They were blue, and then they were an endless spectrum of impossible colors. Thousands of shifting incorporeal eyes tucked away in another plane of existence while his human shell blended in with the people he’d helped to trap in a cycle of death games. Eyes that saw everything.

They’re black now. There are only two of them and they can’t tell him anything he wants to know.

To start over: Grian is human again, and it’s Martyn’s fault. Him and the Listeners. And this is exactly the frustration and helplessness that the others had felt when they’d realized the full scope of how he’d betrayed them. Grian would know. He’d seen the whole thing from inside their heads.

To start over, again: the Listeners resurrect them all and set them down in an uninhabited wilderness. By now, everyone knows what that means.

As soon as they wake up, it’s a race to stockpile supplies. Weapons, food, anything of magical significance. Makeshift shelters go up across the map with barricades of sharpened logs, and anyone who finds themself without a solid alliance looks for somewhere to hide, everyone waiting for the hammer to fall. Grian is no different. The first thing he makes in this world is a crafting table. The second thing he makes is a sword.

This is how it goes: someone gets desperate. Someone breaks. Someone kills.

...Except they don’t.

Except days go by without so much as a skirmish over territory. One of the loners brings a milk cow to Scott’s team to trade for access to their enchanter and ends up staying there. Cleo and BigB tear down a layer of defenses between their bases to plant a basic garden. Someone starts a communal resource pile in a central area and no one puts up tripwires.

Most bizarre of all, the sky is empty of eyes.

That’s not something the others would notice, and Grian can’t see the difference, either, not anymore. It’s something he feels instead, as keenly as the absence of wings, the oppressive looming presences missing from the corners of his mind. The Watchers are gone.

—

A real beginning, then: Grian forgoes the social game this time around and sets up his camp next to the river where he won’t be bothered. And he isn’t— he catches Bdubs glaring at him from across the water one day before he slinks off into the trees, and Lizzie stumbles across him once, then promptly about-faces with a muttered “Nope, don’t think so.”

Those first days aren’t pretty, after the initial adrenaline rush wears off. Actually, Grian spends most of that time shaking uncontrollably, clammy with sweat, gasping for breath through the pain and blacking out when it gets to be too much.

He’s hungry. He’s starving.

There’s no room in his head for anything but that screaming ache, that gaping void beneath his skin, that nothingness consuming him. His body feels wrong, small and squishy, with the wrong number of limbs, and he can’t see, he can’t see anymore and he’s so hungry and….

And….

Time passes. And one day he wakes up with his throat sandpaper-dry, and he finds he has just enough strength to crawl to the riverbank and scoop up a few precious mouthfuls of water before passing out again in the reeds. Rinse and repeat the next time he’s conscious, and the next, until he manages to stand and walk, until he manages to cobble together a little lean-to shelter, until he can move well enough to scout the surrounding area. Staying out of sight, picking up snippets of conversation from behind walls. Watching from afar.

No sign of any fights, no bodies.

When he returns to camp, wolf creeping back to its den after an unsuccessful hunt, he feels more confused than he’d been when he left it. He talks to the sky, shouts and demands answers, but the Listeners don’t talk back, so he gives up and washes the worst of the grime and sweat-smell out of his clothes before collapsing in the packed-down grass under the stick-and-leaf covert that constitutes his base.

It hasn’t gotten easier, being a human. He’s just getting used to it.

—

Grian’s self-imposed exile is rudely interrupted one day when the one person he least wants to see comes to visit. Flanked by Scott and Etho, and all three of them armed and armored, they look like a band of knights on a mission. Venturing gallantly forth to slay a monster, maybe. Whatever. Too much has happened for Grian to be afraid of being hacked to pieces anymore. At least they don’t look happy to be here, either.

“I’m hurt, fellas,” Grian drawls in his most sardonic tone of voice. “You look like you’re expecting a fight.”

“Not if you don’t start one,” Martyn says easily, sitting down on the grass as if to prove it. “And there’s no point in that, is there?”

Oh, if only. If only.

If only it would satisfy the incessant roaring need in his bones, killing Martyn now. Lunging at him like a wild animal and ripping open his throat with his teeth, bringing an axe down on his head, springing an End crystal trap to obliterate them both in a glorious fireball. Just the thought of it is making him dizzy with want as it claws at the inside of his skull—

“Did you hear me?” says Martyn.

“What?”

“I asked if you’ve been doing all right. And if you could stop looking at me like that it’d be great.”

“You’ve taken my other eyes away, so this is all you get.”

Martyn lets out a slow breath. “I said I wasn’t here to fight.”

“Then make it quick. What do you want?”

“I come bearing information,” he says, spreading a roll of paper out on the ground before him. A map. “Getting the whole group on the same page about things. Sit down?”

“Hmm.” Grian casts a meaningful glance at the loaded crossbow at Etho’s hip, but crosses the clearing to oblige. They won’t shoot first, no matter how much they want to. “Talk, then.”

Information is as valuable as diamonds in games like this, especially now that Grian’s been dragged down to the same level as the others. Time to find out the rules of whatever it is they’re playing now.

Martyn starts with a rundown of the basics: who’s teamed with who, the temporary base locations for the larger groups, what sorts of resources people are willing to trade around. Alliances seem strong; screaming matches between teams are rare, and defensive posturing fizzles out quickly when it becomes clear that neither side is on the attack. Things seem… easy, given what they’re used to. Calm.

Calm, that is, until a creeper cornered Tim in some dark cave, and instead of ending up as a smear of gore on the deepslate, he had woken up no worse for wear on the surface. No one believed him, of course— at least, not until a skeleton’s arrow sent Skizz over the edge of a cliff and a frantic Impulse rushed for help only to find him back at their camp, shaken but unharmed.

“Hold on,” Grian cuts in. “Completely unharmed? Not a scratch on either of them?”

“Nothing. Just magically weaker for a few days afterward,” Martyn says. “If you’re surprised to hear that, then that confirms your friends weren’t involved, right?”

“They would’ve at least let Skizz break his legs. Someone’s dumb enough to fall off a cliff, that’s the least they deserve.”

Martyn doesn’t rise to the bait. “And Timmy?”

“First I’m hearing about it.”

All right. That’s rule number one: the Listeners want them alive and healthy.

Next, Martyn explains the rest of the map. In the middle is where they’d woken up, the sandy bank where the river bends, surrounded by a stretch of oak forest. A mountain range curves around them from the north down to the south, and in the east are spots of jungle that taper into plains, then desert. The surveyors hadn’t run into any borders keeping them boxed in, but the central area seems to be where most resources are located— loads of animals and edible plants, medicinal herbs, easy access to caves, even an inexplicable patch of Nether wart. Even if no one was being sustainable about it, there’s easily enough of everything for the entire group.

Rule number two: the Listeners are incentivizing them to stay close by.

But not forcing. No one is being forced to do anything and tensions only seem to be decreasing. The Listeners are smart; they wouldn’t let this happen by accident. Does that mean this is what they want?

…No. That still doesn’t make sense.

Theirs isn’t the storybook outcome of the battle between good and evil, and being in the mouth of a different beast doesn’t mean they’re safe. These— these monsters, gods, things are all the same no matter what they call themselves.

So, then, this is what it’s like to play the game on the other side. This completely helpless ignorance. It’s enough to make his blood boil.

“Okay,” Grian mutters, rubbing his temples, “let’s recap, then. They took us from the Watchers, so the two factions are enemies—”

“The way they said it felt closer to ‘at odds with,’” Martyn says. “Not explicitly enemies of the Watchers.”

Grian ignores him. “They save us if we die, before we die, which could mean they only want us to be killed by each other, but the way they’re motivating us to do the opposite rules that out.”

“And the fact that they told me directly that’s not what they want? You know, like I told all of you already?”

Ignoring. “It doesn’t seem like anyone’s got the Red Curse, or even the Boogeyman Curse. They haven’t given us a time limit or any objectives. They’re making sure no one’s desperate at all.” He scowls. “Make it make sense, Martyn.”

“Yeah, it doesn’t make sense. That’s why I’m asking you.”

Grian blinks at him. Does he really have to spell it out? “Have you tried asking Them?”

“Of course I’ve tried!” Martyn snaps. “It’s not like I can summon them whenever I want, I’m not some kind of— of oracle, or prophet, I’m just—”

“You can’t even talk to them? What good are you then?”

“I’m at least better than a two-faced psychopath who’d sacrifice his friends to those things—”

Grian surges to his feet, but Scott moves faster, and in an instant there’s a diamond-studded sword at his chest stopping him in his tracks.

“Martyn,” Scott says tightly, “not helping. Grian, I’ve beaten you enough times for you to know you can’t win here. Back off.”

Martyn’s a traitor, too, and the worst kind. The kind that doesn’t admit it to himself. The kind that thinks his guilt is enough to redeem him. If the others knew the sort of things he’d done on the Watchers’ orders— If they knew the half of what I’ve seen, Martyn—

“Come on, let’s not do this,” Scott says. “You don’t want this fight.”

He’s right, obviously. Attacking now— dying now, since he wouldn’t even reach Martyn before Scott gutted him— it wouldn’t just be pointless, it’d be pathetic.

Grian’s clenched fists tremble. Taking a slow, mechanical step off the point of Scott’s blade, he sits back down, crossing his arms and glowering at nothing in particular in furious silence.

Rule number three: this is all the information they’re going to get.

Martyn doesn’t speak. Grian doesn’t need to see into his mind to know he’s seething. But any smug satisfaction he feels at the thought is immediately drowned out by the relentless hunger that rips through him like a physical force, bestial and despairing. What he wouldn’t give to see that anger the way he used to, to push Martyn into a real fight, slash open his chest and carve out his heart— or better still, to watch Martyn watch him die, covered in his blood and snarling and victorious—

Etho clears his throat and everyone starts. “I guess I’ll talk, then,” he says. “The other reason we’re here is that we’re sort of divvying up the map. It looks like we’ll be staying in this world for a while, so….” He pulls a pencil from his vest. “Here.”

Martyn gestures at the map between them. “Decide.”

No names on the paper so far, which means they came to him first. Smart. If everyone knows where he is, they’ll know where to avoid. That suits him just fine.

Grian’s eyes wander over the sketches on the page. Birch, oak, river fork, jungle, meadow— “I want the cliffs down here.”

“Aw.” Etho tugs at the corner of his mask. “I kind of wanted the cliffs—”

“Shouldn’t have asked me, then.” He tosses the pencil back to Etho and stands again, dusting himself off and jutting out his chin expectantly. “If that’s all?”

Martyn and his cronies exchange looks, and he scoops up the map and gets to his feet as well, but Grian’s already turning his back on them and heading for his shelter again. He’s got packing to do.

“Grian,” Martyn calls out to him, and he shoots a final reluctant glance over his shoulder. “Let me know if… if you need help, yeah?”

Oh, and there’s that look on his face, behind the anger. It’s pity. He’d pitied Grian back then, too, during the games when he was Grian, Thrall of the Watchers, unthinkably mighty with just the barest fraction of their power, and he’d pitied him when They’d taken that power away. Begged his own reality-bending entities to put the shards of him back together again.

Grian hadn’t asked them to. No one had asked him what he’d wanted.

His skin crawling, too exhausted to start the fight he’s craving, Grian glares daggers at him and bites out, “Leave.”

Martyn still actually, genuinely believes that he saved him.

—

As soon as the sun rises the next day, Grian’s gathered whatever of his meager belongings he feels like carrying and set off. Upstream, round the point of the mountain range, through the oaks until they thin out and give way to spruce. It’s shady and cool, and the forest floor is a soft loam carpeted by low ferns and pine needles that silence his every footstep until all he can hear are the birds, the wind in the branches, and the river.

Ahead of him, curved around the spruce forest on three sides, is the continuation of the mountain range, and to his right a sheer cliff juts up into the sky. At the far border of the cliff face is the waterfall that feeds the river. It’s the perfect strategic position: isolated, imposing, defensible.

That’ll do.

Grian climbs, hikes up gravelly slippages, scrabbles over craggy boulders until his limbs start to shake, and then he takes a pickaxe to the cliff and carves out a cave for himself. He hollows out a decent-sized room, smooths out the edges with magic, and drags loads of timber up the slope over the next few days for a door, a façade, and a little balcony. It doesn’t have to be pretty, or complicated; it just has to be livable.

And livable it is, when he’s satisfied with it. Fireplace, corner full of magical bits, storage, bed, lanterns. Solid door, good view of the valley. Thin little goat-trail to the waterfall. The balcony catches the afternoon sun and he stretches out in it, hangs his legs off the edge and leans back on his hands.

It’s nice. Quiet. He’s alone with his thoughts.

He figures he’ll lose his mind in about a week.

As it happens, it’s only a day or two before something starts moving in the forest below. Grian passes it off as another herd of deer until the first tree falls, then passes that off as a stress-induced hallucination until it happens again and it becomes clear that the something is in fact someone. Building.

Building very close to him.

Which is… strange, and unexpected, and actually rather annoying.

Grian stares at the offending patch of woodland and weighs his options. There’s no way this is an accident, not with territories divided out, so it could be an act of aggression, and he’s not in any shape to fight back with his lackluster equipment and a body that’s still sluggishly making up its mind to be alive. Ignoring the situation is out of the question; he’s bound to run into whoever it is sooner or later, and things could end messily if either of them takes the other by surprise. He can’t even make any defensive plans since he doesn’t have any useful reconnaissance.

Oh, he’s got to go down there, hasn’t he. That’s just great.

He allows himself another hour of stewing in irritation before buckling his sword to his belt, slinging a bow and quiver of arrows over his shoulder, and hiking down the mountain.

The person’s definitely making no effort to be stealthy, which is another point in the ‘aggression’ column. The forest undergrowth has been trimmed away in several areas, gathered into slash piles, and as Grian approaches the scene of the crime, he’s greeted by the sound of an axe against wood. Keeping a hand on the hilt of his sword, he braces himself and steps into the clearing.

It’s Scar.

Of course it’s Scar. Who else would be reckless enough to base this close to him?

He’s shirtless, the way he always is when he’s working— incredibly stupid, going anywhere without armor— and he’s busy chopping a felled tree into smaller usable segments. His back is turned and he hasn’t noticed Grian even now. He never does until it’s too late. It’s how he’s died almost every single time— he just doesn’t pay enough attention.

Easy target. Grian can put an arrow somewhere vital from here for a spine-chillingly satisfying instant kill, or he can hit somewhere to make it hurt. Let Scar bleed and panic and run, let him think there’s a chance to escape before catching up and….

And wasting a kill, because these eyes can’t see anything.

Grian forces his clenched fingers to release their grip on the bowstring across his chest and breathes, in, out, waiting for the hunger to ebb from excruciating back down to mind-numbing.

Maybe once he would’ve shouted or crept up to pounce on Scar, but right now that sounds like a great way to end up with an axe lodged in his face, so he settles for keeping his distance and calling out “Scar?”

He gets the yelp of surprise, the axe wrenched out of the tree as Scar rounds on him, cornered-animal fear flashing in his eyes, the tense freeze as he tries to gauge whether Grian’s an active threat. None of it hits the way it used to.

Slowly, Scar lowers the axe, relaxing as he evidently decides his life isn’t in danger. “Scared the living scars out of me, Grian,” he says, then plasters on a grin and falls back on his favorite weapon: talking. “Hello there and good morning! Man, it’s been forever since I’ve seen you. Where have you been?”

“Around. What are you up to?”

“Getting wood!” Scar sets the axe down against the stump of the tree and stretches his arms high above his head, wincing when several of his joints pop. “And stone. And seeds, and soil, and clay— everything, actually.”

“I can see that,” Grian says with politeness he doesn’t feel. “Are you… building here?”

“It’s a nice place, right?” says Scar, indicating the woods around them. “I can’t resist a forest like this. There’s even some old growth back that way.”

“Yeah.” It’s weird. Scar’s not acting afraid. Not acting anything like the way he should be acting after… everything. Makes it hard to muster the acerbic standoffishness Grian had intended to confront him with. “…I just wasn’t expecting to have neighbors,” he says dryly.

Scar, of course, misses the tone. “Oh, so that is your little nest up there! I thought I recognized your style.”

“It was marked on the map. Didn’t you check?”

“Sort of. I was mostly looking for somewhere isolated, and I liked the waterfall.” Scar adjusts the cloth wrap around his hand and picks up the axe again. “The river’s called the Mystic, by the way.”

“…Okay.” There’s really no arguing with Scar once he’s made his mind up about something, no matter how little sense it makes. Turning on his heel, Grian retreats back toward the quiet of the mountain, only pausing to call over his shoulder, “You’ll leave some of the trees?”

“I will, I will. And I’ll grow ‘em back nice and tall,” Scar says, waving. “I won’t ruin your view, don’t you worry.”

Grian doesn’t bother replying. It’ll be fine. They’ll stay out of one another’s way and that’ll be that.

There are probably worse neighbors to be stuck with.

—

He was wrong.

Scar’s sense of self-preservation is, apparently, nonexistent. At this point Grian’s not sure why it keeps surprising him— this is the same man who leapt off of the lookout tower of a castle to save a few pandas— but surprise him it does when Scar hikes up the mountain to visit him. As if there’s nothing to be afraid of. As if it never crossed his mind what Grian might do to him, with no allies to come to his rescue.

Grian spends most of that conversation staring at him in baffled confusion, and Scar— Scar talks with the unhurried nonchalance of someone totally at ease. Asks about the waterfall, and the wildlife in the forest, and has Grian been down into the caves yet? Scar got lucky with the iron veins; he could lend him some material sometime. Yeah, there’s a little crevice back in the oak forest that opens up into a nice cave system. Plenty of coal in there, too.

He leaves. Grian lets him.

That should be the end of it, but it isn’t. Because Scar comes back. And he comes back the next day, too, just to talk. Before Grian knows it, the singsong “Oh, Griiian…” floating up the cliffside becomes an almost daily occurance.

It’s weird. It’s annoying. It’s too normal. It’s another one of those things Scar’s made up his mind about.

So, today, Grian’s already waiting on the balcony when Scar makes his way across the slope. Might as well, that’s all. He returns Scar’s too-cheerful greeting with a simple incline of his head.

“That’s a perca— pro— precatious— it’s a dangerous climb,” Scar pants. “Don’t you want a staircase?”

“A staircase would imply that I want visitors,” Grian says. “This is fine.”

“A ladder, then. Or a redstone elevator?”

Grian decides not to grace that with a response. “Do you need something?”

“I brought you a present,” Scar says, setting a bundle of something on the balcony next to him. “You love presents. Scooch over.”

Grian arches a dubious eyebrow at it as Scar sits down. Whatever’s inside smells familiar. Sweet and… oh no.

“I can’t,” he says. “Sorry.”

“Never give up, Grian, never surrender! I know you haven’t been eating.”

Grian lets out an irritated breath. He’s been doing that a lot lately. “I don’t... remember how,” he admits.

“Don’t be duck— dove— whatever Mumbo says?”

“Daft.”

“Don’t be doved. How else would you have stayed alive all that time?”

“Because I wasn’t eating food,” Grian sighs. He’d explained it all before. They don’t get it. They never will.

“You’re human now, and humans eat food.” Pulling a sugar cookie from the bundle, Scar takes a small bite and holds the rest out toward him expectantly. Common courtesy, a silent see, this is safe. Scar’s being kind again.

Grian tries not to look as if he’s being offered carrion. “I haven’t starved to death so far,” he points out. He’s... not sure how, exactly. Probably outside interference. Martyn’s friends. “And I’m not hungry for human food, Scar, stop it­­­—”

Scar’s eyebrows go up and he tilts his head just so— he has to have practiced that, somehow, to look so condescending so effortlessly, to make Grian bristle with anger in an instant. He says, “Prove it.”

“Screw you,” Grian mutters, snatching the cookie and shoving it in his mouth before he can think about it.

Mortal. Human. It’s like a mouthful of ash. He fights down the revulsion and tries to remember, instead: someone cries out as his arrow finds their back and they realize they’re not getting away this time, and their terror crackles in exquisite waves over his wings; there’s blood in his mouth and someone’s hands are around his neck and they hate him and it curls around his mind like a flame and it’s the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen; someone collapses when he rips the sword from their stomach and in the numb shock before the pain hits there’s only a faint whisper of why that echoes silver up his spine and he can’t stop laughing—

He’s so insatiably, desperately, unfathomably hungry.

Grian claps his hand over his mouth just in time to keep himself from vomiting over the cliff edge. This is foul, this is vile, and he’d rather be dead than be forced to—

“Oh boy.” Scar’s hand on his back anchors him through another retch. “You okay, Grian?”

Ignoring him, Grian draws in a deep breath, summons all the willpower he can muster, and swallows with a full-body shudder. Disgusting. His exhale is too shaky.

“There we go! That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Scar says, and winces when Grian gags again. “Okay, okay, uh— do you want some water?”

“Water,” Grian croaks. “Yeah, water would be—”

“Yep, yep, yep, here you go.”

Grian grabs blindly at the canteen Scar hands to him and downs the whole thing as quick as he can. The sickly-sweet tang sticks in his throat regardless, and it’s nothing, it’s nothing, it does nothing at all to quench the poisonous craving that smolders inside him, gnawing and itching and tearing in his mind—

It’s not enough. Nothing will be enough, not ever again. Even if he killed Scar now, if he killed everyone, it wouldn’t matter.

You’re human now, and humans eat food.

“G?” Scar says. “You still in there?”

Scar’s face is sharper than it once was, drawn and shadowed with the ghosts of so many death games, and yet somehow, somehow there’s still something soft in it right now. Genuine. He’s looking at him like Grian wasn’t just thinking about knifing him.

Oh, Scar, Grian thinks, you don’t understand anything.

He opens his mouth and— it’s not right, it’s not what he wants to say, but— “I’m sorry.”

Scar pulls back, the barest hint of pain in his expression in the second before he turns his head to hide it. He always tried to hide it, didn’t he? Always hated being seen to suffer. Grian would laugh if he wasn’t so nauseous.

“I don’t… blame… you,” Scar breathes out haltingly. “Not completely. Not this you. But….”

Grian’s already shaking his head. “No, you don’t get it.”

It’s too much for him to ever fully explain in words, but it’s the truth, and Scar deserves at least that much from him. Grian clenches his fingers on his knees and confesses.

“I’m sorry… because I’m not sorry,” he says, and Scar goes still beside him. “I’m sorry because I wouldn’t hesitate to do it all over again. I’m sorry because—” He grits his teeth as it bubbles up inside him, as vicious and satisfying as the twist of a blade— “because I loved every second of it.”

And there it is. The grotesque truth. The reason for that endless cycle of misery and death. It’s the raw need that consumes him from the inside out even now, the phantom thirst for blood that can’t be slaked. It’s the sinister creeping inhumanity of him that Scar can surely sense, a sheep realizing too late that one of its flock-mates has teeth just a little too sharp.

Grian laughs, hoarse and manic. “You can’t begin to imagine what it felt like,” he says. “What it was to see and know everything… to watch all of you suffering and dying over and over and over… it was— it was delicious.” His shaking hand comes up to clutch his chest as the abyss within it yawns impossibly wider, and he gasps out, “I’d kill every single one of you a thousand times more just for a taste of it—”

It’s not laughter, that sound he’s making, he realizes. It’s a harsh racking sob like the cry of a wounded animal. Pinioned falcon, viper with its fangs cut out. Grian is nothing anymore.

The strangled cries that slip out of him are weak with the despair that comes from knowing this is a pain that will never stop. The Listeners had already denied him the mercy of oblivion when they’d dragged him back from the brink of it, and their twisted idea of compassion meant they’d paid no attention at all to the way he screamed while they pieced him back together, begged them with everything he had to give it back, I swear I’ll do anything you want, just give it back—

Grian shudders, swallows back another wave of helpless tears, and cracks open his stinging eyes only to realize very suddenly that Scar… Scar hasn’t left. Off-balance, he scrubs a sleeve over his face and demands, “Why are you still here?”

“You’re my friend,” Scar says quietly. “Even if you’re not acting like it right now. Of course I’m staying here.”

“I don’t— I shouldn’t be worth that to you.”

Scar shrugs lightly, taking another cookie from the bag and chewing contemplatively as he stares out over the sea of trees below them. When he turns back, the half-smile he offers is as honest as it is sad.

“You’re my friend,” he says.

—

“Are you busy?” Scar says one morning, too bright and too early, leaning into Grian’s space as soon as the door’s open and positively dripping charm in the way he does when he wants something.

“I’m sleeping,” Grian mumbles, filtering sunlight and Scar’s grin through the cracks in his fingers.

“Well, stop sleeping, because I need your help.” He moves his head out of the way of the sunbeam he’d been blocking, and Grian groans when the rays blast him full in the face. “Come on! The sun’s up and so are you!”

“I’m not. Go away.” Grian swings the door shut, but Scar just knocks again, and louder.

“We both know you have literally nothing better to do,” he singsongs.

Grian lets out a sigh, his forehead thumping against the doorframe. He hates it when Scar’s right. “…Let me get my shoes.”

The help Scar wants from him turns out to be… planting crops. Very possibly the most boring thing he could have asked Grian to do. And yet, as much as Grian wants to be annoyed at being bothered over menial chores… well, Scar’s right. It’s this or watching the clouds from the balcony all day.

Scar chats amiably about nothing in particular as they work, filling the silence the way he tends to do and not expecting Grian to match him in energy. He’s planned out a plot behind his cabin that they surround with a basic fence, lining the base with rocks to deter at least some rabbits, and then they set to work tilling the dirt into viable farmland. It’s damp underneath the surface, rich dark brown in color. Perfect, fertile soil.

The large variety of seeds Scar’s collected (even beetroot; who grows beetroot?) are enough to fill around half of the garden, with space left over for more when the first harvests go to seed. It’s easy, repetitive work, requiring only enough focus to remember how to do it right, and Grian lets himself get lost in it, with the background noise of Scar’s voice washing over him.

Scar gets to the point eventually, though. Whatever he’d been saying trails off midsentence, like even he’s disinterested with it, and he leans forward on his shovel, brow furrowed in wary contemplation. “Grian,” he says at last. “Are we still being watched?”

The bluntness is a surprise, but the answer is easy. “No.”

“Are you sure you’d know the difference? The way you are now, I mean.”

“I should hope so. They were in my head for… however long it was.” Even he’s not sure. Even time itself had been twisted back then. “Are we being listened to, though? Probably.”

“Is that better?”

“For you, sure.”

Scar’s expression twists into something haunted, subtle enough that it might have been a trick of the light. He scuffs soil over a pumpkin seed and presses it gently into place with the toe of his boot. “Have they said what they want?”

“They don’t talk to me,” Grian says, and admitting it doesn’t make him scowl. It doesn’t. “Or anyone, far as I know. But they’d change the game if they didn’t like how we’re playing it, so… I reckon this is what they want. Whatever this is.” He sighs and heaves another shovelful of dirt over the fence. “It doesn’t make sense to me, either.”

Scar is silent for another moment, and when he speaks, it’s quiet enough that Grian’s not sure he’s even meant to hear. “So they don’t… they’re… they’re satisfied. With this.”

It’s not exactly a question, either, when he says it. He just sounds lost. Grian sets the shovel aside and is about to hazard a response when Scar takes a deep breath, smiles, and changes the subject.

“Do you remember the incantation to grow crops?”

“Do I—” Oh, surely he’s misheard. “Do I remember….”

“How to make food grow.”

“How to make food grow. Wow. Yes I do. And the fact that you apparently don’t is concerning.”

“I remember it!” Scar sniffs. “I remember just fine. I’m testing you. How does it start?”

Grian gives him a withering look, holding it just long enough to make him squirm. “Right. Do you at least remember the catalyst?”

“Ground-up bones. I’m not helpless.”

“Okay, and what’s the word for bones?”

“Lah’diru— Ohh.” Scar smacks his palm to his forehead. “Told you I remember.”

How did you ever survive more than a couple of days? Grian wants to snap. How did you win?

But he knows, he knows it all already. Scar keeps a monster chained up inside him, shuttered away until everyone forgets it’s there. No one sees the fangs in his salesman’s smile until they’re already stained with blood.

Scar murmurs magic over the potatoes as they obediently sprout— Calorie-dense crops first; at least he remembers that much— and Grian’s hands won’t stop shaking. He could take the shovel to the back Scar’s head right now. He could do it.

“—Etr xuo hvadri,” Scar finishes, and the moment passes. “Whew. How about we call it there for now? I’m gonna let Tomorrow Scar take care of the harvesting and replanting. Thanks, Tomorrow Scar.”

That’s code for I’ve got no magic left. Probably still drained dry from building his cabin. Grian manages a grunt of acknowledgement while he tears his eyes away from Scar’s unarmored, vulnerable back, his exposed neck….

Scar says something else that Grian, swallowing back molten-iron bloodlust, staring without seeing at the lines of carefully-tilled earth, doesn’t catch. Easy. It would be so easy. He’s so hungry and it hurts—

Garden rows stretch out before him, brown-black and bare save for the occasional patches coaxed into sprouting. He’ll need more, Grian registers almost subconsciously, beneath the noise of his thoughts, gripping white-knuckled onto the fence to steady himself. There’s the river, of course, and the rabbits and birds in the forest, and the abundance of vole’s cap and butter mushrooms around every tree trunk. It’d actually be difficult for Scar to starve. But….

He moves toward an empty area of earth where they’d planted wheat and shakes the remainder of the bone meal on top of it. Force of habit, he thinks as he kneels before it, pressing his hands to the soil, sinking his fingertips in and beginning the spell. Keep your allies alive so that they’ll keep you alive. And anyway, it’s not like he has a reason to save up his own magical energy lately.

The yellow-green stalks brush against his face by the time he’s done. They’ll need a bit more time before harvesting if Scar lets them mature naturally, or another dose of bone meal and magic if he doesn’t want to wait, but it’s something.

At least one of them might as well eat their fill, and it’s not going to be Grian.

When he stands again, Scar’s watching him with his shadowed green eyes, face carefully blank with an emotion Grian can’t place and thoughts that Grian will never know.

“What?” Grian tries to snap, but it just sounds tired.

Scar doesn’t reply. He doesn’t look away, either, until a pattering of raindrops speckles over their shoulders, the clouds offering a last warning before the coming downpour.

“Come inside?” Scar says.

Grian raises an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Because it’s raining.”

If it’s a trap it’s not a very good one. What’s the angle here? Potions of Harming waiting above the door? A knife up Scar’s sleeve? A good old-fashioned pitfall trap? Scar’s never managed to kill him before. He’s wanted to, more often than he’d care to admit. Grian’s wanted it, too, from the start, and even now the thought of Scar letting loose against him is mouthwatering.

Come on, Scar. Turn us into beasts again, all adrenaline and desperation and teeth and nails and blood and bones. Let me see the look on your face when you get the revenge you so crave. Come on, then. Let’s kill each other.

But Scar just… shrugs, a faint acquiescent smile lingering at the corners of his lips, and brushes the garden-dirt from his knees as he heads indoors.

Honestly, Grian thinks, staring after him, hollow, people call me the crazy one.

He follows Scar inside.

The new-build smell of resin and sawdust greets him, along with a hint of wood smoke. Grian scans the floor and walls for tripwires, suspicious seams, any hidden buttons or levers, but Scar’s already moving into the kitchen at their left. “Are you a tea kind of man?”

“No thanks.”

One floor, simple layout, no pressure plates, no defensive structuring or barricades. Maybe he hasn’t gotten around to it yet. That’s risky. Next to the back door is an unfinished enchantment room, with a basic rune circle setup in the center and a work desk. There’s a bedroom, then what Grian assumes would be a living room, if there was any space to move around through the maze of chests.

The soft clink of a spoon in a mug turns his attention to where Scar’s leaning against the doorframe of the kitchen. He gestures to indicate the cabin at large. “What do you think?”

It’s a Scar build, which means it’s beautiful in every way, with painstaking attention given to even the smallest detail. Grian runs a careful hand over the smooth slats of wood that make up the wall. “Could use some decor.”

“I mean, I just finished it,” Scar huffs, mock-offended. “Trying to combine rustic hunting lodge with charming riverside cottage.”

“It’s nice,” Grian says. “Maybe grow some vines across the ceiling. It’d balance out the darker tones and match the mossy roof.”

Scar hums into his cup of tea, nodding slowly. “I like it.”

—

“Are you planning on coming out of there anytime soon?”

“There’s definitely something on the other side,” says the voice from the crevice, between the clinking of a pickaxe on deepslate. “I just can’t get a good angle on this rock.”

“I’m not coming in after you when you get stuck.”

“I’m not going to get stuck. But maybe it would go a little faster if you held the torch so that I could see anything?”

“Yeah, well, I’ve got a real problem and it’s shooting at me,” Grian says as another arrow thuds into his shield.

“If you die, can I have your pickaxe?”

“Scar.”

“Mine’s all worn out!”

“Scar, I’m about five seconds from just leaving, so—”

“Wait! Wait, wait, just—” There’s a grunt of exertion, and the sound of something giving way. “Okay, there’s room. Come on through.”

Grian waits for the next thud and then drops to the ground, shimmying on his stomach into the gap in the deepslate while the skeleton behind him clacks its dismay at losing its target. The passage is just high enough to army-crawl through without bashing his head on anything, though the tight fit still sets his teeth on edge, and he’s quick to follow Scar to the sliver of opening illuminated by the torch.

“Told you,” Scar says as he pulls himself into the cavern.

“Tell me you checked for creepers before you—”

A panicked yell echoes through the cave, followed by a telltale hiss. Grian covers his head and braces for the explosion, remaining still through the brief scuffle that follows.

“Hoo! No! No, don’t blow me! Get back! It’s okay, we’re fine, we’re dodgin’, we’re weavin’, in and out and—!” The creeper lets out its death rattle, crumbling into dust and plant matter as whatever enchantment holds it together dissipates. “Whew! All clear. You didn’t hear any of that, did you?”

“Of course not.”

“Good. Lights, please!”

Wriggling out of the crevice, Grian stands and raises the torch to give them both a good view of their surroundings. A bit of diorite clustered on the ceiling, some redstone here and there, and….

“Bingo!” Scar cheers. “That’s where they’ve been hiding!”

The exclamation sends an unexpected pang through Grian’s chest, calls up a distant memory of another mining excursion, of stupid jokes and laughing so hard he couldn’t stand up. It hurts to think about now, and not just because it’s colored by the lens of guilt like it had been back then. With a quick glance around the cavern to double-check that there’s nothing else waiting to ambush them, Grian lays down the torch and sets to work chiseling diamonds out of the wall. “By the way, how’s Mumbo been?”

“Hm? No clue,” Scar says.

“No?”

“We haven’t talked.”

Grian glances at him quizzically, but Scar doesn’t elaborate. “Pearl?”

“Not sure.”

“Any of the others, then? Gem, Joel, Tim—?”

Scar shoots him a warning look, suddenly, narrow eyes and tight jaw. Grian’s whole body keys up on instinct, but Scar’s looking away just as quickly. “Haven’t gotten around to it,” he says.

His voice gives away nothing, but the watch it is loud and clear. Grian can take a hint, even if that hint makes no sense. Scar’s one of the most extraverted out of the whole group. If he goes a day without a lengthy social interaction he’ll start to wilt like an underwatered sunflower. And he hasn’t gotten around to it?

Grian’s grip on his chisel falters as the familiar screaming need to know sweeps over him— if he takes this hammer and breaks open Scar’s skull, cuts up his brain into neat little slices and examines them under a jeweler’s loupe with the rest of these gemstones, then will he finally figure out what he’s thinking?— and when he blurts out a change of subject it’s for his own sanity, too. “I heard bats earlier. Do you think there’s a lush cave around?”

“That’d be nice. Could use some glow berries.”

“Dripleaf. We could— dripleaf would be good. Or do you like, er, spore blossoms better?”

Scar hums thoughtfully. “Well, I guess it’s the question of whether you want color or intricate detail in the space you’re decorating. If you really want to draw attention….”

Good, this is fine. This is safe. Scar gets to talk and Grian gets to stop thinking. Now that’s teamwork.

—

It’s called a funnel trap, and Scar learned it from Cleo during the fourth game. They’d made a fuss about it at the time, told him off about how could you possibly not know this and no, a fishing line isn’t the most convenient way, are you stupid?, but it’s no secret that Cleo likes teaching people things, deep down.

They’re good at it, too— they’ve somehow managed to get the lesson to stick in Scar’s head, and even now he follows each step with careful precision, stripping green branches of their bark and braiding them to form a cone, then crafting a smaller one to fit in the mouth of it. The fish swim in, but they can’t swim out. It’s that simple. Fishing line, honestly….

While he sets it into place against the bank, weighing it down with stones and bending the reeds above it to create more shade, Grian busies himself shifting the rocks along the riverbed into a subtle funnel of his own toward the trap. Some deep-buried artistic piece of him is ticking. Too conspicuous or bold of a line here would ruin the scenery, so maybe if he digs down to deepen the river a little upstream, then….

“Hey, G.”

Grian snaps out of it. “Yeah?”

“You and your… uh, not friends, but, you know— you ate negative emotions, right?”

“Yeah.” That’s something oddly refreshing about Scar: he doesn’t dance around the ugly topics. Doesn’t treat Grian like he’s made of glass, like he’ll shatter at the mere mention of the things that have happened to them.

“Why didn’t you….” Scar gestures vaguely. “Why not just… eat the positive ones instead?”

“Mostly because they were so much harder to cultivate.” Grian picks a little writhing water beetle from his wrist, lets it squirm between his fingers. “People… hold onto negative emotions easily, and they spread them without realizing it,” he says. “So all you have to do is keep everyone tired and hungry and scared, and then you give them a countdown, and then they all bring out the absolute worst in each other.” A light flick sends the beetle flying toward the pair of fish he can see lurking downstream. “And then we eat.”

Scar gives him the look one might give a dog that’s rolled around in something unpleasant.

“Well, you asked.”

“Why us?”

“For the crime of being delicious, I s’pose.” Grian points at the flickering grey-blue shapes beneath the water’s surface. “Why salmon? Why chickens, or pigs—?”

“All right, stop that. You can’t keep talking like we’re livestock,” says Scar. “You’re one of us now. I’m not letting you forget that.”

Grian scowls. “I couldn’t if I tried.”

“You didn’t answer the question, either.”

“Oh. You mean, why all of you specifically?” Grian says. “I… I don’t know.”

“You never asked?”

“I think you’re overestimating how much we actually talked,” Grian says. “They gave me orders and I obeyed them. They didn’t have the patience for questions and I didn’t want to risk asking one if I didn’t have to.”

“Then… why do you think….” For the first time since he’d started the conversation, Scar turns to face him directly. There’s a new scar on his face, a diagonal slit through his eyebrow. He’s got a white streak in his hair, too, there behind one temple, and hardship has sharpened every line of his body, turned him lean and dangerous. His voice is heavy with grief when he asks, “Why us, over and over and over again?”

And that— that makes Grian flinch, just a little. That makes him remember. Sun and sand and a still body in his arms, gone away where nothing can ever hurt him again. And then….

“I… I didn’t know they’d—” He swallows back the traitorous quiver in his voice. “I didn’t know. The first time. I swear I had no idea they would bring us back. I thought, once it was over, we’d all be—”

Free.

But Scar’s looking at him like he’s disappointed, like he thinks Grian’s lying, and something inside Grian pulls tight enough that it threatens to snap. Scar doesn’t get it, he couldn’t possibly understand what it had been like— why that second game had changed everything—

“Look, listen.” Grian draws himself up to his full height. Fine. Fine. If Scar wants the gruesome details that badly, fine. “You have— flavors, all of you. They probably decided they liked them enough that they didn’t want to bother finding new ones.”

“Flavors.”

“Unique to you. They change what your emotions taste like.” Scar turns away from him again, shaking his head in disgust. “Mumbo’s fear is different to Gem’s. Joel’s better at being angry than Lizzie. It’s like seeing through different-colored glass, or— or the same song played on different instruments.” He should stop talking, he needs to stop talking right now, but—

(“Don’t you hide from me,” he calls. A slash across his forehead drips blood into his eye. His breath is ragged past a pair of broken ribs, and he’s shaking with the effort of staying standing. “Where’d you go?” Please. Pearl, please. Please don’t make me win this.)

“We wanted your loneliness, Scar,” he says. “And your hate. You bury it so deep, but when you’re pushed far enough that you finally break—”

“Stop.”

There it is. The iciness, the venom. Grian knows the way it curls behind Scar’s sternum, how hard he tries to force it down until it’s too much, how it lashes out of him like the crack of a whip. Scar hates getting like this. Scar hates him, right now, and Grian can’t see anything.

“Grian—” Scar cuts himself off, taking a deep, shaking breath. “Grian, don’t talk to me about the time I won. Ever.”

Grian thinks of the sunflowers and the solitude and all that suffering, and decides that that’s the least Scar could ask of him.

“Okay,” he says.

The rest of the afternoon is spent in silence.

—

They’ll be lucky if this storm lets up before sundown, Grian muses as a raindrop slips along the slant of the cave roof and falls onto his shoulder. Of course, they could always just make a run for Scar’s cabin, but they’re already cold without being soaked through on top of it, so, better to wait on the off chance the torrent will calm to a drizzle before they set off.

In unison, the two of them nearly jump out of their skin when a blue-white slash of lightning crackles through the clouds. Grian exhales slowly through the thunder that follows, glancing over his shoulder at the dim cave for anything or anyone unexpected while Scar scans the treeline for the same. The overcast sky makes each shadow just a little deeper, each hiding spot just a little more sinister, but it’s not the darkness that’s got them both on edge.

The instincts haven’t gone away. Lightning means someone’s dead. Lightning means get ready for a fight. Lightning means you might be next.

Scar’s keeping him in his periphery. Wary, taut as a drawn bow. Grian’s the better of them in a fair fight, but he’d lose if Scar got the drop on him, so he’s got his back to the wall, too. Stalemate. That’s another lingering instinct: never, ever trust.

Might be fun to start something anyway, though. A quick grapple to the death, just for the sake of it, open Scar’s stomach with a knife or let Scar crack his skull open on the rocks— why not? It’s not like it would kill them in this world. Scar’s probably thinking the same thing behind those sharp killer’s eyes. Grian can’t tell anymore.

Flash. Rumble. Hunger, always the hunger.

Grian sighs. It’ll be a long day.

—

Since when does Scar have horses?

Grian stops in his tracks when he realizes just how stupid of a question that is.

Up ahead at the front of Scar’s cabin are two horses, fully saddled and bridled and tied to a fencepost. That means visitors, and visitors mean trouble.

And trouble means….

Instinct kicks on like it had never left. Whoever it is probably isn’t expecting him, so they likely haven’t trapped the area, but Grian keeps an eye out for tripwires as he creeps up to the house. Voices from inside, but no shouting. Means the fight’s either already won or hasn’t started. Either way he’s got an element of surprise.

Scar makes his doors squeaky on purpose so he’s harder to take by surprise, so Grian heads for the kitchen window instead. When he doesn’t glimpse any movement from inside, he slides it open, painstakingly slowly, enough to worm his way through and drop to a crouch on the floor. Depositing what he’s carrying on the table, he follows the sound of one voice in particular deeper into the house.

Because he knows that edge in Scar’s tone. Expertly controlled as ever, but lower, quieter. He knows it like he knows the feel of blood on Scar’s skin, the grate of a scream in his throat.

“I just think that I know redstone crystals when I see them,” Tango’s saying.

“Which is exactly why someone with your discerning eye is able to sense the high-level magic before you today!” Scar says. “Of course, that’s not all we offer here in Mystic Forest— in fact, if you turn your attention over here, I’ve got the deal of a lifetime on—”

“An amethyst shard?”

“—A Dragon’s Hoard fortune crystal, Skizz! This could bring you riches beyond your wildest dreams. You don’t get this kind of magic anywhere else.”

Grian’s seen this from behind a shield waiting for all hell to break loose and he’s seen it from behind a crossbow leveled at Scar’s heart. From inside his head, too, mesmerized by his racing pulse and the click-whir of the gears in his brain spinning. This is the way Scar talks when he’s backed into a corner.

He’s slinking forward before he realizes it, hand hovering over the hilt of his sword.

(The last thing he sees is the moonlight reflected off of a pool of his own blood. He should’ve known better than to turn his back on—)

“I mean… how does it work?”

“Well, now that’s another great thing about the fortune crystals— the versatility! You can wear it as a necklace, or set it into your armor, or tie it to your pickaxe, and just like that you’ve got a greatly increased chance of finding treasure in the mines. Think of all the diamond veins you could crack open, Tango! Before you know it you’ll be the richest man in the land.”

(He makes it to the trees before the last of his strength gives out. His breath catches on Ren’s arrows between his ribs and it hurts so, so much but it’s better this way, it’s better this way—)

Tango and Skizz have their backs to him. Diamonds in their armor and at least a couple of enchantments on each piece. Grian’s unenchanted sword won’t be much of a threat against that, but that won’t matter if he takes them by surprise. He can—

Scar catches sight of him, then, and the carefully-controlled half-smile flickers into an expression Grian recognizes. Something wind-frail and desert-sky wide that tugs at his muscle memory even though he can’t remember the last time he’s seen it.

It’s only there for a moment before Scar smooths it back into the friendly façade so that the others don’t notice, but it’s enough to stop Grian in his tracks— because this isn’t a fight, is it? Now that he’s paying attention, it’s obvious. No one’s even drawn their weapons.

“Now tell me, what would you two be willing to trade for all the treasure in the world?” Scar says, and though his attention remains fixed on Tango and Skizz, he makes a barely-noticeable motion with his hand. Slow downward movement with an open palm. Stand down.

If he starts a fight, he’ll start a war he won’t survive. It’s not worth hitting first. Releasing the white-knuckled grip on his sword, Grian retreats silently into the living room, crouching unseen behind a few storage chests.

“That’s the thing… we might have used up most of our diamonds upgrading our gear,” Skizz is saying from the other room. Grian tips his head back against the wall and listens with half an ear as the adrenaline fades out. “Mostly we came here for—”

“You’re in luck, Skizz, because trusted friends and allies of Mystic Forest receive Friendship Discounts even on rare items like this one! Give me a price you think is fair and it’s all yours.”

“So you do want the glowstone dust?”

“Oh, I’ll definitely take the glowstone dust, you know how much I like sparkly things. But today I’m mostly interested in shiny things, and I’ve had my eye on that axe….”

There’s no point, he remembers dizzily. No point in killing anyone anymore, not when these eyes are all he has. It’d only make him hungrier. Stars, is it even possible to be hungrier than this?

Grian digs his fingers into his ribs and wishes he could reach inside them and tear out the emptiness. Wishes that the face Scar had made hadn’t imprinted itself on the back of his eyelids. It’s excruciating not knowing what it meant.

He manages to get his shaking under control at around the time the trio pass back through the living room where he’s hiding. “I spent half the week mining material,” Tango grumbles. “How did you make me do that…?”

“Oh, give it a couple of hours in the caves and you’ll have more than enough to replace it,” Scar says cheerily. “The crystals have never let me down. Gentlemen,” he announces in his please leave voice as he opens the door, “it has been an absolute pleasure and you are welcome in my humble abode any time.”

“All right. It’s a nice build, by the way.”

“I like the moss on the roof. Cozy.”

“Thank you very much!” Scar says from the doorway while the two of them untie their horses. “You two get home safe, and don’t hesitate to ask if there’s ever anything—”

“Scarface, hey.”

A light jolt runs over Scar’s shoulders and he clamps his mouth shut, but there’s no malice in Skizz’s tone.

“I’m a few miles downriver, in the meadow by the birches. Don’t be a stranger, okay?” he says. Then, when Scar remains silent, “You take care of yourself.”

Grian can’t see Scar’s expression from here. Can’t see anything. Burns to know what’s going through Scar’s head when he lifts his hand in an uncharacteristically small wave, and watches at the door until the hoofbeats fade out.

Scar shuts the door, and visibly takes a moment to compose himself, drawing up to his full height and squaring his shoulders. He scrubs a hand over his face as he finally turns to Grian. “I was worried you were going to kill them for a minute there. Thanks for being backup.”

Grian stares at him.

“Backup?”

Scar glances out the window again and seems satisfied that no one’s doubled back for an ambush. “They said they didn’t want trouble, but anyone can say that. I wasn’t sure if they would….”

It clicks. Relief. That was the emotion he’d seen in that brief moment. Scar had been actually, stupidly, relieved to see him.

“Backup,” he repeats, a sick taste on the back of his tongue.

(Grian’s human-eyes are blurred with tears and all he can do is whisper “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” but somewhere else his other eyes are watching him kill his best friend and are drinking in every second, and it’s absolute, rapturous, all-consuming ecstasy.)

You’re wrong, Scar.

If there was a chance they were going to kill you, I wanted to watch it happen.

Scar’s forehead creases. “Are you okay?”

“I—” Grian shakes his head to clear it, standing and brushing himself off. “Why were they here?”

“They didn’t say. Well, they brought me a gift,” Scar says, nodding toward a potted cherry sapling standing on a nearby chest, “and they said they wanted to trade for something. But I kind of started talking before they said what it was, and….”

“And you scammed them out of glowstone dust and a diamond axe.”

“Excuse you, mister, I sold them a Dragon’s Horde fortune crystal for glowstone dust and a diamond axe.”

“Oh, Scar….”

“Don’t oh, Scar me! I panicked,” he groans. “And it’s not like I’m happy about this either. I was going to make wind chimes out of that.”

“So you accidentally… all right. All right. Sure.”

“Anyway.” Scar seems more than happy to drop the subject. “What brings you to my neck of the woods? Usually I have to drag you off of that mountain myself.”

“I… don’t remember.”

“Well… you’re always welcome to stick around?” Scar says, giving the cherry sapling a wary once-over like he thinks it might explode before scooping it up and moving toward the kitchen. “I think we— Oh stars whatintheworld— Grian! Grian, did you put a dead pheasant on my kitchen table—?”

“Oh. Right, that was it. Caught it earlier. Trade me something for it?”

“…Hm. Actually, yeah. As it happens, I have a very powerful luck crystal in stock—”

“Something useful, Scar. Your tricks don’t work on me.”

Scar sniffs disdainfully. “Magical crystals are very useful, but if you already have something else in mind….”

“A bit of lapis, if you’ve got it. And I want the glowstone dust.”

“Lapis, half of the glowstone. And you have to take three bites of it when it’s cooked.”

“One.”

“Three, Grian, final offer.”

“Fine.” Only because I feel bad.

—

The thing is, Grian used to have answers.

He used to have magic that could bend the world to his will. Blazing wings, a voice like a clap of thunder. He used to have eyes that could unravel any secret. The human piece of him would play the game, act out the proper script, and the rest of him would revel in the chaos from behind the others’ faces, their every thought and desire laid open for him to see. To feast on.

It was all there, shining treasure-bright and irresistable. Nothing could hide from him. Not the way things do now, in this frail cage of meat that might as well be blind for all the good it does him. The glaring absence of his magic gapes like an open wound. He keeps reaching for it, too, instinctually, desperately, and every time he does the gash rips wider.

Scar doesn’t make any sense, and it’s frustrating beyond words.

They aren’t teammates. They haven’t been since the third game, or maybe earlier. They’re hardly even allies— they just haven’t killed each other yet. And still Scar keeps coming back, like a kicked dog, smiling like he’s happy to see him. It’s as if nothing Grian does, nothing he is, is enough to scare him away.

He hardly ever gets angry, even when he has every right. He’ll barely flinch when Grian snaps at him, or he’ll return it with a reproachful sort of bored look, like it’s an annoying habit and not aggression. He’ll steer conversations away from difficult topics, but then ask questions out of nowhere like a curious child— How did They fix us when we died? Where did you get new clothes for us for every game?— and even when his guard is up he looks so at ease that it’s hard to notice, and Grian used to be able to know when Scar was afraid but now he can’t.

And Scar should be afraid. Scar should hate him. More than anyone else, Scar has reason to.

Grian opens the door and Scar grins at him with a Morning! How’d you sleep? and he thinks about Scar in his panda enclosure, kept awake by his own shivering, staring up at the stars. They take a trip to the waterfall for a drink and he thinks about Scar in his sunflower field, pelted by rain and screaming at shadows until his throat bled— Where are my friends? Scar chatters about nothing as he leads the way down the mountain and Grian thinks about pressing his boot to the small of Scar’s back for the leverage to rip out his axe, the way Scar’s mind had whited out from the pain— and another of Scar’s deaths belongs to him—

Grian slows to a stop just shy of the river, glowering at the back of Scar’s head. Out of everyone— Scar, more than anyone else—

Scar pauses to glance back at him in a silent question, and Grian hears himself ask, “Why do you keep doing this?”

“Hm?” Scar blinks. “What do you mean? I’m just walking.”

“Us, Scar. Why haven’t you left me alone yet?”

“I leave you alone all the time, Mr. Hermit! And let me tell you, it’s not healthy being cooped up in the dark like that. You know—”

“Stop it.” Grian’s nails bite into his palms. “Stop playing dumb and answer me.”

Scar tsks. “Oh, don’t you worry your feathery head about it.” He ruffles Grian’s hair like it’s nothing, like everything about them is perfectly innocent, like Grian wouldn’t stab him in the back just to savor the way he’d writhe in his death throes, like the idea isn’t making him salivate— “Can’t a man do something nice for his friend?” Scar says, and it surges up through Grian’s ribcage like a lit fuse, the need to lash out and somehow shock that genuine warmth out of his expression.

He smacks Scar’s hand away as he snarls, “I am not your friend.”

Friends don’t fantasize about killing their friends. Friends don’t do the things he’s done.

Scar’s expression gives away nothing, and it’s all Grian can do not to shake in rage. The not knowing is torturous; the detestable humanity of these eyes that can’t reach inside Scar’s head and flick through his thoughts like pages of a book is enough to drive him to the brink of madness. Start making sense, he wants to scream. Why don’t you make any sense? Why don’t you leave?

“Scar,” he grates out. “Do you even remember how many times I killed you?”

Scar’s steady gaze doesn’t falter. “I remember everything.”

“Then do something,” Grian says. “Hate me or be angry or— or anything, just stop looking at me like that—”

“Like what?”

“Like things are fine between us!” Grian stalks forward, too close, siezes the front of Scar’s shirt in his fist, wills him to be as furious as he should be when he snaps, “I killed you, Scar. I killed you and I liked it. What’s wrong with you?”

But Scar hasn’t stopped looking at him, lake-surface calm and infuriatingly, agonizingly unreadable. When he finally breaks the silence, all he says is, “Were you happy?”

The question sinks in slow as snowfall.

“What?”

“Were you happy?” Scar presses. “Because you were crying the first time you killed me.”

Grian’s mouth opens and closes soundlessly as he finds he’s suddenly holding onto Scar for balance instead of to intimidate. All that time with incredible otherworldly power at his fingertips, so drunk on the flavors of pain and suffering that nothing else mattered, the endless hunger in his head demanding more, more, more— happy?

(Scar’s heart shudders to a stop and it’s the best thing Grian’s ever tasted and he’ll never, ever forgive himself.)

Happy?

Scar reaches up and brushes Grian’s hand away as easily as dusting off a flake of ash. When he turns away, it’s not a surrender. “I was a monster too,” he says. “I killed a lot of people, especially that time that I won. I might have even enjoyed it, too, sometimes. No one’s forgotten that.”

Unmoored without the pressure of his gaze, Grian can only stare mutely in response, but that’s when he sees it: Scar’s composure slipping to reveal something dead-eyed and haunted in its place. The same way he’d looked as he’d limped, alone and spattered in blood, through the sunflowers and back to the ruins of his base, after it was all over.

It’s gone in a moment when Scar draws in a deep, somber breath and turns to face him again. “This is pretending, Grian. We’re pretending right now,” he says. “And I want to keep pretending. Do you understand?”

The fight goes out of Grian like coals plunged into water, and all at once he’s too tired to be angry with Scar anymore.

A monster, he’d said. So he’d built his base here, away from all the others, and has been pestering Grian day in and day out, despite being pushed away each time. He’d sought out another monster, because his only other option was to be alone again.

Subdued, Grian bows his head. “Okay,” he breathes out, nodding. “Okay, yeah. I understand.”

This is what they can have. This is pretending. And Grian’s good at pretending.

They both are.

—

They fall into a routine.

Grian heads down the mountainside a little before noon each day. If he doesn’t, Scar comes up to him instead. They explore the little valley that holds their forest, map out the best places to forage, and clear the monsters out of the upper levels of the nearby caves, leaving behind torches to ward away the ones any farther down.

It’s not always easy. Sometimes Grian’s hunger scorches him from the inside out until the effort of not going for Scar’s throat leaves him shaking. Sometimes Scar forgets where he is and mutters about the shadows that only he can see. Sometimes Grian snaps out words that drip with malice. Sometimes Scar can’t stand to look at him.

But today they cooperate. Today they pretend.

Scar’s on what he’s calling a truffle quest, which mostly seems to consist of the two of them wandering aimlessly through the oak forest and is especially strange considering Grian’s pretty sure truffles grow underground and neither of them have brought a dog or a pig along to sniff them out.

…It’s something to do, anyway.

Maybe Scar knows what he’s doing? Grian could ask, but it’s more entertaining just to watch him brush aside leaf litter at the base of trees seemingly at random, scrape around in the dirt for a bit, then mutter hmm, nope and move on to a different one.

All at once, the tiniest shift of movement out of the corner of Grian’s eye has him dropping to a crouch beside Scar and lunging to clap a hand over his mouth. He only realizes he’s moved too fast when Scar rears back and elbows him hard in the ribs, clawing at Grian’s wrist with one hand and reaching for the knife at his ankle with the other—

“Shh— stop it,” Grian hisses, pulling away out of reach of the blade and pointing toward… a deer. It’s a deer. “Look.”

Scar’s wild eyes stare back at him, knife held unwavering between them.

Ah. Oops. “Sorry,” Grian allows, raising his hands in brief surrender and backing away another step. “Do you want it?”

“What?”

“The deer, Scar.”

“Yes.”

Grian nods and unslings the bow from his shoulder, nocking an arrow and pulling back on the string while he waits for the deer to step just slightly more into the open. Once he staggers it, Scar can rush in and finish the job.

It’s quartering away. Perfect angle. He exhales slowly, lines up the arrowhead with the soft spot just behind the animal’s shoulder.

“Wait.” A hand grasps his elbow. “Don’t.”

Grian lets out a soft questioning noise, but holds back.

“I don’t… I don’t need it,” Scar says, brow furrowed like he’s bewildered at the words coming out of his own mouth. “I don’t need it. Don’t kill it.”

“No?” Grian lets the bowstring go slack a little as the deer, now alerted to their presence, begins to trot skittishly away.

“No.”

They watch it go, bounding through the undergrowth, the thump, thump of its hooves fading away into the background noise of the forest.

“It’d be a waste. I can’t eat it all,” Scar says, as if he’s still convincing himself. When Grian tilts his head in a silent question, he adds, “I’ve got a huge garden, an entire river full of fish, just caught another rabbit in that trap yesterday, and then all the forage I could ask for on top of it all. I haven’t gone hungry in weeks. I’m… I don’t….” He lets out a little huff of astonishment, running a shaky hand through his hair. “I don’t remember the last time I haven’t needed to hunt.”

Grian returns the arrow to its quiver and, before he can stop himself, snips, “That must be nice for you.”

“Yeah, it is.” Scar gives him a Look— one of those pointed, passive-aggressive ones that leave just enough room for plausible deniability if Grian were to call him out on it. “You get sick of starving after a while, am I right?”

“Watch it.”

“I’m not fighting with you right now, Grian, let me have this.”

Grian’s fists clench, unclench. He doesn’t need the reminder that he’s being petty. “Just don’t come crying to me if you end up regretting it later. That was a nice fat one,” he adds, to make it clear he’s backing off.

Scar grunts in acknowledgement, sheathing his knife. “What happened to your arm?”

Grian inspects the throbbing scrapes left behind from Scar’s struggling. Beads of blood well up from the torn skin. “You happened,” he says. “I think you bruised a rib, too.”

“You pounced on me.”

“I said I was sorry,” Grian says, but a closer look at Scar— at the remnant adrenaline-shivers in his hands, the spring-coiled tension of his body— makes him realize very suddenly that that isn’t enough. He swallows down the prickle of guilt and lets some of the truth slip out instead. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”

Scar glances back at him, scanning his face with a wary but thoughtful set to his jaw. He seems satisfied with whatever he finds, and nods his acceptance.

—

“Stop,” Scar’s pleading with him, clutching at his wrists, skin slick with blood. “Please stop. Isn’t it enough? Haven’t you had enough?”

And Grian draws the knife across his throat and watches and watches as the crimson spills out over the sand, presses his fingertips against the wound for the way it makes Scar spasm and choke, watches and watches and sees nothing and Scar dies again and Grian’s sure the hunger must be killing him, too.

There are dozens of murdered Scars in this desert, bleeding and bleeding, watching him right back, and the ground is sticky with gore and Grian’s hands are red, red, red. “Don’t do this,” another Scar says and Grian kills him, too, more blood and more pain and more hunger, and why does it always have to be Scar? Why can’t he hurt someone else? Why won’t he hurt someone else?

Scar dies and dies and dies and the desert and the bodies and the whole sky roil with eyes, and They’re watching him, now, gorging themselves on him, and he looks up at them and shouts “Isn’t it enough? Haven’t you had enough?”

And when he wakes up he’s howling like a wounded dog, curled on the floor and screaming, and when his voice goes too hoarse for any more he cries instead, shaking uncontrollably on the cold stone.

The sun comes up, eventually. There’s a window set into the door that catches the rays just right to refract them through the entire cave. He didn’t mean to build it that way. It’s kind of infuriating him.

He should tear it out, he thinks, throat raw, shirt damp with sweat, face pressed to the ground. Tear out the whole door and close in the stone around him instead. Make himself a cozy little tomb. That would be nice.

It’s maybe another hour before he manages to sit up, aching and exhausted, but he’s sick of listening to his own thoughts and sick of this stupid room and it’s enough to lead him outside into the cool morning air, where he can stare at the forest and listen to the birds and the distant rumbling waterfall instead.

Why is it always Scar?

No, he already knows the answer to that, doesn’t he? It’s always Scar because Grian wants it to be. Because Grian knows how to hurt Scar better than anyone.

And it’s always Scar, it’s always Scar he thinks of first when he needs backup or resources or somewhere to hide. And it’s always Scar whose first instinct is to help, for goodness’ sakes, G, you’re bleeding all over my nice clean floor! Hold still and let me stitch that up. What do you need? I’ll get you a fresh shield. No, stay here and get some rest, you don’t want it infected.

Grian knows how to hurt Scar better than anyone.

His eyes burn again, because apparently he’s not had enough yet, and he hugs his knees to his chest, blinking furiously as the sound of crunching gravel signals that his usual visitor’s arrived. If anyone deserves an apology, it’s him, but Grian’s sick and tired and only has enough kindness in him for a warning. “If you talk to me today I think I’ll kill you.”

Scar’s eyes widen, surprise and not fear, and Grian digs his nails into his arms to keep himself from shoving him off the cliff edge, but he nods and withdraws, disappearing back down the mountain trail.

Grian fights down the tiny, stupid piece of him that wants to call out don’t go.

Somehow everything is so loud but so horribly quiet here. Time moves at a torturous crawl, only measured by the labored drag of his breath and the tap of his pulse in his veins.

Somewhere else in this eerily calm world, his friends (he shouldn’t call them that, not anymore, but any other option is too painful) are probably going about their business, mining or gathering food or just being with each other. No tooth-and-nail scrambling for survival this time, no need to go on the attack. If he could, he’d weave through their thoughts right now, and remember what it tastes like when Mumbo fixes a redstone contraption he’s proud of, or when Pearl focuses so intently on something she’s sketching that she loses track of time, or when Joel bickers with Jim until they’re both shouting at each other, or… anything. All the memories and miseries and dreams and ideas. Any of them, all of them, and their endlessly beautiful minds.

Ravenous monster. Stupid, lonely human.

He doesn’t notice that the footsteps have returned until they stop on the balcony.

Grian jerks his head up, half-hiding his tearstained face. “What are—” he begins, choked, but Scar, not speaking, hardly even looking at him, takes a block of wood from the bag on his shoulder and hands it to him.

Grian turns it over in his hands— oak, about the diameter of his palm, and twice that in length— while Scar sits a careful distance away, taking out a block of his own and two whittling knives. He reaches out with one of them, slow enough to be nonthreatening, taps the blade meaningfully against the piece of wood he’d given Grian, and slips the knife handle into his grasp.

It takes a special kind of crazy to offer a weapon to someone who’s just threatened to kill you.

But… this is familiar, actually. Not from Grian’s own memories, but familiar. It’s actually a Lizzie thing. Something she’d introduced Scar to one dark night on their cherry-blossom mountain. I like to keep my hands busy, when I’m feeling like this. It quiets things down inside my head. Scar, still twitchy and half-crazed from back then, and Lizzie, still apprehensive over her new and tentative alliance with an idiot and a madman who was also an idiot, carving shapes out of bits of wood in the low firelight until the sky went dawn-grey and they finally felt safe enough to doze off for a couple of hours.

Grian presses the blade to the wood and begins stripping away the bark with far more force than necessary, sending chips of it flying off the edge of the balcony. Scar sets to work, too, calm and unbothered, like this is what he’d planned on doing today all along.

They’re both rubbish at it. Scar only knows a few basic knife strokes and Grian’s doing more hacking than cutting— there’s enough resistance from the wood that it sates some of the violence in his fingertips to slash it apart. But then, he thinks, that’s probably the point of all this. Not to be good at it. Just to have something to do.

The sun rolls slowly through the sky. Grian reduces his bit of wood to a pile of shavings, and Scar hands him a new one, then another when he’s destroyed that. When Grian’s knife goes dull, Scar stops him with a faint brush of fingertips on his arm, switches it out for his own sharper one and takes a whetstone from his pocket to hone the first.

He gets blisters. A dull ache echoes through every joint in his hands. Somehow, it helps.

Grian’s not sure how long they stay there. Long enough that the vicious writhing hatred in his chest ebbs and leaves him feeling drained, numb. Too long, probably, for Scar, who’d stayed with him the whole time, as steadying and constant as the mountain itself.

He really hadn’t needed to do that.

Slowly, Grian sets down his knife and what remains of the block of wood, studying Scar out of the corner of his eye. When he finally speaks up, his voice comes out weak and frail. “Don’t you have to eat? Or… anything?”

“Hm.” Setting his knife aside as well, Scar presses his thumb to the center of his palm, flexing the tension out of his fingers. “I don’t think I should leave you alone right now.”

He says it casual as anything. Easy. Grian’s throat goes inexplicably tight again. “You—” he begins, but cuts off when he realizes he doesn’t know what he wants to say.

Scar dusts away a few stray wood shavings and leans back on his hands with a long exhale. “You can come have dinner with me if you promise not to kill me today.”

He did say that, didn’t he? Grian swallows and rubs at his jaw where it aches from being clenched for so long. “Are you going to make me eat any of it?”

“Not today.”

Grian hands the knife back to him, handle first. “I won’t kill you today. Promise,” he says, and adds a quiet “Sorry. And— thank you, for this.”

The corner of Scar’s mouth twitches upward. He stands, lets his joints crack-crack-crack back into alignment, and offers Grian his hand. It’s rough with calluses, and it’s warm.

—

So, it turns out that Lizzie was right. On those long days of working with his hands, doing things the hard way without magic so it’ll take longer, the rabid itch in Grian’s brain… settles, just a bit. Loosens its stranglehold on his mind. Something about distraction. Something about pretending.

The forest is… hospitable to them. Dense blankets of soft moss, a thick canopy as shelter from the weather, fat berries on every branch of every bush. Easily shaped under their hands whenever there’s something they want changed or added. Scar keeps the place so lush and green that it rivals even the rainiest jungle, a perfect balance of dark wood and and bright leaves that catch the sunbeams just right, and he’s strung a few lanterns in the branches, too. Grian’s been sweeping away leaf litter to pack down a dirt path around Scar’s cabin and to the river, and collecting the larger, flatter rocks for stepping stones across the water, at the place they usually cross to climb up to his base. The most recent project is a little storage barn they’ve planned out next to the garden, and that means they need an excessive amount of bricks.

Grian had gotten the fun job earlier today— stamping barefoot in the thick squelch of mud to mix in the bits of straw— so now he’s hard at work making a paste of wood ash and water and forming it into balls so they can make cement mortar tomorrow. For his part, Scar’s pressing the mud into a brick mold and turning them out in rows on the ground. They haven’t built a proper kiln yet, so he’s got to dry them with magic instead. Grian can hear him muttering the incantations under his breath.

That’s what he hears at first, anyway. Around the time he’s scrubbing the ash out from beneath his fingernails in a bucket of water, he realizes Scar’s been quiet for a while.

Scar glances at him like he senses Grian’s gaze and gestures at the wet bricks. “Could you get these ones?”

“Sure.” Grian dries his palms on his trousers. “But— you’re out of magic already?”

Scar hmphs. “Don’t you go shaming a man for low stamina.”

“I wouldn’t if it didn’t keep happening.”

“You’re supposed to ‘that’s-what-she-said’—”

“Don’t change the subject. What is it, are you ill?” He reaches toward Scar’s forehead, pausing when he shies away. “Scar. Let me see.”

Scar brushes his hand aside. “Off. I’m fine,” he says. “Don’t act like you’re doing that much better.”

“I’m not. That’s how I know you’re lying.”

Magic replenishes itself naturally, within the user, up to a certain baseline— or, at least, it’s supposed to. Get too sick, hurt, or stressed, and your body prioritizes survival instead. None of them have been at their best since… well, since this all started, really, whatever that best may have once been, but even taking that into account, this doesn’t feel normal.

Take care of your allies. Pretend. If Scar won’t give him any information, then he’ll work with what he does have. Which is….

Okay, he has what he can see— namely, that Scar looks worn down and tired, troubled when he doesn’t think Grian’s looking— and he has what he used to see. The secret fears Scar keeps tucked safely away, hidden behind a confident smile and a silver tongue that would convince anyone else to look anywhere else. He knows what makes Scar look like that. He knows everything Scar’s afraid of.

“Hey,” Scar says suddenly, “not a big fan of the way you’re looking at me, G.”

Grian blinks, realizes he hasn’t done that in a while, and shakes himself. “I can’t— I can’t see anything,” he feels the need to say. “Not anymore.”

“You were trying,” Scar lilts like he’s not bothered at all, which, of course, means the opposite. “You and those big, dark, spooky eyes. You stay out of my brain, mister! It’s full of enough holes as it is.”

“Right.”

If he’s going to figure out how to help then he’ll have to be more delicate than that, Grian thinks as he magics the rest of the bricks dry. Scar’s obviously not going to talk, and Grian doesn’t have anything to say that would make it all better, anyway. Answers, sure, if he gets questions, but Scar hasn’t liked any of his answers so far, and another round of yes, the monsters were watching all of it; yes, I made sure you couldn’t escape; yes, you were magnificent, you were delicious… probably wouldn’t be too productive right now.

He could just leave. It’d be easier. It might even be the solution, too, if this is just one of those days when Scar doesn’t want him around. But Grian owes him lately, and the ignorance hurts, it itches deep inside his brain and if he doesn’t get some kind of answer it’ll keep him up all night.

Without his eyes, his real eyes, he’ll have to resort to thinking like a human. Putting himself in Scar’s shoes. What do humans like? What makes humans feel safe? The questions feel foreign after so much time spent asking himself the opposite.

Wait, then— then he should go with the opposite of his instincts here? The opposite of what Scar hates?

Scar usually hates being alone, so leaving is probably a bad idea. Scar hates being killed, so… so Grian should make sure not to seem threatening at all. And Scar hates… starving, and the cold, so….

Hm. This is harder than he thought.

“It’s—” He clears his throat. “It’s about dinner time for you, right? Maybe let’s leave this for today.”

Scar squints at the angle of the sun. “I guess it is about that time. Are the—”

“T-tell me, erm, what you’ve been making lately,” Grian says. “With. With food.”

Rinsing the mud from his hands in one of Grian’s buckets, Scar raises an eyebrow. “Uh, I made a bunch of vegetable oil recently. Gotta keep the balance of fats, or else— well, rabbit starvation, you know.”

“Uh-huh. That’s, that’d be bad.”

“Tonight’s just… leftovers. Um, I got a grouse the other day and I roasted it with some pumpkin and mushrooms. Nothing special, and it’d be better with a honey glaze or something, but….” He shrugs. “I’m not picky these days.”

(He isn’t. Especially not since then, when he couldn’t afford to be, when he’d swallow chunks of river squid just to stop the hunger pains, after the snow buried most of the farm along with the last of the sunflowers, and Grian’s meant to be distracting him from this—)

“We can find honey,” he tries. “And different seasonings, if you want. And you can try and make it again, because— because you’ll still have plenty of ingredients. There’s lots to eat.” He squirms when Scar frowns at him quizzically. “What?”

“You’re acting weird.”

“Am not.” Grian folds his arms. “Perfectly normal conversation. I can’t have a conversation with you?”

Scar raises his hands in surrender, shaking the water away. “Come inside, I’ll let you have a bite.”

“Oh.” Grian’s stomach curdles in revulsion at the thought, but— normal, he’s supposed to be acting normal and polite and human right now. “Good. Er, great. Thanks.”

Grian sits at the table while Scar reheats the, the stuff at the stove, suffusing the air with the smell of something savory and… it smells awful and that’s probably not Scar’s fault. He’s got too much pride to serve anyone something he wouldn’t eat himself.

Well— Grian remembers the squid and retracts that last thought— the point is that Scar’s trying to be a good host like usual and Grian’s going to be nice, blast it.

Scar sets a plate of food down between them and hands Grian a fork. Best to get it over with before he can think too hard, Grian decides. Scooping up a bite, he takes a deep breath, counts to three in his head, and shoves the fork in his mouth.

Oh, stars, that’s bad. That’s horrendous. It’s chewy and oily and it’s a blasted dead animal and he’d rather be gnawing on charcoal. Grian brings a hand up to stifle a reflexive choke. Yeah, there’s no way he’s getting this down.

Scar nibbles a bit of pumpkin, impassive and merciless. “You’re looking a little grey there.”

“I’m—” His throat is watering even worse than his eyes. “I’m tasting it.”

“What do you taste?”

“I think,” Grian manages, white-knuckling the edge of the table, “it— it has salt. There’s salt in it.”

“I did put salt in it, that’s right.” Scar sets down his fork. “Do you want me to get you a bucket?”

“Yes please.”

Scar hands him one from the cupboard under the sink and Grian retreats to the garden to dry-heave in peace for a bit. Ugh.

This isn’t working. Scar’s wearing that guarded expression he used to wear during the games, reserved for thinly-veiled threats or tense negotiations with enemy teams. Even though he seems calm, there’s that underlying note of caution, like he’s waiting for something to jump at him from the shadows. Or for the shadows themselves to reach out and grab him.

When humans feel distressed, Grian thinks as he rinses the bucket and his mouth out in the river, it’s because they need something they aren’t getting. So what does Scar need? …And back to square one he goes.

Grian sighs and plucks a couple of mint leaves to chew on as he heads back inside to start on the dishes. That’s good to do, right?

Scar joins him at the counter once he’s finished eating, wordlessly taking the next dish from Grian’s hands to towel it dry. While the two of them clean up, Grian studies Scar’s face out of the corner of his eye, as surreptitiously as he can, lingering on those dark circles. Maybe he should just… make sure Scar gets some sleep for a change.

“Hey,” Grian says as he turns off the sink. “Come up to my place tonight.”

“I shouldn’t,” Scar sighs. “It’s getting late.”

“Then stay over, I don’t mind. No one will find you up there, Scar.” That sounds a bit too sinister for what he meant, though, so he adds, “They don’t want to bother with me.”

Scar actually looks caught out now, and Grian tries not to let the satisfaction show. Finally. He’s hit the nail on the head.

“It’s okay,” he says. “I won’t let anything bad happen. Promise.”

“You’re saying you’ll be my guard dog?” Scar says with the barest hint of a smile. “Or— whatever, guard bird?”

“I’m not going to kill you tonight, if that’s what you mean.”

Scar’s expression turns contemplative, then he nods. “I believe you.”

“Come on then, otherwise you’ll attract phantoms and then no one will get any sleep.”

They make it just as sunset just starts to pour orange across the sky­­­— they’re getting used to the climb, it seems, and frequent use has started to wear a pathway into the scree. Scar’s quiet as they ascend, and Grian doesn’t bother with the small talk, just leads the way inside.

It’s not much. Really it isn’t. He hasn’t bothered decorating or even designing anything beyond what’s necessary, and it’s grown cluttered with his usual assortment of things— chests full of odds and ends over here, pile of nearly-broken tools over there, halfhearted low-level enchanting setup in the corner. Some dried herbs hang next to the potion stand, and Scar’s fingertips brush over a bushel of lilac.

“You don’t like it?” Grian guesses.

“Oh, it’s just a little gloomy for you. Could use couple of windows.”

“I’ll leave a lantern on.” Grian nods him toward the bed and tucks himself into a wall alcove next to the fireplace, where the embers keep the stone drowsy-warm. “Get some rest. We’re safe up here and nothing’s going to get us.”

“…Thanks.”

“Mm. D’you want a bedtime story, some cocoa…?”

“Is there any cocoa?”

“Nope.”

Scar pouts. “Don’t be mean.”

Grian allows himself a quiet, amused scoff. “Good night, Scar.”

“Night, G.”

—

Way back… maybe halfway through the first game?… Scar had dubbed this the Grian Knock. He’d insisted there’s a rhythm Grian uses that no one else does, a sharp ta-tap tap tap, and as soon as he’d pointed it out it’d become theirs. Stayed theirs throughout every game to follow. Ta-tap tap tap, it’s me. For better or worse.

Ta-tap tap tap. He creaks open Scar’s door to an immediate reply from inside. “Is that a Grian?”

“Hi, Scar.”

“Welcome back, my friend! Welcome, welcome, welcome. I was starting to think the foxes had snapped you up.” Scar emerges from his enchantment room, a streak of redstone dust across his cheekbone. “How was the great outdoors… oh.”

Following his eyes, Grian glances down at the grass stains on his clothes and dried mud caked over his skin. He clears his throat, suddenly self-conscious. “It’s not that bad, is it?”

“You look like you’ve… had a long few days,” Scar says politely, plucking a blade of grass out of Grian’s hair. “You’re not hurt, are you?”

“Just my dignity,” Grian says, waving him off and heading for the kitchen. “And ‘m thirsty.”

Scar watches with an expectant raised eyebrow while Grian downs a cup of water. “You’re keeping me in suspense on purpose.”

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Are you going to tell me where you’ve been?”

“Oh, well, if you insist.” Setting down the glass, Grian folds his hands behind his back and announces, “I’ve brought you Cow as a gift.”

Scar’s jaw drops. “You got me a cow?”

“That’s not what I said,” Grian says. “Cow is outside.”

“Why are you saying it like that?”

“Eh… it’s better if I show you. Come see.”

“Is this the kind of surprise that kills me?” Scar says as he follows Grian to the door.

“No, nothing’s going to hurt you. Come on, come on.” Grian takes him by the wrist, carefully, ready for him to jerk away but he… doesn’t. And he doesn’t ask any further questions while Grian leads him outside, and it does something funny to Grian’s chest, realizing that.

He elects to ignore it.

Waiting at the bottom of the porch steps and nibbling at the grass growing there is a handsome brown stallion, spotted with white and swishing a long black tail. It looks up with its chocolate-dark eyes when Scar sucks in an awestruck breath.

“Well, hello there,” he coos, stepping down to pet its nose. “You look like a good one, don’t you? Oop, no, those are my fingers, you can’t have those. You know, Grian, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I’m not so sure this is a cow.”

“I never said it was.”

“You said….”

“I said I’m giving you Cow. And if you check the name tag….”

COW, it’s supposed to say, but he’d been so relieved to finally find a wild herd of anything that he’d begun the taming charm before he’d remembered he needed the name tag, so he’d had to write it from the horse’s back while the blasted thing was screaming and trying to throw him off, so it looks more like a wobbly cOW. And that’s if he’s being generous.

Scar turns the name tag over in his fingers. He lets out a shaky little breath, strained like it hurts him on the way out, the echo of a laugh.

“I looked everywhere but I think the mooing ones have all been taken already,” Grian says, toeing at the ground. “Sorry.”

“I love him and I’m keeping him forever,” Scar declares, and when he beams over his shoulder at Grian it actually reaches his eyes. “You’re helping me build him a pen, right?”

“Fine, fine.”

It’s all about staying busy, see?

—

“We aren’t killing them, remember.”

“Not going to kill them.”

“When we find them we keep them alive.”

“Keeping ‘em alive.”

“I need them, Grian. Alive. With all their pieces together.”

“Mm-hmm, not taking any pieces.”

“We’re not going to drench them in batter and fry them in oil. That would be ridiculous.”

“Mhm, no batter.”

“Ooh, buttermilk’s the best for that. And you hit it with some garlic and paprika, and you dip it in honey mustard and—”

“Nope, no, bad. Bad Scar. No eating the chickens.”

Scar whines aloud, shoulders slumping. “But they’d be so tasty!” he cries.

“This was your idea,” Grian points out, not for the first time. “Eggs, remember? You want the eggs.”

“I do want the eggs. But think of the crispy wings….”

“Think of the….” Grian frowns. “Scrambled eggs. Or whatever it is you make with eggs.”

“You could put them on waffles, you know. You strike me as a waffley sort of guy.”

“Put… the eggs?”

“No— fried chicken on waffles. It’s a thing! I’ll make it for you when we find—”

“You will not, because you want the eggs more.”

“Fine,” Scar sighs. “Plain waffles for you, then. …Actually, let me know if you see any blueberries.”

“For the fried chicken?”

“No, for the waffles. Are you even listening, you silly goose?”

“I think you should make up your mind,” Grian grumbles.

“Okay, okay, blueberry waffles, and we eat the eggs instead of the chickens. Oh, unless you want huckleberry?”

“What the blazes is a huckleberry?” he asks, and Scar gasps at him like he’s been personally offended. “Okay, don’t give me that look—”

“Grian,” Scar says, clutching his chest, “please forgive me for failing you so horribly.”

“You’re actually going to drive me mad,” Grian says, and Scar smirks.

“How about lanceberries?” he asks, drifting toward a low shrub with deep green leaves and clusters of blue fruit. “Don’t tell me you’ve never had lanceberries before.”

“I’m sure I have,” Grian waves a hand, “before before. I don’t remember it.”

“Give it a try. They’re fun.” Scar drops one of the unassuming blue berries into Grian’s palm, and a few more into his own mouth.

“Fun?”

“Yeah, they’ve got some punch.”

“Punch,” Grian echoes, rolling the berry between his back teeth before steeling himself and biting down.

The punch, as it turns out, is quite literal. Grian reels back as the berry juice assaults his taste buds with a zinging shock of overwhelming something. His face screws up of its own accord, a horrified gurgle escaping him, and takes too long for him to remember how to unclench his jaw to frantically spit into the bushes.

“Bad,” he wheezes.

Scar lets out a little sound that might be a chuckle. “You should have seen your face.”

“Scar,” Grian says, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand, “every time you’ve given me something I said tasted like sick— I take it back. That tasted like sick.”

Scar pats his shoulder. “That was called sour!”

“It was called absolutely disgusting—”

“Lanceberries are a little intense, so you have to cut the tartness with sugar, like in a jam. Or you can make this nice sauce with them that goes great on game—”

“Or you can never feed that to me again—”

“—Or drizzle just a bit of the juice on fish to bring out the flavor—”

“Water, Scar.”

“All right, drama queen.” Scar hands him the canteen. “So, sour’s off the list for now—”

“Permanently.”

“If we’re keeping it simple, let’s go back to sweet. Everybody likes sweets.”

“I don’t like sweets. I don’t like food. I never want to eat food again.”

“And I think you’d like spicy, if we can find peppers anywhere. Probably near the desert…?”

“Scar,” Grian sighs, “just stop. Stop whatever you’re trying to do.”

“I’m trying to show my good friend the wonders of the culinary world!”

“And it’s not working, so stop.” The word comes out weak, frayed, and he swallows down the hot rush of emotion it pulls with it. “It’s wasting both our time.”

“Grian, Grian, Grian.” Scar’s traded his salesman voice for something gentler, drawing in close. “You and I are on a journey of discovery. Don’t you quit on me now. You’ve been doing a lot better than you think.”

“I’ve not,” Grian says. “I can barely manage a couple of mouthfuls on a good day. And if you think for a second that I’ve stopped wanting to kill you—”

“I know you do,” Scar says, rolling his eyes like he’s bored with it, and Grian bristles. “Big deal, wow, you’re so scary. Get better material.”

“It’s not funny, Scar—”

“Look, G, obviously whatever’s in charge right now is keeping you alive. I’m not actually worried that you’re going to starve to death.” Scar cups Grian’s face in his hands, squishing his cheeks briefly like this is some cute little game they’re playing. “I’m distracting you.”

Grian glares at him, this fool of a man who refuses to be afraid of him, and knows that he’s lost whatever argument they’re having when his own voice trembles. “Why bother?”

“Because it’s working. You haven’t tried to kill me one single time yet.” Scar’s hands drop to Grian’s shoulders and give him a firm shake. “We’re on the same team here,” he says. “You’re taking care of me, so let me take care of you, too.”

Grian’s taking care of him, huh. Certainly doesn’t feel like he’s been doing much of that. It was Scar who reached out to him first, Scar who kept trying no matter how many times Grian pushed him away, Scar who organizes each little outing to explore and gather resources, Scar with the plans and Scar with the warm home to come back to every night. Scar.

Grian isn’t used to being the weak link in his team.

But… Scar chose him. Out of everyone, Grian’s the one Scar seeks out every day. Grian’s the one he’s been offering those small, genuine smiles to. He could leave, but he hasn’t. He won’t.

Maybe there’s something to this distraction for both of them.

Still not meeting Scar’s eyes, Grian raises a hand to grasp his wrist. “This…. Is this helping you?”

“Yes.”

Grian draws in a deep, deep breath and lets it out very slowly.

“Tell me about spicy, then.”

The smile he gets in return that crinkles the corners of Scar’s eyes is almost worth it.

—

It’s the snail that gets him, of all things.

Not one of the other players, not Grian’s trap in the bunker, not even something thrown from the Spider’s Nest. It’s the snail, and it hits Scar before he has time to scream. He dies instantly.

What a mistake of a Wildcard. Grian should have gone with something nonlethal, something that broke a few bones or blinded instead. The Watchers are furious— he can feel the waves of it rippling through him like growls of thunder. Too soon. Too quick. They wanted more. He wanted more, too.

It’ll be— he can still turn this around, he tells the presences pounding in his skull. Revenge, they like how revenge tastes; he can give them that instead. There’s still plenty of carnage waiting to happen, here at the end of the game. And anyway, he snaps in another useless display of defiance, haven’t they had enough of hurting Scar lately?

As if he hadn’t been right there watching, too. As if he doesn’t know the taste of Scar’s suffering like a favorite song, etched incandescent in his mind. As if he hadn’t been the cause of it, so many times, with blood cooling on his skin or his own body mangled by a warden or his hands around Scar’s neck, there on the sand—

Grian thrashes awake with a sharp gasp and the phantom pain dispels instantly, leaving him staring at the ceiling in the quiet darkness of the cabin.

The lack of the usual brain-splitting migraine confirms that none of Them are actually here, Watcher or otherwise, which means the powers that be are keeping up their infuriating laissez-faire approach to… whatever it is they’re doing. Even so, Grian reaches a hand behind his back to feel around his shoulderblades and make sure—

No wings.

No eyes, either, outside the first two. No extrasensory awareness to reach out with to taste the others’ thoughts, no supernaturally powerful magic thrumming in his veins. Just this. Just him. Human.

Somehow— it’s probably the exhaustion, but somehow the reminder doesn’t make the insane hunger crash down on him like a thunderbolt the way it usually does. It still hurts, bone-deep and constant, but just below the surface, like the deep-sea shadow of one of those leviathans in the old stories lurking under a ship, ready to swallow it whole.

Grian’s not going to risk provoking the beast any further. Distraction it is.

He sits up and shrugs off the red blanket that Scar had apparently draped over him after he’d dozed off. This couch is a new addition; last time they’d fallen asleep on the floor around the fireplace while drawing up plans for an ice cellar and woken up aching in joints they hadn’t known they even had.

Scar must have gone to bed, too, then, Grian thinks, but when he pads over to the bedroom to check, he finds it as empty and silent as the rest of the house.

Outside, then? At this hour? Here’s hoping they’ve cleared all the monsters out of the forest or he’ll be hearing a creeper explode any minute now.

Grian steps into his boots and creaks open the front door to call out a soft “Scar?”

“On the roof,” comes the reply.

Oh, good, he’s still alive. Stepping onto the porch railing, Grian jumps to catch hold of the edge of the roof and pulls himself up.

From where he’s lying on the moss, hands folded behind his head, Scar gives him a little smile of acknowledgement before turning his face back to the glittering panorama above. “You know any constellations, G?”

“Just Azmantaeka. And I can pick out Trickster Crow if I look long enough,” Grian says as he stretches out beside him. “Seems like something you’d know plenty about, though.”

“Trickster Crow’s over there. That long M kind of shape? He stole the north star and he’s carrying it in his beak.”

“Hmm.”

“Kia’seiru the Wolf is chasing after him to get it back. Those two are his eyes. And if you know Azmantaeka— her sword always points south, towards Kasri the Dragon.”

“Doesn’t look like a dragon.”

“We’re using a bit of magic called imagination here.”

“Okay, okay.”

“The patch of light that you can only see out of the corner of your eye is Kasri breathing fire,” Scar continues. “And then waaay down there— you can hardly ever see it unless you’re up somewhere high, but there’s a little cluster of stars that make up Cupi the Fish. She fell in love with the moon and swims all the way around the horizon every night trying to impress her.”

“You’re making this up.”

“Am not! This is important.”

“Yeah?”

“You know, so you can find your way home, when you get lost. And it’s….” Something makes him pause, and he’s quick to shift gears. “And they’re fun. Who doesn’t love a good story?”

Aha. Something’s wrong after all.

How surreal, being able to see that so clearly with human eyes. Sensing it without the blood-bright flavor heady in his mind. Even stranger is the instinct that tugs at him to reach out and help— not because this is an ally in trouble, but because this is Scar and Scar is… Scar is his….

Well, Scar is his Scar, isn’t he?

If Grian presses right now, Scar will backpedal and insist he’s fine. He’ll talk when he’s ready.

So, Grian traces over the outline of the Wolf in the sky and waits. The moss is cool against his back, and the night is alive with the smell of damp earth and greenery. Somewhere in the darkness, a lone frog warbles on the bank of the Mystic. They stare at the stars and nothing is staring back.

“I heard one of… them,” Scar says, finally, trailing off like he regrets the words as soon as he says them. “Once.”

There’s only one them he could be talking about. “The Listeners?”

“Whichever one.”

Listeners. You don’t hear the Watchers. You only see them, with your flesh-eyes or in your mind, and when they speak it’s by carving every burning letter into your brain, kaleidoscope fractals of information scintillating and sizzling and searing in your skull. The Listeners are the same and the polar opposite all at once. Infinite invisible voices thundering through your every cell, thrumming echoes that threaten to unravel you completely. The Listeners try to be gentle. They don’t manage it.

Anyway, it’s not a distinction he thinks Scar would appreciate him explaining right now. He keeps his mouth shut.

Scar shifts beside him, frowning as he elaborates, “It was in that… in-between place. Before the last game. It— I couldn’t see it but I could feel it. It was in my head.”

“What did it say to you?”

“Nothing. It didn’t have to. Just being anywhere near it was….” Too much, he doesn’t have to say. Grian knows the feeling all too well. “I couldn’t move, or even talk. And then it reached out and touched my chest, over my heart. I don’t remember anything after that.”

“Did it hurt you?”

“Not… not really? Maybe. I don’t know.” He sighs. “I could tell it was trying not to, at least, but still… I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared.”

He sounds small, when he says that. As confused and frightened as Grian knows he used to be, before monsters ripping his mind apart became commonplace. Scar shouldn’t sound small; it isn’t natural— he should be bright and laughing and warm, far out of harm’s way and surrounded by all the people and things he loves so deeply.

Fix it, Grian’s husk of a heart screams, and he racks his brain for a normal, human thing to say. What would a friend do here? What would Scar do, if the situation was reversed?

As flounderingly awkward as a baby deer, Grian sidles closer to him until their shoulders press together. “I’m glad… you’re safe,” he tries, and if it comes out stilted and unnatural at least it’s sincere. Probably.

Strangely enough, it seems to work, and as Scar leans into him in turn a bit of his tension eases away. “Did they hurt you?” he asks softly. “The first time. When they took you away.”

“Yep.” Grian grimaces, but only because it’s after he says it that he realizes that’s not a normal thing to be nonchalant about. Pain was just normal where anything involving the Watchers was concerned. “Well— it hurt more than I could even imagine, yes, but— but it felt so good that I didn’t… notice,” he tries to explain. “It was only when they turned me back that I—”

He falters. A tremor.

Screaming, he remembers screaming, endlessly, uselessly, shredding apart by the atoms, falling and falling and falling—

“Sorry,” Scar murmurs. “I shouldn’t have asked.”

Grian shakes his head faintly, drawing in a few steadying breaths. “I think… when the Listeners did… whatever it was they did, they tried to… block it out? That bit is kind of a blur.”

The river frog starts up its little ringing song again. Across the patch of sky that shows through the trees glides the silent silhouette of an owl. Scar says, “Do you ever feel like—”, and hesitates.

Grian flicks his eyes toward him. “Feel like?”

“…Like we’re in a wildlife rehabilitation center?”

Grian blinks, opens his mouth to reply, and coughs out a strained wheezing noise that it takes him a moment to realize is laughter.

His chest aches with the sound, like the relevant muscles are atrophied from disuse. Beside him, Scar joins in with that nearly silent chuckle that makes his head tilt back and his whole body shake, and the two of them devolve into uncontrolled hilarity until they’re both curled in on themselves, clinging to one another to keep from falling off the roof altogether.

It’s been a long time since he’s laughed like this. Even longer since he’s heard Scar laugh like this.

It’s a nice feeling.

—

“You should make a hammock.”

Scar grins. “I should make a hammock. Nothing better in this or any world for lounging than a hammock.” He pops another glow berry into his mouth and shakes his head. “Can you believe we’re lounging? When’s the last time you lounged?”

“We lounge all the time, don’t we?”

“No, no, that’s resting,” Scar says, raising a finger. “Lounging is when you relax just because you can. It’s about being hendon— hedonistic.”

Grian considers pointing out that Scar’s idea of hedonism, that is, taking a much-needed break for an hour or two for a picnic in the back garden, isn’t nearly self-indulgent enough to fit the definition, but… eh, let him enjoy himself.

Scar licks a bit of luminescent golden juice off of his thumb and rolls onto his back in the grass, closing his eyes with a satisfied hum as a sunbeam spreads across his face. Grian rolls a glow berry of his own between his fingers, frowning dubiously at it. He’d tried one earlier— faintly sweet, lots of juice— and the texture had been the worst bit, that thick skin that made the juice spray when it popped between his teeth. Like a bad blister.

He presses it into his cheek when he bites down so it doesn’t take him by surprise. Nope, still horrible.

“Do you want a crown, then?” he says belatedly. “A throne made of diamonds, maybe a few servants standing beside it to fan you with big leaves?”

“Throne, yes, swap the crown for a really fancy hat, and I think there are some leaves just the right size over there.” Scar flicks his wrist lazily. “Hop to it, you know I don’t like to be kept waiting.”

“You’d make an absolutely insufferable king,” Grian says, and Scar snickers.

“I’d have the hearts of the people behind me. I’m irresistable.”

“Incorrigible, maybe.”

“And I’d give everyone a free cat. That’s an official Scar Goodtimes guarantee, you know. A cat on every doorstep.”

Mrow, says Scar’s doorstep.

Grian sits bolt upright, whipping around to where he can just see two little eyes watching him from under the porch. “What in— How did you do that?”

“Hello, princess!” Scar gushes, ignoring the question. “Is that the prettiest, sweetest kitty in the whole wide word? I think it is! Yes, you are!”

The cat slinks out from her hiding place, rubbing against the steps as she goes, approaching curiously but keeping her distance. She’s small, with clever green eyes and a greyed-out coat, like her colors had come out in the wash. Dilute tortoiseshell, Grian’s mind supplies as he holds out his hand to introduce himself.

“Hello, little one,” he coos. “Where’d you come from, hmm?”

The cat eyes him haughtily, gives his fingers a disinterested sniff, and pads away around the side of the house.

“She’s been coming by for scraps lately,” Scar says. “She’s a big softie, underneath that tough-as-nails act. But she’s grumpy, and a picky eater, and she won’t admit that she likes cuddles.” A sly little smirk winds its way across his face. “So I named her Grain.”

“Right.” Grian folds his arms. “What are you trying to say.”

“Whaaat? It’s a good name. Perfectly normal name.”

“You’re laughing now,” Grian says, “but just wait until I get a pet rabbit. I’ll name it Scare and it’ll get so startled over a leaf landing on its head that it’ll fall in the river.”

Scar yelps indignantly. “You’re mean today! That was one time!”

“I keep telling myself that none of your antics can surprise me anymore and I keep being wrong.”

“You hearing this, Grain? The disrespect!” Scar calls on his way back to the cabin, throwing up his hands. “Maybe I won’t share my kitty treats with him, huh? Maybe Grian can catch his own fish to win your favor!”

“No, come back, I want her favor! Let me have some fish.”

“I’m not a rabbit, mister! I’m at least a dog!”

“Fine, okay, you’re a dog!” Grian relents, and Scar’s faux-anger melts away in an instant. “Did you see where she went?” he adds, stepping inside.

“She’ll start scratching at the front door in a minute,” Scar says, opening the oven in the kitchen. “In the meantime, dessert’s ready, so have a seat.”

Whatever it is, Scar was working on it all morning, so Grian obeys even as his nerves clench in their usual dread at the thought of eating. “What have you got?”

“I’m calling it Remember Cake.”

Grian cranes his neck for a look over Scar’s shoulder as Scar tips something out of a little loaf pan, delicately cutting and plating two slices. “Because it reminds you of something nice?”

“No,” Scar says, “it’s because I don’t have butter, milk, sour cream, espresso powder, or vanilla bean paste, so this is gonna be a charitable four out of ten. But it will make me remember what real cake tastes like.” Despite his words, he’s smiling when he takes the first bite of Grian’s slice and sets it down in front of him.

Grian’s eyes go wide at the rich brown color. “Is this chocolate?”

“Yep,” Scar hums. “I grafted a couple of pods onto the trees by the garden, so we should have a good supply soon.”

We, he says.

But then he adds, “Got ‘em from Skizz,” and that’s a much easier surprise to address.

“You two have been talking?” Grian says. “How’s that been?”

“Really difficult,” Scar admits, forehead creasing as he lays a towel over the rest of the cake to let it cool undisturbed. “But… I really think we might be okay.”

Grian thinks of betrayal, of the Heart Foundation, of the ruined trading post, of Scar sends his regards, of you’re a monster and stay away from me and all that snapping and snarling throughout the whole last game, and lets himself be quietly, very impressed.

He sinks the tines of his fork into the cake and pulls away a little piece, watching the wisps of steam curl off of it.

Tastes like mud. Tastes… warm. “It’s good,” he says.

Scar snorts out a laugh. “Sorry, it sounded like you said it was good.”

“I mean it.” It takes him a couple of tries to swallow, and he closes his eyes for a moment to tamp down his gag reflex. “I don’t like it, but I can tell it’s good.”

“…Huh.” Scar gazes at him quizzically, then shrugs off his confusion in favor of something more lighthearted. “Highest of compliments from Grian: ‘this time it didn’t make me puke.’”

“All right, don’t get a big head about it,” Grian scoffs, toying idly with the fork in his hand. Something uncertain and vulnerable is what’s twisting his stomach now. “I think I should… try and eat more,” he says. “In general.”

“I’ve been saying that for weeks, but if you need to believe it was your idea—”

“Can you help me,” he breathes out.

“Of course. But don’t think I’m going to take it easy on you.” Raising his oven mitt like a makeshift sock puppet, Scar affects a ridiculously accented, high-pitched voice: “Oh, thank you ever so much, Scaa, you’re the best friend a man could ask for—”

“Is that your impression of me?”

“Spot on, love! Cheerio!”

The corners of Grian’s mouth tug upwards without his permission. “For goodness’ sake,” he huffs.

—

“When are we climbing the mountain?” Scar says. No preamble, as if it’s something they’ve discussed before.

Grian waits for an explanation that never comes, and then relents, “Which mountain?”

“Our mountain.”

“Do you want to climb the mountain?”

“I would love to climb the mountain.”

“Uh… then, whenever you want to climb the mountain, I guess.”

“Whenever I want?” Scar prompts with a sly smirk, and Grian frowns, searching his expression.

“…Are you saying we’re doing it today?”

“Why, Grian, what an amayzin’ idea!” says Scar, and he scoops his arms underneath Grian’s and bodily hauls him to his feet. “Just as I was thinking we could do with some of that fresh alpine air! There really is nothing quite like it. Good for the soul, I always say.”

“Sure you do.”

“Sure I do! Now come along, my fine feathered friend.”

A grey-white blanket of clouds covers the sky when the two of them set off, and the breeze is pleasantly cool. They trek through the forest for a while in search of a non-vertical slope— of course Scar hadn’t planned a route in advance— and eventually agree on a path through the foothills that avoids the most dangerous cliffs, switchbacking upward for an incline that’s still punishingly steep, but kinder than a more direct trail.

There’s a companionable silence as they walk, climbing high over the forest and quickly leaving the familiar cliffs behind in favor of tall peaks covered in older spruce trees. Late-season patches of snow still hide in the shadier areas, between the new green of sprouting grasses. A trio of mountain goats watch them from afar, beady black eyes against shaggy white fleece, and from the safety of its nest several meters up a tree trunk, a furious squirrel squeaks at them to go away.

“What do they taste like?” Grian says, nodding toward it.

“Like halfway between chicken and rabbit,” Scar says. “Not bad, but usually not worth the effort. Unless you’re interested?”

“Hmm. If you want,” Grian says. They pause atop a lichen-mottled boulder for a snack of bread and salmon jerky, stretching the soreness out of their legs.

Bread is… okay. Edible. Sometimes. The texture isn’t terrible, and the flavor isn’t oppressive and lingering the way most human food tends to be. Grian can get through a few bites without his skin crawling as long as he doesn’t think about it, then a few more if he washes each one down with a swig of water.

And Scar looks so pleased when he does. It’s the same little half-smirk that he makes when he’s won an argument or pulled off a particularly slippery con, but his eyes are warmer. It’s an expression Grian thinks he should wear more often.

The river above their waterfall leads Grian and Scar to its source: a glass-clear lake, steely grey with the reflection of the sky, tucked under the rolling hills of a glacier.

Scar whistles. “It’s like stepping into a painting.”

Grian hums his agreement, stooping to trail his fingertips in the water. “Is it everything you hoped for?”

“Dude! If we smooth that part out then people could slide down the snow and land in the lake. We could sell tickets!”

“Bit of a chilly ride, landing in a glacial lake.”

“Oh, it does wonders for the skin. Cleans out your pores.”

“Does it?”

“Sure, sure, if you make them believe it does.”

“Right. You’ll be the one to fish them out of the water again when they start to drown,” Grian says. “Maybe have everyone sign a wavier for— No. Scar, no. Put it down.”

Scar grins at him, packing a handful of snow into a rough ball. “Don’t you trust me, Grian?”

“With that look on your face? Never.”

“I’ll have you know I am the very definince of innonition— wait, no—”

“Innonition, really?”

“Denontition of— No, I got this— I’m the deftin— deftintrition—”

“That’s not even a hard word, Scar.”

The snowball catches him full in the chest, spraying slush down the collar of his shirt, and he takes off in pursuit of a wisely fleeing Scar, around the lakeshore toward the edge of the glacier. Scar leads him up the icy slope, snickering gleefully, both of them doubling over onto all fours and digging into the snow with their bare hands to keep from slipping all the way back down.

They’re gasping for breath by the time they reach a flat area of the snowpack, clumsy with exhaustion, fingers red from the cold. Scar takes Grian’s hand to pull him up to steady ground, and Grian holds onto it as he turns around to survey the view of the valley stretched out before them.

Nearly the entire land is visible from here. There’s the Mystic silvering through their forest, the oaks creeping up the foothills, the slow ripples of the wind through the plains. Little houses— proper houses, too, not walled bunkers or menacing fortifications— speckle the landscape, each with its own patch of farmland, some with animals grazing placidly in nearby pens.

Grian lets the contentment wash over him, the accomplished tiredness of a long hike settling in with the serenity of a nice view. Then he scoops up a handful of snow and shoves it down Scar’s shirt.

—

Grian knows it’ll be a bad one the second he wakes up.

The hunger has its fangs in him like a bear trap snapped shut around his chest, pouring memories into his head that aren’t his own and stoking bloodlust into a roaring flame, and the first coherent thought he has is Scar.

Scar on his icy mountaintop, hands trembling from the cold as he sutures a knife wound on his leg; Scar gasping his final breaths as Grian rips an axe out of his back; Scar slitting Cleo’s throat and Scar setting fire to the Ranchers’ house and Scar with Gem’s blood on his sword and—

“No!” Grian snarls, dropping to the floor and wrapping his arms tight around his torso, wrenching his mind back to the present. “No. No.”

Scar curled up under the Secret Keeper for shelter from the snow because the shadow people were in his house— Scar digging graves for all his friends until his hands bled—

“He’s at home,” Grian says, doubling over until his forehead presses against the ground. “He’s just down the mountain and I’m going to see him today, because he’s safe and I’m happy about that. Because he’s my friend.”

Scar coaxing Grain the cat closer with rabbit scraps, he’ll think about that instead. Beaming with delight when she lets him scratch behind her ears. Scar stretched out and dozing on the moss under his favorite tree. Scar with that cod he caught the other day, insisting that it looks just like you.

It absolutely does not, Grian had insisted right back, unimpressed.

One moment, Mr. Cod, I’m talking to Grian. Well, hello there, Grian, you’re looking extra slippery today.

Grian had splashed water at him in retaliation, and Scar had sputtered and snickered and nearly lost his grip on the fish, and the memory makes Grian breathe out a shaky little laugh of his own, unfurling just a little. Yeah. Scar will help. Scar always helps.

He gets to his feet in slow, clumsy movements, focusing only on evening out his breathing, and throws on the first outfit he finds, followed by the smaller backpack where he keeps the few odds and ends that he usually finds himself missing. His hand hovers over his sword, but he shakes himself and straps a knife to his thigh instead. Best to leave the bow behind today, too, just so he’s not… just in case.

On his way out the door, he grabs a pair of sticks, each just longer than his arm, stripped of bark and sanded down for easier handling.

He finds Scar in the garden, where he usually is the first thing after breakfast, tugging weeds away from his patch of medicinal herbs and feeding magic into the soil to coax them into blooming. “Mornin’, Grian,” he says when he catches sight of him, and moves to the chicken run to throw the weeds to his trio of hens.

Grian vaults over the garden fence and tosses one of the sticks to him. “Fancy a spar?”

No luck. A line of tension winds through Scar’s shoulders, his forehead going creased with caution. He holds the stick out in front of him like he thinks it might bite him if he moves too suddenly. “Are we playing or are you….” He chooses the word deliberately. “Restless?”

Grian shrugs. “Both.”

He won’t hurt Scar today. He won’t. He’s already made up his mind about that. But the prickling itch in his bones calls for something— some movement, some focus, something to crush between his hands or tear to pieces.

Scar looks at him in that way he does sometimes, like he’s searching for something. Part of Grian wants to ask what it is he’s seeing, when he looks at him like that. The other part hopes he never finds out.

“You can say no, Scar, it’s fine.”

Scar hesitates a moment longer before handing the stick back to Grian. “I was always better with a bow,” he says.

A gentle letdown. Grian nods, and very carefully does not think about exactly how much better Scar is with a bow.

Scar perks up, a little gleam coming back to his eye. “What if,” he begins slowly, “I throw things at you instead? And you have to hit them out of the air before they hit you?”

“What sort of things?”

“Rocks. Small ones!” he amends at Grian’s incredulous glance. “Or eggs. Eggs would be good. Snowballs, little sticks.”

“Sounds like a mess,” Grian says, despite how oddly tempting the idea of batting eggs out of the air with all his strength sounds. “Anyway, I’d want it to be something tougher. It needs to have some resistance to it for….” He realizes what he’s saying, what he means, and trails off with a faint wince.

“Like a pumpkin?” says Scar.

“Like a pumpkin. Exactly like a pumpkin, yes.”

“I would take an axe to a pumpkin any day. Or a mace. Now that would be a mess.”

“Seeds everywhere.”

“It’d make a nice splat, too.”

“And then it’d make a nice pie.”

Scar’s mouth twitches upward. “You hated my pie.”

“Yeah, I meant for you.”

He gets a little chuckle at that. Light, warm. Scar’s been doing that more lately.

Scar hands him the bag of bone meal and Grian’s about to sprinkle it over the tangle of pumpkin vines when a soft whistle floats through the trees.

“Scarface! Anyone home?”

The movement is so instinctual that Grian hardly notices when he steps smoothly in front of Scar and presses the back of his shoulder against his chest. A simultaneous warning to their visitors and a stay behind me for Scar. Up on the path near the front of the house, just visible through the greenery, Skizz pulls back on his horse’s reins, motioning for Tango to do the same, and the dark thing in the back of Grian’s head shivers with anticipation—

“It’s okay.” A light touch to Grian’s arm is all it takes for Scar to defuse the situation. “They’re friends.”

Grian exhales and forces himself to stand aside— like muzzling a misbehaving dog— while Scar heads over to his guests. Skizz dismounts as he approaches and greets him with a hearty bear hug.

Huh. That’s new.

He watches out the corner of his eye for a while as they talk, too far to hear what’s being said, just making sure that nothing… happens. Not hoping that something does, because it would be bad if it did, it would be bad if there was a fight, Grian. Scar said they’re friends.

Curiosity gets the better of him eventually, and he leaves the garden, passing through the house and out the front door to observe silently from the porch. It’s absolutely a bad idea, but… it’s just been so long since he’s seen them. Any of them.

“Grian, come say hi!” Scar waves him over, and Skizz and Tango manage not to glower. Grian obeys against his better judgement, and Scar, in an unusually perceptive show of mercy, continues the conversation instead of interjecting him into it. “No, I draw the line at racoons. I don’t trust their little hands. Sinister.”

“I once had one walk right up to me,” Skizz says. “Just out of nowhere, came right up to my foot and grabbed it—”

“Eugh!” Tango shudders.

“And then it just left. Like it was a dare from its racoon buddies. ‘Go touch that human.’ I’m still not over it.”

“See? Who does that?” Scar laments. “That’s horrifying!”

“Pretty sure that’s seven years of bad luck,” Tango says, and the three share a laugh. “Anyway, Scar, I brought you something I thought you’d like.”

Scar perks up. “More diamonds! You shouldn’t have,” he says, and Skizz barks a laugh.

“I wish,” he says as he digs through a saddle bag, pulling out a glass jar. “Impulse’s been burning through mine like there’s no tomorrow. Apparently digging holes is a good de-stresser.”

Scar takes the jar from him with wide eyes, twisting open the lid. “Is this butter?”

“Well,” Tango says, chest puffed out, “you don’t have a real cow, do you?”

“Oh, I could hug you,” Scar breathes. “Skizz, hug this man for me.”

“You heard him, Top, get over here.”

Tango grumbles a token protest, but he’s smiling when Skizz throws an arm around his shoulders and tousles his hair.

Grian doesn’t need to wonder. He’d seen it, tasted it, ever since that confrontation on Bdubs’ burning base. He knows how Tango locks up whenever Scar gets too close, how the panic constricts his throat even as he curses his own weakness and—

He digs his fingernails into his palm and wills his brain to shut up.

Scar isn’t getting close, though, not like he did with Skizz. And Skizz is keeping his hands visible, moving slowly enough that nothing comes as a surprise. That means they’ve talked about this. That means they’re trying.

Grian feels a sudden rush of pride.

He has to mentally kick himself for that one, too— too much. Not fair of him.

“Oh, that’s right—” Scar snaps his fingers— “I have something for you, too, Tango.”

“I’ll get it,” Grian says immediately, but Scar cuts off his path before he can start walking.

“Nope, you’re staying out of my kitchen, mister! We discussed this.”

They have absolutely not discussed this. Grian’s eyes flick from their guests to Scar and back again. “Scar—”

“Won’t be a moment, don’t worry,” Scar says with the little smirk that means he knows exactly what he’s doing.

“Scar—”

“Won’t be a moment!”

The door shuts behind him, and suddenly everything is painfully quiet and palpably awkward. Grian takes a preparatory breath before turning back around. The three of them resolutely refuse to meet one another’s eyes.

Friends, Scar says. They’re friends. So Grian will do this once. “How have you two been?”

Skizz and Tango both stiffen at the sound of his voice, exchanging glances, before Skizz offers a curt “Fine. Working on it.”

“Right,” Grian says. Once and never again. He’s going to let Scar have it later.

“How are you?” Tango asks, and Grian blinks at the unexpected olive branch, terse though it may be.

The intention’s clear, of course. This is for Scar, not for him.

“Working on it,” Grian echoes.

He helps.

“You two should come around more often,” he says. “He misses you. He gets….” Lonely. He gets so lonely, and I know how it tastes and I know how much it hurts him— “I mean, it’s just us out here.”

Skizz finally turns his narrowed eyes on Grian, and his tone is surprisingly civil even as he says, “I’m not talking to you yet. Don’t want to get blood all over Scar’s nice floor.”

“Hm. Fair enough.”

“I have questions,” Tango says. “Do you answer questions?”

“Whatever you need. Today or another time?”

“Next time.”

“I’ll plan on it.”

“Ooh, no casualties!” comes Scar’s voice from the door. “Nice work, everyone!”

Grian breathes a silent sigh of relief. “Scar, it doesn’t take that long to grab something from the kitchen.”

“No, it does,” Scar says, and doesn’t elaborate. “Make sure you boil the red stinger mushrooms or they’ll make you sick,” he tells Tango, but hands the rabbit-skin pouch to Skizz. “The white ones are best if you fry ‘em until they’re crunchy. They’re a good garnish.”

“Sounds tasty. I’ll let you know how it goes,” Tango says.

“You’ll come back soon, right? I’ll pick you all the mushrooms you could ever want. And we could catch frogs or, or go on a Nether raid or something.”

“Wouldn’t miss it for anything.” Tango aims a surreptitious nod at Skizz and smiles. “But that means you have to come visit us, too, you old hermit.”

“Deal!” Scar crows, practically vibrating with excitement as the two of them mount up. “Have a safe ride back!”

“See you soon!” Skizz calls, waving, and they trot away into the forest.

Grian watches Scar watch them go long enough to see his expression go all warm and sincere and hopeful, and then bumps his head against Scar’s shoulder to get his attention. “Pumpkin time, or are you planning on eating that butter straight out the jar instead?”

“Pumpkin time,” Scar says, his hand coming up to ruffle Grian’s hair, startlingly fond, “and then we’re making brownies.”

—

Maybe it shouldn’t be a surprise, when they end up there.

It’s the place where it all started, after all, and Scar did say they were heading southwest, on this excursion to find something-or-other. Grian had mostly tuned out their surroundings after the are you sure you know where you’re going and just trust me. In between the bantering and bickering, the hours of walking and talking and just existing together, he hadn’t noticed the fields give way to savannah, and the savannah grass thin out until—

He halts in his tracks at the edge of the sand.

The sight of it opens up something raw inside of him, like an old wound that hasn’t healed up right. So much loss, here. So many regrets, carried over the edge of a sheer cliff with the prayer that everyone’s suffering was finally over. So many memories.

As if he hadn’t noticed Grian stop, Scar continues walking up the sloping dune that rises in front of them, swaying a little to keep his balance as the ground shifts beneath him. It’s only when he reaches the top that he turns back and calls, “You coming, G?”

Grian doesn’t move. “Are you okay, Scar?”

“Of course, why?”

He’s getting at something— at least, he must be— and Grian can’t tell what it is. “It’s you and me and a desert,” he says. “I don’t think I need to remind you.”

Scar’s eyes are luminous against his own silhouette, focused and unblinking, and for once it feels like he’s the one with the supernatural sight, opening up Grian’s skull and tasting every thought within. Slicing him neatly open to trace exploratory fingertips along the inside of his ribs. “I’m not scared of the desert, Grian,” he says.

Grian’s breath aches in his lungs. “Why not?”

And Scar’s smile looks almost like the way it used to, before everything. A little tired, a little worn around the edges, but soft and real. “Because the desert was my home,” he says, “and I lived there with my best friend.”

A little sandstone tower on a mountaintop. A barren, windblasted excuse for a garden. Dried fish and stolen bread on the table and the two of them together, until the end. Grian can’t look away.

On top of the dune, Scar holds out his hand. “Come here, G,” he says. Come home.

Grian takes his first faltering step onto the sand.

It seeps into every little groove of his boots immediately, the way it always did. They’d given up on trying to shake it out of their clothes after the first day. It gives way beneath his feet and makes each step twice as hard. They’d gotten lots of practice, and shredded their calf muscles to ribbons until they could run on the unsteady ground. It’s hot, and unpleasant, and Grian swears he can still smell the blood and sweat and dynamite-smoke.

It’s familiar. It’s home.

(“Welcome to Monopoly Mountain!” Scar declares with a sweeping gesture at the desert sprawled before them. “Everything the light touches belongs to us!”

His ally, his partner, pulls himself up to rest his forearms on top of the sandstone cliff, panting. “I’m thinking we go with a tower,” he says. “Birch and sandstone, with oak accents. Do you want to handle the interior?”

“Deal.” Scar offers his hand to help Grian to the top of the cliff. Feels like muscle memory, the two of them side by side. Grian-and-Scar. They belong together. He may not remember how, but he knows that, soul-deep. They’ll be unstoppable.

“Better make it quick, though,” he adds. “We start digging at sunrise.”

Grian gives him that look of fond exasperation, and—)

—Reaches out to take his hand.

Scar pulls him in close, spins the both of them in a half-circle, and plops them down on the sand dune, their faces toward the sun as it begins to dip under the horizon. That’s familiar, too. Carefree in a way Scar hasn’t been in a very long time.

“I’m not thinking about dying,” Scar says, scooping up sand and letting it slip through his fingers. “That’s not what I remember when I come here. And I don’t want killing me to be what you remember when you’re here, either.”

Grian, just barely, manages not to flinch. He sinks his hands into the sand, squeezes tight around it, and lets go again. “What should I remember, then?”

“Pizza,” Scar says. “And the sandcastle. The quiet first days when we were all still friends. That little river where we used to catch crayfish.”

“I think you ate them to extinction.”

“No! I’m sure there were more upstream. Somewhere.” Scar nudges Grian’s shoulder with his own. “Your turn.”

Grian bites his lip. It’s not easy to separate the warmth of the sand from the memory of holding someone as they slowly grew colder.

Leaving aside its blood-soaked context— the failed traps that had reduced their landscape to a glass-smeared crater, the ashes of their home, the flash of lightning that meant Tim was gone, a battlefield strewn with dead dogs where they’d lost Joel and Scott, the circle of cacti— leaving aside the way it had all ended— mostly what he remembers about the desert is….

Mostly he just remembers Scar.

Scar with his wicked smirk and shining eyes. Scar with his recklessness and unpredictability, infuriating as he was endearing. Scar bringing him fresh water and gunpowder and redstone crystals that neither of them knew the first thing about using. Picking cactus spines out of Grian’s hands with little whispered apologies for the sting. Chasing rabbits like he ever stood a chance of catching them. Insisting they move the bedrolls next to each other to conserve heat the first time he saw Grian shiver. Skin darkened to tan and honey-warm streaks of sun in his hair. Smiling, always smiling.

“You stole Etho’s shoes,” Grian says at last. “And Tango’s trousers. And Joel’s sword—”

“They all made wise and informed trades to increase their reputation—”

“And you sold people bits of paper. I’m still not sure how you managed it.”

Scar grins. Stretches out his legs and leans back on his elbows so that the sun washes over his face and lights up the silvery marks slashed across his skin. “Maybe they just knew a good deal when they saw one,” he says. “Remember how cold it got that first night? You were convinced we were going to die.”

“I was convinced of that before we arrived, but that was the cherry on top. We couldn’t even light a fire because of the wind.”

“You were so mad. We stayed huddled behind that sand dune until the sun came up and then slept all morning….”

“Fantastic start. Everyone else at least had basic shelters by then.” It’s impossible to stay upset about that, though, just as it had been back then, because… “You made me that poncho. With the feathers and flowers on it. It was nice of you.”

“Ah, I almost forgot about that!” Scar laughs. “How about that time we found bees, and Scott and Jimmy helped us harvest the honey?”

“Mm. They had a nice base.”

“They had a great base.”

“We had a better view, though. Up on the mountain.”

“View of a bunch of cactus, maybe, but at least it made us tough to sneak up on. Even after dark. Everything stood out against that sand.”

“You would go outside every night to look.”

“You didn’t like the stars. You said it felt like they were watching us.”

“They were. You couldn’t see it like I could.”

Scar with his head tipped back to the heavens, making direct eye contact with Grian’s thousands and he’d never know it. The rest of Grian looking on from the doorway of the sandcastle, knowing there was nothing he could do to save him.

Scar, now, basking in the remnant sunshine without any looming inescapable doom hanging over his head, and he’s the only thing Grian can see with his two useless human eyes but when he takes Scar’s hand he still knows that this, here, the two of them, this is the way they were always meant to be. Grian-and-Scar.

And Scar….

He looks good. The sharp angles of his body have filled out, and the color’s come back to his face. The dull sea-glass haziness in his eyes has brightened to forest green, and there’s an ease to his movements, apprehension and pain replaced by relaxed contentment.

Scar’s happy. Scar’s really happy right now.

Something in Grian’s chest gives way. Something in him sloughs off a sheet of ice.

“Scar?”

“Yeah?”

“I— I’m glad—” He swallows. “I’m glad you’re safe.”

Scar’s eyes widen. “Are you?”

“Yes.” The word cuts his mouth on the way out, and no matter how Grian wrestles, the only thing he can chase it with is, “I’m sorry.”

Scar tilts his head to one side almost imperceptably. “Because you aren’t sorry?”

“I’m….” He looks down at where he’s laced their fingers together, squeezes tightly, and meets Scar’s eyes again when he squeezes back. “I’m getting there.”