Fraul, 10

When Raru woke, the air was cool and his immediate thought was of the blizzard. He still heard it pounding dully at the shutters.

Fraul was asleep in the tub, his chin on his chest. Raru reached out a hand and felt the water.

He went slowly, minding his cold feet, outside to the bath house’s store of firewood. He tossed some into the fire pit below the cauldron and started it again with painstaking effort, since the wood was not fully dry. He found some kindling still unburnt in the embers.

Then he went to the bath water and fit his arms beneath Fraul’s shoulders. Fraul jerked awake and snarled, shying away from Raru’s hands.

“Sorry,” muttered Raru, retracting.

Fraul forgot to breathe; his body locked up. Raru frowned, nodding at the water. “It’s cold,” he said. “I figured you could dry off while I...figure it out.”

Fraul glanced around for the chair, did not see it. Raru said, “It’s still outside.”

The older man heaved a great sigh, and then wrinkled his nose at the water. He was cold. Raru turned and went to the closet of towels while Fraul set about getting himself out of the water. It was one thing getting from the tub to the chair; it was another getting from the tub to the ground. He managed to sit on the side of it, legs in the water; then he tucked himself in a little ball and tumbled the short distance to the ground. Raru heard him cursing and hissing as he came back to a sitting position.

“You should have let me help you,” Raru said, tossing a towel at him.

“I can do it,” Fraul snapped, and the younger man huffed.

“Yes, you can do it, we all know you can do it–but I’m here, aren’t I?”

Fraul was silent. His thoughts on the matter were too vulnerable to voice and he didn’t like the idea of asking for help anyway.

“None of this should have happened,” Raru muttered, as much to himself.

“What, the blizzard? Or me, like this?” The venom in Fraul’s voice surprised them both. He tucked the towel around himself, the heel of one hand digging into his knee. “You only say these things to appease your own guilt.”

“I have no guilt.”

“You shouldn’t,” said Fraul primly.

Raru looked away. “Well, I don’t,” he said.

Fraul was silent, and then against his better judgment he went on, “You had that look. That death look.”

Raru scowled, one hand going to his thigh, to the raised scar. He had healed and grieved at once, trying to convince the general to go after his captain. He had volunteered to do it himself, but Hill had only said, with deep lines around his mouth, You are captain now. You won’t be going anywhere.

Raru rubbed his face. He wanted a drink more than anything. He had left his flask at the den.

Instead he walked up, squatted down. His swift advance garnered no response in Fraul, who sat there with that cold pleasantness in his face and the threadbare towel atop his clothes.

“You saved me,” Raru said. “And then you left me.”

“That wasn’t what I meant to do,” Fraul said. “This is why I don’t bring it up. You brought it up.”

“Because I wish you hadn’t done it.”

“Well. I do not regret it.”

“Would you still have done it if not for me?”

“No, certainly not. I think we were winning, actually.”

Raru threw his hands up. “Well, how’s that supposed to make me feel? I caused all of this? I’m the reason you–”

“No, Raru. I suppose I can’t control how you feel. But I did it because I love you. You were my lieutenant–I was happy to do it. It felt like the right thing to do. And you keep going back to it because you think you could change all this but I wouldn’t want to change any of it.”

Raru was struck silent. In his silence, Fraul’s face cooled. He looked away, tightening the towel around his shoulders, and sat in his island of comfortable pain.