Fraul, 9

In the morning Raru got up early. He swung his legs over the edge of his cot and got his company up. His eyes kept going to Heath’s cabin on the far side of the clearing. His dreams had left him hanging again.

He ran the men through drills and sent them off for breakfast. Ashin Rolfe, nearby, was doing the same. Raru turned away and crossed the field, one hand resting on his sword. He stood in front of the door and called, “Heath?”

The door opened. The old healer was rubbing his face.

“What’s going on, boy?” he asked.

“How is he?”

“Still asleep, like I was.” Heath blocked the doorway with his body, arms folded. Raru frowned, but shaking his head he turned away.

“Oi,” the healer said, grabbing his cane. “Are you going to breakfast?” Raru paused, and Heath shut the door behind him. “Let’s go. You smell like a woman.”

Even this did not cause Raru to smile. He said shortly, “Bathed yesterday.”

Heath’s nose wrinkled. “Not a respectable thing to do,” he said.

“Neither is you living on camp grounds, sir.”

“Watch it.” Heath clocked the back of his leg with the cane. “I’m not old yet.” Raru, now smiling a little, feinted a punch back at him. Tere stopped as they crossed his path without noticing.

“Raru, Heath,” he said.

“Leonard,” they both said.

“Going to breakfast?” Raru asked, and Tere shrugged and swung his feet to align with theirs.

The two captains and Heath made a little group and entered the meal tent together. Still Raru was distracted: at every flicker of the tent flap he glanced up.

Ashin sat down beside him with a clunk. “Didn’t see you at the den last night, brother,” he said. He inclined his head to Tere and Heath, absorbed in their own side conversation.

“Went to sleep early,” said Raru through a mouthful of chicken. “How was drills?”

“Oh, fine. The grappling sets Crowe added aren’t going well and they put on about twenty minutes.”

Heath got up with an empty mug. Tere turned to Ashin and said, “Mine were awful.”

“Why’s that?” Raru asked, pausing his chewing.

“Just takes awhile to get them going,” said Tere. “They loiter around half the morning.”

Ashin turned. “You mean it’s because they’re all old-timers and you’re about twenty years old.”

Tere’s nose wrinkled. “It gets funnier every time, Ashin,” he said.

“Doesn’t he look like a boy?” Ashin asked Raru, who was staring into space again. “Raru.”

“Huh?” Raru’s eyes focused. “About fifteen.”

Ashin beamed back at Tere, who didn’t find it funny.

“So what am I supposed to do about that?” he asked. “I made captain fair and square.”

Ashin shrugged. “I was young as a lieutenant,” he said. “But I didn’t have the luxury of being the healer in the camp like you do.”

“Luxury,” scoffed Tere. “Any one of you would rather bang on Heath’s door than walk the twenty feet to the healing tent.”

“Well,” said Ashin, tactfully admitting nothing. “I say keep doing what you’re doing. They’ll recognize it collectively and take pity on you.” He went back to his porridge.

Heath slid into the bench and started to gather the food onto his tray. Tere tore a piece of chicken off the bone with his teeth and said without chewing, “How’s Fraul?”

“Sleeping, still. So not dead,” muttered Heath.

And sleep Fraul did, for another two days, grinding his teeth all the while. Raru was afraid he was going to die and refused to go into the cabin–he practically held the funeral rites himself. Heath was getting crabby from sleeping in the chair, and was about to find another cot, when Fraul gasped himself awake.

“Fuck,” he said, “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

Heath woke with a snort and cricked his neck. Fraul reached back to feel his spine and shied away from the movement, his face contorted. His fingers were swollen from dehydration.

He remembered some dream. His jaw had been clenched all night and his head ached. He was shaking and burning up. But he was too tired to stay awake, and wandered back off into unconsciousness.

Heath could not sleep with the sound of his teeth grinding. It had been two days of fever, two days without water. Heath had no books for this, no notes. He threw his hands up and muttered to himself before he sat heavily back down and stared at the floor.

In the evening when Raru came to check on them, Heath did not waste time with formalities.

“I think the river might help,” he said, making sure the bandage was tight. Frowning, Raru scooped Fraul up, put him in the chair, kicked the door open and walked out toward the river. Fraul’s head lolled.

Heath nodded. “Throw him in.”

“I’m not going to throw him in,” Raru said.

“Then go in yourself. Just get him in the water. Keep one hand on the bandage, though, try to keep it sealed up.”

Raru eyed the muddy bank, bundling Fraul in his arms. It was still frozen on the edges, wreathed in fog, and a drizzling rain started up as he stood there. Fraul was lightweight, he had never realized.

“Hypothermia is a real thing, Heath,” Raru said slowly.

“Won’t be for long. Just dunk yourselves.”

“It won’t make things worse?”

Heath’s voice came sharper than necessary. “I can’t work with the teeth-grinding, Raru. Gna-gna-gna, all night.” Heath gnashed his teeth together and went on, “But if you have a better idea, now’s the time.”

The heat emanated off Fraul in waves. Raru himself broke into a sweat in the cold night, holding the skinny man against his chest.

“All right,” he said. “All right, Heath.” He put Fraul down and took his boots off.

The first step he took into the river made his balls leap up into his body. He swore and looked at the healer. Then squaring his jaw, he waded further until the snowmelt came up to his knees. In the middle of the river, he was waist-deep and freezing.

Fraul stirred, lifting his toes out of the river’s reach. Raru dunked them both.

Fraul’s fingers locked around his arm. He clutched at Raru’s sleeve as if he would be swept downriver, and–feeling his borderline panic–Raru hugged him close and tight and dunked them again.

Shivering and trying hard to keep his balance, Raru dug his toes into the riverbed and waded back toward shore. He lowered Fraul onto the rocky ground and wrapped his arms around himself.

“Did it–work?” he asked, spitting on the ground, stuffing his fingers in his armpits. Heath clapped him on the back and muttered, “Dunno.”

Fraul looked small and bony in the moonlight, the linen shirt glowing white, and his eyes roved behind their lids. Still shaking and maybe because he was so damn cold, Raru couldn’t blink away the tears that filled his eyes. He bundled the blanket around the other man and put him in the chair, then bent to retie his boots.

At the cabin the healer struck up a fire. Raru put Fraul down beside it and wiped his nose.

“I’m going to bed,” he said. “Come wake me if you need me.” Heath sat down at his desk, hunched like a vulture, and watched him go.

Raru shivered, awake, in his cot. He got to his feet long before the blue dawn and walked out of camp.

On the army edge of town, there was a little thatched house with one room and a porch made of old ship wood. Raru cleared the stairs in one step and knocked.

He jumped violently when he saw Ashin, coffee-in-hand, in the rocking chair right next to him. The Bazairi man’s white-toothed grin shone against his skin.

Raru’s face collapsed into a smile. Ashin heaved up from the chair and beckoned him inside, finding his only other mug. His friend went to the kettle.

“Sleep?” Ashin asked softly. Raru shook his head. He was still chilled from the river. He sucked at the coffee before it cooled, then followed Ashin back onto the porch. Raru sat on the edge of it, one leg kicked out.

“I went in the river,” he said.

Ashin’s eyes moved over his wet hair, grinning a little. “I think that’s taking the ice bath to an extreme, don’t you?”

“He needed it,” said Raru, and sipped his coffee.

Ashin’s grin faded. “Would he do it for you?” he asked.

Raru put down the mug and propped his elbows on his knees.

“Brother,” he said. It was too early in the day for all this, and he hadn’t slept, and he tried not to scowl so deeply. He softened his face and picked up the mug, thinking, taking a drink. “You know I love you, right?” he asked Ashin, who took it in stride.

“Sure,” he answered. “Sure I do.”

“And not because I tell you.”

“You could stand to tell me a little more often, actually.”

Raru grinned and reached out, pushing Ashin in the knee. “Fuck off,” he said. The other man’s face looked younger, his eyes crinkled.

The amusement faded. “Yes,” Ashin said. “I know.”

“Well, I know it about him.” Raru couldn’t hold Ashin’s gaze as he went on, “But I don’t want to talk about it with him. And I don’t think he does either.”

Ashin nodded slowly, then raised a suspicious look to Raru with eyebrows lifted.

“But you know?” he pressed.

“More or less.”

“Well, fine. It’s none of my business. Just take care of yourself.”

“Sure,” Raru said, getting to his feet, reaching out a hand. “I’ll see you at drills.”

Ashin thumped his hand, and Raru walked with shoulders hunched and hands in his pockets back to Heath’s cabin. The wind whipped the snow up on either side of him, and he put his head down and pushed through it.

Fraul sat close to the fire with a blanket wrapped around him, staring listlessly into the coals. He glanced up as the door opened, and said a little, “Ah,” when he saw Raru. Heath snored on the cot.

“Hey,” muttered Raru, closing the door. “All right?”

Fraul rubbed his face and said slowly, “I think I went in the river.”

“Heath’s idea.” Raru came to sit on the dirt beside him. He pulled up his knees and hooked his elbows over them, feeling like a boy as he looked into the older man’s face. “Are you feeling better?”

“Era,” Fraul said with purpose, sounding a little drunk. Raru looked at him with earnest eyes, waiting; Fraul opened his mouth but didn’t continue. He reached out and pressed the backs of his fingers to Raru’s cheek as if feeling for fever, and then his hand retreated to his chest.

“Up!” Raru called to the company, and his voice echoed over them and released them from drills. Where the day before he had been distracted, today his focus was absolute. He wouldn’t even look at Ashin. Without seeing he knew exactly when the smoke appeared in Heath’s chimney. His bones ached from the cold of the river.

The soldiers moved around him, flowing toward the meal tent, ready to get out of the snow. Raru, standing for a moment and gazing toward Heath’s cabin, finally turned and followed them. He got a plate for himself and brought it back to his tent.

Heath slept until midmorning, and he awoke to find Fraul sitting up, staring at the embers. He had made himself coffee by clambering across the floor and with one arm emptying everything into the kettle, and now he sat with the hot steaming cup and the crackle of a woodfire.

“All right?” Heath grunted.

“Fine,” he said. He caught his reflection in the window. He looked like death. “Better,” he clarified.

“None at all?”

“Some, always some.”

Heath swung his feet onto the ground and slipped them into his woolen slippers. “Hope you made coffee for both of us,” he growled.

Fraul nodded at the kettle. His old friend shuffled across the floor and poured himself a cup. Fraul’s eyes sank doggedly into the flames.

Heath sipped his coffee, absently catching his own scent–he needed a bath. The whole house needed a good clean.

He tried not to think about it, and a flutter of wind through the cracked shutter sent his papers spiraling. The winter was thawing and the air was fresh. Heath’s eyes traveled again to Fraul, and he set the coffee mug down.

“You all right?” he asked. Fraul looked at him as if seeing him for the first time.

“I’m fine,” he said, but he did not sound it. “I’m going to the baths. The cold water helped.”

“Well, warm up afterward. Don’t overwork your body or it won’t be able to recover.”

“No, sir.” Something in Fraul’s voice was too gentle. Heath felt a prickle of intuition, some healer sense trying to tell him something, but he didn’t know what it was and he went back to his notes. Finally Fraul pulled himself into the chair. The snow was still thin, and he rolled over the wheel-tracks of the night before.

He found himself at the river. He saw Raru’s muddy, ice-encrusted footsteps, and he shivered and drew his arms around himself. He wanted to talk to Sandrine. He had received no letters from Tali–had he given her the right address? Had he put her in danger, asking her to go to the port alone?

He tucked his chin against his arms and bundled himself up. He breathed out slow, and his breath was a billowing cloud. He loved the land here. He loved the army. But he wished he could leave, could walk himself out of here, could take a walk.

Fraul cast his mind out into the snow, searching for Raru. The den? The bar?

He needed to set the younger man straight–no more going in the freezing river for him. No more doing things for him.

They had never discussed it out loud and they wouldn’t start now. Personally, Fraul had made this rule to keep Raru safe. And himself. He would tell Raru just one time, out loud, just to be sure. And then they would never speak of it again.

He turned the chair around and had a hard time making it through the powdered snow, but nevertheless he struggled onward and the pain started low and licked up his back and his sides and radiated into his shoulders. He stopped and wanted to sob out, but he sheathed his face in ice and stared at the horizon.

He wasn’t making it through the snow. He gave up and tucked the chair against the tree and folded his arms around himself, pressing his rouged face into his arms.

His dreams were merciless. When he woke the powder was thicker. He was freezing, still chilled from the night before. He had nothing but the threadbare blanket, which was still damp.

Raru was in the Bazairi den. Ezurans knew a blizzard when they saw one, and the camp was hunkering down for the day. Raru was waiting out the cold and, tossing back blackfire, was trying to give himself alcohol poisoning. Ashin, watching him take each shot, was watering them down.

Raru felt a lurch in his stomach that wasn't the alcohol. He put the stone cup down.

“Where’s Fraul?” he slurred.

“I don’t know, era,” Ashin said. “With Heath?”

Raru grunted, stood up and swayed. Ashin’s sharp gaze followed him.

“Going to the baths,” he muttered, waving his hand, swaying. “God damn freezing.” Ashin, cuddled up in the beanbag cushions, made no move to follow as Raru stumbled into the road and wrapped his cloak around him.

He wanted to see Fraul. He swaggered down the street and headed vaguely back toward Heath’s house. When he looked inside, Heath shook his head. Both looked out into the snow, and sudden terror made Raru sober as a church mouse.

“How long’s he been gone?” he demanded.

“Long time,” Heath said. “Few hours.”

“And you didn’t think to look for him?”

“He’s off doing his Dreaux thing.” Heath glared up at Raru over his book. “He can take care of himself.”

Raru slammed the door so hard the windows tinkled. His cloak whipped in the wind and he walked around aimlessly, turning circles. He saw the bathhouse, boarded up–he checked inside and saw no wheelchair tracks. Squinting at the ground, he paced and felt his teeth rattling in his head.

He found them. Almost covered by the blizzard, twin rails moving through the snow–Raru followed them to the frozen river.

He turned around and saw a strange humpbacked shadow at the base of a tree. He squinted again.

He tore off the cloak and tramped through the snow that was knee-high, took off his gloves and felt the gray face of the figure huddled around himself. He felt for a pulse and Fraul shifted and pushed him away. Raru wrapped the cloak around him, scooped him up out of the wheelchair and stomped through the blizzard, toward the bath house.

“Lieutenant Ire,” the captain lilted, “where is the map?” They had a whole company behind them. Raru dug in his pouch, and his face was empty with horror as he looked at Fraul. His captain shrugged. “No problem, no problem,” he said cheerfully. “We have been up here before.”

“Not with a whole company, sir,” said Ire, hair cropped short and beardless.

“What’s the difference?” Fraul winked. “Unless you think you can’t get us down.”

“No, sir, I can do it.” Raru steeled himself and looked around, but he couldn’t see a foot in front of his face. He was young, maybe twenty, and not used to making decisions for a hundred people. His voice faltered. “I…think we ought to camp it out.”

“What, dear?”

Raru raised his voice over the wind. “I think we should camp!”

“Perhaps you’re right.” Fraul walked back through the knee-deep snow to the men in front, Raru’s platoon. They were on a plateau, a field of glazed white. “Camp here for the night!” he called. “We rise early in the morning! Strike tents!”

Raru had already started to do so. He was weighing down the inside with his pack, and his captain came and knelt next to him. “We’ll be all right, Lieutenant,” he tittered. “We’ll make it home tomorrow.”

“How far do you think we are from home? Sir.”

“Not far, I’m sure,” Fraul lied, holding the stakes. Raru found the rope with shaking hands and numb lips. He snuck a glance at his captain, who was bent over a roll of tarp that had frozen into its position. He sighed, saw Raru watching and said, “Help me, will you?”

Together, pulling off their gloves, they unrolled the tarp and it split halfway down the middle. Fraul took the frozen poles and lashed them together, working quickly, complaining for his hands.

“The hands are the most important part, you know,” he said. “The hands are the fighting bits.”

“You could fight without a finger or two,” Raru said.

“Not where I’m from,” Fraul sniffed, pulling his gloves back on. Raru ducked his head to hide his smile and, raising his voice, he asked, “Does the desert ever snow?”

Fraul laughed. “Not a chance in hell, Raru,” he said, and Raru felt warmer.

They threw the tarp over the poles and the other men were doing the same, and then they dove inside. Both shivering, they looked each other in the face until the tent grew warm with their body heat, which was escaping from the crack in the tarp.

Fraul pulled his knees up to his chest. He had always thought his legs were skinny like twin tree branches, and he said so to his lieutenant. Drawn up like this, they looked even more gangly than usual. Raru didn’t want to say that he liked them, but he mumbled something about how these legs served Fraul well enough.

The bath house was locked. Raru broke down the door with his foot. The wind howled into the room and he used a hook of his heel to close it back. The door stayed cracked, broken now, and he didn’t care and staggered still-drunk back to the steam room.

It wasn’t warm enough. He set Fraul down against the wall and accidentally dripped water over the coals, tried to start a fire, failed, and he was near to tears when he remembered the baths. They used a cauldron there.

He went to the baths, where rows and rows of tubs sat empty. There was the great cauldron, the fire dead below it. Raru put his hand on it and it scalded him.

He took the bucket and dipped it into the cauldron, went to the baths and poured it in, back and forth, back and forth like his thoughts. When the tub was almost full he picked up Fraul and dumped him in, clothes and all.

Fraul jumped, his eyes opening, glancing around, seeing Raru. His brow creased, nose wrinkling as pins and needles filled his body. Circulation came back to his joints, and he hated it.

“Why did you…” he trailed off. Raru looked up and his old captain had his chin tucked to his chest, his eyes shut. “I was so comfortable,” he growled. He shook violently and then didn’t, shivered and then stopped. Raru watched him, hands clasped, elbows on his knees, sitting in a chair used by the attendants. He tried to keep his eyes on the stone.

Something woke him. Fraul said again, “Raru.” Captain Ire lifted his head, his neck sore, and met the lucid tawny eyes with his own. He wondered if he looked as old as Fraul did.

Raru rubbed his eyes and got to his feet, moving over to crouch by the bathtub. His stomach rumbled but there was no going outside.

“How are you?” he muttered, still waking up. He jumped at a hand on his face. His eyes opened and he followed the brown skin of Fraul’s arm to his chest, ravined with muscles and tendons. Raru made to pull away and Fraul’s hand dropped to his chest.

“Sorry,” he breathed. “I know you don’t like it.”

Raru started to mumble something, then remembered the day before. “Did you intend to die, Fraul?” he asked.

Fraul frowned. “I went looking for you.”

“Why?”

“I wanted to tell you…” Here they reached the impasse that had always been impassable. Raru filled it with his words.

“I thought you were dying. Again. Again.” He knew Fraul had not intended this but it felt like something he was doing intentionally, something which Raru was continually enduring for him.

He stood up and backed away from the tub. Fraul watched him go, frowning. With a surge of heartbroken love Raru realized that Fraul would have followed him if he could have. Since he could not cross the gap between them, Raru did, plodding back to the side of the tub, kneeling beside it.

Fraul’s fingers brushed his face and he jumped. One knuckle tapped his cheek.

“You’ve been drinking,” he said.

“No I haven’t.”

“Don’t lie. You smell.”

Raru’s voice was husky. “You’re worse than Heath,” he said. Fraul’s eyes looked like his own again. Halfway smiling, he huddled down in the water and pulled his arms around himself. Raru wandered back to the chair.