paradisalogs | The soul is healed

Entry tags:

felix harrowgate

The soul is healed

Who: Felix, his son Ryuga, and ANYBODY
What: Watching after his child
When: Today
Where: The play room at the resort
Rating: PG for kids

Years ago he might have worried what people would think if they saw him now - the people he once knew in the Mirador certainly would be laughing themselves silly - as he sat at a comically tiny set of table and chairs. Considering everything else that had happened, it was now the least of his concerns. One of them was Ashura, who he'd left in their room to rest after quite a bit of goading, while he took their fussy impossible progeny out to play. He watched with a tired but gentle smile as his son rolled a tiny plastic truck across the floor to his feet.

His son. He could never quite get over that.

Felix rolled the toy back with his foot, but Ryuga simply frowned and tossed it away, evidently unsatisfied with this.

"You don't like that one?"

Ryuga shook his head, obviously pouting.

"Well, what do you want?"

The boy only whined louder, and Felix rubbed at his temple. The boy had been much easier to entertain when he was smaller, and not quite to the age where he could articulate it effectively. But he'd have to think of something soon, before this turned into a tantrum.

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Mildmay arrives with a small girl in toe. The child looks almost nothing like Mildmay-- she is sharp-featured where he is not, spindly-- aside from the mess of red hair atop her head. It's rather knotted at the moment, Mildmay not having the fortitude necessary to hold the squirming child still while he dragged a comb through it.

When they walk in the door, she hides behind Mildmay, peeking out from behind him with wide eyes an entirely different shade of green from Mildmay's.

"Shy, Ally?"

"No." She frowns up at him.

"Then go'n play."

"I am." To prove a point, she marches triumphantly out into the playroom.

Felix had just about to get up to deal with Ryuga when Mildmay walked in. He'd seen little of his brother since they woke up here or even before that, following the rather rude awakening of finding out that Gideon had been in Paradisa for some time before he'd found out about it. His mood had thawed in the intervening weeks, if only because he couldn't be bothered to be angry at Mildmay after everything that had happened.

He raised a brow at the girl as she moved into the room, then turned to glance back at Mildmay.

"She's certainly spirited," he said, light teasing, cautiously testing the waters between them.

Ryuga largely took no notice of the girl, and flopped over onto the carpet with a low whine.

Ally moved quickly to run around the room, and claim what toys she could for herself, developing a small hoard. Mildmay rolled his eyes, and found a chair to occupy. To Felix, well... he'd take forgiveness if it was offered.

"Yeah," he said, evidently tired. "Dunno where she got it from."

"Part of it is the hubris of youth, I think, although I doubt she is all that different from yourself. I can't say I could remember truthfully how I was at his age..." Felix said, waving a demonstrative hand over at Ryuga, who was in the midst of what was likely to be a truly impressive bit of sulking in the next few minutes.

Mildmay just raises a brow. Like anyone here knows who he was at four besides himself. At four, Mildmay was mouthier.

But let's set that aside. Mildmay shrugs. "I'm guessing he's, uh, yours and...?"

"Yes," Felix confirmed, deciding the answer to that was obvious enough given the boy's set of sharply pointed ears sticking out of the mess of red hair; and similar to Gideon, Mildmay seemed hesitant to treat Ashura amicably.

"It's his third year with us." Ryuga, at three, was at an age Felix had trouble placing, given what he remembered was mostly sound and color and not much else.

"And yours...?"

Mildmay sighs. Lucky prick, getting paired with somebody you know. "Some lady I ain't never seen before. Woke up next to her, and this'n was prancing around in the room." He shrugs in the direction of Alice, currently running around in circles, arms outstretched, pretending she's... a bird? A bird. Okay.

"Anybody I know?" he asked, raising a brow idly at Mildmay, vaguely picturing the scene that might have made, especially knowing his brother's propensity for overt modesty.

Ryuga, meanwhile, grabbed a stray ball from the ball pit and tossed it vaguely in Alice's direction.

Alice grabs the ball (after it careens past her) and aims to lob it at Ryuga's head. Mildmay watches with dull resignation.

To Felix, he says, "I dunno, don't you know everybody?"

Felix smiles vaguely. "Actually, no, though perhaps not for lack of trying. It's difficult when people come and go as often as they do..."

The ball taps him on the forehead, and though not terribly hard, Ryuga has his father's sense of dramatics and bursts rather immediately into tears.

"Powers..." Felix says with a sigh, and walks over to crouch by his son, brushing his hair away from his forehead, slyly affectionate.

"Those are not for throwing at other people, Ryuga. You should know better."

Ally, meanwhile, scampers over to her father, attempting to hide behind him. Mildmay clicks his teeth and grabs her, settling her in his lap. "Don't throw shit at people."

"Why not?"

"Because I fucking told you not to."

"...Sorry."

Mildmay sighs. "'s fine. But don't do it again."

"Fiiiine." Ally starts to squirm in Mildmay's lap, but she stays put even after he's released her from his grasp. Fine, sit there. Mildmay can endure far worse than spoilt children, and they both know it.

"You're fine, stop that crying this instant," he says to the boy, sternly, and gathers him up into his arms, glancing somewhat sheepishly across at his brother.

"I think somebody needs a nap."

Mildmay snickers. And then Ally pouts and clings to his shirtfront. "Never thought we'd be having this kinda talk."

"Neither did I, considering the likelihood of me ever fathering a child back home," he said, trying not to think about that in too much depth. If he had been born into any of the noble families he might have been required to marry and such, despite his own proclivities, but there were advantages to being the lone survivor of a fictitious family line.

He adjusted his grip on Ryuga, who pillowed his head against Felix's shoulder and didn't seem ready to move immediately.

"What about you?"

"I dunno. Knew a few girls, when I was younger, who... disappeared. Always wondered if that was my fault." Mildmay shrugs. It's something he stopped dwelling on, when it became clear he'd never know. And it cleanly avoids the question of would you ever want.

Ally, for herself, is content to curl up in a ball, in her father's lap, apparently tired from earlier exertions. Mildmay decides to introduce her properly to her 'uncle' and 'cousin' later, then.

Probably not as cleanly as he might want, given that was exactly the question Felix was fishing for, though he wasn't sure why he wanted to know.

"But in the future?" he asked softly, wondering how much of that relied on the dubious nature of their mutual fates. What would happen to them once they reached Corambis was still a mystery, assuming there was any going back to their world at all. The gnawing doubt about that continued to grow, but he was not ready to heap that on his brother's head.

Mildmay shrugs. "Who'd have me? I wouldn't wanna... I mean- shit." We're a little self-obsessed, ain't we, Milly-fox? "It'd depend on too many things. Ain't something I'm looking for, though." He isn't strictly opposed, either, but it seems prideful to think it's something he'd hold out for, to assume he could pull someone in for it.

Felix would have of course wanted to tell Mildmay of his own virtues, if it wouldn't have thoroughly embarrassed them both and his brother likely would not have believed it anyway. He was certain he wasn't the only one capable of seeing Mildmay's beauty - something he had to sometimes turn a willful blind eye to - assuming of course his brother allowed anyone else close enough to do so. He's sure Mehitabel would not have enjoyed his company for so long if he was undesirable in that department.

"Well...we have this for now. There is little else here that can be counted on," he said pausing to hush Ryuga, who had started to fuss and squirm again.

Ally, meanwhile, has fallen asleep, or is doing an excellent job faking it. Mildmay won't count his blessings. "'Spose so. Can't say I mind too much. Could be the fucking blood everywhere again."

"Luckily that's only every few months," Felix answers with a wry half-smile, clearly joking. The slightly morbidity of that mostly escapes Ryuga, who is twisting around to look at Mildmay as he speaks. Felix has a brief qualm about what language the boy is picking up from his brother, though he supposes it can't be helped, and in the grand scheme of things, this will amount to but an eyeblink in the boy's life.

"Oh, good." Ugh. "Any other treats I should know about?" He gets the joke, but from some people's reactions, he's gleaned that this event is a semiregular one. There could be other repeats. He wants to be prepared.

"There are only a few things the castle does more than once. This is one..." he begins, moving to take a seat on the floor instead, being marginally less awkward than one of those chairs, and it left Ryuga a better place to settle himself, given that his arms were rapidly starting to get tired.

"It likes to celebrate certain Earth holidays - if you haven't heard of that world yet you will and in detail. Their new year is winter, in the month they call January..." a slight pause where he again contemplated the oddity of intrinsically being aware of a calendar that was not his, "...the castle makes all the liquid you consume have the same effects as alcohol for the entire day. The next month there is a romantic holiday called St. Valentines day. That one is always different, but it usually involves trying to pair people off in some manner. It's generally a good bet to not eat any sweets you might find around the castle. The last one is Christmas, at the end of the year in December. It always snows and sometimes it will bring you a gift from home. Something you wouldn't be able to wish for, normally. There are other things, but it's different each year."

He dropped his gaze to his child, having not mentioned the one part of Christmas that was consistent, though the method of it changed; the kissing. He couldn't resist the urge to keep that to himself, for reasons he'd rather not dwell on, and tells himself there was no harm in it.

Mildmay nods. "I been learning the calendar and how their numbers work and all that shit. Pain in the ass." On his lap, Ally giggles, and Mildmay rolls his eyes.

He laughs softly, mostly at Ally's reaction. "I hope you're teaching her that more than you're teaching her the art of conversation. Luckily, other than the months, everything else seems to resemble the wizards' estimation of time."

"I ain't teaching her nothin'," Mildmay says with a snort. He doesn't have anything he'd want to burden a young child with the knowledge of. "And, yeah, I noticed. Lucky you, I guess." Fucking base-ten systems.

The soul is healed

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