the war came with the spring - wildflowers in progress
the war came with the spring it got away from me, so you're getting it in parts. It starts with a phone call, like so many things, but there's no use in pretending that you don't have a past. A beginning, of sorts, and the end to a great many things.



“Quinn,” Josh murmured quietly, still half-asleep, sheet marked, slurring, and hard. It was early, so much so that the spill of light through the dormered windows was long and hazy, already a promise of a long spring day. Disoriented, still half-dozing, Josh was already pushing his hips against Quinn’s fingers before he realized why he’d been woken up.

“I hate you,” he said. They both smelled like smoke and stale beer from the gig the night before, unshowered, tired, boneless under the sheets. They were both disgusting. With a quiet sound, Josh slid his hands back through Quinn’s thick, greasy hair, and pulled. “Fuck you, I hate you,” he said softly, and laughed low in his throat when Quinn kissed him.

“Jesus,” he laughed, stretching so hard his back lifted off the mattress, heels slipping on the sheets. After two tries, he got his hands where he wanted them, stroking his hands drowsily over feverishly hot skin.

“Not quite,” Quinn demurred, humming softly under his breath, tone deaf drummer, all rhythm no sound. He slid his hand up the inside of Josh’s things, dragging his nails lightly. When he spoke, his lips brushed the groves on Josh’s belly and the light hair below his navel. “I wasn’t that destined prince, baby. No thank you, no.”

Josh laughed again, still in a delirious half-world between sleep and consciousness. He rubbed his face tiredly, one hand tracing through the familiar, short cropped black mop on Quinn’s head, fingers tangling effortlessly in the long hair at the nape of his neck.

“Worse ways to be woken up,” he finally decided, breathing out slowly through an open mouth. Quinn sniggered into the crease of his thigh, opening his mouth over the skinny jut of Josh’s hip bone and was still just screwing around, teasing, when Josh finally did relax and started to moan.

“Yeah, yeah,” Josh muttered like he always did, trying to lift his hips, “Quinn…oh, I…”

Which was as far as any of it got, that morning, because without a warning or apology, Riley breezed through the unopened door like something out of Ghostbusters and clapped her hands loudly, rolling her eyes grandly when she got the measure of things. Fae or not, none of them used magic often, and the incongruity of Riley, strong, unbending, real, in this lazy moment only made Josh more bewildered. Flailing a little, he almost caught Quinn in the jaw.

“Fuck,” Quinn muttered, surfacing out of the blankets. “You almost kicked me in the – Riley. What’s wrong?”

Instantly, Josh was awake. He’d heard Quinn like that twice before, twice, and both times something from beyond the fence had been coming for one of their own. He turned to pick up some boxers from the edge of the bed, his own embarrassment already forgotten.

“Nothin’, babies. Not yet, anyhow. You best be getting down to the kitchen, though. Dere’s an important call from Dante on the line. Cormac’s handlin’ it now, but sure as sunrise, he’ll be wantin’ to talk to you, too.”

“Dante?” Quinn said, his voice jumping up an octave. Josh looked up quickly, the reaction hardly lost on him. Riley nodded firmly, just once, and then she was gone again, back through the door like an apparition. In the silence that followed, Josh found himself blinking, trying to take measure of what he’d just seen, wondering if he’d ever woken up. Things changed too quickly on the farm, he said so more than once. He scratched his fingers over his newest tattoo, lyrics over the lump-bump over his ribs. Things changed quickly, and so rarely he had a chance to let himself react.

It wasn’t until he saw Quinn, naked on the edge of the bed and bone white, that he forced himself awake. He scrounged up a pair of jeans off the floor and wandered over, crouching down on the floor in front of him.

“Quinn?” he prodded softly, handing him clean shorts. He crouched down in front of him, trying to gauge the other man’s reaction through the fringe of his bangs. “What’s wrong? Who’s Dante?”

“…an old friend,” he murmured, tossing Josh a forced, fleeting smile. He looked dumbly down at the boxers, chewing his bottom lip.

When no further explanation followed, Josh arched an eyebrow, tracing his fingers up the outside of Quinn’s thighs to cradle his hips. “How old are we talking here?”

Quinn grinned humorlessly and leaned over to catch his mouth in a sweet, unexpected kiss, lips closing over Josh’s bottom lip. It was quick and innocent and the hazy spring time light was still long on the bedroom floor.

“Old enough, lover.” He stood abruptly, clapping Josh on the shoulder. “Come on, they won’t want to be kept waiting.”

*

When they made it to the kitchen not very much later, Josh was almost surprised by the scene. Or in fact, the lack of a scene. Maybe he’d expected devastation, weeping, something that lined up with Riley’s urgency and Quinn’s sudden distance. Something more dramatic, at least. As it was, Riley was putting a load in the dishwasher, the twins were curled up in the big leather arm chair, Seamus was restringing a harp, and Cormac was simply sitting on the dining room table with the old rotary phone on the table beside him, the receiver cradled against his neck.

“Yes,” he was saying as Josh and Quinn made their way in. “No. It’s fine. It’s fine. Dante, please don’t worry about it. I was doing this shit when you were a spark in your great-grandmother’s eye. Have a little faith.”

With a quick nod and a silent gesture, Riley waved them both to the dregs of the coffee from that morning and flapjacks cooling on the kitchen counter. The house was silent, save Cormac’s half of the conversation, and Josh felt strange, surreal, sitting down to blatantly listen in as Cormac’s spoke. After a length of time, enough to drink three-quarters a cup of coffee, Cormac hadn’t given more than a few yes or no responses, and what more he’d said had been in a language Josh didn’t know. At one point, he looked up from what ever point he’d been fixed on as he spoke and looked directly at Quinn. Who looked, Josh abruptly realized, ashamed of himself.

“Yeah, he’s here,” Cormac said, still starring at him. “Do you want to-?”

“I’ll take it,” Quinn said, shoving back his chair suddenly, only grabbing his mug of coffee before going to take the phone out of Cormac’s hand. “Give it here.”

“Take care, Dante,” Cormac rumbled, arching an eyebrow at Quinn. “See you soon.”

“Hey,” Quinn murmured very quietly as he got on the phone. “Dante, god, hi…” And with that, he picked up the phone, which had a very long wall line, and took the conversation outside to the porch, very firmly closing the door behind him. No one else in the room seemed surprised by this, Josh realized when he glanced around, trying not to be insulted by the very deliberate exclusion.

“They’ll be up by tomorrow,” Cormac said after a minute, hands shoved in his pocket. He was chewing his bottom lip, looking very far away. “Christ, I had no idea things had gotten so bad…”

“And ‘ow were you to know, lover?” Riley demanded, furiously tidying the kitchen, slamming cabinet doors. “You gave dis war more blood than half an army and always dey want more.”

“I started this war,” he reminded her quietly.

“Aye,” she murmured darkly. “And it was not enough for them.”

“They need our help,” Seamus said quietly, Seamus who had been a soldier in a long, hard war. “We’ve had our peace and our rest for more than a century. We never expected it would leave us alone that long.”

In the armchair, the twins pushed together like they were cold, murmuring quietly to one another. Josh had to actively make himself look away.

Bracing herself on the oven, Riley shook her head, her dark fizzing hair shining in the still early morning light.

“No, we didn’t,” she admitted, “But, gods, ‘ow we hoped.”

“I’m sorry,” Josh said, still looking at the phone cord that snaked out onto the porch, listening for any conversation he could catch. The soft, unintelligible murmur was drifting through an open window and he’d heard enough to know it wasn’t English.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, tiredly, “But what the hell is going on?”

*

“It’s a long story,” Seamus was saying, grimacing as he helped Josh lug an antique dresser down the farmhouse’s narrow stairs. There were a few people coming up tomorrow, and Riley wanted the old, cramped storeroom at the top of the stairs cleaned out and turned into a bedroom for the week. For Josh and Seamus, it meant lugging the heavy furniture they’d been storing there down the stairs and out into the barn. Quinn had gotten out of it by pleading errands not long after he got off the phone, and disappeared out of the driveway in the old VW van. That had been maybe an hour ago.

“With you guys, they all seem like long stories,” he grunted, easing backwards down the stairs. “I already know some of it, anyway. Cormac was some kind of revolutionary, right? Some big wig Seelie lord, took all the peasant fairies out of the, what’s it called, Inner City and had them set up shop this side of things?”

“More or less,” Seamus said, “Here, watch the ledge, that plank is loose. There you go, you’re fine.” He readjusted his grip on the dresser, trying not to let it slip and barrel into Josh. “Anyway. Yeah, no one had ever done that before. Mass exodus, leaving the King and the Queen short of willing subject and willing soldiers. They never saw it coming. Seelie and Unseelie have been at each other’s throats since time out of hand. It was about time someone said enough. Wasn’t really until Cormac that the thought got put back into their heads. Our heads. My head. We’d all forgotten so much. Merlin was the first traitor, but he’d left centuries before Cormac was even born, and he left alone. The man was so disgusted with everything that he just left the lot of us to our squabbling and our wars. For that, the Queen would have gladly ripped out his heart and choked it down, but he was good enough to stay two steps ahead of her for a long, long time. When she couldn’t lay hands on him, she flayed her own citizens, because someone had to die, right? It was before my time, of course, but it was said that her palace and courtyards reeked of blood and bile for nearly twenty years after Merlin went away. It’s still whispered about around fires on winter nights – the rage of the Queen for the first betrayal, the one that cut so deep.” With that, Seamus paused, concentrating on getting them past a platform on the stairs. He was quiet so long that Josh thought he’d have to prod him to continue, but when they started moving again, he sighed to himself and went on. “But…for however much she hated Merlin for that first betrayal, she’ll always curse ‘Mac twice as loud.”

“Why?” Josh said, taking a quick breather when they reached the bottom of the stairs. He rummaged a handkerchief out of his back pocket, mopping his forehead before using it to tie back his hair. “It’s not like ‘Mac tried to over throw her or anything, right?”

Seamus shrugged. “She’s proud,” he admitted. “She’s too damn proud, her greatest fault by far. He took away her mindless peasants, which is the base of any kingdom. For that alone she could have hated him, but he was a favored lord, well loved by the Court, and it’s always worse to be wronged by an friend rather than an enemy. It nearly brought down the kingdom, what Cormac did, and don’t think that because he’s alive he hasn’t been punished. She had his family killed, down to the most distant blood ties, done slowly and publicly, so that everyone would see and know what they did to traitors to the Queen’s throne.” He paused difficultly, looking at a point a few feet above Josh’s shoulder. “She killed children and pregnant women. All that for leaving, all that for what he took with him.”

“Jesus,” Josh breathed, trying to reconcile the quiet, nut-brown bassist with a leader that had lost so much.

Seamus nodded, rubbing his hand over his mouth. “Things were never the same after that, after the exodus. Not for mortals and not for the fae. It wasn’t only the Seelie that left, you see? Unseelie’s aren’t that different than us, you only need to look so far as the twins to see that. So, when Mac lead the Seelie out, the Unseelies caught the idea and made a break for the world. Made the King and the Queen come as close to an alliance as there’s ever been in the Inner City. Sure, they still pick one another off like gnats and vermin, but when they push forces out here? To look for traitors? You can bet that it was their two heads together that spun up the plan.”

“They’re still looking for traitors?” Josh asked, “Five hundred plus yeas later?”

“Man, five hundred years for them is hardly a decade,” he said, “This is still just last season’s news. The price on ‘Mac’s heads is still high enough to make a pauper into a wealthy man overnight. It’s why Marlo showed up not so long ago.”

“I thought she just came to start trouble?”

“Marlo’s always after trouble. But she’s got a special place of hate for Mac. Long time ago, word is she was in love with him.”

Josh’s mouth dropped open and he stared at Seamus, as if expecting him to laugh. “No shit.”

“I shit you not,” Seamus said sadly.

“But, she’s Unseelie, isn’t she?”

The other man shrugged, not so horrified as Josh would have expected. “She is. It’s been known to happen. Not common, but not unheard of, either. It’s just one of those things. Word is, she was happier before him, less cruel. But…he betrayed her to get the doors between the Inner City and this world open. He never speaks of it, mind you, and what I know is all third, forth hand. Although…it makes me wonder why he keeps such a soft spot for the twins…” Seamus glanced up at him suddenly hard. “Don’t go mentioning it to him, all the same.”

“I won’t,” Josh murmured. He shook his head, still reeling. “So…what does any of that have to do with what’s going on now? Why was Riley so angry this morning?”

Seamus laughed softly, obviously not out of any true mirth. “Because she’s a woman in love with a soldier. She’s fierce, a fighter, and I wouldn’t go up against Riley in a match for love nor money, but. She’s still in love with a soldier who might die before this story’s truly done. After the exodus, after the Courts had taken everything from ‘Mac but his life, he escaped here. I don’t know where they met up or how, but all of a sudden she was there with him, helping him. It wasn’t so easy as getting away from the Inner City, right? He still felt obligated to hide the ones that had come with him, and to throw the pursing forces off their tracks. And he did that for…god. Almost four hundred years. They were doing it long before Quinn and I crossed tracks with them. Something happened, though. Not long before we met, they…dropped out of the war. There were others by that point that helped shoulder the responsibility, helping and hindering as they had to, but all of a sudden Cormac and Riley were gone from the war. That was…a hundred years ago, maybe.” Seamus closed his eyes.

“Not so long ago,” he murmured. “It was the first respite for either of them. They’d both been musicians, which is how me and Quinn fell in with them, and that’s how they passed those quite years. I guess they both knew that the war was never going to leave them alone for long, but I don’t think Riley was ready for it today. Nor ever, truly.”

“What’s going to happen?” Josh asked after a pause, fingering the bevel of the dresser thoughtfully. “Who’s coming up?”

For the first time, Seamus tossed him a sincere smile. “You know, I don’t have a damn clue as to what’s going to happen, but as to who’s coming…the New York crowd. There’s a good pocket of resistance down there, and some of that gang is coming up here on business. Caspian, Dante, Jack….” He tipped his head at him. “Merlin.”

Josh whistled out through his teeth, shaking his head. It was one thing to hear the mythical figure spoken of, but to see him in the flesh? Unreal.

“So…” he added casually, looking up at the crooked line of Seamus’ nose. “Who’s Dante, anyway?”

Seamus laughed. “Puppy, that’s a question for Quinn. Now, here, grab your end, I want to finish moving all this stuff by noon.”

*

As it happened, he didn’t get a chance to ask that afternoon or that evening. Riley, though she might have been quietly angry at the intrusion on the calm they had achieved for so long, was still a hostess and a fighter. Be angry, she murmured to Josh when he asked if she was okay, but not foolish. All things come in their time.

So they were set to cleaning and polishing, making runs to the liquor and grocery stores, setting up rooms and beds where they could.

“You’ll be sleeping with Quinn,” she told Josh, handing him wood polish and a rag. “Ya spend enough of your time there as it is and I’ll be needin’ your room for Dante and ‘is hubby and their little girl.”

He wasn’t angry. He’d been intending to sleep with Quinn anyway, but the spurious order chaffed at him. “Yes ma’m,” he muttered, polishing the banister. “Right away, ma’m.”

“Don’t be a shit,” she said lightly, with a quick smile that was so much of her charm. She rat-tailed him with a damp towel and went up on tip toes to kiss his cheek. “Be easy, Joshua,” she said quietly, with a seriousness that belied her playful mood. “It is no’ easy for any of us, your bedfellow least of all.”

So, between cleaning and errands and getting what scant information out of the band as he could, it was night before they were alone. In the loft in the barn, Josh sat on the edge of the bed and watched as Quinn undressed, skinny and pale and tired in the TV’s blue, flickering light. It felt like a year since that morning and the slow burning need they’d shared. On impulse he reached out and tugged Quinn down against him, gathering him even as he pushed and muttered and tried to roll away.

“Hey,” he said, kissing Quinn’s hair line when he was lying back against his chest. On T.V., a B horror movie was just starting. “Be easy,” Josh went on, nodding his mouth against Quinn’s hair line. “Relax.”

“Tomorrow,” Quinn said softly, “Josh, I swear, I’ll explain everything tomorrow, just. Please. Not tonight.”

“In your own time,” Josh said, with more patience then he felt. He pulled the coverlet up around them and leaned back into the pillows, softly stroking Quinn’s side. Tomorrow, and the war which came with it.

Josh sighed, teeth nipping the soft curve of Quinn’s jaw, holding on to a moment of peace. All things come in their time.