The hall leading to the Vacker kids’ rooms was quiet. And it was this very quiet that made the sniffles from the room with the door ajar noticeable.
Fitz’s room.Exactly where she had been heading.
She paused outside of it, listening to make sure her ears weren’t playing tricks on her. But sure enough- there was another, forcefully quiet sniffle.
Marella was nothing if not nosy.
She peered through the crack between the door and its frame, into the dark room beyond. If she squinted, she could make out a person-shaped lump on the giant bed in the middle of the room.
It’s not your business. She chided herself. Nevertheless, her feet did not budge, seemingly cemented to the floor outside of his room.
Fitz and she were practically best friends now… right? They had shared tearful confessions and awkward hugs, and she flirted with him ruthlessly.
So why then- did this feel like some big secret she wasn’t supposed to be privy to?
The sniffles stopped for a long moment, and she strained her ears to listen for more. Maybe he was sick? Biana hadn’t mentioned anything about a cold… right? She should leave-
A deep shuddering breath sounded, followed by a muffled sob.
“Nope.” Marella whispered to herself, “Guess I’m making myself privy.” She pushed the door open. “Fitz?” She said, knocking her fist against the door. Another shuddering breath, followed by the ruffle of blankets… and then silence. “Can I come in?” She asked, knowing full well he’d heard her. She pushed the door open a bit further, a beam of light pushing into the room, falling over the bed. Beside the person-lump was a gigantic pile of laundry heaped onto the bed next to it.
“I know you aren’t sleeping, Fitz. I heard you.” The blankets ruffled again. “I’m coming in. I’ll leave if you tell me to, okay?”
She received no response. Maybe her ears were playing tricks on her. Maybe she was, indeed, talking to a sleeping Fitz. Finally, she reached the bed- on the side where he was laying. Sure enough, there were his pretty teal eyes peering out at her over the blanket. Shimmering with moisture.
“Hey,” she whispered softly, taking in the red rings around his eyes, his hair which stuck up at odds and ends, and the way the blankets were trembling.
“Hey.” His voice was thick and muffled. The most absurd desire to run her fingers through his hair came over her, and she had to consciously stop her hand from moving.
“Can I sit? Or do you want me to leave?”
“Sit.”
“Okay.” Marella did, sitting beside where he laid, one leg dangling off the side of the bed. “Just want company, or do you want to talk?” She asked, reaching up to run her hand over where she knew his arm was under the blankets. He moved then, hand appearing from under the blanket and grabbing hers. She jumped, “jeez- you’re freezing! Are you sick?”
He shook his head and tried to retract his hand, mumbling, “Sorry.”
Marella held on, twisting her fingers through his. “No, it’s okay. I can actually help with that.” All elves could regulate their body temperatures. But not quite like pyrokinetics and cryokinetics. She pressed warmth into his palms, feeling his fingers practically thaw between hers. He breathed a deep sigh of relief.
His head was inching closer to where she sat. She could see the residue of salty tears still on his cheeks. This time, she didn’t stop herself from reaching out to thread her fingers through his feather soft hair. Where her wrist brushed his temple, she found his skin clammy and cold.
He practically melted into her hand as she continued drawing patterns on his scalp.Fitz was a tactile person, she knew, but this was making it beyond apparent.
“So…” she began when his breathing evened out. “What’s got you so upset?”
“S’upid.” Fitz mumbled.
“I doubt it.” She said as she trailed her hand down his face, easing the hair behind his ear, thumb softly brushing along his jaw. His chin wobbled, and she watched him bite his lip as more tears spilled from his eyes. He shook his head, teal eyes pleading. “Okay, you don’t have to tell me.” Seeing more tears, she felt emboldened. “But at least let me hold you, okay?”
He nodded jerkily. She unlaced their fingers, pulling the blanket around him open, to find his whole body shivering. Quickly, she kicked off her boots and slipped under the covers beside him. Before she could doubt herself, she wrapped her arms around his waist, pulling him into her. He went easily, limp and shaky.
He sniffed again, and she found her hands trailing up his spine, drawing soft patterns through the fabric of his shirt. She focused the rest of her mind on heating her entire body.
Fitz pressed his cold nose to the column of her throat. And Marella forgot to breathe, her hands moving of their own accord, working their way under the back of his T-shirt. The feeling of his skin against her palms made her whole body warmer.
“This okay?” She whispered when he stiffened.
He nodded into her neck, his breath and lips brushing the small space there. She pressed him impossibly closer to her, fingers mapping the wide expanse of his back under his shirt. She felt his heart thrum against her chest.
“Just stay here- with me, please.” He murmured.
“I’m not going anywhere.” She considered tacking on a silly joke like ‘Dollface’ or ‘Is this better or worse than the dreams you normally have of me?’- but some moments, she decided, deserved to just be tender, without her stupid desire to alleviate seriousness with humor. Some moments just needed to be held, and sometimes- it was better that way. She continued her ministrations along his shoulder blades.
Minutes passed. He wasn’t crying loudly, and the only reason she knew he still was came from the dampness against her collarbone.
“Sometimes–” Fitz cleared his throat, voice coming out stuffy. “I look for him. Ever since Keefe and Sophie let him go, I have. Sophie said last time she saw him he looked… really sick, from the hive, when I–” Fitz’s voice cracked, and Marella met it with steadying breaths and drawing small circles on his back with her fingers. “He’s my brother, Marella. His mind is so familiar, and I can reach it no matter where I am. He blocks me, of course, so I can’t ever know where he really is–but I know it’s him. I can feel the walls he puts up. I used to practice breaking those walls when I first manifested. I know him.”
Marella had never heard Fitz talk about Alvar in sadness. She’d heard his anger. Everyone had. She’d seen him red-faced and conflicted, but never in this withering, quiet grief. This quiet grief which had probably always been there, underlying all of it.
“Marella…” Fitz’s voice held a note she didn’t recognize, like he was not only preparing himself for his next words, but her as well. “Marella, I can’t find him anymore.”
She blinked. “You… what?”
“When I reach for him–there’s nothing. It’s empty. The thread that I’ve followed since I was little to get to him… it’s just gone.” Fitz’s breaths were coming out short and stifled, his chest stuttering against Marella’s rapidly. Instinctually, she guided him into a sitting position, keeping one hand on his lower back, the other pressed against his rapidly beating heart. Her mother used to have these; flashes of such strong panic that she’d forget to breathe. “God, Marella,” he needed to breathe. “It feels like–feels like–God, it feels like I lost a limb.”
“Fitz, hey, I need- you need to calm down. Come on, breathe with me.” His eyes looked wild, welling with tears and grief and panic.
“Can’t- I’m tryi- Can’t-” His hand came up around hers, pressed against his chest. His heart rate thrummed under her fingertips.
“Breathe with me, Fitz,” she repeated, taking exaggerated breaths as an example, in for four, out for five.
“He’s dead, Marella. My brother is d-ead, and I killed him–” His face crumpled, and Marella’s heart squeezed painfully.
“You didn’t-” She protested.
“He got sick because of me, because I- in the hive.” His breathing was slowing, like the shock of the words he was saying were literally slowing his brain down.
Marella didn’t know what to say, or what to do to make this better, but a deep unrest was settling in her chest at his words. What if Fitz Vacker broke from guilt right then and there? What would she do? Would Sophie be able to pull him back?
“What am I going to tell my family? I can’t just–should I tell them? They’re going to know it’s because of me.” He looked at her now, eyes full of guilt and pleading. “I didn’t know it was going to kill him- I mean, I did–but at that moment, I was just so scared that he was going to hurt someone else and I just wanted him to stop. I wanted it all to stop.”
Marella hadn’t been there when Fitz had locked Alvar in the troll hive cubby. But-
“Biana was there too.” She reminded him meaningfully.
“That’s different. She’s younger than me. I would never have asked her to make that decision.”
“I suppose you would see it that way.” Marella’s head was spinning with revelation. Fitz looked confused. “Is that why… you fight so hard against Alvar? Because you know she can’t?”
“Because I know she shouldn’t.” Fitz ran a shaky hand through his hair, and Marella tracked it with her eyes. “I don’t want it to weigh on her all her life. I don’t want her to have to make the hard decisions. She’s smart, and she’d probably do it better than me–but it–all of this weight? I can’t let that touch her.” He shook his head. “I feel that way about all of you guys. Sophie, Keefe… you. You’re all so capable, and smart, and I know that- it’s just hard to let people do things that might hurt them. Especially when I'm older. It just doesn't seem fair to any of you.”
Marella chuckled, hoping to bring some lightness. “And here I thought they were just control issues, not deep-seated empathy.”
“It’s both, I think.” Fitz shook his head, a small smile gracing his features before it fell away completely. His eyes widened in shock, and his hand tightened around hers- he made a sound in the back of his throat that had Marella sitting up taller, panic arcing through her.
“What-? Fitz? Are you all right?”
He looked away from her, exhaling sharply. “I just- it knocked the air right out of my lungs- I forgot for a minute- can you believe that? I forgot my brother was dead.”
Marella frowned, the bluntness of the words like a gut punch. She didn't let her face betray her own shock at the situation. The last thing Fitz needed was for her to get panicky. “I think that’s normal.” She said.
Grief was such a strange occurrence in the lost cities. Loss, unheard of. But she had understood it at a young age, when she watched the last of her mother wither away into distant memory. But grief didn’t happen to the Vackers. And yet, here she was, holding its evidence in her arms. “When did you… realize… he was gone?” She asked tentatively.
Fitz blew out a breath. “Last night. I haven’t gotten out of bed since.”
Something tightened in Marella’s gut. “No one came to check on you?”
“Biana’s out. My parents don’t… come up here very much anymore. Alvar’s old room is across the hall. And well, I haven’t exactly been nice to them.” He bit his trembling lip, and Marella reached up to cup his cheek. She lowered his face to hers, pressing their foreheads together.
“I’m here. We'll figure this out.” She whispered, “and I’ll stay as long as you need me.”
And she did.
She stayed with him in silence. Made his bed after convincing him to shower, crept into the kitchen and brought up two cups of tea and snacks, even though he was void of appetite. She listened as he debated the ways he was going to tell his family, held him when his eyes welled with tears and he forgot to breathe. Marella stayed, and she let his mind melt into hers. A blanket, a softness and reassurance that she was still there, even as he drifted into sleep.
