The Terrible Date (Patreon)

This is a continuation / follow up of The Serpent and the Siren

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Emery studied Ian as the other man slurped up a spaghetti noodle into his mouth. Ian had asked him something a moment ago, but he could barely remember what it was. 

Was this a date? 

Ian had said that this was his treat, but he’d also implied that it was because they’d been hanging out for a while. Was this just more hanging out? Spending time together as friends? Or was it more?

The serpent-blooded man tilted his head, chewed, swallowed, then spoke.

“Emery? You good? You kind of spaced out for a moment.” 

Emery quickly nodded, and Ian squinted, then shrugged. 

“Did you hear what I asked?”

Emery flushed and shook his head, and Ian laughed good naturedly. 

“I know I’m hot, but I’m not that distracting, am I?” 

Emery’ flush went from a light pink to a rich scarlett. Ian WAS really attractive. His long dark hair, smooth ochre skin, and intense serpentine eyes combined with his tall, broad frame to make a striking appearance. 

“I asked if you could teach me some signs,” Ian said, finally relenting on the teasing. 

Emery nodded excitedly, glad that his friend was taking interest. Even if they were just friends and never became more, a surprisingly small number of people were invested in learning a new language. 

He personally thought that the mono spell was to blame. When the worst thing anyone ever experienced in verbal or written language was a slightly janky translation, there wasn’t much of a reason to invest time in one of the methods of communication that weren’t automatically translated, at least not for average people. 

Emery grabbed the pad that sat between them, and started scribbling, explaining. Most people started with the alphabet, and while that was fine, as it did come up, especially with people’s names, Emery found it better to start with some basic signs, like the knocking motion for yes, and jerking hand for no. 

The topic carried the pair throughought the night, and Ian was happy to try his best at mimicing the gestures. 

It was only as they were on their way back to campus, Ian’s confident strut forcing Emery to take twice as many steps, that disaster struck.

A man sidled out of the alleyway in front of them, and Emery felt as Ian’s aura – normally restrained as much as it was possible for him – exploded outward. Ian might not have been a combat mage, but his aura was strong, absurdly so, and its full force was enough to spark a touch of fear in Emery’ heart, even with all of his years of controlling his emotions and tempering his mind against outside influence. 

It was strong enough that any normal third gate mind shield would crack under the pressure. Strong enough that any opportunistic theif would be sent fleeing. 

But the person at the end of the alleyway didn’t so much as pause. 

“Sorry little girl,” the man called out. “That ain’t gonna work on me no more…” 

Emery initially thought that the man was talking to him. At five foot four and with the slender body and gentle curves he’d inherited from his mother, it would be far from the first time that someone had mistaken him for a woman.

Then he noticed Ian’s hands clenched in rage, his muscles twitching and trembling. 

“Which one sent you?” Ian said, and unlike the clear anger in his hands, his voice was cold. 

“It don’t matter, do it?” the man asked.

Emery blinked rapidly as he tried to figure out what was going on, then he quickly snapped together a pair of spells. 

First was a recording spell, since he didn’t want to be held liable for what might have to happen next. 

Second was his personal favorite, Analyze Magic. The world lit with colors and auras, and Emery identified an arcanist grade mind shielding potion running through the man’s energy system, and the faint leakage of third gate desolation mana from the stranger. Analyze Mana-Garden would do a lot to tell him about what exact capabilities the man had, but Emery didn’t cast it. 

It wouldn’t be nessecary. 

“I don’t know how much they promised you, but–”

“You think I do this for money?” the stranger asked, letting out a dry chuckle. “No. Aint nothing like that, girlie. The paycheck’s a bonus. But…”

His chuckle escelated to a full blown giggle as Ian stepped forwards and tried to throw a punch at the stranger, who slid aside and snapped, the spark of what would become a fireball appearing over his hand.

“Hey now girlie–”

“Shutup!” Ian roared, and the stranger started to absolutely cackle, continuing without pause.

“If you and your pretty little girlfriend just come with me, I can promise to keep it all civil like. They just want the orchards, that’s all, and they’ll let you both go. Course, you might be… damaged.”

Ian’s voice dropped to a deadly cold calm again.

“My uncle sent you to do this, didn’t he? He told you how to press my buttons, and gauged how strong my aura was.” 

The stranger’s eye twitched, and he shrugged.

“Maybe. I don’t care. Now we gonna do this the easy way or the hard way? I only get paid if you live, but I can have plenty of fun with a cor–”

Ian stepped forwards to throw anothet punch, and Emery knew that the man was going to launch the fireball. He saw the mana begin to churn. 

And stopped it. 

“Stop.”

His bloodline, his legacy, which had lain dormant for years stirred to life with a vengance. 

Power filled that word as it rang out through the alleyway. 

Ian froze mid-punch and toppled to the ground. He stopped breathing. He stopped blinking. He stopped everything, as Emery suddenly became the focus of the entire world.

The would-be attacker paused. His mana stopped responding to him. He stopped breathing, stopped thinking, stopped everything. The mental defense potion inside of him shattered like glass.

Ian wasn’t the only one with an inhuman parent. His mother was a siren, and all sirens bore legacies that allowed their words to draw attention, and allowed them to enforce their command or control over others. 

Most such legacies are limited by the person’s gate, as it carried the metaphysical weight of their mana.

A strong siren legacy might allow their words to carry more strength, perhaps punch up a gate or two. 

But there was a reason Emery had people asking him to act as a breeder to enhance their heirs. 

His legacy was not dependant on his personal strength. It operated at a minimum potency of seventh gate with a supporting title. 

He still didn’t fully understand what that meant in magical terms, but he did in practical ones. 

There were only a few dozen people in the world with the ability to resist his voice. 

Emery ran over to Ian and hauled him to his feet, then took a deep breath. He hadn’t meant to catch his friend in the effects, but he couldn’t truly control the overwhelming power of his voice. 

Still, he did his best, focusing on their attacker, tossing the recording spell over. 

“You can move now. You are going to go to the peacekeepers. When you are there, you will admit every crime you have ever committed. You will show them this recording.”

He was tempted to command their attacker to rethink his life, and to be a better person, but… He already felt gross just for speaking. It was invasive – and illegal. This was self defense, but the government would still investigate hard. 

Emery realized he’d made a mistake Ian jerked to obey the first command, walking to the Peacekeepers. Emery turned to him.

“Ian, don’t listen to my verbal commands. Ever.”

The last part was unfortunately futile. It would last, lingering in his mind, yes, but the moment Emery spoke again, if he ever was forced to, it would override it. 

But to get Ian out of his control, it worked. Ian’s eyes went as wide as saucers. 

“Primes, you can talk?”

Emery shook his head no, and Ian’s face softened. 

“You were… Radiant. Terrifying. Primes. I… you… When you spoke, it was like you were the sun, and I was nothing.”

Emery turned and fled. It was absolute cowardace, and he knew it. He should have stayed, written out an explination, and hoped that Ian would still want to be friends. 

But he couldn’t. 

There was a reason he’d fled his home country entirely. It was impossible to have a fair, balanced, equal relationship of any sort when one person just needed to speak, and they’d get what they wanted. 

It didn’t matter if they were friends, lovers, family, or enemies. Emery couldn’t have any of them, not after he opened his stupid mouth. Not when they asked about his legacy, and he told the truth, because of course he did, he didn’t want to lie. 

No. Emery was unloveable.

…

Ian stared as Emery fled from him, and wondered what exactly that had been about. 

Was Emery an Occultist in disguise? Had he been flirting with an old man?

No, that didn’t feel right. His aura had reacted to those words. 

That had been Emery’s legacy. 

But why in the pinkie toe of the lunar prime had he fled? 

Deep down, he knew. He had always been unloveable. 

Part of it was the strength of his fear aura – though, having seen Emery’s bloodline at work, the thought that his was strong was somewhat laughable now.

But then his stupid uncle had to hire a stupid kidnapper, to try and take over the family buisness. Again. At least this time they’d be able to link the kidnapper back to the uncle, especially since potions of that strength weren’t cheap.

But if having a rich family who constantly squabbled over inheriting the enriched lightning-struck orchard, and no less than four mafia-tied family members wasn’t enough to ruin his his thrice-cursed uncle had to go and taunt him. 

Ian had transitioned sometime around thirteen or fourteen, and that had been what tipped him off. Most of his other family members respected him for who he was. His parents, for all that Ian didn’t want to deal with their money or problems, had supported him.

But his uncle had never really accepted it. He’d use the right pronouns, right up until an argument broke out. Then this misgendering and dead-naming began.

Then again, it was possible someone else had hired the kidnapper and told them to misgender him to get him to think that it was his uncle.

Ian shook his head out to clear it. Thinking too much wasn’t for him. He’d tell his parents, at least a version of it, pretending that Emery’s magic had worked together with his aura to barely break through the potion. 

He didn’t think Emery would mind – he’d subtly probed the tiny man for his thoughts on the matter over the weeks they’d hung out. 

It was just terrible timing for it to come into the open when it had.

But a part of him whispered that he was lying to himself. He was unloveable, and he knew that. 

He shoved those whispers aside. He’d talk to his parents, like he’d just thought, and after the weekend, he’d talk to Emery and get this sorted out.

It was with some hope and confidence that Ian strode into his and Emery’s math class… only for Emery to not show up. 

Ian didn’t even bother staying around after that. He checked with the next class Emery would be in, but his date wasn’t there.

Ian headed to the dorms, asking after Emery, but the short man’s roommate hadn’t seen him at all over the weekend.

Ian… started to get concerned. 

He combed over campus several times, using his aura to blow away the few people who tried to stop him from going places he shouldn’t be. He looked through maintnence tunnels, in classrooms, and even in the decomissioned building that would be renovated into a service center once the construction corps got to it. 

When that got nothing, he marched up to admissions and demanded to know if Emery had dropped his classes. When he learned that no, Emery was still enrolles, Ian felt a spark of fear fade. Maybe Emery just needed more alone time, the weekend hadn’t been enough? 

Maybe.

When the week rolled by without Emery showing up for any of his classes, Ian started to search again. 

This time, he found results, spotting the group from halfway across campus with one of his rarely-used sensory spells.

Like a scene out of a bad mirror-drama, a group of larger students were pushing Emery around between them in a triangle, demanding that he talk for them. Ian recognized them a moment later – translating thermal signatures and taste to visual images was hard.

It was the same group that was in the class Ian usually sat in with Emery for, the ones who thought they could just mess with him because he was too weak to mess back.

Ian stalked towards them, moving quickly across the campus lawn, and the group continued. One of them shoved Emery to the ground, and another made a comment that Ian couldn’t make out.

He was able to make out the mocking kissing gestures, and the suggestion that they’d pay Emery for… services.

It was a juvenile insult. People in their late teens shouldn’t have felt a thing from it. They shoule have rolled their eyes and moved on.

Ian reached for another spell, Serpent’s Grace, and exploded across the lawn with all the speed he could. He was standing over Emery a moment later, blasting his aura out at full strength, and the group of idiotic bullies staggered back in fear.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Ian snapped at the group, even as they fell back. He locked eyes with each of them, then stepped forwards, concentrating his legacy’s fear aura on the idiot. 

To their credit, all of them turned and ran. Emery was getting to his feet, and before he could run away, Ian reached out and put his hands on Emery’s shoulders, and started speaking in a rush.

“Emery please let me talk I’m so sorry I didn’t know that would happen my family is terrible and I understand if you don’t want to see me again but please tell me and don’t run off you scared me half to death and–”

Ian froze as Emery made slow signs, and tried to proccess them. 

“You no angry me?” 

Then it clicked, and he stared in disbelief. 

“If you don’t hate me why did you run away?” 

Emery gestured for pen and paper, and Ian took his hands off the small man’s shoulders, then passed him some. 

Emery explained. Explained his legacy. Explained how it meant that they shouldn’t hang out. Explained how he didn’t care about Ian’s family. How he really liked Ian and had fun, but was scared Ian would hate him. How he had been treated as nothing but a resource back home. He didn’t hate Ian, he ran beacause of fear. Fear of himself. Fear that Ian would hate him. 

Ian read between the lines as well, picking up on the same threads he felt in himself.

Emery thought he didn’t deserve to be loved. 

Ian grabbed his shoulders again and did something that was either very brave, or very stupid. Probably stupid.

He leaned down and kissed Emery. Emery gasped, and Ian pulled back quickly.

“Primes, I’m sorry, I should have asked, I’m so sorry. I just… No. I don’t care. You can take control of anyone, but so what? I don’t care. You won’t. I like you. A lot. And I couldn’t think of how to say it, and I wanted to show you that you are deserving of love, and I…” 

Emery stared at Ian, and Ian felt his heartrate pick up. Then Emery kissed him back, sliding his soft, small hands around Ian’s waist and pulling him in close.

When Ian’s brain finally came back to itself, he stared down at Emery. 

“We both have problems,” he acknowledged. “But I can deal with yours. Are willing to deal with mine? My horrible family. My uncle. The fact I wasn’t born into the right form.”

He continued, listing out his flaws, until Emery pressed a finger to his lips, then very gently signed ‘yes’. 

“Then… are we… dating? Going out, at least?”

Emery nodded, lowered his finger, and kissed Ian again.