Chapter Text
one.
Here’s the downside of recovering from magical branding in the middle of winter:
It’s fucking boring.
The problem is simple; you can’t wear clothes yet. It takes a week before you can stand to put anything against your red-pink skin, and then all you can manage is the softest linen shirt Jake has in his closet. The ornate lines of the brand protest and sting at the light pressure, but it’s bearable.
Sometimes it even feels kind of satisfying, but you don’t tell Jake that, just curl your hand around the back of your neck and press down into the aching.
But the point is, it’s a long period in which you’re consigned to some level of nudity in the middle of winter. You’re lucky that the house is so warm that it’s not uncomfortable to stand around in jeans and your skin, but it’s tedious regardless.
“Don’t you have magic,” you ask Jake, “to make this heal faster?”
Jake gives you a full lipped pout, and you’re damn sure he knows what a good look that is for him. It makes you subside, frowning down at your omelette.
The next day, Jake helps you slide into the shirt, his hands careful, his lips pressing against the lines along the back of your neck. It’s just enough to sting, and you know he’s got your number. Your weird goddamn masochistic number.
“Button up, buttercup,” Jake says, stepping away before you can catch him. “We’re going out.”
“Out,” you repeat. “Are we… somewhere else? Not Dublin? Somewhere above forty degrees?”
“I enjoy the heat, but that would be sweltering!”
“Fahrenheit.”
“Oh.” He pauses, glancing back at you. “And no, no. I’m trying to be frugal with my arcane expenditures ‘til you’re all tuned up and recuperated. When I said out, I meant through the other door.”
That changes the landscape quite a bit.
The one and only time you ventured out the kitchen door, you’d found another fucking world sitting on the other side. Wide open haunting space with a lush garden and a cemetery of tombstone trees all around, a thick wood with no undergrowth. Jake just calls it Summer, and you can hear the conspicuous capitalization in his voice as he says it. Faerie lands.
“If you’re going to stay with me,” Jake says, sounding almost resigned, “then you should be comfortable with it.”
“What, lest I fall through the goddamn looking glass?”
He hums and at the door, nudges the curtain over the window aside to check outside. “The looking glass was a dream. As was Oz and Neverland. This is something a bit more ravenous, I’m afraid.”
“You know, I was feeling nervous about headin’ out into the Neverwhere, but that right there just turned me around.”
“Oh, stuff a sock in it, Strider, c’mon.”
You follow him through the kitchen door to the outside. It’s precisely like you remember. Even the light seems the same, that faint glow of the air like a candlelight through smoky glass. Glowing motes drift lazily around you, tiny but so prevalent you can’t avoid breathing them in, exhaling them in a swirl that disturbs their kin.
While you linger in the doorway, Jake stomps across the overgrown garden to the fence, putting his hand on the white picket to look out into the unnatural woods beyond.
“Anything?” you ask.
“Oh, plenty of things,” he answers vaguely. “Nothing with enough gristle to dare come close, though, don’t you worry.”
You cautiously step down to the stone path. The blackberry bushes are so full, they’re leaning solidly in your way. “Cool. So, what’s the deal with this?”
Jake’s attention is already diverted. He breaks off the path, taking a huge swung-hip step over the roses-- “Ow, ow,”-- to gingerly pick his way to the far corner. There, he kneels down to run a hand over the candy orange shell of a pumpkin, thoroughly distracted.
In that case, you decide to take a look around. The blackberries look incredible and you kind of want to try some, but know it might be a bad idea. Or maybe not? They belong to Jake, and so do you, ergo... You're not sure how all these rules work yet.
Tucking your hands in your pockets like a child in an expensive store, you amble down the path to the gate. It’s just tall enough to lean across. You peer out, squinting at the mirage-like surroundings, wondering what the hell could be out there.
There’s larger drifting lights. Wisps of cool yellow light. You reach out for one, wanting to see if its tangible. It floats a bit out of reach, and you go for the gate latch.
The gate is just barely unseated when Jake says, “No, absolutely not, Dirk Strider, stay put.”
You freeze all at once. Or, it’s not accurate to say you do anything. You are frozen, acted upon, and you are stopped.
Jake returns to your side and puts a hand on your elbow, drawing you back. You go, and the gate slides back into place.
“Dude,” you breathe.
His hand pats your hip briskly, and you feel the reins of your body placed back into your grasp. You shudder all over, one full body shake, and look at him.
“No wandering off. Believe me, Dirk, there is nothing in Summer that is meant for you, and anything that’s putting on airs to suggest otherwise is a lousy trap.”
You arch your eyebrows. “You’re from Summer.”
Jake’s lips press together. “I can’t speak to lie, old boy. Don’t be difficult.”
Makes sense. You look back out at woods. Jake’s hold on your arm and hip tightens, drawing you back to lean against him.
His lips touch the shell of your ear as he leans up to whisper to you: “Dirk Strider, you will never cross that gate without me. You’ll stay close, where I can keep you safe. You will never invite anything in or open the gate for a stranger.”
The branding tingles, building heat with every syllable from Jake’s mouth, and you shut your eyes against the slowly kindling fire. It feels like something being burned into the scars, the commands settling into the hooks and curled knotwork tied around you. You swallow and nod.
“You should really take better care of the fucking garden though,” you say.
The tension pops as Jake snorts, dropping back on his heels. “Never had cause to, but you’re likely right.” His hand slips from your elbow to your wrist, fingers closing and tugging. “I’ve got some mini watermelons and springs of mint and an idea you might like involving this bottle of rum I’ve kept in the fridge."
The rest of your day is spent daydrinking, shirtless with healing balm spread over your brand. For the first time since you arrived in Jake's little narrow house, the curtains in the kitchen are pulled open, letting Summer outside infuse the day with yellow light.