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Several weeks into traveling together, D kisses Rogier.
Rogier isn’t sure why he does it. He usually has a good instinct for this, but he didn’t see it coming at all. In fact, until that moment, Rogier thought D has been stoically enduring his presence. Half the time, Rogier was convinced that he was imposing upon D, having asked to travel together as companions until the next major crossroads.
If Rogier had to guess a scenario in which they might advance to being lovers, he might have thought it would be after the heat of battle. It’s easy enough to imagine D, riding the cresting wave of having survived in a world gone entirely wrong and turning to Rogier for physical comfort.
But it doesn’t happen like that at all.
Instead, they are sitting at their nightly campfire, and D’s stare bores into Rogier.
“Something on your mind?” Rogier asks.
And, as if chasing a whim, D says, “Would you mind if I kissed you?”
Rogier can’t help but blink in surprise. Still, he’s not a dead man, and it’s been a long, long time since he’s had the comfort of a lover. So he answers, faltering only slightly: “By all means, please go ahead.”
D smiles a little, probably noting the eagerness, but he blessedly does not comment on it. Instead, D shuffles his knees forward through the dirt until he’s directly in front of Rogier. Rogier finds himself kneeling up to meet him.
Then they are kissing, quietly and softly. It is only after a long moment that D’s tongue flicks against his mouth, and Rogier allows him to deepen the kiss.
D does with enthusiasm. His hands find their way to Rogier’s waist, and Rogier feels held as D explores him desperately. Rogier shivers under D’s attention, sensitive to every touch.
Eventually, D pulls away with a sharp nip to Rogier’s bottom lip, and Rogier is left breathless.
“Would you mind if I had you?”
“By the gods, D, is that how you proposition a man?”
But D keeps looking at him, staunch and unwavering. Rogier could not hope to resist. In answer, he presses his entire front to D, leather and cloth giving against D’s unforgiving armor.
“Rogier,” D prompts.
“Yes, you insufferable man. You may have me,” Rogier agrees.
D smiles, a rare expression that will become only more rare in days to come. He begins to strip off his armor, methodically.
Rogier laughs as the first piece of metal clanks as it comes off. It looks like an ordeal compared to his own garments. And there is always the possibility of danger approaching them in the dark—there is always danger in their crooked world.
“What?” D asks, still removing piece after endless piece of armor.
“Oh, I’m only amusing myself. Tell me, D, have you had many lovers?”
Now bared to the waist, D grimaces. “A few.”
Rogier takes that to mean ‘not many.’ He asks, “What would you guess of me? Would you prefer if I’m experienced or an ingénue?”
“I prefer you as you are,” D says, simply, and begins to work on undoing Rogier’s trousers.
Rogier takes the hint. The time for speaking has passed, and so he uses his mouth to kiss D again instead.
A few days later, with each night seeing D invite himself oh-so-politely to Rogier’s bedroll, he tells Rogier:
“I have not told you yet of my purpose. I am heading to Liurnia to meet with my brother.”
Rogier cannot help but be intrigued. D seems committed to mystery, saying little about himself or his past. He says, “You never mentioned a brother.”
“We are twins.”
“Twins. How auspicious for your parents,” Rogier says. “I imagine they were thrilled with a set of strapping young boys—a matched set.”
D frowns, the lines in his brow deepening. But he says nothing.
Rogier thinks he might understand D’s reaction once he meets his brother.
They meet at an apparently preset position and day. Liurnia is sunny and warm, the afternoon breeze not unwelcome. D says the brother will appear at sunset, and he does. D spots the figure walking near a tree line before Rogier and strides over to embrace him. Rogier allows them some distance for the reunion. They speak in low tones for a moment before D gestures to Rogier and leads his brother over.
D’s brother offers his hand, and his smile is so much sharper than D’s. “Hello. You may call me D.”
Rogier looks to his D for confirmation, feeling uncertain.
D huffs. It is his brother who answers first, though. He says, “Or, if Darian here has already claimed the name, you may call me Devin so as not to confuse yourself.” He smiles that sharp smile again. “So Darian says you’re traveling together.”
Rogier shakes his proffered hand, unease gripping his belly.
Other than the shaking of their previous companionable balance, there seems to have been little reason to worry for a while.
Rogier and D no longer share bedrolls at night, but that is not surprising given that there is no privacy with a traveling party of three. Rogier finds himself missing the closeness though and tries not to resent Devin for its loss. He’s done nothing, but there is something about Devin that chills Rogier.
The twins are very different. Perhaps it is only that. Devin is prickly where D is stoic and reserved, but not enough to find issue with the man. He forgets to invite Rogier into conversation with his brother, but again, they must be accustomed to traveling alone together.
But each conversation alone with Devin leaves Rogier unsettled.
On one occasion, when Devin and Rogier are left alone while D scavenges for firewood, Devin says, “Darian and I are the same person, you know. Essentially.”
“Excuse me?” Rogier asks.
“We are mirrored—and we have been since birth. Different minds but the same soul. Did he not tell you?”
Rogier almost answers by reflex that D barely mentioned to him that he had a brother, but he holds his tongue.
It’s a few nights later that D and Rogier finally are alone, Devin on a day-long journey to meet with a friend who he hopes has some information.
D sidles up to him in camp, as if they hadn’t spent the last days with Devin firmly wedged between them.
“So you remember who I am now?” Rogier asks. He immediately knows he’s being unfair. D and his brother had been long separated—and there are the considerations of group travel—but he can’t seem to help himself. He feels like they’ve barely spoken since Devin joined them.
D looks taken aback. “Did I do something to insult you?”
“No,” Rogier admits. He pushes the thought of Devin aside forcibly. Instead, he moves forward so that D allows himself to be pressed into the soft grass, Rogier straddling his hips. “I am too much in my mind lately, maybe.”
“Can I help with that?” D says, as suggestive as he gets.
“I’m hoping you will,” Rogier says and grinds back pointedly.
The brothers argue with some frequency. If they share a soul, it is not something that would be obvious to most onlookers.
“The answer is at the Erdtree, Darian. Don’t look away simply because you don’t want to see the answer before you.”
D sighs, “The Golden Order gives us cause and reason, we need not go searching further for answers.”
“I want to see it with my own eyes,” Devin says, shrugging.
“But why?” D asks, irritation seeping into his voice. “Travel with me. Be content to find your place in the Order.”
“Travel with you, you say?” Devin scowls. “And your friend? Will you be so happy to share your time with him with me?”
“I don’t know what you mean by that,” D says, stiffly.
“You do.”
Rogier decides that is his moment to excuse himself from camp. If Devin does not leave, he will.
The next morning finds Devin gone. Of all things, he leaves Rogier—rather than D—a letter.
It is simple, just a few lines:
Take care of Darian for me. I seek the Erdtree. And remember that even if a reflection seems far away, it is closer than it appears.
With growing distance between them, Rogier tries to wish him well; he fails.
D has always been a quiet man, but after Devin departs, he’s nearly always silent. He follows Rogier more like a shadow than a man, only coming to life to dispatch Those Who Live in Death. In battle, he’s always beautiful and animated.
“Tell me about your brother, D,” Rogier says one evening.
“You’ve met him.”
“Yes, but that’s not the same, is it?”
D seems to mull that over, sucking in one cheek as he thinks. “Devin and I, we have always been very close, as twins often are. From birth, they said we were cursed.”
“Why would they say such a thing?” Rogier asks, hoping it isn’t clear that he already has some knowledge.
“We share a soul. The Golden Order gave us shelter despite the fact but… You once said our parents would have been pleased. They were not.”
Rogier cannot help how his heart reaches for D’s. He looks so small, so vulnerable in sharing this. It is easy to imagine him as a child, not understanding why he has been marked different from all others except his brother. He slides closer so he can press his shoulder to D’s.
“If they had any sense, they would have been.”
D bumps against him companionably. He doesn’t seem disposed to say anything further.
Rogier turns to him, feeling all of a sudden how tenuous their tie together really is. So easily disrupted by fate or a brother.
He asks, “We’ve shared many nights together. But not this: would you mind if I had you?”
D looks at him. His eyes open wide with shock and, perhaps, hunger.
“Yes,” he agrees, quiet and somber.
Rogier spends a great deal of time lavishing attention on D that night. He strips D’s armor with sure hands and touches every revealed muscle reverently. Though he tries to think of only D—not Devin—that reflection hovers closely, smug in its inescapable presence.