Essence of Quinn Parts 3 & 4 (MxM)

Alone in the World

Quinn nuzzled his face towards the fingers that gently stroked his cheekbone. He smiled, savouring the touch from his mate and breathing in his scent. 

He opened his eyes, meeting the dim glow of Air’s purple stare. 

“Hey,” he whispered. 

“Hey,” Quinn said, pulling him closer to his side. 

Calista stirred next to him and stone cold reality punched him in the gut as he realised where he was; curled up on the sofa with Air and Calista, eyes gritty from the tears he’d shed mere hours ago. Tears for Amaya.  

He blinked rapidly, gritting his teeth as the ache in his heart resurfaced.  

“It’s okay,” Air whispered, smoothing strands of hair from Quinn’s forehead gently. “The worst part is over with. The other seers will look after her. You know how close they are now. She’s one of them. Just as you are. If you ever need them, they’ll be there for you, too.” 

Quinn scowled, not about to voice out loud what he really thought about that. He sighed instead. 

“I know. I just... I think I want to wallow for a while.” 

Air smiled and kissed his cheek 

“There will be time for that. You need to eat, though. It’s morning.” Quinn went to protest, but Air put two fingers over his lips to quiet him. “Don’t. I know all you want to do is stew in your depression nest for a while, and you can definitely do that very soon, but there are some things you need to do first. I won't let you punish yourself for this. You can be sad all you want, we all will be, but you won’t beat yourself up over it and you certainly aren’t going to starve yourself.” Quinn wanted to protest, but Air was right. “You’re going to eat something, and then we are going to clean up that mess you made yesterday, and then you can lie down and feel sorry for yourself for a while.” 

Quinn didn’t want to do anything except curl up and be miserable right then, and he suspected Calista would most certainly join him. 

The ghuleh in question stretched next to him. 

“What? What did you do? What mess?” she said, voice still full of sleep. 

Quinn sighed, but Air answered her. 

“He trashed his room. We at least need to clean up the broken stuff and tidy it a bit.” 

It dawned on Quinn that Calista had never seen his room before. When she stayed with them, they always slept in Air’s room or in the den. Air was the only other who he was comfortable having in there. 

“It’s fine. I can do it myself. It’ll keep me busy for a while.” 

Air growled. 

“Did you even see what you did? It’ll take days to put that right on your own. With the three of us, we can sort it today and get it out of the way.” 

Calista must have realised what his issue was. He knew she’d noticed he always directed them away from his personal space. He couldn’t even give himself a reason for it. Now that he thought about it, there was no reason for her not to be in there. There was no reason any of his other pack mates shouldn’t be in there, either. It was force of habit these days, rather than the compulsion for privacy at any cost. 

He frowned and turned his face to meet Calista’s. Her eyes were still a little red from the previous night's tears. 

“It’s okay if you don’t want me to do that. I have things I can do to keep myself busy. Angelina has been meaning to sort the kitchen out for a while. Maybe I can do that for her?”