These Cages We Build for Ourselves

Chapter 2

Nash

Nash stands guard in the doorway where Niko positioned him, his nose twitching as he inhales the potent mix of magic and desperation that permeates these halls. Tonight's job has brought them to a boarding house that caters to all things not-quite-vanilla-human.

The guy they're here to help, Corrin, keeps shouting about how he has unlimited power thanks to a cursed ring he somehow acquired, but he sure didn't do much while they dragged his bed away from the wall, or while Nash held him down on it while Niko drew a circle of runes around it. He can't leave the bed now, but he's still cackling while Niko draws more runes.

A door slams open across the hall, and all Nash can do is stare at the expanse of bare, tattooed skin and shiny jewellery he's confronted with. Worn cotton boxers hang precariously low on narrow hips, creating an odd juxtaposition with fingers adorned in jewelled rings and wrists draped in beaded bracelets.

Brown ink tattoos, their rough lines suggesting an amateur hand, wind their way up a lean stomach and across a flat chest. Webs and overlapping circles of runes hint at some magical purpose, but they mean nothing to Nash. What catches his eye is the way one of the circles rings the dark pink of a nipple.

A sharp sigh heaves the chest he's been staring at, jolting Nash out of his trance. His gaze snaps up to meet cold blue eyes, narrowed in annoyance and set in a face framed by wavy, chin-length pale blond hair.

Nash steels himself for a well-deserved tongue-lashing over his inappropriate ogling, but the newcomer seems to have other priorities. He shoulders past Nash to share the doorway, his attention fixed on the man Niko has contained.

"Corrin, you fuck," the guy spits, his knuckles whitening as he grips the doorframe. "I'd like to fucking get some sleep one of these days, you know. I don't need a cursed artefact and a bunch of strangers in here in the middle of the night."

It takes Nash a moment to realise that they are the strangers, and apparently this guy considers them to be an equal annoyance to the very dangerous cursed ring Corrin is currently twirling on his finger. After the leering introduction Nash just gave him, he can't really blame Aster for the sentiment.

Corrin laughs, his back arching off the bed. "They can leave. I'm fine! Better than fine, Aster. I've finally found what I've been looking for."

Aster rolls his icy eyes. "What I've always told you is still true. Power is never easy. It's never free."

"It's easy for you!" Corrin hisses back.

Nash places a hand on Aster's shoulder, not liking the rising tension in the room, but the look Aster shoots at him is so affronted that he immediately removes it.

Niko's dark blue eyes flick to them momentarily before returning to his rune work, narrowing in concentration. He still looks completely unruffled, not a single dark brown hair out of place. He always does. Well, almost always. By this point, Nash has discovered that it is possible for the perfect mask he wears to be disturbed, but it doesn't happen often.

Nash spent their first few months of living together thoroughly convinced that Niko just used magic to keep himself looking sharp, but then one day he needed to talk to him in the morning and he caught him in the middle of doing his hair. He really does just use a blow dryer and hair product.

"Yeah, it's so easy for me," Aster retorts, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "I could do anything I want, but I guess I just choose to live here and deal with everyone's drama every single fucking day."

Corrin scoffs. "I don't care anymore. I can do anything I want."

"You wouldn't still be here if that were true."