I've returned from the past

Chapter 36

Orion was, rightfully, reeling. In fact he's pretty sure he's been hexed and jinxed beyond oblivion and this was some very strange dream he was staggering through. He'd punched his brother, his brother hadn't retaliated and had even shouted at Riddle.

Yes, a very, very strange dream.

Of course, the dream didn't stop and the reality got sharper and sharper until it twisted metal rods into his head and threatened to spill out his eyes with shards of glass.

He's pretty sure he's burst an eardrum because the words people are saying as they walk through the house wash over him but he doesn't really hear them.

Instead, he hasn't moved from the stables and he looks at the two horses.

They were so similar to the horses they'd had when they were younger. Not entirely the same. They were larger, softer. Normal. His mother hadn't gone through great magical breeds and breeders and spent a weekend bidding at an auction for them but the sentiment was still there.

He stroked the nose of his horse and he knew it was his horse because it was in the stable Orion's horse had always been at. He missed Blaze, and Sassafras wasn't in the stall next to her but...

"You'll have to take me for a ride," Orion tells his brother who stands next to him and observes him. Close enough to be almost touching but not quite, like an imitation of closeness. Orion doesn't close the gap in case it is all an illusion. He doesn't want it to break. He might have punched his brother and the redness is still there but his brother had excellent healing abilities underneath his skin. In fact, he doesn't remember Hadrian getting ill. Ever. Except from exhaustion and overexertion.

"Yeah. I wonder if the old track down by the river is still there," Hadrian murmured. Orion glanced at the face out of the corner of his eye.

No one but Hadrian would have known about that. But then again, he's not sure if Mancer had ever found out anything else.

Orion turns his attention from the horse to Hadrian who watches him warily. Deserved, really. He had punched him and Orion give him a crooked grin.

"I don't know whether to strangle you or hug you." Hadrian doesn't laugh, which he appreciates. He might have said it jokingly, but he meant it.

He's angry and he feels like he's the only one that is.

"How long have you been... out here for?" He waves around at the world and waits for the answer. "You didn't survive that day, did you?"

"You saw the memories," Hadrian said slowly, gaze flickering, "you know the answer to that."

"I need to hear it from you." His brother stared at him for a long moment.

"No... I didn't survive that day and no manner of magic was going to save me." Orion let out a long breath and slumped against the stall wall and up at the mansion he'd once decided to leave out of hatred. "I came back three years ago. Roughly."

"Three?" Orion demanded, gaze whipping around to his brother. "You wilfully abandoned us for three years? You didn't come earlier? You left us, to suffer and wonder what happened, for three more years than we had to?"

"Would three years have changed anything?" Hadrian asked softly, gaze full of shame but looking for an answer.

"Well yeah we could protect you, the family would have been back together-" Hadrian's gaze was long and quiet, like he usually was before he was about to say something deep and meaningful and that would make Orion regret what he'd said.

Orion didn't want to hear what he had to say.

He stood up angrily and paced the courtyard. "If you'd just- if you'd just not told us that you'd come back Hadrian maybe we all could have moved on. Not that I'm not glad that your back but you lied to us- to me, for years and it took you dying to confess it. Are you going to have to die again to confess another big secret? Or are you going to take it to the grave? Or..." he spins on Hadrian with a glare. "Can you not die? Am I going to have to grow old and watch you never age a day and know that I failed you in such a way that I physically can't do anything about it? Honestly I'd rather die fighting Mancer than that outcome." Hadrian flinched and rubbed his jaw.