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Elrond had been looking over the piece of art he had painted earlier before he lifts his head to spot Wilhelm and . . . a visitor, it seems. His brow furrows for a moment, taking in the situation with an uncanny look upon his face before smiling faintly.

"I did see a few," Elrond replies smoothly, keeping his attention on Wilhelm, though it's clear he has noticed Jesper from the amusement dancing in his eyes.

"I never behave," Jesper whispers to Wilhelm with a laugh but he does stop kissing him, so he is doing that much. He follows him into the room only for his curious gaze to fall right on Elrond.

"Oh hello." He says with a smile, playfully tapping his fingers along Wilhelm's spine to tease him. Jesper has a very forward way of sizing people up.

"I'm Jesper, Wilhelm's date." That works better than calling him a friend or lover, it's a true statement. This was definitely a date. "And who are you?"

This is my friend, Jesper, he rehearses in his head, only half listening to Elrond's reply. Except Jesper, possessing his own free will and then some, crumples up the script by cutting in. This leaves a flustered Wilhelm to bury his awkwardness in the task of pulling off his gloves and unbundling himself from his coat and scarf — and to pretend he hasn't noticed the amusement brightening Elrond's eyes.

"My roommate, Elrond," he supplies, sweeping a broad gesture between the two as a means of introduction.

Date. Not a word Elrond is familiar with, but thankfully context is quite clear. Elf eyes are quite keen after all, and neither of them strike him as particularly subtle. He straightens to give a curt bow to Jesper, his soft cloak rustling with his movements.

"Well met, Jesper. As Wilhelm said, I am Elrond. I hail from Lindon."

The half-truth slips so easily these days.

"A pleasure to meet you, Elrond from Lindon. I would bow but I'm out of practice." Well, somewhat. Jesper keeps his bright green coat on for now, trying very hard not to flirt since Wille and he hasn't discussed threesomes and you know, roommate. Not always threesome material. If it was just them in the room this would be going very differently. Look at the hair. And the ears. Nice.

Focus.

"Wille here is a bit shy, whereas I am not. If I promise to make you a spectacularly beautiful piece of jewelry as a thank you, would you be open to maybe taking a walk? We can negotiate."

[He plops the teabag into his mug, leaving it to steep. The whole concept of alternate universes is still a little too slippery to wrap his brain around, but the important bit to pull out of that is the fact that Wanda's been reunited with one of her kids. Good for her — in the sincerest possible shade of the phrase. It takes him a moment to figure out why the name Billy rings familiar. Oh, right—]

I sort of dropped in on him a little while ago. Here in the Horizon, I mean. Totally by accident.

[When the Horizon — and possibly the Singularity itself — was out of sorts thanks to weird old gods run amok. Watching Wanda carefully, pulling his mug closer, he asks:]

Is it...weird?

[Seeing him all grown up all of a sudden. Missing all those years in between. He'll let Wanda fill in the blank.]

Wilhelm keeps trying — first of all, to believe Istredd. He can't hurt anyone here. He can't burn anything down. It's his faith in Istredd's power as a mage more so than any faith in himself that persuades him of the sturdiness these claims possess.

Second, to pull the flame toward him. He forces his breath into a slow, even rhythm; he feels the fire's energy. All his willpower pinpoints on the ball of flame, which stretches toward his hand, little by little, until finally...it falls into his palm. Well, not into it — it's still hovering in the air. But when he moves his hand, slowly, carefully, the flame stays with it.

He doesn't say anything, as if afraid that the fire will startle like a bird, but his relief is visible. Palpable, even. He looks to Istredd for the next instructions.

Oh, you did?

[wanda smiles softly, happy to know that wilhelm has a face to draw upon when she talks about billy. the smile remains for just a moment longer before it falters entirely. his question is not unexpected—she anticipated something regarding her feelings to him being here.

she's never thought of what the answer would be, despite that, regardless of who asked.]

Well, when I first met him and recognized who he was, I nearly killed him with my magic.

[said with the air of something that should be a funny anecdote. thankfully, billy's magic reacted to her own, and no harm befell the boy.]

—but... it's definitely weird. He isn't my son, but he feels like he is. There are so many things of him that are like my Billy's, many parts of him that are just — very much a Maximoff thing. [here her smile returns, small and tight.] I've been trying to do better by him.

I'm sure that's what any other Wanda would do if any of my boys ever showed up at their doorstep.

[too bad she doesn't know, at the moment, that the future holds this billy disappearing from abraxas and returning to his world.]

It would be impossible for Wilhelm in here to harm anything in Istredd's domain which is why it is the perfect place to practice. His strength in the Horizon is impressive since so much of it requires the mind, enough to help Wanda in the midst of her power during the heralds. Even when they're on the outside, Istredd is strong enough to contain most magic from a young user. As uncontrolled as it may be to them.

"Good job, you pulled it to you. This next thing, think of it like stretching or lifting weights. Watch me."

It's an exercise, intended to help Wilhelm learn how to fluctuate the intensity of it, and also so that he might have an easier time putting it out later. These are the fundamentals, it'll be some time before the boy is confident enough to do real fire magic, but it is good to start out small.

Istredd uses his own fireball and moves one hand to on top of the flame while the other stays at the bottom, hovering it in between. "Just as you reached out and felt the fire enough to pull it toward you, now feel it between your hands. I want you to try and grasp the energy with your top hand and then pull, stretching the fire between. Make it larger, longer."

He does exactly that, the flame growing longer as if stretching like a rope between his hands and then more volume in between the palms. "And then you push down and make it smaller, hold it down as close as you can." Istredd pushes until the ball is almost invisible, as if he could snuff it out between them. "Don't worry if it goes out or gets too large, it's all under control in here."

[Moving back toward him, he slips his fingers down Rhy's wrist, tracing his knuckles before taking his hand. His eyes fall to the link formed of their hands, then flutter up to him.]

Okay. [It's not hard to concede to those kind, warm eyes.] I just...really appreciate everything you've done for me.

[Not just the thoughtful gift, but everything else. Checking on him, making sure he's not slipping through the cracks. Making him laugh. Believing in him when Wilhelm sure the hell doesn't. Pulling him out of his depressive funks or sitting through them with him. Letting him indulge in...not feeling so lonely for a while.]

Right now, from Wilhelm's perspective, Elrond is the coolest person ever for keeping his knowing looks to a minimum and refraining from any ribbing. Any of the guys at Forest Ridge would be eating him alive right now — well, for so many reasons. Shaking his head at Jesper's blunt bribe, he reaches behind him to hang his cold weather gear on one of the hooks by the door.

"Maybe a nice long bath would be, uh...relaxing before bed," he suggests with a shrug.

Emphasis on long. He has the grace to look apologetic, aware that, though in not so many words, he's kicking Elrond out. He clears his throat awkwardly.

"If you don't mind."

How transparent youth can be. Elrond seems bemused, his dimples deepening.

"Of course," he says with a smile, "I could use the fresh air. Feel free to use the room in my absence."

Transparent works for him, he hates being subtle. He's not good at it, it always is obvious in the end. The smile he flashes is bright and appreciative.

"You're already on my favorite list, Elrond, thanks, mate. I'll make you something shiny." He already has a few ideas based on Elrond's coloring, he's very pretty. Easy to get inspiration for.

Now that he is apparently going to stay Jesper shrugs out of his flashy green jacket, setting it to the side.

[ Rhy squeezes his hand back, his smile widening. Then, he pulls Wilhelm into an embrace, holding him for a few moments, just firmly enough to feel secure. ]

I care about you, Wilhelm. I like spending time with you.

His shoulders slope with a sigh of relief as Elrond agrees. As awkward as this whole exchange is, this is about as smoothly as it could have gone. Fussing with his hair, Wilhelm moves away from the door — another not so subtle hint.

"Okay, cool," he says with unconvincing casualness. And then with a slight grimace: "Sorry."

Having never had a roommate before, he isn't entirely sure how to navigate the vast waters of etiquette surrounding the sharing of a living space, but...Elrond seems okay with the sudden change in his evening plans. They said thanks; they said sorry! How much more polite can they get?

Elrond merely shakes his head as he makes his way to depart. The young have only so much time. He's hardly going to hold any of this against them. He closes the door quietly behind him.

[Timing has never been Wilhelm's strong suit either. The world has a way of crumbling underneath your feet just when you've found your stride. Catching the stumble in Wanda's smile, he wishes he hadn't asked and rushes to offer reassurance.]

I'm sure...I'm sure he recognizes that.

[Except, well, he can't guarantee any such thing. He knows damn well how fraught the relationship between mother and child can be. It must be weird for Billy, too, to encounter his mom-but-not, a refraction through the prism of another universe. He shakes his head with a wry little curl of his lips.]

I wonder if there are other Wilhelms out there.

[Maybe one of them gets to have a normal life.]

It's a little like stretching muscles you haven't used in a while. The movement is stiff at first, awkward as you get reacquainted with that part of yourself. But Wilhelm is starting to remember how it goes.

Holding the flame in his mind, he wills it to stay between his hands as he copies Istredd's position. The fact that nothing has gone catastrophically wrong in the last five minutes has, in fact, propped his confidence up a bit. With a slow breath in, he tries to stretch the flame out. It grows with the movement of his hand — and then slowly dwindles again as his palms gravitate toward each other.

He practices this a few more times, eyes flicking toward Istredd to seek feedback. On the next cycle of stoking and suffocating the fire, it flares up bigger than he expected, and his hands jerk away reflexively. Panic leaps into his expression.

"Fuck."

But the flame just tumbles harmlessly through the air like a tire spinning through mud. When he sees that, the tension trickles out of him.

Jesper saw which bed Elrond was on so he just boldly goes right over to the other one, Wilhelm's for certain, and casually kicks off his shoes. He arches an eyebrow at him playfully and crooks a finger. They are a far way from their first tumble in the Horizon Crow Club, which was a good time but all very new and a little awkward given the newness of it all. Jesper loves having sex with people, but he prefers keeping regular lovers because there is so much more to learn about someone that way. One time is never really enough.

"So what kind of ravishing were you thinking, sweetheart? Because I may have something very helpful we can use if you'd like to get in more than my mouth." This is Jesper Fahey. The fact he has lube on him in one of his many, many secret pockets should in no way be a surprise. He likes to be prepared and does have a taste for semi-public sex, but this will be a lot easier. The point is that he wants to offer and then Wilhelm can set his comfort level.

Jesper is usually wearing layers, especially in weather like this, so he undoes his vest, taking his time in part so Wilhelm can enjoy the view, unless he wants to come over and tear it off himself. "I'm yours, pigeon, any which way you want." A true switch by all definitions.

[she recognizes what he's doing, and wanda reads the cues well enough to move past the subject. she is grateful that he's gone and asked about billy, but her focus returns instead to him — his talk about 'other wilhelms out there'.]

Most likely.

[with the concept of the multiverse as it is—]

But I know from personal experience that thinking of what ifs will only make the choices you regret and your grief a lot more difficult to cope with.

[pulling the teabag out of her cup, she sets it down on a small saucer that she conjures from thin air; a silver, delicate spoon appears between her fingers, now, and wanda stirs at her tea to make sure the herbs have infused properly with the hot water.]

—I wanted to show you something. [she sets the spoon down on the same saucer as the teabag, fingers lingering on it for a moment as if she's trying to find the words to say what she wants to say. eventually, as she starts speaking again, she moves her hand away.] A friend of mine drew a picture of my brother while on the ship. It surprised me how much I had forgotten what he looked like.

[there is a point here that she wants to make. she wants to show wilhelm what her older brother looked like, but she also would like to... maybe offer to take the memory of his brother from his mind, ask that steve also draw him? it's powerful — just having a picture to look back at.]

Do you mind if I showed you?

Istredd keeps showing the exercise so that Wilhelm can copy it but he nods when he looks up for feedback, smiling at him reassuringly. So far he is doing a good job and it is supposed to be awkward in the start. The problem with a lot of teachers of rudimentary magics is how people want to move too fast through lessons. And get to the exciting part of magic, but control is necessary so exciting doesn't become lethal.

He watches when Wilhelm goes a little too large on the next one and doesn't reach out to stop it or stifle it himself, since he wants to watch how the boy reacts to it first. With panic, yes, but that's fine because letting it drop or die out is the right reaction.

"It's alright, it is normal in the start. The first time I used any of the elements I messed them all up in unique and embarrassing ways. You are doing great." It is a funny thing because some people think if it is a natural skill it should come naturally, but that is just not the case. "Let us try another thing. Don't panic, this is contained."

He warns about the panic because it is going to seem big for a moment. Istredd steps back and he widens his flame until it is very large, spreading halfway through the room they're in, although none of us it is actually near Wilhelm. Fire is not his strongest element but it is easy in here to keep it enclosed.

"What I want you to do is find pieces of the fire I created and pull them toward you like you did with the ball. You can do one at a time. Take then to your hand but this time I want you to snuff them out. Push your hands together and picture it like you would a candle and you pinching out the flame."

It is more difficult picking out pieces but Istredd's plan is to get him used to having to put out fires. It may help him do the same in the real world.

[Settling into the embrace, he holds Rhy with the sort of covetousness reserved for things you know don't truly belong to you, and the sort of gratitude reserved for things you know not to take for granted. He buries his nose in Rhy's shoulder, breathes him in, and feels at peace for now.]

Glad you're not sick of me yet.

[He says it like it's a joke, but it isn't exactly.]

When the door shuts and they're left alone, Wilhelm breathes another sigh of relief that lands in a smile. His gaze follows Jesper to his bed. One small awkward snarl in their night is easy enough to smooth out, especially when Jesper looks so damn pretty perched there. He tugs off his boots, leaving them in a heap beside the abandoned fur blankets, and folds up the distance between them. His steps are measured not out of reluctance, but something closer to reverence: he's inhabiting this moment. Letting everything else fade beyond the horizon of his mind.

Going by his expression, Wilhelm understands exactly what Jesper is implying. He hides his momentary daze by ducking his head, and distracts Jesper by wedging himself between his legs, helping with the last button of his vest, and pushing it off his shoulders.

It was supposed to be Simon. Someday, when they were ready for it. He never consciously decided it; he realizes only now that it's inked in his heart like religious dogma, right alongside the insistence that they're supposed to be together.

But Simon is not here, and maybe what fell apart between them would never be set right. Jesper is here, and he's now. Maybe he can't control the schedule by which all those aching feeling loosen their hold on his heart, but he can choose whether he tightens his grip to match — or lets go.

"Maybe...you could show me?" Wilhelm murmurs, running his hands over Jesper's tight curls. Tilting into him, he claims his lips in a kiss, slow and sweet but opening into heat and hunger as his hands drip down Jesper's chest to pet his thighs.

[Wilhelm nods and tries to shelve the thought. He has already surrendered countless hours to what ifs that never soothe but only exacerbate all the aches in his heart, the way prodding at a bruise only deepens it.

Following Wanda's cue, he imagines into existence a saucer on which he can set his teabag now that it's steeped for a few minutes. Whatever she's on the precipice of saying, he senses it's important — and when she says it, understanding alights on his expression.]

Sure, I'd love to see it.

[He'd gotten a hazy glimpse of Pietro once, that time Wanda's powers surged out of her control, shaped out of raw emotion. But that afternoon is all jumbled up in his memories. Now Wanda has risen from that dark place — though he knows the darkness doesn't just go away, it shrinks to hide inside of you somewhere. He recognizes that she's opening up on her own terms.]

I tried drawing Erik, but...it didn't look much like him.

[Though he chuckles and shakes his head, he can't quite hide his disappointment.]

He breathes in, deep and slow and steady, trying to sharpen his focus and dispel his nerves. Over and over again, he reminds himself that he can't hurt anyone or wreck anything in here. If he fucks up, the worst that can happen is that Istredd will make him try again. The man's unshakeable serenity once irritated Wilhelm, but now he finds it to be a reservoir he can tap.

"It's hard to imagine you messing anything up so badly," he says, shaking his head. But that's reassuring too. Everyone here was already gifted with magic and skills they'd honed to perfection before they were ever summoned. That made it easy to forget that they all once had to have been beginners like him.

Watching the fire flare into a wall, he keeps pulling in breath and pushing it out. He grounds himself like Kyle taught him to. When he's ready, he tries calling the fire to him. A tongue stretches away and breaks off, forming a ball that tumbles toward his outstretched hand. It takes a few tries, but eventually the flame puffs out. And through the failed attempts, though he can feels its warmth fanning out over his palms, the flame doesn't burn him.

The next flame he culls from the wall dies in fewer attempts. After about a dozen extinguished fireballs, Wilhelm can snuff it in one.

INBOX

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now for the nsfw part of the evening

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