Meet the Hobo

[igiko]

Haha. Who knows how to write Rutile? I sure don't.

"Is she hurt anywhere? Please let me help. . . . Ortonik Setomaouge!"

A strange, colorful light discharges from the unfamiliar man in unusual garbs and envelopes the child in Roland's arms. Her cries, wan from starvation and sickness, must have attracted the bright-eyed man's attention. Roland raises his hooded face and waits for the light to fade before he speaks, stopping the man from a second attempt.

"There is no need," he says, words measured. "This child . . . has already passed."

He slides his hand down the child's head, where he was stroking her thinned hair as a soothing gesture in her final moments, to close her eyes. Too many have breathed their last in his powerless company, yet he hopes those moments have been kinder to them than recent years. He sends a silent prayer with the child when he hears a muted gasp, and looks up to wide green eyes.

"Roland . . . ?"

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The green-eyed man, Rutile, tells a series of interesting tales that raise a considerable amount of suspicion in the back of Roland's mind. Many of the details, though personal and far from public knowledge, are nonetheless no secrets. Rutile could easily be a spy, which sours the air around him, yet the looseness of Rutile's tongue beggars belief that these could be the words of an operative.

Roland's head snaps up when he feels a gentle pressure on his pinched brow. Watching him with sad eyes, Rutile brushes his thumb against Roland's brow before ghosting his hand across a sunken cheek.

"When was the last time you ate, Roland?" He says the name over and over again, as if he might blink and lose sight of him.

Roland's expression evens out. "Yesterday," he replies, simply.

"Yesterday . . . ?"

"Yes."

It's been a whole day since he last partook of precious bread. If not for the unexpected visitor, he'd be breaking fast on another loaf right about now. He realizes how he must look and sound to Rutile, who appears quite well off himself, but his condition is merely reality to Roland. Eating once a day is a luxury for those who've been driven out to the corners of Norzelia.

Surely Rutile understands this. In fact, he seems to grasp that reality from the way he straightens, that warm hand retreating from Roland's face to rest against his own chin in thought. He considers something before clapping his hands.

Soon, Roland finds himself looking down at a handful of star-shaped candy—sugar.

"These will rejuvenate you. Please take them and hand them out to those in need. Ah, if it would ease your mind, I can try one for you, though I assure you that I would never poison you. After all, you're . . . "

Rutile shakes his head. Then he picks up a starry sugar, seemingly at random, and plops it into his mouth. He swallows and eyes Roland expectantly—no, hopefully—with his hand, where his offerings lie scattered, still upturned.

The way Rutile beams when Roland accepts the sugar is reminiscent of a blooming flower in a verdant field, so unlike their desolate surroundings of dilapidated buildings and barren lands with the lingering stench of rot. Roland does his own share of considering with the sugar in his hand before slotting one between his lips, unable to recall the last time he tasted such a strong flavor.

He lifts his gaze at the call of his name. Rutile all but shuffles in place, lips pressed into a delicate smile; the faint crease of his brow betrays his nervousness.

"Now that I've told you our . . . my story, would you be able to tell me yours?"

Even a spy has no use for half-hearted secrets. The ability to take a life is all that should have been necessary here. Seeing as Rutile has yet to strike—and because it has been far too long since he could engage so freely with another soul—Roland nods in acquiescence. Many already know of his shameful tale, anyhow.

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They descend into silence once that tale reaches the present. It's far from a conclusion, though he suspects the finale is on the horizon. He chooses not to convey this to Rutile, even if a part of him suspects that, should Rutile's own otherworldly stories be true, Rutile must know some incarnation of himself well enough to make an educated guess—only to remind himself that the Roland Glenbrook in Rutile's recollections is an entirely different person.

(And should those be more falsehoods, a rueful part of him should be flattered by such a kind imagination.)

His thoughts are cut short by a peculiar request that has nothing to do with the story of his disgrace. Roland questions the wisdom of baring himself to someone who's ostensibly a stranger. His hands are moved by Rutile's sincerity, however, and he lifts his hood away from his face to rest against his back. He sits there, unmoving, while Rutile runs a tender hand along his jaw where he's neglected to groom himself.

Despite his smile, Rutile's eyes are unbelievably sorrowful as they peer into his own.

"You don't have to say, 'Yes' . . . But would it be all right if I did this for you? Just this much."

Surely a wizard of such power could have banished an unruly stubble with the wave of a hand or the utterance of an incantation. The accounts of flight and teleportation—punctuated by the flourish of a snowglobe—suggest as much. But Rutile's hands are gentle and patient—loving—as they run a small blade along Roland's jaw while Roland remains situated with his eyes shut.

The shave takes more time than it reasonably should, yet Roland is even slower to open his eyes once it's over. He feels the smooth contour of his cheek with the back of his hand, gaze trained on the decaying floor of the old building in which they've sequestered themselves away from prying eyes. His thoughts brew like a storm, and Rutile's voice cuts through it like a faint ray of sunlight, distant and warm.

"How is it?"

"Better," he replies after a pause. Another pause follows, and then he nods. "Thank you. . . . Now please leave."

"Huh?" Roland looks away as he rises from his seat.

"I wish for you to go. Return to your loved one's side, and forget that you ever saw this side of him. . . . Please."

He understands very little of how this miraculous encounter came to be. Perhaps those at the heart of Norzelia are toying with him, unfathomable as such cruelty is to him even now. Perhaps everything Rutile has said is true, and some powers that be have sent Rutile someplace wrong—to someone wrong. Either way, Roland no longer wishes to harbor Rutile.

Predictably, even in the brief time they've been together, Rutile refuses to part so easily. He presses without shoving, but pushes enough that Roland squares his shoulders.

"It is for your safety," he says with some firmness. "I am not the one to whom you've made a promise. Your heart isn't bound to mine. And I will not bind you to mine by anyone's will."

Change is on the horizon. If the wrong person were to lay eyes on Rutile, he might end up on the precipice when he was never meant to exist in this reality. The only option, Roland reasons as he still neglects to meet Rutile's eyes, is for Rutile to leave and to hope that he never returns.

A soft gasp tumbles out of Roland's mouth when Rutile winds compassionate arms around him. The gesture stuns Roland speechless, and Rutile leans in to murmur into his ear, "You're you, Roland. Regardless of the life you've led and the choices you've made that are different from the ones I've known . . . I promised that I would always love you. So, please, don't tell me to leave you behind . . . because I love you, too."