Cursed with immortality, Mars goes on a journey with his lifelong more-than-friends partner Astral, a painfully average future-seeing mage, to find the root of magic, in an effort to ease the side effects of Astral's visions - and to finish their th...
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We were sitting in one of the many sitting rooms, eating, when the vision hit. I managed to catch Astral before he hit the floor.
"Help me," I growled, and Keefe hurried around the table, grabbing Astral's legs as I held his upper body. We got him down on the floor together and I quickly shoved my arm in his mouth before he managed to bite his tongue.
"Is there anything I can do?" Keefe asked, looking endlessly worried.
"No, we just have to wait until it's over. Then we can try and get him back to bed," I explained and then clenched my jaw as Astral bit down hard on my skin. His body was shaking, and I felt his body temperature spike way too fast. He was barely breathing, making the weird sounds again. As if he was trying to force air down and then out.
And then, he stopped. He had passed out. I gently forced his eye open, finding it back to normal and not glazed over with white.
"Alright, he's back but we need to get him back to the room-"
Astral interrupted me with a groan and looked up at me. He muttered something incomprehensible, and then his eyes slid shut again.
"Hold on, I've got him." Keefe looped his arm under his knees and put his shoulder in Astral's armpit. My friend was entirely limp, but Keefe didn't look at all bothered. How strong was this guy?
We got Astral back to the room followed by the curious stares from the other patrons. I quickly left again to find some boiling water and returned to the room, brewing some tea for when Astral awoke again. He was already running a fever, so I knew this was a bad one. And it was probably not the only one he'd get that day either.
He was awake by the time I had finished the tea. I had sent Keefe and Zeke away, knowing Astral hated having an audience for this.
"Mars," he said with the smallest voice in the world.
I came back to the bed, sitting down on the edge. "Are you in pain?"
He grabbed my shirt, his hand shaking. "I saw the trees. They were burning. And I was burning."
"You were burning as well?" I asked and frowned. "You've never had a role in this vision before."
"I know," he whispered, looking endlessly scared. "I can't do this anymore, Mars."
I leaned forward and placed a kiss on his forehead. "I know, love, I know," I murmured against his skin, running my hand over his hair, smoothing some of the unruly curls down. "Do you want some tea?"
"Yes, please." I hated how his voice sounded tiny. Astral wasn't a small person. He was larger than life and he usually wielded a voice that demanded attention. I loved the sound of his voice because he had a dialect that sounded like he was singing. It was soft and he rolled his R's in the smoothest way. And despite not having lived in the mountains since he was a small child, he never lost his dialect. He knew I loved it. He'd sometimes make it even thicker just for me.
