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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The pit in my stomach still hadn't filled itself after talking to Astral. I still felt so horribly hollow. He had never betrayed me before. Astral and I had always been so solid in our friendship, and it killed me, he chose the time of his ultimate betrayal to profess his love to me. I had waited for so long to hear those words from him, but it was so ruined. Everything was ruined.
Astral tried getting me out of bed but was massively unsuccessful. He'd leave the room to do whatever and then come back to sleep with me. He'd tell me of his day with Venus, how they practised using The Sight, how he could control it. It all sounded very good for him. I was happy for him, but the pit in my stomach wouldn't really let me... Be... Anything but this.
"Come on," Astral murmured and gently pulled on my shoulder, getting me on my back. "Venus has prepared a lovely dinner and I know you must be starving."
"I'm not hungry."
"That's a boldfaced lie. Come on, Mars. You can't hide in here forever and I know you're angry with me, but you can't starve yourself. I won't have it."
He pulled me up in a seated position and I slumped forward. I was so tired and exhausted and hurting. I was just hurting so bad.
"Let's get a shirt on you, yeah?" Astral said and left me in the bed for a minute before returning with a fresh shirt. "You know how much I love it when you're shirtless, but I also reckon you don't wanna attend dinner like this."
Tears filled my eyes and almost immediately flooded over. Astral gently wiped them away before buttoning my shirt.
"There. And now I'll brush your hair so it's all shiny. You'll look so pretty."
A sob rocked through my body. Astral simply kissed my forehead and wiped my cheeks again. Then he moved behind me, standing on his knees and gently ran the comb through my hair. He was so gentle, and it felt so nice. It was heart breaking. I loved this dumb boy so much and at the same time, I was so angry.
He stopped brushing and then took up the top of half of it, styling it like he styled his own. He used a leather string to keep it in place and then he came back around, facing me.
"There. Now you're all pretty."
"I'm not. You're just saying that," I muttered through a sob.
"Would I lie to you?" he asked, and I sent him a look. "Uhm, I... I wouldn't lie about this. I would never lie about how I feel about you, nor how beautiful I find you."
I nodded a bit.
"And I won't let you starve yourself over something I did to you. I'm going to spend eternity making up for this. I promise." He gently took my face in his hands. "I love you and... I don't know what else to say. I'm so bad with words-"
I leaned in and kissed him just to shut him up. I hadn't forgiven him, but I was working on it and so was he. Him complimenting me wasn't it. I couldn't exactly explain what had pushed me toward the first step. Maybe it was time, maybe it was the fact that he refused to give up.
