'You've done enough.'
Enough? Walter frowned slightly, but acquiesced. No apology from the lips that pressed tighter together, but attention returned to Laric for certain, trying to glimpse into him now. His hands rested at the other's shoulders, still no attempt to dust himself off when Laric presed on with a question.

"I..." Walter sounded hoarse, and a bit lost for words. How would he answer the question, still mellow in the aftermath but confused now. "Are you- A little raw, a little pleased, I suppose. I might need a bit of rest before our game can continue, however." He raked through his own hair. "To do these shameless things at my own home feels a little like a loosening noose." The flustered redness deepened ever so subtly, marred by worry. "But why are you- have I hurt you?" He coughed, cleared his throat, smiled through a wince, a little worried. Fingers that grabbed the cold table earlier were lukewarm, too, if touched, lines drew on the forehead.
 
"No. No apologies, I chose to do this." Walter whispered, shaking his head. He held the other. "I wanted to. To feel you coming undone on shaky legs, and to hear you gasp my name." A touch of lips at the temple. "Breathe, my darling. It felt good, didn't it? I could be a little sore, but if your heart doesn't stand that, I won't indulge us in such dark, cold places anymore."
Hands rubbed at the shoulders. He shivered, himself, however.
"How drastic are the measures you propose. Tear out the roads, upend the house." A breathy chuckle. "Maybe I like that it's only you who knows how gentle I can be? My legacy is your fond words and glances, not public demonstrations."

He swallowed, opened his neck to affections, relaxed the shoulders once the reassurance was offered. Kissed the golden hair.
"Good. As intended. The worst torture I could bring about to you was teasing, I hope."

He offered a smile and let Laric fuss at him. Caught the hands, caught his attention, kissed the fingertips on one and palm on the other, looked fondly into cat-green eyes.
"Tea with honey, if you would parlay with Anthea on my behalf. I won't take longer than a couple hours, and you are welcome to be beside me while I rest, if you like." Another careful throat clear, a chuckle under the breath. "We have a box of cherries, my studies, and some comforts to enjoy alongside that evening and each other. As well as anything else you might like that I could give to you."
 
Walter hummed in response, relaxing into the warm nuzzle, the kisses at the crook of his neck sending pleasant shivers out his scalp. Thornley choices of fashion usually featured high neck coverage, but he felt like giving an excuse to cover his neck later. Proved right. Laric seemed to enjoy that part of him, and his affections against Walter's neck helped Walter relax, positively melt into the embrace. So long as there weren't teeth.

He was quiet, too. Holding just a little closer, though never touching, never indiscreet, until the heavy door - which stood half-open, the maids cleaning it up, leaving enchanted water jugs by the bath, taking up clothes for a wash. There, with a glance to ensure no one was looking, Walter leaned closer to Laric, rising up slightly to reach the corner of the other's mouth. A gentle squeeze of the other's fingers with a hand, a promise, and a smiling whisper of "Go on, then," as he rocked back into proper standing, and entered the room. The slightest shift in airs, in posture. In the presence of his people, lord Thornley did not matter as a man too much.

He would not change dress, settling at the desk and sent Oliver and Rose out when asked for additional directions. Pages of writing unfolded across the tabletop, the book stand filled with one of the tomes he brought away from the library, its heavy pages smelling of preserving oil and old ink. A good time to organize his thoughts.

*

Anthea was in the main hallway, about to call the maids, when she spotted Laric. A formal polite bow followed, and she stepped aside, rather less assertive than her husband, preferring the old way of being addressed first. Not at all how she was as the Hunt's elder figures, and none of the noble boys' business.
"How may I be of service, milord?" The cheeks creased, small lines running in small rays from the corners of her eyes and around her mouth. "Have you any need unmet?"
 
She had the knowing eyes, turned greyish-blue with age when once they must have been more hazel-green. A polite smile, a patient wait to Laric's searching stare. Her clothes were simple and covering, her hands sported many callouses from household labors, and there seemed to be naught more to read into the amiable air than what was presented.

"So kind of you to pass the word, my lord," she offered, just as serenely. If she understood the implication, there was not a muscle twitch in Anthea's face to indicate it. Every Hound wasn't just good at finding secrets out, but at burying them, just as well. "The healer will check in within an hour if necessary, she is preoccupied at the moment." A tiny pause. She was watching Laric, too. "I will attend to the tea myself. Would there be anything else, my lord?"
 
Anthea inclined her head. "You are too kind." And left it at that, giving commands to the maids in a different, more business-like tone as she stood in the center of the hall, watching Laric ascend in her periphery. She knew where the young viscount was headed.

"You may come in," the voice from behind the door called, ending with a careful cough. Walter's eyes landed on Laric entering, and his face lightened. When he spoke again, he lowered the tone to the much more comfortable murmur, "Thank you, sweet."
In front of the man, there were several organized manuscripts with notes on separate pages, drafted before they would be re-written as conclusions into a journal waiting at the side. A smile to Laric, as Walter finished transcribing what looked like an alchemical formula, and took the gloved index finger off the page of a large tome on the book stand beside.

The fire was crackling softly, spreading heat from not too far away.
"You have a fresh shirt on," he noted, idly. "Missing me already?" A smile in the corners of the mouth. "Come, take a seat, wherever you like," he gestured broadly at the divan, the bearskin, the smaller chair opposite the desk. The bed was on the other end, too far away to talk comfortably. "I know, this doesn't look much like rest just yet. I'm finishing a couple formulas before I lounge about... lest I forget. Make yourself comfortable. And if you wish to spare my voice, how about you tell me something? About Pantheros, where you've invited me, for example."
 
A chuckle, a shake of the head, and Walter focused on carefully copying a rectangular-shaped array. It wasn't meant to be an actual inscription, but rather a way to wrap the aspects in a way that would create the hypothetical. Eyebrows knit a little, lines ran up the forehead.
"I have full intention to visit you," Walter murmured quietly. "Fenestra? You might have to remind me, it doesn't sound familiar."

The quill scraped slightly on the parchment. For some reason, looking at those symbols aligned almost like they had been once - was making his vision blur. So Walter rested the quill back into the stand and leaned back in the armchair, head tilting back as is eyes closed. A moment later, a hand came up to pinch the bridge of his nose.
"Would that be the one that supported your lingering notions?" he asked. Set the paper away to dry, pulled the half-filled journal closer, began paging through it, eyes narrowed and searching for... something.

It wasn't there. The array made no sense in the way it was turning out to be. In the way he was transformed. A bitterness begun to set in, and Walter focused on breathing deeper, to calm down. Perhaps, best to wait until Laric would have gone back home before he'd proceed with research.
 
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Walter seemed to catch the tone, though not the meaning. Paused. "I've never been cruel to her," the words came calmly, and the shuffling of the papers resumed, in an attempt to organize.

He glanced at Laric, then at the papers. Listened to the tale about the pits of the dead.
"Sometimes, when... when something is far too dangerous and could cause a disaster," he said, eyes not venturing from the journal that he set neatly into the table arrangement, "a particular creature is sighted. In some accounts, called upon. It breaks down the bonds of the Shroud. Like rotting breaks down the dead bodies. An undead is not just something moving. A lot of them mimic living things, predators, or basic thinking. They can't, of course, it is an imitation. Death is not a state, a dead body is essentially... hollow, on the way to becoming something else, attaining a new aspect."

He stretched his shoulder, head tilted back lolled to look at the lover, as he continued, the wandering gaze distant. "Undeath is a Shroud-incentivised variant of that 'else'. But if there is no longer an identifying aspect, in the magical sense, if it's made nameless, then... you can't make an undead. Nothing for the aspect of mobility, or thought, or whatever else that used to be within the living body, to re-attach to."

A sigh. He closed his eyes tightly, reopened them. A knock came, a maid was let in, glanced at Laric lounging in front of the fire, bowed to the lords and set a small table by Walter's desk. The tea, the honey pot, and two cups on a tray. She filled them, bowed again, and departed quietly, not to disturb.
Walter took a pause, to drink the tea, and let it soothe, if a little, the mostly recovered voice.
"I need to gather folklore about particular... guardians. In those places where people are still mostly part of nature, they know the value of sacrifice. I've seen accounts. In some regions, they called upon a certain entity, by different names, when things were dire. When it was hopeless. Death being part of life didn't mean they stopped struggling, or shunned blood like soft-handed children. When rampaging violence and imminent erasure come to your doorstep - you don't give grain... I probably speak in riddles, forgive me."

His eyes softened a little, gaze travelling up and down Laric's form more focused on the man, and less on Walter's wondering thoughts.
 
"Not riddles? Good." Walter chuckled, pleased. "It is a rare indulgence, to not be... misunderstood."
He stood, slowly, besides the chair at first, to stretch upward with gusto and a groan, rolling the broad shoulders back and tilting the locked hands behind the head level.

"Yes. Including several men, like the strong folk of the village, warriors, sacrificing their blood, their strength, rather than their life, for the summoning, along with the prey they've felled."
He walked to the hearth, tapped a hand absent-mindedly on the mantlepiece, and reached for the poker to move the kindling about.

"I do believe that, yes. Something has to be killing the larger shroud fiends where swords fail, too. And other apex predators. The sightings never mention the creature acting as a wild fiend, itself, either. It intrigues me. Like there is something binding it." Dark eyes traced Laric's form. "Sometimes there's a temptation, in releasing that control."
 
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