Work Text:
Percy knows he’s prone to working late. Historically it hasn’t been a problem, but then historically the only schedule he was ruining was his own; these days, living in Vex’s house, he does try his best to be a bit more conscious of the time. It had been a problem before, that he’d miss dinner and only troupe up to bed after Vex was already settled in with a book and while that had been discussed and sorted and thoroughly resolved (Percy finds his hand rising to the ring he wears on a chain, the better to keep it from being damaged as he works) he… does sometimes lose track of time even then.
He has gotten better, that’s for sure. One of the last things he ever wants to do is let down Vex and he knows Vex will make it very clear if he has hurt her feelings by his absence. He doesn’t miss meetings or mealtimes and if he’s perhaps a little late up to bed sometimes… well when he’s not working on the rifles for Whitestone’s guards, he does still work on lovely things for Vex, little treats that soothe away any annoyance when she realises his absence was due to wanting the end result to be perfect.
He’s no jeweller, not really, for all he used to dabble in clockmaking - there’s a reason he wanted to commission Senokir rather than attempt to make certain things himself - but he’s not averse to learning new skills and if there’s ever a time to learn new skills it’s now.
There are earrings, of mother-of-pearl and whitestone, the former set in silver and the latter in perfect, round beads like pearls below, which Vex adores. There’s a bracelet, of turquoise and aquamarine and lapis lazuli that she wears to just about every official function she can. There’s a clip, of simple, elegant silver shaped to look like a bear’s claw crossed with an arrow, meant for neatly holding her feathers and which can double as a brooch or a hair ornament as desired. There’s a necklace, the pendant a wreath designed to look like all of Vex’s favourite flowers and herbs and in place of each bloom is a sapphire so small he strained his eyesight getting them into place.
There’s the rings they each keep on chains because they’re not quite ready to tell the others just yet, when this thing, for now, is just for them.
He works with Tary sometimes, which Vex will forgive because she’s letting Tary stay in her house too and he’s emerged, some late weekend mornings, to see the two of them still in pyjamas and dressing gowns, elegant flutes of Daggerbay bubbly and Marquesian orange juice in their hands, gossiping not at all quietly. Sometimes, Zahra even joins them - and that’s when the really interesting drinks come out - and when he ambles over to give Vex a good-morning kiss, he usually also gets a gentle pat on the back from Zahra which he’s come to interpret as good job.
He doesn’t fear Zahra’s opinion of him half as much as he does Vax’ildan’s, but he does fear her more when it comes to what she might do if disappointed. He remembers how close his sisters and their friends were, how terrifying the payback they would sometimes wreak could be - the last thing he wants is Zahra’s magic and brilliant mind bent on vengefulness against him - but he supposes if he lets down Vex again it’s only deserved.
This all to say: he’s much better at timekeeping now than he was, and he and Vex are much better at communicating when something is the matter, and usually he wouldn’t be downstairs this late but this is an exception.
He knows, too, that if he’s not upstairs in fifteen minutes there’s good odds that Vex will send Trinket to force him upstairs - an agreed upon tactic to be fair, because the last thing Percy wants is Trinket upsetting his workshop or burning himself by the forge, and the first thing Trinket wants is to make Vex happy. Honestly, Percy and Trinket can agree on that.
There’s also the fact that he wants to get this done, this last little thing that’s proving to be absolutely impossible, because he wants to be able to present this to Vex this evening and not tomorrow. She’s only lately started to learn the local festivals - she was asked at the Spring Sowing if the Hunt would bring anything to the Harvest’s End Fair that autumn, and she’s learned all the religious ones of course, to do with Pelor and Melora and Erathis and the balance set between the three that it’s her duty to arbitrate, but he doesn’t think she knows this one, and he’d like to surprise her.
He’s so focussed on cleaning up the piece, all his lenses pulled down for the finest magnification he can manage as he works gently with brush and file, that he doesn’t hear the door creak open, or the unusually light footsteps across the floor of his workshop, or really notice anything at all until Vex’s hands gently move his arms so she can slip into his lap.
This is a position they’ve found themselves in rather frequently since they each mustered up the courage (ha!) to admit what they’d both been feeling so long, sometimes for more active pursuits and sometimes… just for this, as she leans her side against his body, her arm snaking around his shoulders, her chin coming to rest atop his head. It’s easy enough to set things down, to wrap his own arms around her and to breathe out a long breath. Vex’s presence is a soothing one and all his coiled up anxiety tends to evaporate when they’re like this, wrapped around each other with nothing else to focus on.
He hears Vex’s hum before her words, a lovely rich vibration full of gentle amusement.
“Tary said you’ve spent the day in here,” she says. “That you didn’t even emerge for lunch or dinner; just asked for sandwiches to be brought to you.”
“Some projects are more challenging than others,” he admits, leaning back and returning his lenses to their usual configuration, so Vex’s face is no longer grotesquely magnified. “And while I didn’t want to disappoint you, I also didn’t want to get distracted from the project as I would if I left it. There are much easier tasks I could have done, but-”
Vex’s raised eyebrow is a question on its own, and he reaches to take one of her hands in his, to interlink their fingers.
“D’you know about Peacemaker’s Day?” he asks. “Or- if you were reading the books, it might be down as Peacemaker’s Pledge-”
“Melora and Erathis had a spat over whether the town was taking too much from the forest,” Vex says. “The head of the hunt was tasked by Pelor to find a way to mediate as neither of the goddesses were interested in listening to him, even though the people were his people, and his sun had ripened the fruit Melora wished to keep only for the animals and the centaurs and not for the people of the city.”
“You remember how the whole debacle was resolved?” It’s one of his favourite stories, which his siblings had teased him over but then he’s always found the complicated methods of conflict resolution as interesting as rules lawyering and they’d accepted that reason just as much as the real reason. Honestly, he finds it rather romantic.
“Neither goddess felt appreciated by the other,” Vex said. “And neither goddess would listen to Pelor or the head of the Grey Hunt - but they’d listen to their worshippers. So the head of the Grey Hunt journeyed from the city to the woods, and asked the centaurs what songs they sang to praise Melora and taught them to the people of Whitestone. And then, they asked the congregation of Erathis what songs they sang to the Lawbearer, and taught those songs to the centaurs.”
She pauses and glances at him but he just nods, asking her to continue. He knows the story off by heart, of course, but it’ll help if Vex knows it all the way through. Besides, he likes to hear her tell it.
“And at the brink of the city,” Vex continues. “The two groups met and sang the songs for the other’s god. Surprised by the calls from followers not their own, the goddesses looked through the Divine Gate to see one another’s followers appealing to the other’s god - after all, there was more fruit than the centaurs and animals of the forest could eat and it would be wasted without the people of the city, and there were more people of the city than the fields alone could sustain. The two existed best in symbiosis, each tending each other and that was why the Grey Hunt existed and why Pelor had sought to intervene.”
Vex lets out a breath and then continues. “There’s still an oddly-shaped pillar out at the edge of the forest, it’s worn as hell, I can’t make out any inscription it’s so old, but everyone says that it was a stone axe placed there by Erathis and then the moss and flowers grew around it because of Melora, but neither was there to damage the other, a sign of the peace they pledged to maintain.” Finished, she looks down at him. “And storytime was required because…?”
“Local festival,” he says. “With local traditions.” Carefully he moves his legs, nudging her to turn and look at his desk. It’s not complete complete, but honestly he’d be up all night if he was trying to clear every speck of dust from it or smooth every rough ridge. Besides, some degree of natural form is encouraged, not meant to be as ordered as a city nor as wild as the forest but somewhere in between.
Slowly, Vex picks up the brooch.
“Wood isn’t exactly my usual medium,” he admits. “And I’ve been hiding the practice attempts from you by throwing the mistakes in the furnace. But that’s what I’ve managed.”
The wood is the same honey-gold shade of brown as her skin in spring, paler than it is now after picking up a tan through the summer. It’ll darken over the years, with oil and wax to keep it polished, with sweat and rain and probably, knowing them, blood or some other horrible thing, but he wanted a colour that would complement Vex, and that wouldn’t stand out from her Hunt leathers.
“Oh,” she says quietly.
“It’s a pledgepiece,” he says, reaching up to tuck back a loose lock of hair. “Traditionally people who feel they need to will make something to represent a promise that they’re making to a loved one. This one is for you.” He sighs. “I imagine next years is going to be Cassandra’s. I’m helping with the Council, but I suspect that’s not enough. But I have the year to figure out what is wrong and what I need to do-”
“What’s the promise?” Vex asks. Her voice is quiet, a gentle interruption of his ramble and he doesn’t mind, given he’ll ramble long enough if she lets him.
He reaches out a hand again, to tuck back that loose strand that keeps escaping, before letting his hands drop to her hips where she rests comfortably on his lap.
“We discussed it before,” he says quietly. “The ways in which I was hurting you, my terrible timekeeping - and I am sorry about today, I was hoping to have it done for dinner but then I split the last attempt completely in half, and if I wasn’t done in the next ten minutes I would have headed up regardless-”
“I know,” she says. There’s a smile on her face and he can hear the fondness in her voice. He nods at the brooch.
“It’s my pledge to keep those promises I made you,” he says. “I know we promised already and we have-” his hand goes to where the ring rests against his breastbone. He nods at the brooch again. “But I wanted something else, something specifically for the timekeeping promises. If you look-”
Vex’s thumb traces over the design of the brooch: the progression of seasons, as carved by someone without much practice carving. Daffodils, a summer sun, an autumn leaf and ear of grain, and three snowflakes for winter.
“And it’s not metal,” he adds. “So you can wear it when you’re out on a hunt; it won’t reflect light and get you noticed. It felt… right, that you have a pledgepiece you can take with you out there, given the tradition’s origin.”
Vex’s weight is perhaps getting a little heavy on his lap. He finds he doesn’t mind when, damply, she wraps him in a hug and holds him tight.