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[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
A Hillside, to the South of the Rose

There was an odd sharp smile on Gideon’s face; Aremu did not, this time, take it personally. He was drained and sore; he did not much care if it was meant to be a threat. Even the worst depths of his mind could not dredge up the man hurting him now.

Aremu snorted. “You’re welcome,” he said. His left hand was aching, soundly, worse with each tug, but finally the knot came loose, and he could undo the rope. He’d been about a second from cutting it through with his knife. There were indents left in his pants, cramped spots where it had pinched into his hips as well, although it was very little compared to the brutal ache in his shoulders and the tightness all down his back.

He tossed the rope off to the side, leaving Gideon to undo his as well, if he cared to.

Aremu scooted back, slowly; he closed his eyes, and lay back in the grass at the edge of the cave, feeling the warmth of the sun on his face and upper body. The wind was startlingly cold, a Dentis breeze whisked in off the Tincta Basta. He grinned, breathing it in, feeling all at once the prickling chill and the heat of the sun; it was solidly overhead still, although starting to dip down towards the horizon. He couldn’t have said how long they’d been in the cave, moments ago; it had felt like houses. He was startled to think, when he opened his eyes and squinted at the horizon, that it couldn’t even have been a full house.

Aremu groaned; he stretched himself out in the grass, and eased up, slowly. He ached, but it was a good, fulfilled sort of ache; it was the sort of ache that would heal with a night or two of rest, and perhaps a bath. He was not fond of them, as a general rule, but just now the thought of being immersed in hot water was astoundingly pleasant.

Aremu propped one leg up, rubbing his face with his hand once more, and glanced at Gideon again, then away. He found a hold on the rocks on top of the small slit in the ground – from even a short distance, he thought, it would be all but invisible – and levered himself up to his feet with a pained grunt. He stumbled, slightly, and straightened himself up, all the bones in his back cracking and popping with the motion.

Aremu rubbed the back of his neck, glancing around. They’d come a good distance inland, but not so far he couldn’t see the Mahogany, and the curve of it around the edges of the Rose. It would be a long walk back, but not unbearably long; he was tired at the thought of it, but grateful too – grateful to be upright and squinting in the pale winter sun.

“Are you heading back to the Rose?” Aremu asked, glancing down at Gideon. He felt oddly – he would not particularly have been sorry to part ways with the other man, but that he wanted to see it through. They had come this far together; he was not sure why, quite, but it felt strange to leave him here, even now that they were out of the cave.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Later in the Afternoon
A Hillside, south of the Rose

Aww, see. Peregrine didn't need to say it after all, seeing as how Aremu heard it anyway. They were willing to consider that a victory. They sat for a moment more while Aremu untied all them knots. Everything was so sore, they didn't think it would hurt none to wait. After Aremu finished though they thought--yeah, best to undo their own too. Didn't want to wander back to the Rose all wrapped up in ribbon like some kind of birthday present, after all.

That was slow too, just like the climbing had been. A lot of the knots had pulled tighter with the weight of Gideon's body straining against them. Another disadvantage to having picked a face so godsdamn big, they thought. With size came weight, and everything else that went along with that. Gravity and such. Ah, well. There would be marks all over them, and bruises too. Peregrine couldn't say they minded overmuch, though they might could just change their mind tomorrow morning when it was all so much more painful.

Aremu was stretched out in the cold Dentis light like a cat in a sunbeam. Peregrine felt the salty-cold sea breeze before they felt the sun, emerging from that dark hole. Less enamored of the weather, but still proper pleased to be able to see the light and feel that whip of air against Gideon's face. Couldn't have said how long they'd been down in the dark; could have been minutes, or hours, or days. Of course it didn't help that Peregrine didn't seem to as properly remember what time it had been when they went in. Time was a slippery kind of thing, when you had infinite amounts of it like they did. Maybe not in the same face, but it weren't the face that mattered so much, hey? Skin-deep and all that.

Now that they were out and standing, Peregrine found themself just a bit curious on where it was "out" had put them. Same as they couldn't have judged the time, so too they couldn't have said how far in, up, or down the cave and tunnel had been. Could have been anywheres. It weren't likely to be too far from ol' Ring-Around-the-Rosie, though. Didn't do you no good to have to haul all them smuggled goods too far, hey? They craned their neck around, and yeah--yeah. They could still see it, that city all teeming with bodies and secrets. Not too far at all.

They licked their lips; Gideon's mouth was dry and cracked, somehow. Probably all their wandering about in the salt air before they'd even gone squirming in the dark. Had to remember this happened, with faces. Didn't want to ruin a pretty one by taking poor care of it, after all. Pretty faces needed love and tenderness and all that, or they wouldn't as stay so nice for long. Peregrine rooted around suddenly in a pocket and found the little tin of ladies' salve they carried around. Smelled like roses and everything; good shit, for taking care of Gideons.

Aremu's question came just as they'd touched a finger to their mouth to spread it around. They turned it over in their mind. The cold light of the sun cleared their head some; they found as thoughts came more easily than they had. Did Aremu want them to walk back together, then? Well weren't that just so sweet. Peregrine knew stressful experiences could be a sort of bonding ritual; they grinned up at Aremu.

"Sure am," they said, more cheerful than they'd felt in a house. Or however long it had been since they realized they'd have to crawl through some crammed little rabbit burrow so as ever to see the light again. "Wouldn't mind no company, neither." Bonding--Peregrine weren't so great with friends, but they'd made them stranger ways. And a good number of them had wanted to run them clean through, too. Usually after the friendship part, but they weren't picky.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
A Hillside, to the South of the Rose

Standing felt good; standing felt very good. Even standing upright at the base of the wall had felt cramped, somehow. It was as if the darkness all around had seeped into the weight on his shoulders, had cramped his spine even as the press of the crawling tunnel had diminished. Aremu breathed deep; he arched his back, cracks and pops sounding down the length of it once more, and leaving him slightly sore and feeling considerably more limber.

It was, too, the ability to expand his lungs – to feel as if he could breathe deeply without panic, without fear of wasting oxygen. He had known, consciously, from the brush of the breeze in the cavern, that the air would not run out for them on the endless journey through the dark. All the same, there had been a constraint to each breath in the time that had passed; on the climb up, his breath had been focused and careful, and even since he had used it to pull, to lift, to focus.

Now there was nothing to do but breathe, to taste the tangy salt of the seawater in the air and feel the shine of the sun on his face. He let it shine through him; the air was all dry wintry coldness, not like the damp thickness of the cave below. Aremu didn’t look at his coat, or the knees of his pants, or his sleeves; whatever dirt he had ground in could be removed, in time, and if it could not, they were only clothing – as sorry as he would be to lose the coat, as much as it had meant to him, he would set it aside, if he needed to.

Gideon grinned again; it wasn’t the most pleasant grin, Aremu thought, but he had stopped seeing nightmares and shadows behind it. In the cool, clear, winter light, he could make out all the hard planes of the other man’s face; the dark tousled hair; the eyes which, admittedly, he did not quite want to meet, although he couldn’t have said why; and the tired bruises beneath them, dark stained purple like a bruise.

Aremu did meet Gideon’s eyes. He nodded at the other man’s suggestion of company. The tunnel seemed like a distant memory; if Gideon was willing to look past his threats, he thought he could look past the other man’s panic. As angry as he had felt, then and later – that, too, had seemed to fade, slipping through his grasping fingers like water or sand. It was often that way, Aremu thought, with anger; he couldn’t seem to hold it, no matter how well he wanted to. He understood, he thought, so much of that which made him angriest, and that understanding doused the sharp fire of fury all too well.

“Right,” Aremu said. He stretched once more; he almost hesitated, but in the end, he did it. Both arms reached up overhead; he grabbed hold of his right wrist with his left hand, pulling gingerly, and groaned faintly at the release of the pressure in his back. The other way was harder, but he was not ashamed; he pressed the stump of his wrist into his left hand, and pushed, firmly, with the ease of learned practice, and felt, too, the knots in the right side of his back loosen.

Aremu lowered his arms; he shook them out, and rolled his shoulders, tilting his head from side to side slowly and evenly. There was stiffness and pain in his neck, too; there was, he thought wryly, stiffness and pain everywhere. He welcomed it; he was alive, and he could stand upright and feel it sweep through him, and it was good, clean pain. He sat back down; he pulled his shoes on, one after the other, and held the laces still with his right wrist as his left hand did the work. It was easier for the stretching; his hand was sore, as well, but not insurmountably. He knew his constraints; he knew, too, when they could not be yielded to.

“This way, I think,” Aremu rose again, not bothering to dust the new dirt off his pants. He turned himself towards the Rose; he was pricklingly aware of Gideon at his back, but he did not look back again, or settle his hand on his belt, or anywhere near the cool knife still tucked against his spine, but started ahead.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Later in the Afternoon
A Hillside, south of the Rose

The grin didn't seem as to quite want to leave their face. That was alright with them though--seemed as though Aremu had adjusted to it. Didn't cringe or nothing at any road, which was plenty good enough for them. Sometimes they got a little tired of folks skittering away from their smiling face. Weren't nothing they could do about it in any sense.

They clambered up all the way to join Aremu, keeping just a bit of distance. Respectful-like, you see? Didn't want to get in the man's way while he was stretching out. Gideon's tall frame groaned and creaked as Peregrine did the same. They thought, on account of how Aremu was so sensitive about the hand, it was better to turn just slightly away. They didn't want as to upset him already, yeah? Just crawled out of that dark pit, and they didn't want to go back in it just as yet.

Peregrine had half a mind to leave their shoes off, watching Aremu put his own back on. They wiggled their toes thoughtfully. Nah. Nah, it was too cold and too sharp for that. The Rose was a long way back. Their room a longer way still. With a sigh, they put their shoes back on too. Their socks were a little damp from walking over the ground; the constant annoyance was a nice reminder they hadn't been buried in that pit after all. While they tied their laces, Peregrine resumed their tuneless humming.

Aremu rose before Peregrine had quite finished tying their boots back on. Turned his back on them, even, which made their grin stick even harder. All that panic had made them fair giddy now that they were out in the cold light of the day. They stood and took a moment to dust themself off. Didn't help much, but it felt good to do. More the form of the thing than the function, right? Yeah. Lots of stuff was like that, they thought. Most of the stuff Peregrine did every day, in fact. Far more form than function.

"Leavin' me behind already?" they called out, but weren't worried none. Gideon's long legs, those gawky limbs what made crawling through the cave so difficult, ate up the ground between them fast enough. They didn't remain at Aremu's back but fell rather easily into a pace by his side, sometimes roaming forward and then falling back again. Humming all the while. Happy as a clam. A clam in high tide, they thought. A free clam.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
A Hillside, to the South of the Rose

There wasn’t anything like a trail through the thick yellow winter grass of the hillside. It rose up to something like mid-calf on Aremu, for the most part, thin enough on the ground that it was easy enough to walk through it, to spot the occasional rocks or dips in the ground which might have proved difficult.

If this spot was used still, then Aremu supposed they had missed some sign of a trail at the entrance to the cliff. He did not mind; the last thing they needed today was to actually encounter the smugglers. Being a Brother was not always enough – and, sometimes, hard to prove – and if they were out in the day, it would likely be because it was something important, and something they didn’t want interrupted.

The wind whistled off the cliffs and through the grass; it chilled whatever scraps of bare skin it found, and Aremu was particularly conscious of it on his head and cheeks. He wasn’t ashamed of having sweat during his own climb up the cliff and the effort of hauling Gideon up after him; both tasks had been effortful, and he was still sore all through. But the prickling of drying sweat on his skin was unpleasant, to say the least, when the cold air brushed it.

The wind ruffled Gideon’s dark hair along with the grass, brushing it over his sharp cheekbones. The other man sped up again, then relaxed his pace; his humming caught on the wind, odd and tuneless and flat.

They walked on; the ground rolled, down from the crest where the cave had spat them back out, and then up once more, a slow, steady trudge. The Rose dropped out of sight beneath the curve of the hill, although Aremu knew, still, where it was.

Next to him, Gideon’s humming fell still, the other man breathing a bit more deeply. Aremu shifted, unsure; he hadn’t heard anything that, to him, sounded like the end of a song. But the silence lasted a moment or two more.

Aremu ran his tongue over dry lips, and began to whistle. It wasn’t something he’d have learned as a boy, but anyone who worked in shipyards knew the power of a good, sharp whistle; once he’d learned to make noise at all, it hadn’t been hard to figure out how to modulate it, with the pinching of his lips, the shaping of his cheeks and mouth. He’d never had much in the way of a knack for music, nor a particularly good voice, but he could find the thread of a tune recognizably well.

He whistled a tune he’d learned from one of the Mugrobi shipmates aboard the Eqe Aqawe, a quick, upbeat thing. He’d asked if it’d had words, once, and the man had laughed, and told him the wind didn’t need words. He’d remember it all the better for that, and the whistling of the wind had brought it to mind.

Aremu wound it down after a few moments; he ran his tongue over his lips, and glanced sideways at Gideon, not sure in the least what to expect on the other man’s face – nor if he expected anything at all.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Later in the Afternoon
A Hillside South of the Rose

Winter wind lashed against every little bit of exposed skin Peregrine had, picked up the halo of dark curls and whipped it against their face. It was fair benny, after being underground. And to think, Peregrine had been so close to having to cut their own throat and bleed Gideon out! They made the careful mental note: next time they went crawling around in a filthy rabbit warren, make the bleeding their face dry Plan B. Possibly even Plan C. Sometimes it helped to have a little optimism, yeah?

They hadn't done it, and they was fair grateful to Aremu for being so aggrieved with them as to make them climb out of the cavern. That was a messy business. Much better to be out here in the thin winter sun, ranging through the dead grass. Peregrine weren't being as too careful, so they stumbled into every little hole and divot that came in front of them. Nearly tripped on their face a few times, but even that weren't enough to kill that happy-clam mood they was in. Kept up their humming, and it seemed as like the wind was humming along with them.

Eventually though they had to stop the humming, even if the wind kept up its accompaniment. Just too hard to keep doing it while letting those easy strides get a little less easy. They felt restless, but a different kind than what had drawn them out to the cliffs in the first place. Just a clean desire to use muscles they'd thought to say goodbye to forever. Besides, they'd as forgotten what song they were humming along to somewhere in the middle. Could have asked Aremu if he knew, but most folks had a poor impression of Peregrine's ability to carry a tune. Matter of taste, they thought. Likely.

Peregrine had gone a little ways ahead, even though there weren't no path and the Rose had passed out of their sight for a time. Now they fell back again and stayed there, in step with Aremu. The man hadn't said nothing to them the whole walk, and Peregrine hadn't neither. Seemed like a companionable semi-silence, yeah? Leastaways it did to Peregrine, and they were lots of things--liar, living corpse, handsome face--but they weren't no mind-reader so they were happy to assume similar feeling in absence of any evidence to the contrary.

The whistling, then, was unexpected. Picking up where Peregrine left off, carrying along with the wind in the grass. Peregrine had let their expression grow slack again--too much effort to keep it up all the time--but the whistling brought the smile back to their face.

"That's it! That's the song I was trying to find. Leastaways I think so--fair forgot in the middle there somewheres. And in the beginning, for a while." They tried to hum along, and this time they could hear they weren't as doing it right. The humming dissolved into a short, dry laugh. "Maybe best left to the experts, yeah?" Peregrine ran a hand through their hair, still smiling.

"You a sailor, then? Or was ye?" They were curious now--hadn't managed to ask Aremu no questions about himself in the dark of the cave. Except about the hand, which he seemed fair sore about. Peregrine didn't look at him, not quite, but they didn't lope ahead like they had been neither. Kept their pace steady with the shorter man. Enjoying all that winter sunshine, all that shit.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
Another Hillside, to the South of the Rose

Gideon’s face had been entirely hard when Aremu had started whistling; for a long few moments, it had stayed that way, and he started to think he had made a mistake. He’d thought – he wasn’t sure what he’d thought. But maybe Gideon’s humming had been for his own amusement, and he hadn’t wanted Aremu intruding. He wasn’t exactly sure why he kept at it; there was some part of him that didn’t want to break the song off in the middle.

You started it, he wanted to protest, half-defensive.

Then Gideon smiled.

Aremu wasn’t sure if his smiles had gotten less alarming, exactly. All of Gideon’s teeth seemed to show when he smiled, and there was something which… he couldn’t have said, but it made him hesitant to meet the other man’s gaze once more. He did, though, even though Gideon’s eyes were dark and bruised looking, the sharper afternoon light doing the darkness on his face no favors.

The same song; Aremu wondered if he’d guessed, subconsciously. He certainly hadn’t known; he hadn’t thought that was what Gideon was humming, and he didn’t think he could have identified it. The other man hummed through a bit more of it and lost the melody again, but kept his smile.

Aremu grinned, and whistled the phrase once more, lightly. His lips were dry, and a bit cracked; the whistling pulled at them, somewhat unpleasantly, but he could set it aside.

“Of a sort,” Aremu said; his right wrist found the pocket of his coat, and slid inside, out of sight. He hadn’t thought of it much, this last little way, walking and whistling; it wasn’t as if Gideon didn’t know, by now, what he lacked and what he had both. “I was on an airship,” he added. He’d never have named it; if the Eqe Aqawe had been flying, and Aremu with it, he wouldn’t have named it.

But he wasn’t flying anymore, and neither was the Eqe Aqawe; there was no more Eqe Aqawe, not metaphorically but very literally; the shards of the engine he’d lovingly rebuilt with his own two hands were scattered, burned and twisted and melted, at the bottom of the Tincta Basta.

“Not for a few years,” Aremu added. He wasn’t sure why; he wasn’t smiling anymore, either. He glanced away from Gideon, the sunlight streaming over the planes of his face; he looked out at the grass, watching the waves of it roll in the wind. He’d never thought to ask where the other man had learned the song; he’d no idea where to find Kere now. He’d left rather than become a Brother. He could imagine the man a sailor; Kere had known how to keep his balance in the midst of the worst storms.

Aremu cleared his throat; he glanced back at Gideon. “And you?” He asked. “Did being a sailor take you to Mugroba?” How long ago had Gideon said he’d been there? It couldn’t have been two decades; he didn’t think Gideon had more than two and a half in him. He supposed he could have gone there as a boy, but – bhe. Aremu wasn’t sure.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Mid-Afternoon
Another Hillside, to the South of the Rose

Well weren't this nice, all smiles and whistling. The mood now was so different from down in the caves, Peregrine was of half a mind to think they'd made it all up. Were it not for the itch of the sweat dried on their brow and the dirt on their knees, they'd have believed exactly that. Certainly wouldn't have been the first time for something like that. Usually didn't involve other folks, when Peregrine weren't able to tell what was real and what was imagined. Usually, but not always.

"An airship," Peregrine repeated thoughtfully, and then nodded. Sharp, jerky movement, like all the others. No part of Gideon ever moved quite right, it seemed. They hadn't had so many problems with other faces; seemed as though Gideon were just ornery. They supposed this happened, from time to time. You never did know. Weren't like Peregrine had ever met another Peregrine before, so if there were rules to being one nobody had told them.

Airships weren't something Peregrine had much been on. They knew, couldn't have said how but they knew, oes, that something about them could make spells go funny. Not always, nah, not reliably neither. Seemed to depend on lots of factors, yeah? Miles in the air seemed a bad time as to discover that this was one of them factors. They were content to stick to land and sea, leaving sky for other kinds of birds.

The thought--a flightless Peregrine--made them smile; almost they thought to tell Aremu. But then they remember as the Peregrine bits were on the inside, and Aremu didn't know what they were. All he saw was Gideon. So Peregrine kept his trap shut.

"Nah--maybe? Don't rightly remember." Peregrine didn't frown, seemed too much effort, but they furrowed their brow slightly as they thought. Had they been a sailor first, or in Mugroba first? How had they gotten there? Who had they been before? The details were blurred and seemed like they just got blurrier the harder Peregrine tried to grasp at them. Tricksy little things, memories, when you had so many of them.

In the end they shrugged, giving the cause up for lost. "Been a long time, ent matter no more. Ship I was on sank anyways, while ago. Work the docks now." Peregrine rattled this off with the same ease they'd had when they talked about clams, or anything else. If they felt anything at all about the ship they'd once crewed, now somewhere at the bottom of the ocean, it was hard to tell. Even for them, they thought. Hadn't exactly liked each and every soul aboard that vessel, neither. Especially the ones what tried to throw them overboard.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Mid-Afternoon, 37 Dentis, 2719
Another Hillside, to the South of the Rose

Something inside Aremu crawled once more; he glanced away.

A shipwreck as a boy, he thought, slowly; that might explain a good deal. Strange, still, not to remember, but – everything about the other man was strange.

Aremu remembered, a long time ago, laughing about such things as if they might never touch him; he knew sailors amongst the Brothers who did not know how to swim, who said that a quick death by Hulali’s waters was better than a slow one starving and roasting beneath the sun. He knew others, grinning, who said that the advantage of airships was that no one survived a wreck.

Aremu could not remember if he had ever made such jokes. It would have helped to say, now, that he had not, that he would never have been so callous. He knew better; they all had. If he had not made them himself, he’d laughed at them, unknowing, unthinking. But if he’d thought, Aremu knew, he could never have flown.

There was an ache in the place where his right hand had once been, a throbbing, as if all the muscles were pressed tense. Aremu grimaced; he half-glanced at Gideon, then looked forward again. He eased his right arm from his pocket, slowly; he pushed his sleeve up, and his sweater sleeve too, revealing the scarred wrist and the long knife scar, more recently, which ran up his forearm. Carefully, Aremu dug his thumb and fingers into his arm, massaging lightly, as if he could find the place that would make the hand he no longer had relax.

A shipwreck as a boy, Aremu thought; if Gideon had been lucky, that would have been only a short while drifting beneath the sun and over the waves, alone or with other men as badly off as he had been, scanning the horizon with little hope of any sight there. He thought he could see it, if he tried; a small, wide-eyed boy, all hollow angles to his cheeks with a mop of dark hair, peeling beneath the sun and desperate for water.

He put it aside; he pressed a little harder into the muscles of his own arm, and let out an involuntary sort of grunt. Maybe it helped; he wasn’t sure, really. It didn’t hurt.

Aremu’d stopped walking; he hadn’t quite meant to. He started up again, catching Gideon’s longer strides with short, quick ones. He didn’t put his right wrist away, although he reached to unroll his sleeves once more; it wasn’t comfortable, having them bunched so.

“I don’t know much about the docks,” Aremu said. “I’m a mechanic or – close enough. Or I was, anyway.” He pulled down his sleeve, hiding the scarred stump of his wrist again; he didn’t look at Gideon, his jaw held tight; he swallowed, hard, forcing himself to relax.

[Peregrine]

37th of Dentis, 2719 - Mid-Afternoon
A Hillside South of the Rose

Peregrine hadn't thought much of their little story. Certainly didn't think Aremu would think much on it, neither. After all, they were very clearly alive and well--as far as Aremu knew. Most folks didn't as walk away from a shipwreck like that, but they hadn't even mentioned the storm. Every soul aboard drowned, as far as they knew. Every soul but one. There were certainly worse ways to go. Peregrine had experienced a few of them. Not many worse, they reflected, but some.

Peregrine stopped a little ahead, when they realized as Aremu hadn't kept on neither as that grunt had come from too far behind. He weren't smiling no more--well shit. Didn't that just figure? Peregrine ran a tongue over their teeth, trying to think as to what they'd said. Not remembering when they'd been a sailor, or in what sequence? Or had it been the shipwreck part? Couldn't be the bit where they worked the docks. Nah, nah--it was fair likely the drowning bit.

"Ent much to know," Peregrine reassured him, on account of how it seemed the decent thing to do. Or something? They didn't know. Seemed as though they kept making one step forward, and then two little skipping ones back. They snapped their teeth, thinking. Maybe this was how they didn't end up having many friends, no matter the face. They had to be better about remembering all the little rules--like not talking about shipwrecks, and probably their other deaths too.

Sometimes they didn't know as why they bothered trying. Seemed to always go sideways underneath their best efforts. Ah well. They'd keep at it, yeah? Sure.

"You ent one no more, then?" Peregrine looked down, curious. They'd seen that scarred up arm, where there weren't no hand. But they'd seen the man climb a wall and haul Gideon up it, too. Whatever they'd asked back there in the dark, it had been out of practical consideration of a person they didn't know well. "The hand?" Wait, shit, ah. Nah, weren't supposed to ask questions like that. Gideon would never ask questions like that. Weren't considerate, yeah? Their teeth gnashed again; they frowned, and then released the expression once more.

Well the question had been asked; weren't no way to un-ask it. Least no way Peregrine had found. Could cheat death, but couldn't cheat the forward march of time, yeah? Not yet, anyways. Life was long, especially for Peregrine. Could be as there was a way.