They were sellswords, that was their life.

It had been their life before they’d met and it was the only reason they had ever crossed paths in the first place.

***

Leo had found in him on a battlefield.

Another faceless lord, a mass of faceless soldiers, hired to combat the right to a land that a faceless enemy also claimed. The conflict was petty and meaningless but they paid in gold and that was all Leo had ever needed to draw his sword.

The day after his own temporary lord’s victory had been attainted was also the day that Leo had chosen to take his leave of that company, purse heavy with the worth of the lives he’d slain. It was as he had neared the edge of the battlefield—a small clearing in a woody area now stained with the blood of enemies and comrades alike—that he first heard him.

It was faint, barely heard above the rustling of the wind through the trees around him, but it was there.

Leo had turned to the source of sound and his eyes had come upon what he had at first assumed was a corpse on the ground, camouflaged to the careless eye by the deep shadows the trees around it cast.

But it was not a corpse because it still drew breath—a weak, raspy thing—but enough to have caught Leo’s attention.

The stranger did not wear the uniform of his lord’s regular soldiers nor was he any of the mercenaries that were hired alongside Leo; one of the enemy then, and also a foreign sellsword, as his hands were bereft of the swirling tattoos the native people of this area sported.

The enemy had lain on his stomach, head turned towards Leo so that his cheek lay in the dirt, hands splayed out around him limply. His sword had been within reachable distance of one, but if he could have physically reached it, he would have by then. There was a ragged gash on his back, from right shoulder blade to left hip and it had soaked the dark blue cotton of his robe to an even darker shade with blood.

His hair was an ashy grey, his eyes an even brighter shade of, and they locked onto Leo’s with a stunning ferocity even as he lay dying.

They had stared at each other for a long while, piercing gray pinning Leo into an unusual hesitance.

The soon to be corpse’s breath had counted down the seconds in ragged repetitions of rasping sighs as Leo had come to a decision.

He had begun walking towards the man, who the entire time followed him with his gaze until he was knelt before him. Then they’d locked eyes again, the stranger’s grey ones shining with something until they closed finally, seeming resigned to the fate he no doubt believed Leo, an enemy, was bound to give him.

Instead, Leo had spoken.

“The powder I sprinkle on your wound will bring you much pain but it will stop the bleeding. Afterwards I will put leaves in your mouth, eat them, they will pull you into slumber and you will need to be asleep when I lay you across my horse or the pain of it would doubtless shock you into unconsciousness anyways. There’s a healer in a town half a day away, if you make it to the town you might live.”

Grey eyes had startled open, staring up at Leo and not quite believing; it wasn’t until Leo had indeed sprinkled a powder on his wound and the man’s breath had hitched in agony that he seemed to truly believe what Leo had just said. He’d eaten the leaves Leo had given him willingly, if agonizingly slow.

Leo had picked him up and laid him on his horse as he’d promised, grabbed his former enemy’s sword from the ground, and had begun making his way towards town.

***

He would tell Ravi (his name being the first thing he’d spoken to Leo when he’d woken up at the healer’s home) much later on that it was his eyes that had persuaded him to save him.

Even as he had lain wounded, Ravi’s eyes had been alive and ferocious, clinging to life even as death crept closer and closer to him.

Despite his profession (or maybe because of) Leo valued life above all else, and seeing Ravi’s eyes hungry for life was what had made him want to do anything he could to keep the man alive.

***

He did not know what compelled him to stay in the town as Ravi recovered, but he had, and when Ravi had been well enough to leave the healer’s home, he had gone straight to Leo and bowed on knees and hands, sword laid at Leo’s feet.

“You have spared and saved my life, that is a debt I cannot repay but I choose to give my life to you now as an attempt to. You may do with it as you wish.”

Leo had responded after a stretch of silence.

“I am a sellsword; I render my service for those who can pay for it. I expect you to draw your sword for whatever cause I may draw my own.”

Ravi had bowed deeper and answered.

“My life had been much the same before, it will not change much.”

***

It would be years later and on the same day that Leo willingly took a blade for Ravi, sword biting deep into the flesh of his shoulder, that Leo gave him his life back.

Ravi had been quick to take down his would be assailant as Leo had fallen to the ground, sword arm dangling bloody and useless at his side.  

It’d only taken a few moments as Leo had knelt in the dirt, teeth grit against the throbbing pain at his shoulder, for him to realize that he hadn’t exactly thought his actions through. He was an easy target now, a liability on the battlefield, and he honestly hadn’t known what he was supposed to do next, but Ravi had, apparently.

He’d stood guard over Leo’s bleeding form, riding out the battle as best as he could from his single position, defending both himself and the crippled Leo behind him.

It was when the battle had finally ended and Ravi had dragged him semi-conscious to a medic tent that Leo had grabbed his arm in a steel grip and told him that he was free, that at that moment Leo gave him his life back.

He stayed conscious enough to see Ravi nod and then he’d let darkness take over him.

***

When he woke Ravi was still there, sitting vigil alongside his sleeping roll.

“You saved my life as I saved yours, your debt has been repaid, you may do with your life as you wish now.”

“And I wish to live it alongside you, if you would permit it.”

“I would.”

(What Leo left unspoken was that Ravi’s freedom had more to do with the fact that Leo had been completely willing to die for him than it had to do with any repayment of debt.)

***

It was not a long while later that Ravi found himself in Leo’s bed.

It was not that much of a surprise. Leo had seen the way Ravi had looked at him sometimes, a different kind of hunger in his eyes, and he knew it was well reflected in his own.

It was also not uncommon, companions in arms seeking comfort in each other when they did not linger in any place long enough to foster any other relationships. It was especially common in the type of relationship Leo and Ravi had had before, as master and subordinate.

It had been an unspoken thing between them but when Ravi had given his life to Leo, he’d given his body as well, as a weapon, as a shield, as everything his master wished it to be. But Leo had never claimed that and Ravi had never offered, despite what his eyes said, and for that Leo was grateful.

That they had lain together for the first time— panted breaths lost to the rustling of the night around them, slick against each other as they lost themselves to pleasure—only after Leo had set Ravi free meant Ravi gave his body because he wanted to give it, not because he felt he owed it.

***

Leo had known—had always known—that the life of a sellsword was the only life he was fit to live.

He was cruel and cold and efficient in battle, he was not suited for anything else but the taking of lives and he would live that life until the day it claimed his. He had made peace with that fact long ago.

But Ravi was different, he was warm.

Leo did not know what it was that had led Ravi to the life of a mercenary and in their years together Ravi had never chosen to reveal why.  

Despite this Leo knew that one day Ravi would give it up, that one day they would arrive at a town and that when it was time to leave, Leo would be the only one to walk away because he did not know how to live any other way.

But Leo would not, could not, begrudge him that, not ever.

Ravi had a chance at a life, and Leo would not take that away from him, even if he knew that the day he walked away from Ravi would be the day his eyes turned to stone.

Ravi might share a bed with him, might gaze at him with fondness in his eyes sometimes, but Leo was too cold for someone that radiated the warmth of the sun.

Ravi would realize that one day, that if he stayed with Leo his heart would eventually turn as cold as his.

***

That day came sooner than Leo had ever hoped it wouldn’t.

It was a town, as Leo had pictured, and it was a girl, as Leo had dreaded.

They had been paid handsomely for their last job and they had temporarily settled down in a sizable town for a few months’ time, waiting for news of war and strife—the calling cards of their profession—before they set out into the world again.

In this town there was a young woman a year or two younger than them, a girl named Lily.

She was a girl who sold flowers at the market and one who Ravi had befriended when he’d stopped a thief from taking off with her stall’s earnings one day soon after they’d first arrived.

She was a girl who was just as warm as Ravi, all easy smiles and bright eyes.

She was the reason Leo saw Ravi leave for the market more and more often, arms full of fresh bought flowers when he would eventually make his way back to their small rented room. She was who Ravi would accompany to help collect flowers from far off fields and meadows, as much for the added protection that a swordsman would bring on a long journey—as Ravi insisted—as it was just for the pleasure of her company.

With each passing day Leo saw the life Ravi could lead start to appear before his eyes.

A wife, the respectable living of a merchant…children.

Leo felt himself grow colder and colder with each day that they lingered in that town and when news finally reached his ears of warring lords a couple months’ travel away, he felt icy relief coupled with dread wash over him even as he resolved not to inform Ravi of what he’d heard.

***

It was a few days later that Leo decided he would leave.

As cold as he was already, he would be the one to bid Ravi farewell, to part ways, because if he had to be the one to listen to Ravi choose a life that did not include him in it he was certain his heart wouldn’t just turn to ice, it would crack into pieces as well. That was not something he ever wanted Ravi to witness.

So he’d strengthened his resolve, and it was just as the sky had begun darkening into twilight on the completion of their fourth month in town that Leo had laid his sword by his side and bowed on knees and hands to Ravi, just as Ravi had done all those years before.

“My path is that of a sellsword, it always has been, but now I see that your path is that of sellsword no longer; your path leads here, to this town, to Lily and to the life you can have with her. I wish you the happiest life and it is here that I choose to part ways with you and thank you for the time we have spent together. It has been my greatest honor to fight alongside you as a companion and if there is but one thing I do not regret in my life, it was choosing to save you all those years ago.”

The silence had stretched on and despite himself Leo had not been able to stop from glancing up.

Ravi was furious before him, grey eyes reflecting enough anger and rage to startle Leo out of his bow. It was as he had flinched back in surprise that Ravi had lunged at him, grabbing him by the lapels of his robe and all but sneering into his face.

“I did not know that my affection for you meant so little as to be discarded so easily.”

Leo was frozen, stunned into silence by the words that tumbled out of Ravi’s mouth.

“Yes, I love Lily—as the sister that was ripped away from me long, long ago, but it is you who I had already decided my path led to years ago, you who I said I would choose to live alongside, and you who I had believed chose the same—yet you bow to me and tell me that it is here you choose to part ways, to leave—I pledged my life to you out of debt and when you set me free I gave it back to you willingly, now tell me! Do I mean so little to you that you could walk away from me so easily! Did I always mean so little? Was I just a warm body to in the lone traveling’s of a sellsword! Was that all this ever was!”

Leo had gaped, incredulous, because what Ravi was saying, it was all he’d ever dreamed and all he’d ever feared, but his silence must have lasted too long because Ravi’s eyes went from the blistering heat of anger to the sharp edge of hurt.

His hands had loosened their white knuckled grip on Leo and he had jerked away only to have Leo barrel back into him with enough force to knock them both to the ground.

Leo’s next words were mumbled into Ravi’s chest as he lay atop him, tears he hadn’t shed in years staining the front of Ravi’s robe dark.

“My life is yours. My life has been yours. Since before I gave you your freedom I knew—it’s just that—I thought—someone as cold as I am, you can’t be with someone like me, you shouldn’t be—the only life I know is that which takes other lives and I know you can have something different—but I didn’t want to leave—I don’t want you to leave— but I—why would you ever choose me—I—”

Ravi’s arms had come up and around him then, almost straining in how tightly they clung to Leo, and in a voice that was ragged with emotion he said,

“I choose to give my life to you, willingly, it will forever be yours.”

Leo had not been able to stop the tears that still continued to fall from his eyes, nor had he been able to completely quell the feeling that this was wrong that it was too good for someone like him—but if Ravi chose him now, if Ravi felt he could choose someone like him, then he would choose too.

With a shaky smile he responded.

“Then I give you mine as well.”