Fic: Starfire (April Fic Challenge)

[csi_sanders1129]

Title: Starfire
Chapters: 1/1
Author:csi_sanders1129
Ratings: K+
Word Count: 1115
Pairings/Characters: Farid, Dustfinger, Gwin
Synopsis: In which Farid is so very alone.
Comments: Written for my April Fic Challenge 2021, Prompt: Shower. Gen or Pre-Slash. Can technically follow my other Inkheart fic, Wildfire. Comments and kudos would be awesome. Enjoy!

Farid is so very alone.

Dustfinger's gone, read back into his own world, but that awful Cheeseface hadn't sent Farid back with him like he was supposed to, the way he'd promised Dustfinger he would when they'd made the deal. Farid had managed to get away from the wicked man before he could do anything more nefarious. He'd also managed to snatch away the book and the paper the bastard had written his own words upon and when he finally managed to puzzle out what the new words said, it became clear that it wasn't a mistake – Orpheus had never intended for him to go with Dustfinger at all.

And now, he is alone.

Alone, but for Gwin, who had been in Farid's bag when Dustfinger was read away, but the marten is of little help and rarely makes for good company.

Desperate, he seeks out Meggie and her silvertongued father – hoping that he can somehow convince the man to read him back to Dustfinger, fully intending to pester him until he gives in and agrees. He spends days, weeks, months looking for them, travels as far as he can and then farther still, but he cannot find them anywhere. Every lead he follows dead ends without a trace.

He is alone.

He is trapped in this strange, unfamiliar world that is neither the one in which he was born into or the one in which he feels he truly belongs. And while he is better at adapting to this one than Dustfinger had seemed, there are many aspects of it he is not at all prepared for. He bears out the cold of a lonely winter lurking on the edges of cities and towns. He puts on shows in the squares when he can, but he does not have Dustfinger's fire magic and he very rarely makes any coin that way. He finds other ways, none of them particularly pleasant – none much worse than the things he'd endured in his original world. When there are no other ways, he reverts to thievery, steals warmer clothes, boots, rations, whatever is needed to survive.

He steals some things that are not needed, as well – he slowly teaches himself to read proficiently on borrowed books until, eventually, he can read Inkheart, though he can never bring himself to read those last few pages even though he knows the story no longer ends that way. He steals pen and paper and tries to write his own words, ones that would send him to Dustfinger's side should the right person give voice to them.

Still, he is alone.

When spring finally comes, when it starts to get warmer, he bothers less and less with the towns, retreats into the woodlands and forests where he feels more at home. Or maybe just closer to Dustfinger. Same thing, really, he considers.

It's a night like any other night of late. Farid's settled in a small clearing in the woods. Having already caught and eaten his own dinner, Gwin circles around him, burrowing into the bag still slung over Farid's shoulder, content to sleep. Farid himself has caught a rabbit and it's roasting now on the small campfire he's built up. He has a small pile of forageable foods, too, plants and roots and berries that Dustfinger taught him were safe to eat. While he waits for the meat to cook, he lays back in the soft grass, staring up at the clear night sky, speckled with a seemingly infinite amount of stars.

They look like the same stars that were in the world Silvertongue read him out of. He'd stared up at them, then, too, on the chilly desert nights.

He wonders if they're the same stars in Dustfinger's world, as well.

He watches, awed and amazed, as one bright star streaks clear across the sky, leaving a glowing trail behind it. These, too, existed in his world, though he had never seen one there. He's read of them, here, as well, in some of the books he'd swiped from the cities over the long winter. In books about the world, where they were called meteor showers, and in the stories meant for children, where they were wished upon.

With nothing to lose, he wishes.

He wishes that he were watching this wondrous sight with Dustfinger, somewhere in the Wayless Wood.

If only it were that simple, he thinks, letting his eyes drift closed for just a moment before he goes to retrieve his dinner from the fire, before he lets himself try to sleep despite the ominous sounds of the forest, before he continues on this lonely mission to find where he belongs. If only…

If only.

When he opens his eyes again, he is still staring up at the star-filled sky, still lying in the soft grass of a clearing in the woods. There is still a fire flickering nearby, with some roasting meat cooking upon it. But something is different.

The trees are taller, older, ancient. The sounds are different – there are no far off car horns, the howls and hoots of the nighttime creatures aren't quite the same. The smells are different – there is still the earthy mix of old wood, fresh grass, wet dirt, but the smells of springtime differ to those he's grown used to. There is something in the air here that was absent before – something magical.

And there is a figure on the edge of the clearing. They are cast in shadow, but Farid is not afraid. Even from this distance, Farid can tell that they, too, are staring up at the night sky and he would recognize that familiar frame anywhere.

Dustfinger.

He jumps to his feet, and Gwin jumps from the bag, and the marten makes it to the man first.

"What?" Dustfinger wonders, looking down in confusion at Gwin's impossible presence here as the marten climbs up to settle on his shoulder, nibbling an ear in an eager greeting. "How-?"

And then he looks up.

And he sees Farid.

Dustfinger sighs in something beyond relief and opens his arms just in time to catch Farid in a close embrace. He holds tight to him for a long moment, and it seems that Dustfinger, too, is reveling in their reunion – the questions, the answers, those can wait. They have all the time in the world. "I was beginning to think," comes Dustfinger's achingly familiar voice against his neck, "that I'd lost you forever."

"Never," Farid swears to him. Nothing will ever keep him from Dustfinger for long. Not time or space or distance. Not different worlds. Not Cheeseface. Not the White Women. Not even death.

He will never be alone again.