Speared Upon the Wire

Arcaneverse Jayce Genfic // Currently Unfinished

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Cuckoo - Cuculus canorus : a long-tailed, medium-sized bird, typically with a grey or brown back and barred or pale underparts. Many cuckoos lay their eggs in the nests of small songbirds.

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Jayce did not think about birds. They weren’t useful to him, that isn’t to say they weren’t impressive, but they were more like a backdrop noise, something he heard growing up, and then not hearing when he moved to the academy. Birds, to Jayce, were like any creature really, interesting if you cared enough, and he didn’t care enough.

He might have cared enough when he was younger, before his mother almost died in the snow, before his life was saved and changed by a mage. But if he did care enough, he never brought it up. Not verbally at least.

If there were old books on birds shoved besides books on magic and runes, books with bent spines turned white and colorful tape keeping them together he didn’t talk about them, if there were pictures of a small Jayce, no older than 5 sat with his dad, pair of makeshift binoculars in hand he didn’t look at them.

Post it notes with messy annotations, the smudge of graphite caused by little fingers, frayed ribbon bookmarks and dusty pages littered his walls and shelves.

Jayce didn’t let himself look at their well loved spines for more than a second.

— • —

“I’ve never seen a bird before that wasn’t dead” it’s not a new way for Viktor to start a conversation, but it takes Jayce a few seconds to understand why he’s even said it in the first place (the first few seconds were spent reminding himself that he did not care about birds)

He’s holding a worn book about birds in his hands, there’s tape covered in flowers keeping part of the spine attached to the thin scrappy remainders of the rest of the paperback, and colourful drawings of shrikes and wrens on the front cover, obviously done by a child.

They’re shitty drawings.

“That’s… Surprising” well done Jayce, way to get your new lab partner to open up a little.

“The conditions down there aren’t that kind to them, is all. I did not know you liked birds, you never brought it up” He’s flicking through the book now, there are small post it notes attached on some of the pages, Jayce can barely make out the scruffy handwriting from where he’s stood next to his blackboard, they’re still using his blasted up room to work in, something about needing to safeguard their new lab, so they’re working on more of the theory work right now, making it more than Jayce’s half scrawled notes and messy technical drawings covered in stains from food.

“I don’t like birds.” He tries very hard to keep his voice level, to not let some hit of emotion slip through.

“Right, so you just have these books on your shelves because?” Viktor is looking at him now, brow furrowed a little.

Now he had lots of reasons for the shelves being littered with various bird books, none of them obviously would make much sense to Viktor. It would take lots of explaining he didn’t want to do right now, because he wanted to get back to neatly copying up his work in an understandable manner.

“It was easier to hide my arcana books if there were other books to set them apart” is what he ends up saying.

He wants Viktor to put the book down more than anything, if he was a stronger man he would just take it off him and place it back on the shelf Viktor found it from, but he’s not, so he stays firmly where he’s stood, staring intently at the beaten up book.

“Ah, that makes sense, these are lovely books after all.” Viktor says, like it doesn’t make sense and then shuts the book carefully, and smooths his hand over the cover as he says it.

Jayce doesn’t think the book is lovely at all, in fact, he doesn’t really much like the book at all, the drawings on the front mess with the actual illustration of a Marsh Warbler on the cover. Viktor gently sets it back on his bookshelf, and turns back to the work in front of him.

“Sure.” Is all Jayce says before turning back to his own scrawlings.

The rest of the afternoon passes quietly after that. The sounds of chalk against the blackboard, Viktor’s subconscious tapping of his foot and fingers against any surface he can reach, and the scratch of his pen against paper drowns out the birdsongs outside, blocks out the sight of the plump body of a pigeon that has made itself a home in the large gap in his wall.

Jayce couldn’t be more thankful for it.

— • —

Marsh Warbler - Acrocephalus Palustris : A small brown bird, the marsh warbler looks similar to the reed warbler, but it is whiter below, more olive above and has pale legs. It is notable for incorporating striking imitations of a wide variety of other birds into its song.

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“Can you see that one in the branches there? Look follow my finger” He’s startled slightly by the loud voice near his ear. Jayce had been happily staring at the cute little finch that had sat down on the railing eating the seeds left out there.

However, looking at a new bird was also very fun, so he did as the voice instructed, and followed to where it was pointing at a very fat nuthatch making its way down the tree trunk.

It was very hard to not slam his hands down onto the railing in excitement, but he didn’t want to scare the little finch, because he seemed to be enjoying his meal, and it might also scare the fat nuthatch, Jayce had never seen a nuthatch before, and if he scared it off by being too excited and careless he would be very upset, and would feel very bad about scaring it for the rest of the day.

The nuthatch was mostly down the trunk now, it’s strange little body making contact with the woodland ground, where it looked around for a second before snatching something off the ground, and making its way back up the tree again.

“That was cool” is the first thing he said after a few seconds, before scrambling to get his book, the hand passing him a heavily chewed pencil and a yellow tab of paper so he could scribble a few notes about the nuthatch onto it.

“Yeah? Well done on staying still, last time we saw something for the first time you yelled so loud your mother thought I’d thrown you into the trees'' The voice sounded amused, Jayce remembered that, they had seen a nightjar for the first time, it’s weird little face had opened its even weirder little beak, and he’d yelled so loud he’d scared it off, and felt terrible the whole day.

“Yea well! I didn’t this time. Because I’m good at this now, I’m an expert.” The last word gets stressed for a little too long, and the ex part sounds more like an es sound, but Jayce stands by what he has said. Because he’s very good at birdwatching now, he didn’t even make a noise when he saw the little nuthatch.

The voice only laughs before patting him on his back, slowly standing up and heading back into the building behind them.

“Wait wait! But! There’s more of them!” He doesn’t want to stop looking at the birds, he doesn’t want to stop writing things down about them, he’s having fun.

“And they’ll still be here when you look again tomorrow, there might even be new ones” Jayce cannot tell that the tone is meant to make him easier to convince, Jayce after all, is 5 and he’s actually a little tired, small hands coming up to rub at his eyes, smearing graphite onto his nose.

He follows the Voice back into the building, the smell of warm stew and fresh bread welcoming him inside,

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Nuthatch - Sitta europaea : The nuthatch is a plump bird about the size of a great tit. It is blue-grey above and whitish below, with chestnut on its sides and under its tail. It has a black stripe on its head, a long black pointed bill and short legs. They have the unusual ability to climb down trees head first, unlike other birds which can only go upwards.

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The snow is piling up outside their lab’s window, he can feel it seeping through the glass, marring his skin and mind, it’s hard to work when it’s cold, but it’s so white outside he can barely focus at all. Viktor is sat at a stool next to their blackboard, or he was the last time Jayce picked his head off the table and looked in the direction of the blackboard. There was a little Robin sat on top of the snow drift piled up next to their window, and Jayce had been intently looking at it for a good half an hour now, it’s red chest so bright in contrast to the bleak dull snow, like a beacon. It hadn’t sunk into the snow, it’s small body too light to make anything but footprints as it idly hopped around, trying to find something to eat in the drift.

Jayce wants to rip off a corner of the sandwich He’s got lying on his desk, the bread slightly stale from how long it’s been sat there, but he can’t move, the cold has seeped into his joints now, and its almost like they’re locked into place, hes stuck like this, head turned towards the snow, resting against his desk. His hands don’t respond when he tries to move them, which honestly makes things even worse, memories of blue tinted skin against dark snow keep rushing through his head, and he can hear the wind in his ears, it’s deafening, the storm curling in around him, making a place in his chest as he struggles to move.

And then there’s a weight on his back, and the storm calms a little, a long hand in his hair, just shifting the short strands on his head, before moving to his arms and rubbing them, heat quickly seeping back into his muscles, the wind has started to die down just a little, the lab isn’t as cold as it was a second ago.

“Jayce?” Viktors Voice is next to his ear, and it takes Jayce a few seconds to realise that viktor has draped himself over Jayce’s back,his hands are rubbing up and down his arms and there’s a blanket and a cup of coffee next to him on the desk, they look warm.

They stay like that for a while, Jayce still can’t move his body, but it’s easier to deal with now, it takes him a while to find his voice again, his throat feels full of ice, but communication is important and he needs Viktor to know he’s okay,

“Thanks.” It’s really not good enough for what Viktor did, but he can feel Viktor hum into his shoulder.

He doesn’t look out towards the window again, when he’s able to move some more they push the blackboard to the opposite side of the room, facing away from the window, The Robin flies away eventually, a holly berry held in its tiny beak.

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Robin - Erithacus rubecula : A small bird Olive-brown above, orange-red face, throat and breast. Bluish-grey flanks and whitish belly. The Robin is notorious for being one of the most common birds to be seen in Winter.