Chapter Text
There was something about human cities that Keefe found appealing. There was an energy, an underlying sense of anticipation and excitement that was palpable. There was something about the potential and possibility of human cities that made them feel as if the cities themselves were alive. He hadn’t realized how appealing and perhaps slightly addictive that feeling was until he left for a short time and then came back. Would he miss that if he returned to the lost cities?
On the whole, returning to the lost cities at least temporarily was probably the right decision. Sophie was right, any choice he made now could be changed or tweaked going forward if it ended up not feeling right. She was also right that he had never really given the idea of living in the lost cities with his new abilities a chance. There had been no safe way to make that happen when his mom and the Neverseen were still a factor, but now he should probably at least try. And Grady had said he would help him train in his ability.
Keefe wasn’t really sure what Grady would do to help him train. Grady may not have liked him much or trusted him before, but Grady was a good person. He had stood up to the Council numerous times to protect Sophie and to do what he believed to be morally right. He was trustworthy, and he was asking Keefe to trust him.
Keefe wanted to trust Grady, but he didn’t have great experiences with parents and other parental-type figures being there for him when he needed them. So he was naturally a little skeptical. Could Grady really have come around that much? Plus, Grady was an emissary. He would have to report to the Council on their training. What if something went terribly wrong? What if, as he got to know more about Keefe’s abilities, he realized how dangerous and unstable they were? Would he turn on Keefe if he thought Keefe’s abilities were putting Sophie in danger? And what if he did actually put Sophie or others in danger again? Training sounded…risky.
There were so many unknowns. But it was either trust Grady and have the possibility of a life in the lost cities, the possibility of a life with Sophie, or stay in the forbidden cities in relative isolation forever. He probably wouldn’t get a second chance to come back without repercussions, but he could always leave the lost cities again if he needed to. He still had his dad’s pathfinder, and Sophie could teleport anywhere.
Keefe was still exhausted from the incident the previous day with his ability activating. He also felt antsy, which was a bad combination. He had just returned to Paris from Havenfield an hour before, and the walk to the hotel from the leaping location had exacerbated all the leftover aches and pains. He wished he had one of Elwin’s elixirs. He had tried human pain relievers such as Tylenol and found that they really didn’t work for him. He took a shower and, even though it was afternoon, decided to take a nap.
Keefe woke up several hours later in a cold sweat. His body was trembling and he felt like he was going to vomit. He focused on his breathing. That was what he always did in times like these. Slow breathing in, and out, in, and out. He had been back in Loamnore in his sleep, and it had felt so real. His body must have thought he was still there, because he was trembling in fear. He had been so, so afraid in Loamnore, but he had tried to cover it up, put on a brave face, make a joke. Now he just let the fear happen. Let himself re-live the experience mentally as he repeated to himself, “I’m safe now, she’s gone, I’m safe now.” He hoped that one day he would truly believe those words.
Eventually Keefe’s breathing evened out. He got out of bed and splashed some cold water over his face in the bathroom. The Hair had gotten a teensy bit smooshed during his nap, so he applied some of his products and scrunched it into his signature, slightly-mussed style. Before he knew it, thirty minutes had passed, but hey, no amount of time was too much when it came to The Hair, and it was looking good!
Keefe could tell it was getting close to evening because the sky was getting dark. He was pretty hungry so he ordered dinner in and then checked his imparter. Sophie had called him some time ago. “Show me Sophie Foster,” he said into the imparter.
“Keefe!” Sophie answered. “I’m so glad you hailed me. I was starting to worry…” she trailed off.
“Hey Foster, yeah, sorry about that. Turns out the Keefester needed a nice long nap. I just woke up.”
“Oh, right. Yeah, that makes sense,” Sophie replied.
“Awww, was Foster worried about me? It’s nice to know how much you care!”
Sophie rolled her eyes. “You know I care, Keefe. I was worried that maybe you decided this was all too crazy and just…”
“Hey, I promised, Foster. And I meant it. I’m not going to avoid you any more. The rest of the elves? Not so sure yet,” he finished, his smirk making his way onto his face.
“I know. I know, and I believed you, I do believe you,” Sophie replied.
“It’s okay, I know I don’t have the greatest track record when it comes to trustworthiness.”
“It doesn’t matter, Keefe. I do trust you. More than anyone,” Sophie replied.
“I hate to break it to you, Foster, but if I look trustworthy to you, you may not be the best judge of character,” said Keefe.
“Actually, today Bronte told me that I was an excellent judge of character and that he trusts my judgment in regards to you,” Sophie replied.
“You talked to Councilor Bronte about me?” Keefe asked.
“Yeah. The whole Council knows that we’ve located you but Biana and I have kept it light on the details so far, just to give you some time before they start bothering you,” Sophie replied.
“That’s a relief.”
“Yeah. I didn’t think you’d want to deal with Council Alina showing up asking annoying questions,” Sophie replied, “although with such easy access to sparkly poo at Havenfield, maybe you would have welcomed a reason to prank your old nemesis. Oh well, too late now.”
“I like your thinking, Foster!” Keefe replied. “So how was your day?”
“My day was eventful. During inflicting I practiced inflicting calm onto Bronte after he had inflicted fear onto me, just to see if I could get a little more consistent in that aspect of my inflicting. That way I can help you with your ability if you need it,” Sophie replied. “Then I had to meet Leto/Forkle for lunch because he wanted an update on you. I told him about as much as I told Councilor Bronte, because I didn’t think you’d want the Collective showing up asking you tons of questions either.”
“Wow, sounds like an intense day,” Keefe replied. “I feel like you’ve turned into my PR rep. Thanks for dealing with all those people for me. That does not sound like fun.”
“Yeah, well the most fun part of my day was my cognate training with Fitz and Tiergan after lunch,” Sophie said, scoffing as she did so. She was clearly annoyed about something. Keefe had been hesitant to ask about his (probably former, at this point) best friend. When he left, Sophie and Fitz had just broken up from their sort-of relationship. He had hoped that Fitz would get it together and make Sophie happy. She deserved to be happy.
“I didn’t realize Fitz still trained with you since I assumed he graduated already. He still comes back to Foxfire?” Keefe asked.
“Yeah, he’s not at all my sessions but he comes once or twice a month. Tiergan says our cognate bond is still not as secure and stable as he would like it to be. I guess it’s a pretty fragile thing, and once it’s gone, it’s gone. So even once I graduate, we’ll still have to meet regularly to train together if we want to keep being cognates.”
“I can’t feel your emotions from here, Foster, but I am picking up some distinctly annoyed vibes from you,” Keefe replied. “Is everything okay with you and Fitzie?”
“Well, if by okay you mean that I’m super annoyed with him and he’s mad at me again, but we were totally honest and shared every secret with each other then yeah, everything is okay with Fitz.”
“Ah, so you’re still not thrilled with total openness and sharing?” Keefe asked.
“It’s never been my favorite, but I honestly think the biggest issue we have as cognates is our…personal history,” Sophie replied.
Keefe raised an eyebrow. He was trying to be cool, but he was now wondering if Sophie and Fitz were still harboring feelings for each other. Could she still like him? She had told Keefe she loved him. And he had felt it. But he couldn’t help but feel a little insecure about that particular relationship because Sophie had been really obsessed with Fitz for a long time.
Keefe really wanted to know more, and he didn’t have to ask because Sophie continued to explain. “I have a secret I can’t share with him, I can’t share it with anyone,” she explained. “It’s about the identity of one of my biological parents. I discovered the information almost by accident right before Loamnore. Fitz was upset that I couldn’t tell him who it is, or even explain why I can’t tell him. That’s why we broke up.”
Sophie paused and sighed. “Later on, Fitz said he was working on accepting my match status and that he wanted to try dating again, so we tried. However, once we started dating the secret became a bigger and bigger issue in our cognate relationship. It was too important to him. We were so close to losing our cognate bond that Tiergan had us do this whole Inquisition thing which was really terrible,” Sophie shuddered. “At the end of it we agreed that we needed to stop dating and give up on any future prospects of dating as well. It just made sense to save the part of our relationship that worked well, especially since romantically it was clearly not working out. I’m sorry, is this awkward for you to hear about?” Sophie asked.
“Foster, I am good. You can talk to me about anything, no judgment,” Keefe replied.
“I know, you’ve never judged me on anything I’ve ever told you, even the most embarrassing things. But I know my relationship with Fitz must have hurt you. I should have asked, before I started rambling about it.”
“It’s really fine. I mean, yeah, those were not my favorite Foster emotions to have to experience, but I know you love me. I don’t take any of it personally. So tell me more. You had this Inquisition thingy and decided to be friends, and then what?” Keefe prompted.
“Ugh. Well, around the time of the horrible Inquisition thing was when I finally started to realize my…feelings for you. It was this whole process where we had to ask each other about unresolved issues and he asked about you. I thought at first he was just asking about you because he didn’t agree with my search plans or something, but eventually I realized that he had been feeling jealous of you. Which was weird because you weren’t even here, but something clicked eventually and I realized that I was in love with you and had been for some time. I never talked to him about it because it never felt like there was a good time to bring it up, you know?” Sophie said.
Sophie continued, “Anyway, today I had to tell him and he … was not psyched. About us. I think he expected that one day I would change my mind on the matchmaking stuff. It was not a fun conversation. But, we got our highest telepathy reading ever, and broke the existing cognate telepathy record so, yay honesty!”
Keefe chuckled. His dinner had arrived so he sat down and propped his imparter up. “Holy flareodon, Foster, that sounds, not fun. And I’m sorry you had so many not fun things to deal with today,” he replied. “I am really impressed with you though. I mean, cognate training sounds kind of like torture for you, and you stick with it. Do Tiergan and Forkle still think it’s important to keep up with it? I mean if the Neverseen are defeated, couldn’t you just give it up if you didn’t want to do it anymore?”
“I came close.” Sophie said. “The day we started the stupid Inquisition, Fitz and I had had a big fight about something and I just wanted to be done with it. But Tiergan insisted that I would regret it if I did. And Fitz apologized, so I stuck with it. I trust Tiergan.”
Keefe was relieved. It sounded like, as far as Sophie was concerned, there were no unresolved feelings for Fitz. He felt a little bit sorry for his old friend, though. It sounded like he was probably a little heartbroken, and that wasn’t fun. He was also a little disappointed in Fitz for being so stuck on the matchmaking issue. He knew that Sophie was a little sensitive about that, and it probably didn’t help that she had broken up with her first boyfriend over it.
“I guess that makes sense. How are you doing now? You look…peeved. I mean, don’t get me wrong, you look absolutely adorable, but are you going to be okay?” Keefe asked.
“Oh yeah, I’ll be fine, it was just really awkward and there will probably be more awkwardness to come. But it’s fine.”
“I don’t know, Foster, I’m not sure if I buy that,” Keefe said. “I think a cheer-up poem might be in order.” Keefe sat up and cleared his throat. “A-hem. Ode to Sophie Foster, so brave, lovely, and smart; She’s so much better than Fitzy, who smells worse than an Iggy --”
“Okay okay, I think we get the picture,” Sophie cut in, giggling. “You’re terrible, Keefe!”
“And you love me!”
“Hmmm, maybe my judgment is questionable,” she teased.
“Well, you did date Fitzy twice, and he smells worse than an Iggy --”
“Keefe! Stop!” Sophie cut in again. Now she was curling up on her dorm bed giggling.
“Whatever you wish, Foss-Boss!”
Sophie rolled her eyes at him. She took a breath to compose herself from the giggling. “I have more I need to tell you,” she said.
“What’s that?”
“Well, Forkle would like to meet with you,” she replied. “I told him I was trying to give you space to figure things out without too many people bothering you, but he said he had an offer he wanted you to consider. He wouldn’t tell me what it was,” she said, rolling her eyes, “so I’m assuming I’m not going to like it, but you should meet with him if you want to. I told him I would relay his message and let him know your response.”
“Huh. I wonder what Forkle wants,” Keefe asked. “Knowing him, it probably involves reading a library full of books.”
Sophie snorted. “Yeah, sounds about right. Well, you don’t have to decide now, but when you do let me know and I’ll tell him. We can set up a neutral meeting spot if you don’t want him knowing where you are.”
“Eh, I’m good with the Forkman,” Keefe said. “I’ll meet with him, but will you go with me? Just, you know, for backup?”
“Sure, Keefe, of course,” Sophie replied. “Should I set up the meeting at one of the Black Swan hide outs, maybe Alluveterre?”
“Actually, that sounds perfect.”
“Great. How are you feeling, Keefe? Gods I’m a terrible girlfriend, we’ve been talking this whole time and I haven’t even asked!” Sophie said.
Keefe’s heart pounded in his chest momentarily at her use of the word girlfriend. He hadn’t been expecting that. He had definitely wanted it, but he remembered how awkward Sophie had been about using that particular word when she and Fitz had been sort-of-not-really dating the first time. Although, now that he thought about it, maybe that awkwardness had been because of him, and her very deeply buried feelings for him at the time. Either way, he was kind of screaming a giant cheer inside his head right now!
“Oh so you’re my girlfriend, now?” he said with a smirk. “I knew it! It’s my abs, isn’t it, you just couldn’t resist them?”
Sophie fell into another fit of giggles. Wow, he loved hearing her laugh. When he left over four years ago, he didn’t hear that sound very often. He was glad Sophie was happier now.
“Well, yes, I mean unless you don’t want me to be your girlfriend,” she said back in a teasing tone.
“Oh, I’m good with it! I’m really good with it,” Keefe replied with a smirk. “And my day was fine. I’m still a little sore and tired, but it’s really not that bad this time. My brain is kind of ready to explode with everything I have to think about, but the nap helped.”
“Is there anything you want to talk about?” Sophie asked.
“I don’t think so, I mean I haven’t decided anything yet about what I want to do,” Keefe replied. “I’m pretty sure I want to at least try coming back to the lost cities, but I think I’m just trying to get my mind around all the issues and problems that might cause and how to deal with them.”
“Well, I’m happy to help problem-solve, if and when you’re ready,” Sophie replied.
“Thanks, Foster”
“Anytime, Keefe, I’m always here.”
