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Illuga's life was a strange combination of monotonous and thoroughly unpredictable—and combined in it, he thought. Sudden, bone-chilling assaults, followed by standard protocols and forms. He held fondness and resentment for both, seeking control everywhere he could, yet feeling terribly restless when things were going a little too smoothly for too long.
Unlike his life, the one at the Final Night Cemetery was the same day in and day out. The murky sky, the cool headstones, the welcoming flowers, the guiding lighthouse—Illuga could paint the scenery from his point of view on the boat and fit the canvas over the place a year later and struggle to find the edges of it. And of course, a lone, guarding figure at the edge of the sand, near-always present, an anchor and a guiding lighthouse of his own.
Illuga was already smiling before he even stood up from the boat, pulling it ashore and hefting up the backpack with supplies, walking over to meet with the man, "Sir Flins, good evening."
Flins, to Illuga's credit, seemed to have been smiling since he spotted him across the water—not an unusual behavior all around, but what with his ever-controlled face bereft of a single line, the smile may have looked the same as ever were it not for the way it creased Flins' eyes slightly, making them almost twinkle. He pressed a hand over his chest and bowed at the waist, "Young Master, you honor me with your presence as always."
Illuga huffed good-naturedly and let the backpack rest by his feet, "Always greeting me with flattery. It seems you are as unchanging as this isle, Sir Flins."
The man straightened and hummed consideringly, gazing at Illuga with slightly narrowed eyes for several quiet moments. If Illuga was more bold, he'd dare say his words might have hit Flins deeper, with the sudden, minuscule crookedness of his smile.
"I seem to have grown into the moss and stone alongside this land, but if it is a little change the Young Master desires, who am I to ever deny him? Considering he brings the sun itself with him whenever he visits." Illuga huffed again, a bit louder, to hide the flutteriness in his chest, but remained quiet when Flins moved again.
Hand back against his chest, but this time his left foot sneaked behind and further away from his right one, and his other hand picked up the fabric around his waist, lifting it to the side and bending his knees down in a curtsy.
Illuga couldn't help a delighted laugh spilling out of him, quickly stifling it behind his hand. "Forgive my previous statement then, Sir Flins, you're always able to surprise me. And look as elegant and–perfect, while you do so."
When he straightened, he almost looked ready to challenge Illuga's hand for hiding his laugh, such was the sudden color and depth to his eyes. Illuga saw his mouth move for a moment before it stilled, thoughtful, finally pronouncing with a purr, "Flatterer," and Illuga laughed again.
"Now you're being humble. Anyone with even decently working eyes can see grace come as naturally as breathing to you, sir," he said and, feeling the need to prove his point, hopped up a mound to Flins' side, then offered him a hand.
Lips stretched further yet, so much so that they lifted and plumped up the cheeks to Flins' already gaunt face. It struck Illuga then, a silly thought he should not be having as a seasoned Ratnik alongside his senior: it felt as though they were playing. Not as cat and mouse as Illuga sometimes felt with Flins, but as youths, carefree and wild in the tall grass, uncaring of dew dampening their shirts and fresh mud clinging to their trousers.
And Flins indulged him indeed—indulged him was wrong, for Illuga could've sworn this was the most fun he's seen on the older man's face in the years he's known him. He accepted his hand and when Illuga raised it above his head and guided him over Flins' right shoulder, the man obliged and twirled around on his foot as gracefully as a figure skater, his hair and skirt flaring out behind him.
Illuga grinned at him in pointed victory and hopped down—then glanced at Flins' fingers still in his grip. What game would be fun if it ended early, prematurely even? He never would've done this normally, and the contradiction is vast, for this gloomy, somber place and its unsettling keeper to be the one to settle his muscles fully at rest, to shroud his mind in warmth of home.
So he folded his other arm behind his back and pictured Flins' movements in his mind's eye and followed them—it was easy as breathing, to bring his feet together, keep his back straight as he leaned down, bring up the gloved fingers and press his lips gently against the back of them—for it has been done unto him innumerable times.
He strayed from the steps, however, when he didn't straighten or let go, but merely backed an inch, his breath still ghosting the leather, as he glanced up with a half-grin through his lashes.
He couldn't see Flins' mouth from this angle, what with the collar, but his eyes had undeniably widened and he, for Flins, stood as good as frozen. Illuga savored the satisfaction for several moments that Flins didn't speak, and finally he let out a breathy laugh rife with–something, that Illuga was incapable of naming.
"It appears I have impressed my many flatteries onto my Young Master, more than I could have foreseen," he spoke in a terribly soft murmur, high with color in his cheeks—it was no red nor pink, still pale and almost bruise-like, yet it was all Illuga could have dreamed of witnessing, much less being the cause thereof.
Illuga couldn't help but return the joy made physical at the possessive, "You are an impressionable teacher."
Flins looked at him as if he was the most precious thing in the world. "Then allow me to reward your diligence, if you please," he said, sweeping his arm towards the lighthouse.
Fish and water, he knew, but if this was the face opposite his whenever he partook in them, what meal could possibly be sweeter?