Title: in the shadow of the rose that blooms

Author: Erica

Fandom: Sailor Moon

Disclaimer: Too tired to come up with something good to put here, but basically? I DON'T OWN IT, ALL RIGHT?

Summary: "It doesn't matter," Helios says, and it sounds as though he is making a vow. "It will be worth it, no matter what happens." He smiles. "My prince."

Notes: OMG, nearly 7,000 words of Silver Millennium, Endymion/Helios goodness. Oh, yes. Written for the smmonthly prompt: lost. Yeah, I'm amused at that too. So that would totally be a yaoi warning, you know. Yeah. Con crit, etc., is welcome. Please tell me if I've made my boys way out of character or not.

IMPORTANT: This story has been cut and modified in order to meet standards. If you would like the full, explicit, better version, you must go to my 'website' (livejournal) where you can find it, and other stories, in my memories. Thank you, and I'm sorry for the trouble.

II

When Endymion was little, he was a rose.

This is the story his mother always used to tell him, when she would sweep him up into her smooth, tan arms, and hold him close. First, she would say, you were nothing more than a seed within the hearts of your father and I, and then as our love grew, it nurtured you, until one day, you were no longer a seed, or even a bud upon a vine, but a small, delicate, perfect red rose, blooming in the sunlight.

Burying his nose in his mother's dark hair, he mumblingly asked where his petals were, and if this meant he had thorns. Mother had laughed. When you were little, she explained, you were a velvet soft rose, but now you have grown, and are no longer a seedling, but a young man. The lessons that you have learned, and the things you have experienced; your dreams and your hopes and your ambitions; all of the things that make you who you are, have shaped you into this bundle of scrappy flesh and messy hair (did you comb it today? Oh, never mind) and now your rose is inside of you, beating red - the color of passion and love and life's blood - ever blooming within your chest. You are protecting that rose, the most important part of you, my dear one, with your very being.

Endymion, of course, insisted that he still had razor sharp thorns with which he could rend his enemies to pieces. His mother had called him as blood thirsty as his father, and decreed that he would make a good soldier, if only he could keep up with his sword lessons.

So in the beginning, Endymion was born from a seed, which grew into a rose bush, which budded until he bloomed, pungent with thick perfume; and the rose still resides, safe and protected, within his body. Sometimes, when he places his boyish hand upon his chest, he thinks that he can feel the gentle pulse of life within, like how he feels the earth breathing around him.

When Endymion is thirteen, fifteen year old, impish Zoisite disabuses him of such a romantic notion, and when he is fourteen, proceeds to show him – in explicit detail – a variation of just what, exactly, his parents had gotten up to. For weeks afterward, Endymion cannot look his mother or father in the eye, and blushes every time he catches sight of Zoisite's smugly pleased smile. (Not that this is much of a deterrent when Zoisite offers a repeat.)

But despite this, Endymion still spends most of his time among roses – where, he had so long thought, he was amongst his own kind – within the wild beauty of his Earth's garden kingdom, where the sourceless sunlight washes everything in shades of gold and honeysuckle. It is a habit he cannot, and does not wish to, break. He has an affinity with roses now, even if he is not one of them. He loves his roses, and cares for them, and Elysion is the most beautiful sight he has ever seen.

Until one morning, when he is halfway through his fifteenth year, and Endymion's heart reaches up and does its damndest to choke him.

II

There is a small alcove, deep in the winding pathways of Elysion. Endymion thinks it must have been a gazebo originally, but he can only find, here and there, miniscule places where the sturdy wood shows through to prove his theory. He has often wondered if someone had deliberately cultivated it to look that way, like an intimate cave, with walls and ceiling and floor of intricately weaved roses, or if they had merely grown on their own like that, wild and luxurious. On his more romantic days, he thinks perhaps it was the meeting place of illicit lovers, once upon a time.

Usually, he just contents himself with curling up into the cool, sweet shade it makes, carefully coaxing the roses to turn their thorns away from him so that they will not prick his hands, or catch upon his clothing.

He is skiving off sword lessons, again, in favor of reading the book he snitched from Nephrite's room, by light of his impressively tiered, rice paper fire lantern, imported directly from Mars. It had been a present from Kunzite, in order to get him to stop filching the silver haired boy's candle supply. Luckily for Kunzite's purse, it had been successful, and he hadn't spent a large sum of gold for nothing.

Endymion hopes his father does not find out he is skipping, because he doesn't think his ears can really stand another long-winded lecture, but has rather given up hope of his mother losing her all knowing powers – or the fact that she is bosom buddies with the sword instructor. But it is worth it, he thinks, as he delves into the complex history of the Venusian Courtesans. Not his usual read, admittedly – he usually would have preferred to read up on Mercury's latest technological advances on the modern Inter-Galactic space engine – but it has the added benefit of being scandalous, as well as intriguing. Politics and underhanded alliances and diplomacy, he thinks, are at their best here, and nobody can match their silver-tongued manipulations.

He has gotten to Chapter III: The Code of Aphrodite, when he hears footsteps walking towards him.

To hide, or not to hide, that is the question, he thinks. In the end, it is his pride that answers for him. "Who's there?" he calls, walking to the entrance, book held tightly in his hand, a finger marking his place. He expects to see his mother, in her gowns of off-the-shoulder white linen, and fresh crown of pale white roses (she does not need a metal-worked one to tell her station, not like his father, Endymion often reflects; she is queen in every inch of her tall body) or Titan, in his heavy armor and warrior's cloak, come to fetch him.

What he did not expect to see was a dream, meandering about outside someone's fanciful imagination.

Nothing, surely, has ever been quite this lovely, or quite this beautiful to Endymion before. It is like something has taken the essence of a rose – gentle and delicate, alive and vibrant – and meshed it lovingly into a slim slip of a boy. Like everything that Endymion has ever loved and cherished about his beautiful kingdom has been embodied. For a moment, Endymion cannot breathe.

The boy had jumped, startled at Endymion's imperious question, and now turns around to face him. His eyes are large in his face, the color of the sun dancing through the air. They make Endymion think of his mother's crystal scepter, shimmering with golden light. "Hello," he says, voice awe-stricken.

"Hello," the boy says back, and despite Endymion's preconceived notions, the voice isn't effeminate. Stepping closer, out of the gazebo-cave and into the hazy light, Endymion examines the figure more carefully, taking in the slender form, the angular face, and hair so white that it shines blue. He is dressed in a white tunic more like a robe, with sheer sleeves and golden tassels, and long trousers, flowing down over the tops of his bare feet; no armor, unlike Endymion, and that is perhaps what made Endymion first think the boy a weak, tiny thing.

"Were you lost?" asks Endymion.

The boy smiles at him, "I still am."

Endymion, too excited to keep up his stately façade, grins, boyish and lop-sided. "Nonsense. I know perfectly well where you are."

"Oh?"

"With me, of course," he says, and is surprised at how pleased the boy's soft laughter makes him feel. He opens his mouth to say something, though he is not sure what, in the hopes of hearing it again, when they instead hear two people not far off. Both of the boys freeze, and Endymion sees the other boy's face pale slightly. "What is it?"

"The Maenads," he says, voice sulky. Endymion has never heard of them before, and draws his sword. "What are you doing?" the other boy asks, voice lilted with surprise and confusion.

Endymion shrugs. It felt like the right thing to do – these Maenads could be boy-eating beasts, for all he knows. "Protecting you?"

The boy makes an incomprehensible sound in the back of his throat, that Endymion thinks might or might not be laughter. A blush begins to creep up the back of his neck, and he wonders if he looks as stupid as he's beginning to feel. The two figures are getting closer.

"Hide!"

Endymion's pride balks, mutinously, at the whispered hiss. "Not a chance! Look, I may not be very good with the sword yet, but that doesn't mean I'm going to run coward!"

The boy steps close, and Endymion is momentarily distracted by a red jewel that is set into the boy's forehead, flashing in the sun like a bubble of fresh blood. He wonders if it is melded into his skin, or if it is a birth right, like the circled cross on his mother's forehead. "Listen." A small, pale hand reaches toward the sword hilt and wraps itself around Endymion's tanned, work-callused one. "I appreciate it, it's very sweet of you, honest," he smiles at Endymion's blush. "But I don't need that kind of protection. Though I will get in trouble if you don't hide!"

"Why?" Endymion demands, frustrated.

And the look on the boy's face is so sad and lonely, that deep in the place where, if Endymion had one, his rose would have been eternally blooming, a flash of pain and a feeling a lot like being lost welled up. "I'm not supposed to interact with other people. Please," the boy beseeches. "Please, hide for me."

Endymion swallows down the feeling, and his desire to wrap the boy up in his arms and chase that expression away. "Okay," he says, and steps back into the concealing shadows of the gazebo, eyes never leaving amber ones; he hisses a command word, and the beautiful lantern snaps itself off. Thankful, the other boy smiles at him, and Endymion once more has to catch his breath. He tightens his hand on his useless sword, so that he won't do anything else embarrassing.

He hates this feeling, he realizes. And he isn't sure, at first, what that feeling is, as he's never felt it before. But then, he is a prince, and he has never been in a position where he has failed to do anything that he truly wants to do. Yet he stands there, in the cool calm of his rose-cave, and finds that he does not have the power to keep this boy, nor does he seem to have the power to protect. It is the most agonizing thing he has ever felt, and the frustration is so acute that it feels like acid sizzling along his nerves.

It is helplessness.

Good bye, he mouths silently, as he watches the boy turn around, to greet the Maenads, who do not look like boy-eating monsters, but rather like worried caretakers, elfin and lovely. But at the way the boy has gone all somber-faced and solemn, Endymion thinks they may as well have been.

They disappear around a rose hedge, and Endymion realizes that he never asked for the boy's name. The book lies, forgotten, half-hidden beneath thorny roses, where Endymion had dropped it.

II

"Titan was furious."

Endymion is sprawled across Jadeite's bed, looking comatose and admiring the ceiling. It was very difficult, after all, to throw those darts in the correct positions. Now, there is the slightly wobbly rendition of a half-robed woman outlined in different colored feathers. If they had used gold for the hair, Endymion considers, the image probably could have been passed off as a Venusian Courtesan.

"I think that's called stating the obvious, Jadeite," Nephrite drawls from where he is curled up in a pile of cushions, his brown hair pulled back as he examines the damage Endymion did to his book. "And you, little prince, owe me a new book. I won't let you borrow any more if you treat them like this."

"He doesn't borrow," says Zoisite. "He steals."

Amazingly, Zoisite sounds almost proud at this. Nephrite frowns, affronted. "As if I can't tell when he has one of my books hidden in his cape."

"But that's not the point. The point is, is that he is stealing, no matter how badly done it is."

"Touché."

"Just what I always wanted," Kunzite says, absently, from where he is polishing his weapon. "A thieving liege."

"Oh, shove it Kunzite, just because you're an uptight-"

"I wouldn't finish that sentence, Jadeite." Kunzite doesn't even lift his arrogant head from his task. "I have a sword in my hand, and unlike some of us I could mention, I know how to use it."

Nephrite and Zoisite snicker, and Jadeite singsongs, "Tight-ass," from where he is cowering on the other side of the room. Kunzite growls, and Jadeite grins cheekily at him. "And that reminds me," he says. He turns to Endymion, his face turning half-serious. "Titan really was furious. The Queen didn't look too happy either.

That actually makes Endymion pay attention. He props himself up on his elbows, blowing dark hair from his face. "She was there today?"

"Of course she was." Kunzite finally looks up, propping his chin on one of his fists to glare faintly at his prince. "She's there everyday."

"But usually she just looks faintly amused at his highness' tendency to go AWOL. Today, she looked pissed." Jadeite says, considering, "I think you've finally pushed it too far, Endymion."

Endymion flops back onto the bed, and scowls up at the winking woman. "I don't care," he states petulantly. In response to that defiant phrase, the silence is absolute, and Endymion wonders if everyone really thinks he is that much of a momma's boy. The answer, of course, is yes.

"Well," Nephrite drawls, uncertainly. "It's your carcass for the carrion, then."

Endymion clenches his sword fist, and it feels as useless without a weapon in it as it did earlier, with one. "I don't care," he says, lowly. "I don't care."

II

When the servants come to put out the lights, the boys readily leave to go to bed. The dregs of their conversation had turned somewhat stilted, after Endymion's confession, though Endymion didn't seem to notice, closeted in his own sullen world. And when Endymion shuts the door on Zoisite's hesitant face, he does not notice the flash of hurt in Zoisite's emerald eyes, or the tightening of his mouth.

Endymion locks the door absently behind him and slips into bed, hoping to dream of pale boys and soft laughter and eyes bright like true sunlight on sea, a sight he had seen once when he was a boy, when his father had taken him topside to visit their people.

It had been otherworldly.

II

The next time Endymion comes to his secret alcove, the boy is already there, head pillowed dreamily on his folded arms. At first, Endymion thinks he is sleeping, and curses his armor for being so loud. But then he sees a small, mischievous smile on pale lips, and no longer worries. "Playing dead, are we?" Endymion teases, plopping down next to him.

The boy's bright eyes open, and he grins at him. "Certainly not."

Endymion, who had daydreamed and fantasized about seeing this pale creature again, and carefully worked out the suave words he would use, and the witty phrases he would employ, blurts out, "What's your name?" He thinks, faintly, that he might very well be dying of mortification. "Sorry," he mumbles. "I'm not very good with words today, I guess. Um."

The boy smiles, and says, "I don't mind." Endymion isn't sure if his obvious relief isn't even more embarrassing than his sudden question was. "It's Helios."

"Helios," Endymion repeats, trying out the syllables. They curl off his tongue beautifully, and he says it again, just to hear them. "Helios."

The boy, Helios, laughs softly. "And you're Endymion." Blinking in surprise, Endymion asks how he knows. Helios answers, "Because you're my prince, of course."

"Well," Endymion says, dryly. "That explains everything."

"It should," Helios reprimands gently. "I'm your priest, after all. Didn't you recognize me?"

"My priest?" Like the Maenads, Endymion has no inkling to what Helios is talking about. "What do you mean, I have a priest?" And Endymion really thinks that he should be more concerned than he is, or outraged that he hadn't been told about this fact, but he finds that he is not. Helios has a soothing effect on him, like a balm to his teenage emotions, and Endymion wonders if this is partly from the fact that, apparently, Helios is a priest. Aren't priests supposed to be like that, after all?

But like yesterday, Helios is suddenly slipping from easy going and calming to pale-faced and upset. Endymion's chest suddenly constricts, and he struggles to breathe around the uproar of emotions. "You mean they didn't tell you?" Helios asks, sounding as though someone has just sucker punched him. "They didn't tell anyone? Am I really to be- Do I really have to- Will I always be alone, then?"

And, finally, Endymion can break free of the hold the emotions has on him, and he tackles Helios to the ground, his arms tight around the other boy. He can feel him trembling, faintly. "Shh," he soothes. "You're not alone, I promise. You're here with me, after all. I won't let you go."

Sadly, Helios tells him, "It doesn't work that way." But he lets himself melt into Endymion's hard embrace, and curves his body to fit against his anyway, mindful of the ebony armor and the sword poking into his side. Endymion strokes a hand through pale hair, and rests his forehead against Helios', feeling the jewel press uncomfortably into his skin. It doesn't matter to him.

"I won't let you go."

Helios seeks something, desperately, in his face, and Endymion keeps his dark blue eyes carefully open, his guards down, even though he hasn't the slightest clue what the other boy is searching for. He hopes that he finds it anyway. Apparently, he does, because suddenly the emotions, like a dreary-colored lump in his chest, melt away to be replaced by peace, and in those shining gold eyes, there is a quiet acceptance that Endymion marvels at.

"It doesn't matter," Helios says, and it sounds as though he is making a vow. "It will be worth it, no matter what happens." He smiles. "My prince."

Puzzled, but willing to go along with it, if only to make this warm, comforting feeling around them grow large enough to encompass the entire world, so that no matter where they go they will always have it, Endymion smiles back. "My priest."

For a timeless moment, surrounded by wild roses, they are perfect, one in his pale robes, and the other in his dark armor, beautiful in their contrasts; and the earth beneath them, and Elysion all around them, vibrant with its golden light, seem to harmonize between them, as their hair mingles, white and black, and they find comfort in their embrace.

Finally, Endymion cannot help but speak. "So," he says. "What, exactly, does my priest do?"

Helios laughs, and pushes him off.

II

The calluses on Endymion's sword hand slowly soften and disappear from disuse. He listens patiently through his father's lectures, because they are worth the priceless time Endymion gets to spend with Helios. The two sit and talk for hours, until one or the other must leave, or until the Maenads get too close.

Sometimes, Endymion has arrived to see Helios slipping off a winged Pegasus, all quivering muscles and liquid, intelligent eyes. Occasionally, Endymion has brought pomegranates for lunch, and cool wine for dinner, and the sweet cream his father and he used to make before he got too big for those kinds of things for desert, and they tell stories while they watch each other eat.

One day, Endymion is struck by the fact that talking isn't enough, and so he kisses his priest, and his priest kisses back, and that rather sets the tune for the rest of their time together.

Endymion hopes that it will never end.

II

It is a little more than a month before his sixteenth birthday, and Endymion is in his room, carefully crafting a report on Neptune's transplanetary irrigation system, the pros and the cons, and how certain aspects of it could be applied to Earth's hemispheres, when Zoisite barges in. Endymion looks up startled, and hisses when it causes ink to blot out the last word he has written. He scowls and carefully places the eagle feather quill down, and tries to clean up the mess.

He only succeeds in turning his fingertips black.

Sighing, he leaves it be and turns to face his copper haired friend. Zoisite has been strange the past several weeks, agitated and barb-tongued, not like his usual laid-back attitude, or amusing sass. Now, he is staring at Endymion with a stubborn expression on his young, handsome face. "Need something?"

"Yes," Zoisite bites out. And goes straight for the jugular. "Are you seeing someone else?"

Endymion chokes on air, and almost falls over coughing. "What the fuck?" he gasps. "Was I seeing someone before now?"

There is something in Zoisite's eyes that flinch, which Endymion almost misses, but doesn't. It puzzles him, and he is no longer quite so concerned with the embarrassingly invasive nature of that question, and is more concerned about getting to the bottom of what is bothering his friend. He thinks that Helios would approve. It seems like a priestly kind of stand, after all.

"So you are, then." Zoisite's voice is strained, and he places clenched hands behind his back, as though he is trying not to punch something. Carefully, he leans back on them firmly. "And when were you planning to tell me this?"

"I wasn't. I don't really see how-" And just like that, Endymion realizes that he is the world's worst cad, the most abominable, heinous person in the solar alliance, and to his shame, despite this realization, it is still Helios he is most concerned with. What would he think of me if he knew what an ass I am? "I'm so sorry," he says, subdued.

Zoisite barks a brittle laugh, chin up defiantly and eyes dry. Endymion is impressed. It is easy to forget the slender boy's strength. Though, Endymion is beginning to recognize with a sickening lurch, perhaps it is just that he is a fool that cannot see what is right before his eyes.

"You can hit me if you want," he offers. "I deserve it."

"I'd rather castrate you," Zoisite says, voice in an acid-rendition of light joviality. "But I won't. At least you had the courage to own up to it." Zoisite breathes carefully until he is back in control of his emotions, and Endymion stays very quiet. Eventually, Zoisite shakes himself out and pushes off from the wall, his hands loose, if fidgety. "Next time, tell your fuck-buddy when you start fucking somebody else."

Endymion flinches, this time. But he says, steadily, "Okay."

Which makes Zoisite tilt his head, like a bright, inquisitive bird. "You're different than you used to be." Endymion, too scared of screwing things with his friend – if, indeed, he still has the right to claim him as friend – up again, just raises his eyebrows curiously. "You're a lot more sensitive than you used to be, more mature." He smiles, and there is only the slightest touch of bitterness. "Thank Terra for that."

Endymion winces at that bold truth. "I deserved that," he acknowledges, and Zoisite's smile grows a little warmer. Endymion doesn't think it would be wise to tell him that it is because of Helios' doing that he has grown as much as he has, despite that Endymion is rather positive the quick boy has already figured it out. It would be insensitive, and as Zoisite has already pointed out, Endymion has learned to make sensitive work for him. Even if he is still a bit oblivious, at first.

"Damn right, you deserved that. And you," Zoisite threatened, "are going to owe me one hell of a favor some day, understand?" Grinning, Endymion nods.

It wouldn't have been Zoisite, after all, if he hadn't milked the situation for all it was worth.

Zoisite nods, grimly satisfied with their transaction, and leaves, shutting the door firmly behind him. Endymion lets out a heavy sigh, and slumps across his bed (which does not have any Venusian Courtesans above it) in relief. He sits up and begins to shuck off his armor until he is down to his breeches and linen shirt, and then he locks his door, and shucks those off too.

His fire-lamp is the only light in the room, and when he murmurs a series of command words, stringing them together into a phrase in an ancient language he cannot understand, the rice paper bleeds color across itself, until the steady fire inside is shining through swirls of amber and royal blue, casting his room in beautiful shades.

Again, Endymion flings himself across his wide bed, the covers soft and slinky against his bared skin. Rolling onto his back, he shivers in anticipation, and trails his hand down his chest, too exhausted to care about prolonging this, too excited to mind that he isn't. Instead, he thinks about gold and white-blue and pale flesh when it is just starting to flush, looking like a white rose with just the faintest dusting of pink touching its petals.

He does not stroke himself like Helios does, because for some reason that feels a little as though he would be sullying something sacred, if he tried to mimic that devastating touch. But he thinks of soft, velvety skin, and heat and quiet, gasping cries, of a smooth back firm against his chest, and of hips thrusting in time with his.

He thinks of how Helios will smile when he tells him of how he has handled himself with Zoisite, and thinks of the sweetness that echoes inside his chest whenever he is around his slender priest.

He thinks, suddenly, clearly, astoundingly:

I am in love,

and comes, messily, all over his clean bed.

II

In the month before Endymion comes of age, he once more displays his powers of obliviousness by not noticing his mother's concerned eyes, or gentle, restrained manner. Since his realization, he has felt as though he is on a tightrope, high above the world, but ready to fall at any moment. His heart is in his eyes, and he does not care who sees it.

He is in love, and if that in itself does not kill him, then nothing will.

Endymion is skipping sword lessons again. Tomorrow is his sixteenth birthday, and he thinks that his friends might be planning something behind his back, but isn't too sure. He intends on being here, at the rose-alcove, all day anyway. He cannot think of anywhere else he would rather be more, than with his lover.

"Hey," he calls, as he comes closer. A faint yawn is his answer, and he grins, amused. Endymion often wonders if Helios ever falls asleep while he is praying all day in his shrine. Stepping into the musky smelling shade, he unbuckles his sword belt from his waist, and props it carefully against a rose covered wall. "Help me out of this, would you?"

Helios does not answer, and when Endymion turns his head to look over his shoulder at him, he sees that he is still curled up elegantly in the midst of a bed of roses, eyes half-lidded, and obviously not getting up. "Well, fine then," Endymion says, ignoring the way his insides are trying to melt in adoration. Taking off all of his armor in the half-dark with his lover lounging only feet away is arduous; Endymion's fingers fumble several times in his haste, but, eventually, he has dropped his princely attire to the ground.

He kneels beside Helios' still form, and strokes his fingers over the silken hair, trailing his fingertips, occasionally, over the slender neck. Finally, as Endymion's strokes grow bolder, Helios sighs and rolls over, onto his back. He catches Endymion's hand in his and tenderly kisses the palm. Endymion shudders violently above him.

"How do you do that?" he asks, voice already hoarse.

"Do what?" Helios asks, laying sweet kisses on the delicate veins in his wrist.

"Make me feel as though I'm going to explode at the simplest touch from you." Helios gives a small smile, and pushes Endymion's dark sleeve up, kissing the crook of his elbow, his bicep, his shoulder. Groaning, Endymion continues. "It's like I'll die if I can't have you, like I'm nothing if you're not with me, touching me, loving me."

The shirt slides over his head, and Helios' mouth is trailing across his collarbone, hands hot against his naked sides. "Your mouth worships me," Endymion pants, mind half gone with desire. A slender tongue laps at the pulse in his throat, then sucks its way up his square jaw to his ear.

And Helios whispers, "Yes," like the answer to a prayer.

II

There is a point, in the midst of that devastating heaven, in which Endymion believes that if he had not said what he said –

I love you

– then he would have been destroyed, utterly annihilated. That his heart, unable to confine the depth of his feelings, and suffering under the all-consuming weight of it, would have turned upon its holder, and torn him to shreds in a plot to escape.

But Endymion says it, and his heart suddenly soars like it has wings and gravity is non-existent. It is not what he says, then, that tears him to shreds, nor is he torn to shreds when Helios, hearing it, sobs

I love you

back to him, the sweetest thing Endymion has ever heard in his life. His heart, suddenly, no longer needs even wings to fly with.

It is, instead, during the quiet aftermath in which Endymion is maimed.

II

For several minutes Endymion and Helios lay, sweaty and sticky and satiated, an echo Endymion swears he can hear in the cool earth beneath them and in Elysion's roses all around them. Endymion hums contentedly, and his thumb rubs gentle circles on Helios' waist, where Endymion has placed his hand proprietarily. "And just why," he asks, lazily, "haven't we done it that way, before?"

Helios smiles softly, eyes somber. His fingers trace patterns in the drying come on his belly, wrinkling his nose in disgust at it. "Because I wanted it to be special."

Endymion kisses him on the neck. "Well it was. Happy Birthday to us, indeed."

Beneath his arms, Helios stills. "That isn't why I wanted it to be special."

And now Endymion is confused. "No? Then why?" Helios is trembling like he hasn't since their second meeting, and it is beginning to frighten Endymion. "Helios. What's wrong?"

Sounding as though he is pronouncing their death sentence, Helios says, "We cannot see each other any more."

And maybe it really was a death sentence he was saying, because Endymion hears and feels his heart shatter, and he thinks that if he were to open up his chest he would see a jagged, broken glass heart, with pieces of himself torn on it, bleeding and moaning and in so much damned pain, so much that it would be a mercy to reach inside and rip it out, completely, and-

"Endymion!"

Endymion blinks, only to find that he has stood up, and that he has his armor on, and his sword belt is half way cinched on, and his eyes are burning. He reaches a hand up to touch his cheeks, but finds them dry. He should have seen this coming, after all. They weren't even supposed to have this time together in the first place. Of course it would have to end, Endymion realizes, which doesn't make it any less painful.

Curled up in a miserable ball on the ground is Helios, lips trembling. "Endymion."

Endymion cannot speak, because if he opens his mouth he will scream. His chest feels as though it is on fire. He waves his hand in a jerky motion, indicating that Helios should get dressed, and, amazingly, Helios understands. But then, Helios has always seemed to understand, hasn't he? And Endymion is about to lose this.

"Endymion." His eyes have closed without him realizing it, and Endymion opens them to find his priest cum lover kneeling before him, looking up at him with eyes gone old and hair a mess. "Endymion," he repeats.

"Stop saying my fucking name," Endymion rasps.

Helios flinches. "My prince," he says, instead. "Before you l-leave. Please. Allow me to give you your birthday present."

A harsh laugh tears his throat raw. A gift is the last thing he wishes to receive, unless it is this creature to be by his side for all eternity. "Very well then," he says, instead. His voice is cold, imperious. He is hiding, because if he tries to be human right now he will break and shatter, and Endymion is nothing if not stubborn, and he wants, at least, to be strong in this way.

He is not strong enough to keep Helios, but he will make damn sure he is strong enough to let him go.

Helios bows his head, and brings his hands up to his chest, clasping them in prayer, and though he trembles, his face tightens in concentration, and Endymion has to tear his eyes away so that he will not crush the pale boy to him and refuse to let him go. He stares at the roses around him; their dark colors and leaves drooping like tear drops.

Then he feels a sensation, like heat and love and sex, passion and heartache and protection, and he gasps; his chest feels like it is opening up, and releasing something, everything. Helios' soft voice calls him back down. "Here, my Prince." And Endymion looks.

He sees the rose in front of him, and for a shining instant, it is like a fairy tale come true, and Endymion could almost laugh – look, he would say, mother and father were telling the truth; I have a rose inside me – except that though he is a prince, Helios is no princess, and his priest is still leaving him.

Endymion swallows and says, "Beautiful."

"This rose," explains Helios, voice once more calm, eyes reflecting the light of Endymion's rose, "This rose is linked to mine." And he places one slender hand on his own chest, and in a brief instant there is a second rose, just as beautiful, shining in front of him, and the glow of the two roses seem to reach out and intermingle. "And both of our roses are linked to the Earth, and to Elysion. We feel what each other feels, we know each other in ways that no body else can take away. We are connected in a way that no amount of distance can remove. Do you understand?"

In the light of their ever-blooming roses, Endymion whispers, "Yes. I understand."

II

It is, perhaps, the hardest thing that Endymion has ever, and will ever do, to watch Helios leave him, and travel to the center of Elysion's labyrinth, to where his shrine and Maenads and eternity of solitude await him, and long after Helios has disappeared, Endymion stays standing there, watching after him, and breathing in the scent of roses.

II

The next day is Endymion's birthday, and for once, when Endymion is hurting and needs help in order to put himself back right again, it is not his mother he goes to see, but his father.

He finds him in his throne room, alone, watching out over the gardens, where Endymion thinks he sees his mother walking. The look upon his father's face is one that he recognizes, deep in his soul, and Endymion is glad that he came.

"Father," Endymion says, voice quiet and intense.

"Son," the King replies. He turns to face him, and Endymion sees himself reflected there, in more than the bone structure, enough to let him pour out a little of his soul. Even then, it feels as though he is spitting out jagged pieces of rocks, rather than words.

"Have you ever felt like you are not enough? Like despite everything you do, you are not strong enough, good enough, to protect the ones you love?"

His father's eyes are the same color blue as his own, and as they study him, Endymion reflects on how truly pathetic it is that it takes insecurities and bleeding hearts to cause the two of them to truly understand each other on something for the first time since Endymion left the simplicity of childhood behind.

"Yes."

"Then what's the point?" And that is the question, the question that has been burning inside him since Helios said goodbye.

His father slumps heavily in his throne, hands clenching in his rich blue cloak, and Endymion sees the care-lines etched in his aristocratic face. "The point, boy, is to try. Maybe you won't be strong enough, but Terra only knows if that's how it will play out in the end. You try, because if you don't, you've already failed and let your loved ones down. You try, because it's worth giving your all, no matter if it's enough or not. You try, because you are human, and because you love."

"Will I be strong enough?"

"I don't know," the King says. "Will you?"

And that is so similar to what Helios would have said, had Endymion asked him that. Swallowing back tears, Endymion shakes his head, not in denial, but in overwhelming feeling. His chest still hurts, but it isn't as agonizing as it had been the day before. He can feel, deep inside, a sense of calm purpose pervading him, and he wonders if that is his will, or if it is Helios'. He likes to think it is the both of them.

"I want to be strong; I have to be strong so that I can protect the rose within my heart." He sees his father raise his eyebrows, perhaps in surprise at what his son has grown up enough to finally learn. "I don't care what I have been told, or the ugly truths life throws at me, I can feel it, deep inside me, like I can feel the earth moving and singing beneath my feet. I need to be strong, so that I can protect this rose."

Endymion presses his palm, upon which he swears he can still feel Helios' touch, against his chest and takes a harsh breath. His father nods at him, pride and understanding in his eyes. Both of them know that Endymion will be at sword practice the next day. "To protect this rose," Endymion reiterates. "That is my life's true purpose, I know this now."

The King, his father, smiles, and says, "So long as you remember that, my son, then everything will end well."

II

Though Endymion goes back to the alcove, he never sees Helios again. It's okay, however, because through their connection the distance disappears like it is non existent, and he can feel him praying, sweet and silent and worshipful, like a rose that will never stop blooming in his heart.

II

Fin