Linus hesitated, and when he spoke again, it sounded as if he were picking and choosing his words carefully. “Before you came back to the island I’d heard rumors of someone or someones moving people around, but it was right when I started working at DICOMY, and then it was swallowed up by the machine of bureaucracy, much like I was.”
Arthur didn’t know where to start. “I was … young. Cynical. Angry. No one would listen to us. No one would protect us. And on top of that, there were increasing sweeps of towns and cities, hunting unregistered people, forcing them into the limelight so they could be documented, tracked.”
“I remember those,” Linus whispered with a shiver. “It proved to be an unpopular action, which is why they shut down the program after a few years.”
“Unpopular to a slim majority of non-magical people,” Arthur said bitterly. “They didn’t give a damn about what we said.”
“So you took it upon yourself.”
“Yes.”
“How many people did you help?”
Arthur blinked. “I … don’t know. I didn’t keep count.”
“More than one?”
“Oh, yes. Many more.”
“And you moved them from place to place, to keep them safe.”
“I tried.”
“Why did you stop?” Linus asked. “There must have been a reason you decided to return to the island.”
Arthur said, “I was tired. Tired of never having a place to call home. Tired of being on my own. I tried to keep the loneliness at bay for as long as I could, but eventually, it began to eat away at me until all I felt was hollow, empty.”
“Fires can’t burn forever,” Linus murmured.
“It felt as if I was chipping away at a mountain with a pickax. I could see evidence of my work, but…”
“It felt like diminishing returns. For what it’s worth, I think I’d feel the same way.”
“It’s worth more than you know,” Arthur whispered. “I couldn’t keep up with it. And the worse off I was, the more room there was for error. I didn’t want anyone to suffer because of me.”
“So you went back to the island,” Linus said, his hand in Arthur’s hair. “The place where it all began.”
“Sic parvis magna.”
“Greatness from small beginnings,” Linus said.
Arthur nodded. “That’s what I hoped and continue to hope. I’m not a perfect man, Linus. I’m riddled with faults. I don’t have all the answers, even if I seem like I do. I’m brash, obstinate. I make mistakes. And I worry! I worry all the time about the children. I worry about them when they sleep. When they wake up. When they run, when they eat, when they laugh or cry or sneeze. When they ask questions or when they answer questions. What does that make me?”
Linus snorted. “That makes you a father.”
Arthur blinked, lifting his head to look at Linus. “What?”
“It makes you their father,” Linus said again. “And they are so very lucky to have you.”
“You mean that,” Arthur said with no small amount of wonder.
“Of course I do,” Linus said. “Because I happen to love those things you call faults. They’re part of you. And they have served you well. Arthur, in the eyes of those who love you, those who know you, you’ve done what you always have: your best. That might not mean much to ridiculous councils, but I happen to know six children who would go to the ends of the earth for you. And if anyone faults you for that, I’ll have a few choice words for them, believe you me.”
Amused, Arthur said, “Then I suppose I should listen to you.”
“You should. I sometimes know what I’m talking about.”
“So I’ve gathered. Now you know. Now you know all there is to know about me. I have nothing left to give.”
Linus said, “You do, actually. One last thing.”
Arthur frowned. “What would that be?”
Linus slid out from underneath Arthur, climbing off the bed and going to the closet where they’d stored their luggage. Arthur watched as Linus opened the closet door and began to dig around in his suitcase. When he found what he was looking for, he stood upright, closing the closet door. He hesitated a moment, hand on the doorknob.
“Linus?” Arthur asked.
Linus jumped, as if he’d forgotten Arthur was there. When he faced the bed, he looked nervous, jittery. One hand was behind his back, clutching whatever he’d pulled from the suitcase. He approached the bed slowly. “I’ve thought about this,” Linus said. “For a while now. You put the idea in my head, so whatever happens next, remember: this is your fault.”
“And I accept full responsibility for whatever it is,” Arthur assured him. He didn’t know why Linus was so nervous. It should have worried him. But for some reason, he felt as if he could float away in the slightest breeze.
Linus stopped next to the bed, thighs against the mattress. He fidgeted from one foot to the other, and right when Arthur was about to ask if he was all right, a change overcame Linus. His breathing slowed, his shoulders squared, and he smiled, a bright, warm thing that made Arthur’s heart stumble in his chest. “I love you,” Linus said. “You have given my life color in ways I did not expect. You and the children and Zoe.”
“You already had it in you to—”
“Perhaps,” Linus said. “But it took kindness and patience to bring it out. It took a home where one should not exist. But it does. It does exist, and that’s because of you.” He brought his hand out from behind his back, and there, sitting on his palm, was a small black box. As Arthur looked on, Linus opened the box to reveal a silver ring with a line of tiny cerulean-blue gemstones across the top, seven in all.
Arthur reached a shaking hand toward the ring. “After all you’ve heard today? Still, even now?”
