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Chapter Text

In all fairness, Hermann didn’t mean to eat the chicken. He just saw them during his nocturnal walk, and a deep craving shook him. Before he knew it he had hopped the rabbit-proof fence and sunk his teeth into the nearest silkie. Instant regret overtook him, and now he was standing in the middle of a chicken coop, the other birds going mad with fright, holding something which had been animate only moments previous.

“Oh bugger,” he said, as a light in the farmer’s house turned on. He could have been gone in an instant, leaving only a trail of blood and the dead chicken, but it was a very pretty creature and it seemed an ignominious end for something which had clearly been raised with such care.

So an apology then? An impromptu burial? An anonymous note nailed to a door later entitled This Is Just To Say? Ridiculous. Better to leave and make the farmer wonder how a fox got to be so wily.

“Hey! Stop right there!” someone yelled, and Hermann realized he’d prevaricated for too long.

“I’m not going anywhere,” he promised, and blinked at a light shone in his face. He wondered how much of a mess he was, chicken blood and feathers on his chin and the broken chicken in his hands.

“Aw, what the fuck,” the farmer groaned. “What the fuck is this?”

“I have a condition,” Hermann explained blandly. “And I’m afraid I killed your chicken in a moment of weakness. Is there a way I can make it up to you?”

“What kind of condition is that?” the farmer asked, lowering his flashlight. “And what the fuck man! Get out of my chicken pen!”

“You just told me to stop right here.”

“Yeah, well now you can get the fuck out. You’ve frightened them.”

Hermann hopped the fence again, aware how dreamlike it would seem to the farmer.

“What should I do with the chicken?”

A long pause and then the farmer sighed.

“You better come inside. I need to figure out what to do with you.”

As it was a proper invitation, Hermann could avoid the full body shudder which would usually accompany trespassing. In the light, he could see the farmer was dark-haired, bespectacled, and deeply freckled from the sun. Colourful tattoos started at his wrists and presumably continued, though they were hidden by a worn green flannel. He put away his flashlight and a shotgun and pointed to the sink.

“Put her there,” he said with a sigh. “Washroom’s down the hall, first door to the right. You’re covered in it, man.”

“Thank you,” Hermann said sheepishly. There was nothing else to say.

He came out of the washroom, scrubbed clean and most of the chicken blood out from under his nails. The farmer had taken the time to make tea, and had set out two cups. Hermann wasn’t sure how he warranted this level of hospitality, but sat down gratefully.

“You hungry?” the farmer asked.

Starving.

“No.”

“You remember your name? My name’s Newt.”

“Hermann.”

“That’s a start,” Newt said with a cautious smile. “My property has a lot of acreage. How’d you wander so far in?”

“I’m not crazy,” Hermann said as he suddenly realized the probing tone Newt was taking. Newt held up his hands in a surrendering position.

“I don’t think you meant to do what you did,” he said. “And I don’t like that word either. What I think happened is maybe you were dissociating? Or maybe you’ve got poor impulse control and you have a thought and then you act on it right away, which like, me too. I just want to make sure you didn’t bump your head or something. You didn’t, eh? That you can remember?”

“I didn’t bump my head,” Hermann smiled in spite of himself. Humans could rationalize any behaviour, as it turned out, but this one was particularly kind and level-headed about his diagnosis. “I told you, I have a condition.”

“We don’t have to talk about it,” Newt said. “It’s your business. Now, my business is chickens, partially, so I gotta ask, are you going to do that every time you see one?”

Hermann shook his head.

“I am sorry. And terribly embarrassed, for what it’s worth.”

“So usually, folks who help me for the season get a chicken by the end of it,” Newt said, drumming his fingers. “You could help.”

“I see,” Hermann said. “What does help entail?”

“Do you know anything about farming?”

Hermann snorted, and Newt looked offended for the first time this strange evening.

“You’re the one wandering about my fields in the middle of the night. I thought I could at least take you for an enthusiast.”

“I am a wanderer,” Hermann said, for that was the closest to the truth. “So I haven’t had the opportunity to farm, no.”

“You got the opportunity now,” Newt said. “If you want to stop wandering long enough to make this right.”

“Why don’t you call the police instead of pressing me into indentured servitude?”

“Because I don’t like cops, man,” Newt said, and his eyes shifted down for a split second before he brightened. “And anyway, this is better. Tit for tit.”

Hermann mouthed the last bit, brow furrowed, while he thought. He had asked Newt how he could make this right. Though the idea of menial labour was laughable at best and insulting at worst, it had been quite a lonely while since he’d had a place to call home, and the farm was… homey.

“I have a skin disease,” he finally said. “Direct sunlight is very painful.”

If Newt thought that was odd, he didn’t show it.

“There’s lots to do before the sun rises. I’m a bit of a night owl myself.”

“I left a cane in your chicken pen,” Hermann continued. Newt nodded.

“I’ll get it. You got more clothes than what you came in? Pyjamas? I’ll turn down a bed for you.”

“I can arrange my own accommodations.”

“No way, Hermano,” Newt laughed, and Hermann bristled at the nickname. “The hours are weird here, and if you go away, how do I know you won’t welch on our deal?”

“I don’t welch.”

“And I don’t need to be standing around at four in the morning wondering where you are, if you have car trouble or if you died or something. In any case, you’re staying here tonight. It’s three in the morning and there’re coyotes and maniacs out there.”

If only he knew, Hermann thought, and licked his fangs absentmindedly while Newt stomped around upstairs to make up the guest room. If only he knew he’s invited one in.

Chapter Text

Hitting his alarm clock to stop it, Newt woke up to the smell of coffee and caramelizing sugar, and in a half-awake moment of panic wondered if he left the coffee maker on. Hurriedly, he pulled on a shirt and bumped on down the stairs. Hermann was sitting at the breakfast table buttering what looked to be a scone. Right. Hermann. Weird maybe-satanist chicken mutilator who lived here now.

“Good morning,” he said. What was that accent? Newt blinked.

“You made breakfast? Thanks.”

“I didn’t know what was all right for me to take from your refrigerator,” Hermann said. “I hope you don’t mind my taking the liberty to make scones.”

“Are you a good chef?”

“I’m out of practice.” And there was that weird ‘I have a condition’ smile like Newt was supposed to be in on some kind of joke. “I hope these are palatable.”

“They smell great.”

Newt sat down, and Hermann pushed the plate over to him. Was he not going to eat? Then again, maybe he already had while Newt was sleeping. He bit into the scone, and the pastry melted in his mouth, butter dispersing through the crumbs. It was impossibly light, and Newt couldn’t believe it was made in this kitchen.

“This is really good,” he muttered, mouth full. “Is that… cream cheese in here? I’m obsessed.”

Newt thought he was a pretty decent cook, and liked to eat, but it had been a while since anyone had cooked for him. That was probably since last summer when that buff couple from Russia had kept him fed with peasant food the entire time and taught him everything he needed to know about the care and maintenance of his ancient tractor. He still kept up with them, through written correspondence in his childish Russian and their simple English. He would Skype if the tractor was acting up, and Sasha would smile wide and call Alexis over so he could see their kaiju boy. Sometimes he Skyped even when the tractor was fine, but at 3 AM when he was barely lucid and spiralling, and needed calm voices to drown out the ones he could sometimes hear after days of being alone and awake.

“I made a dozen,” Hermann said, breaking Newt’s reverie. “They keep quite well, though they don’t last long enough to keep.”

“No, no way,” Newt agreed and finished the one he’d been given, drowning it with a scalding hot cup of coffee. “Okay, let’s say hi to the horses.”

The minute they walked into the stables, all the horses got agitated, shuffling in their pens. Newt narrowed his eyes at Hermann.

“What’s gotten into them?”

“You’re the one with horses, why don’t you tell me?” Hermann said coolly, taking off the floppy black straw hat he had insisted on bringing with him even though the sun wasn’t even out yet.

They don’t call it horse sense for nothing.

For a split second Newt wondered what kind of bad energy Hermann brought with him, before dismissing that thought outright. That sounded like the kind of thought that could get twisted around in the laundry wringer of his paranoia, and anyway, all the horses were fine. Just skittish this morning. The first morning Hermann was here. Because he was a new person. That was all.

“They’ll get used to you,” Newt finally said.

The rest of the morning was taking care of orders for the shop at the edge of his property, by the highway. Hermann carefully stuck cartons of newly cleaned eggs into milk crates and Newt loaded them into the back of his truck.

“Get in the car,” he said to Hermann, who was standing and clutching his cane. He wasn’t shivering, but he looked cold. The windbreaker he was wearing didn’t look like it kept out shit. “Turn on the seat warmers.”

He finished loading up and then climbed into the driver’s seat. Hermann looked over.

“Where are we bringing this?”

“The shop. It’s a quick drive,” Newt said, stuck his keys in the ignition, and said a little prayer to the god of starting engines.

The shop seemed largely unmolested, a relief to Newt, who had wasted many days replacing broken windows and painting over graffiti. He unlocked it for the day and started unloading, after sending Hermann inside to turn on the lights. The shop ran by honour system; people stopped and picked up their provisions, leaving money in a safe box. Through this arrangement, Newt didn’t have to see people and they didn’t have to see him.

“Geiszler!”

Tendo Choi called out from his rolled down window, and Newt raised a hand in greeting.

“Long time no see, brother,” Tendo said, hopping out of his car. “How are you? You look good.”

Newt highly doubted this, especially given the past week, where he’d been pulling all-nighters and missing meals. Tendo, on the other hand, was clearly thriving. Married life suited him, and Newt told him as much while he got Tendo’s order together (two dozen eggs for the week. The Chois were big bakers.)

“Absolutely, I am a changed man,” Tendo said, and then smiled wide. “Alison and I might try for a kid.”

“Oh!” Newt said, then frowned. “Do you think you can still…? I mean, would you be carrying to term?”

“Well, we visited our gynecologist,” Tendo said. “I’m going to stop HRT for six months or so, and we’re going to see.”

Newt whistled.

“That’s big news. It really has been like ages, huh.”

“Know you don’t like to hear it, Geiszler,” he said, “but we worry about you, you know? When twenty-four eggs at the shop every week are the only proof of life we get for months on end…”

“I uh…” Newt said and felt himself colouring. “I’m sorry. I’m trying to call.”

“I know it’s hard. Don’t apologize.”

Tendo clasped Newt’s shoulder, breaking Newt’s four-month streak of not being touched by another person.

“Why don’t we come by one of these nights? I’ll bring some apple vodka from the still, and we can have a dumpling party.”

“Yeah? That sounds nice, it’s just, you know with the house and everything, and uh, it isn’t finished.”

Newt couldn’t bear to look at Tendo, afraid to decipher disappointment or pity, or maybe just the sense of an ending, the budding notion that Newt was too difficult to keep as a friend. He liked Tendo, knew that every time he pushed away his attempts to connect was another step closer to losing him because nobody was patient enough for every missed plan, every paranoid forty-minute rant, the endless and diaphanous ideas for a renovated house which was safe and could hold friends…

“It’s okay. Let me know when it’s finished. Or how about when it’s close? I can help,” Tendo offered. “But in the meantime, thanks for the eggs.”

“Yeah,” Newt said. “Good to see you, man.”

“Just a minute, let me get you your money.”

“It’s on the house this time. Tell Alison I said hi!”

Tendo peeled back out onto the highway, and Newt watched his car leave until he couldn’t see the tail lights anymore. Maybe he would reconnect the phone at his house tonight, dig out Tendo’s number and call, stay on the line until someone picked up. Maybe he could have his helper do it, dial the number and hold the phone until there was a voice on the other hand, force Newt to take the call. No. Hermann was clearly a weird dude but nobody was weird enough to do that without a thousand questions about why a full-grown man who could live on the land was scared of phone calls.

“Grow the fuck up,” he muttered to himself, without any real sting, and brought another crate of eggs into the shop.

Hermann was wiping down the shelves in the shop and looked up with some distaste.

“How often do you dust in here?”

“ Dust. That’s cute.”

“I’ll take that as a never.”

Newt could concede the shop looked better after Hermann’s vigorous once-over. He checked the safebox, pocketed crumpled bills and IOUs before checking the chest freezers and the fridges. Since yesterday little was depleted, though of course, the eggs needed restocking. Someone had left him a few jars of jam, whole wild strawberries suspended in a softly red gel. Newt grinned and hoped he would remember to write a thank you note to the farmers down the road.

“Here, this is the best.”

He handed Hermann one of the jars, who looked nonplussed.

“What on earth would I do with this?”

“Eat it. It’s spoon jam, means you eat it with a spoon. Probably good with one of those scones too.”

“I don’t eat sugar, I’m afraid. But thank you.”

“What do you eat?” Newt asked, and realized how rude that sounded only when he saw Hermann’s expression. “I mean, I like to cook. I wouldn’t want to make anything you can’t eat for dinner.”

“My condition requires me to keep to a rather eccentric diet,” Hermann explained. “I couldn’t in good conscience ask anyone to accommodate me in that regard. I am more than capable of cooking for myself.”

“Uh, okay.”

This condition of Hermann’s sounded unbearable. No sugar and no sun? Newt would have died long ago, freebasing chocolate bars and laying out on the beach.

Speaking of the sun, it was creeping over the horizon. Hermann had put on his floppy hat, a seriously floaty scarf produced from the pocket of his jacket, and a pair of sunglasses. Even through the dark lenses, Newt could detect the sidelong glance Hermann gave him.

“If you have any smart comments about my attire, now’s the time.”

“Far be it for me to criticize,” Newt said with a grin that only got wider the more he tried to suppress it. “I think you’re what they call ‘fetching’ on the continent.”

“Better I look ridiculous because I can assure you the alternative is unpleasant for myself and everyone around me.”

“I didn’t say you looked ridiculous, I said fetching.”

And now Newt was flirting with the first new person he’d seen in ages. Hopefully, Hermann wouldn’t notice. Or maybe he would, a mortifying possibility. Newt could probably rein it in now if he could just think before he spoke. Ha, un-fucking-likely.

“Let’s go,” he said with an awkward laugh. “Sap’s running.”

Chapter Text

The sun had begun its ascent across the horizon, and while Hermann was certain the cold rays of the early spring would not interact visibly with his skin (brittle like dry parchment) until midday, as they meandered towards the forest, he wondered how to beg out of any outdoor work from noon through to evening. Newt seemed the sort easily led by obsession, immediate tasks. The way he talked of the forest made it very clear he was smitten with it, and unchecked would likely be there until nightfall.

“You ever collect sap before?” Newt asked, breaking from his feverish fugue on ground cover and ants. Hermann shook his head. “You’re gonna. I don’t think the collection will be too much. It was cold last night so shit might not be running. But if you’re not up to it, you can drive the trails and I can collect.”

“I would prefer that,” Hermann said, biting his tongue. It was centuries now since he had repudiated the Earth and the work which kept her dependents limping along. Arrogance among the undead was an inherent part of the condition, and Hermann’s was supplemented by glances upwards, towards the stars and way from the gleefully Earthbound, Newt’s ilk.

But there was something charming about the way Newt flitted from tree to tree like a rarified monkey, slamming the lids down on the maples’ buckets and taking long moments to note the moss and plants beginning to poke through the snow.

They came out of the forest an hour or so later, and Newt directed Hermann to the sugar shack, where he dumped the day’s collection in a large vat to be boiled.

“You’re up at night a lot,” Newt said. “I’m hoping to get you boiling syrup by the time the sap really gets flowing. Do you know how to build a fire?”

Hermann thought to the last fire he’d seen built, back when his still body could conduct and retain heat. His mother had built it, showing him the best way to coax a homey flame. His mother had been dead for two hundred years.

“I’ll need a refresher,” he admitted.

“Some kind of city slicker, aren’t you?” Newt said, shaking his head. He’d taken off his chunky red scarf, overheated from the collection. Hermann could see, under all those unsightly freckles, how flushed he was, and worse, he could smell him, the sour sweat but also what lay beneath, a sweet gamey scent of prey in its prime. Hermann blinked, hoped Newt couldn’t see him staring behind his dark glasses.

“What else do you do in a day?” he asked.

Newt took off his glasses and wiped them, squinting at Hermann while he did. He had done this a few times in the sugar shack while checking over equipment, and Hermann wondered if it was a nervous tic, if Hermann was making him nervous. Apart from this gesture, he hid it well if he was uneasy. Most mortals couldn’t contain the deep, sudden fright which crept up on them the longer they spent in his company. Newt seemed immune, or at least oblivious. Perhaps evolution had smoothed away that prickle on the back of his neck, the way other mortals sometimes lacked their wisdom teeth or achieved double-jointedness.

“Mostly this.” Newt shrugged. “At least for now. There’s not much else that can go on while the ground is frozen. Anyway, I’m gonna teach you how to build a fire, we’re going to boil for a bit, and then lunch, I think. Oh, but first!”

He grabbed a ladle hanging from a nail on the wall and dipped it into a bucket of sap he’d taken inside with him. He poured it into a chipped little cup and handed it to Hermann.

“I know you don’t eat sugar,” he said with an apologetic grin. “But this is really good for you.”

Hermann looked at the clear substance, before sipping experimentally. It was only a little sweet, and still cold. To his immense surprise, no part of his physiology repelled it, or even itched at its presence, and he took another drink. It was the first thing he’d kept down that wasn’t blood since time immemorial. What on Earth...?

“You like it?” Newt asked.

“Yes,” Hermann said, finished the cup. The deep hunger which was his constant companion felt dulled, which was impossible, as he hadn’t properly fed in nearly a month, and… “Thank you, Newton. It’s good.”

“And about to get better,” Newt said, opening the fireplace in the maple boiler. “Okay, grab me a few sticks from that pile, and some newspaper.”

He pulled over a little stool for Hermann to sit on so he wouldn’t have to crouch, and they looked into the little fireplace together while Newt half-explained how to build a fire.

“Matches are in a plastic bag,” he said, pointing. “Keeps ‘em dry when it gets steamy in here. You wanna start the fire?”

Hermann nodded and struck a match before setting it gently in the carefully constructed fire. After a few moments, it caught, and Newt shut the door before flooding the boiler with sap. He seemed contented to talk through the process with a fond specificity which made the topic less tiresome than Hermann would have expected, and an acceptable soundtrack while they watched the sap simmer, and eventually boil.

“So,” Hermann said before Newt could go on another tangent related to the different shades of syrup (lighter at the beginning of the season, deep and dark by the end). “Have you always farmed?”

“Not always,” Newt said with a shake of his head. “Just a couple years. I used to live in the city, but it was bad for me, you know?”

Hermann did not know but nodded when Newt looked at him expectantly.

Cities had been very good to Hermann over the centuries, never truly changing even if the buildings got taller and the people more numerous. Nobody who lived in a city really saw him, which suited him fine. Nobody talked his ear off like the strange man who had taken him in, and the city’s noise was better than the quiet of the country. In the city, Hermann couldn’t see the stars and couldn’t feel the nonsense pang of homesickness when he looked up and away from the mire in which he was currently submerged.

“And I just, yeah, I,” Newt wrinkled his nose and fed another log into the fire. “I feel like I’m doing something now, and I don’t have to rush it, even if it’s important work. It’s a relief. Such a relief. What about you? What wind blew you this way?”

Hermann paused, wondering how to answer. Newt had been nothing but honest with him, generous and hospitable as well, traits which even vampires could appreciate in the mortals they were required to live amongst. And, like his moves which weren’t motivated by necessity, danger, he couldn’t define the restlessness which had unrooted him.

“I suppose I got bored with where I was before,” he said slowly. “Too many people and they all thought like me. I needed to be alone with my thoughts.”

“Yeah! Same!”

Not same, Hermann thought with some irritation. How could a mortal even begin to understand the loneliness of being surrounded but completely separate on account of some intrinsic part of yourself? But he nodded tightly.

“No better place for that than here,” Newt said blithely. “Wanna try feeding the fire for a little? I gotta feed the chickens.”

“All right,” Hermann said. Newt rose from his seat and stretched before leaving.

Now he was alone. Hermann let himself lift, levitating just enough to ease the weight on his bad leg. It was a luxury he had when he was by himself. Listening to the fire crackle, smelling the sap as it boiled, had almost a hypnotic effect on him. It was pleasant, a rare moment of quiet. And he didn’t hear Newt come back in.

Chapter Text

Newt walked in to see Hermann opening the fireplace with the head of his cane and feeding the flame with a contented smile. Save the contained little smile, this wasn’t in itself unusual. What was unusual was that Hermann was floating in the air, appeared to be floating in the air, Newt thought he was floating in the air.

Newt took off his glasses and looked again. Hermann was now very blurry and still floating. Usually, hallucinations stayed in sharp relief while everything else got grainy when Newt took them off unless he was having a really hard day or he was just dreaming. Quietly, Newt exited the sugar shack and took a deep breath before walking back in.

Hermann was now sitting normally and looked up with a little interest.

“Chickens all right?” he asked. Newt cleared his throat and nodded.

“Yeah,” he said and sat down. His hands were shoved in his jacket pockets so Hermann couldn’t see them shaking. No big deal, at least he knew people didn’t float, could call bullshit before he got too far down the rabbit hole. “Hey, uh, good job with the fire! You kept it at the same boil.”

“Oh, thank you.”

Hermann seemed nonplussed at the positive reinforcement, and more so when Newt smiled uncertainly at him. He sighed internally. Maybe he’d get better at this over the course of the season.

It didn’t help that Hermann was cute, in a very specific, exactly Newt’s type kind of way. And Newt got so much dumber, so much more excitable around people who were cute and also bothered giving him the time of day, a holdover from when he was younger and painfully aware that interaction with him was an ability only some people had and chose to exercise. Hermann had that talent, chose to exercise it, hadn’t snuck off in the dead of night yesterday, though apart from a verbal promise there was nothing preventing him.

And he could tend to the fire, which was great.

“So, we’re going to draw soon,” he said and pointed to the temperature dial. “When the syrup’s at 107 degrees, that’s when we can take some and finish it for syrup. It takes like 40 cups of sap to make one cup of syrup, and I reckon the season’s going to be pretty light this year. Might just wrap it up by the end of the week. It makes money when I sell it, but I like to keep it for myself, and nobody needs like, an industrial amount of it.”

“Do you ever keep the sap as is?” Hermann asked. Newt shrugged.

“I guess I could? It tastes nice from the tree, and it’s a pretty good mixer for gin too, but I like the process. Tell you what, though, when I wrap it up, I’ll keep the big maple by the house tapped for the rest of the month, and you can do what you like with the sap. Drink it, or, uh, bathe in it if that’s what you fancy.”

Dumb, Newt’s brain helpfully supplied while he blushed. But Hermann actually smiled again (was this smiling thing going to be a common occurrence? Newt was unprepared), and nodded.

“Thank you. I think I would like that.”

“Nice! Okay.”

On two levels, it was a remote relief that Hermann would accept this gesture. First, it meant Newt wasn’t being weirder than their mutual baseline, admittedly warped given their grisly meeting, and second, it meant Hermann was consuming something. Newt didn’t buy into all the alternate health woo-woo surrounding maple sap lately, but it definitely had nutrients that Hermann, with his sallow complexion and highly restrictive diet, needed.

They finished boiling, after hours of more or less pleasant arguments and scattered tangents into the sciences. Hermann knew more than the average guy about astronomy, probably went some place to study it given his specificity regarding black holes. Newt was so tempted to ask where he got his degree, but his horror of small talk RE: school prevented him.

The sun was setting when they drove back to the house, and Newt set about preparing dinner.

“You sure I can’t make you anything?” he asked, not without anxiety. As a response, Hermann pulled out a bottle of pills and shook them. Newt’s stomach dropped.

“Vitamins aren’t a meal! What do you do for energy?”

“A shake with a rather distasteful name, I’m afraid. My constitution is ill-equipped for anything else.”

Newt shook his head.

“Total travesty dude, you’re on my farm now, you can’t with the shakes and the pills, especially if you’re going to do any farm work. If I cook you something little every day, will you try it?”

A weird mix of emotions played across Hermann’ face, and Newt realized he had definitely overstepped, was on the verge of an apology before Hermann nodded.

“So long as it doesn’t make me ill.”

“That’s all I ask.”

Newt reckoned Hermann needed iron, and decided on a saag of sorts, setting rice to cook while he bloomed some spices in oil, using the non-stick pan he’d had since he was in university. More oil, then spinach and pulped tomatoes to simmer.

“The rice is golden,” Hermann said, curiously wafting the steaming rice so he could smell it. “Turmeric?”

“Saffron,” Newt grinned proudly. “Home-grown. The fronds come from crocuses, lovely in the spring and not too hard to rear once you get the hang of it. For very special guests ONly. Uh, are you lactose intolerant?”

“Yes,” Hermann said offhandedly, stirred the rice. “And celiac. No other allergies.”

“Vegetarian?”

Hermann paused.

“I’ve been known to eat meat. Nothing raised cruelly.”

“Of course not. Fish?”

Hermann wrinkled his nose.

“I can eat it , but you understand, the odour…”

“Got it. Weak constitution.”

Newt skipped the generous finish of yoghurt that typically made saag velvety and moreish, opting for chickpeas mashed in tahini to add some body. Feeling self-conscious, he set two places on the table. He hadn’t cooked for somebody in a really long time, and Hermann was a tough customer to be sure. Newt was pretty hungry, though, and focused on eating his own meal instead of trying to gauge Hermann’s enjoyment.

“Do you want something to drink, I could make tea or something,” he said to his plate. Peripherally, he could see Hermann pushing his food around before taking very small bites.

“I’ll make tea, after. I have a very old recipe I’d like to try.”

“Okay! And dinner is it…”

“It tastes very good,” Hermann said, looking fairly apologetic. “You have a talent. I’m afraid it is often difficult for me to eat, even with the best on offer. What is the green?”

“It’s spinach,” Newt responded with a blink. Food literacy in the city really was at an all-time low. “Leafy greens. Lots of vitamins. Probably not as concentrated as those pills but…”

Hermann took another bite.

“I don’t mind it.”

“You don’t have to eat it all, or even eat it here. I remember when I was at my mom’s house, she’d make me eat everything on my plate at dinner before I could leave, and it really sucked, so I mean I don’t want meals to suck for you while you’re here, especially with all your restrictions and stuff…”

Newt was rambling, tended towards logorrhea even when there was nobody else to hear. Apart from a look of amused irritation, a weird balance to strike, Hermann didn’t seem to mind.

Strike two for him being a hallucination, a fun little voice in his head piped up, and Newt changed tack.

“What’s this tea you’re talking about?”

“Oh! I suppose it’s a little like chai,” Hermann explained and took a saucepan from the kitchen island before fiddling with the stove. “Electric?”

He looked as though someone had offered him a fish stick, and Newt shrugged.

“Not my first choice either. But it works.”

“Very well.”

Hermann filled the saucepan with water and set it to simmer. Spices from Newt’s cupboard were unceremoniously dropped in, then he pulled a little sachet from the inside of his vest.

“What’s that?”

“A very rare herb,” Hermann said. “When the world was newer, I hear it grew plentifully. Now you cannot cultivate it except in very special circumstances.”

“Oh dude, if that’s a psychoactive you have to tell me before,” Newt said and picked at a hole in the sleeve of his hoodie. “I’m pretty cool, but I need to know about that sort of thing.”

“Nothing so crass, I swear to you. It has an effect on the blood, warms the heart. Good for chilly spring nights after winter.”

“Okay.”

Hermann dropped the sachet in, and let the mixture steep. A scent, hard to place and almost velvety, hung in the air, and Hermann pulled out a couple of cups. Newt took the cup he was given, letting the warmth seep into his hands before he took a sip. It tasted of raspberry skin and the warming spices, and he shut his eyes, feeling instantly calm after a day of ragged nerves.

“Wow,” Newt sighed. “Thank you.”

Hermann stirred his tea, took a deep drink, and looked out the dark window as though he could see what was out there.

“What a treat,” he finally said. “All this quiet. When you sleep, it must feel like a blanket.”

A bit poetic for this time of the evening, but Newt agreed. He had difficulty sleeping sometimes, but there was the strange effect of being cradled by the silence of the country when he wa at his most weary. He drank some more tea, and listened to Hermann talk.

Chapter Text

His host turned in early, and Hermann found himself wandering, as he often did in the time when most things slept. The moon was bright and the air was frigid. Dead grass crunched underfoot, and Hermann realized he was walking, though none were around to see him. He vastly preferred to drift, cane hooked on his elbow and leg now relatively unburdened. He imagined that in space, he would be far freer to fly than he was here, gravity-bound. Though his leg still pained him, Hermann’s discomfort was often the direct result of walking, the dreadful pantomime of passing as one of the living.

“Bruder,” a low, familiar voice said. Hermann turned around, masking his surprise as much as he could. Karla was there, bare feet clean and mouth black, from blood or lipstick, difficult to tell in the moonlight. Golden eyes blinked at brown, and she smiled.

“What are you doing here?” Hermann asked.

“You summoned me, did you not?”

Karla held up a dead chicken, recently disinterred, and Hermann cursed inwardly. Arcane rituals to draw and summon the undead were too numerous to avoid, and Karla knew them all, abided by them with more strictness than even the most nonsensical vampire. If Hermann dropped a handful of rice on the ground, she would count them until the sun rose. And of course, if he killed a fowl and let a mortal bury it, she would have come from any corner of the globe.

“You don’t look happy to see me. I thought you might be in trouble,” Karla continued.

“I didn’t mean to summon you.”

“Well, tell me I’m not welcome or suffer the company of your sister for a moment more. Perhaps you would like some news? This seems terribly boring, I must say,” Karla said, gesturing to the quiet of the forest. “You really let the winds blow you where they will.”

“A diversion from the work, I confess. I’m working off a debt.”

“Quaint.”

“Is father still furious?”

“Graf von Gottlieb’s displeasure is as timeless as his name.” Karla rolled her eyes. “But the first tests have been promising, he will concede that your calculations have some merit. He must, or look very foolish.”

“They haven’t sent anyone up yet?”

“If you’re so curious, why don’t you come back?”

Hermann paused, wondered seriously why he didn’t. He was itching to depart from the planet, and even with father’s shortsightedness, their differences would surely be put aside as the feasibility of departure grew more and more likely. And a piddling debt to a mortal, over a pet chicken, was hardly to postpone the centuries-long dream of discovering new galaxies. He was more of ease amongst his kind, disliked though he was.

“The farmer needs help in the season upcoming,” he finally said. “He’ll be shorthanded.”

“Farming,” Karla snorted. “ You. I suppose you’ve been eating as well?”

Hermann’s silence made her eyes widen.

“The stock of Lars Gottlieb limping about with someone who eats food from the ground? Haven’t you been very ill?”

“Not yet.”

Had Hermann any running blood, he would have been blushing.

“It seems very common. And inefficient. They can’t help but eat, We’ve got better methods.”

“It was… pleasant.”

“When do you do anything for pleasure, Hermann?”

“I’ve been bored,” Hermann said, only just realizing the truth as the words left his mouth. “We have worked ceaselessly on the space project for decades without any diversion. If I eat a meal or choose to cavort with mortals, it can only serve to make better the quality of my work. If you truly were summoned, Karla, you may take your leave now. And if, as I suspect, Father sent you, be a dear and tell him I’ll return in the fall, before winter begins.”

Karla blinked, once, and Hermann held up his hands.

“You are no longer welcome. Aroint thee.”

“Well,” Karla narrowed her eyes. “If you must.”

And she was gone with a pop. Hermann sighed and drifted back towards the farmhouse, his evening reverie ruined. Family, even Karla (sometimes especially Karla) was such a strenuous ordeal, an exhausting necessity while the vampires planned their planetary quietus. The memory of the last explosive fight he had with his father before he left in a fury was no longer so fresh, though he often replayed their argument, how he could have been more impartial, more eloquent, less green and mortal.

He could see a light on in the farmhouse, Newt sitting on the porch with a quilt and a cigarette. The hand which held the latter was shaking. Hermann made double sure he had both feet on the ground and walked over.

“Are you all right?” he asked. Newt startled. He wasn’t wearing his glasses. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“It’s okay,” Newt muttered and looked own. “I’m on edge anyhow. I had a bad dream.”

Karla’s influence. She liked to blow nightmares through the windows of susceptible mortals, like a less friendly giant from the book and thought it very funny to watch them bolt upright in harmless but awful fright. Newt must have been a particularly tempting target, with the eccentricities of his brain begging out for some kind of stimulation from passing practical jokers. Hermann felt a pang of something like guilt and sat down with Newt.

“Would it help to talk about it?” he asked. Newt shook his head and pulled the blanket closer.

“It’s just--” He broke off, frustrated. “Just my imagination.”

“Cold comfort. It was real to you at the moment.”

Newt nodded and took another drag of his cigarette. Hermann could hear his lungs, could hear that he wasn’t a habitual smoker, the cage rattle of his heart, and wondered what images Karla had curated from this poor mortal. She had a tendency towards the Grand Guignol.

“Would it be worth it to try sleeping again?” Newt shook his head fractionally. “It’s just going to get colder out here. Let’s go inside and I’ll build a fire.”

“I don’t mind the cold. It reminds me I’m alive.”

That doesn’t follow, Hermann didn’t say. The cold is all I feel, and I’m quite dead.

Instead, he carefully pressed a hand on Newt’s forehead and removed the cigarette from his fingers as he fell forward, limp and in a deep sleep. Positioning the sleeping man so he was lying on his lap like a sick child with its mother, Hermann took a careful drag from the half-finished cigarette, watched the resultant smoke obscure the moon, the marshall of so many of his impulses, a force on the planet to which he remained tethered. Yet it was just a rock suspended in orbit, and it would be imperceptible, powerless when Hermann was lightyears away. Much like Newt, though Hermann knew he imperilled his objectivity the longer he stayed. It had only been two days and he was coming to be very attached to the fellow.

Cigarette finished and smouldering on the ground, Hermann floated to Newt’s bedroom window and opened it. Then he bundled Newt in the bed, careful not to disturb the room’s remarkable disarray. IHe shut the window and went to his own room, pulled a book from the shelf, and read until sunrise.

Chapter Text

Newt stumbled out of bed ahead of the sun that morning, feeling more well-rested than he had any right to be. He couldn’t remember having dreams, which was unusual but not unwelcome, as he usually had real humdingers for dreams these days.

Hermann was washing dishes, quietly humming and leaning heavily on the counter, cane set carefully on the breakfast table. Newt cleared his throat and Hermann looked up.

“Good morning. Coffee?”

“You know it.”

Newt pulled out a mug from the shelf above the sink, and then pulled out another after a thought.

“Do you take anything in yours?”

“I don’t drink coffee,” Hermann said with a sidelong glance, took his hands out of the sink and dried them on a towel. Toast popped from the toaster, and Hermann set the well-done slices on a plate before finding the butter in the fridge. They sat at the table, and Hermann scraped butter on toast, before taking a large bite.

“Aren’t you celiac?” Newt asked cautiously. A trail of crumbs stuck to a smear of butter on the corner of Hermann’s mouth, and Newt’s hand twitched, wanting to wipe it away. “And lactose intolerant?”

Hermann shrugged.

“I felt like toast this morning,” he said. “Good, burnt toast. With butter.”

“Like, right on dude, but won’t you get sick?”

Hermann took another bite, and Newt guessed that was his answer.

After the morning’s tasks were done, they drove to the shop. There was a car there already, and Newt’s heart started beating too fast before he recognized it.

“Your eggs are on Tuesday!” Newt yelled out the window while he parked.

“Not here for the eggs,” Tendo responded when Newt got out of the car, opened his mouth to say something else, and then blinked at Hermann, who was lurking just outside Newt’s periphery. “Hi?”

“This is Hermann, he’s at the farm now,” Newt explained.

“Good to meet you,” Hermann said, thrust out a stiff hand to Tendo, who took it after an amused glance.

“Pleasure’s all mine, brother. The name’s Tendo. I didn’t know you had a work-away, Newt, was this planned?”

“You know how it is sometimes, you just meet people.”

“Is that how it is sometimes?” Tendo repeated. The furrow in his brow told Newt they were going to talk about this. “I thought you would need help with the sap today. It was freezing last night, and the buckets at our house were pretty full yesterday.”

“That would be awesome, dude, thanks,” Newt said. “Which means you can stay inside, Hermann.”

They took Tendo’s car to the forest, leaving Hermann to watch and clean the shop.

“So,” Tendo said. “When were you going to tell me about Hermann?”

“What is there to tell? He’s here for the season. Just arrived a couple of days ago.” He left out the detail about the chicken because Tendo looked pretty concerned already. “Anyway, weren’t you just saying that I could use the company?”

“I sure was.” Tendo laughed easily, tipping a nearly full bucket of sap into a jug. “Look, I trust your judgement, and my gut instinct has been wrong before, like with you, but I got such a weird feeling from him.”

“I think he gets that a lot,” Newt said, and shrugged. “As I am composed entirely of weird feelings, I guess we’re going to be thick as thieves in a week or so.”

“Fair point,” Tendo said. “And, what, he farms?”

“He can do the syrup, but after that, he might be purely ornamental,” Newt admitted, trying to think about Hermann digging compost and failing miserably.

“I knew it, dude, he’s totally your type! That cardigan was made out of boyfriend material for sure.”

“Shut upppp.” Newt could feel his cheeks get red. “But yeah, you’re right. Completely my type. All aloof and tall and shit. Not by any plan on my part! He just dropped on my lap.”

“I hope so.” Tendo cackled when Newt got redder, somehow. “Look, I kid. Should I change the subject?”’

“I don’t know, what else have you got?”

Newt knew Tendo. While he appreciated the extra help around the farm, the fact is if there was news from outside Tendo caught wind of that he thought Newt should hear, that was when he was most likely to show up without Alison first thing in the morning. Tendo’s smile dropped, and he sighed.

“I wouldn’t be bothering you with this stuff if I didn’t think someone else would bother you with it sooner or later. Your mom is contesting your ownership of the land.”

“Again? Why?” Newt asked tentatively.

“Who knows why Monica does have the things she does, Newt. If I had to speculate, it’s the groundwater on the property.”

“What does she care about groundwater for?”

Tendo hesitated again.

“Lately,” he said, and switched tack. “A lot of rich folks are spending their time and money securing sources of drinking water because doomsday predictions are getting real fashionable these days. I’m assuming she’s jumping on a bandwagon. Plus she gets to try and screw you all over again.”

“Should I be worried? I mean, about mom obviously, but also like, the end of the world? I mean, more than I already do.”

“No, Newt, I think you worry the right amount about that sort of thing as it stands,” Tendo said hurriedly. “And Alison is going to deal with your mom’s lawyers, just like the last time. There’s nothing new there.”

“And she won’t, like…” Newt trailed off and picked at the cuff of his sleeve.

“She’s not going to come here in person.”

“Thanks. I’ll pay you back eventually.”

“I don’t doubt it.”

They finished collecting the sap, and then met Hermann at the sugar shack. Hermann had brought lunch, a thermos of coffee, and some playing cards, and had already set about building a fire. He was not floating, to Newt’s intense, nonsensical relief.

Chapter Text

Hermann liked Newt’s friend, though his watchful eyes were a little unnerving. His father often told him stories of the descendants of vampire hunters, who were more attuned to the presence of the undead than other mortals, and Hermann had no doubt that somewhere down Tendo’s lineage was a variety of such a watcher.

Newt seemed… jangled, more than usual, in the time between having seen him in the morning and now, when they were in the sugar shack and watching the fire, the temperature of the boiling sap. It was nothing to do with Tendo, though Hermann could sense some kind of regret coming from him, perhaps he was the source of some bad news?

“These are really good, Hermann,” Tendo said, mouth full of the schnitzel sandwich Hermann had made after stocking the shop. Newt nodded in agreement, picking apart the sandwich’s construction and eating the tomato separately. “Thank you.”

“No trouble at all,” Hermann said. “It is nice to cook for others. In the city I did not have a good kitchen, or the occasion.”

“What did you do in the city?”

Hermann hesitated minutely, confident Tendo would be able to pick up on any kind of lie or half-truth he told. In that split-second, he decided on telling as much as he could.

“I am an astrophysicist,” he said. “Currently on sabbatical, though I am sure the Work will entice me back sooner or later.”

“Hopefully not too soon,” Newt interjected. “I didn’t know I even had the stuff to make this, dude. It’s so good.”

He was pulling the schnitzel apart with his fingers, and while this would have set him on edge usually, Hermann found that the snappishness he would have associated with mortal table manners was somewhat softened by the fact that it was Newt.

“You just need a little bread, some oil,” Hermann said. “If you wanted something vegetarian, you could do it with broccoli. My mother was Jewish, so she often made vegetable ‘cutlets’ when we were children.”

She was ahead of her time in that regard. In his possessions, Hermann had a kosher vegetarian cookbook from the 1940s with similar methods, but had no doubt the recipe was as old as the 1800s.

“I didn’t know you were Jewish,” Newt said quietly. “Me too.”

“Not by observance.”

“Well, hell, me neither, not really.”

It was an obvious topic of guilt. Newt’s eyes shifted downwards and Tendo looked like he wanted to say something, to explain. Hermann wished he could gloss over this topic, guide the mortals to somewhere else in the conversation while they were under his thrall, but he was not sure how susceptible Tendo would be. The more he knew about Newt the more he was inclined to remain, to be kind to a man who wasn’t kind to himself.

“I apologize,” he said instead. “I’ve made you uncomfortable.”

“Naw, I did that myself.”

Newt laughed, and the mood did seem to lift without Hermann’s stir.

“Anyway, it’s no reason not to acknowledge it, dude. I know I’ve got a seder plate somewhere in the house, if you want to have a little celebration when the time comes,” he said. “I kind of miss all of that.”

Hermann tried to remember the last time he’d been at a Passover seder, and found he couldn’t. The idea was appealing, the memory of dripping wine on the table cloth for the Egyptian firstborns suddenly vivid and warm.

“I miss it too,” he said. “I think I’d like that, Newton.”

“Okay, it’s a date,” Newt said, and Tendo’s eyebrows raised minutely while Hermann played dumb.

They chatted idly while the sap boiled, watched the sun set through the sugar shack’s little windows and Tendo showed them photos of him and his wife Alison at a vacation in San Francisco, where both of their parents lived. Hermann couldn’t imagine the degree of love Tendo had for Alison, found it to be a pleasant diversion to be sure.

“And how did you and Newt meet?” Hermann asked in a purchase to keep the conversation going. Newt turned bright red and Tendo laughed.

“That’s a story for another time, brother,” he said. “And it’s getting late. I should get home anyhow.”

“I’ll drive you to your car,” Hermann said, standing up. “I think the syrup is about ready to draw and finish.”

“Oh, yeah,” Newt said, looking at the dial. “Thanks dude, I got this.”

Hermann and Tendo walked to the car, and Hermann could feel the other man’s eyes on him, the weight of a question unasked.

“It was good to meet you,” Hermann said. “Do you often drop by?”

“Here and there. Just when Newt needs help,” Tendo said. “So what do you think of him?”

Hermann paused, opening the door to the jeep. Tendo looked extremely nonchalant in a way that telegraphed his readiness for a violent reaction, and for a split second Hermann’s grip tightened on his cane.

“What should I think of him? He’s been generous with his time and very accommodating towards me. And he isn’t nosy.”

“No, he isn’t,” Tendo agreed. “Neither am I. Lots of people come here to lay low, Newt’s frankly included in that. But if you have… stuff that’s going to come up here…”

“Why would you think that of me?”

“Call it an instinct, I can usually pick out the career criminals in a crowd.”

“It’s uncanny,” Hermann agreed, aware that this was an avenue of confession. Good then, that he didn’t attempt glamour on Tendo. His charms usually had the opposite effect on people of of his ilk. “My stuff, as you call it, is unlikely to follow me. Your friend is very safe. Or he is in no more danger than he usually is. You have my word as a friend of his, if I can have some guarantee of your discretion.”

“Of course. It’s not my business.”

What is your business? Hermann didn’t ask as he dropped Tendo at the shop. The man had an air of organization and focus, a whiff of secrecy which indicated government, or government-adjacent. Newt, loose-lipped as he was, might have a few insights in this regard. But it was not a curiosity driven by survival, an inherent need to know. Hermann would leave him whatever privacy he commanded.