He didn't actually think Greengrass would say what he was feeling. If anything, he'd hoped that, in his anger, Greengrass would hint to something that would make it easier for Valerian to come to a conclusion—or maybe he would simply let it show on his face. That, he thought, was better than the petty jabs they were exchanging, which were doing nothing other than further irritating Greengrass and frustrating Valerian.

But he said it—the word were clear, and they were... arguably a bit too loud. Valerian immediately cocked his head to the crowd of men, who fortunately at the same time had erupted into laughter over what looked to be a game of cards going on across the room. He felt the air escape his lungs, and his heart began to settle. He stood up abruptly, turned his back to the crowd and his eyes back onto Greengrass.

"You're coming with me," he demanded, his hand grasping the upper part of Greengrass' arm. They would go into one of the empty side rooms, or maybe into one of the bedrooms so he could lock the door behind them. He wasn't going to discuss this here.

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There was nothing Ford wanted to do less than be dragged off to somewhere more private so that they could talk about this. He hadn't wanted to say it in the first place, and still didn't know why he had. It was as though the words had gone straight to his mouth without stopping by his brain first, but that made no sense. He didn't just blurt things out on a whim, even if he was frustrated. He always thought about what he was going to say, and if anything being angry made him slower to choose his words. So where had that come from?

"I am not," Ford insisted, trying to pull his arm free from Macnair's grip as he slid out of his chair. "I'm leaving." He'd reschedule his meeting that evening, or maybe he'd just fake his death and never speak to that particular man again. He couldn't imagine recovering from this degree of embarrassment, so death seemed rather preferable at that point.

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Set by Lady!

Valerian jaw tightened at Greengrass' refusal. He leaned in slightly, his face mere inches from the other man's. "Do you honestly think you can say something like that and then—leave?" he hissed, unwilling to release his hold on Greengrass as he tried to pull away.

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For a moment when Macnair leaned in, Ford was actually afraid. He wasn't afraid of Macnair, necessarily — after being intimate with him it would have been difficult to ever see him as physically threatening, regardless of the circumstances. Rather, he was afraid that this was all going to spiral out of control. It had already started to spiral out of control, because Ford didn't know why he'd said that. He hadn't wanted to say it, and hadn't thought about saying it, which made the fact that he had rather alarming. Was there something wrong with him? If there was, he had no idea what had caused it, or how long it would last. What else might he admit to, if pressed? The best case scenario if he stayed here was that he might wholly and utterly embarrass himself in front of Macnair (if it was possible to do that any more than he already had, anyway); at worst, he might ruin his life, or ruin his family. Since he didn't know what was going on, he couldn't risk it. He couldn't stay, but Macnair was holding onto his arm and he also couldn't grapple with him right in the middle of the gentleman's club to try and get away.

Before he had a chance to think better of it, Ford slipped his left hand into his jacket and fumbled for his wand. He was right handed, but Macnair had a hold of that arm and there was no way he'd manage to reach it with his normal hand, but he shouldn't actually need his wand hand. He didn't even actually know if this would work, because he'd never seen anyone apparate or disapparate in the club before and there may have been wards preventing it, but he was hoping there weren't and people just steered clear of it normally because it was impolite. Impolite he could manage, compared to how ruined he might be if he stayed. Even splinched currently sounded more pleasant than staying. He squeezed his eyes shut, because he couldn't focus on apparating when Macnair's face was so close to his, and tried to get himself to High Street.

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Set by Lady!

Somehow no response was worse than being told to shove off. Valerian's gripped tightened, and he opened his mouth to demand he follow—but then something happened. It took him a split second to recognize that they were apparating, but by the time he'd properly braced himself they had already landed wherever Greengrass had brought him. The first thing he recognized was that he was sitting down, and that the bricks were hard and uneven under his body. They were somewhere in the streets, then, and the side-along apparition had knocked him off his feet. He opened his eyes, and he realized—with a mental sigh of relief—that they were in some alleyway rather than in the middle of the street with a dozen other people.

The next thing he noticed was the searing pain in his arm. He grasped at it, letting out a his a his fingertips pressed into warm, wettened flesh. His gaze dropped down to his arm, and—"Fucking shit," he cursed, not paying attention to Greengrass as he tried to figure out the extent of the splinching under the layer of blood.

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Ford had just enough time to be relieved that it had worked before he realized that something was wrong. If he had taken the time to think about this at all before he'd done it he might have thought Macnair would have let go of him, but truth be told he hadn't considered it one way or another. He'd just been thinking about getting out, and apparition was the only way he could think to do it. The word "fuck," was out of his mouth before he'd even realized Macnair was bleeding. His continued presence here was distressing enough, even without adding any additional emergency.

"You weren't supposed to come with me," he said, unsure if he was trying to make an accusation or offer an explanation or something else entirely. He tried to put a little distance between the pair of them on the pavement and nearly lost his balance, having to shove his hands out to prevent himself from falling over. It was only at this point that he realized something was wrong with Macnair, because he was clutching at his arm. Ford blinked, trying to make sense of it, then realized what must have happened.

"Shit," he muttered, pulling out a handkerchief and pressing it to Macnair's shoulder.

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Set by Lady!

Valerian was a healer, but he wasn't a Spell Damage healer. He'd assisted with splinching case early in his trainings, but it had been decades and he could hardly think straight when there was a deep cut up the length of his arm. He peeked up at Greengrass and was hit by the urge to yell at him. As if he could have known not to come with him! Who in their right mind apparated with someone holding onto them, and without their wand out? He might have said that and more, but he was doing his best to stop himself from letting out a groan. He allowed Greengrass' handkerchief to take the place of his hand and grasped at his pant leg with his blood-covered hand to wipe away the blood.

"I'm—sure you're—pleased—with yourself," he ground out, pushing his bloodstained hand into his pocket to fish out his own wand. He needed to do something; Greengrass might have been an expert with ghosts and boggarts, but he doubted he could heal a splinching.

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"Pleased?" Ford asked with an incredulous look. At what point during this entire conversation had Ford given any indication that he was pleased? And this was the worst bit so far, aside from the unintended confession itself. He'd been trying desperately to get away from Macnair, not to end up alone in an alleyway with him while he bled on Ford's shoes. This was actually about as far away from managing to escape the interaction as one could get, because he certainly couldn't leave now. Macnair would probably do just as well without him, since he was a healer and Ford was fairly useless when it came to first aid, but what if something happened? What if this injury ended up being worse than it looked? It was hard to tell exactly how big it was, with Macnair's sleeve in the way.

"Do you need a hospital?" Ford asked, chewing his lower lip.

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He didn't really think Greengrass was pleased, but he was hurt and he wanted Greengrass to feel guilty. It was selfish of him, but he wasn't too concerned about Greengrass' feelings when he was becoming increasingly worried about the amount of blood he was losing. "No," he responded, looking down at his arm. He couldn't tell how deep it was along the entire wound, but there was one spot on his forearm where he was certain it had bitten into his skin fairly deep.

"Get my coat off," he directed, pulling himself into a straighter sitting position, "and unbutton my shirt. We can use it to stop the bleeding if it's that bad." Going to the hospital would require too many explanations, especially given that a good number of Hogsmeade's healers knew him.

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If Macnair thought they didn't need to go to the hospital and was able to issue directions that was a good sign, Ford thought. He was inclined to trust the other man's judgement given that he did this sort of thing for a living, even if he didn't usually do it for himself. If he thought he could handle it himself in an alleyway outside Black's, Ford would trust him on it. It certainly saved him the headache of trying to explain what had happened to anyone at the hospital.

He nodded and let go of Macnair's shoulder. Ford let his fingers move to the top button of his jacket before his mind caught up to them and he froze, tense. "I'm not undressing you in the middle of the street," he protested, though he didn't really have any better suggestions.

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Set by Lady!

He was overcome with relief when Greengrass listened to him. The last thing he needed was the other man fighting his requests because of their exchange in Black's, especially when he wasn't in a place where he could physically help himself. He watched Greengrass, trying to focus on his fingers rather than the burning pain in his arm—and then Greengrass paused and began to protest, and Valerian pursed his lips. "I don't think anyone who stumbled across us would assume you're trying to ravish me. Your reputation is safe," he retorted dryly, lowering his gaze back to his arm with a grimace. He could see the blood seeping through the thick fabric of his coat, and the bricks where he was bracing himself were stained with blood.

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   Fortitude Greengrass

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The tops of Ford's cheeks tinged pink at the word ravish. Macnair had a point, but truthfully it hadn't been the fear of someone else stumbling upon them and getting the wrong impression that had caused Ford to hesitate. It was more that if he undid all of Macnair's buttons, he'd have to sit here on the pavement two feet away from Macnair looking at his bare chest. It wasn't that he was afraid anything would happen while Macnair was bleeding all over the place, but it was just one more complicating factor on this interaction that Ford was struggling to get through as it was. He didn't imagine anything could happen that would make it go any worse, but he just didn't need the added stress of trying not to see the way the muscles on Macnair's chest moved as he shifted around on the ground. He'd spent hours after their encounter at the Fae Ball turning it over and over in his mind, overanalyzing and reliving every moment of it, which probably wasn't healthy... and Macnair hadn't been partially naked for any part of that conversation.

It wasn't as though he could say that, though, and even if he did he knew that his own potentially compounding heartbreak was less important than the fact that Macnair was bleeding.

"Yeah, alright," he agreed. He tried to focus only on the buttons themselves, without looking at either the blood or at Macnair's face, as though he could divorce this task from all the rest of the context and pretend these were someone else's buttons, but with minimal success. His fingers were still clumsy and fumbling as he worked through them.

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Set by Lady!

Valerian sat in silence watching Greengrass fumble with his buttons. He didn’t want to make assumptions, because he merely could have been nervous about handling this much blood, but they were so close, and after the confession Greengrass had made minutes ago he couldn’t help but wonder whether the fumbling was related to that. It was unlikely—it was likely just his ego at play, because they still hadn’t had time to unpack what Greengrass had said.

Still, he watched Greengrass’ face as the man worked to undo his buttons, observing the way his facial muscles shifted and tightened as he concentrated. Without even thinking he reached up and smoothed one of Greengrass’ brows, only to go still and pull his hand back.

“Do you need help?” he asked, thinking he might be able to get the last few of Greengrass was still fumbling.

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If it looked like he was focusing on trying to get Macnair's buttons off, that wasn't entirely accurate; Ford was really focusing on not taking in anything else other than the sight and feeling of the buttons. As much as he was fumbling with the simple task already, it would have been far worse if he'd been glancing at Macnair's face while he was trying to do it. Given that, he didn't realize that Macnair had moved his hand until it was already on his face, and he immediately tensed.

You can't do that to me! Ford thought desperately. His eyes were fixed on his hands where they'd frozen on Macnair's buttons, because he couldn't — couldn't — look at Macnair's face as he pulled his hand away. Merlin take it all, did Macnair even think about things like that before he did them? He had to know what a gesture like that would do to Ford, particularly after Ford's unwilling confession a few moments ago. So he had to know; the question then was whether Macnair was doing this on purpose to get a reaction out of Ford, or whether he was doing it on instinct before he'd had a chance to think about it and realize what the impact would be. There was no way for Ford to know which it was, and he wasn't sure which option would have been worse.

Did he need help? No, he didn't need help. He needed Macnair to stop bleeding so that Ford could get the hell out of here. He needed to go drown himself in a lake so that he'd never have to figure out how to overcome this crushing embarrassment. He needed to get his hands on a time-turner and prevent himself from coming to the club tonight at all.

"I'm fine," he said tersely (a lie, obviously). "Just fix your arm."

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Set by Lady!

I’m fine, Greengrass had said, even though it was clear by his tone that he wasn’t. He lowered his gaze to Greengrass’ fingers as they finished the last of the buttons, unsure if he should—or if he even could—respond. He was certain Greengrass had felt his fingertips, so clearly he was trying to ignore it, only Valerian wasn’t sure whether that was what he wanted.

Finally his shirt came off, and Valerian shrugged it off with mild difficulty. He looked down at the wound, and shit, it went all the way from his shoulder down right below his elbow. He gulped at the prospect of trying to heal that on his own—splinchings we’re painful by nature—but it was still preferable to the hospital.

“My coat pocket,” he said, nodding to where it laid just out of reach. “There’s a pouch in there—it’s got an undetectable extension charm. I’m not sure if I have dittany.” Merlin he hoped he did, else he’d be stuck finding a more temporary solution.

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Ford would have been ill-suited to play nurse in any circumstances, even if he hadn't been spending half his mental energy trying not to look at either Macnair's bare torso or his bleeding arm. He'd never learned anything in the way of healing magic, and it had been long enough since Hogwarts that he wasn't even sure he'd recognize dittany when he saw it. Also: was that the sort of thing people just carried around with them? Presumably so, if Macnair thought he might, but it seemed strange to Ford. He was fairly certain Noble had dittany in his workshop somewhere, but there was a difference between keeping it in stock in a workshop and carrying it in your breast pocket.

As he fished the pouch out of the pocket Macnair had indicated he wondered idly if he ought to suggest Noble's workshop. Ford would literally rather die than invite Macnair into his home in this state, much less explain to any of his family members what had happened, but he wouldn't rather Macnair die if it came down to that. But he was being melodramatic — Macnair wasn't going to die from a cut on his arm, even if it was bleeding a rather frightful amount. Besides, how would they even get there? The Greengrass home was only a few blocks away, but Macnair wasn't going to walk there half-dressed and bleeding, and it wasn't as though he'd be keen to let Ford apparate him to their garden.

At least he didn't have to be touching Macnair while he groped around for this dittany. He was pointedly not looking at him, too, which was the only way he was surviving this interaction. "Is this it?" he asked, holding out the first vial he'd found and looking at Macnair's shoulder rather than his eyes (still not ideal, but there weren't a wealth of options that allowed him to sort-of look at Macnair without really looking at him).

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Set by Lady!