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[oom] Sunshine, lakeside
The strands of her magic cling to him like cobwebs, but not unpleasantly. Perhaps more like warm silk, sticky and soft in the same breath. She doesn't need to hunt him in the traditional ways any longer. She has her gift.
It is a truth that makes him cautious, but not wary. Never wary. Of all the people in this place who wish him ill, she has the most cause perhaps, and yet, he can still taste how drawn she is to him. It would be a lie to say he wasn't flattered by her attentions, and perhaps, even more of a lie to deny that he seeks her out.
But now, she is hunting him. Along the cold dark bank of the lake he winds, the mist of his passing seeming to defy the cold stiff breeze off the water. He feels her in the distance, a bright star in brilliant counterpoint to his own dark nature.
He hesitates, feeling her come for him.
The predator in him shifts restlessly. She will be the death of him, he fears.
It is a truth that makes him cautious, but not wary. Never wary. Of all the people in this place who wish him ill, she has the most cause perhaps, and yet, he can still taste how drawn she is to him. It would be a lie to say he wasn't flattered by her attentions, and perhaps, even more of a lie to deny that he seeks her out.
But now, she is hunting him. Along the cold dark bank of the lake he winds, the mist of his passing seeming to defy the cold stiff breeze off the water. He feels her in the distance, a bright star in brilliant counterpoint to his own dark nature.
He hesitates, feeling her come for him.
The predator in him shifts restlessly. She will be the death of him, he fears.
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So much has changed, these last six months of her life. Her life? Six months ago was the first plunge into a life as far removed from her own life in the sunlit world as possible. A life full of darkness, dread and desire, one she feared losing herself to, even as she sought it out.
Rae had not come through these last few months unscathed; there were holes and lumps and strange knots in her makeup that hadn't been there before, but she was healing. She was whole.
Whole, and healing in this time of peace Rae knew wouldn't last. She would be out in that dark world again soon, when others came to claim the hunting territory left vacant when she had destroyed Bo. She will soon be doing horrible things again, shattering herself again, finding out further horrible things she is capable of doing, needing to heal again. Fighting the dark again, for the sake of those that still live wholly in daylight, as she had, though it is the dark that she desires, that makes her heart hurt so.
"Don't let me lead you," she whispers. "I can't be sure of where I'm going."
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"You are like the warm wind off the ocean, whispering promises of a far away paradise. Torment. Sweet, sweet torment."
He bends his head as he speaks, both hands cradling her face now, and his brow almost resting against hers. His eyes play over the finest details of her face, as if he could read her thoughts by counting and recounting her eyelashes.
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"Torment is not my intent," she says, quiet but completely serious. "Ever."
(But it never tastes as good if you make them go mad.)
"It shouldn't be torment; it's not paradise at all. You were right, that time."
To victory, he had said, and thus to hell.
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He does not quite understand the emotions he's tasting, but he is not pulling away.
"You seek refuge then. In darkness."
In him.
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(A really good wall. Very wall-like. Immovable. Solid)
"Someone I might turn to, when the light threatens to overflow and burn me out."
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Despite all he has seen, despite all he has done, there is, at the core of him, something still vulnerable. An iota of humanity that longs for all the things a human longs for: Companionship. Solace. Trust. It is that part of him that always draws him back to their company, even when he knows they will turn from him the first time he reveals his true nature.
It is that part of him that thinks, maybe -- just maybe -- she is not like them.
"I seek refuge, too."
His words are almost too quiet to be heard.
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Her reply is quiet. "What would you seek refuge from?"
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"Do you think we might -- adjourn this conversation? Perhaps to a more civilised setting?"
It might be a way to deflect answering her question. It might be a way to answer it, just as easily.
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"I... sure," she murmurs, wondering, her hands in his.
(There is always a need for ceremony, my lady. At least where you and I stand.)
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Around them, the shadows ebb and flow.
"You are the first to ask such a question. Others of your kind, they tell me -- there is no refuge. There can be -- no refuge."
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No one gets away from a vampire.
"But it's not nearly so black and white. People might want to think it is, for simplicity's sake." And she had been one of them, wanting Us versus Them because it's was simpler, safer. But then, well, things had happened, and she can't go back to that. Can't just be the baker of the best cinnamon rolls in the history of Independencia.
"But it's not. It's really not. It doesn't have to be, either for them or for you."
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The corner of his lip curls up, and the air around him grows thick, cloying with the scent of roses and rotting paper.
"The most dangerous lies we tell, are the ones we believe with all our hearts."
He is condemned by God. For him to believe in just the possibility of refuge now is a dangerous indulgence. A weakness he cannot bear.
He lets her hands go and steps back.
"Let our truce hold, just a while longer."
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Even as she automatically turns to seek an alignment, to find him, she is certain he wasn't playing with her. That he is gone, leaving her standing on the warm, somehow-Caribbean sand, surrounded by the depth of a Scottish winter night. Leaving her shivering not just with cold.
Leaving her wondering exactly when in these last few months she had taken complete leave of her sanity. As though her life and loyalties weren't already tearing her apart. What did she think she was doing?