heaven help us, says your unholy mouth, your hands on my hands
I don't know where the darkness ends and you begin.
The autumn sea is unlike any other. It is, perhaps, the only sea that Vercingtorix relates to. He watches the waves with steely eyes; there is a storm-front moving in, as is wont to do when the seasons shift. It is this sea that has brought him back to Novus, from a venture outward, a venture into other, foreign seas. Torix had bartered from ship to ship, trading work and knowledge in exchange for passage, until he had visited so many islands and countries he had lost count. None stood out to him, even now, even staring out at the shore of Novus. Everywhere, he thinks, the sea is the same. Even in the tropics, away from cliffsides and the cold of currents, the sea glares and winks and breathes.
As he stands observing, the cold wind buffets him and carries with it the brisk tendrils of winter. The hair of his mane whips wildly into his face, but Torix allows it; the sting is a welcome reminder of where he is. The tide is falling low and in it his eyes scour the beach, searching—rumours have it the Scéal live here, the water horses of Terrastella.
Gealach and, among them the Comhar, the Dathuil, the Diasca. In fact, from what Torix has garnered of myth, all of Terrastella is haunted by the beasts; inland live the Séasúr, ghouls half-starved and haunting the swamps of the nation. He is still unaccustomed to the word “kelpie.” It flits off his tongue inelegantly, foreignly. He hates it and yet it is the word the most cultures seem to recognise. Vercingtorix does not believe he will find them here, not now, not with the storm rutting up along the coastline.
Eventually, the clouds cross over the blue that is left in the sky. He feels the first stinging pinpricks of rain.
He wonders if she is out there. He wonders, more fully, if she has any idea he is back in Novus. The only reason he returned is because, no matter how many water horses he found and defeated, their deaths seemed empty. The thing that bound him to the slaughter lived in Novus. Vercingtorix memories of Bondike—no, no, she had stopped being Bondike years ago—Boudika were so vivid he can see her running where the surf meets the sand, a flash of red and black, so bright, so brazen. They had once raced up the coastline in a dare, fearless of the dangers beyond.
Yet, that had only been because they had had one another. Now when Torix stares at the sea it is with the knowledge his flank is exposed.
And it is your fault, he thinks to himself. Strangely, the internal voice is not so different from his father’s. The drizzle of rain intensifies—and then, out several yards, Torix watches the kelpies breach.
The herd of them is breathtaking and luminous. They hit the surface in a plethora of equine colours, reds and bays, blacks and dapples, some with horns and many without. Their skins look slick and seal-like, or catch the thin, waning light to reflect from scales and iridescent skin. Then, like that, they are gone.
Torix was so captivated by their appearance—and the affirmation that they are, in fact, real—that he did not hear the telltale sound of approach.
He jerks his head in the direction now, however. His smile is quicksilver. His smile is mercury, and arsenic, and radiant. All things that will kill you. “You shouldn’t sneak up on a man like that. It is a good way to end up with a spear through your belly.” In saying it, Torix acknowledges his spear is lost. In saying it, Torix acknowledges day by day he sounds less like himself and more like the father he detests.
He appraises the golden mare with a hard eye. “You shouldn’t be out here alone.” It is what he has always said to women by the sea. It might begin to sing to them—and if it did, they would be lost. They were all born with one foot in the sea, and one on land. And this is something Vercingtorix will never forgive them for.
take this burden away from me and bury it before it buries me
“It’s getting dark, Elena, have a safe trip home.”
His voice, it was never terrifying, Elena realizes it now. He hadn't been fear. If he had been fear, when Elena thought of his eyes later that night, it would have been a nightmare instead of just a passing thought as she snuggled closer to her cousin to try to sleep.
Do not think Elena fearless.
She has known it.
Just not from him.
She’s tired.
She stares into her tea, watching the steam rise, but she cant manage to bring herself to drink it.
He loved her.
He told her so.
And they danced in the lake as if it were a baptism.
She tries to take a sip, it is hot on her tongue, it stings, but she thinks she has felt worse pain than that, so the hot liquid slides down her throat. The pitter of rain hits against her windows, she waits for a patter but none comes. A chill climbs up her spine, despite the warmth inside. It comes with a thought. (She would never be enough – fragmented, broken, she would never hold any heart captive).The rest of the tea starts to grow cold, and Elena lets it.
Pitter, pitter, pitter.
She steps out the door desperate for a change of rhythm, a break in the constant. Pitter, pitter, pitter. She realizes quickly stepping out of her seaside home and walking down the trail that she is not alone on this rainy day. Something buries itself like a burr in her chest, tight and sharp, digging into the soft of her wretched heart. Blue eyes watch the shape of the man with gentle caution. She can feel his emotions almost like a tangible thing, pulsing around her and it cuts through her body like something sharp, something savage, complicated. There are no powers that pulse below his blood and Elena, who has grown so used to magic, finds it almost strange.
Her heart trembles reflexively in her chest when he turns to her, battering itself to death against the cage of rib-bones like a trapped moth. For once she is glad someone does not offer her words of kindness, does not give her simper on their face because the ache of doubt in her chest, the carved out hollow of flesh and bone, it isn’t ready to be filled with a smile. This isn't what love is supposed to feel like. “I cant help it, the sea in the rain has always captivated me, a wild, reckless thing.” She resents the tremble creeping into her voice, resents Tenebrae for putting it there. “Besides,” she says, she steadies herself. “I’m not alone. You are here, aren't you?” She walks closer to him, closer than any girl should walk towards a man like him. And she says things that girls like her should not say towards someone like him. Elena likes to think herself bold and daring in times she feels fragile and crumbling.
“I really hope you aren't looking to cause trouble. Terrastella is my home.” She says, looking up at him like some delicate little butterfly, blue eyes bright with more humor than warning. He has hands that can crush her and she tells him to go ahead and try. There is a smile on her face that unlocks her heart because she has never been able to turn down a stranger dripping with rain water.
Then, she, just a small moment, she thinks she sees the devil in his smile.
Although, Elena so often confused Hell and fire, thinking them one and the same.
But she has seen worse things.
She has feared those less deserving of it.
And stared fearless into eyes she would have best hidden from.
so take away this apathy bury it before it buries me
heaven help us, says your unholy mouth, your hands on my hands
I don't know where the darkness ends and you begin.
I can’t help it, the sea in the rain has always captivated me, a wild, reckless thing.
Her response tells him everything he needs to know of her. The sea has Touched her, as it touches many women, and now she must be watched and guarded for the rest of her life, lest the sea call her to it. He remembers his mother one night, bewitched—he had been so, so young—during a midnight storm not unlike this. The Khashran had been singing to her, as coyotes do to dogs; she had stumbled from their home in pitch black and made it all the way to the beach. Torix’s father had saved her, but she had never acted as though she were saved, only cursed. How dare you come after me she had screamed. How dare you take me from the sea!
After many years, it was easy to pretend it had never happened.
But it had. And he remembers: if a mother would leave her sons and daughters for a siren’s song, then perhaps she was born cursed.
Somehow, Torix remembers where he is at. This is Novus; and through careful observation he has come to understand the residents of the country do not think the way he thinks. The tremble in her voice is something he discerns easily enough; and he lets it soften each and every hard edge of him. “I didn’t mean to be so crude,” he apologises.
Besides, I’m not alone. You are here, aren’t you?
His eyes are alight with something akin to amusement. “Yes,” he says. “But you have no idea what kind of man I am.” Vercingtorix says the words lightly enough they do not emerge threatening. Yet, she is so brave, it seems. She approaches him as though to comfort a broken stranger. And who, he wonders, stands in rainstorms besides the broken?
I really hope you aren’t looking to cause trouble. Terrastella is my home.
He smiles again; but it is less wicked. If anything, the gesture is charismatic, crooked. The smile of a man accustomed to his own handsomeness. “What gives you the impression I’m a trouble maker? Perhaps I’m only easily surprised and worried about a stranger approaching me in the rain alone. You could be dangerous, after all.”
Vercingtorix’s voice is coy.
The thing, he thinks, about men like him is that the lies begin to feel like truths. He is no longer alone and so the dark reaches of his Soul struggle to surface. With a witness, there are so many walls to erect, so many masks to present. With a witness, there is no opportunity to show himself, as he is.
No, Vercingtorix has been wearing other faces since the day he was born. His father’s expectations had demanded that from him, the smooth compliance of a man capable of interacting in any social setting. He was a man’s man; a commander of soldier’s who was not so different from the enlisted; personable and communicative; bright and humorous. The only person who had ever seen him—bare-faced, beneath the lies, beneath the expectations—had betrayed him.
“Why,” Bondike had asked, after a particular altercation with Torix’s father. “Why do you let him treat you the way he does?”
“Because it’s who I am.”
“No,” Bondike said. He stood so close, upon the cliffside. It was beneath the villa of Torix’s house, a narrow crook of rock ledge that was difficult to reach and hard to find. Bondike knew of it, however. They were young, then—so young. Bondike’s red eyes were alight with concern and the whisper, too, full of love. “I know who you are. You are brave, and bright, and kind—and your father tries to strangle all those things from you.”
He wishes the feeling he felt now is sadness; but it is too complex, too jagged. It feels like his guts are full of glass.
But he does not dwell on it long, with the rain against him and the water horses lost to the sea. No, Torix will dwell on it again, when he is alone and staring into a storm. He steps closer to her now, neither warning nor invitation, a gesture that simply is. She is small beside him, small and gold and plain, and the sea sings to her in a way he cannot understand. He knows only broken people come to the sea in a storm and so he asks, remembering the break in her voice: “And what brings you here, besides the sea’s siren song? I know enough of life to know only the weary, heartbroken, or young stand in rain.”
take this burden away from me and bury it before it buries me
She wonders sometimes what would have happened if Aletta and Valerio had not come to save them that day in Murmuring Rivers. When Frostbane came to claim the golden filly he had been promised in exchange for her mother’s life. A promise that was made before she was born. She knows, but she pretends to wonder so she does not have to feel the agony of even a hypothetical. At the end of it all, it hadn't been Lilli Forstbane had been after and the snow prince had little room for spares. Her coat was already such a deep crimson back then, what would have been the difference to him if he had added more to it. Elena would have laid down her life for her cousin, in those thoughts, it is so much easier to imagine herself dying for Lilli then the other way around. Then Frostbane striking her down, like the little butterfly she had been. He would have taken Elena to his snowy tundra. Valerio, Aletta, Marcelo, Ori, they would have wondered where the golden filly went, perhaps they just would have assumed she was dead too, while she stood shivering int he tundra, distraught with grief.
She would have rather have been dead.
Elena thinks she would always prefer death to her body than death to her mind, to her soul, to her spirit.
A smile blooms across her face. “I will forgive you this time,” she says. Only because it is so hard to be angry with someone who stands alone in the rain on a lonely cliff side. “No, I don’t.” It is an easy truth to speak. She likes the way it glides from her tongue. There is no effort of trying to make herself believe every syllable. She likes the way his eyes light up, even if it is a warning signal, Elena pretends they are ember sparks of a the cliff’s bonfires that had burned so bright just days earlier. “You could tell me—what kind of man you are.” She says, looking at him through long, dark lashes, like a child might. Elena, for once, doesn't make a guess.
“Well, are you a troublemaker?” Answer a question with a question. Rishiri had told her as much. “I don't think anyone has ever called me dangerous before.” That isn't true. Tenebrae found her dangerous, for reasons that are entirely his own.
His emotions are sharp and she wonders why she isn't bleeding as they scrape against her with a sting like the blade of a knife, or the fragmented pieces of glass from a broken window.
And what brings you here, besides the sea’s siren song?
She laughs. “Can I just say a walk?” But it isn't the whole truth. She pretends to send messages in a bottle, wondering if maybe her thoughts wash up on some distant shore. The golden girl likes to imagine her thoughts far away from here, where someone else can collect them.
“You have misspoken in my presence, sir,” she says as she moves to the cliff side, brushing past him like a stroke of a paintbrush against the canvas. She looks over her shoulder, it easy to forget here that her eyes are not summer skies, but just eyes of blue. “The sea beside this cliff does not sing—it dances.” There is a glint in her eye as she gathers his emotions within her like a tide in a cave beside the sea, she moves closer, the butterfly in a net, she thinks herself free until her wings are caught against the fabric. “I come to watch it, every day.” There is something wistful in her voice that would have been better (better for her) if it wasn't there at all. “I always thought it danced the tango, but in the rain, what do you think?” She turns her eyes to him, there is no ocean churning there, although there is something reflecting like light on water. “The waltz?”
so take away this apathy bury it before it buries me
heaven help us, says your unholy mouth, your hands on my hands
I don't know where the darkness ends and you begin.
The last time his father hit him, it was Bondike he had gone too.
It was the sea where they had met, on the cliffside of their island so wrapped in magic they were drowning in it. It was on the cliffside overlooking the setting sun, and they were teenagers, and the night was straining to overtake the island. The sunset was a rare one, a bleeding red in a sky typically too swathed with clouds. Torix had been bleeding, too.
But it was Bondike he had gone too.
It was Bondike who had cleaned the cuts and tended the bruises. It was Bondiek who said, “You will be more of a man than your father ever was.”
Vercingtorix wishes the memory hadn’t come back to him, in this moment, the rain slicking him. He wishes to say that when he smiles, the tug at the edge of his lip where the scar catches there is from war, and not a broken bourbon bottle.
He wishes the rain didn’t make him think of the way the clouds came in late that night and drenched them. The way it had been like a christening, or a sacrifice; and he and Bondike had howled from the cliff-side, had screamed at the sea, and he had known there would never be anyone like his companion again. Someone who could smooth the rough edges of his soul, hem his hatred, and teach him to love the way the cold air felt when he laughed.
I will forgive you this time.
Yes, and that smile he wears is the same crooked smile. His eyes are gleaming with an animated life false to his heart.
You could tell me—what kind of man you are.
He recognises the look, veiled by heavy lashes. Faux innocence; a woman’s stare. He wonders, a little apathetically, if she finds him handsome. His smile is fleeting, then; as brief as a bird overhead. “Why don’t you tell me what kind of man you think I am?” Vercingtorix challenges, but his voice is liltingly soft; nearly suggestive. The voice that says, do you want me to buy you a drink?
Are you a troublemaker? He almost laughs with genuine amusement, then. “No,” Vercingtorix says, and he means it. He has never seen himself as that. He loves law and order too much for that; he is too attached to justice, duty, organisation.
Can I just say a walk. She already knows he doesn’t believe her. Then, she jokes with him; she moves to press past his side and her warmth is brief, searing, as sharp as an insult against his side. Then she glances over her shoulder. It is hard for Torix not to interpret the gesture as something coy, flirtatious; perhaps she means it as chastely as she had a glance from beneath her lashes, but he is well aware of the look of those who play with fire.
Do you see my scars, my disposition, and think I am some exciting adventure? he wonders. Do you think I exist to soften your sadness? A wild ride, to free you from your crushing mortality?
She moves closer again. I come to watch it, every day. I always thought it danced the tango, but in the rain, what do you think? The waltz? Her eyes are beautiful, he supposes, if one likes clear skies.
Vercingtorix shakes his head; but it is his turn to step closer, to teach her to dance. His leonine tail flicks and so faintly it brushes her side before he is past her and on the very edge of the cliff. If he were to step forward, there would be only open air beneath him.
“I don’t think the sea dances,” he admits. Vercingtorix is not looking at her, now. Because what woman loves a man who is not far away? What woman loves a man who does not, at the very least, evoke some tinkling bit of fear? Of danger? Of excitement? He looks almost lion-like there, on the precipice of sea and sky and land. “But if it did,” Torix says, more softly now. His voice is the rain. “It would be the dance of the wolf and the fawn.”
The last time his father hit him, he told himself he would never be a fawn again.
take this burden away from me and bury it before it buries me
He reminds her of Tunnel. She doesn't want to be reminded of him, she would rather be reminded of anyone besides him. Give her Aerwir, Underworld, Cassian, anyone but Tunnel. Anyone. She cant even explain why he reminds her of him. Just the the tickling in her mind, that distant remembrance should be enough to make her run away. But this is Elena. When she should run, she digs her heels in deeper, when she should back away from the ledge, she leaps, and when she should show hesitation, she throws her heart like a lifeline.
Why should this be any different?
Pitter, pitter, pitter.
There is still no patter. She waits, but it never comes.
There is an ache in her chest putting words in her mouth that feel sharp and unfamiliar, like broken glass from the windows of her eyes. “I think you must be the kind of man who finds women on cliff sides and tells them veiled warnings,” she says with narrowed blue eyes. Elena may not look it, but she has grown up strong. She had to, but more than she had to, she had seen strong women at a time when she was so weak and they told her how to hold her strength. “Perhaps you could tell me when I’m permitted to leave or even where to go, Your Majesty. Or better yet, I can wait idly by for you. Why should I have a life of my own?” She remembers Aletta telling the story, about her and Valerio’s first argument, when he followed her out to the meadow. It had been so long ago, before Elena and Lilli, before the twins, even before Malachi. Aletta tells them that actions of those we love can be misinterpreted, Lilli squeals about how romantic a gesture it was, but Elena’s eyes grow like wild fire. Aletta had taken her life into her own hands, and she had stood strong, like the mountains of their ancient valley. They say it is harder to stand up to your enemies, but even harder against those you love.
”I’ve never needed protection. I’m quite capable on my own.” And Elena knew she wanted to be the same.
“I’ve always been fine on my own.” A lie, but one she feels justified telling. In truth, Elena has had a line of people ready to fight for her, protect her, even lay down their life for. She does not know truly what it is like to be her own sword and shield.
The sound of his voice, even that one single syllable, seeped through her bones like poison. If he thinks she likes to play with fire, well, Torix may know Elena better than most. They tell her again and again she will burn herself, but Elena reaches for the flame, not like a moth, but like a dragon.
She knows these autumn seas are not as kind as the summer. She knows when it storm the sea grows relentless, forgetting those who have once bathed in its shallows and admired the water the sunlight skipped light across it. Palomino skin (that looks almost dull on this grey day) feels the touch of his tail as he moves in front of her. She should have known a man like him would not stay back behind her for long. Foolish, she wants to say, but Elena is weak and so she thinks him brave.
For a moment, she sees something in his shadow and her breath catches in her throat. Tunnel. Then it is gone and she can breathe again. The navy blue monster leaves her mind. (Elena tells herself she is winning whenever she can forget him.) “No?” She asks him. She takes a step despite herself. She sees the lion in him too, remembers the card Corrdelia had pulled. Mountain lion. ‘They speak to holding on to what your goals are until they are rooted and ready to be unveiled.’ She’s reading too much into it. He is just a stranger on a cliff side.
What was the harm?
They were only strangers.
A mantra she knows too well.
“The lion and the lamb.” The words come out like a loose tooth.
Pitter, pitter, pitter.
Patter.
so take away this apathy bury it before it buries me
heaven help us, says your unholy mouth, your hands on my hands
I don't know where the darkness ends and you begin.
It occurs to him, perhaps too late, that he would rather be alone. There is nothing to be done for it now. But her presence, to him, feels invasive; as if she is a shadow within his confessional, the barrier between himself and the priest. And who then, is the priest?
He looks to the sea.
There is no other place for confessions.
I think you must be the kind of man who finds women on cliff sides and tells them veiled warnings. He smiles a crooked, foxlike smile. “Except you are the one who found me.” There is a laugh; brief, light. “Perhaps you are the type of woman who looks for men like me. But, My Lady, I certainly don’t have the time of day to tell you what kind of life to lead. Only that there are dangers in surprising a man."
I’ve never needed protection. I’m quite capable on my own.
Anyone who needs to say it is lying to themselves, Vercingtorix thinks.
Anyone who needs to tell him what type of independence they possess has none at all.
In that moment, she reminds him slightly of himself. Except—a much younger version, unscarred, naive and inexperienced. No one, he thinks, is truly capable on their own. No one, he thinks, can live their lives without protection. Why else join Courts? While else erect governments, cities, churches? Protection. They were, at base, nothing except herd animals. They, of Novus, of all civilisations, were as primitive and frightened as forest deer; as clever as the apes; and yet forever reliant upon one another.
He only says: “I’m sure.”
Doe-eyed; golden; a heart on her brow.
She is a damsel if he has ever seen one. Where are your scars?
Even the women of Oresziah have scars.
Bands upon their haunches for each colt they’ve birthed. A knick in the ear to represent marriage. A sun sigil for the priestesses.
Where, Elena, are your scars?
They speak to holding on to what your goals are until they are rooted and ready to be unveiled.
“What do you mean by that?” he asks, because he does not understand.
Step forward a small voice says. You will be alone again, if you do.
Empty space below.
He closes his eyes against the enormous pressure of the cliffside. He closes his eyes against the storm, against the golden girl, against Novus. He breathes in, a meditative breath.
When he turns to look at her, it is with light in his eyes; an easygoing expression. He smiles. “Yes. The lion and the lamb.”
He knows which one she is.
And Torix has spent a very long time cultivating himself.
Then:
“Perhaps we should return to Terrastella.” It is an offer. “Before—well, I only meant that there are dangers here, by the sea, in a storm. Terrastella is known for her kelpies, if she not?”
Kelpies—the word, garish, in his mouth. Unsophisticated. They are such ugly creatures, in Novus. At least Vercingtorix’s villains had been beautiful, amorphous, like the sea itself. These things—they were bound to one shape already, there and gone, with weak magic.
take this burden away from me and bury it before it buries me
His smile is what catches her, what causes her to look at him longer than she should. “Dangers?” She questions him in mock surprise. “You haven't proven to be dangerous yet,” she almost taunts him. Elena doesn't recognize herself in this moment. She has always been bright and strong, but this, this fire she fans is a flame she has not seen in herself before. She blinks blue eyes like she has never been afraid before. “You never even asked for my name,” she says. “It’s Elena.” She is bold, too bold. She will forget this boldness when she needs it most. She will think back on how she had been so bold against this man and wonder what could have spurned it, and if she could live her whole life as so.
“No don't go lying to me,” she says sweetly. She isn't toying with him, she knows he doesn't want her in any way, especially that way, she would be able to feel it if he did. Then why does she continue this behavior? Elena behaves as those she is untouchable. It comes down to it that this man could kill her if he wanted to, still could. But, he hasn’t, and Elena thinks this is what it is like to be immortal.
Where are her scars? What are her scars?
A scar upon her shoulder, to mark her as his, a debt to be collected.
A scar on her knee, tripping over a tree root as she can, carefree, thinking nothing but the wind could catch her.
A scar on her shoulder. Taken from her from a boy of navy blue, telling her he cared about her so much that he would hurt her to prove it.
A scar just above each eye, when her vision came back.
Everywhere, her scars are everywhere.
These scars, are nearly all covered up by the years. She tucks them away neatly in her chest, paints over them, colors them, sculpts them until no one can recognize them, until only the foundation is weak. She is not something to be easily broken.
Even if so many think she is.
“I said that out loud?” She asks him before shaking his head. Elena watches him, decides she doesn't like the way he is standing against that cliff side. She remembers stopping Litotes from jumping over one, well, tried to stop him anyway. It had been an illusion, they had landed in a hole. She wonders if he likes dancing on cliff sides too, or if he stays away, because he likes flying off them far too much. She wants to jump forward, pull him back, but everything in her is restrained. He is not the type of man to pull away from a cliff, he is the type of man you watch take another step forward, plummet down, and never tell anyone what you saw.
She smirks at his smile. “An old fable,” she says, thinking too of the lion and the mouse. She wonders why lions like to involve themselves in other animal's affairs. “I suppose she is,” Elena responds. It is then she feels the hatred at the ridge of her spine, it hits her like knives and she silently takes an inhale of breath before she meets his eyes. “Though they have the right to make Terrastella their home as much as I do,” she says, feeling the urge to defend the creatures that could very well not do the same for her. She had been told the dangers of kelpies, knows what they could do to her, but Elena is so stubbornly true to her nature, and she will not insult even monsters she does not know. “You’ll find a pleasant inn, at the heart of the city, I suggest staying there, well away from the ocean.” She says to him in such a voice that tells him she has no intention of showing him the way. “You can leave in the morning.” Elena speaks with some sense of finality before she begins the walk down the path she had come from.
And as she walks she hears not the pitter of rain, just—
Patter. Patter. Patter.
…Patter.
so take away this apathy bury it before it buries me
heaven help us, says your unholy mouth, your hands on my hands
I don't know where the darkness ends and you begin.
Vercingtorix has never known hot hatred.
He has never known the fury of the fire.
No.
If you ask Dante, the center of hell has always been cold.
If you ask Dante, the ninth layer is eternal ice and Satan is frozen there.
Vercingtorix feels that, perhaps, as all the most extreme sinners do. Cold. Her words do not penetrate him. Her words do not evoke fire in his heart. Only. cold apathy. Dangers. You haven’t proven to be dangerous yet.
He smiles politely, almost as if he knows it is the smile that set her off. He doesn’t. It is simply the only way for him to react such a barbed comment. There is nothing Vercingtorix needs to prove to her; he has lived long enough to know that those who feel the need to prove something are the most likely to be the exact opposite of what they say, what they express.
Those who must prove they are dangerous are only infantile; only insecure.
That polite smile.
“I see. The pleasure is mine, Elena. I’m Torin.” He says it like he believes it. If anything, her reaction—very nearly volatile—has done nothing but make his apathy grow.
Over-emotional. Defensive. Confrontational.
Only one of the three is a trait suitable for a woman.
So Vercingtorix draws into himself. He looks into the sea. He wonders if falling ever feels like flying but knows, in his heart of hearts—in the secret chamber of hell somewhere between his aorta and right ventricle—it would only feel like a descent, fast, hopeless.
A little like this conversation.
An old fable. I suppose she is. Though they have the right to make Terrastella their home as much as I do. He makes a noncommittal sound in the back of his throat. There is a point where naivety prevents intellectual conversation, and Vercingtorix does not have much usage for any other sort. He does not appreciate her indirectness; her thinly veiled aggression.
“Lady Elena,” he says at last, as she is beginning to turn. ”If you are going to dislike me, at least have the confidence to say it outright and sooner in the conversation. I don’t appreciate my time being wasted.” There is an edge to his voice—genuine, hard as the sound of steel striking flint—when he adds: “I do not think I will be staying in your Court tonight, after all. If your hospitality has shown me anything, it is that I am not welcome in Terrastella.”
He is not hurt when he turns, the rain slicking his flanks, the cool chill of the autumn air biting at his flesh; it is of little concern to Vercingtorix as he departs the cliffside. There is another long night ahead of him. Another night in the field, in the rain, alone. But what does it matter? No, he has already thought it: these consequences are of little concern.
And Elena?
She is the least of his concerns, with that cold seed of hate buried somewhere between his breastbone and heart, growing steadily.
![[Image: ddvotwe-59302ba6-6a81-47bf-9846-30c5a5db...0iFb4PvyXE]](https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/8026a53b-dc57-41ab-b574-9f8a8fe57ce4/ddvotwe-59302ba6-6a81-47bf-9846-30c5a5db0780.png?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOjdlMGQxODg5ODIyNjQzNzNhNWYwZDQxNWVhMGQyNmUwIiwiaXNzIjoidXJuOmFwcDo3ZTBkMTg4OTgyMjY0MzczYTVmMGQ0MTVlYTBkMjZlMCIsIm9iaiI6W1t7InBhdGgiOiJcL2ZcLzgwMjZhNTNiLWRjNTctNDFhYi1iNTc0LTlmOGE4ZmU1N2NlNFwvZGR2b3R3ZS01OTMwMmJhNi02YTgxLTQ3YmYtOTg0Ni0zMGM1YTVkYjA3ODAucG5nIn1dXSwiYXVkIjpbInVybjpzZXJ2aWNlOmZpbGUuZG93bmxvYWQiXX0.ujCJH7FAbsQhfZlQniMmEd_vw-VmvaTDn0iFb4PvyXE)
