Part 13- Like Sugar
[Version 1.1]

It was one of those resplendent of mornings such as might smell sweetly as the latest 
evening and yet, be glorious as dawn until noon, and rued the fact he must forsake it from 
the moment sleep had been sent away from him.  The dolorous sense came but faintly, 
and could not utterly seduce.  No, it was only a sadness like one halfway infatuation 
recalled in the arms of lover true.  And he knew it would only make the coming days into 
something words could always live without, the stuff of songs just glancing on some 
place inside best left to being spun around by poetry.

And besides, the very best precognitives money could buy him had been right, and in his 
bursting joy, he had paid them all their weights in silver baubles before they left him. 
Now they were gone, but the quiet excitement of it all could live... here! Now! Dancing 
with all his pretty things! Dissolving and reforming! Catching sunlight from other such 
smiles in his heart.

For he did have one.

And it would at last be satisfied.

That memory which had for so long been displaced... it came back to him. He 
remembered...

***

England, Two years ago, almost to the day.

"Don't be silly, Anstruther! It's always a pleasure to see you!" he'd laughed, handing his 
jacket over to the maid. It had uncommonly warm, uncommonly clear that day too, even 
a third of the way across the world, like time had tied that moment to another on purpose; 
made the flower-limned tableaux meet. 

As for the Englishman, he was lightly dressed, but formally and had just taken his feet 
from his desk just instants before his guest peered into the study.  His windows had been 
propped as wide as they would go, and the papers were singing a tune with the sparrows 
and the river.  "Likewise of course.  It's a shame our positions don't permit us to call on 
one another socially."

"True."

"I saved the white chair for you, as always."

He'd nodded and taken his seat.  The maid left and a kind of mental silence dusted the 
room.  They were both shielding, but that was how negotiations always went.  He 
couldn't help but wonder if they could have still been friends if they chanced one 
another's thoughts.  No matter.  They did well enough dancing with words.  And glances, 
for he could not help but let his eyes wander.  

The room was really more like a solarium in the morning- painted pale to offset the jewel 
and dark trimmings.  The photographs that stood among the books peered out from 
behind flowers.  There weren't usually flowers but besides that...  "You've changed the 
pictures since I was last here."

"I finally got some decent ones out of that Nikon.  I knew it would do wonders once the 
bloody thing worked right."

"I see... did you have to ask one of the psychometrics at Estet what was the matter with 
it?"

It wasn't really very funny, but they both laughed.  "No, I didn't have to go that far.  
We're not as... do pardon me for saying, frivolous.  I have trouble expressing it 
otherwise... with the powers our members exhibit."

"Oh, no offense taken," he'd waved his hand and leaned back then.  "You're much more 
coercive and secret.  It's true, both what you've said and I have." He fumbled his gloves 
for an instant, but opted not to take them off, for from the very edge of his sight, he 
noticed his companion's pupils, and the way they bloomed at the site of the tiny blue 
diamonds on the catches.  "We're even."

Nodding, the papers literally flew from beneath the crystal titanium dragon in their 
paperweight, for a breeze caught them suddenly and dipped them into Anstruther's palm.  

As for him, the guest, the other telepath, he pulled himself closer to the other side of the 
desk and began to read even while his companion outlined everything.  

"We've not made too many alterations, just cleaned up the grammar of the whole 
agreement."

"So I see!"

"Bit of a pity, it looks less and less like the medieval document it was every single day to 
me.  Well, not that old really, but looking that old by the wills of my superiors." 

"The world is going to ruins, or so said superiors are always promising."

"Oh yes! But it's a fine day isn't it? A fine, fine day."  

He looked up to nod to Anstruther, and he had, but not so simply.  For there was little in 
his life he had been so glad of before that moment, that one little gesture.  

For there was a ghost behind the other man, slightly hidden by the arch of a lily, held by 
the tension of water and light to one of the pictures of Philip Anstruther's collection.  He 
knew her even through the space of years where the third of the gleaming days waited, 
more distant than the other two could ever be from one another.  

The one that haunted his dreams, his waking; his words and is marrow.  Oh, she had no 
spirit in the image of her body, and no age, but he saw her as he had last seen her, 
stepping out of his mind and fading from existence to grace rather the pale creature with 
the eyes like milky kohl where she had been kept beneath the emulsion.

Waiting for him to see her.

But alongside a countenance he knew not.  A young man with fair eyes behind his glasses 
and fine, silky-looking dark hair.

And he knew.  

***

In the present, his own maid called for him.  "Sir, the lady and her escort are here to see 
you."

He sat up, taking his shoes from the desk as he did so, shaking his head at himself 
because he had so unconsciously mimicked Anstruther.  "Send her in at once then."

There was no need.  Ren Luminia had been waiting just outside his door.  She swept into 
the chamber and Kelvena come upon her heels, the latter with her eyes closed to them, 
and the uninteresting present. 

Ren's dress bobbed and swayed about her like the heaven-spun garb of a Rosetti 
Demoiselle.  She chided him, "You're going soft.  You didn't have your shields up when 
I came in, and whatsmore, you were even remembering putting them up for someone 
else!"

"Maybe I wanted you to see that," he intoned rather flatly, getting to his feet and 
approaching the shining thing she was.  Even if they could have so easily read each 
other's minds, her audacity never ceased to stun him, and he had trouble matching it.  So 
he'd tried, and she still outdid him.  

"But I know you always used to do business with those Estet trolls!" Her hands came to 
the sides of her breasts in fists, as a child might have argued with him.  "It won't do you 
any good to rub that in."

"The same goes for you! Or did," A lock of her brown hair had come down from where it 
was wound atop he head, and he hooked it around one of her lavender earrings.  "But 
that's all over and you're still here. Now I want something from you."

Rem Luminia swept from his arms and Kelvena, smirking, slid from her path as easily as 
a bee darts out of the way of a wildly jiggled flower stem.  "One man for the chance to 
change the future.  I know! I know so well, darling.  Even if we fail, the ending will be a 
beautiful departure from what it was meant to play out as.  It might make you glad.  And 
there is little that makes you glad any longer, is there?"

"Very little."

Without another word, they began.  Nothing of today's negotiations, and nothing brought 
on only by the breeze.  She had him on the floor, and Kelvena opened her eyes to watch.

***

The summer fields grow high. 
We made garland crowns in hiding, 
Pulled stems of flowers from my hair. 
Blue in the stream 
Like none I have seen 
Apart from dreams 
That escape me. 
There was no girl as bold as you. 

How I've learned to please, 
To doubt myself in need, 
You'll never, 
You'll never know. 
You'll never know.

Violet serene 
Like none I have set 
Apart from dreams 
That escape me...

Saffie sang as she and her procession came skipping down the nearly empty streets of 
Valdemar come morning.  There was scarcely anyone about, save the early risers in the 
cafes, though the sun was smiling brightly as it rode closer to noon than dawn.  Mostly 
sparrows of the grey sort that Lord Vyx liked followed her, for there was no one else to 
offer them crumbs.  They circled over and over, but came not near enough to snatch one 
thread of yellow hair, cavorting in midair above the heads of her dozen drowsy porters 
which she had summoned so her poet might rather play on their journey.  It felt more like 
the earliest of May than the end of June.  The air only bore water near the fountains 
where they would pause to cast their pennies (pennies which did fantastic acrobatic 
routines before hitting the surface).  They sky had bluish clusters of cotton candy in it, 
headed everywhere and nowhere with the lines of dragons in them.

Nagi glanced once again over his shoulder to make sure his hookah was in safe, corporeal 
hands and she giggled at the frown he gave the youth who bore the glass for him.  It left 
him, but her hand did not.  No, that much of her hid within his palm, smushed up like a 
posy found to dear.

"Neeeee, Nagi-chan, what do you want for breakfast when we get home?"

::Assuming Bradley and Schu-baby remembered the FOOD for once.  I... one 
moment...::

She waved for the porters to wait once more and put her fingers in her mouth so she 
could whistle at the figure across the street.  She tweeted and the sparrows all fled.  
"Fiona-chan! Je no Copine!"

Fiona stopped dead in her tracks and nearly dropped her baguette.  She wanted to rub her 
eyes but had no way to do it with her grip so occupied.  "Oi Savil!" this half-muttered, 
half shouted, for it was hard to speak certainly when she was trying so hard to get her 
burden and her thoughts in order so both might be of suitable tastes whenever they were 
sampled.  "Ah... where you off to?"

"I'm going home."

"Home?"

"Bradley bought Saint Catherine's for us!"

"Oh... well, you have a good time then! I ah... gotta get home m'self."

"Me too!" ::And I'll mind the ghostie! Domo arigatou! Chu chu!::

"Eeek!"

For once in a great while, both sides of the street rang for a moment with girlish delight 
before they slid apart and headed their own ways, Fiona and Saffie.  

"Now, about breakfast, or brunch rather," Saffie said to Nagi.

Fiona didn't say anything to anyone, just shook her head trying to make herself certain 
she had really glanced at the last possible moment the little herald holding hands with the 
boy she only knew from the plane.  Her eyes went fuzzy and she couldn't get her mind 
around that, or the fact she had called the damnable Villa home.

(OOC: Je no Copine is Terran Creole for "hey there", see the appendices for more 
details!)

***

The day shone bright through the windows of the tower bedroom at St. Catherine's, and 
beyond the wide, long panes of leaden glass, countless birds were raising their voices in 
song. 

And inside the spacious bath which connected to said bedroom, in a tub that dated back 
to more opulent days surely (one that had creaked and grumbled when Schuldich had 
tried the taps upon rising), Crawford was voicing his own opinions on the matter. 

"Damn it all!" he groaned, gingerly stretching. "Why did I let you talk me into contorting 
myself in such a way!?" 

/Yes, I know the sex was brilliant, but.../ 

Silence, while Crawford got a mindful of sly cajoling and amused "I-told-you-so's from 
his lover. And then he sighed heavily, and sank down further into the steaming water, 
wriggling his toes as much as he dared. 

"Oh, fuck it." 

/Yes, and me too./ 

/*That* you never have to ask, Aubrey, and you know it./ 

He cupped some water between his hands and splashed it on his face, wiping it away with 
one of the cloths that lay on the rack which straddled the middle of the tub. A shadow fell 
across him, and he drew it away from his eyes to find his lover standing beside the tub, a 
tiny cup of fresh espresso in one hand and a bottle of aspirin in the other. 

A look of utter relief stained Crawford's face. He dropped the cloth into the water, and 
held out his dripping hands to take the means of his salvation from his devil's grasp. 

"Oh, Aubrey..." he breathed after taking that first, delicate sip from the dainty cup. "If 
there was a God, I'd ask him to bless you."

***

Schuldich watched his lover have a second sip and then took a seat along the edge of the 
tub, which he managed to do without falling if only because of his exquisite thinness. It 
was one of those sassy, glinting mid-mornings (or late mornings, he actually hadn't 
looked upon a clock yet) and he was one of those sassy, glinting boyfriends. The kind 
that wear their kimonos leave themselves open.  

It seemed almost as if he had more donned a pair of emerald and chocolate wings and 
less that he made any effort to cover himself up. 

For no reason at once apparent, he took a hold of Crawford's wrist with his thoughts and 
drew it and the coffee cup away. The precognitive canted him a smooth scowl and he 
gave him nothing in return. Two pills slid out onto his waiting palm and he pressed them 
past Bradley's still-warm lips before returning his hand to him. 

"Funny, you don't TASTE so pissed you'd wish such a thing on me." 

He stretched himself then, and looked rather as if he was proposing a dance beneath the 
slowly blooming sunbeams that tumbled in past the wide open window. 

"But I'm a demon! If you bless me, won't I melt, or turn into something that isn't as 
spectacular and sexy as a demon?" 

He felt someone coming up the footpath that ran alongside the tower then, but played no 
attempt to convince the lazy sunbeams to take a path through the glass rather than the 
invitation of the wide open window. Brad seemed to hear them too, and he only kicked 
the panes further apart before slipping his foot back into the tub.

***

"Actually," Crawford mused, "I'd think you'd look rather sexy and spectacular as an 
angel." 

/But then, I can't picture you as anything less than sexy and spectacular, no matter what 
form you take./ 

"...Human, or supernatural..." 

He sipped greedily at his drink again, and listened to the scratch of the flowering vines 
against the brick as the wind grabbed at them. A few blue morning glory blossoms 
fluttered through the open panes and landed in the bathwater, on his damp hair. Crawford 
made no move to brush them away, even as he tipped a cautious, searching look at his 
lover. 

And then, he looked away again, and set his cup carefully down, and eased the rack back 
a bit on its squeaking rollers. Picked up a fading flower from where it had fallen on the 
low sill and held it to his nose. 

"I don't think I'd like to leave this place," he murmured. 

Long fingers landed upon his head, brushed down his straggling, musician's locks to pet 
his nape. He felt the cool smoothness of the ring upon his bath-heated skin, and it made 
him shiver. Crawford gripped the sides of the tub, and sat up, and Schuldich's hand left 
him. 

He slowly hoisted himself onto his feet, groaning a bit as he straightened up. The ache 
wasn't as bad as when he'd awakened though, that much pleased him. 

Schuldich, all on fire in the sunlight and partially clothed, pleased him. When Crawford 
leaned upon his shoulder as he climbed out, his hand lingered there, fumbling with a lock 
of red-orange floss. 

And then, biting his lip hard from the shattering ache that rumbled along his nerves from 
his lower back, Crawford had Schuldich by the arm and had pulled him onto his feet, and 
against him. Just held him that way, and stared down into his eyes as if he were desperate 
to commit the face before his own to memory; every line of his body, all the thousand 
ways Schuldich made him feel. 

And then, he kissed him. Simply that, but not brutally. It was not a caress of lips imbued 
with bitter passion or anger, but was yearning all the same. 

And then, Crawford abruptly let him go, and turned away as if he'd delivered no such 
tender blow upon Schuldich's lips. 

"Let's get dressed, and go back to the hotel. I've much to do today."

***

"I'd be delighted." He said plainly, drawing the kimono from his arms and mixing it in 
with the sheets.  A little mental tap send Crawford down among them too, naked of 
course, and shining as with bits of glass as he watched.

For there was nothing the telepath did that was not show, including getting dressed.  He 
combed out his hair with the brush that Bradley had used on him a few days ago, tossing 
his mane this way and that over his shoulders as he sought out the tangles, bending 
forward to the mirror to straighten his parts and check his roots, since he had no reason 
any longer to pretend he did not do such things, and a fine ass to tilt towards his lover.   

This would have been regularly followed with at least five gratuitous minutes of his 
riffling through his clothing, but he cursed rather loudly upon recalling that the clothes 
were in fact all abiding in the cartons in the livingroom.  In a great huff, he marched out 
after then, coming back wearing nothing but a smirk, and with his things slung rather 
over his arm.  

"I feel delinquent today.  I'm going to dress the part."

Or rather, he stripped in reverse after dousing himself with lime-spice cologne, for even 
without the parfume, he found excuses to touch himself that tempting way, or draw 
fingers across himself after that crease.  

Schuldich put on a turquoise thong, hidden at once behind a pair of not-particularly 
scandalous black shorts, a white, sleeveless dress shirt of which he fastened only the 
middle two buttons of so it scarcely covered his nipples, a pair of knee guards such as a 
roller skater might have worn- they were red and blue and quite unfamiliar to his lover.  

The so-called invisible trench coat was not, and was, besides blue itself, a sash, a pair of 
rolled cuffs fastened with without sleeves to hold them and a collar that sat tight against 
his bared neck.  A pair of glass cufflinks with dead daisies set in them like cameos, some 
of purple sneakers and an aqua scarf which tied back a good half of his hair and left the 
rest wild, and he mentally declared himself dressed, only to go dashing out just as 
suddenly.

He returned dragging Jasper along behind him on the chain belt.

"I need to walk my owl," he shrugged.

And Brad shrugged too just as the coachman whislted from the front door.

It was no one he knew, and no one any more interesting than whatever wheeled above the 
overgrown garden with it's wild blooms who had tried to make their way into the indoor 
chambers by way of the outdoor sill of that window. The ones they had torn off were still 
lying on the floor, and they smelled as if they knew nothing more of man than the 
doorstep- just clean.

Schuldich fancied that found himself holding a shred of just what, for such had lain 
curled up and away beyond the shimmering, silver shields before.  They would split now 
and then, and he would smiled, nudging at his smarting lips, not to brush the kiss away, 
but rather to force it into his skin and his tongue where he felt rather the flavor of his 
lover's hot mouth.  

***

Crawford had seen the children of his household in passing, they two coming up the 
overgrown, shaded lane to the church just as the carriage bearing him and his lover was 
going out. He'd tossed them an airy wave and an amused cock of his brow at the sight of 
their entwined hands. And then he had settled back in his seat and engaged in a bit of 
necking with Schuldich until they arrived at the hotel. 

***

His heart had rejoiced a little upon witnessing the departure of the two eldest Schwartz, 
and Nagi let a little of his mood trickle over to Savil, squeezing her hand as he'd waved 
the gate open. He summoned the wind, and brought a shower of lilac petals down from 
the trees their bushes had grown into. They fell like pink rain before her, one step ahead 
of her always. 

And the laugh she gave him warmed him to the marrow. 

The doors parted before them as if they were royalty, and at that moment, to Nagi, it 
seemed so. The porters he bid leave their belongings in the vestibule, and then leave 
them. They tipped their caps to Savil before making their exit. 

And then, there they stood, in the utter, solemn silence. Alone. Gingerly, he reached out 
to curl one golden lock around his finger. 

"I think I would like...some chocolate croissants and coffee, and a scrambled egg." 

***

Saffie giggled anew, scrunching up her nose to try and shake away the tickles lilac petal 
which remained there.  "Oh!  I'll start on it tout de suite! Though it'll be a bit, since 
Schu-baby didn't know at *all* where they put the pans."

His fingers strayed then rather to her minute pout, and it left her then sooner than it had 
so much as fallen.

::He never was sure if he liked that I've got the memories of fourteen chefs or not.:: And 
a wink for Nagi then. ::You can sneak in and use their tub awhile if you want.  I'll call 
you when I'm done.::

So thought, she left him with a small, ephemeral kiss upon his cheek and floated off 
towards the kitchen, only to return a short while later to fetch her golden orb, and make 
sure none of the keys her brother had insinuated he had borrowed had fallen and gotten 
lost in any of the rugs.  

Just why she wanted her toy, she could not say at first, until at least her sight clearly 
remembered the kitchen, which was ever so quaintly blase.  No panache at all.  Having 
perched the ball upon the windowsill, her hands flew through the boxes of her cookware, 
and her mind through a myriad of other colors that might do well for when they refaced 
the cabinets.  She was sure she would be adamant about refacing the cabinets! Even if she 
had to pay for it out of her own allowance.  Perhaps marbled salmon and white with pale, 
spring green?

She found with much delight that a passable portion of the dishes had been unpacked, and 
all washed save for one cup expresso cup and saucer, which went right in the sink, 
naturally.  She didn't trust a dishwasher with so much as the mid-priced of their many 
china collections.  Which left bits and pieces of this and that to be fished from the 
boxes... 

A cranberry pyrex saucepan, her set of nesting snow white mixing bowls with forget-me-
nots painted on the sides, the small mortar and pestle, the French press, and all the shiny 
stainless tools that belonged upon her rack there was no longer room for, came up and 
say beside the semi-unpacked groceries she found taking up one corner of her counter, 
and sporting a large, unpaid delivery bill which bore directions it ought to be satisfied 
within five days.  A quick inspection of the cupboards and the tiny refrigerator turned up 
enough to get them through a rather rural and ordinary day or two foodstuff-wise.   

"Leave it to those two to get me everything for stuffed pears, except of course for the 
pears!"

In the spirit of country life, she put on her ruffliest apron and left her shoes to mind their 
own business in the corner, while the ghee waited in the pan for the eggs that were still 
awhile off, and one of the mixing bowls found itself home to the mercifully discovered 
bittersweet chocolate which would go later to live in the croissants, being as most fillings 
are notoriously faithless to their abodes.

Butter then! Lots of butter and flour the sorts of which no cakes would ever take; just a 
few touches of egg for the stickiness between hopes the finer powders required for bread 
would turn up.  The did, and the filmy, simple substance of the unbaked croissants all but 
materialized before her.  Now for the filling! But first...

A small glance away to the warmth about her left arm which found no sunlight there, for 
the window was quite on her other side, the lingering twinge of heat so elegantly 
displaced.  

"Good morning! You're being awfully quiet.  Do you want some chocolate, or don't you 
eat?"

***

/I can't eat a thing. But if I could.../ 

The air at her elbow thickened into a warm, hazy, mist, which in turn slowly took on the 
shape of a woman. In the kitchen, Miranda's form was sharper, her features clearer; after 
all, it was the place where she had died. 

Miranda glided away from her a bit, and took up a perch beside the counter, where she 
could clearly see Savil's face, could watch her work. A quiet sigh of wistful satisfaction 
sounded from the wraith's direction. 

/It's been so long since anyone's cooked in here. I thought I'd never see anyone ever use 
this kitchen again./ 

/I'm so happy that you are./ 

The ghost drifted a bit closer, and stroked a gentle hand along Savil's curls, making them 
sway. 

/You are a pretty child. But then, I suspect you know that./

***

Saffie giggled from behind the curves of her dainty fingers where she could not blush at 
once.  She did know, and the ghost knew, so there was no point in hiding it.

::Oh that's a shame! It's got such a nice view here, and it feels kinda homey, I think.  
Even though I've never cooked in an especially homey kitchen.::

Which got her an undead little puffle of a question- no words, just a different way the 
sunlight felt upon her tongue.  ::I've lived most of my life in hotel room and apartments, 
which wasn't bad, even in the kitchens.  It's just that the kitchens in those places aren't 
supposed to be used, they're just to look at.::

She shrugged, and caught up the scoop for the flour which happened to be in the middle 
of Miranda.

::Schu-baby said there was a surprise waiting for me inside, but he made me promise not 
to peek in his head and see what it was.  You've met?::

"I guess?" A nudgey little smirk here.  

***

Miranda bestowed upon her young companion a look of warm regard. /Oh, yes, we've 
met, child. And he gave me quite a show, at that. Are they...always like that?/ 

Savil's silvery laughter assured her that they were. Miranda shook her head in mild 
wonder. /Doesn't surprise me in the least--but to act that way in front of a child!/ 

/But,/ she amended quickly, /you aren't so much of a child, are you? No herald of Terra 
ever is./ 

The egg whisk floated out of its ceramic holder and landed beside the bowl. 

/And that boy of yours isn't one either, even though he isn't a herald. Just another lost soul 
looking for succor./ 

The ghost turned her vaporous eyes to the window. The pink climbing roses she had 
loved so much in life had grown considerably since her death; the tender vines thickly 
framed the panes, their roseate blooms shooting off in all directions. She had seen that the 
groundskeeper hired by the realtor's had kept it carefully pruned so the view was not 
disturbed. Miranda sent Savil a brief image of herself clipping a few blooms from the 
vines to grace her sill. 

/I loved the garden. I loved this place, despite the fact it wasn't really mine. I hope you do 
too, child./ 

Another grandmotherly stroke of Savil's tumbling curls, and Miranda faded into 
nothingness. 

/Just going for a stroll, my darling--mind if I call you that? I won't be gone long./

***

"Darling?" Saffie wondered aloud, pausing in her motions with the whisk hovering just 
out of reach of her dish of broken eggs.  It darted away then, turning to several crazy 
angles as he laid her thumb against her cheek.  ::No one's ever called me darling before 
in my life.  At least not in English.::

She giggled, and the loops descended into the clear goo before her, followed by a few 
tiny leaves she plucked from the thyme.  Not too many, and followed by only the hulls of 
a thimble full of pepper corns.  The dark middles went sailing then down the drain where 
they rang like glass beads.  

::But I don't think I mind ooooooooone bit.::

What she did mind was the conspicuous absences of whipped yellow cheddar, which had 
always been a staple of her more peculiar recipes, or own variants of other's where no 
time had been taken to add any eye-catching, jaw-dropping or giggle-able quirks to the 
ingredient lists.  In the end, she settled for some cream cheese, which had appeared 
without any complimentary bagels or English muffins, sliced off a chunk, warmed it over 
the stove in a saucepan for just a moment and proceeded to mix it in with the eggs.  

"That's better..." But the eggs got to stand for a moment, not so much so the flavor 
would seep through them, but because she had, as usual, forgotten to put the croissant 
dough in.  Though it would only take a moment.

/It's a crime to spend eight months living down the street from a patisserie run by a 
genuine ex-French prostitute and NOT know how to make descent croissants./

Though they didn't get made straight off.  Saffie hoisted herself up onto one knee that 
rested against the edge of the counter. From there, she held one hand upon the frame 
while the other wandered outside in the sunshine after a handful of roses that had 
clustered themselves against a single, mossy chink in the stone.  They broke off with a 
shuddering of the vine and came to live in a martini glass filled with sprite, for flowers 
did better in sweet things she knew, and she did want to see what Bradley would say 
when he came to the kitchen to give visual lessons regarding how he and her brother were 
involved to the table, the counter, the floor, and the sill of the sink as well.

***   

Miranda wandered up away from her newfound little chef, towards the second floor of 
the rectory. She knew the boy was there, could hear the creak of cases being opened and 
the rustle of clothes as they unfolded themselves and put themselves upon hangers. When 
she reached the doorway of the children's shared suite, she found the boy standing in the 
middle of the room, chaos all around him, while he arranged a small vase full of morning 
glory vines. Miranda lingered there by the jamb, watching it all, and then wandered away 
again. 

Nagi, however, stayed. The vase was soon set aside, and he turned to glance once more 
upon the curious, bow-wrapped box he'd found along with his own. It wasn't like 
Crawford to buy him presents, not really. Anything he wanted, he simply purchased 
himself, so when he found the box among his belongings, he couldn't resist opening it. 

And when he saw what it was, he couldn't resist putting it on either. The poet's shirt fit 
him perfectly--grazed his hips, and flowed like silk around his body. He'd paired it with a 
pair of slim-legged, black pants that he'd never worn before now; left off his shoes in 
favor of black house slippers. 

So what was in Savil's box? Too small for any such article of clothing, too small for a 
new doll. What could he have gotten for the girl who had practically everything? 

Only one way to find out. 

The ribbon fell away at his bidding, without a trace of shame from Nagi. The lid wriggled 
free from its tight fit, and landed upside down beside the box, and the pink and yellow 
tissue paper fluttered open to reveal a black silk covered jewelry box. 

Nagi's brows twitched as the box landed upon his outstretched palms, but the look he 
gave the amethyst, topaz, and emerald choker was appreciative. It was lovely--would 
look beautiful around her throat, he knew. 

But still, Nagi longed to see it on her. He took up his simple bouquet of morning glories 
and the necklace, and headed off downstairs. Savil was still busy at preparing his 
breakfast, he could hear her moving about. He raised his shields before descending, 
hoping to surprise her even as he figured he never would be able to do such a thing. 

As it happened though, she had her back to him when he padded into the kitchen, in the 
middle of preparing the chocolate filling for their croissants. Nagi smiled at that, and, 
after placing the vase on the kitchen table, crept up behind her with the necklace. He 
swung it over her head, and around her throat, causing her to go very still. Nagi deftly 
hooked the two tiny claws through the rings, then lay his hands upon her shoulders, and 
leaned forward to quickly kiss her cheek. 

"It's not from me, though I wish it was."

***

Saffie hung in Nagi's arms for a moment, rather like a kitten who does not realize at first 
it has been picked up, and with her eye wide and blinking but slowly.  Her curls jingled 
with the thumps of her stammering heart, and she supposed that if the boy had let his 
shields fall, she would have found a trace of disappointment there.

But he had been right, she WASN'T easy to catch unawares of anything whatsoever.

Not as if being surprised didn't delight her in every possible way.  A curious murmur 
rose without her lips and she whirled about beneath his hands then, as if doing so would 
somehow permit her to tilt her head to just the right angle to see the necklace.   She could 
but feel it now- a hundred cool raindrops bound about her neck.  The window fell but 
partway closed then, stopping just above the rim of the highest petal in the martini glass, 
and she found in it the sight of Nagi smiling behind her, and not only the image of the 
necklace which was jeweled dark upon her fair reflection, but also the pinpricks of 
colored light the crystals of it had spattered on the white cabinets.

Her response to the sights thereof had a jejune and direct quality.  "Ooooh!"

And with a giggle, she wound her arms backwards around her companion's waist in such 
a way she had no choice but to lean against him.  "Well, since no one else is here, we can 
pretend it's from you! The surprise was after all! And I like that just as well as the 
necklace."

A tap upon his shields and she found herself ushered back to his thoughts with a gracious 
wave she could not have imagined but a week ago.  ::And I'm not just saying that! Since 
being surprised is like being sad and afraid for me- I don't get to do it very often.  But 
surprise is better because it doesn't last very long.::

"Ah, that's too much before breakfast though, isn't it?"

So instead she simply whirled about and snuggled up against his shoulder for a moment, 
offering many a praise of the new shirt and how it looked upon him.

***

Nagi's fingers wandered over the links of cool stones and colder silver which now 
adorned Savil's throat, purposely touching her ever so lightly on the thin bands of skin 
which shone between the sparkling Mardi Gras stars. She was so warm in comparison. 
Nagi had the oddest urge to dab the tip of his tongue between those lines of radiant orbs, 
tasting metal and then her. He pushed it away almost as quickly as it had come, and 
slowly withdrew his hand from her throat. Fumbled with his sleeves instead. 

"I am glad you like it. I don't know why Crawford gave this to me though." 

/Or why he gave you this, although I can't say as I fault him for his generosity./ 

She rose from his shoulder with a giggle, but he only caught her before she could leave 
him to give her a nibbling little kiss. 

"Arigatou, Savil-ch..." He broke off with a tiny sigh. "Savil." 

A bit of a blush stole across Nagi's cheeks as he released her. He walked back to the table 
and picked up the vase of morning glories. This he set down on the counter beside the 
roses. 

"They were growing outside of the window in Crawford's and Schuldich's bathroom. I 
couldn't resist picking them." He tenderly stroked one delicate flower, then turned to her 
with another little smile. 

"They're just as blue as your eyes." 

***

Saffie chuckled and drew the vase up once again until it rested just where it would have 
been if she had peered in from the window, the blossoms nodding around her cheeks 
when she giggled.

"We'll have to go rowing on the lake sometime, Nagi-chan! Or I'll never find anything 
the color of your eyes. It's true! And it's not fair if I don't..." The flowers popped behind 
her back then as she wiggled her shoulders this way and that, hands creased around the 
pilfered pillar of glass.  "Or do you think I'll be such a bad girl I'll upset the boat and get 
us both wet...?"

The way that bells of sugar must have tasted here, of ever such a thing had been wrought.  
::You know you'd be bored if I was good, whatever that is.  I don't think any little girl 
that ever really lived was ever "good", but that's me, and I'm more interested in these!::

Finger tips against his shirt for an instant.  The vase rejoined the roses who had tipped to 
swoons each for fear of what might become of their blue brethren.  Saffie tipped them up 
again and laid one nose to nose with a morning glory.  "It's not even our birthdays.  You 
never know with them, changing the dates with things.  It's their anniversary whenever 
they feel like having one, and Schu-baby changed my birthday three times before he was 
happy with it."

Instead of an answer, she got a little bird of butter which made it's way onto a floating 
cookie sheet and began to glide about in figure eights the most graceful of figureskaters 
would have been frightfully envious of.

***

They found that all of their belongings had been packed up, and stood in neat piles by the 
front door, so all they'd had to do was fetch a porter to carry their cases down, and to 
settle up with the desk clerk, a dark-haired young man with an Italian accent. Easy 
enough, that. 

But then, Crawford did something which might have been deemed curious. 

"Tell me," he began, once the desk clerk had taken his cash for the suite, "do you have 
any couriers on the premises who might be hired to travel to Antiterra?" 

"But of course, sir. Our couriers are for hire day or night." 

"How about distance? That is, would it be a problem if I needed one to go to Japan? I 
would pay for all his expenses, of course." 

At that, the boy registered mild wonder before schooling his features once more into their 
cool mask. "No, sir. There wouldn't be a problem." 

"And..." he began, lowering his voice a shade, "what about, if the thing I needed would 
require he commit a bit of breaking-and-entering to retrieve?" 

"Again, sir, there would be no problem." 

Crawford smirked, and took up one of the quills out of the tin on the counter, and dipped 
into a round little pot of ink--blue as a summer sky in color. He tapped the edge of the nib 
along the bottle's rim, and precisely wrote out an address, and handed it over to the clerk. 
"There is my name and address. Any bills the boy incurs between the time he actually 
leaves and when he comes back, just send those to me." 

The clerk took note of the address, then set it aside, and went to take out a rather formal-
looking, albeit brief, document. This he set in front of Crawford, and then he crossed to 
the back wall and tugged sharply upon one of the bell pulls. "If you will read over the 
contract carefully, and then sign at the "X," please, sir. All our couriers are bonded and 
licensed, so whatever you have him retrieve or send will be kept safe and confidential." 

"Oh, I have no doubt," he murmured. Crawford dipped the nib of his quill into the ink 
once more, now one as dark blue as dusk, and signed his name where the boy had 
indicated. Just as he replaced the quill into the tin reserved for used pens, his smartly 
uniformed courier approached the desk. 

"Yes, Antonio?" 

"Simon, this is Mr. Crawford. He has hired your services for the next three weeks." 

The boy bowed gracefully to Crawford. Stood attention when he rose. "What may I do 
for you, sir?" 

Crawford drew him to one side, away from the desk and out of earshot of any straying 
patrons. 

"I want you to travel to Tokyo, Japan, go to this address," here he pressed an envelope 
into the boy's hand, pointing at the name and street he'd written on it earlier. "I want you 
to gain entrance of the building you find there, and take for me..." 

He whispered the last into the boy's ear. 

"Very good, sir." 

Crawford grinned, and tapped the envelope. "Inside, you'll find $100. If you'll steal 
something extra for me from that person, I'll double that." 

The boy's eyes lit up a little, and he nodded once in agreement. "I will do as you bid." 

"The plane ticket will be waiting for you at the terminal in the morning--I will contact the 
hotel about the necessary arrangements for the trip. When you reach the ticket window, 
you will receive information about the other item I might want you to take." 

"Very good, sir." Simon came to attention again, and then pivoted on his heels, and 
walked away. Crawford slipped his wallet back into his pocket, and slipped an arm 
around Schuldich's waist after he had left, all relaxed and smiling. 

"Now...How about I treat you to a proper breakfast?" 

***

Schuldich didn't answer, but rather, smack in the middle of the Ashkevron Plaza, , leaned 
against his lover and set about savoring his neck with open-mouthed kisses and long, 
popsicle worthy licks. Jasper cooed and went back to chasing some inanimate lavender in 
the straw that dusted the floor, rather than make any attempt to nap during his usual 
hours.

::Mmm! You just did...::

Where he paused for but a moment to rest his jade eyes on Bradley's icy orbits; the 
almost imperceptible sadistic joy there.

And he nodded with a laugh before setting to work again.  His lover tried his best to 
nudge him away as they walked out, but it was rather he rocked back and forth between 
admiring his neck and having his lips on it.

Antonio took his break early and ran for the broom closet hoping no one would notice the 
bulge in his pants.  Jasper hooted in dismay upon being plunked down along on the far 
seat and Schuldich put his hands in Bradley's hair.

"Too bad Lady Jessica's closed, or we could go there.  Remember how you used to stick 
the flowers from the table on me with the green marmalade?"

He did, and parts of the memory bounced back and forth between them.

"And how Paul and Prim used to whine about it?"

Somewhat less pleased recollections now as the ascended the single step into their 
carriage. 

"Maybe the whores have set up camp somewhere else. So long as it isn't Claire's.  
There's this old guy keeps hanging around after Aya in the mornings.  He had the nerve 
enough to pull up my pants yesterday!"

***

Crawford tutted most disapprovingly over Schuldich's revelation. "What a dreadful old 
sack of bones he must be to brazenly cover up a work of art such as the narrow curves of 
your hips!" 

/Or rather...perhaps I should say the work of art that is you in general./ 

Crawford settled one hand upon said part of Schuldich's anatomy, just grazing his groin 
in passing. His lips sought out the curve of his throat, fingers tangled in his hair. He 
nibbled, and swept his tongue in one long, broad stroke from chin to hollow, and then 
murmured against his skin. "...Nowadays, a man can't even publicly parade around in a 
state of semi-nakedness without finding censure. What is Valdemar coming to?" 

/Interesting, though, that Aya has already found an admirer--oh! Correction! *Another* 
admirer./ 

Crawford undid the buttons of Schuldich's shirt one after the other, and parted garment 
over his chest. Petted him there, toying with first one nipple and then the other. 
"Mmm...but I don't think he'll be any competition for *you*." 

He left off laving his throat with kisses and bites, and sat up to stare down into 
Schuldich's lazy green eyes. 

"Not at all." 

He pressed his palm across the nipple he'd been lightly pinching, and slid his hand 
upwards over his chest, his shoulder, to cup the back of his neck. Crawford slowly leaned 
in to kiss his lover's parted lips, a slow burn of a caress. 

/Wherever we go, I want a sumptuous feast, with gorgeous young men for us to fondle 
and plenty of cushions strewn about so that I.../ 

/...can play.../ 

"...with you..." 

Crawford pulled away and opened his eyes to gaze upon Schuldich once more. "The ice 
cream and Aya-kun will be our dessert."

***

"Oh," Schuldich drawled, his wet lips creeping into a smile so gradually, he felt it took 
his lover sometime to realize they had faded into a grin.  "And what would you like to 
play with me?" 

He said no more at first, but the carriage stumbled a bit over a bump in the street and they 
fell together of motion's accord.  One of the telepath's arms came up and snaked about 
his lover's shoulders, looping around his neck and resting firmly there, unwilling to be 
stirred away by another jolt.  His fingers slid into Bradley's collar and played against his 
jaw.

::Take your time...::

As if to make it certain then he could well enough make a game of himself, his free 
fingers alighted on one of his stiffened nipples, held it squeezed in the circle of his thumb 
and forefinger.  

::...It'll be... almost like two desserts, won't it? Because... hmm... you do taste like 
you're in the mood for a little role-playing.::

He got a swat on the center of his chest, doubtless aiming for the hand that was toying 
with the now quite rosy bud there.  Missed though his fingers were, he drew them away 
and tugged his shirt down over his shoulder where it lounged rather in the crook of his 
arm for awhile.  

"Would you like to play... dolly? You never play dolls with me, not in bed.  Just with 
Nagi while I have my Saffie.  Or we could play nurse.  Maid? Nursemaid? Demonhunter? 
Edwardian dandy?"

A little pout then, for Schuldich had never been especially fond of the 1920 teahouse as it 
was called, whereas the owner, also a telepath, was dreadfully fond of him.

"At least we know we can ALWAYS play priest at home..."

***

"And we will," Crawford replied. "But...this morning, I want to play demon hunter." That 
said with a wicked grin. "Seems appropriate, doesn't it?" 

/The question is: Where do we go?/ 

To that end, Crawford reached up and knocked sharply on the ceiling. A tiny door opened 
on the front of the carriage, and the driver's chubby face came into view. 

"Something wrong, mister?" 

Crawford shook his head. "I just want to know where in Valdemar can one go to indulge 
their fetishes?" 

He laughed, and took a deep drag on the worn pipe he held between his yellowing teeth. 
"Mister, there are all sorts of places around here for that. What did you have in mind, 
exactly, if you don't mind my asking?" 

"Role playing--of the adult sort, of course." 

The driver nodded enthusiastically. "There are four such places in town which specialize 
in that, but only one serves breakfast at this time: The Velvet Pantomime." 

Crawford peered up at him over the rims of his glasses. "Is it a seedy sort of place?" 

"Oh, no, mister! It's one of the classiest establishments in town." 

Crawford exchanged delighted looks with his lover. "Then take us there," he called back. 
"But there's no hurry, driver. No hurry at all." 

He could hear the man chuckle knowingly as he closed the tiny door in the roof, but 
Crawford gave him no mind after that. He promptly sunk to his knees between 
Schuldich's legs, and teasingly undid his lover's fly. 

/Just a warm up, of course,/ he thought at him as he slid his mouth down over his lover's 
cock. 


The Velvet Pantomime turned out to be a three story mansion of red brick and white 
marble. More suited for a boarding house than an adult club, Crawford thought. 

Of course, he already knew he was wrong before they alighted from the carriage. He had 
seen glimpses of the interior before they'd even swept through the twin oak doors and 
into a Moroccan style room. All wide, curving doorways, brass lamps, and colorful tile 
mosaics on the walls; a predominately red Persian rug covered most of the lobby floor. 
Through the one archway directly in front of them, they could see a few men lounging by 
and swimming in a palm lined, indoor swimming pool. Parrots and birds of paradise hung 
in glided cages from the ceiling, and ferns sat upon stone pedestals here and there. 
Crawford could feel the warmth from the room from where he stood. 

"Good morning, gentlemen. I am Rodolpho. How may I serve you?" 

Crawford turned around to find a slight, dark-haired man with an aquiline nose standing 
behind him. He held a clipboard under one arm. 

"We would like to rent one of your rooms for breakfast." 

The clerk nodded. "Have you been here before?" 

"No. We have only recently moved to Valdemar." 

"Ah, I see. Well, we have a number of theme rooms open at this hour. Bondage, Jungle, 
The Honeymoon Suite, The Royal Suite, Prison Cell...May I ask what sort of play you 
were wishing to engage in?" 

Crawford glanced over at Schuldich questioningly, considering, and then said, 
"Something extremely...physical, I suppose you would say." 

Again, he nodded, smiling. "Then I suggest the Jungle room. It is quite spacious, plenty 
of room to move around in, to get lost in, even. Certain areas of the floor are set up as 
sunken beds. There is even a small waterfall and a pool large enough for four people to 
lounge in." 

Another glance in Schuldich's direction, and then he said, "We will take it." Crawford 
reached for his wallet to pay. "How much?" 

"We ask $150 upfront. That will get you two hours in the room, plus breakfast, but you 
are welcome to stay longer for a nominal, additional fee. " 

"Costumes?" 

"There are a number of them in the closet by the door--the porter will show where that 
is." The clerk drew a bell out of his pocket, and rang it twice, and a loincloth clad boy 
sprang out of the back room, and fell to one knee beside Rodolpho. 

"Take them to the Jungle room." 

The boy nodded once, and then got to his feet. Wordlessly, he motioned for the two men 
to follow him upstairs. 

*** 

Schuldich applauded then, still holding Jasper's make-shift leash as he did so.  The chain 
rattled and the owl rattled so it was a very vexed owl indeed who teetered on the edge of 
the rug, fell face down on the floor, and finally hobbled after his master much to 
Crawford's discontented mental grumbles.  The telepath only sniggered and licked his 
fingers when his lover turned around to shush him.  

As for Bradley otherwise, it almost appeared for a second as if his lover had distracted 
him enough to make him walk into one of the ferns, but he side-stepped it at the very last 
possible moment.  Naturally, so it was only their boy who collided with anything lovely 
and not meant to be toyed with.  A few blushing shuffles and he had them in front of an 
iron door whose glass sweated bits of dark water on the inside.  A wreath of cages hung 
about it, some set with flower birds of paradise, and some with the sort that sang.  Sure 
enough, behind one coterie of them stood a mirrored slider which Schuldich at once 
bounded over to.

The scarf in his hair was sagging, the kneepads had developed uneven creases.  His ring 
glittered and Jasper looked dimmer than ever.  So everything was perfect and just 
wonderfully out of whack! He applauded himself before skipping over and catching their 
porter's wrist up.

The child regarded him as he might have a bothersome strand of hair, and he felt no 
wonder from his face, nothing exotic in his mind to match the distant dreams his body 
evoked.  With eyes only he looked him over and kissed him as he did.  

"Mmm! Not bad.  Won't you do me a little favor though?"

A nod, and no other answer.

"Keep my lover outside until I say so and make absolutely sure he doesn't peek at me 
while I'm getting ready!" 

"Yes, sir.  Anything you like." Though he seemed to know he had missed something, the 
boy, and glanced between them with a shrug.

Prancing away with a lilt of a false swoon to his moves and one less twenty in his pocket 
then, Schuldich concluded, "I embarrass easily after all!" And lost himself in the closet 
then, owl and all.  

It took him all of five seconds to find something he liked, all of five minutes to change 
and all of a fractional moment to leave his original things on the floor as if he had no 
intention of ever laying eyes on them again.

A blue and henna streak darted out from behind the sighing doors then, and had Crawford 
in its arms before he ever could have had a chance to whirl and see it more certainly.  
Palms pressed to Crawford's eyes beneath his glasses- "Peekaboo! Better come find me 
before I have sex with someone in their sleep or buy myself a few innocents to pose like 
furniture that won't match your silver cushions!"

The wire frames fell to his palms and stayed there as he dashed away and cried above the 
hiss of the warm air leaving their chamber, "Only clerics are any good against demons of 
course! Or pretty boys with vorpal blades washed in bloody fountains!"

Barefoot, whistling and still carrying his fragile prize, Schuldich slammed the door 
behind him and leaned against it for a moment, chuckling all the while.  It was with the 
very faintest of disappointments he found he could not make out his lover's glasses as 
well as he would have liked to.  They shone dimly now inside the jungle room, for it was 
somewhat evening there, though morning elsewhere- not the impenetrable blue, or the 
darkness where there is but a sliver of a moon, but rather a cooing, paper sort of light all 
around, like too many stars might have given, or the spangles of Chinese lanterns over a 
darkened deck.  

He found no lanterns, and no lights of any kind- nothing but a cobalt dome with bits of 
silver worked into the glass.  Still there was grass beneath his feet- little tickles of it 
reaching after his toes as he twirled around and around over the moss -and leaves of 
fragrant things without names to call their own to tangle in his hair.  And they stirred! 
There were small, shyly curious things moving about their green curtains.  Little soft, and 
shiny things that gleamed like facets jewelry even in the wan, warm glow.  They breathed 
in the damp air, or sang.  He could hear frogs and see them clinging to the underside of 
some of the larger leaves- just small ones, reaching after insects bigger than they.  

Stealing into the stream, he reached after one got up as an orchid that was making a pass 
at a mantis clad much the same way.  

"I can't believe they put BUGS in here!"

Jasper hooted in agreement and as a consequence, found himself tied so he could only 
play about the roots of one baobab.  Still with the white mantis clutched in one hand, 
Schuldich went on, deeper into the room, sensing no walls and no limit to the glowing 
dimness.  It would not stir as long as held it, the insect, as if it was afraid.  Since he knew 
nothing of its mind, the bug began to annoy him, and the temptation came to smash it to 
bits.

A little voice then, "Please don't hurt my little friend!"

It had come from the floor, where he stooped to find with even less surprise that one of 
the mushrooms had turned upwards to face him, revealing a cute, pudgy, vaguely human 
figure beneath it's hood.  

And a wind up key in its back, much like he suddenly realized he could feel on the insect.

"Oh, and why not? What will happen to me if I do? Will I have to pay for it?"

"Yes yes! And those are more than the room, don't you know."

"What if it would make me happy to break it?"

"You should do what makes you happy.  We're all here to make you happy."

"Great!" A pinch of the tiny body between his fingers, a little spark, and the mantis 
sagged in his hand, dripping fiber-optic wires which were warm and ticklish.  He pulled 
them out a little and tied them in his hair.  "Then shut up! I don't want to get caught too 
fast!"

The mushroom nodded and Schuldich took to the darkest corner he could squeeze 
himself into, hiding the glasses curled up against his chest less they decide they would 
like to wink and let anyone see.   

***

Crawford, now much hindered by his lack of clear vision, had their guide escort him to 
the closet; once there, however, he chose to depend upon his own resources. There were 
myriad costumes in the well-lit, mirrored, rectangular space, just as the front clerk had 
boasted. And there was the problem. Should he be some wandering mage in a hooded 
cape and long dark robe? Should he be a monk with brown wool and rosary belt and holy 
water vials? 

Ah, but wasn't that what he wanted? What Aubrey might expect? 

So he fumbled through the racks, fingered garment after garment when a streak of white 
caught his eye. Crawford immediately gravitated towards it. Slid the costume away from 
the others, and held it up to the light. 

It was a long white robe heavily shot through with gold and silver mylar threads which 
sparkled alluringly in the light. Simply made. He swiveled the hook and hung the robe 
sideways onto the rack, and then quickly divested himself of his suit and shirt and shoes. 
The robe came off the hanger and Crawford drew it over his head, then turned to look at 
himself in the tri-fold mirrors. 

The skirt was flowing, obscured his bared feet. The sleeves were long, and bell shaped, 
and double layered, the points slightly off center by design. The neckline was round and 
shirred slightly, and the fabric itself was lightweight, double layered as well, but made to 
flow smoothly as the garment's wearer moved. 

Crawford smiled at his fuzzy reflection, for he realized just what he had become: An 
angel, sans wings. 

He started forward in his excitement back to the racks; stumbled over the full skirts; 
caught himself; caught his voluminous skirts in both hands and began again, cursing 
softly. Then he immediately burst out laughing, remembering what he was supposed to 
be. 

He sorted through the racks again until he came upon the monk's robes, and from it, 
Crawford fished out the long, crystal and silver-tone rosary out of the sack that hung from 
the costume's hanger. This, he wrapped around his waist, and threaded the crucifix end 
through the loop. Arranged it so it dangled low around his waist, and puffed up the fabric 
around his middle until the hem cleared the tops of his feet, which he chose to leave bare. 

And then, Crawford gathered up his clothes, piled them on top of Schuldich's, and left the 
closet for the jungle. 

The steam did not bother him, though the feel of grass on his bare feet was odd to him. 
He couldn't remember ever having gone barefoot in his life, though he figured he had at 
least once. 

But then, he'd done most everything at least once. 

He glanced at the curiously wrought ceiling of the ballroom sized room; took in the 
abundant, humidity-loving vegetation, and marveled over it all, even though in the next 
moment, he had forgotten it. After all, he had a demon to hunt. 

Crawford took step after cautious step into the room, until he reached the shade of a 
palm--one slightly swaying in the warm breeze. 

"I can feel the presence of evil in this Paradise," he called, only to be answered by the cry 
of a startled toucan from somewhere in the distance. 

"I know you are here, foul demon, and I will vanquish you!" 

Silence, save for the shrieks of monkeys greeted him, but Crawford didn't care--it was all 
part of the act, his shouting out his dares. He had already seen all the places Schuldich 
would have chosen to hide in, and he set off in the direction of one of them--towards the 
waterfall.

***

Schuldich was obliged to set his teeth to the edge of his palm or giggle out loud in his 
latest foray into the realm of bizarre pleasures.  The bite left a wet print on the edge of his 
glove and he frowned on it, shaking his head and sinking forward towards his knees.  The 
glasses creaked between his thighs and his middle so he fished them out and hung them 
rather sideways on the loop of golden links about his neck.  

::But of course you will!:: Snide brandy an citrus bitters this.  ::And the moon and the sun 
will hold still because Joshua asks nicely! What fools you emissaries of light be! It is the 
darkness by which all thing's are swallowed; nothingness which all consumes. Cold in the 
very atoms of you being!::

He hooted then, as Jasper might have, but was not mistaken for Jasper in the least.  
Crawford's bare feet rustled in the moist grass, and he felt his own toes upon the earth 
even as the spray from the waterfall brushed him as he fled- light and blithe and blue 
between the nocturnes above and the shadows below.

The pattering behind him ceased, but the blind eyes did not meet his own, only the cubby 
of pale stone where he had been, merely resting, and not fleeing still, for there were no 
colors any longer he could truly hide against.

A jingle of the chain against the steel frames and he took off leaving but a stirring of 
leaves behind him and the memory of a laugh that had not been uttered.      

::Surety you crave! I shall give thee none! If you would sue for my possession, you must 
first do my bidding! Those are my only terms.  Take them or leave them!::

A splash, and his glove went wet again as he clasped it in his lips.  As if they knew 
something was funny, a few of the mushrooms were glancing up at him with wide, soft 
eyes and smiling tenderly as machines could smile upon such a thing as he.  

The same hue, brilliant and audacious, covered him all over.  The place past cyan 
trimmed with but a little gold and glitter.  There were tight chains tied upon his feet.  His 
trousers had been deliberately sliced and so fluttered more than hid him, hung low on his 
hips and tied at his crotch rather than buttoned or zipped.  Such pockets waiting to be 
parted dotted his shirt, and so the ribbons of theirs darted this way and that as he moved.  
The chain clanged, and the gloves without fingers he drew off and left in the brush as if 
coaxing some creature who found scent enticing as he did the flavors of thoughts.

At last he came to a tree he thought might hold him, and feeling no sign of his lover close 
by, he scurried up it and lost himself in the silver-green leaves.  Though melting into 
them was not as easy as it might have been otherwise, even if the boughs seemed meant 
to enfold someone of just his size- even carried winding reaches to steady his feet upon.  
But there were birds here too, and they knew why he didn't quite fit, for he carried 
something they themselves knew well.

Stitched to the shirt and to wires which held them beneath was a pair of sparkle-strewn, 
transparent dragon wings, textured with make-believe scales, and nearly as wide as he 
was tall if he would have had the mind to unfold them all the way- an act the birds did by 
will, and he by means of two more ribbons.   

*** 

Crawford lingered upon the banks of the pool, weakly scanning the blur of green and 
brown that he knew to be the thick of the forest. "You are wrong, demon. The darkness 
cannot exist where there is light. Nothingness is obliterated by Existence. You cannot 
defeat me, and I will not bargain with a creature of Hell." 

He smirked at nothing, at no one, and then gathered his skirt up a bit and extended his 
foot towards the water; the steam licked at his sole before he touched the rippling surface. 
Crawford kicked up a bit of spray with his toes, and then he drew away from the pool. 

"You think you can hide from me, Sarphilus? Think I cannot find you in the heart of the 
forest?" Crawford laughed lightly. "This realm is under my care, and I know the place of 
every creature who dwells within it." 

/Including you./ 

With that, Crawford tore away towards the shifting, crying blanket of green before him, 
moving quickly and quietly over the damp ground as was his habit. As if he were 
tracking someone he would eventually kill. 

***

Schuldich, for the sake of being difficult, refused to answer straight off, taking time 
instead to adjust the way he and the tree were fitting together for the occasion- stretching 
this way, sighing that way without his breath, and finally straddling the branch which his 
toes dangling almost to the edge of the leaves.  Something powdery and light settled upon 
one and stretched its wings, so he held very, very still.  

It didn't really surprise him it was a robotic Cream Lassie dyed tangerine and violent 
indigo.  He hoped it would bite him if it could, but he didn't know why, outside of the 
fact it would be a fantastically bizarre happening.  Telepath got up like demon bitten by 
synthetic moth.

::You've already bargained with something!:: He spat back with an echoing tumult of 
non-existent giggles.  ::Haven't you noticed yet? There's nothing really alive in here! 
Unless you expect the plants to rise up and do your bidding.  This is a place of art, useless 
art! Is your god the ruler of futility? Your light that of a cheap halogen rather than a 
candle?::

::No wonder you're still chasing me...::

***

Crawford came to a halt just when he reached the outer edges of the forest, and there he 
stood for a moment, listening, and scanning the trees, the bushes as best as he could for 
any signs of human life. Any flash of flame red. 

All he saw was a massive mechanical beetle crawling along the tree to his immediate left. 
Crawford frowned at it in disgust, and moved on, wiping his hands on the skirt of his 
robe as if his skin crawled. 

"I chase you? Surely you see the illogic of your statement, for I have never descended 
into Hell to seek your company. Always, it is you who come here. I wonder why that is?" 

No answer. Crawford smiled at the cool green canopy above him. 

"Remember, Sarphilus, a wise human once said that '...Life imitates art more than art 
imitates life.' The living creatures on Earth are merely pale shadows of perfection. These 
mechanical toys are the true reality, and I, God's beloved, am their guardian." 

He reached out a hand towards a low growing bush and came away with a tiny, emerald 
lizard. It scampered away from the hollow of his palm and up his sleeve, coming to rest 
on his shoulder. 

Crawford turned his eyes towards the canopy again. 

"And why do I need to command the creations of my Lord, Sarphilus, when I have you to 
fill that void?" 

***

Schuldich, now Sarphilus, was actually inclined for some moments to sit and ponder his 
response, which he did while fondling the dully glinting frames of his prize, and 
luxuriating in the sugar and the sour mists of thought his mental reticence had called forth 
from his lover.  The thousands of softly implied fragments of his names winding their 
way through the liquidy green and colored blooms of the branches and the bracken which 
came close.  Schuldich... Sarphilus... liebe... Aubrey... Aubrey... Aubrey...

Aubrey who, so called, was last to answer, if he answered at all.  Such was tradition.

::Because you can't stand it! Either way that could be taken.  I know you mean you think 
that I'm the master of the wind-up dolls here.  And I am! If to bring death is to be 
master!::

The white praying mantis replaced the glasses in his palm.  He pondered tearing it apart 
so it might come to the playing angel down below in pieces, but no.  The sight of the 
white thing, intact but for the tangle of fiber-optic viscera was far more the pity.  He tore 
it away with a few strands of his hair and flung it as far as he could into the underbrush.  
Crawford did not see it sailing through the humid air, but heard its rattling thump, 
stumbling towards that and nothing more.  

::But you could almost say... part of you meant that you want me to take the place of all 
the dollies, or to be one myself.  Because it's just as bad for you to know there's 
something that wasn't made by human hand, that isn't yours, that looks perfect but isn't, 
that still isn't yours.::

And when he felt Bradley had lifted the metal shell of the insect from where it had landed 
on the moss:- ::They are pretty, until they break.  But they still break.  So are they really 
all that close to "perfection".::

Something far from it then fell through the tangle of emerald and peridot above the earth 
then; a soft-focus outline of a woman carrying blades in either hand, or something long 
and thin and almost sexual at least.  To his eyes, she was but a fog above the clarity of 
earth, to Crawford's part of the indistinctness, swiftly gathering herself before him until 
she was close enough to have slid into focus.  There, Aubrey blew on her and she flew 
away like tangles of smoke.  

***

Crawford impassively regarded the cracked and crumbling white shell in his palm. 

"Yes, they are perfect because they can be easily replaced; they haven't any souls, no 
conscience to plague them as humans do. This device, along with all the rest here, are 
works of Art. And in Art, one always finds perfection." 

He gingerly unwound the strands of Schuldich's hair from the ruined toy, and tossed the 
latter onto the ground. The long fillaments glittered in the filtered light as he turned them 
this way and that. Crawford wrapped them around his ring finger, securing them as best 
he could. Then he turned his vague eyes towards the treetops again. 

/Danke, mein liebe./ 

He coughed to clear his throat, and then continued. "You are wrong on many counts: I 
don't consider you are the master of these creatures simply because you can so willfully 
and easily destroy them. I don't care that these things were fashioned by magic stronger 
than what I possess, or that I was made to guard them--not when they tempt you into 
coming here to taunt and debate with me." 

The light shifted through the branches, and Crawford raised his hand to shield his face as 
he continued to gaze upward. "I don't want you as a doll. I don't want you as a toy, and I 
could never own you." 

/Nor do I want to.../ 

"I think I like you just as you are, for all your wickedness."

***

"Is that so?" Schuldich muttered softly as the leaves began to nod.  He knew somewhere 
a fan had gone on to bring them a breeze, but he couldn't hear it.  

He had, however, been heard, and as if he had but transported himself there, Crawford 
appeared below his dangling feel, and said nothing as he faced the blue and henna 
airbrush haze the telepath knew he appeared as.

"For all the pride you have in your existence and how you have brought it into being, you 
would honestly live in a church made by peasants as you would a church made by nobles, 
and answer their prayers just the same, even though they are dirty and boring and 
imperfect?"

The glasses in his hand clicked as he toyed with them.

"It is a sad world we live in when not even God can be swayed by money."

If he had had a coin on his person, he would have dropped them towards Bradley's eyes 
since they had no fountain and the stream was far away.  

"So if I gave you something to guard, it would make no difference to you of what it was, 
or how it came to be? So long as I would come back?"

He was on his toes then, balanced on the ribs of the branch he had taken, which still 
nodded with the after thoughts of his motion.

"Like a child thinks? Such must be the wisdom of the ever lasting, to know that they were 
right in the first place.  But then again, I'm sure you understand how perverse children 
can be."

Without waiting for an answer, he leapt from the bows of his present haunt and into the 
arms of another and another.  Leaving nothing behind but a stirring sound and a pair of 
spectacles hooked just out of reach for someone standing on the ground.  

***

"Yes," Crawford remarked dryly as he watched his winged lover take to the trees again, 
"I understand perversity all too well, having dealt with you for as long as I have." 

He heard a resounding crack in the distance, and the disheartening rustle of leaves and 
twigs. Something fell to the ground with a tinny crash, and Schuldich's laughter rang out 
in a startling burst through the trees. Another mechanical inhabitant had just met with its 
death at his lover's hands. 

He shook his head, and laughed as well. Then he looked up at the tree his lover had 
inhabited, and just caught the fuzzy glint of his lenses within a peekaboo veil of leaves. 
Still laughing, he thought, /You're a incorrigible bastard, Aubrey./ 

Crawford felt him grin in his head, and he shifted a look in the direction in which 
Schuldich had gone. And narrowed his eyes in a calculating way. Crawford hitched up 
his skirt a bit higher above his rosary belt, and sprang for the lowest branch within his 
reach. He swung back and forth a bit as if he were on a gym bar, and then heaved himself 
up onto it. Gingerly shifted around until he had his feet placed firmly upon it, one hand 
clinging onto another overhead branch for support. 

/Okay, so I'm not as fast as you about it./ 

"I am merely a servant of my Lord. I am not in the position of granting the prayers of 
humanity, whether from highborn or low, so your question is pointless." 

He shook the fat branch he held, leaned on it, and then swung off onto it, repeating the 
same procedure as before. Once he got himself settled again, he continued. 

"As for you giving me something to guard--yes, I would gladly take into my care 
anything you wished me to guard, so long as it meant that you would visit me as you do 
now. If that makes me a child, if that makes me perverse, then so be it." 

Crawford balanced himself on the branch, leaning against the smooth tree trunk for 
support, and he reached up to pluck his glasses from the branchlet above and to the right 
of him. He had to get on his tiptoes in the end to get them, but he grinned as his hand 
closed around them. 

"Question is, what would you give me to guard..." 

/...Aubrey?/

***

Schuldich paused, the tips of his toes just shy of breaking the surface of the lake that had 
been gathered along the edge of the stream.  His reflection remained intact for one more 
moment as he turned back to the empty reaches of the woods, strewn now as they were 
with the glittering hulls of mechanical things that had stopped by leave of his fingers.  
Ribbons of wire blew in the breeze he couldn't feel from where he stood, and the 
mushroom had begun to weep with tears of peacock ore oil.  

/You want something...? Like that...? Heh, now if that's not goddamn weird, even for 
you.../

He drew his wings open, as he asked his thoughts forth, and they began to sway with his 
Barbie doll gait as he padded about the smooth stones at the bottom of the throne where 
subjects of the sapphire birds had gathered, rather than to steel about the lush and lusty 
land below.  ::It was a hypothetical question.  Who said I WAS giving you anything?::

The stones began to nip at his feet, and he danced from them back to the grass and the 
ripples of grim wonder gathering about his distant lover as storm clouds come whirl 
about the crest of a mountain biting the sky.  

::But just the same...:: And those considerations cleaved to the wordless conversation.  
::If I did.  It would be something that would have to remind you that it was mine.  
Something perverse and childlike.::

Schuldich was standing in the middle of the glen beside the hot tub when Crawford found 
him.  He had his ring off and was holding it between his cupped hands as if he had 
gathered dew that hung still like crystals even when drawn from its leaves.  A smile clung 
to his lips.

"And don't say that's not what you had in mind."

The wings spun with him, a blur of scales that would not move and the streak of gold as 
the ring spun in the air and came back to him.  He caught it with his ring finger and eased 
it back to where it had been with his lips.

***

"I wasn't going to say any such thing! I would be lying if I did." Crawford gave him a 
lazy smile as he entered the glade. "And I'm not so much a fool as to do that..." 

/...to a demon./ 

Crawford walked over to the edge of the steaming pool and there lingered. Watched the 
water bubble and ripple where the falls met the surface. 

"But you didn't answer my question," he said. "What childish and perverse object in your 
possession would you give me?" 

He leveled his attention towards his lover again, smirking. "Or was that the point of 
playing with your ring?"

***

Schuldich swept away as if he had been taken aback, though the wicked guise about him 
said nothing of the sort.  Once some semblance of alone in the synthetic, evening-level 
lights, he moued and held his marked hand within the cup of the other. "It's *MY* ring." 
He fussed with far too much drama.  "You can't have it back no matter how much you 
ask."

He peered at it then, looking rather as if he had something small and living wrapped up 
between his fingers which he suspected of wanting to flee.  His next words had only 
begun when he felt his lover's shields clutch his surprise back to the spaces around his 
mind.  "I like it way too much for that.  Why, I wouldn't let you take it away even if it 
was scratched!"

A glance over his shoulder and he found the ripples had more of Crawford's attention at 
the moment than he did, or were being put forward by the precognitive of knowing that 
place in the world.

Uninhibited as ever, he bounded into the water, and stood right in Bradley's line of sight, 
the spray from the waterfall leaving a spray of peacock rainbow droplets in his hair.

"But what would I get you?" And here the game re-asserted itself in his words.  
"Something from the very depths of hell where the ghosts can not even remember their 
own names.  Like... a pomegranate."

***

Crawford knew the myths; he knew all the old tales. Such stories became a source of 
fascination for him when, as a boy, he resumed his studies in England. So at the mention 
of the pomegranate, he looked exactly like he'd just found something he'd lost long ago. 

And then his face closed up, and his old knowing smirk returned. "Hoping I'll eat of the 
food of Hell, and be trapped there forever?" Crawford snorted in amusement. "I'd be 
stuck there, and you would still be free to come and go as you wished. The ultimate 
joke." 

Crawford gathered up a handful of skirt, baring his ankle as he stepped down into the 
water. "Ever the kidder. Ever wanting to play," he murmured dreamily as he waded away 
from the bank towards him. His robe trailed after him, dragging along. The rosary fell 
around his hips, and when he came to a halt just a foot away from Schuldich, he took the 
long, heavy length of chain in hand and drew the crucifix out of the beaded loop. He 
lifted the cross up from the water, and held it upside down between Schuldich and 
himself. He kissed the very bottom edge of it, and then pitched it onto the grass. 

"I would hate for you to get a nasty burn."

***

Schuldich made a gurgling hiss there in mimic of a frying pan and entertained for a 
moment, the idea of making imaginary smoke for the place in the grass where the bit of 
not quite silver had landed.  "It's all I can do to make up for the irony of an angel who 
likes to get it on with a demon."

And something else found its way around Crawford's waist then, namely a pair of wiry 
arms just tinted with a bit of loose silk.

"Frankly, it's you who oughtta worry about getting singed.  Don't make me tell you all 
the reasons why."  

His wings bumped against the stone bower of the waterfall, and they began to stream 
water from it down their tips in long, clear threads.  Some got into his clothing and he 
made no indication of caring, for they brought out his form without unclothing it.  Just 
parts.

Many lunatic moments then.  Just the rush of the of their cataract and his mental fingers 
leaving traces of something close to skin warmth in Bradley's shields as they would not 
fall.

But how soft Brad's eyes seemed in the half failed light.  And since he could not taste his 
mind for the time being, he leaned in, and drank of his lips instead.

Which he chuckled into.  "My turn to hurt god."

***

Crawford gathered him close, arms sliding around his shoulders. He chuckled as well, 
just before brushing his lips against Schuldich's. "Hurting Him because you've succeeded 
in tempting His favored one? Because we are about to defile His Paradise?" One set of 
fingers skimmed his damp back between the glittering wings, moving upwards under the 
heavy veil of his hair to cup the back of his neck. 

"Shall we make him cry, demon?" 

Once more he pressed his eager mouth to Schuldich's, lowering his shields as their 
tongues met. 

/Kiss me and kiss me. Brand me as yours, even if everything's a lie and you don't really.../ 

Crawford tore away from him to bury his face in Schuldich's hair. His teeth found his ear, 
and he nipped at him. Licked at the mark he'd made to soothe it. 

"You've made me curious about the reasons now, and nevermind the risk of getting 
singed."

***

Schuldich held still for a moment, feeling Bradley's cheek as it swept back and forth 
against his damp hair so the droplets upon it gathered.  He did not knock again before 
settling himself in the hoarfrost of his lover's head, the place that made him trill, feel 
sherbet candy fizzing with more than just his mouth and mind. He merely went there, and 
he crossed the blue wastes of sheer beauty.

But they were... they were just...

So warm that moment.  They made him sting.  Back beneath the water fall and drenched 
in corporeal body heat, he scrunched his arms up around himself instead, crossing them 
and looking just as devilish as he could.  But then he realized he had the appearance of 
having been tucked into a ball by Crawford, so he fought him of and glared up at his half-
closed eyes.  

"Because," plainly said this.  "You want me."

In one sweeping second he had pulled away and with a stream of diamond ripples behind, 
gotten himself up on the shore, where he stood, dripping and smirking with the front of 
his trousers gone wet and flush with his own stiffness now.  

"But the other angels listen to you about it, and I won't.  I seduce, it's what I do.  
Humans? Who do they want besides themselves?  That's what this has always been 
about.  I'm not like you, you're not like anyone."

***
 
Crawford's veiled gaze lazily tracked from his lover's ire-filled eyes to the unmistakable 
swelling in his groin and back again.  Wondered over him. Schuldich had never run from 
him like that before; always, he would meet his sexual challenges--as well as issue them.

But now...

"I've always thought you were sexy enough...Sarphilus."  He'd very nearly called his 
lover by his public sobriquet.  "But why are you running?  You have an angel in your 
palm, one of God's messengers.  Why aren't you taking advantage of me?"

/Why?/

He slid his glasses off, leaving them on the opposite bank for safety's sake, and then 
waded to the other side of the pool hesitantly, as if he were afraid Schuldich would bolt if 
he moved too fast.  He had seen it happen in a flash before his mind's eye just seconds 
earlier, but was not made privy to the words he shouted as he ran--much to his 
disappointment.  Crawford paused at the bank, and, never taking his eyes from 
Schuldich's, he reached around and unfastened the single button which held the robe 
closed at the neck.  Then he gathered handfuls of the fabric and pulled the garment over 
his head with deliberation, the sodden hem dragging over his body.  Crawford let it drop 
into the water, where it bubbled and drifted away.

"You were mistaken when you said that only humans want to know angels.  A few of my 
brethern once became enamoured of human females, and mated with them. Begat 
children off them--it says so in the holy scriptures."

"But then, I don't expect a demon to know about something like that."

Schuldich said nothing, just stared at him with those strangely glittering eyes.  The wings 
fluttered slightly in an unexpected gust, sparkling in the artificial light.

"As for demons being the sole seducers--don't you think that humans are just as seduced 
by us?  We are depicted as being fair to the eye, androgynous, radiant.  We are in the 
business of luring souls to God, to goodness, just as you are in the trade of ensnaring 
souls for your Master.  Like you and your ilk, we angels have to lure humanity to our side 
any way we can."

He smirked then.  "And what is a demon but a fallen angel?"

Crawford placed the flat of his hands on the bank, and pulled himself onto the grassy 
ground.  His erection wavered gently as he straightened up.  Water streamed off his 
naked body in rivulets, glinting in the light as it ran and dripped.

"Don't you want me?" he asked softly.  "Don't you find me appealing?"

***
 
Schuldich's string of mental applause faded out, for the performance that had so struck 
his fickle fancies was over now.  He gave his lover a sweeping bow, but in it, swept 
backwards one long step.  "It's been a long time since we were so much the same as 
now." He offered with a cryptic, wordless murmur that touched on whimsy as his toes 
met a stone not much further behind him, but still there, away from Bradley.

For he was drawing away with all the delicacy in Crawford's approach that came tarrying 
after him as he moved.  "All that time."  The rims of his wings met the tangle of airmoss 
that trembled in the breeze, veils and shrouds of green hanging from one of a thousand 
trees.

::You're right.  I'm not even the only one who wants you.::

The voice that Crawford heard then was not quite what he remembered from but a 
moment before, not in the sound of it, but the way those rustles of their air were made, 
and what they uttered.

"Well, it's no loss, I guess. But you owe me, Crawf."

***

Crawford ceased his casual pursuit of Schuldich right there, right then. Froze in one tense 
line of anticipation for more, but no more words in that one's voice fell upon the humid 
air. His present lover remained in the mossy tangles, no longer of a mind to flee it 
seemed, since he himself had stopped. 

"How did you do that?" he breathed, wholly startled and wondering. 

Schuldich might have become a statue for all the response he gave Crawford. The dark-
haired man frowned in disappointment at his reticence; felt no small amount of irritation. 
He spun away from him, no longer wanting to play with the devilish fiend he dared called 
his own in the inner recesses of his mind. Strode to the pond, hopped in and fished out the 
drenched robe; fetched his glasses from the far bank and put them back on. The robe he 
wrung out as best as he could, but didn't put it back on. He didn't give a damn what he 
looked like, what anyone thought--he only wanted to leave. 

Crawford was nothing but cool when he walked away from the pond again, and paused 
near the spot he had been when he heard his long-ago darling's voice. 

"Fine, then. You aren't the only one who wants me." Crawford shrugged. "I'm not 
surprised." 

/And you, Aubrey, have gone too far. But then, I suspect that was your intention./ 

"Since, however, you aren't in the mood to take advantage of me in this Paradise, then I 
will take my leave of you. The duties of a guardian are many, and the domain in my care 
is vast." 

/And you annoy the hell out of me. But then, again, I suspect that was your intention as 
well./ 

***

Schuldich did move then, swaying back and forth to keep his balance on the rolling still 
floor, for a moment through his bare feet he thought he could feel the blades of grass 
rocking him back and forth, floating like a million tiny storms over the ground.  The heel 
of his hand brushed over his bangs, his vision swapped it seemed with his lover's, for 
everything had grown foggy and yet too shiny as if see through impure glass, as if he had 
just awakened from a long sleep.  He smiled then, and he shivered.

"Aw! You don't know a damn thing about me and it didn't piss you off before, ya lousy, 
old prick! Now all of a sudden everything's all screwed up to you.  As if it wasn't before.  
You think I don't have to lie in bed and listen to you burbling inside about all the shit 
your dad did? You think it doesn't drive me crazy everything you do to me.  I know you 
lied to me the other night, but how you pulled it off, that I'll never know.  'cause you're 
not happy, are you!? But you have the nerve to sit there and look me in the eye and tell 
me you're all right!? You have the right to let me put my hands in your hair! You have 
the right to turn me down when you want me."

He laughed then, with such bitterness, the sound compared to the soupy wonders around 
it seemed glorious and vain beyond all hope.

"You think I'M SELFISH! You won't even let me fuck with you!"

But just as if he hadn't in thousands of years of hurdling light through the missing silt of 
space dust, he sprinted after Bradley, the ground curling around him, mist in truth, the 
leaves alternately rattling as if it was fall, singing as if it was spring.  Even though they 
were inside and part of him knew it.

***

Crawford whirled around, throwing the robe down as he turned, and raised his balled 
hands instinctively in a defensive pose. He knew he was coming, and how he would look. 
It wasn't the first time he'd had a taste of his lover's fierce temper--and this time, as with 
all the others, a curious little thrill rocked through him. 

But Crawford didn't deal Schuldich any blows, merely dodged the one he sent towards 
him, and then tripped him up. The redhead staggered but quickly caught himself. Spun 
about and hastily maneuvered himself between Crawford and the door, blocking him 
every time he tried to go forward, much to his obvious aggravation. 

"Get out of my way. We've played enough." 

But Schuldich only shook his head, which only irritated him more. Crawford lunged 
forward to seize him by the arms, but he just danced away from him, still positioning 
himself as a barrier to the exit. 

"What do you WANT?!" 

The echoes of Crawford's cry vaulted around the room, but Schuldich said nothing--not 
even down the link. Crawford sighed in exasperation, and whipped off his fogged glasses, 
reaching for something to wipe them off with and muttering an oath when he 
remembered he was naked. 

/Shut up./ 

That got a response: a stream of vulgarities and insults in German down their link. 
Crawford couldn't get a word in edgewise in that manner, so he resorted to the next best 
thing. 

"IF YOU THINK I'M SUCH A LOUSY OLD PRICK, THEN WHY ARE YOU STILL 
HERE?!" 

A pause, and then Crawford heard nothing but his own thoughts in his head, even though 
he could still feel the telepath's smug presence. That he could live with. Crawford heaved 
a sigh of relief, and with his next breath, launched into a tirade of his own. 

"No, I DON'T know much about you, only what I see in visions and what you care to 
reveal to me--which is very little--and it DOES bother me. It annoys me all to fuck, and it 
always has. Don't pretend you've never picked up on it." 

"As for staying awake at night and feasting upon the memories of my own private little 
hell, *I* never told you to do that. You made that choice for yourself, Aubrey. You've 
made a lot of choices for yourself. I haven't forced you to do a damn thing. I don't have 
the power to influence anyone that way--or have you forgotten that?" 

He took a step closer to him, and then another when Schuldich didn't try to move away. 
On the third, he did move, so Crawford came to a halt again. After a moment, he 
shrugged, and flopped down on the grass where he stood. 

/Since I'm obviously not going anywhere.../ 

"Yes, I have the nerve to tell you lies. But you're no different from me. Often you've lied 
to me, went behind my back. Why am I supposed to overlook your numerous 
transgressions, but I have to answer to you for mine?" 

/Why do you care if I'm unhappy?/ 

"And why are you talking to me IN HIS VOICE?!" Crawford snarled, quite irritated 
again. "WHY are you so DAMNED interested in him anyway?!"

***

"I can't help it.!"

His voice had cracked on half the words and he wasn't sure exactly what he had meant to 
answer with his shout.  In the unsettled silence that followed the fleeing of the birds about 
them and a few of Jasper's frantic hoots, he slid backwards a few more steps, eyes set on 
the distant vines peeling from what was probably supposed to be the wall, and his throat 
grew too warm for him in the phasing realization he had answered more than one of the 
lines of his lover, and that lover could not seem to decide which ones.  His own thoughts 
on the matter wavered moment to moment, choosing this one and then that one.

He smiled again then, but his cheeks ached from smiling before, even though this was 
indecision sheerly scintillating.  "I care because you should know better.  I care because 
you're tired of believing me.  I care because you like to pretend you don't.  I care because 
even if you're the most delicious person on the face of the earth you still suck to be 
around sometimes."

"I care because you'll never fess up that part of you's just..."    

Schuldich started to laugh all over again the moment his eyes stole against Bradley's.  

But the swells of giggles seemed not so intense as to send both of his hands to fold over 
his stomach and wring their fingers in the damp silk around it, yet he did so.  The sound 
started to melt into something less clear, until it was nothing but a scratchy cough.  One 
palm left the hold of his tipped belly and knotted up before his lips.  

His cheeks went white and finally he fell over on purpose, landing with a jangling thump 
and a creak for the wings he wore curled around him and his weight somewhat 
unwillingly.  Some of the glitter had caught on his temples when he, gasping peered up 
from the small well of his arms where he had tucked his face. 

Though his voice otherwise was faint and chokey.  "Don't you look at me that way, 
Crawf."

***

"I'll look at you anyway I damn well please, Aubrey," Crawford said, smooth and cool, 
even though he had been struck by all Schuldich had just said to him.  After the night 
before, and his offhand rejection of him, it was the last thing he'd ever expected to hear.  
But then...perhaps that was the point.

Crawford raked a hand through his hair, holding his long bangs back as he pondered his 
lover and all his possible motives for making such confessions; for speaking in Richard's 
voice.  Words plucked out of his memories, some of them.  But the rest?  Were they 
Schuldich's, or Richard's?

He let his hand drop to the ground, and he rocked forward onto his knees, canting him a 
speculative look.

/What are you doing?/

No answer.  Crawford got to his feet, and crossed the short distance between them, 
dropping down on his knees again beside him.  Schuldich twitched as if he might try to 
make another bolt away from him, but Crawford grabbed his wrist, pinning it down.

/Don't even fucking try it,/ he spat down the link, his free hand working to remove the 
wings from his lover's back.

"You're right:  I am tired of believing you.  I am tired of pretending.  I do know better.  
But I'll tell you this, Aubrey...it sucks to be around you too."

"And yet," he added, yanking free the ribbons that clung to Schuldich's sides and tossing 
away his demon's wings, "I'm still here."

/Or is that the real problem?/

Crawford sat back and tracked down the line of his bare back, watching the muscles there 
shift with every ragged breath he took.  Hesitantly, he reached out to touch him there, but 
ended up curving his palm to the back of Schuldich's head instead.  Let it rest there 
lightly.

"If you wanted to know anything about my past, all you had to do was ask; you didn't 
have to rape my mind to learn the truth.  I might have told you everything you wanted to 
hear...once I got over the shock.  Even about Richard."

/So you see, my redhead, you didn't have to go to these extreme lengths after all./

Crawford moved his hand down to comb Schuldich's hair away from his wan face. Didn't 
flinch under the touch of those knife-edge eyes.

"If you're going to vomit, kindly go ahead and do it so I can take you home."

***

"I don't," Schuldich began dryly, "need your permission to puke."

And then with a light shove to his lover's hand, he began pulling himself to something 
that resembled a sitting position, move by move, as if playing chess with his body more 
than simply coaxing himself upright.  

"Besides, I don't think I have to anymore.  I got it.  I'm fine."

But he was sitting then, and his eyes began to cross but he shook it out of them, rubbing 
the lids a little with a grumbling moan.  They were empty when he turned them back to 
Brad.  Just green, and very still, barely blinking as he stared at him for some time.

Something began to sing like a popping saxophone in the bushes, and they both wished 
for their pistols to blow its merry head off, fell away from one another's regard for a 
moment, and turned back the instant they realized they had taken their attention from 
each other.

"Crawford?" 

::Like I would ever call you Crawf.::

"Whatever I said, forget it."

Schuldich got to his feet then, with his arms still folded around himself, for he was damp 
and not seeing very well suddenly.  He cursed the momentary vertigo by thought alone 
and caught himself.

"I didn't mean anything after the part about being like you."

His footsteps over to the tree where Jasper hung were not followed.  The owl though 
hopped onto his shoulder without much convincing, and sat there, working his skin with 
the spines on his toes.  It tickled a little, at least until he went straight for some of the 
henna red hair beside him.

But he was still alone when he came to the door, so he turned, and beckoned to Bradley 
with a small nod.

"I just wanted to play."

/'s not so bad.  Lying./

/But.../

"I'm..."

He coughed then again, rolling his eyes at himself.  But he smiled.

"I screwed up.  I admit that.  And it's not like I'm trying to patronize you, but I'll pay for 
ice cream.  I don't care if I was almost sick all over the ferns, I'm HUNGRY."

Said with a wink.

***

But the much stung Crawford didn't return his wink in kind; in fact, he showed no 
emotion at all. He merely got to his feet, and crossed over to the door where his lover 
stood. There he paused to give Schuldich a long, searching look, after which he briskly 
brushed past him and stalked out of the room. 

"I don't want ice cream. I don't want anything to eat. I'm only going there for one thing, 
and after that, I'm going home. You can do what you want." 

/I suddenly find I don't give a damn./ 

The boy who'd attended them was waiting for them on a stool inside the closet room 
door, and when Crawford saw him, he threatened him with his fist. The boy scampered 
away with a frightened gasp. Crawford glared after him, only assuming a semblance of 
calm when he found Schuldich's attention turned onto him. He set off again after his 
clothes, which the boy had gathered and hung sideways on the rack while the two were 
engaged at their 'play'. Crawford wasted no time in re-dressing himself, and when he was 
finished, he promptly left again as if Schuldich wasn't even there. 

In fact, he sent him only one message before he slammed his shields up altogether. 

/No, you don't call me Crawf. But then, you don't call me Crawford either--it's so formal. 
Looking to put some space between us, are you?/ 

He turned to look at him when he reached the stairs, and, after a pause, performed for him 
a courtly bow--the sort a man might do to charm a lover. But the smile he gave him upon 
rising was limned with frost. 

/As you wish, Aubrey. After all, I only want your happiness./ 

With that, he shut his lover out of his head with a definite, final-sounding click, and took 
off at a fast clip down the steps.

***

Schuldich was even less than half dressed when he got to the doorway, and so while he 
stood there, watching the sunlight trickle this way and that over the empty stairs, he was 
doing up the laces on the front of his shorts and throwing his hair back besides the 
million snaps he had to do.  Jasper hooted and hooted and tried to flutter up on the 
banister only to have his master pull him back down to the ground.  

"Say," the evident leader of a party on the way in asked, tapping him on his bare 
shoulder.  "Are you free? And not worn out, I mean." A few of his charges behind him 
chuckled as his incredulity... they were from the Villa and doubtless knew a forty-three 
when they saw one.  

"Sure am!" he replied with another wink.  "But most people buy me lunch when they 
pick me up, so I'm full if you want to know the truth.  Besides the fact..." he spun here 
like a dancer on a music box, pretending to fumble for the words.  "I don't know if I feel 
comfortable eating or drinking around someone who lists one of his hobbies as being 
pissed on by underage boys.  No telling WHAT you'll put in everything or what I'll have 
to do to leave."

A hiss of somewhat less than pleasant shock rose from the assembly the man had 
gathered, and his face began to resemble a strawberry Japanese jelly treat, for it shortly 
matched the color and was jiggling with rage.  Schuldich excused himself then, and 
waved without looking at the spatters of irate thanks he got for his troubles before the 
cursing match began.

Jasper cooed and tried again to each of his locks.  "That's it.  I'm getting you some food 
and some furniture, you damn bird.  Then I'll go home and..."

A sigh for the pedestrian nature of what he knew he had to do.

"Unpack stuff."

While the owl fluttered in his ear, he paused beneath a mulberry tree that grew along the 
path to the gate, and nibbled the wonder of the manager over the proposition perhaps the 
Velvet Pantomime would make a fabulous brothel substitute.  The boa who had so 
detested Ken was there, and his ass was making quite the argument.  Oh, what fun he 
could have mentioning this to a few souls here and there, maybe even teasing with the 
most innocent of hints alone.

In the mean time, he rubbed his eyes, that were struck with an image of a red-headed boy 
who reminded him of himself.  And he remembered as he looked down the street Brad's 
carriage had driven down.

"I'm sorry, mon petit lapin.  Maybe... we could sit down and... even if I already know... 
everything about you.  Like... that you were gonna walk away right now? Isn't that just 
so  stupid?"

"Kinda like the fact you're leaving for Chicago even though... oh well."

He shrugged and popped his back before walking down a street he assumed would 
eventually lead to a jewelry shop that could carry out his latest wild whims.  Part of him 
wished he'd thought to bring his bike.

***

Ran only just made it to work, he'd awakened so late. He'd had only enough time to wash 
his face, throw on some clean clothes and bolt down a bowl of cereal and some orange 
juice. Hair left pillow rumpled as he'd forgotten to comb it, and he earned quite a few, 
poorly concealed grins from those he'd passed on his way out of the Villa. Ran glared and 
silently cursed everyone who'd dared to find him amusing. 

Even Claire, when he did arrive a little over fifteen minutes later, coming at a full sprint 
(he'd run the whole way from the Villa) to the door. Just when the clock struck 11. 

"You are late, boy." 

Ran cocked a brow at her, and looked down at his wrist to verify the time; found it, much 
to his chagrin, naked. He felt his face grow a shade warm, but nevertheless, he raised his 
head to meet her calculating stare. 

"I am not late. It was 10:43 when I left the...When I left." 

Claire looked him up and down, and then opened the door, wider, stepping back to let 
him pass; if she'd caught his near slip, she obviously wasn't going to remark on it aloud. 
"10:43, hm? You always that picky about noting time?" 

Inwardly he flinched as he passed through the portal, past her who smelled of some subtle 
perfume. It had been his habit to be that careful to note time; a minute either way could 
mean success or failure of a mission. Could mean that someone lived...or died. 

"So what if I am?" he grumbled. 

"Just an observation, boy. You don't have to get so snappish," Claire replied, not offended 
in the least. 

Ran said nothing, but wound through the scattered tables and rounded the corner of the 
ice cream cases. Went to the back to the get the aprons. Only one of the clerks was 
present, a girl named Seraphita, who was busy at haphazardly chopping bananas for some 
new concoction of their boss'. She only gave him a nod, and a hesitant smile when she 
saw him. 

He in turn, much to Claire's surprise, nodded back. He who had fairly growled at the 
other two lasses in her employ just the day before. 

"My, my! You must have had a pleasant evening." 

Ran only pursed his lips in a frown as he untangled his apron from the others on the 
hooks. 

"I do hope that young man of yours is well." 

That remark earned her a stern, forbidding glare as he donned his simple uniform; Claire 
remained unmoved--until, that is Ran's face softened slightly in a smile. 

"He is," he said quietly then, and he swept past her to the sink, to wash his hands. 

Claire turned all the way around to watch him as he did so, leaning against the jam where 
she'd fallen in her flabbergasted state. 

"Well, I'll be absolutely damned..." 

Ran cracked a smile, partly because he had gotten away with his ascerbic employer, and 
partly (if not mostly) because he was thinking about the sleeping young man he'd left 
behind him that late morning. 

The boy he'd taken the time to leave a note for upon the pillow he'd rested his head on the 
night before. 

{Ken-- 

About the Kami--I always considered my experience as proof that miracles can, and do 
happen, and always when one least expects it. 

And out of all the beliefs and hopes and dreams that I had held, and had lost in the years 
between then and now, that one I have clung to. 

I have had to, else--given what happened to my family, to me--I think I might have gone 
mad.} 

He had skipped a few lines after that, and then added: 

{Dakara suki}

***

Claire decided then there was little point to simple standing around being struck silly, and 
so applauded, hooting a bit as if she had just seen a friend of her's do some foolish and 
amazing stunt.  Seraphita and Genvienve (who had just snuck in through the back and 
was hoping to pull of not being noticed) smiled themselves and tapped their fingers. Ran 
did naught but watched them all, and they were glad, for it was nice to be jolly first thing 
in the morning and a pity the sign declaring they had better damn well be so had been 
destroyed the week before in a freak strawberry accident.  

Just then, and with quite a bit of swearing, the proprietress realized it was now past 
opening time while the sign of the door was still proclaiming they were closed.  She had 
her hand on the door to tear it open when she realized she hadn't dispatched the daily 
commands.  Spinning around found her three present employees all waiting patiently for 
such.  

"What are you all? Puppies! Following me around like this! I'll tell ya."

"Exactly!" Seraphita whispered.  

"I heard that!"

Silence there for several seconds.

"Anyway, that fancy new candle wax club's open for their one day a week today, so she 
shouldn't be as busy as yesterday, unless the excitement's done as excitement usually 
does around here and gone on living like a mouse in the cellar of a paranoid evangelist.  
Boy, you can watch the counter but if any other half-dressed boy skanks show up and sit 
their bare asses on my glass again, I wantcha back in the freezer.  Seraphina, we're going 
to be testing how much rum we can get in the bananas foster before it turns to goo instead 
of thin gellato.  Come along..."

"I'll get my gloves."

She had started to hurry off when Genvienve cleared her throat.  "Umm... ma'am?"

"What!"

"What about me?"

"I'm only docking you half an hour's pay.  I know that one fellow you used to mind 
hangs around your place in the morning." Nothing more to be said on the matter in her 
mind, she swished out of view, leaving the clang of many pots behind as opposed to the 
image of herself.  

The girl she had reprimanded shrugged, and, with a shake of her head, went over and 
turned the sign around just as Claire had forgotten to do, parting it for the first few 
customers- only seven or so -who has been waiting in the shade beneath their screens.  
They filed in with no complaint and the Genvienve propped the door open because it 
smelled so nice outside- almost as nice as some of the ice cream.

The herald with beads where once her hair had been passed by the glass then in the wake 
of three others.  She stopped there, as if admiring some glittering knickknack in the 
window of an antique store.  One she had long sought it seemed, for her eyes lit up and 
squealing gaily did she race down the streets crying, "Lulu! Lulu! I was wrong! The boy 
is still there! He really is!" 

***

Ah, there was nothing that could kill Ran's rare good moods as quickly as the shrill 
whoop of an excited teenage girl. He wanted to crawl under the nearest table, and die. 

And it didn't make his situation any better when Genevieve set to giggling. She didn't 
even bother to hide her amusement, and he could feel the blood rush to his cheeks. Ran 
ducked his head a bit lower in embarrassment as he bent to rake his scoop across the 
pristine surface of a new vat of White Chocolate Caramel Souffle. 

"Why don't you stop standing around and giggling like a child, and take someone's 
order?" he snapped. 

"Ooh!" she mocked, waggling her fingers at him. "Touchy, touchy!" 

Ran fumed silently as he plopped the carefully shaped ball atop a waffle cone. He handed 
it over to the old woman who'd requested it, and then dunked his dirty scoop into the hot 
water trough, and took up a fresh one. 

"Get to work," he snarled, waving her over to the register as he set to work on the next 
customer's order.. 

Genevieve smirked, and dropped a curtsey, and sauntered over to the register to take the 
old woman's money. 

Ran glared at her beneath his red fringe. /Brat./ he thought sullenly at her as he stacked 
another scoop atop the first on in a cup of Raspberry Mocha Almond. He rose to pass it 
over to another elderly woman, similarly robed as the first, her hair dangling down her 
back in a long, white braid. 

And then he heard an ear-splitting squeal. Ran leveled his startled gaze towards the door, 
expecting to witness a crash (as the sound brought back memories of brakes shrieking), 
but saw instead three girls of about 16 years of age. 

And when they noticed Ran was looking at them, they broke out into giggling and 
whispering. 

/Ch'kuso./

***

And if the atmosphere of the otherwise peaceful day, rendered so by the fickle nature of 
the citizens of Valdemar, who loved all that was new, be it pertaining to hot wax or boys 
they found especially charming, had been shattered earlier that morning, it was trampled 
into something less than dust by the whinny of a startled horse and the subsequent 
reprimand its master gave onto the object who had gotten in his way, or rather, the 
person, who spat something rather shrill back to him before going on with a huff.  The 
girls who had affixed themselves to the front window paid no attention to the racket, 
though stares from elsewhere on the street lingered and followed the obstacle onto the 
sidewalk with an almost forced sort of interest. Obviously, he was the only thing of note 
about at the moment.

Said obstacle gasped then, and the sound of his steps grew much faster.

"What's all this then! Don't you know Madame Claire will throw a fit if you get grease 
marks on her glass! Back I say! Back! We must keep the Sultana of sugar placated, you 
know!"

"Hey! Just what do you think you're... eeeeeek!"

There came the flash of a walking stick flickering across the view the pane permitted and 
the three heralds, shrieking again in a wholly different tone, all took off down the street, 
their skirts in tow of one another, their feet lacing together as they ran, as if they meant to 
trip each other, though all proved graceful enough to escape such a fate.  

As for Lord Vyx, he paused for a moment to catch his breath, clanking his cane most 
menacingly upon the ground.  Or at least as menacingly as he could for he was far from 
threatening for many a reason.  Mostly because of his garb, which he had, as always, 
spared little expense regarding the oddness of.  

This morning, he wore a purple tunic over lavender trousers which were tucked into his 
best pair of black boots wearing plum glass crystals.  And over all of this there was the 
spangle and the sparkle of what looked to be more or less a cleric's robe of the middle 
ages, save that it opened in the front so it might be worn as a more modern sort of coat.  
He had his great feathered had on with it, and was not evidentially bothered by the fact it 
matched nothing he had on. Either way, he shortly, with a  great sigh, picked up his cane 
and a the frightfully large and even more frightfully overstuffed shopping bag he was 
carrying, and so thusly bounded into Claire's as if he were a merry rabbit rather than an 
eccentric old man trying a stint as a cross between a priest and a cavalier.   

"Good morning, good morning to you all, mes amis!"

***

Ran had never thought he'd have a savior in the form of an oddball old man who had a 
marked preference for the color purple--nor did he ever think he'd be so glad to see Lord 
Vyx as he was now. The shop's latest customer strolled towards the counter with the air 
of a noble on a walk through a garden peppered with lovelies. He bowed, smiled--Ran 
swore he even winked in appreciation at a willowy youth with grey eyes, who only 
smiled at him indulgently. 

He handed off yet another cone to yet another warm hand, and the voice of his boss 
sounded from the back room. 

"Who is that?" she called, peering at the cluster of people around the counter, up on tiptoe 
until she caught a glimpse of Vyx's gallant figure. He tipped his hat to her, and she tossed 
him a wave. 

"Good morning, Vyx. Keep an eye on sunshine over there for a bit, won't you? I might 
not be able to come out for a while. This mixture's so fussy, I dare not let my attention 
stray from it." 

He made her a short bow in acceptance of her request and Claire disappeared from the 
doorway. Ran finished off seeing to the last of their first few customers, tossed yet 
another scoop into the scalding trough, and then he moved down the case to stand across 
from Vyx. 

"Ohayo, Vyx-sama," he said in his usual quiet, plaintive way. "Did you come in to order 
a scoop of Claire's latest confection? Or were you hoping to show off your morning's 
purchases?" 

***

"Both, my dear boy!" Vyx chortled gaily, and with quite a bit of huffing, he hoisted his 
things onto the counter where they laded with a clunk.  "And for the pleasure of your 
company for what time I am permitted to bother you.  Surely you didn't discount that...? 
Aaaa... I see from your dastardly little smirk that you have.  No matter, and might I go 
back a few verses and pardon myself for forgetting the customary 'good morning'?"

With grins then all round, Lord Vyx greeted everyone in the shop, including several of 
the customers, who did not seem to have ever seen him before in their lives.  

"There now! Let's start with the presents, shall we?"

"Oh no!" Genvienve suddenly cried in mock dismay.  "This isn't what I think it's about, 
is it?"

He swung the edge of his coat up over his face then, and peered out from behind it, 
playing along and acting sinister for her.  "I hope not, you naughty, naughty gamine!" 
And then with a true laugh, he quite deliberately upset his shopping bag.  

Out from it spilled a plethora of fancy mini umbrellas in every shade and texture and 
wildly imaginative sort of purple that ever had been, would be, and might have existed 
solely on the handles of the small rods that were rolling across the counter.  One took a 
nose dive into the water trough and got the apron of the rather vexed Ran rather wet.

Hearing the commotion they made, Claire sighed so loudly she made herself cough.  "Not 
this AGAIN Vyx!" and with another jerk of her head from the maw of the freezer.  "He 
does this every single year!"

"But I have to!" This protested with a wave of the soggy umbrella he had retrieves from 
the tank of wash water.  "Because I'm quite sure you've not kept the ones I brought about 
last year, or have forgotten where you've put them, or done some other such nonsense 
with them that is truly unbecoming of a fine umbrella.  Which only turns out to be more 
foolish if you would remember correctly that EVERY SINGLE SUMMER if we are to 
have a spat of lovely days, such as this one, where it feels rather more like spring than 
summer by day and grows chilly by night, then a few days later is always turns to a 
deluge." He had begun to wave his finger in reprimand by the time he had finished.  

"Well, at least you're not complaining about your joints this time."

"I'll have you know I was getting to that!"

Between them came a mutual presentation of tongues that ended with the waving of one 
fist and one lavender umbrella with kittens' eyes peering out from between the folds of 
its mantle. Seraphita dove for the mop.  

Lord Vyx admired his drippy weapon, saying of it, "Ah, as much as it likes you, it's not 
the one I picked for you.  Not at all." And with that, hoisted a black-bodied slim creature 
of an umbrella from the stack- one with sakura of a phantasmal sort of CG amaranth tint 
to them printed on it.  This was followed by one of make so similar they two were most 
likely of the same manufacturer, though the second carried moons and stars of the same 
unearthly color rather than flowers.   "There now, the first is for you and the second your 
lover.  It wouldn't do to have either of you fall ill!"

***

"Umbrellas? But..." 

Vyx only chortled and plopped his gifts onto the top of the case before him, pushing them 
right to the edge nearest Ran, so the redhead had to catch them or find himself splashed 
again. 

That someone cared if his lover and he got sick was alien to him--strange to the point of 
being mildly amusing. Someone wanted to make sure a pair of ex-assassins didn't catch 
colds. 

What would their benefactor think of them if (when?) he ever found out about their 
pasts? 

/Ah, old man, you have no idea who you're trying to protect.../ 

But Ran tucked them under his one arm, and nodded to Vyx. "Arigatou, Vyx-sama," he 
said, and then he spun around and took them back to the store room for safekeeping. 
Genevieve walked out from behind the cases, and dragged a chair over to the pile. Picked 
up one of tie-dyed lavenders, wisterias, and plums, and popped the little snap band 
holding its folds tight. 

"Which one is mine?" she asked, but before Vyx could answer her, Claire popped up 
again from the freezer. "What are you doing, sitting down before break?" 

"So I'll take my break now." 

"You have only been at work for 45 minutes. You aren't due for a break right now, so get 
up and get back behind that counter." 

"And do what?" she whined. 

"Clean something!" 

"Ohhhh!" But Genevieve got to her feet, and lumbered off to her station again. Ran had 
returned during the start of her exchange with Vyx, and was setting out a new batch of 
drink and ice cream cups in the dispensers. He shot her a bemused look, to which she 
huffed, and stalked off to fetch a rag and the vinegar Claire kept to clean the glass. 

"Teenagers!" Claire cried, throwing up her hands as she ducked back into the freezer. "If 
I wasn't friends with her mother...!" 

Vyx only chuckled at that, as if he knew she could never fire any of her girls--or boys, 
and then he hammered gently upon the floor to get Ran's attention. Which he promptly 
got. 

"What can I get you, Vyx-sama?" 

***

Vyx gave up his chuckles for that moment and tapped the umbrella Genevieve had been 
admiring over in her general direction.  As if she had rather been offered candy just 
before dinner, she grinned and tried to stuff it into her back pocket, where it remained 
despite looking downright odd.  "The usual, my dear boy- Butterscotch VSOP, if you 
wouldn't mind of course, or if I haven't eaten it all.  But I think I'll have it on a chocolate 
cone this morning.  Just because."

"Oh!" Serafita blustered even whilst fiddling with then grape-laden coating of her very 
own umbrella, which had decided to crease right where the logo of the manufacturer was 
worked into the print.  "There's always a reason to everything you do! And maybe you 
don't admit it, but deep down inside you're scheming about something, that one little 
thing that might just change the universe."

"How erudite!" He giggled then.  "Though it's nothing quite so grand, I assure you.  I 
was only imagining the ruckus Louis will make when he finds out I've had the exact 
same thing all week!"

The girl sighed, then finally managed to smooth out the logo on her parasol, and upon 
realizing it to be one of the very pinnacles of snobbery for not only wards of rain, but 
pocketbooks and shoes as well.  She squealed in delight, pecked the customer on the 
cheek, and dashed out the door to try her present out, despite the fact there wasn't a 
whisper of a cloud in the skies above.

Lord Vyx, Ran noticed, looked quite embarrassed actually, and stood with wide eyes, not 
quite wise themselves, fumbling the lip-prints on his cheek, not quite seeing the counter 
before him.  His face cleared then, and he shook his head, clapping do himself with a 
touch of a tut-tut to his moves.  "Oh, Watashi-no-claire-san-tachi-shonen, rather it seems 
I ought to have bought you a comb.  Not that you don't look just fine, but I fear there's 
not a woman on Terra or Antiterra for that matter who doesn't go for that look you've 
got."  His fingers strayed into the air before him, as if he reached to touch the boy's hair 
himself, convince it to be orderly.  But he caught himself at the last moment and began to 
fumble in his many pockets in search of a wallet, rather than any personal space of 
another to find himself in.

***

Ran found Vyx's attempt to straighten his tousled hair odd, but he let his faux pas slide, 
and instead proceeded to shape a generous scoop of Butterscotch VSOP out of the tub. A 
secretive smile lit up his face when he caught the scent of the ice cream. "Really?" Ran 
murmured as he plopped said scoop onto the cone and handed it over to his abashed 
customer. "Then I will remind myself every morning to come to work combed, if it 
means women will leave me alone. I had enough female attention back in Tokyo."  
Vyx raised his eyes to Ran's then, and the boy's smile turned to a little smirk. He took 
Lord Vyx's money (exact change, of course), and rang up the cone. When he looked up 
again, he found that Vyx had followed him, and looked very much as if he had something 
further to say to him. But before either of them could speak, Claire strode out of the 
freezer again, wiping her hands on a towel she'd had hanging from her apron pocket. 

"Ran, I need you to go down to the grocers on the next block and get up a few things for 
me." She walked over to the telephone, and scratched out a very small list on the pad 
there. Tore off the sheet and handed it off to him. 

"10 bags of semi-sweet chocolate chips and six fresh coconuts?" 

"Yes. I forgot to pick any up this morning, and I am in desperate need now." Claire took 
out her shop keys and went back to her office. He could hear her open a drawer, take out 
something which rattled, and sounded heavy from the thump it made when she set it 
down. The drawer was closed again, and she came back out with two twenties. "Here. 
This should be enough and then some." 

Ran stuffed the bills into a pocket, and then began to untie his apron. He hung it up on the 
peg and set off for the front door, nodding at Vyx in passing. He only got half way across 
the shop, however, when he heard Claire's voice call out again, 

"Wait!" 

Ran stopped, and cast her an expectant look over his shoulder, thinking she wanted to add 
one more item to the list. But she turned to Vyx instead, and said, 

"Would you go with him, Vyx? It seems my new clerk attracts attention, mostly 
unwanted, and I don't want him to get into any trouble." 

Both Seraphita and Genevieve laughed merrily at that, and Ran glowered at them even as 
his face turned crimson. 

***

"Do you, madam, honestly believe that having a verbose, old poofter got up in a 
PURPLE priest's outfit or some facsimile thereof is honestly going to get him LESS 
attention?" Vyx here stammered the slightly amid disbelieving laughter.  

Claire responded with an snide chuckle of her own, far from forced like most of her 
sarcastic little sounds.  The two girls glanced at each other and nodded with a sober 
discontent.  "I most certainly do! Because, after all, everyone around here's so used to 
you, even if they don't know who you are anymore, they sure as hell won't give you any 
mind.  Whatsmore!" her hand flew up in the air here as if she had become a Greek 
philosopher giving a speech to a garden full of enthralled students.  "As you are so fond 
of saying, 'I have a theory!' Also as you are so fond of saying, 'the people in Valdemar 
only notice things which are close to ordinary, but not quite there.'  In other words, that 
the hopelessly odd is hopelessly ignored, while, converse to the expected result, the 
bizarre is nothing worth a second look!"

"And I do believe you are mocking me!"

"You bet I AM! But you love it, don't you?"

"Well..." sheepishly muttered into a spot that had come out all caramel in his ice cream.  
"Maybe a little." Whereupon the typical Lord Vyx decorum asserted itself.  "But I shan't 
go unless he says he doesn't mind.  I don't know if he buys into your theory or not and 
he's already done well enough for one day putting up with me for five minutes."

All eyes came tumbling over to Ran, who was still rather red about his cheeks, but 
looking somewhat less uncomfortable about the whole thing.

And nodding.

"In which case, I shall be delighted to accompany you, my dear boy.  Regardless of 
course, of any pleasure our mutually acquainted old bat may have to say about it.  Do 
mind the umbrellas for me while I'm out! Ta-ta!"

Saying so, he shooed the swordsman and himself out the door and slammed it before the 
breeze of childish curses had a chance to get through the pane of glass and bells.

*** 
 
Primera gave up.  Still holding her big, butter-gooey slice of slightly burnt French bread 
toast in one hand, she marched up the stairs and tapped upon the bedroom door. 

"Ummm... Ken? It's getting late.  I'm sorry if I'm bothering you but Fiona didn't know 
if you wanted woken up or not."

A laugh greeted her, not to mention the shifting of the light that came in beneath the 
bedroom door, the sound of sheets ruffling under someone's slight movement.  "Eto... 
sorry about that.  You can come in if you want."

A shrug and she did so, her cheeks stuffed.  It was not as if such invitations had been 
seldom to her during the reign of her mother's boarding house.  They were only the 
leavings of a much-beloved Victorian way of doing things- meant nothing but perhaps 
laughs.  

She found Ken sitting alone and plainly naked in the center of the bed, the covers swirled 
around his legs and waist like whipped cream and the mosquito netting rather like steam 
about him, though it caught the light and muted it to something slightly less than brilliant 
It smelled rich and dark in the room... and buttery besides being near her toast.  

"Well, don't you look cozy!" she giggled.

"Guess that's why I forgot what time it was." Something on his lap crinkled then.  "You 
need me right away? 'cause I can throw on my robe and all.  I..."

"Nah, just getting worried about you.  And Ran! I thought for sure he'd stay home 
today."

"Not him! He goes to work if he's half dead.  I couldn't have stopped him even if I'd 
been awake."

She tittered a little behind one slippery hand.  "Well, alright.  I could have guessed that.  
Take your time.  There's a bunch of messages for you from the contractors, a thank you 
note from Carly, an excuse from Yuriko for the morning annnnnnnnnd... some toast!"

"Fun! Gimme just ten minutes then.  And maybe an alarm clock."

So she left him then, alone with the note he had found beside him rather than the fair 
body of his lover.  He carried it over to the dresser and, amid the many spent candles, left 
it with the first, taking a moment to pin them together with a tiny golden hatpin he found 
in a crack at the base of one drawer.

As for what Prim discovered upon re-entering the downstairs, it happened to be Fiona, 
standing on the middle of the rug with a sledge hammer in hand. 

"Now can we tear the door down?" she whined.

***

MacGregor's Market was a candy-striped awning, white brick affair. Low, wooden bins 
full of potted herb seedlings stood before the wide rectangular windows, and a blue-
haired cat lounged by the front steps. She blinked sleepily at the two men as they passed 
by her, didn't even twitch when Ran swept the door open and the string of sleigh bells 
above it jingled out their entrance. The smell of lemons greeted them as they stepped 
inside, and Ran flashed on a memory of his mother dressed to go out for dinner in one of 
her favorite kimono. In his mind's eye, he saw her dab a perfume stopper behind her ears, 
and then he forced the image back into whatever cubby hole it had welled up from. 

A line of small carts stood by the window to their left, and Ran took one, wheeling it 
around to the produce section. He was amazed to find that, for such a small, 
neighborhood grocery store, it had quite an array of fruits and vegetables--all at prices 
much cheaper than they were in Tokyo. Ran was enrapt by all he saw, and, while he had 
formerly had the impulse to make his way quickly through the store and out again, he 
was now taken with the notion to linger a bit. 

Apples; melons; it all caught his eye, and over every section hung signs touting the goods 
as being 'organically grown.' He lingered over a mass of red and green grapes, gingerly 
picking up this bunch and that, and holding them up to clear white lights that beamed 
down over them. They shone like translucent jewels in his hands. 

Was this what Ken was used to? Abundance? Not so much fish and rice but salads? 
Steaks? Venison and pheasant? All the things Westerners usually liked. 

/Yeah,/ he reasoned as he hesitantly fondled a particularly eye-catching orange, /but he 
ate whatever we cooked without complaint./ 

/Or with little complaint,/ he amended, remembering the sole time Youji attempted to 
cook a meal which didn't require opening cans or tearing open packets. 

/Didn't he?/ 

Ran found he was staring at the orange, and, much chagrined, he set it down with a moue 
of distaste and wheeled his cart away. He was worrying over something utterly silly, and 
he duly admonished himself for it as he jerked his cart to a sharp halt before a wooden 
bin of coconuts. Two for $2.50, this week's special. Ran gathered them up by twos and 
put them in the cart. Then he looked over at his companion, who had been curiously quiet 
ever since they had arrived. The man had finished his cone sometime while Ran was 
examining the grapes, and had apparently been trailing along behind him, lurking just at 
the fringes of the boy's awareness. 

Ran stared at him rather grimly, frowning slightly as if Vyx were a puzzle he had to 
solve, and then the one clad in shades of ink and soot blurted out, 

"Why purple?"

***

Lord Vyx hadn't exactly been sure he would be invited to speak at all by Ran, who 
walked through the store as if rather he stole down some side street he thought he 
remembered.  He certainly didn't appear to be strolling through a grocery store, even 
when the orange appeared to be deemed unsuitable for whatever he was seeing instead of 
an orange. 

/Either that, or he doesn't much like citrus.  Just in case, I'll have to remember that if I 
invite him over for tea.  Which I'd love to of course, it's only a matter of getting him to 
say yes./

/Best not to rush it, or have Veronica make marmalade cookies./

...and then him.

"Well, to tell you the truth..." Kimberly began, swaying as he strode a little closer than 
he had been throughout their walk, his cane rocking back and forth with his steps.  
"...there's really no reason for it any longer.  But when I first moved here, there wasn't a 
soul who went about in purple.  At least not all purple.  Oh, we had one in red, and a few 
in blue... all manner of pinks because it was so dreadfully unheard of for boys to wear 
pink back on Antiterra.  And then there was that herald who was so notorious for going 
about in white... It made me easy to spot is all! But that was back when I wanted to be 
spotted."

For there had been such a time, and if Ran had gotten his time to reminisce, or do 
something like it, Vyx figured he was entitled to a second or so.

He broke out laughing though, as if he had chanced upon someone in the old dancehalls 
he knew well besides the other kicky dressers of the bygone days.  "Oh! I forgot the most 
important part! Not that you expected less of me, I'm sure.  It's my favorite color.  It 
reminds me of the violets, even though I can't smell them anymore if I try.  I'm too used 
to them."

Lord Vyx shook his head then, dabbing at his eyes as if he expected them to be merrily 
wet, which they weren't.  "I used to like blue back on Antiterra..." This spoken to Ran, 
but trailing off as if someone besides his companion was speaking, or meant to come in 
and say else about it.

"So nothing spectacular there.  I suppose you feel the same way about black?"

***  

Ran drew a hand down one sleeve of his blue-black shirt, glanced down at his grey-black 
trousers. It was the most color he'd worn in a long while, a vague throwback to the 
second hand orange sweater he once often wore, the odd colored T-shirt. Usually, though, 
it WAS black he clad himself in. Black to conceal. Black like night. 

Black like his murderer's soul. 

"...No, I don't," he murmured, staring off at some point over his shoulder as he lagged 
behind in some foggy reminiscence. "My favorite color is..." 

"...green." 

Ran's gaze sharpened, and shifted onto Vyx's as he regained his hold on the here and 
now. He stared down into the other man's eyes as if he'd been dealt a stunning blow--but 
then in a way he had, for Ran had nearly forgotten it, just as he had nearly forgotten many 
other things. 

With a touch of sheepishness, Ran averted his gaze, and wheeled the cart away to a stand 
of persimmons, one of which he picked up and fondled in the same gentle manner as he 
had the orange. It gave him something to do, something else to concentrate on other than 
his discomfort. 

But just as suddenly as he had picked it up, Ran put it down. He turned away from the 
produce altogether, and set off for the other aisles at a slower pace than before, offering 
unspoken encouragement for the older man to accompany him. And when he was aware 
Vyx was at his side, he asked in a shy sort of tone, 

"Would you tell me about Louis?"

***

"That's quite a story! Are you certain you want to hear the whole thing? It's bound to bo-
..." Vyx trailed off in the middle of his likewise blushy words, trying to call the crimson 
out of his cheeks at least.  He could sound as embarrassed as he wanted to, but going all 
pink so near a boy of Ran's age... bound to cause problems! Just millions of them.  
"Well, of course you do! You don't strike me as the sort of person who wouldn't ask for 
something if he didn't really want it.  Please, don't mind me."

A quick glance to his side though, and he found his companion was minding nothing less, 
and nothing else.  He had paused a moment in his wandering circuit of the store, 
somewhere between the canned soup and the flasks of sauces with names in scripts from 
far away.  Vyx was obliged to keep up with him there by taking a few steps backward, 
almost tripping over a cat who was after a fallen special tag someone had crunched up 
into a ball for it.  He caught himself on his cane without taking his eyes from the boy's.

After all, it was the first time, he'd gotten a truly good look at them, no fluttering of the 
deep red lashes, no nervous glances away.  Wherever Ran was seeing, it seemed he was 
trying in his own way to give Lord Vyx a peek.  Now, when Vyx had quite forgotten that 
those eyes were the whole reason he had chased Ran down the street in the first place! It 
seemed odd he would have let them slip from his thoughts, for they were stunning.  Just 
plain stunning, and not only for the far off reaches were they gazed- a lonely sort of place 
he had to wonder if anyone had ever been to before... but then again... didn't Ran have 
the Hidaka-dono? Gazing himself to the jewel-imprisoned undines? Every single night 
under the skies of deepest blue that were jealous to the point of weeping that they could 
not be that amaranth?

It was only a second or two their gazes met so deeply, but it inspired him: not with any 
emotion he knew how to name, but a starburst of belief.  He knew there were undines 
then! And that man was not merely a creature with nothing splendid to look forward to 
but mortal coils.

He knew he could tell the whole thing.  And it wouldn't make him cry once, as if he had 
already.  And just because he was glad and the tears would make a nice contrast.     

"You see, the story of Louis, is really the story of how we both ended up here.  And not 
to be rude, but I have to start with my part of the story, since that's what I remember 
coming first, even though it really didn't."

He paused to rub his temple for a moment, grinning in a cock-eyed sort of way.  "Now, I 
should probably sound upset about this, but it's been a long time, and I don't really 
remember being out of sorts about it, but I was sixteen when I got kicked out of my 
parent's house, and they had the nurse do it since they didn't want to touch me.  Why? 
Because I was 'that way' of course, and what's the point of educating a boy any further if 
all he'll make of himself is a dreadful fop who embarrasses himself at family 
gatherings?"

A shrug here, and Vyx paused to take a spin around on the toes of his shoes, imagining 
perhaps what it might have been like to come swishing into one of those parties and head 
straight for the punch amid a slew of nervous whispers.  

"To get on with the story and out of that mire of complaints, I used to spend most of my 
time in this church or that one, mostly because this was back when most churches were 
open, not to mention had stained glass windows that weren't just shattered bits of color 
put together all wrong.  No, they had pictures! That's important later."

"In one of them, I met the priest who took me to Terra with him.  He wouldn't stay with 
me of course, wanted to go back to Antiterra and see if he could find anyone else who 
needed his version of saved.  With nothing better to do, I drifted here like I did on earth... 
here, there, everywhere... spent a few days in this town, checked in with a herald and left 
before my name was dry in their ledger.  It wasn't that I didn't feel as if I fit in, no, just 
the opposite.  There were too many places! I couldn't pick one."

"I did find myself a little hobby though, but it didn't move well, not to mention that all 
the places I could go about it were back on earth and not open to my sort." An editorial 
cough here.  "Whatever they say of construction workers and the like these days... BAH! 
Such chaps have nothing on a glazier from the forties! Maybe it was the war, or the 
constant cuts, but they were just SOOOOOOO butch! And in a not-very-cute way.  Had 
plenty of work though... lots of windows needing fixed and not enough people to put 
them up properly..."

***  

"You sound like me," Ran murmured as he leaned upon his cart. "Roaming, but with no 
real place to settle..." He hitched one shoulder in a slight shrug. "Or I've never viewed 
any place where I've lived as a real home, I guess. It feels so odd now..." 

Again Ran's gaze melted away from that of his companion. He'd spoken of windows, and 
in the doing had jolted his memory. All the stained glass he'd seen just in the few days 
he'd been in Valdemar, and sometimes in the most unusual places. Nondescript stores 
boasted such masterpieces above their faded doors. Rambling old houses which had 
otherwise seen better days sported pastoral scenes and Grecian-style nudes and 
impressionistic gardens as their eyes. Even the Villa itself had been studded here and 
there by such works of art. 

Just like... 

"The window overlooking the garden entrance." Ran turned to look at Vyx once more, 
this time in mild wonder. "It's your work, isn't it? That was why you asked me about it in 
particular." 

***

A great big, creamy grin danced across Lord Vyx's features at his companion's words, 
bringing with it the slightest swirls of a blush which tarried on his cheeks.  And he 
winked mischievously rather than chase it now, tapping one of his gloves against the end 
of his nose.  But he would not laugh, or seem more pleased with himself.  He was plainly 
more taken with Ran than himself.

"It is! It is! Well... the window is mine.  Please don't misunderstand and think I was 
trying ONLY to be vain by asking you about it.  It was a bit of an offhand way of finding 
out what you thought of me without asking straight out.  Even though I don't think about 
any of them as being parts of me- I'd better not since I've lost track of how many I've 
done -I still made them.  Hundreds of them."

A light giggle here, that of an over-complimented girl, for the gentle amazement had not 
yet left Ran, and the longer it remained, the more it flattered him it had been for... well, 
him at all.  "And hundreds of windows or not, I'm still just thrilled you feel anything for 
that one.  I'll have to show you the special thing about it someday.  I was always a joker 
about those, but anyway... getting back to what you asked me in the first place before I 
so rudely interrupted myself...  Louis really does have something to do with all of this."

On those words, he swept forward through the aisle, arms held wide, as if Louis had been 
the sparkle of the sun on the quartz worked into the pavement, and the shadow of the two 
moons together; the kiss that wakened the flowers, the impish aspects of cats and the 
gleam in hearts of all things fleeting.  

"You see," here he faced Ran again, walking backwards now through the aisle so he 
wouldn't loose sight of his manners and not face audience.  "While I was wandering, I 
did cross certain places more often than others, because they would be on the way here as 
well as on the way there.  There used to be this marvelous city called D'Ange here on 
Terra, but if it's still around, I'm willing to bet they just don't call it D'Ange anymore.  It 
was just to be ironic in the first place.  I'm quite sure you know the sort of place I'm 
talking about- the sort a younger me didn't know better about puttering around in.

"But they had this one club out of the whole lot I used to go to!" He paused to scratch his 
chin and only just missed backing into a display of olives.  "Now... what was the name... 
Tieya... Tiy... Tia... well, it wasn't in any Indo-European tongue, how's that? But I used 
to go there and drink just to be a sot about it and cry about the sad songs they'd have the 
entertainment sing to clear out the hall after two AM, which never worked.

"Ah, and this was in the days it was actually unusual to see anyone whatsoever got up 
like a girl prancing about.  Boys got up like girls I mean.  So of course that's what one of 
the regular acts was.  Ah, I saw him the first time I thought it was a herald up there in the 
white Erte dress.  (This was after Erte started going out of fashion and all, so it was just a 
nostalgic thing...) But he certainly didn't sound like a girl, Louis.  He didn't sound like 
anything.  Just... Louis."

***

Ran set the canister of peppermint tea he had been examining back in the narrow gap on 
the shelf and wheeled off down the aisle after his companion. "So you took up with a 
lounge singer? That doesn't surprise me at all, you being as theatrically disposed as you 
are." 

Vyx whipped his cape around him, raising the side edge to cover the lower half of his 
face. He waggled his brows in a comically villainous way, stalking forward after Ran like 
Dracula. But when he let the cloak drop, his teeth were bared not to strike, but in a grin. 
Ran couldn't help but smirk in kind. 

They rounded another corner, and there they found the baking goods. Ran rolled up 
beside the chocolate chip display, unhurriedly searching through the various kinds until 
he found the flavor Claire had asked for. Ten bags wound up in the cart, and then Ran 
leaned upon it's handle again, clearly not in any mood to leave just yet. 

"How did you get Louis to leave D'Ange for Valdemar?"

***

"Ah, that was the most hardest part of all.  Even though... we didn't really choose to 
leave and weren't going anywhere in particular when we did.  You have to remember, I 
never took up with him either.  Not formerly, not how I'm fairly sure you're thinking of 
it."

A bit of figuring then, and he admired his fingers, not quite trying to work anything out 
upon them, more fiddling simply because he could fiddle.  "You see, I went to the club 
where he was employed right after I got here, on recommendation of the bar owner 
himself who I'd slammed into on the street- great big burly chap who loved all things 
with pink frills." Here, Vyx's arms had flown out, giving the dimensions of the man in 
his thoughts, so even before he had gotten onto his tip toes, they were both snickering to 
picture the fellow got up like goldilocks.  

"It must have been... my fifth time there. I was eighteen by the night I wondered back 
stage early one morning and grabbed his hat for him before one of the cats made off with 
it.  I was pretty hung over, he was asleep on his feet.  But being Louis and all, he left me 
a thank you note the next time I was in town.  Besides, if you think the one I have one 
NOW is impressive, you should have seen the one he used to wear.  Mother of all 
lambs..."

They had both paused and were looking over the circlet of velvet and peacock feathers 
that was Lord Vyx's customary wear... something Lord Vyx wasn't being especially 
good at.  Mostly because he was wearing said hat.  

"And it wasn't either that I thought anything special of him for the longest time 
afterwards.  He'd just... been there, like a far-north star that never sets, just goes around 
and around until the top of the earth wobbles and it can't be seen at all.  And after I got to 
talk to him, even if it was just for a little while..." He paused again, and steadied himself 
on the front of the cart.  "You know how performers always start to seem different after 
you speak to them in person? Even if it's just a small place they're in.  You look at them, 
and you say to yourself 'I know what you sound like when you're not singing', 'I know 
what you look like with only half you makeup on', and that makes them seem like family 
you can be all proud of if you want to.  Even if they're perfectly disgraceful.

"So, then I used to go back because I could say I knew him.  Even though I didn't.  Well, 
words uttered into cups get around fast, and one night after a show, he jumped right off 
the stage, stamped over and complained that I didn't know him one bit and had no 
business saying so, even if it was just to impress people."

Lord Vyx shrugged and padded over to a display of wine bottles then, coming back with 
one cupped almost fondly to his chest.  "I said, 'I can fix that' and bought him a few 
rounds of whatever the special was from the bar."

***  

Ran eyed the bottle the older man held cradled to his bosom, then looked back up at Vyx. 
"I wouldn't know anything about performers, for I've never met one. I've only 
met...people like myself." 

The redhead shifted his gaze to the shelf, to a jar of whole cloves which tempted him to 
unscrew the top for a whiff. He was reminded of snow and a fire burning in an iron stove. 
Ran set the bottle back on the shelf with a quiet sigh, and straightened up, rolling his 
shoulder a bit when his lower back protested his move. He gave the cart a nudge, slowly 
strolling past rows of different sugars and flours and mixes. 

"So that was that, huh? A love affair borne from a rescued hat and a few drunkenly 
uttered lies." He glanced back over at his companion as they cleared the aisle and headed 
for the checkout. "What happened after you ended up in Valdemar?"

***

"You make it sound so unromantic!" Lord Vyx complained, taking the bottle from his 
breast and swinging it back and forth until his elbow creaked and he was obliged to 
switch hands.  "And it wasn't like that, after awhile.  Though it's true, we never DID go 
head over heels for each other and whatnot.  But we didn't miss it.  And we didn't go to 
Valdemar just yet either!"

A little whistle, meant to gather attention and nothing more.  "I told you it was a long 
story.  You need to meet a performer someday though, they're fascinating.  Well, it may 
be someday by the time I'm finished at this rate.  But we were friends after the first time 
we went drinking.  Or sort of friends.  I felt impudent enough to go talk to him 
sometimes, or whistle really loud.  And he felt impudent to take me back to his dressing 
room after shows and throw brandy bottles at me."

Which stopped Ran dead in his tracks, and stare into indeterminate space seeking some 
explanation for this peculiar remark.  His companion set his wine bottle back on the shelf 
and skipped up behind him again where his eyes crept to his back for a bit as if he meant 
to give it a little thump back.  Which he didn't.  

"Louis was a bit of a... well... what DO they call them nowadays...? Diva! And there 
was very little about me that suited him, and he had no qualms about telling me as much.  
He didn't go in for my roaming around at ALL.  Thought it was downright indecent for 
many ill-explained reasons.  Thought I was too rough, thought I was looking behind his 
dressing screen.  But I always came if he asked me to.  And not just because of the way it 
made me feel when I was watching him on stage.  After awhile it wasn't so much of 'I 
know him,' it was more... 'I don't know him'.  And I simply couldn't stand not knowing 
what was making him so frustrated, and the way he'd... just murmur to himself and take 
things back quick.  Like... he wouldn't just ask me to come with him, he'd say- 'Kim, 
I'm so desperately lonely,' all quiet like when we were in the hall on the way back, or, 
'why do you have to be so stupid about it?' when I hadn't said anything."  

He shook his head then, and offered small reassurance to Ran, "He had terrible aim 
anyway.  It made me feel all noble that I was the one he felt comfortable enough with to 
be angry around.  I'd never gotten to take care of anyone before.  Even if it was fairly 
bizarre.  And he didn't tell me anything.

"But I did get fed up, and the one night before I'd planned to leave again, I bought him a 
whole damnable case of the old bottles and said, 'Look, if it'll make you feel better, I'll 
stay, and you can hurl these at me for awhile, and I'll just sit here and be quiet as long as 
you want, or you can talk about whatever you want- hats, sex, Spinoza.  All those lovely 
things.' He didn't answer, just grabbed the closest one and flung it past my head. Then 
one after the other... crack, crack, crack...  and all of a sudden.  'I hate you! I hate you so 
much! Why do you put up with me! Why Kim!? I can't stand it'." 

"'Woul, because you won't tell me why I shouldn't!' And then it hit me.  God, I was 
thick when I was younger, but I'm sure even you say that to yourself sometimes.  'But I 
wouldn't really mind if you kissed me to while you're at it'.

"Which was just what we were doing when the bar owner walked in- the frilly chap, you 
remember- and then right away I knew why Louis was so upset.  You see... he wasn't the 
fellow's kept boy, but close! His indentured servant, with a bedding clause in the 
contract.  That was how he got to Terra." 

***

Ran fell silent after that, during the whole of his unloading of the basket, the handing 
over of Claire's money. Ran pocketed the change and hooked his fingers around the many 
plastic sacks the cashier had piled up at the squarish, metal bay which marked the end of 
her station. He ignored Vyx's offer to carry one as he was lost in his musings. 

So Louis had been an indentured servant, bound to sleep with someone he'd probably had 
no tender feelings for at all. Almost like Ken. Ran wondered if Vyx realized just how 
near the mark he'd hit? If he saw the parallels to their respective situations? 

From the intent way Vyx was studying him beneath the brim of that flashy hat, he had. 

Did it mean that he might find some sort of answer to his own problem in hearing how 
Vyx had solved his own? 

Ran drew up short at the door, ignoring the way the bags bearing the coconuts bit into his 
fingers. He turned to look back at Lord Vyx again, and blurted out, "How did you get him 
away from his..." Ran's voice dropped to a chagrined murmur when he saw he'd garnered 
the cashier's attention, "owner? How did you get him to...to, um, warm up to you?" 

The older man gave him a knowing sort of smiling look as he whisked the door open for 
him to pass. Ran did so without further hesitation, rubbing his cheek on his shoulder self-
consciously. He kept his head down even when Lord Vyx stepped out onto the street 
beside him. 

"I know I should go back to Claire's now, but I want to hear the rest of the story. I have to 
hear it now, and I know you understand why I do; why I can't wait. So if you are up to 
relating the rest, and have the time...?"

***

Lord Vyx smiled gently and nodded.  "Why, I've got all the time in the world for you.  
I'm sorry I didn't get to the good part faster... dash it all."  And he laughed then, just  
little.  "We'll just tell the madam there was a line... can you lie well?"

Ran gave him a reluctant nod. 

"Good! Good!" He stretched then when the sunlight hit him, one hand on his walking 
stick, the other his hat.  "But first, something to wet my whistle.  No one's listened to me 
for this long in AGES!"

Saying so, he swept his robe as sort of a beckon for his companion to follow, which he 
did, but only with Vyx watching him intently to make sure he wouldn't walk into 
anything, since his eyes wandered along the sidewalk.  He didn't even see where they 
were going at once, did not say more than the very softest hello to the vendor at the 
sparkling water stand.  

The story teller purchased two bottles with a swirl to their tapers and a faint pinkish tint 
to the liquid therein and took to the nearest shady bench he could find, which was just 
outside a furniture store, so the air smelled a little of wood shavings, and a little of the 
pansies growing in the landscaping.  Ran had scarcely sat down before the second bottle 
was offered him. 

"It's not sweet," Lord Vyx him.  "Just tastes a little... umm... red.  Rather hard to 
explain.  I hope you like it."  Which he most certainly did himself, as he polished off half 
the bottle in one attenuated swig.

"Now... where was I? The being discovered, right? The most important part of all! 
Happens to everyone about something, sooner or later.  And with Louis and I, it was 
sooner."

The bottle had once more risen to his lips, but he had barely kissed the rim of its throat 
when he drew it away again.  "I wish I could say to you, my dear boy, that I did have to 
get him to fancy me, but as things turned out... it was more or less the other way around I 
think.  He wouldn't let go of me the whole time he was shouting at Sir Frills, which was 
not as wonderful as perhaps it seems now.  I was quite sure at the time he had crushed my 
forearm."

A sparrow came and decided Lord Vyx's boots were worthy of its attentions, and so, in 
near mimic of an owl, it nodded this way and that, examining the purple leather.

"But here was the other peculiar thing.  You see, the club owner always made as if 
*despised* Louis in all matters not occurring between curtains or sheets, and had only 
kept him around for the obvious profit he felt he was netting, and for his own accursed 
pride.  But, I think now, that he did love him, in some way that's hard to understand even 
so long after.  He started to cry halfway through the whole mess and he begged him to 
come back.  Louis said he couldn't.  Not 'wouldn't,' couldn't.  I have to say, I almost 
pushed him back and told him it was silly to have affairs with a man he openly referred to 
as a vagrant just to get back at someone who honestly did care for him.  But then Sir 
Frills... 'When did you get so angry? When did you get so upset? What's bothering you 
in the first place! This is silly, darling.'"

Lord Vyx let his boot wobble over a little closer to the sparrow, who leapt back at the 
sight of its quandary moving.  "Yes, that's the idea," he murmured to it, and then faced 
Ran once more.   "Heh, here I am equating the throwing of liquor bottles at my head with 
love.  And Louis just kept shouting, 'I'm tired of you taking care of me! I am! I tell you 
that and you don't listen.' This went on for... two hours at least.  There were wet hankies 
and broken glass all over his dressing room by then.

"Finally, the club owner gave in, and he made us a deal.  If I could do a better job 
supporting Louis than he could, he could stay with me, and then he left us to figure it out.  
Well, I just sank to the floor in despair! I had no money and no place to go.  There I was 
with a man I didn't even know adored me, one who was still got up like a girl, who I 
couldn't have even if he wanted me to and he began to laugh at me, asking why I'd gotten 
all glum.  'Because I spent my last ten dollars here on BOOZE, Louis! And I don't have a 
job! How are we supposed to go about fulfilling a bargain about money if we don't have 
any?'

"He got down on his knees beside me then and rather knocked me into his arms with my 
head on his shoulder so I didn't just HEAR him laugh, I could feel it too.  'And who said 
I have to give up singing once we get married? Why, Kim! This is the easiest bargain in 
the world!'  At which point, I was pretty much stunned.  So I do understand how these 
things can happen quickly.  I can just imagine what it must have been like when your boy 
suddenly asked if you were willing to call yourself his, having the whole matter about 
keeping explained to you in a matter of hours..."

***

"My boy...?" 

Ran turned his attention fully onto his companion at that, an ominous air gathering about 
him. "I believe you are mistaken, Vyx-sama. I am not *kept*, and neither is Ken," he 
said, a touch indignant. "We worked together; lived in the same apartment building. He 
brought me with him from Anti-Terra because..." Here Ran paused with a frown and took 
the first sip of his drink, which he found to have a definite fizzy bite. He coughed a little 
into one hand. 

"I don't know why he brought me here," he amended, "only that I...I love him! But I 
sometimes suspect..." Again, he paused, and then, with a soft growl of irritation, Ran 
abruptly forced himself into silence. He took another, greedier sip from the bottle. 

"Nevermind what I suspect. It's not important," he muttered grumpily, more out of sorts 
with himself and his situation than with his companion. The sparrow took to the air in a 
whir of wings, and Ran glanced at Vyx out of the corner of his eye. Sat for a few more 
moments in grudging silence before quietly asking, 

"What happened next? Did you marry him then, even though you weren't really in love 
with him?"

***

(OOC: It sounded entirely too silly to write, but were this an actual anime, the first 
paragraph of this post would be a description of Vyx going SD and floating away with 
little squiggles of shame dancing around his head.)

Actually, what happened next at that particular moment in time was Vyx turning the 
color of a newly polished apple and spinning away from Ran in such a way his hat 
obscured his flushing visage.  "Oh dearie me..." he mumbled.  "I didn't... I'm simply... 
really quite... set in my ways and, as is tradition for me being set in my ways, I have 
gotten everything turned around all wrong.  I'm honestly sorry I... good lord this all must 
have sounded terrible then..."  Only then did he take a peek from behind the rim of his 
hat to find the small look that had been thrown his way, and the fact there was no blunt 
object just below it was comforting enough to make him face his companion once more.

"No, I didn't.  But we did run off together, or more of drove off together in a carriage 
with one horse and a steamer trunk of Louis's things.  And it wasn't so much that I 
wasn't really in love with him more... that I wasn't very MUCH in love with him.  It was 
rather a shock after all- one day I'm gallivanting about Terra as I please and all by 
myself, the next I have the mystery of my past four years solved for me and riding in the 
back seat.  It was just... sudden.  And we... well, I at least... still had all those notions 
about wooing and waiting stuck up in my head.  I wasn't ever... bitter about it... except 
maybe sometimes when it rained on the dirt roads and we'd get stuck and muddy 
somewhere god-forsaken.  Since there's not much between towns anymore and there 
never was."

He sighed and leaned back, having another sip of his drink.  "He still joked about it 
though, getting married.  Oh, he wanted a big church with real maids of honor all in 
white, and a pastor who'd been Orthodox besides the fact he lived on Terra now.  So I'd 
always tell him, fine then! I want an even bigger church, with real stained glass windows 
and a hundred best men PINK! And we'd laugh, and one of the springs in the carriage 
would pick that time to give out on us."

"But we still didn't settle anywhere of course, simply went about, living out of the 
carriage.  Louis would sing anywhere that had a club that suited his tastes, and we'd keep 
the money to ourselves just so we had an excuse to camp out under the stars.  A little like 
wandering mistrals we were and... I don't know.  Perhaps things would have gone 
differently if it wasn't just the two of us but... for as mean as some of this story had 
been... I'd always liked Louis... there just wasn't anyone like him."

Lord Vyx shook his head then, and his hair caught across his lashes and had to be 
brushed away.  "But you said you hadn't been the best of friends with your Ken before, 
and you just told me you loved him now so... well, maybe you'll be the first person to 
understand me and my bard." A crooked smile.  "No one else seemed to get it.  They all 
thought it was one of those relationships you have out of necessity.  But it wasn't.  He 
would have been fine on his own and he knew it.  But he stayed.  And I started to adore 
him for it."

***  

The sparrows started twittering in the eaves overhead, and a family of them alighted on 
the ground to Vyx's left, the chicks fluttering and crying to their parents for their lunch. 
The older man fell silent, watching them and chuckling a little; admired a particularly 
handsome carriage as it rocked past. Ran mulled over what his companion had just told 
him, grateful for Lord Vyx's indulgence in granting him a bit of silence. 

"I do get it. Sometimes it sneaks up on you, how you really feel about a person. That's 
what happened to me." 

"Thing is, I don't see how it can be that easy, getting someone to love you just by sticking 
around. I've been around Ken for three years, and it only hit me a few weeks ago how I 
felt. I don't know...how he feels, not really. I mean, I know he cares about me, but I don't 
think he really needs me at all, and I always felt he did before, just a little." 

/I was the leader, and now I'm not. Now, I'm.../ 

Ran scowled at the pavement at his feet, muttering, "But now, I'm just the Hidaka-dono's 
*boy*. And everything is temporary, just as it was in Tokyo." 

That realization stung, and it added to all the nagging little suspicions he carried--ones 
which had grown stronger just from the trip to the grocers, and from all the things Vyx 
had told him. He was there with no purpose of his own. What was Ken's reason for 
bringing him? 

And did Ken think he was capable of being by himself? Or did he think he was someone 
in need of help, and nothing more? Someone to be pitied. 

Did that mean that after he thought he'd cured him, he would leave? Maybe abandon him 
for someone else? 

Ran's hold on the bottle tightened a little, and he had the sudden urge to throw the damn 
thing to the ground. He forced himself to drink from it instead, draining it in a few gulps. 

"Gomen ne, Vyx-sama. I shouldn't have said so much, perhaps." Ran wiped his mouth 
with the back of his hand. "I didn't mean to interrupt your story. Please go on...Or was 
that all of it?"

***

Vyx's grin went a little crooked then and a memory found out of place worried his eyes, 
made him look all over as if the river of time had run back across itself and sparkled 
backwards now that it was afternoon in Valdemar again.  

"That's it for now." He said with a nod.  "There's a little more to it, just like there's a 
little more to everything.  But you asked me to tell you about Louis, and I have.  The last 
part is all vanity, and there are other stories about Louis."  He sighed and twirled his 
glass, which was not quite empty and so got whatever had been inside across his trousers, 
much to his chagrin.  "I'm actually not sure why I told that one, or even why I told it the 
way I did."

His hands folded across his lap and across the street a bevy of heralds began to ooh and 
ahh over a black rabbit in the window of one of the stores- a live one, with a white mark 
on it's brow that seemed to resemble the kanji for love.  Lord Vyx was tempted to amble 
over and buy Ran an impromptu present, but then again, he wasn't at all sure if his 
companion fancied rabbits, or was allergic to them for that matter.

"But I know I'm the one who needs to apologize for going on like I do.  You've yet to 
ruffle up my feathers wrong with anything you've said.  It's not as if I've never been 
somewhere at least within reasonable mailing distance of where you are now.  And 
besides..." His slouch vanished and he swayed on his seat so he had himself all bunched 
together like a lady riding side-saddle, even if it was just to face Ran a little better.  "You 
asked me something else just now, or I think you did."

The former Weiss regarded him with pensive credulity for some time as he tried to make 
the words go together in his mind.  "People resent needing each other, even the most 
benevolent of them.  Not just because they can't do everything they'd need to get by on 
their own if they were alone, but more because... they can't be happy with just 
themselves, even though that's hard enough to begin with.  That's why it hurts a little 
when you're really in love- you're thinking about giving up that dream of finally being 
autonomous.  But not everybody needs the same way, and some people can't really get 
over loosing any hope for that desire.  They can't come out and say straight to anyone's 
face, 'I can't do this on my own', even if they'd give up their lives for that person."

"Sometimes..." he sighed softly, "it's all you can do to be there."

***    

"...But..." Ran began softly, only to lapse into quiet. He didn't want lay all his troubles 
upon Lord Vyx's shoulders. After all he hardly knew the man--and he wasn't the sort to 
unburden himself on anyone, no matter how much it hurt him to hold it in. 

Ran glanced over at the bottle in Vyx's hand, and wordlessly reached out to take it from 
him. His companion gave it up without protest, and Ran rose from the bench to throw 
them away in the bin outside the hardware store's entrance. When he returned, he sat 
down again on the bench, toying with the crinkling handles of the bags that lay between 
his feet. 

"I know why you told me that story the way you did--it's because, you have some idea of 
my situation. Some idea, but not the whole. I guess you thought to help me in some small 
way." Ran paused, then drew his hands away from the sacks and peered solemnly over at 
Vyx. "And I suppose you have. You've made me see a few things that I had missed." He 
shrugged. "Or maybe I just didn't want to see them in the first place." 

Ran fell silent again, and then slowly got to his feet again, looking somewhat dejected. Of 
course, he felt just that way--even more so than he outwardly appeared. 

"Thank you for the drink. Thank you for opening my eyes, as well."

***

At that point though, thanks was about the last thing Lord Vyx thought he should get.  
No, a smack over the head seemed much more appropriate for just so many reasons.  
"You're welcome, Ran." He said though, pulling himself to his feet and trying to look as 
soft and unruffled as he could while he handed over the bags his companion almost 
seemed to have forgotten for a moment.  "I'm glad... I could do anything for you besides 
filling your head with the gossip on these streets from back when I was new here..." 
Another wink.  "Since I remember it all."

But there was plenty to wish he could turn away from just then- that which he had not 
meant to conjure in the boy's heart, for even he could see he had brought small ruin there.  
Somewhere between when he left home and when he found one.  

/So much for telling the truth, Kimberly.  So much for that.  Why can't you lie like all the 
other old geezers and tell him that everything is wonderful, always has been and always 
will be? Why didn't you make up some faerie tale for him?/

The answer made him shake his head at himself and he was obliged for the moment to 
excuse himself with off-hand mentions of fancies that had nothing to do with anything.  

/Because faerie tales used to be really, really grim./

And then there was the ache in his arms he could not mistake for any mark the year had 
left behind on his skin.

He desperately wished to throw his arms about his friend.  Or sort of friend.  Or someone 
who looked just then like he sorely needed a friend.  But he knew then enough about such 
people, and the Japanese people who had once settled in Valdemar, and he couldn't insult 
him as much as he wanted to.  Or bother him by making some sort of pass at his private 
life.

It couldn't have been easy living with any Dono in the mildest halcyon days of Valdemar, 
which the present hours were not, and could not hope to be.  Never mind the one memory 
he had concerning the previous one...

They came to the door of Claire's much faster than they had left it, and he bowed to Ran 
rather than follow him in.  "You made my morning wonderful, Watashi-no-Claire-san-
tachi-shonen." (And he had there until a few moments past) "I thank you for your 
company and whatever else of it I might make off with again, for I should dearly love to 
continue my thievery of your time."  A nod, rather sly, but innocent, and he followed up 
with much more slight words.  "Of course, if... for any reason at all you should wish me 
about some time that isn't a morning in the presence of the madam, I live out near the 
theater, which is sort of south-east from here.  You can't miss the house- it's in need of a 
coat of paint and says 'Glazier' over the front door.  Any courier over thirty would know 
where it is if you're more partial to notes."

His hat came off and the feather's brushed against Ran's nose as he tipped it.  "But only 
if you like.  Ja ne, then!"

***

Ran rubbed at his tickled nose with the back of his hand, watching his dignified new 
acquaintance saunter away down the sidewalk, whistling merrily. But Ran felt that his 
cheerful mood was nothing but a show, much like Omi's cheerfulness was at times. 
Before the man could round the corner and leave his sight for the last time that day, the 
boy set the bags inside the door and took off after him. He caught up with him easily, and 
wasn't even out of breath when he came to a halt. The older man stopped in his tracks, 
obviously stunned to see him there before him. Ran tried not to pay too much attention to 
his expression. 

"I would like to visit you sometime, Vyx-sama. But only when you care to invite me." 

Vyx's blank look gradually lightened into one of relief, and he gave him a genuinely 
pleased smile as he touched the side of his cap. Ran stepped aside to let him pass, 
lingered just a moment to watch him before he headed back to the door. It wasn't until he 
placed his hand on the door handle when he was struck by what he had done. Then it was 
his turn to be dumbfounded. 

Had he actually just been...social? 

Before he could dwell upon his uncharacteristic behavior, the door was torn out of his 
grasp. He focused his gaze upon the person who now stood before him. It was Claire, and 
she looked fit to be tied. 

"Where *have* you been?" 

He glanced over her head, and saw a line of customers gathered around the cases. Ran 
looked back down at her, gesturing at the plastic sacks which still rested inside the door. 

"I was at the grocer's, like you asked." 

"Do NOT get smart with me, boy," she said as she stood back to let him pass. "That 
market is only two blocks away. You would not have been gone for an hour and a half 
just to purchase six coconuts and ten bags of chips." 

"I would have if there had been a line." Ran took up the bags he'd left, and headed off for 
the back room. Claire was hot on his heels. 

"HA! I know what the two of you were doing! That Vyx seduced you with one of his 
fanciful tales, and made you forget about your responsibilities." She paused to sneeze 
loudly. "You'd think he was the Pied Piper, the way he carries on, charming people." 

Ran had to bite down a smile as he turned to present her with the sacks of coconuts. 
"What should I do with these?" 

She gave him a steely glare. "Don't tempt me, boy." 

He gave her a disapproving sort of look at that, and she waved him towards the door with 
an impatient gesture. "Get back out there and help dispense with that crowd. When 
they're gone, I'm sending you on lunch--a fifteen minute one! Now get!" She took the 
bags from him, and walked off before him, muttering under her breath about fanciful old 
men and easily influenced children. 

Ran donned his apron, and set forth to the cases to fill orders. He worked for all of a half 
an hour before the cluster had dissipated, at which time Claire had emerged from her 
laboratory to send both him and Elspeth off to their respective lunches. Ran ducked into 
the back long enough to gather his simple lunch (a pear and a bottle of water) and the 
paperback book he'd brought and had left in his locker before making his exit. He walked 
around to the side of the building and sat down at the entrance to the open, sunny 
alleyway on a wooden crate that he'd found outside the shop's service entrance.

***

KenKen sighed and leaned back against the edge of his lover's bed, one of his arms 
steeling over his eyes so the sunlight would not worry them.  He sighed, and not even that 
made him feel any cooler.  The room had been burned blue as the sky by the afternoon 
warmth, and the cicadas all applauded it.  He did not.  His papers were damp from the 
moisture on his hands.

"Mmm, Kaze? Can I be done now?" He asked softly, for he could not fight the wet air for 
more in his voice.

"No, you can't be done now," the elder boy replied.  "You need to finish that or you'll 
fall behind in math.  You know that."

Wiping the sweat from his nose, he glanced hatefully at the broken fan among the 
valkyries on the far desk... they were all nodding in the imagined breeze, the blades 
behind them still.  "But I feel..."

A hand found its way down against his cheek and crept down the folds of his tank top, 
between them and his skin, which they rubbed here and there, lingering not too long in 
any one place.

"Everyone always feels this way when it's hot out."

"Really?"

"Well, maybe not Eskimos."  A little laugh here and the fingers left him.  The scratched 
on someone else's paper began.  "but most people.  Besides, you and I are the only two 
people in the world who count, right?"

"MMM!"

"So finish up, now."

Rising to lean over his notes took all of his strength- he found himself holding his shins 
to keep from falling back into a melted strawberry popsicle puddle of a boy.  Only a few 
more problems stood between him and tearing off his clothes, but they looked rather like 
trees sketched poorly on the paper, and not so much like mathematics at all

"Do you need help?" Kaze asked form behind him, his essay pausing in mid sentence.  

No direct answer, but Ken nodded, and shortly had an equally warm, damp body beside 
his own.  He gave his a sleepy glance, and he started to pull away into the checkered 
shade the screen on the window was making, but the younger boy reached over and 
tugged him closer.

"You're cooler than the air is."

"And you did number six wrong."

They laughed, and outside the door, Kaze's mother sighed and wadded up another paper 
for their wastebasket's growing collection.  "I wasn't upset with you boys!" she abruptly 
corrected, sounding more worried over them than her presentation.  "Just... tired.  You 
must be tired too.  You understand."

KenKen yawned in agreement, but neither called back to her.  She often shouted to 
herself, and expected no reply.

"Kaze?"

"Ee?"

"Help me more."

The other boy's hands ran over his lips, and he nodded to him, reaching them for the 
front of his shorts.  He never found them, for the Hidaka boy rose and drew himself into 
one of the corners of the tiny room.  There standing, he braced himself against the wall 
with his elbows and tipped his bottom out towards his lover, grinning sheepishly.

"I hate it when it's hot out.  I do."

"I thought we said math first, now."

"Onegai..."

The denim left his hips then, falling with a muffled rustle to the ground.  Without more 
than a no he could not catch, he felt fingers in him then, and a bare waist brushing his ass.

"My little snow faerie's too warm, hmm?"

It didn't occur to him no one had ever called him that before until he had fallen, spent and 
ragged to the floor. 

***

"Ken... yooooohooo! KE~EN?"

"Ee?" he looked up and rubbed his eyes.  It was hard to make them focus properly after 
so long they had spent looking down on the blanket he was kneeling on then- a velvet 
one, lined with all the keys they could find in the whole Villa, laid out, one after the 
other, rows and rows and rows of them, glinting gently in the light of the hallway.

"We've given 'em all shots, 'cept for this one."  And here his friend held out what was 
very obviously her own house key.

He shook his head at her and got to his feet then, running his hands through his hair.  
"Nice try though."

"We COULD," Primera began then, pushing away from the wall where she had been 
slouched.  "start all over again from the beginning just to make sure we didn't miss one."

They all moaned here, and all eyes once again came upon the door they could not seem to 
get open, which had not changed, and had not vanished, though at that point, no one 
would have thought it much change if it had, for it did them little good as it was, outside 
of being something to ponder while the second half of their auctions started to end.

Fiona grumbled and kicked one faceted golden twig from the its neat little line.  

Yuriko then, once more, her hands brushing over his shoulder so he would look at her.  
"You're tired."

"I'm not..."

Her dirty wink said something quite different clung to her mind, something that had little 
to do with being tired.  "You..."

And he drew away from her then, letting her frown for a moment, thinking she had 
touched on something better left unsaid, even though she had been making saucy jokes 
all day, and not all of them about him, Primera's backside knew lots about THAT.

But he whirled around them, hands behind his back as if he had a present.

"You know, this is a waste of time.  This is MY home now and DAMNIT! So you know 
what? I say screw the stupid keys.  Fiona, otanjoubi omedettou."

With a wry grin, he heaved the sledge hammer up from where it was lying prone on the 
carpet, and offered it to her with a bow.

"Why, now you're desecrating the all-sacred Hyacinth villa!" Yuriko bemoaned, 
farcically smacking her cheeks with her palms.  

"I'm not, Fiona-chan is."

They two shot a quick thumbs up between them, and he escorted her over to the door 
which in a moment, would be a door no more, and doubtless ever again.

"It's fitting, you know."  Prim yawned, and drew back, stepping among the keys herself 
now.  One caught on the rim of her dress and she had to draw it off.

Sadly, when the steel head of the hammer met the plank of the barrier between them and 
what they thought to be the tower, it made more of a splintering thump than a crash, 
though otherwise surrendering without trouble.  There was a lot of dust though.

Through the newly ripped portal they all glanced and whistled with dismay.

"Well, that got us nowhere."

"At least we know it got us nowhere."

"And that's somewhere."

"Can I finish now?"

***

Crawford had been in a dark mood ever since leaving Schuldich behind at the Velvet 
Pantomime. Locked behind his shields, eyes closed behind his spectacles, he had brooded 
all the way to Claire's, not bothering to stir until the carriage coasted to a halt a block 
away from the shop (as he had requested). The driver announced their arrival through the 
tiny roof top door, and Crawford promptly swung out of the cab, handing up his fare 
before he set off for the shop. 

As it happened, though, Crawford wound up making a detour before he ever reached 
Claire's front door. He had approached from the alleyway side, and so saw the ex-Weiss 
assassin sitting on his crate, munching on his pear, a book straddled across his lap. 
Suddenly, it was New Year's and Halloween all rolled into one. Jauntily, he set forth, 
making a beeline for Ran. 

"Good afternoon, Aya." 

Ran visibly stiffened before he even shifted his attention from his book to his visitor. It 
was plain just from the look on his face that he was seriously pissed, and Crawford was 
tickled to no end about how he had affected him. 

"Get away from me." 

Crawford cocked a brow in amusement. "My, my, the manners of Japanese boys these 
days. What would your mother say if she heard you greet an old friend in such a way?" 

"Go to hell!" 

"Oh, *that's* an improvement." 

"What the fuck do you want?" 

"Why I just wanted to see you, Aya. I have some gossip for you." 

Ran eyed him warily as he bit off another piece of pear; the flesh snapped crisply from 
the core. He said nothing, though--simply turned back to the book in his lap and 
attempted to continue his reading. 

"A-yaaa?" 

He turned another page, but his hands shook slightly around the sides of the book when 
he brought them to rest again. Crawford placed his palm flat on the brick wall over Ran's 
head, and leaned over him, throwing a long shadow between the ex-Weiss and the sun. 
Ran finally gave up on the book then, slamming it shut and setting it aside. He shifted his 
attention to the grinning American who hovered over him. 

"Go. Away." 

Blithely ignoring his command, Crawford shoved away from the wall, jamming his hands 
in his pockets and rocking back on his heels a little. "Guess who came to see me 
yesterday afternoon?" 

Ran said nothing, just GLARED at him as if he'd like to kill him. Crawford wasn't fazed 
in the least; the smirk he wore faltered not a millimeter. 

"Well?" When Ran didn't answer still, he sighed, and nudged his glasses up his nose with 
his thumb. "Oh, come *on*, Aya. Play along with me for once." 

"Why the hell should I?" 

"Why? Well, because the person who came to see me was Ken." 

Ran stared at him, utterly poleaxed. And then he hissed, "You lie." 

"Do I?" Crawford casually took his cigarette case out of his pocket, and took one for 
himself; held the case out to Ran, but then shrugged when the boy made no move to take 
one. "Was he home when you arrived?" 

"...No. But that doesn't--" 

Crawford exhaled sharply. "Was he sporting a bruise, oh around, " he gestured to one 
cheek, "here?" 

Ran went livid, and in a rush he was on his feet, making a futile grab for Crawford's 
collar. He only dodged his hands, laughing. 

"You hit him!" 

Crawford nodded gleefully. "Oh yes! But only because he asked me to do it." 

"That's a lie!" Ran swung at him, and missed. 

"So you've said." 

"He would never *want* someone to hurt him!" 

Crawford preempted the second of Ran's potentially disabling blows by wrapping his 
hand around the younger man's fist when it came at him. "Oh? Are you so sure about that, 
kitten?" 

Ran just stared at him, wide-eyed and panting in rage--an emotion which transmuted to 
visible dismay as Crawford's words sunk in. No, he wasn't sure about that--not with the 
matter of Ken's romantic past. So lost was he in his grim realization, that he wasn't aware 
Crawford had moved in close to him until the older man was upon him and whispered, 

"I thought not." 

There was a brief lull after the ex-Schwartz leader had spoken, and then Ran screamed 
and took another swing at him with his free hand, tearing the other out of his grasp. 
Another swing, and another, even though he never managed to strike his target. And then, 
a fist came out of seemingly nowhere, and crashed into his jaw, sending the redhead 
reeling to the sidewalk. His head hit the pavement with a resounding crack, and for a 
moment, all he saw was a field of wildly sparking black. 

And through the void came Crawford's voice, low and soft in his ear. 

"Your precious Ken did come over yesterday, Aya, and at my invitation. I offered 
cocktails, but he wanted my cock instead." A hand cupped his battered cheek, stroking it 
gently. "And you know what?" 

That same hand suddenly clamped over on Aya's mouth, followed by a hard knee 
slamming into the pit of his stomach, effectively pinning him down. 

"I gave it to him, gave him everything he wanted. Slapped that pretty face of his until he 
cried. Stripped his ass bare and rode him hard...Christ! Is he ever a sweet fuck!" 
Crawford laughed nastily, and added, "But then, you wouldn't know anything about 
*that*. You're nothing but a virgin--a pathetic, unyearned for virgin; he told me so! And 
that's all you'll ever be." 

Crawford jerked his hand away only to replace it with his lips, and the boy got a mouthful 
of wriggling tongue before Crawford pulled away from him for good. After he got to his 
feet, he kicked Ran viciously in the ribs, making him gasp and clutch his side. 

"Hidaka-dono is used to rough-playing *men*, kitten. You haven't got a chance with 
him." 

With a soft, mocking laugh, he walked off towards the shop; suddenly, Crawford felt like 
treating himself to a cone.

***

Claire, with some fascinating oaths that would have melted the ice cream in her vat had it 
ever turned to ice cream at all, bemoaned the untimely death of her dark chocolate pina-
collada swirl.  The girls and a few of the customers who had taken to ignoring the 
"employees only" sign on the freezer door, stood about the metal tub, hats in their hand, 
if they had had hats to take off.  The herald with beads in place of tresses had taken off 
her wig and stood now, sporting a hairband of glittery tattoos that had laid beneath it, 
which, now revealed, culled more attention for itself than the tub of milky, xanthic slush 
and the bubbles of dark chips there.

Genvieve began to sob, probably out of the talents found in her drama classes than 
anything else.  "And it smelled SO GOOD!"

At which all of the assembled wafted some of the confection's aroma, and shook their 
heads in the tragedy of it.

Claire finally opened her eyes and there beholding their forlorn faces, was struck with an 
idea besides what to do with the LAST two coconuts (besides bringing death and flavor 
to another few gallons of cream) "WELL! What are you standing around here for! You 
want some? Grab a cup and a straw people!"

Which captured for her a few stunned glances, for so seldom was it she released her 
failures onto the public.  Then again, said failures were usually salt-ridden or capable of 
eating through most polymers.  The herald with the baubles for tresses put her wig back 
on backwards te announcement stunned her so.

"We got slushies for four dollars, people! Get 'em while they're mush!"

What line their was promptly retreated into the freezer, making murmurs to the effect of 
the curiosity of the afternoon, or the latest curiosity rather.  Genvieve, amid her shameful 
tears, began ladling the mixture into cups, apologizing for the lack of little cocktail 
umbrellas.  Claire took her leave of the laboratory of the time being, for as much as she 
was honestly glad to see it go, she found she COULDN'T very well devise a manner of 
bringing it truly to life while the remains of the test subject were being spirited away in 
purple paper cups.

That, and the girls, fickle as ever, were all still on lunch or gone for ladles, leaving one 
smirking dark-haired man at the counter.  

/Funny guy! Too steadfast for his own good I see.  Wonder if he's met the boy?/

A glance to the clock here and she shook her head.  /He's late coming back again! Hehe, 
he gets to 'help' with the next batch then./

"Hullo, sorry for the wait.  I'm the management so don't bother complaining.  What can I 
gettcha?"

The door jingled before he could answer and it seemed she could hear someone panting.  

***

As it turned out, Claire was correct: There was someone panting by the door--namely, 
Ran, who had managed to drag himself from the pavement and into the shop despite the 
fact that his vision was wavering badly. He shook his head to clear it for what seemed the 
fourth time, and lurched forward across the shop towards the unmistakable blur that was 
Crawford. 

When Claire saw him coming, though, she very nearly dropped the scoop she held at the 
ready. One side of his face was a massive bruise, and a thin trickle of blood crept from 
one corner of his mouth. He was moving as if walking pained him. 

"Ran! What--" 

The next sound out of her mouth was a cry of alarm as Ran lunged forward to deal 
another punch across Crawford's jaw, only to miss him and hit the steel frame 
surrounding the glass windows on the cases--luckily for him. The case trembled, but 
mercifully, the glass did not shatter from the force of the blow. Ran pivoted unsteadily on 
his heels, turning again to face Crawford. The older man had moved back from the case, 
and was standing there grinning at him as if Ran were nothing more than a clown. 

"What the hell is going on? Ran! Don't--" 

But he had already lunged at him again, trying to once more to hit him. Once more he 
missed. A pair of girls rose from their table by the window for another one far from the 
action. 

"Stay away from him!" 

Crawford only laughed, and deftly dodged another blow. "If Ken wants to spend time 
with me, I'm not going to turn him away. No matter how late at night he shows up at my 
door." 

"Bastard!" he snarled, aiming for him again, but Crawford was too fast for him. He didn't 
leave off with merely dodging his punch that time, though--instead, he slammed his fist 
hard across Ran's other cheek, sending him sprawling to the floor. 

"Stupid kid," he muttered, vigorously rubbing his knuckles as he glared at the prone 
figure at his feet. "I bet I'll have a bruises there in the morning."

***

"Oh, I think you'll have a few more." Claire began in a tone of sheer complacency, 
though a shuddering one that only in the ease of it, in half-slow motion, betrayed a hint of 
anything close to anger.  

She slid her glasses then, up against her nose, for they had fallen.  She was smiling, and 
Crawford did not seem to know what to make of it.  

Genvieve teetered out from the mouth of the freezer, knowing full well, but not 
whispering loudly enough for anyone else to have guessed.  She grabbed the two girls 
who had just shuffled away and hauled them into the lab, the door of which moaned shut, 
but for a line of wide and fearful eyes.    

There was a rattling sound about the case then, the bells on the door rang though no one 
touched them.  

"In many very uncomfortable places, if I have anything to say about it."

She slid out from behind the counter then, making no effort to conceal her slight limp, as 
she might have been expected to do with anyone she stared down such as she did 
Crawford then.  Indeed, her eyes did not flee his, not with any step she took.

"Cocky little prig, aren't you?"

He simpered back at her.

"Must be new, too.  I guess no one told you the rules.  Not about fighting, that's a given.  
But my rules."

One of her callused fists met the cup of her other hand with a resounding crack.  "Rule 
number one..."

A slurping noise came from the counter where now rested an ice cream scoop that had 
not been there moments before.

Only now did her voice raise, and she took one step nearer her opponent.  "NEVER..."

Clang, the scoop sailed through the air and bit Brad across the brow.  

"EVER..."

Another followed in its wake, two more sort after, striking the precognitive at uncanny 
angles and tumbling onto the floor.

"FUCKING..."

A step amid the latest volley, and he fell back before her small and chubby frame.

"HARASS MY HELP!"

***

"STOP!" Crawford shouted, but yet another volley flew across the room and struck him, 
one across his shielding hands, the other two lower down. It was that last scoop which 
disabled him the most, as it hit him directly in the groin. Very hard. Crawford doubled 
over where he stood, one hand still raised to ward off any blows to his face, the other 
clutching at his offended member. 

"HOW *DARE* YOU COME IN HERE AND BOTHER ONE OF MY KIDS!" 

Fortunately for him, the scoops stopped coming. But then, Crawford pushed his luck a 
little too far, forgetting at that moment the consequences of his actions. 

"HE STARTED IT!" 

Which was entirely the wrong thing to shout at a furious shopkeeper. The napkin holders 
and straw canisters were the next objects to take flight. It was then that he wisely chose to 
make his exit, awkwardly running from the shop. Claire was after him straight off, 
screaming down the street in his wake, "DON'T YOU EVER FUCKING COME 
AROUND HERE AGAIN!" 

The door fell shut, and the "Be Back in Ten Minutes" sign was flipped over to face the 
street. Claire made her way back to where Ran still lay, knocking over the chairs and 
moving the tables out of her path with her power as she went. He was only just coming 
around when she knelt beside him and smoothed his tumbled hair back from his injured 
face. He heard her call for a cup of water, and that was when he opened his eyes. 

And saw the debris scattered across the shop. 

"...Claire-san? What happened?"

***

"Nothing to worry your fluffy little head about," Claire remarked with a world-weary 
sigh, even though she was smiling down on her wounded employee, all of ire having fled 
after Brad along with a few of the spoons, which were lying in the street now, quite 
inactive as spoons are supposed to be, but being remarked on by those strolling past as 
something one does not typically find on a sidewalk.  

Seraphita fumbled with the water cooler in the back and came dashing out then, 
scampering between odds and ends that barred her safe passage, trying to hurry and not 
spill at the same time.  

As things were, the cup she carried left her hands then and rather shakily descended into 
Claire's.

"Nothing indeed!" the girl huffed then, hands flying to her hips.  "This is twice the mess 
you made LAST time you lost your temper."

A few more faces fully faded in from the space between the door and the wall that kept 
the lab out of the shop.  There were whistles of dismay and a few scattered applause.   

"Well," the owner of the shop conceded, "That's true, and I do tend to be a little showy 
about that, not like regular showy of course." 

And then, as she scooted the cup close to Ran's lips.  "Unfortunately."

"I'll get the brooms..." an exasperated Genvieve volunteered, having pushed he way 
through the spectators who had not yet plucked up the courage to file out and have better 
looks for themselves.  

"Don't you fuss now! I didn't hurt nobody!" she chuckled then, grinning lopsidedly, 
"Nobody important."  But the momentary glee of having banished Crawford from her 
shop as dramatically as possible left her, chased away by her usual stern self.  "You're 
the only one got banged up and I didn't have anything to do with that I don't think.  Just 
who was that sunnovabitch? He got anything to do with that orange-haired skank was in 
here before I..."

Seeing then how her companion's eyes had clouded over then, she shook her head.  "No, 
never mind that... for now.  You alright, boy? He nailed you pretty hard there."

***

"Um, yeah, I'm...okay. I've had far worse injuries." 

As soon as he'd said that, Ran's eyes darted over to Claire, who was studying him 
curiously. A twinge of panic rose in his breast, and he began to splutter, "That is, I--My 
former..." 

But Claire motioned for silence, shaking her head. "Nevermind. What's past is past, boy. 
You can't change it, so why give it another thought?" She unthinkingly tugged on one of 
his dangling eartails, then took him by the arm. "Come on, now, and get up, and let me 
take a look at you in the back, where the light's a bit better." 

"That's okay," Ran began as he heaved himself upright, staggering just a little once he 
was on his feet. Every bone in his body felt like it was broken, though he knew that 
wasn't the case. Maybe only his ribs, from the way they pained him if he moved even the 
slightest bit. 

"It is not okay. Your face looks like raw hamburger. Why, you're going to scare that boy 
of yours when you get home!" 

At that, Ran scuffed one foot on the floor, and shrugged, looking a touch crestfallen 
again. Claire, worrying her lip a little, leaned in and whispered, "Listen--whatever that 
bastard said your boyfriend's done, I wouldn't believe him. You can't just go off taking 
jerks like him at face value! Especially when he obviously has a deep seated hatred of 
you." Claire nudged him gently in his uninjured side. "Have you spoken with your 
boyfriend at all today since you came to work?" 

Ran hesitantly shook his head. 

"Well, there you go! How can you believe *him* when you don't know the whole story? 
And who do you trust more, boy? That cretin I just chased out of here? Or your Ken?" 

He grudgingly stayed silent for a moment, but then murmured, "Ken," to which Claire 
patted him on the arm. 

"Then you'll talk to him tonight, and get whatever the problem is sorted out. And right 
now," she said, striding off towards her office, beckoning to him to follow her, "you are 
at least going to come in here and sit down with some ice on your face. We'll clean up, 
and then..." Claire sighed, looked around at her store, and then threw up her hands in 
exasperation. 

"...in an hour, we'll close up. Oh...I've had enough excitement for one day." 

The clerks promptly did a high-five.

***

Claire shot the girls a baleful look, some of which trickled onto the remaining customers 
who had hidden in the fridge with their pina-collada almost milk-shakes, and as they 
were not frightfully used to the awe-inspiring majesty of a pissed off look from Claire, 
they all came scurrying out of the laboratory with everyone else and stood at attention in 
one long line.  

"You can go," she told them with a chilly shrug.  And they did, very, very quickly, 
stepping on each other's heels and laughing some for the sheer thrill of being terrified 
one sunny afternoon. 

"They'll just bring more tomorrow, but we'll worry about THAT when it comes, won't 
we?" 

Without a second reminiscent of even slightly philosophical remark, she lead Ran into 
her office, which was small and smelled a little of lime soda even though there was none 
to be seen in it.  The portrait of the frozen yogurt was sporting a band-aid now where it 
had been torn.  Her desk was littered with measuring cups and scribbled-on notebook 
paper in many shades and varieties, all of which went wheeling to the floor.  A pat on the 
cleared surface.  Plainly she meant for him to sit there as if it was a doctor's bench and 
she at least a nurse.

Only after a few exchanged scowls did he comply, and then with a fragment of a wince.

"Finish up your water and take off your shirt.  No remarks about being shut up in a small 
place with an old pervert lady, now! Why, I wouldn't infringe on Ken's space for 
anything after the way the mere suggestion of it seems to rile you."

He sputtered she though and left  him long enough to collect the baggies full of ice 
Elspeth had presented her with between searching for this scoop and that chair leg, for 
one had evidentially snapped off in the midst of the excitement.  She got back just in time 
to see her latest employing strip off his shirt with only one deep breath in honor of his 
soar spots.

"Well, you're no wimp when it comes to going without that sharp tongue of yours either, 
now are you? Don't even run off screaming when I start throwing things around with my 
head and... oooh, boy.  He whacked you good on your stomach.  What the hell, put a 
little ice there too.  Can't hurt."

***  

Ran groped at his ribs, in the spot where Crawford had kicked him, pressing down on 
them whilst trying to make it look he was only fumbling for a bruise. The bones, though, 
felt whole, didn't ache like fractures usually did when touched, even though the skin was 
tender there. And beginning to green just as the skin over his stomach was. However, 
when she held out two of the baggies for him to take, Ran declined with a shake of his 
head. "I don't think ice will do anything for my stomach except make it cold. And wet. 
And I told you--" 

Claire cut him off with a wave of her hand. "Yeah, yeah. You don't need looking after. 
You're a tough boy who's lived a hard life, and you can take care of yourself." 

"I *can* take care of myself." 

"I didn't say you couldn't! Why are you so touchy?" She brazenly pressed the baggies to 
his injured stomach. "Now, *hold* them there." 

A huff of impatience and a glare, and Ran relented. Claire gave him a cheeky little smirk 
as she took another baggy in hand and gently lay it against his swollen lip. "He really got 
you good, boy. You hurt anywhere else?" 

"...No." 

"Eh? You didn't sound very sure of yourself just then." 

"I'm fine." 

"Is that your standard response for every question?" 

Ran didn't answer, so she just tucked his eartail over his ear, and moved the baggy to that 
cheek. "You hit your head pretty hard on the floor. Are you dizzy?" 

"No." 

"Do you have a headache?" 

Ran paused, pursing his mouth in a tiny frown. "...Yeah." 

Claire tipped him lightly on the chin with her index finger, causing him to look back over 
at her. Then she dropped the ice bag to the desktop, and scrambled around to the other 
side of the desk. "Don't you move just yet! I'm not done with you." The center drawer 
came out of its hole, and he could hear her digging around through all the papers and 
pens and whatnot which she kept stored there. 

"Where is that thing? I can never find things when I need them...Ah!" The drawer banged 
against the deskframe as Claire slammed it shut. When she came around to stand in front 
of Ran again, he saw she was holding a penlight in one hand, poised to beam. 

"I don't--" 

"Hush! Look me in the eye, and don't move a inch until I tell you." Claire clicked on the 
tiny light, and wavered it in front of Ran's eyes, first one and then the other. She did it 
twice to each before she was satisfied. Then she held up her finger and commanded him 
to track it with his eyes only--performing that procedure twice as well. Then, without 
warning, she reached around to prod at the back of Ran's head. Gave him a grim smile he 
jerked away from her hand. 

"Ah ha! You have a lump the size of an egg on the back of your head!" 

"So?" 

"So? Why the hell didn't you SAY had a bump on your head? You might have had a 
concussion. Do you realize how serious that is?" 

Ran sighed wearily. "Yes, I do." 

At that, Claire gave him a sad sort of look, and then thrust a bag of ice into his free hand. 
"Put that on the back of your head." She disappeared again; once more he heard her open 
a drawer and toss the penlight back into the chaos. It was closed, much more gently this 
time, and another drawer opened. 

"I want you to go home by cab. I don't want you walking back. All those injuries, and that 
creature gunning for you--it's just not safe!" 

"I'll be fine." 

A sound of irritation came from his boss/defender. "Maybe you will, but I won't be if I 
send you home on foot. I won't be able to relax at all tonight, thinking of what evil might 
have befallen you en route." 

"I have to go back to the market." 

"Fine. I don't care if you have to go to every nightclub in Valdemar on the way--but you 
are going to take a coach. And you will have to give me a receipt signed by the driver 
with my change tomorrow morning, or you'll catch it from me again." 

"You certainly are bossy," he muttered. 

"Thank you. I try to be." She walked around her desk again, this time holding a long 
black wallet in her hand. "Now, where exactly do you live?" 

"Why do you need to know that?" 

"Because I have to make sure I give you the right amount of money. Cabbies don't 
transport people for free around here, you know." 

Ran glowered at her. "I can--" 

"You *will* take the damn money, and you can pay me back on payday. Where do you 
live?" 

Ran was reluctant to tell her, but it was clear Claire wouldn't back down, and he was 
really too tired at that point to argue. "I live nine blocks away from here, to the West." 

She arched a brow at him. Such cryptic directions. "Drivers generally like to be given a 
street name when a cab is called for." 

"...Yfandes Boulevard." 

Nodding, Claire opened her wallet, and drew out fifteen dollars. "This should do it." But 
as she held the money out to him, the light of realization dawned on her face. She 
regarded the boy before her in some small wonder; only one building lay to the West on 
Yfandes. 

"The Hyacinth Villa." 

Ran said nothing, but he went visibly tense, as if he were about to spring away. He 
dropped the waterlogged bags to the table and reached for his shirt, slipping it back on as 
gently as he could. 

"You're--" 

"I'm *not* a whore," he grumbled. "I'm no one's kept boy, either." 

"I never thought you were. But you are the new Dono's lover, aren't you?" 

Ran pointedly averted his eyes, staring down at the floor as he smoothed out the hem of 
his T-shirt around his hips. "Don't tell anyone. It's bad enough people gawk at me now for 
being the new clerk." 

"Oh, my boy! I won't breathe a word, you can count on it. I just don't know why you 
didn't tell me. Not that you *had* to, but..." Claire bit her lip, knowing she was rambling 
needlessly. Then she reached out and patted Ran on the elbow. "Nevermind. You hang 
out here and rest a bit, hm? I'll go call for a coach." 

With that, Claire turned and left the office, leaving Ran perched upon the edge of her 
desk. 

***

Crawford, after having put considerable distance between himself and the volatile Claire, 
had found himself before the gates of the city's sole public park--one which bore the 
appellation of Brightest Havens. It couldn't have bore a better name than that, either, for 
it was a veritable paradise in a sea of brick and marble. Lush green grasses and sweeping, 
stately trees as far as the eye could see. 

But Crawford was immune to its obvious charms. He was far more concerned with the 
state of his health--and with the repair of his badly crumbling pride. 

"Damn. I mean...DAMN!" he shouted, taking the handkerchief away from his cut 
forehead to examine the fresh streak of blood that now overlay the old. "What is it with 
that woman!" 

"That INSUFFERABLE WOMAN!" 

A flock of crows rose from the poplar opposite, screaming in indignation over being 
disturbed as they streaked upwards into the blue summer sky. Crawford watched them 
wing away with a fierce scowl, and then he set off again, silently cursing every ache (and 
there were several) that radiated through his body as he walked. 

/If that woman's cut me THERE, I'm going to sue her for everything's she's worth./ 

It was another three blocks before he lucked into finding a cab, and it was a grateful 
Crawford who climbed its step and sank into its velveteen seats. If he had his way, he 
wouldn't move from that spot for the rest of the night. 

But, as he had learned long ago, he never really got his way. He was Fate's plaything, he 
knew. He had to bend to its will in all matters, whether it was his life he was shaping, or 
that of someone else's. 

And in this case, it was of someone else's. Two someones in fact. He'd immediately seen 
the possible outcomes of his minor scheme the moment he had thought of it. As it was, 
nothing terribly dire would come of it right off, but it would lay a framework for other 
problems, should he choose to carry it out. 

Crawford did choose to do it. And so, when the carriage drew near to MacCready's and 
Wilson's, Crawford rapped on the roof, signaling the driver to stop. He asked that the 
man wait for him, that he wouldn't be long. 

The establishment in question was a liquor store, strangely enough--one which 
specialized in rare wines and liquours, but also sold more mainstream brands. But such 
indulgences he would save for himself. On this occasion, he planned to opt for something 
a little less extravagant, but no less special. 

After looking over their vast selection, and taking the advice of the ever helpful 
Messieurs MacCready and Wilson, Crawford decided on a locally vinted white wine: 
k'Treva reserve, vintage 1950 (which the proprietors had assured him was a good year). 
He had requested it be delivered to a particular address, had had it wrapped in 
shimmering yellow cellophane and tied off at the neck with a flowing silver bow. 
Beneath the sparkling band, he slipped a small card which read: 

{To Ken-- 

In thanks for a memorable afternoon. 

Crawford} 

Then Crawford gleefully left the shop to resume his journey to St. Catherine's.

*****