The once-pirate sighed as she flopped on the seat, feeling a little dark at what had just passed. Let your guard down for a second and someone gets hurt. At least it had just been a toppled chair, this time around. Bernie was not far behind her, and it pleased her that he followed. She would hold his hand and forget her troubles. His concern was evident, and she meant to explain herself. She laced her fingers together and rested both hands on the table, to see him, to meet him eye to eye.?
"You know that woman?" A nod over towards the table where the riot of color and the inkstained fellow were currently busy with...? something in Drow.
"I do, yes.? Days and days ago, thunderstorms passed." He smiled, placing the hat on his head, shadows licked the bridge of his nose, the curve of a gaunt cheek.
"She's a friend, an ally.? I like to think...I could protect her." He hunched forward, mirroring her movements, but for his hands which were palm down, pressing for hers. Maia welcomed the contact, a little chill up her spine at his hands on hers.
"You look unwell." His eyes filled with concern, something was not right.? A great black cloud cursed them all.
BROTHER, THE BABY IS DEAD IN THE STREAM.? BROTHER, SWEEP THE ASHES OF THE DEAD.
He pressed his hands to his temples, massaging there, gritting his teeth, but focusing his attention on her, her words, not the Elses.
"Made her unwell.? Don't feel so lovely about it..."? His hand peeled away from hers, working at those soft spots, and something was wrong. She knew it the minute she really looked at him. Her turn for concern.? He seemed so distracted, off himself.? Not the slow, casual way that he had once regarded her, but something less centered.?
"Bernie?"? She leaned in, reaching to gather up some part of him.? A hand, a chin, a lock of hair, anything she could get a weathered grip on. He gripped at her hand, eyes severe.
"God damn." He winced, not at her, but his mind, or whatever infected it. "I'm unwell..." That made a pair of them. He looked down, squeezing his eyes shut.
"But go on..how could you make someone sick?" When they opened again, his eyes stared at her, lost, not comprehending.
"I tried to tell you."? A deep breath, and a long slow exhale, like the air could calm her, bring her down from her ledge, or back up where she needed to be.? "You oughtn't spend your days with a woman like me."? There were too many shadows to negotiate, too much darkness to maneuver.? It was like sailing through a reef.? A sane person just didn't do it.
"No...no..."
BROTHER. buzz. hiss. snakebite.
"Shit!" He slammed his fist upon the table, grabbing his head.
"No Maia...you are ...wonderful." He bent over, then met her gaze, eyes cleared.
"It's ok.? What happened?"
BROTHER.?
All was fractured.
Her hand was warm, and she pressed it to the side of his face.? "It is all behind, in the then.? Stalking shadows.? Have you forgotten already?"? Damnit.? She knew it had been too light, too easy.? He was falling to tatters before her eyes.? Was this her fault, too?? Was her darkness spilling into them both? That first day at lunch, before she had really let him touch her, before they had begun, she tried to tell him everything she could.? Her darkness.? Her eight years.? The reasons for all.
"What is this? No-- no shadows, Maia. You speak wrong.? We are fine, future can be ...all we have it to be." He reached out to her in return, watching her face, the lines, the cut, the bruise, her eyes.
"I'm going mad, Maia"
"Nay.? You cannot be."? Deny it.? That would help.? That would heal him, no doubt.? What the hell was happening to her starlight? He leant back.? Stars died quick.
"I gotta go, Maia." He drifted upwards, spilling shadows every which way, a hunched over lamplight, arboreal, cadaverous, inky tendrils spilling behind him, hat wide brimmed and lost in lantern flare, which gave his face strange light.
"Come with me."? He stood, eyes downcast.
She was up in a hurry, and only peeled her eyes from him long enough to grab her coat and her hat.? Once both were in place, that fierce gaze caught him again, sweeping up every bit of him like the tide claims all that stands before it.?
"Where will we go?"
"Where none can find us bothered, and you tell me your heart.? I love you woman, and I won't have myself collapse at your feet. I want you, you are my match." His gaze as fierce as hers, he gripped her shoulders, his kind face anguished, eyes impossible.
She reached forth, straightened his coat for him.? It was a very possessive gesture, and his words were as sweet as any she had ever heard, and far sweeter than any that had come recently.?
"I want you, too.? Powerfully so."? She wanted the light and the dark of him, his joy and his pain, she would take it all and make it her own.? How she feared the thought.?
"Home?"? No hesitation in her actions, though, despite how her heart demanded it for his poor sake.
"No...no.? Just..you and me" He looked outside, the rumble of thunder. "Come," and with that, his hand moving for hers, he took a breath.
She did not fully understand his words, but his eyes made it clear.? He would lead, and she would follow.? Fingers entwined and with a grave look about her, she went along.? The thunder did not bother her, save that it was an audible reminder that it was overcast, that the stars had not bothered to make an appearance.
He moved swiftly, with an urgency his explanations would do nothing for.? And what for the why?? He was troubled, she was unnerved, and that was enough.? He moved out of the streets, wanting field, wanting only her and him, only night and clouds and rain, here.
"Find me here," he whispered.
Maia kept pace, despite the length of him, his advantage in it.? She would run if she had to.? The driving discontent made the trip short, buildings were left behind.? First there were yards, trees, something like a thicket.? Then there was nothing.? The nothing he wanted.? The clearing.? The smell of damp earth, ready for spring, it mingled with night air and rain.? In its capacity to calm, the perfume was dizzying.? Like the eyes in her mate.? They stilled her as well.
When they arrived, she understood.? No horses.? No shadows.? No lingering memories, no ghosts of old.? Their places had an abundance of both.? This place had them and the sky, his dreams and her nightmares, or perhaps vice-versa.
He rose out of his jumbled, jagged edges to cup her face.? He looked at her.? This woman.? His agony, in his perfection.? That he could make her smile, have her moan, have her pleasured despite the haunted traces within her.? Maybe that was why he had found her, and she him, alone, against the tides, against the sands, because they knew.
"I don't know what is yet to happen.? I've got people on my trail....Law enforcement, other towns.? The war is not from my home, but from here." His voice was frail.? Meek even.? He was dust.? Ashes to ashes.? He fell to a crouch and moved his hand behind her to massage her bottom, rain drops pitter pattering upon their faces their hats, these two wayfarers.? He kissed her thighs, tears accumulating on his cheeks, for that he had found in her.? Why he gave her the wagon, so she could run if she had to.
"The world can be ruin, can be hideous, can be to maim and hinder.....but find me here." His hands sought to unlace her from her clothing, as he nibbled at her pants, a hand, of elegant design, exploring her boot ... the curves, the delicacies to her fierce.
Her jaw tightened in his hands as he spoke of people coming for him.? Let them come, she thought.? Maia would pick up the blade for him just as soon as she would give it up.? Try to take him?? She would make red ribbons of them.? History, at best, or perhaps just forgotten like she was.? Maia knew war and she knew blood.? She knew death all too well.? She'd dealt-- and dealt with-- her share and then some.?
"Let them come."? He sank to his knees and she brought her face up to meet the cold rain.? In spite of it, her blood ran hot as his hands ran over her.? A shudder in her spine, that nerved organ that reconciled the conflict.? When blues came down to meet him, she was not just the woman, the sailor, the heartbreak and salvation.? The killer, cold and still, lived there, threatening as the rain.?
"No man shall take you from me, Bernie, my love.? I say let them come.? They will not make it here."? She trembled, for it frightened her. The way she felt, how easily she could picture it.? An army might come for him and she would not fear them, but this made her tremble like a leaf against him.? Moving hats away.? A new variation on the same dance.? She sank to her knees to find his mouth with hers and press up against him, strong arms gathering him near, drowning out her fears with a kiss full of the only thing more potent. Hope. In spades.
He clung to her. "I don't want this, this fear..." His mouth trembled, in rain drop, against her jaw, eyes hunting hers, squinting, hands enveloping her back, to hold her close, warm skin beneath wet clothing. "I need you, Maia...I'm lost here." He kept his tears at bay, breaths heaving as he looked up, at that sky.
"I cannot fight it again..I cannot tell them I am innocent. It means nothing.? Nothing means nothing because I am that to them. I won't have you fight for me...I know what I might become, maybe..maybe I did kill a baby and drown children..my head is lost to me...you have my heart...you keep me alive." He fell against her, burying his face in her breast, a hand running along her spine. "I can't fight without you"
"You are not lost!? I have found you, you damned fool."? She was angry.? Maia hated the powers that be, that destiny that seemed incapable of leaving her alone.? It came through him now, but she would not give this up.? Not him.? Not another decimation of her poor hope.?
"We fight, then.? You and I."? Maia did not know that tears spilled from those killer's eyes, more fiercely blue for the pink that came with those tears.? One set of fingers tangled in wet clothes, the other through wet hair, holding him.? Infinitely strong wherever there was sorrow.? Sorrow.?
"Leave your fear, there is no place for it here."? Words for him?? Or for herself?
He moved against her, as if the wind might steal her, like it was possible he was mad, and that he might break.? He stood, watching her, helping her to stand, his hand cupping hew jaw.
Maia stood, pulled the hand that wasn't on her face to her chest, and pressed it there, that he might feel the center of her.? Her rhythm.? She splayed her own hand over his, heart, to count the beats.? Her words were quiet and she met him for the first time again, eye to eye.? "Find yourself right here."
His mouth found hers, and he felt the pulse of within that emotion.? Where angels feared to tread, the land they both knew best.
