Phear my mighty pen!!

[bjornwilde]

((One note, the tense of verb between present and past tense is on purpose.))

A double Rose

It started with a touch.

I remember falling from my horse. I remember that infinite fall. I remember
Her touch as She caught me. I remember that first touch. I remember each day
as a little piece of my humanity, my soul is destroyed.

I stand in the ruins of what was once my home. The walls crumbled, the trees
turned to thistle, the glory decayed. How many years has it been since I
have truly been in this world? Not even the dust my boot stands in seems
real. All that remains of the home I knew are the roses. The one bit of my
families glory. Our roses were our pride.

One year ago I touched my mortality again. I remember her, Janet. I remember
the honey morning dew in her kisses, the rain flushed in her cheeks, the
grass in her hair. Her warmth. Her beauty, the likes of which I have not
seen nor felt in the too many lifetimes I have lived. She is not perfect,
she is mortal and in what is left of my heart, none other is more beautiful.

Every seven years one of us goes to hell. Not the hell of the mortal's dead
god, but a more subtle and wicked hell. In the heart of Winter, I look down
my blade at visceral victory. I have given mercy to one of myself. There are
too many of us here, one is too many, but this one at least is freed. I slip
in his (her?) life. A slip.

I remember that day. With Springs milk yet to run, my Grand Father and I
road out to feel the warming sun on our faces, too used to fire, and the
wind in our hair, too used to dead laden air. In reckless invulnerability I
challenged a chase. I was winning . I slipped. She caught me.

The honey blood of the her maiden hood fills my scent. The salty ocean of
her passion, the innocence of her mortality. Her need is anxious, but no
where near mine. To touch my mortality, faded so long ago. Each day a death.

In Winter I look to my Master and see Her mercy, the blade falls and another
victory for Her is made. The bitter blood of Her potency shatters my
morality but I show nothing. I had learned lifetimes ago that Her cruelty
will only be fed.

It started with a touch and a whispered story. I tell her I can be freed, I
can be won. Come back again in a year and a day. Fear me not, I am your baby
's Father. She can free me! I can once more feel warn golden light on my
face. Smell the rich fertile soil, groom and tend the roses of my families
glory. Bring the life back to Carterhaugh that was taken with that touch.

This AllHallows Eve I am to go to the Winter again. Again the fighting and
slaying. Again the smothering blood, the metallic bite of screams, the offal
of mortality smeared for entertainment. But I can be Free!

But I do this for myself, hollow reasons. Not Janet's. I am taking advantage
of her and She will have her revenge upon Janet. This in know in what is
left of my heart.

Morality. Honor. Empathy. Humanity. I thought myself dead. I thought my
heart withered and buried these many years ago. Springs milk flows again. I
can not sacrifice Janet for freedom.

I meet her as I promised. The night air is crisp, the moon but a sliver. I
give her gold to give our baby life. It is true gold, of the Mortal, not
Twilight. The tears of her soul bind me to lies. I have not the strength to
part with her this way. I tell her a story. Pull me into your arms. A
salamander, an adder. A bear, a lion. A swan, a steel bar burning. She will
make me all these. I will ride the Brown, my left hand gloved and I
fartherest from the town.

The next night, she saw through my story, my lies, to truth. She freed me.

It all started with a touch. I stood and watched as the harness tore.
Helpless.

"Shame betide her ill-far'd face," Spoke he Queen.

She fell. Fading breath, fading life. Our child with her to see not one sun.
Fading sighs, banshee cries.

"And an ill death may she die."

I am nothing again.

"Tell me Tamlin, did you savor the taste of freedom? An' did you think you
could be freed of Faerie and Myself so simply?"

Silver bells and crystal laughter.

It started with a touch...