Jane crept carefully down the cramped little tunnel, careful not to step on stray bones or trash, her ears straining to hear steps other than her own. The soft footfalls of her walking shoes seemed unbearably loud this far into the catacombs. She wondered, idly, if the steps were scaring off the very creatures that she had come to study.
It didn’t take too much to get Jane interested in a new subject. All one really had to do was provide a reasonable creature and a reasonable place to look. Her curiosity generally did the rest. She’d heard stories about things living down in the catacombs before; ghosts or vampires, hiding among the bones, dragging the unlucky down to dinner. Jane turned her light down a side passage and hummed. It seemed, at least for this section, the rumors were just that.
At least, that’s what she thought, until a thump of a footstep fell out of time with her own. Jane froze, her feet planted on the dusty floor, and listened. Nothing else seemed to be moving. Nothing she could hear at least. Jane cast her light around slowly, looking for any kind of reflection, any signs of less-than-human life.
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That girl thinks she’s the queen of the neighbourhood, she got the hottest trike in town...
Since coming to Paris, Grace always searched for a place to unwind, no crabby roommates or stuffy tutors at the orchestra. Just her and the drums. She’d always come into the pit after hours, when the sun was down and everyone would leave. People say that strange things happened at night, that it wasn’t safe to be in the Opera House alone. There were rumours of a vampire who stalked the halls. Vampires, bullshit.
That girl she holds her head up so high, I think I wanna be her best friend, yeah!
She played along to the track, she never got to let loose when she played for the house, classic music was so restrained, she held herself back and she despised it. She started to branch off, drumming on her own, creating riffs but still being perfectly in tune and time.
Rebel girl, rebel girl!
Rebel girl you are the queen of my world!
Rebel girl, rebel girl!
I think I want to take you home, I want to try on your clothes.
She kept going, and going, hitting her sticks onto drums and symbols, the rest of the world didn’t matter, whatever eyes were watching her went ignored... For now.
Those of a discrete nature often find themselves the subject matter of their own apprehension. That is to say, self degradation, the lack of confidence while living a life requiring substance of us all. Hope. Greed. Love. Loss. Desire. And, above all, will. The drive behind action, behind the very thoughts perceived of ourselves that conclude days with regret or accomplishment. Or nothing at all.
Tucked far away, hidden among the thick trees of a forest that has carried the same name for generations and years in between, stood a castle. Tall and firm, built of mighty stone by a mightier hand, with an open face that could be closed with such intimidation that the trees themselves threatened approach. Doom washed the overgrowing trail, thick with grasping weeds and tangled branches, nature’s warning. Stay away! Go no further! Woe to those who tread so far, as woe begot the lives trapped within the forest’s embrace.
No stories escaped the castle’s empty halls, nothing but what the wind whispered in a language none but the hushed leaves could comprehend. For there, locked away, behind stone, behind sorrow, lived a beast. Built in body like a man, but smeared in visage like an animal, his fur grew and tangled, hands tipped in claws that left their marks in tapestries and paintings, wood and stone alike. An animal’s face, behind which the vibrant, rich eyes beheld the man the beast once had been. Wrought in a man’s sorrow, a boy’s misunderstanding, and a creature’s quick rage, he sulked deep within the recesses of his castle, and his mind. Pondering the day that it might, perhaps, reach an end.
It all began in the heart of the man, only just stretching in his height out of boyhood, with eyes like the sky and a vision just as broad, his heart followed his head into the clouds, and there wasted his time and efforts, certain that his kingdom would fall as it should from father to son. Not a negligent boy, or young man, but his gaze remained lofty and unseeing, focused on his imaginings and not the reality his father the King, and mother the Queen so heavily tried to, in his mind, place as a burden upon his rightful wings. However much the Prince tried to dismiss them, words of wisdom, of truth, troubled his ideals, setting his course with questions and doubts, arguments and dichotomy. For a spell.
He grew, as did his ideals and firmness, plotting a course as he, as future king, saw befitting to his distant, unknown peoples. Insistent that his brand new path would guide his future kingdom into an era of grace and wealth for all--a path that, had he listened in his studies to the new tutor, who appealed to the Prince’s good and gentle nature to reconsider his history, would have revealed wholly faulty and unwholesome. Trust in his father and mother and the years they shared that the Prince had yet breathed. Yet his quiet stubbornness stood him stout against all teachings, against all warnings and wisdom. When at last the Prince had tested his wizened teacher to his last, the old man suddenly, in a bewildering spectacle, became young and tall, with eyes that bespoke of the true age that even his former visage could not fathom. The Prince, moved by the power and ability, was moved to listen then, pleading with the Wizard for all the wisdom he could contain, but the sorcerer spurned the Prince as the Prince had spurned his previous warnings.
And thus, with this flick of a wrist and the power in his voice, the Wizard beheld before him no longer a youth in the vigor of life, but a beast, twisted in the likeness of creatures the Prince had never before seen. The castle fell into eerie silence, broken only by the terrible scream of the Prince, frightened by his own malicious voice.
Until such a time as this--
That the youth shall learn the merits of wisdom in its many forms, from the broadest perspective to the simplest of truths, to glean knowledge from another without unwarranted debate, to exchange the most powerful and dreadful of trusts: the heart when it loves.
Only in such a time as this would the spell be broken. Or his form, as it is now, would forever remain.
The castle fell into disarray. Its servants, its guards, its court, his life slipped away, into the looking glass, to be viewed and longed for only when the Prince gazed into a reflective surface, and was in turned forced to gaze upon himself.
Fangs. Fur. An inhuman face. Mounting loathing and confusion locked behind the refusal to sway from his chosen path.
The Prince, after some time, when his temper at last shattered his forced calm, covered the mirrors, the armor, the shining wealth so that he might not ever again have to endure the glare of his failure. Locked himself, his birthright, his kingdom, and all of the decisions he no longer wanted to make away, never to be looked upon by another creature, another person, for the rest of his days...
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It warms my heart to know that you have arrived at your destination well and whole. I hope that you continue to do well against the cold in such a foreign-sounding place, though I imagine it is quite beautiful there as well. I look forward to hearing of more descriptions of the city and its colorful, hearty people, as well as if your search for your family traces yield wonderful results.
Perhaps if you can manage it, bring back a number of recipes of the food you most enjoy. I might be able to make renditions of them for you when you return. I should enjoy the challenge, I think.
All has been rather quiet here as of late, this evening, as I dictate to my mother the words I have for you, is no different. I must apologize profusely at the lateness of my response, but the winter months are always quite busy for a bakery, and have left us both quite worn at day's end. You will be glad to hear, however, that mother and I have agreed it would be best for the both of us that we hire on a few more hands. We can now afford it without worry, and look forward to helping whomever is willing to put into the work and effort of our modest company.
Your sister still resides at her future father-in-law's townhouse along with her future husband and their daughter. I regret to say that I've seen very little of Aisling, but know that she thrives with her extended family. I have heard that Erika and Colin plan to relocate into a house of their own within Paris, and I hope soon will announce their wedding. What has and has not been done until now I can no longer fault them for, though I do regret to admit that my judgement was cast unfairly too soon. Any who see them, or hear them, cannot help but be fascinated with their closeness and adoration. They have only done everything helplessly out of order.
But forgive me, I did not mean to bring such heaviness into a joyful correspondence, but this has been on my mind since you have gone.
A part of me, too, wishes that I could have seen, however little I can still see, so much snow in a single place. But perhaps we might still make such a journey sometime after you return. The mere thought stirs a longing inside me I once thought long gone. I thank you now for returning it to me, Erik, and I will thank you again next we see one another.
For now, be safe and warm, and may you find all that you have gone to discover.
Ramón no longer recalled the length of his incarceration.
Had he been caught before Christmas? Was it in the Fall? Did it really matter anymore? All that he did know was that his wife had visited yesterday. Or perhaps last week. The previous month...?
The grimace etched into his expression deepened as he surfaced from the haze of illness induced slumber. Hissing as he pushed his heels against the stone floor to lessen the ache in his shoulders. Arms shackled above his head--that he did know had happened right after Caolinn left--but unable to sit, whenever sleep overshadowed him Ramón dangled just off the floor like prized game.
And it pulled where he'd been stabbed as well--though he did not recall exactly when that had happened, only that he woke to the sudden sharpness, and has suffered all the more as the wound reopened again and again, now inflamed, well on its way to festering like the wounds he received from his beating.
That had also happened after Caolinn left. No...no, she came back for that. She watched them, their mercilessness. It had not surprised him, but they doubled their efforts just for her.
He was going to die in here, leave his wife and infant son behind. But the Captain would care for them. Carlito would ensure Armand did not capitalize on the young widow.
Ramón ought to have escaped by now, but what good would it do for him to bring home a fugitive order, causing them to flee. To hide. Stealing her from her family, her home. He would do it, if he could, but now...it was so difficult to stay awake. Far better to get lost in dreams drenched in peppermint and red and cream...
