Conversation Space IV.

[powersthatbe]

The small room is painted a dark beige, with stained wood paneling on the lower half, and lush burgundy carpeting. The ceiling, however, is cracked and bowed, sagging alarmingly, occasionally shedding chips of plaster. Wrought-iron lamp-posts in the corners suspend pale, wan globes of light, and between them along the walls run rows of painted sunflowers, all turned towards the center of the room as if listening attentively. A jutting spire of granite rises from the floor on a diagonal, its flattened top sporting a cracked wineglass from which the wine (a white) slowly spatters teardrops across the plinth. And there is no chair, but a therapist’s couch, blue with gold trim, and ornate scrollwork on the legs, beside which the fluted horn of a phonograph player pipes music into the room, quiet enough to just be background ambience.

Comments

[willyousee]

"I imagine very few have revealed their true names to their Chosen," he says, a touch dry. Brushing his fingertips down her cheek, he lets them progress to her throat and shoulder before trailing down to her hand. His hand curls gently beneath hers and their fingers lace neatly. "I only know one of yours from Riddick."

[iseethe]

"Do you wish to call me another?" she murmurs.

[willyousee]

"Perhaps. Perhaps not," he smiles. "I do not yet know my options. But one with as many faces and voices as you have must have names to go with them all."

[iseethe]

"LUNE. Luna. Diana. Yue. Sadly, 'Selene' has since been claimed by a far furrier being than I."

[willyousee]

He laughs, soft but merry. "Does that displease you, my lady?"

[iseethe]

"Why should it?" she says lightly, but there's a slight brittleness to her words.

[willyousee]

"Ah..." he sobers, contrite. "Ilargi, Artemis, Losna... Forgive me. I wonder if Thorne accidentally gifted her one of your names, or if she had taken it long before. I am sorry. It hurts, to lose a part of yourself."

[iseethe]

"I may take it back," she says. "If it sows confusion, sobeit. That is what I am too. If Little Miss I Have Many Names has done it, so might I."

She looks away from him. "I tired of this conversation track. Choose which you wish and let us speak of other matters."

[willyousee]

He has made her unhappy. Interesting. Not precisely what he had intended, but a datapoint nonetheless.

"Of course," he ascedes softly. "Will you sit? Or do you crave action?"

[iseethe]

"You can take action while sitting," she replies archly, but she takes a seat on the couch, reclining a la Helene.

[willyousee]

"Oh, I am aware, my lady," he says, settling in likewise and snuggling back against her instinctually. "Is that your preferred method? Sitting back and directing and letting events unfold? Was it your handsome rival who drew you out to dance?"

Resting his head against her shoulder, he sighs, a touch melancholy. "I miss that. Costumes and finery and mystery and dancing."

[iseethe]

A grey arm, silk over stuffing over porcelain, drapes over him. "Sol is handsome," she agrees. "Was that why you held a ball last year? Because you missed it? Psyche insisted on decorating the liminal for you. I might have gone for something a bit more elegant."

[willyousee]

She didn’t answer his question, he notices, but he doesn’t pursue it. “I would have preferred elegant, truthfully,” Alcuin smiles, laying his hand over hers and lightly lacing their fingers together. “I mentioned my longing to Lady Helena and she was enchanted by the idea. She thought to request a space of you, and Thorne came to her own conclusion as well. Which was more effective? The note or the, ah, large coding script I think she called it.”

[iseethe]

She chuckles. "I wouldn't want to ruin your lady's experiments. Tell me, Alcuin, she hasn't come between us, has she? Lover she may be, but I am still your patron."

She delicately wraps her ankle over his.

[willyousee]

He stretches sinuously against her, curling his foot about hers. "I do not know, milady. Do you believe she has? She may not be under your patronage, but do her goals fall so far outside your challenge to me?" his tone is one of idle speculation.

[iseethe]

"That depends on which goal," she murmurs back.

She undulates against his back. "I think," she breathes in his ear, "I shall give you a gift."

[willyousee]

He hums. "A gift? I am flattered. I can think of nothing which might be able to repay you, however."

[iseethe]

"You may repay me by continuing to be as exquisite an exemplar of my archetype as you have been since I saw you," she murmurs. "I do not think it will be difficult for you."

Another undulation against his back. "You would like to be able to know where my other Chosen are whenever you please, I think. One new one in particular."

[willyousee]

He half turns his head to glance at her through lowered lashes, raising their hands to his lips that he may kiss her knuckles. "I must be all but transparent to you, Lady Luna."

[iseethe]

She sighs at his courtly gesture. "Delightfully so. She kisses well, the Lady Melisande."

[willyousee]

"Yes," he murmurs just above a whisper, "she does. Nor is it her only skill. If you are collecting kisses from your Chosen, far be it from me to stop you... I cannot imagine you as anything but beautiful."

1/2

[iseethe]

"Well, then," she says, with a bit of throaty laughter. "Let me slip into something more mortal..."

2/2

[iseethe]

Alcuin will notice that the hand he is touching has become more like mortal flesh and less like silk covering porcelain, although it retains the same grey coloring.

"You may turn around now," she murmurs.

Re: 2/2

[willyousee]

With a fluid twist, he winds up on his back, legs still lightly tangled with hers, and gasps, real pleasure and wonder in his face. Slowly, carefully, giving her time to pull away, he reaches out to brush his fingertips along the curve of her cheekbone and down the line of her face. "Oh I knew I would be right. What a lovely face you've chosen, my lady," he breathes.

Re: 2/2

[iseethe]

"I'd hoped you would appreciate it," she says in a husky voice. She leans forward to brush her lips against his.