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Post by angeloftheodd on Nov 27, 2009 0:11:23 GMT
Dante followed her eyes toward the door
It had become apparent that this was not going as planned. Not that this had been the least bit pre-meditated and therin lay the problem.
"Kali please I wouldn't. Just no. The clocks stopped on your command. You did that."
He took a step back.
"Be logical. I never got a chance to... do anything like that. It's called the awakening. I know now that you have felt, seen, dreamed strange things and maybe always have. Now it will start to make sense.."
With a sigh he ran a hand through his hair and let his hand rest, cradling the back of his head.
"I can explain it all if you give me the chance."
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Post by madfruitbat on Nov 27, 2009 22:32:22 GMT
Kali decided that the door was too far away, and too many objects littered her path, for her to chance running for it. He'd stepped back, rather than towards her, and she breathed a tiny sigh of relief.
Maybe if I can just keep him talking, someone else will come in and I can leave that way...
She didn't move any closer, and simply raised her hand, palm outwards, showing off the blackened flesh. "Ok," she said, using all the self control she possessed to keep her voice even. "How about you start by explaining this? "
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Post by angeloftheodd on Nov 27, 2009 23:01:31 GMT
"About that..."
Well I guess it's pretty logical to be pissed off about that. Not an easy one to hide either
"That would be a symbol of Time."
He paused a moment to reflect on what he had just said.
"Yeah ok it's a clock so you know that already, but it being in your palm is a sign of mastery over it you see."
Dante suddenly pined for times long passed. Sure they were full of smallpox and perpetual war, but people still had wonder. Modern skepticism just made life infinitely harder.
"It's a rune. It can act as a focus for what you can do, let's the others know who you are and when you really need it reminds you who you are. If you are having a hard time believing that, don't ask how it got there."
This will be a long evening
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Post by madfruitbat on Nov 27, 2009 23:40:01 GMT
He's talking in riddles again...
Kali lowered her arm, closing her fingers around the brand, and sighed. "With all due respect Dante, I know who I am. My name is Kali Anne McKinnon. I study Science, Maths, History; tangible, real things. Things that are measurable, things that happened. I know what I can do, I don't need physical damage to my skin to focus me, thank you very much."
She turned her head away, cradling her injured hand in the good one. "I don't need help believing anything. What I need is help understanding." She raised her gaze, locking her eyes onto his. "I don't understand what's happened here this evening. I don't understand what I've seen, or what I did. I don't understand you." She tried to look away again, but something compelled her to keep staring into his tired eyes.
"Who are you?"
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Post by angeloftheodd on Nov 28, 2009 0:20:02 GMT
"Kali."
He sighed.
"All things are immeasurable until you find a means by which to measure them"
Such resolve.
"Your understanding will grow with time. Sorry I couldn't let you know what was going on before."
He was conscious that she held his eyes but couldn't resist continuing to stare deep within. He yearned for the spirit he knew lay beneath them.
"But you know who I am. Dante Tiresias. I have a mark too, only not quite the same as yours. I we met long ago and the fact you are still here, I think it means a part of you still knows me."
Every fibre of his being wanted to reach out, hold her in the hope that something deep within her would return how he felt, but he couldn't be sure.
He sighed and whispered under his breath. "Oh Lilly..."
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Post by madfruitbat on Nov 28, 2009 2:01:20 GMT
I'm 17, I don't do 'long ago'...
"Tell me before? You still haven't told me what's going on now!" Kali could feel her frustration rising again.
The room was warm, and the pull holding her gaze onto his was growing stronger. Despite herself, Kali felt her mind begin to drift again. The room around her swayed and fell away, the steady tick of the grandfather clock the only thing remaining constant.
She stared around her. The room felt smaller than the lounge, and was much darker, but a fire burning in the grate gave off some light, enough to see a mirror fixed to the wall. She walked towards it, and looked. The face staring back wasn't her own, and yet could just as easily have been. She ran her fingers through the short dark hair, and the eyes staring back at her glittered, reflecting the light of the flames.
"Lily?" a voice called from somewhere behind her. She turned to answer it, and saw a figure, a man, standing just outside the light of the fire. She smiled, and walked towards him, raising her hands to take his as she reached him.
Kali blinked at the sudden change in light as the lounge rematerialised around her. She still held Dante's eyes and, without really understanding why, other than knowing with a certainty she couldn't explain that it was the right thing to do, she walked towards him and took his hands, just as the woman in the dream had done.
"You're right," she whispered, hating herself for believing the dream was real, hating herself for failing to understand it. "I do know you, I just... don't know how. It's there, somewhere. I just can't reach it."
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Post by angeloftheodd on Nov 29, 2009 0:13:20 GMT
Her touch spread through his fingers, down his palms a into every facet of his being. It was a wave of warmth, washing away the melancholy chill which had possessed him so long. He knew it wouldn't last, nothing it this world did, but for the time being it was enough.
He clasped her hands as gently but firmly as he could and gently kissed her brow.
"The spirit within you has lived many lives, in your last, as Lilly, you loved me... and I, Dante, you. We saw the world together, accomplished great things and died with me by your side."
He looked deep into her eyes, clutching their hands to his chest.
"You have so much power and so many memories. I want to help you remember. Will you let me?"
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Post by madfruitbat on Nov 30, 2009 13:59:59 GMT
The point on Kali's forehead where Dante had kissed her burned as if he'd held a match to it. The rational part of her mind was screaming, trying to force her to stop listening, to pull away, to shout for help. He surely must be mad with his talk of past lives, seeing the world, and loving a man she'd only known the name of for half an hour.
But something was overriding it. Images from her dreams, the vivid intense dreams she'd had for years but never told anyone about, were flooding back into her mind, and one stood out more clearly than the rest. She was standing in the arms of a man whose face she'd never seen. Kali had never been in love, but was certain that the feelings she'd experienced in this dream were the closest she'd ever come.
What if they're not dreams?
Kali returned Dante's deep stare and spoke softly, but surely. "I'll let you. Please help me remember."
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Post by angeloftheodd on Nov 30, 2009 23:52:07 GMT
"Thank you..."
Keeping hold of one hand, part out of reassurance and part to be certain she wouldn't sprint for the exit, Dante reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew a folded tattered scrap of paper.
Carefully it unfolded into a photo. frayed, creased and monochrome but a photo all the same. He had taken less care with this picture than others he had, through the years this had become almost a talisman to safeguard his sanity.
He placed it carefully into the hand he had just freed.
"You may recognize the handsome fellow, but the lady you know better than anyone."
The picture showed Dante, better presented, with longer hair and in tails, but Dante all the same. He held hands with his beloved outside a large Victorian manor house.
"Commit their faces to memory, the pose, the place. Imagine how the world sounded, the air tasted..."
The risk of this didn't elude him, but if it was the only way to convince her, so be it. With his other hand he traced around the symbol of the clock with his finger.
"Picture the sigil on your palm as you reach out toward them..."
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Post by madfruitbat on Dec 1, 2009 14:02:20 GMT
Kali stared at the photo. She could tell from the look of it how time had taken its toll on the picture, but for one of its occupants the years seemed barely to have known him. Dante, although better presented than now, had barely changed, even though the photo had to have been taken the better part of 100 years before.
She turned her attention to the woman, and was instantly reminded of the face in the mirror, the one that moved as she did, running her hands through her hair, tilting her head in time with Kali's own movements.
Surely it can't be...
Kali closed her eyes, still focusing in her mind on the figures in the photo, trying to bring them to life. Without releasing Dante's grasp, she ran the tips of her fingers over the sigil on her palm. The clock suddenly blazed into life over the faces in her mind's eye, obliterating all thought, all vision, all else.
As Kali opened her eyes, the first thing she became aware of was that Dante's hand was no longer in hers. In fact, he was nowhere to be seen in the room, which had once more become the fire-lit space in which she'd seen Lily's face in mirror. The fire burned brighter this time, illuminating the room in greater detail. It resembled what she imagined a typical Victorian drawing room to look like, with chairs, sofas and small tables littering the space, and ornate rugs covering the wooden floor.
Kali became aware of another consciousness fighting her for head space. She allowed herself to fall back, to simply observe.
---
Lily settled herself back on the softest sofa in the room, Granted with the Victorian furniture she'd insisted on sticking with there wasn't a lot of choice between this and any other, but it was something. Her back ached, especially in the cold, and the drawing room had always been her favourite room in which to unwind. It was comfortable, warm, inviting. The only problem with it was that damn mirror, which she'd kept meaning to take down, or at least turn to face the wall. The last thing she needed was yet another reminder of time's persistent march, and her own mortality.
Not that it's of much consequence any more...
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Post by angeloftheodd on Dec 1, 2009 20:25:47 GMT
Dante felt the grain of the wood, every contour, crack and splinter against his fingers as his hand slid impotently down the door. He had begun with the simple intent to open it, but couldn't muster the strength, not knowing what lay beyond.
I cannot fight it, I cannot parley with it. For all my power, for all my knowledge and years I can do nothing.
Finally easing the door wide he strode through. As he brushed slowly past the ornate furniture he let his senses savour the crackle of logs on the fire and the warmth that washed over him in waves.
I will forget nothing of this night.
As he stopped a moment he regarded himself in the mirror. He wore his finest suit, A purple double breasted tailcoat in velvet and black cravat.
As he looked a moment into the eyes of his reflection he could swear another man stared back. The world span and for a moment he felt as though drifting from his physical being, like a helium balloon cut loose from its string. All at once this vertigo peaked and subsided.
Crossing the chamber he knelt beside sofa and stroked the hair of the figure who reclined upon it.
"Are you awake my darling?"
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Post by madfruitbat on Dec 3, 2009 23:33:28 GMT
Lily smiled without opening her eyes. "Yes, just relaxing for a moment." She finally flickered them open, looked for a second deeply into Dante's eyes, then moved her attention to his attire.
"You look smart. I always did think that colour suited you perfectly." The smile, although fixed to her lips, faded slightly from Lily's eyes. "Not that you need to dress up for me, hardly a special occasion or anything." She gave a small laugh, hoping it sounded vaguely mirthful, or at least more so than it sounded in her head.
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Post by angeloftheodd on Dec 7, 2009 20:35:19 GMT
As Lily laughed, Dante tried a weak best to smile. The emptiness of it struck into his heart like a dagger.
"You always look so beautiful. This..."
He gestured down at his attire
"Is all I can do to keep up."
As he leaned in closer to encircle an arm around her, he breathed deep and paused a moment to take in her scent. Beneath perfume and clothing and the other trappings of this world, her scent was the same, as intoxicating as the day they met.
It's like we're... she's... we're young again.
"Tonight is so many kinds of special and this is for you."
With a theatrical flourish something fell from his sleeve and hung from his finger, swaying and glistening in the candlelight. It was a pocket watch in silver, with a face in flawless pearl and an amethyst lilly set into the back.
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Post by madfruitbat on Dec 7, 2009 21:48:34 GMT
Lily cuddled up to Dante, the closeness of his arm about her warming her in a way that the fire could never begin to. She smiled in delight as, with a flick of his wrist and a flash of silver, the pocket watch appeared out of nowhere. As she focused on it, taking in every detail, her hand flew to her lips, almost startled by the beauty of the piece. She reached out and gently took hold the swinging disk. For a few seconds she watched the hands tick round, tracing their movement with her eyes, before turning it over, and gazing at the lily set into the back of it, the stone shining with tiny pinpricks of purple light.
"Dante..." she began, struggling to find the right words to express the myriad of emotions flooding through her. She brought her face close to his and simply whispered, "Thank you," before pressing her lips to his.
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Post by angeloftheodd on Dec 7, 2009 22:05:34 GMT
Dante held the kiss as long as he was able, drinking deeply the softness of her lips and the warmth of her breath against his skin. Suddenly eternity didn't seem so long, he wished he could live this one moment forever.
"It's Britannia silver, you wouldn't believe the trouble I... Y'know its worth it all just to see you happy."
One last time.
The words were unspoken but resounding.
He held her closer.
"I Love you my Lillian, I truly do."
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