(Untitled)

[kira_galliard]

{Early Evening- Tuesday, 29th June ~ Day 394}
{Crossroads DanceHall}

Tonight I'm gonna have myself a real good time
I feel alive
And the world turning inside out, yeah
And floating around in ecstasy, so
Don't stop me now
Don't stop me
'Cuz I'm having a good time, having a good time

It is finally time to open the doors

Comments

[tezcatl_ipoca]

I am watching Valmont dancing with Hermia, and there is a sad sort of ache in my chest. Everything in confusing. It has all been stirred up again by meeting Gaueko. I don't want to be what I once was, before I was pulled apart and cobbled back together: I want to be only what has grown since then, the Micah who Valmont knows. But then there is Iblis. For her sake I wouldn't want to forget again. Once it would have been easier to move through all this, I think. I almost-remember it, thinking clearly.

There's punch, at least. Perhaps it will have alcohol in it. it won't make it easier to think, but it may make the feelings better.

[sapphira_ststep]

Coming off the floor for a drink, downstage and downtime, slipping through the lines of motion that shape the guests and crowd. It's a lovely night, I think, well worth wearing something bright, and I would like to come here again.

There are several other people moving towards the drinks as well, but the saddest is a--boy or a man, really, here and in this time it rather depends on him--moving alone and towards the punch, and I offer him the glass I've just poured for myself. "Evening," I say, smiling. "Excuse me, but you don't know Leah, do you?"

[tezcatl_ipoca]

Someone in a mask hands me a drink, and I blink down at it for a moment, and then back up at them. "Evening." They are smiling. I can't tell if it's real. "Excuse me, but you don't know Leah, do you?"

I think about it. "I don't think so. I'm sorry." At least it's easier to remember to apologise for things now, to be polite. I take a sip of the punch, and yes, there's alcohol in it. Good. "Thank you," I add, remembering.

[sapphira_ststep]

"I don't think so. I'm sorry," and I nod. He doesn't really look like her, but I look at the two and... Well. "Thank you," he adds.

"Oh, you're welcome," I say, pouring myself a drink. "Pardon my asking, you just reminded me of her... Couldn't say why." I shake my head and smile. "What do you think of the hall? I'm Sapphira, by the way."

[tezcatl_ipoca]

I look at the hall. It looks like...a hall? "It's busy," I say, because that's the main thing about it. Too many people and too much noise, though I like the music when I can hear it properly. "I like your mask," I tell her. It seems a sensible sort of thing. I'd like something that covered my face, I think, so that people couldn't look at me. Or couldn't see me if they did. It would be...restful, I think.

"--Micah," I say, as I remember. There was a moment there where I wasn't sure which name I would say.

[sapphira_ststep]

"It's busy," although not quite as grouchily as I'd expect an unhappy young man at a party to say. Usually there is a bit more spit and sulk to them, bad mood on edgy display. "I like your mask."

"Thank you," I say, reaching up to brush back feathers and hair. "I make them myself; it seemed as if tonight might be worth being in a brighter mood than usual." Oh, surely there are other ways to do it, and it's not as if the mask sets my mood, but it'd take a fool to know about them and think they couldn't change things.

Move on to introductions and: "--Micah," he says, almost smoothly, and I tilt my head to one side, shift a little; gesture to match the expression of a raised eyebrow.

"Really? Alright, then," I say. "Micah it is. Have you been in Excolo long?"

[valmont_vicomte]

I leave Hermia and walk to where Micah is talking with an elegant woman wearing a mask. I've seen her in town, I think; the mask-wearing habit is fairly distinctive.

"Good evening," I say, giving her a little bow. "Valmont Laclos. Micah, I hate to interrupt, but could I speak with you when you have a free moment?"

[sapphira_ststep]

"Good evening," a rather well-put-together gentleman says, joining us. Fine manners and step and a courtesy that I return, although the corners of his eyes are tucked a very little with worry. "Valmont Laclos."

"Sapphira St-Stephens, m'sieu," I say lightly.

"Micah, I hate to interrupt, but could I speak with you when you have a free moment?" and I dip my head a little, step back and aside. Not out of the circle of conversation, yet, but enough to break aside gracefully. I suppose they could be related, although I wouldn't imagine it was close; cousins, parhaps, or half-brothers at closest.

[tezcatl_ipoca]

I smile at Valmont: he's left Hermia and come to me. "Do you want to dance?" I ask him. "I don't remember very well, and my foot is sore, but I can try." I can hear the hopefulness in my own voice.

[valmont_vicomte]

There's a French lilt to what she says, a familiar sort of cadence, and it makes me smile a little.

"Enchanté, madame," I say.

"Do you want to dance?"

"Um, perhaps later," I say. Because that's what my reputation needs, the town seeing me dance with a teenage peeping tom. "I would like to speak to you for a moment, though. About - your girlfriend."

[tezcatl_ipoca]

"Um, perhaps later." My smile fades a little. "I would like to speak to you for a moment, though. About - your girlfriend."

There are two thoughts, then, that come at once: that this is somehow about what happened with Wanda or my conversation with Hermia and Lucien; and that he knows who she is. One is from my Micah-self, the other from the self-that-was-Tez. Is Tez, however much it doesn't wish to be.

"Alright," I say, like it doesn't matter. "She's not here," I add. Not in any of her forms, that I've seen.

[valmont_vicomte]

"She's not here," he says, and "good," I reply, a little too firmly. Not the best start. I sigh and run my hand through my hair. "Excuse us a moment, Ms St Stephen?" I draw Micah aside. "Perhaps we should sit down," I say, and find us a seat in a quieter corner of the room. "I'm not sure how to tell you this, Micah," I say, "so perhaps I had better just come out with it at once. Danika is... not a farm girl. Or a girl at all, really. She's - something very old, and dangerous, and cruel."

[tezcatl_ipoca]

I look at him for a long time. I wish I didn't have to do this. I think perhaps I'm memorising his face, his expression, this last time he looks at me and sees only Micah. My chest hurts.

"...So am I," I say at last, still looking at him steadily, and then I look down at my hands, because it's too much, I can't bear to see his expression change. "I - remembered. I'm sorry, Valmont. I should have told you before." My fingers knot themselves together hard. "I'll leave, if you want." I don't want to. I want to hold onto him. But I'm not just Micah any more, I'm not a child. I've done far harder things than this, haven't I?

[valmont_vicomte]

"You remembered what?" I say, quite gently. He looks so very sad, and I feel - strangely afraid.

[tezcatl_ipoca]

I don't want to talk about it here. But I owe it to Valmont, I think. His voice is kind, and I manage to look up, just briefly

[valmont_vicomte]

I... don't understand. I knew there was something different about Micah - special, and strange - but this...

"You threw me out of the Whitechapel, once. The old me. But I loved her then - Danika - and I still do. I know what she is, Valmont."

I stare at him for a long time.

"Tez?" I say at last. My voice is a croak.