Charyou Tree. Come Reap.

[notwithmyhand]

Life for you, life for your cropIt was night, and the moon had come up as Alain walked back to New Gilead, whistling Careless Love in a strangely melancholy key. The Demon Moon hung there full in the sky, and as had been his habit as a boy, he did not look up at it, superstitious of ghosts, demons, and all thing other worldly. And small wonder too

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[ifsogirl]

Their hands, she sees now, are painted red. She can't look away from the flames, even though Alain tells her not to look in the first, because there's something beyond horrifying about it. Horrifying the same way it had been when she'd found The End of the Game in the Compound. The thing she'd never burned, because she'd never had the heart to do so.

It's Red. Ilse licks her lips, firelight flickering in her eyes as a shiver goes down her spine, making her feel a little sick because of its contrast with the heat off the fire. She hadn't meant to make light of it, and when she gets her wits back about her she looks at Alain with a worried fascination. Bits and pieces of stories are filtering back to her, stories that she remembers from so many months ago, nearly a year, when she'd been fresh and recovering and leaning on him every day for his support. He'd hinted at things, and she'd always thought there was more to it than what he'd allowed. He'd only ever told her the good stories.

She forces herself to take a step toward him. She doesn't like the look on his face, she doesn't like it at all. Ilse lays a hand on Alain's arm tentatively, ready to pull away if he gave the slightest inclination. "Everything's okay," she hears herself say, her voice a whole lot more sure of itself than she actually feels inside.

[notwithmyhand]

As she laid her hand on him, he didn't flinch but looked at her face again as she spoke. He gave her a wry pained smile and shook his head. "You know that's a lie, Ilse. That is far from the truth and that," he said, shrugging his head and shoulders to indicate the bonfire, "Ought not to be here at all," he said.

All at once his mind went reeling back to a conversation he'd had about a month ago. That conversation had neither begun nor ended well. In that same moment of remembrance, he was almost certain that someone had done this, but he wasn't sure how that could be.

He shook his head and gave her an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, Ilse. This isn't easy for me to see. Gods forbid Bert come and see it," he said, brushing a hand up through his curls.

Strangely enough, the thought of a person being behind it had calmed him somewhat. He liked the idea of a mortal man, or something like it, much better than he liked the idea of the magic that seemed to infest the place.