Out, Damned Spot [Keara]

[Peter Parkman]

Peter nodded. Never had he had a ritual done on him before, but it was yet another thing to experience, right? It’s why he was torn about this new life. Some nights – like tonight – he hated it. It brought with it a whole new deluge of different nightly problems to deal with. Major things, too. Not just the little things. A routine was harder to get settled into, though Peter had done his best—drifting between the Cabin and the Asylum, never crossing any bridges or running water, with the Animal Rescue residing somewhere in between. The tome was handy, as were the portals. At least this way he could pass over to the other side of the city without physically having to cross water. If there was any pain, it was only brief. A twitch in his physical being as it came back to rest in the physical world.

Some nights, however, he relished the new discoveries. Some of the things that he himself was capable of—it was like he was living in one of his comic books, and though he was divided about that, too (how can one escape reality when reality itself had become the world into which one had previously escaped?) more often than not, he delighted in learning new things.

Of course, this was contradictory. One couldn’t stick to a proper routine while continually learning new things, but Peter did try. Oh, how he tried.

He was distracted, momentarily, by Keara’s comment on the room. His head lifted and his gaze drifted lovingly over the spines of all the tomes lining his walls. He re-arranged them all the time, depending on his mood. Sometimes by the date they were published, sometimes by author, sometimes by title. Sometimes by a whole different range of categories known only to him. But the entire room is set up to his own specification and no one else can come in and mess it up. At least, he didn’t think that they would. Although he knew there were family members who did steal, without care or thought, he hoped that none were malicious enough to break in and mess with his system.

He almost perked up.

”There are probably some in here that are as old as you are,” he said. And then he stood—as if Keara had inadvertently broached a subject that made him forget all about the night’s previous woes. ”When… what was your favourite book? I can… maybe I have it. Or maybe I can track it down for you. A first edition,” he said. Though his lips were not smiling, his eyes were—his fingers touching upon one of the spines as he turned, expectantly, to hear Keara’s answer.

[Keara Aithne]

Keara nodded. She didn't doubt that texts from her time had survived to this day, she even had a couple of her own diaries that Epsilon's family had kept safe and returned to her when he had found her in the city. It was like looking into a window of time every time she sat to read the words they contained. Most of the pages contained her own thoughts but there were a few entries written by Ven and Nevaeh too. She didn't look to those often though as it still didn't seem right to read their thoughts.

"A favourite book perhaps have I do not. Not from when I child was. Literature a little different then was. And stories told were by mothers and players upon the stage. While read more I did in before the realm me did claim, possessions to a minimum we kept. Often read I did what available to me was. Like I do the texts of Shakespeare. When read that I do, recall I can a night that I in the Globe Theatre was. Very exciting that was."

The conversation had moved on and Keara was happy to let it move away from the events that had occurred earlier that evening, as peter seemed to relax a little more. If he wished her to do the ritual, she was sure they would find the time; not that Peter need be there when it was performed. In fact, even if Peter didn't request the ritual, Keara was considering doing it for him anyway as she didn't want to see him go through anything like this again. Just because he had the ability to sire, didn't mean that he would or had to, it would just allow him the freedom to choose if he ever found himself in that sort of situation again, even if she did hope to Nox that that would never happen.

"Power there is in a performance. Think you that not? That is why enjoy I do for films with your father to watch. The stories varied and interesting are. Though oddly found I have that while plays best performed are, films from books loose something do. Of course not ever film a book has."

Entertainment in this era wasn't really all that different from her age, not really. Stories were still narrated and books were still written only people had become lazy. Performances were rarely given live, much was recorded and quite a lot of it was enhanced through the use of computers. Keara had marvelled at it all even before she met Enver. The night he cleared a theatre for her was the first time she'd ever actually watched a movie on the big screen and she'd thoroughly enjoyed it; which as probably a good thing given his chosen profession. She wasn't sure if she could love him without loving movies too, they were after all an important part of his life. Thoughts of Enver stole her mind and Keara soon came to rest, one arm resting upon a shelf as she looked out at nothing in particular.

[Peter Parkman]

The tactile feel of the books beneath his fingertips was a comfort to Peter. As if somehow they transmitted to him their staying power; their strength. They had survived centuries, and could survive centuries more. Even if the leather or the pages weren’t that old, the words inside were. Words written by hands that lived more than two thousand years prior. The possibilities opened up before Peter, crowding his mind’s eye. Books often had the ability to transport Peter in this way; to think that he could live two thousand years, that he would be able to see which books would prevail. What modern works have the ability to survive?

He would never make it that far if he remained as delicate as he seemed to be. If the smallest instances could bring him down like a sack of rocks to the bottom of a river, how could he hope to be able to stand up to the centuries? Peter cleared his throat and nodded, focusing on the conversation at hand. He could feel a stirring of passion; history, and books. Two of his favourite things.

”Well of course. Shakespeare was written with the intention of performance so of course the performance would be powerful. What I love about Shakespeare is how each person can interpret the text in a different way. How each performance can bring something new to the text. The text itself is always growing and changing beyond what the original author might have intended,” he said.

”I prefer books to movies, though. I don’t watch much. Maybe I don’t like watching other people’s interpretations of things that I love. Movies are… they’re a passive experience, aren’t they? You sit and you watch and you allow the actors to tell you a story in a way that a director dictates. But when you’re reading the book yourself, you can find your own meaning. You can make it look and feel like you want it to look and feel, not how someone else tells you to,” he said.

Since being sired, he had learned that Enver was something of a famous entity, but Peter had never recognised him. That was how much Peter watched movies. Peter smiled, then—a far sight better than what he had been only half an hour beforehand. His gaze immediately drifted across the expanse of his bookshelf, knowing exactly where his Shakespeare tomes were kept. He moved over to them now.

”Which play was your favourite?” he asked.

[Keara Aithne]

Keara could agree that performances changed from company to company as each actor tried to play their own version of their character. Of course then a company was very small and people often played several parts, so you had to watch for the costume changes and props at times in order to know who was who. She nodded, but her mind never fully cleared of her husband. She knew Enver had worked on a number of productions but couldn't recall if he'd ever trod the boards in any Shakespeare play. Of course it wasn't difficult for her to imagine him in any sort of masculine role, as to her he was the epitome of masculinity; even if she was the fighter in their relationship.

"My favourite play?"

The question was asked but it wasn't verbalised to gain clarification on what he said as much as it bought her a little extra time to consider the question itself. She could recall seeing several plays in her lifetime and she had to pick through her memories to see which of the plays she liked above all others.

"Titus Andronicus," she announced without a single note of doubt. "Quite intriguing found I did that play. And gruesome for our time it was. For the sons to the mother in a pie to serve. Most shocking that was. Though my favourite character from another play does come. Portia her name was and found she is in The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. Interesting she was for she burning coal did consume for herself to kill. Much discipline think I do that take must. Think you that not?"

There was a disturbing amount of admiration for the character in Keara's voice as she spoke of how the woman took her life. It was perhaps telling that she could idolise such a character. Enver would have easily been able to draw a parallel between the two women given a half a moment to think on the subject as Keara was quite the fan of self-mutilation; it was perhaps the one aspect that she considered he might change about her given the chance. He seemed to hate to watch her cut herself or drive her dagger deep into her flesh, and yet it was such a common occurrence that he possibly should have grown accustomed to it by now.

"Do you a favourite play have?"

It wasn't an afterthought to ask him which of Shakespeare's works he might prefer. She had intended to ask him, if only to gain a little insight into who he really was. Her own choices were so telling that there was no way, in her mind, that it could not be. Though her take on the plays might be a little different to most, what with having lived in the age in which they were written. They were like sitcoms in some ways as they were a product of their time and some of the jokes were so specific to the culture that you could only truly appreciate them if you of that age.

[Peter Parkman]

Peter did find it interesting to know the reasons why Keara’s favourites were her favourites. Even though she had asked him a question, he was still silent for a while as he stared at the books on the shelf. It might look as if he were thinking about it, as if he were unsure what his favourite was. Instead, he was thinking about Keara’s answers. The expression on his face—the one that Keara would not be able to see, as he half had his back turned to her—was a frown of consternation. She was one of those people, then, who must love horror movies. One play being her favourite for its shock value, and the other her favourite because a woman was able to swallow a lump of coal in order to kill herself. It was morbid.

But, here was a woman who liked to call those close to her ‘darkling’. One who was never shocked by violence, but instead seemed to condone it. A shiver ran down Peter’s spine and he tried not to think on it too much more. He tried not to think about the fact that the woman behind him, currently in this place of comfort, should scare him. Might even begin to scare him if he continued to think about it. So he didn’t. His long fingers settled upon a thin leather tome, which slid with a swish from between its brothers. He took it over to Keara.

”Romeo and Juliet,” he said, and then paused. Maybe Keara would begin to think that Peter was some die hard romantic, but it wasn’t the case. Not at all.

”The first Shakespeare we ever get to know, as children. The main one. The one that seems to have been re-adapted over and over. Why that one? Out of all the numerous plays that Shakespeare wrote, why is Romeo and Juliet the one that has captured everyone so much? I’m interested in the history of it…” he said. Of course, his favourite had nothing to do with the story or with the characters within it. It had only to do with the historical aspect. The historical repercussions. The affect those repercussions have on the modern world. And how long would they last?

Why is that story one that lasts through the ages? Why do any of them? Why do people keep coming back to them, rather than create new stories? There was something timeless about them. But, Romeo and Juliet the most.

[Keara Aithne]

Romeo and Juliet. Of course she was familiar with that play, though she never understood it before. Not until now that was. Since her return from the shadow realm she'd had more important things to consider, than re-evaluating what she thought she knew before. Though to be fair she would have had no appreciation for the play even then, it was only with Enver in her life that she able to understand that love that strong wasn't just something from the twisted, overactive imagination of playwright. Of course she assumed it was the romantic notions that drew her son in, even if she did understand his appreciation for history. Peter was a sensitive soul, or so she believed, so it wasn't difficult for her to believe that he might be drawn to the romance of it.

"Understood that play until this moment I did not. For thought of it in an age I have not," she admitted. "Confess I must, that thought I did that kind of love impossible. Know I do not, if told you I have, that I once before married was. But our love quite different was. Question now I do if it really love was. Though that perhaps silly is. Love many forms may take. Love you I do. You my childe are. That natural is. And he my sire was. Much respect had I for him. Loving him too natural was. And shared myself with him I did not. Could not. Forbidden that was."

She was probably over sharing, as Peter had no need to know of hers and Ven's relationship, and yet in a way he did kind of need to understand that she'd felt love before, that she'd been marred and that she'd never felt a fraction of what she now felt with Enver.

"Indescribable the love is that feel I do for your father. If I my former self could meet. If try I could for it to myself to explain, for to describe how feel I one day would, believe myself I would not. No sense then did it make for one’s life to take, for the death of an another. That quite irrational to me did seem. Love such devotion does not deserve, or so believed I did. Though understand that now I do. Without Enver, chose I would not for in this realm to stay. He my life is. Without him..."

Her words broke off as she thought about how best to finish that sentence but there was no finishing it. Without him there was nothing. Of course she had other duties, other loves, she knew that. If Enver were to die, she would still have her family, still have Peter and yet, as sad as it might seem, that would no longer be enough. Her family didn't need her; at least she didn't think they did. They wouldn't suffer in her absence. In fact without Enver at her side to ground her, they might be a damn sight better off without her, as her grip on reality would likely shift once again. She didn't want to become the broken woman she'd been before and knew that if she regressed, she would likely be the worse for it because a part of her would be missing.

"Without him, exist now I cannot."

[Peter Parkman]

Peter blinked at Keara.

He should have expected this. He should have calculated ahead of time that mentioning a play like Romeo and Juliet would trigger some explanation about Keara’s love life. Even though he had explained that his fascination with the play had nothing to do with romance, Keara discussed romance anyway. Peter cringed, and took the book back. Snatched it, almost.

There was a whole other life that Peter had lived and even then he had wondered whether it was a lie. They had medicated him so that he was more ‘normal’, so that he met society’s standards. And he had thought that he was in love, then, but he lost her. He had lost her, and his unborn child. Had he grieved enough? Keara said that she could not exist without Enver, but here Peter was, existing. He hadn’t loved Lily like that, then, had he? Couldn’t have. It was only seven months later, approximately, that Peter had met Jersey.

Could he love Jersey the same, or was there some latent grief that he hadn’t yet completely succumbed to? Would no woman ever match Lily? Or was he deficient in some way? He did love Jersey, he did. He reminded himself that he did, and if she left him there would be a hole in his life that he would struggle to fulfil. Was it the same kind of love that Keara had for Enver? It wasn’t particularly something that he wanted to test.

”Love is an unexplained chemical reaction in our brains,” he said. He did not believe that it had anything to do with the heart, or the soul. Did he?

”To live only for the purpose for loving someone else – that can’t be all that we’re built for. There are other things. Other people. Other purposes,” Peter said, slipping the tome back in amongst its friends. Except, now that he was looking at his wall of books, he thought that they needed rearranging. They were due for a shuffle. For a new system. As if trying to convince himself of that other purpose that he spoke of, he began to pull all the books off, one by one, from the top corner and working his way right. He brought a pile of them over to the desk. He’d figure out how he’d put them back as soon as he had pulled them all off.

It had been a long night. The aftershocks of Peter's recent experiences were still present--his control of his emotional state was tenuous, at best.

[Keara Aithne]

“Belittle love you do for so to speak. Seeking you are for the science of magic. Some things explained should not be.”

She placed her hand on Peter’s shoulder and squeezed it gently. He was setting about the task of pulling all of his books from the bookshelf and while she didn’t understand what it was that he was seeking to do, she did realise that it was best to stand back and let him continue.

"Oh but of course darkling. Many reasons there are for to live if seek only you do but a purpose for content to be. Purpose had I did in my former life. No such purpose have I here. Begun I have to believe that you all my purpose are. That here I am for my blood to others to give. For to help with our race back from extinction to bring. Well. That. And for your father to meet. Here I am for him also. Know that I do. He Nox's plan for me is. Certain of that I am. Wait you cannot some four hundred years, return from death when that all but impossible is and not believe this to be true when find you do the one to whom belong you do. No other design can there be. Died I had to for him to meet. For here to be, when here he came."

Keara firmly believed this too, that Enver was her destiny and that everything she'd ever done had lead her here to be with him. Even her first marriage was designed to lead her here to Harper Rock, as without Ven she would have been mortal, she would not have joined his guild, she would not have fought for what was right and she would not have travelled to distant lands on quests that were of great importance to her and her kind. Ven had been instrumental in shaping who she was. She was always a survivor at heart but he taught her everything she needed to know to be able to endure time. Thanks to him, she had a cold determination about her until the day she died; something that kept her safe in the shadow realm and prolonged her life, so that she might one day return. Not that she knew that, that would ever be possible. Through Enver however, she had softened somewhat. He didn't teach her to survive, he taught her to live, to love, to feel. He was everything that was good in her life and that was why she knew she wouldn’t be able to survive without him. To many, the loss of sunlight upon turning was something to grieve and yet Keara had missed it not, but then she wasn’t about to compare Enver to sunlight, he was infinitely more than that. He was her anchor, the world on which she stood. He was her senses and without him she could not and never would be whole. Could she explain this t peter and make him understand? Could she explain it to anyone?

“Silly you think me. Yes? For such things to say. For such things to believe.”

[Peter Parkman]

Peter shook his head. For a time he was silent, making sense of Keara’s words as he re-arranged them in his head. His head felt heavy, thick with things that he did not believe, that requirement for order and knowledge foremost, pushing back any notion of magic or of fate. They were like germs in his brain, and his body was fighting to protect him from them.

Though of course, he would not say this to Keara. He would tell her so bluntly that he thought that any magic was only science that was not yet explained. Regardless of the fact that they were immortal and that there was a purgatorial realm from which they could return from death; regardless of the fact that their blood could perform healing miracles or that there were certain abilities that they were capable of that Peter might never have deemed possible, he still steadfastly believed that there was some kind of explanation. It was why he started his historical journal; a front, to try to research their history. To find out everything that there was to know.

Perhaps Keara was right. Perhaps love was some kind of chemical reaction that began before anyone was even born. Perhaps there was such a thing as souls splitting, and those two halves drift through time, lost until they find each other again. Maybe that longing brings them together, somehow, and the path etched is what they like to call fate.

But it was all a bit too far-fetched in Peter’s opinion. He liked to know things. He liked to be able to touch them, to smell them and see them, to taste them. And in that moment of physical reaction he would know that it was true and real, and he would believe in it.

”I don’t think you’re silly. I think you believe in fate and Nox. Where I believe in order and clarity and knowledge. That’s not to say that you don’t believe in order and clarity and knowledge, but you have higher priorities,” he said slowly, not losing his focus on the books that he continued to unstack. The dust swirled in eddies around them; hidden dust that had settled between the books and upon the pages. It almost looked magical, the way it danced on the waves of heat. But that was all physics, the heat of the fire causing the atmosphere to shift and waver. It wasn’t magic. It was reality.

[Keara Aithne]

Keara stepped closer to her son, momentarily interrupting his process. She didn't want to keep him from his task but neither did she want to leave without giving him a proper goodbye. She was sure that his mental state, for the most part, had stabilised and that now he just needed to work through his issues in his conscious mind. She took a hold of both his hands and smiled at him.

"Going I am for to investigate if I the ingredient have for the ritual I mentioned to do. Expand we shall your capacity for childer to create. See we shall if this your burden does lessen."

She couldn't recall the ingredients required off hand but she did know that they would require a polar bear pelt and that, that could be obtained through one of the black market, magic shops. While not readily available in the city (by which I mean one could not find and slay a polar bear for themselves) and despite the fact that they were extremely costly, they did always seem to be available at short notice. The magic shops in the Harper Rock were nothing if not diligent in their ways. In fact if she knew Enver well enough, which she was sure she did, he'd likely made sure that the family magic shop even had one or two in stock for emergencies; if the need to sire could ever be considered an emergency that is.

"Ask I shall your father for one of the ingredients to buy as know I do with certainty that have it I do not. Quite costly it is, but bought it can be in any magic store that worth its salt is."

Having said this, she put a little of her weight onto her sons hands, pulling him down and towards her so that she might more easily kiss his cheek. She needed to go and change and think about whether or not she should explain the evening's events to Enver. He had a right to know about it all but for some reason she could not shake the thought that perhaps a little creative editing might be necessary for when she recounted the tale. While she didn't wish to keep her husband in the dark as to the specifics, she couldn't see how it would be in anyone's best interests to tell him about what had occurred in the shower, for truthfully nothing had happened; nothing besides a mother caring for her son that was.