Intentionally remaining in the shadows, the monster's now perched on the third floor's railing. He likes his heights; it's advantageous to be up high, in the crow's nest of a ship or on the balcony of a castle overlooking the town one is meant to protect. Those are thoughts that don't belong to the monster, even though they do belong to the monster at the same time.
Height is advantageous. Shadows blanket his face. He can leap back and disappear during the time it takes her to locate the next staircase, climb said staircase, and locate the bannister overlooking what seems to be the heart of the castle.
This time, the lamp light at least throws shadows upon him. It's clear he has knees and arms, and wide, black wings. Are those shadows wisping around him like smoke?
"Is that what you want?"
His voice remains a rasp so unlike the voice of the man the monster is. He's silent for once; there's no wing flapping, no groaning railing. The castle doesn't even creak; the wind outside doesn't bat the trees against the windows.
Gwenaëlle very nearly says something very acerbic about making a leap, but being as they are now dangerously close to one that would kill her — she takes a prudent several steps back from that banister, instead, taking in the shape of him that the shadows allow. He could take that height, she supposes, a pragmatic first thought to have on such an impression,
but she could not, and ought not tempt her fate.
“Your social graces,” she informs him, straightening, “could use work. As host, it's generally frowned upon to ask your guests if they crave death.”
This isn't exactly an answer. But what answer might she give? Yes, sometimes. No, not tonight. If she'd wanted to die so fucking badly she could have relinquished herself to the fate behind her, outside of this castle, let it choke and smother her until she'd seen no other way out. A hundred opportunities have been provided to her, over the years, through her own doing or not—
she had been forced, in the recognition of desiring to master her own life, that she might also actually want to live it. It's just going to be incredibly stupid if admitting that, finally, is what gets her killed after all that she's survived.
Given the demon has never spoken to anyone when awake, his social graces are murky like a thin streak of grey cloud over the moon. They're there, but terrible. Nikolai would never ask if someone craved death. He'd ask if someone craved adventure, or the wind in their hair, the sea spray splattering against their skin.
But the demon isn't Nikolai, and there's nothing but cool air, the midnight noises, and the raging storm outside to inspire him.
He watches her, remaining still for the moment.
"Should I instead ask if you crave life?" And then, as if somehow slipping into the man he wears, he adds without thinking, "That sounds like a rather boring topic."
Her head tilts as she squints into the gloom, wishing she could better make out his face; struck, abruptly, by how little she can imagine what his face might be, attached to such a body and speaking with such a voice. All the same— the shape of his conversation does, she thinks, rather bear out her assessment so far. He is, she's increasingly certain, alone here.
She checks herself; there are a lot of reasons that could be true that she shouldn't get bold about.
“I think that depends on the life,” she says, instead. Probably someone with a boring life would still be as desperate to hold onto it as an adventurer. How many people sit around shrugging off the idea that they might as well die, for all that their story's worth? Even still. “And the capacity for imagination in the listener.”
It's hard to find absolutely nothing of curiosity in a person. Not impossible—
difficult.
“Generally,” she adds, “neither are hospitable small-talk.”
He doesn't reveal his face—he never does, not unless there's a high chance that the person seeing his face won't be able to recount it later. Instead, he uses the shadows to his advantage-after all, that's what he's born from. Still sitting perched prettily, the demon has a sense to… establish something.
This is the longest that anyone's spoken to him before.
Granted, this is the only time anyone has spoken to him. Others have cried. Many have screamed. No one's held a conversation with him.
"It's unfortunate he's not available to speak to."
Who's he? Him. The other him. The one who's a great conversationalist and can turn any small talk into riveting stories. The demon, while being him, doesn't seem to possess the skill. Perhaps he intentionally doesn't wish to.
He who is the obvious question — is on the tip of her tongue — but if it was a slip of his then maybe she shouldn't, at once, draw his attention to having done so. So,
instead,
“It isn't that I don't wish to speak to you.”
Although she is inclined to think she'd be well within her rights if it were.
Her shoulder aches where she'd landed on the stairs. She is tired, and it is dark, and cold, and she is difficult for the sake of being difficult. Maybe to leave her own clawmarks behind, I was here, even if she's remembered most of all as an inconvenience. At least, she cannot be ignored.
"You expected an abandoned castle to be abandoned." He doesn't ask it as a question. The demon doesn't even know why he does. Perhaps it's Nikolai coming through, his insatiable need to fill the silence with speaking—to talk about shit and not shit, and anything found in between—and his desire to connect. The demon rolls his shoulders. He doesn't like that one bit.
The floor creaks. He's lifted up and off of where he is and lands on the loose wooden panels of the floor—still shaded in shadow. The demon thrives in it.
Footsteps echo. The wooden floor is both empty and full. He doesn't move toward her, staying far away, knowing it's better for his survival… even though he knows he can attack. This sudden birth of a conscience prompts him to scratch at his arm.
Lightning slashes soundlessly against the dark, gloomy sky. The demon's human-like shadow (his wings are the only inhuman part about him) casts along the wall.
"The east wing's floors are caving in." He has no idea why he says it.
Probably if he intended her to go tumbling through those (as well), then he wouldn't have said it, so Gwenaëlle decides that whatever else he might have meant and why he might have said it, she can add to the things about him that she has observed: that he does not wish her to unwarily step through a crumbling floor. It's a low threshold, but a threshold all the same, and she decides to take her victories where she can get them. Better than to be ungrateful, and miss any altogether.
“I'll bear that in mind,” she says, gathering her composure and her dignity about her, tattered things but essential all the same.
Her life hasn't gone the way she envisioned it. None of the ways, even; her worst fears came to pass and she'd had to invent new ones. She has persevered, and persevered, and persevered, and now she is here and when she looks behind her every step had made sense and the sum of them all is—
clutching everything she'd managed to carry, alone with a monster in a storm.
Or: still here. With someone who had rather she not fall through a floor. If you don't like a story, tell a different one. She tacks on, “Thank you,”
and when she is relatively certain that she's oriented east and west, starts to move again, quietly determined. At the very least, she can wait out the night.
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no subject
Height is advantageous. Shadows blanket his face. He can leap back and disappear during the time it takes her to locate the next staircase, climb said staircase, and locate the bannister overlooking what seems to be the heart of the castle.
This time, the lamp light at least throws shadows upon him. It's clear he has knees and arms, and wide, black wings. Are those shadows wisping around him like smoke?
"Is that what you want?"
His voice remains a rasp so unlike the voice of the man the monster is. He's silent for once; there's no wing flapping, no groaning railing. The castle doesn't even creak; the wind outside doesn't bat the trees against the windows.
"To die."
no subject
but she could not, and ought not tempt her fate.
“Your social graces,” she informs him, straightening, “could use work. As host, it's generally frowned upon to ask your guests if they crave death.”
This isn't exactly an answer. But what answer might she give? Yes, sometimes. No, not tonight. If she'd wanted to die so fucking badly she could have relinquished herself to the fate behind her, outside of this castle, let it choke and smother her until she'd seen no other way out. A hundred opportunities have been provided to her, over the years, through her own doing or not—
she had been forced, in the recognition of desiring to master her own life, that she might also actually want to live it. It's just going to be incredibly stupid if admitting that, finally, is what gets her killed after all that she's survived.
no subject
Given the demon has never spoken to anyone when awake, his social graces are murky like a thin streak of grey cloud over the moon. They're there, but terrible. Nikolai would never ask if someone craved death. He'd ask if someone craved adventure, or the wind in their hair, the sea spray splattering against their skin.
But the demon isn't Nikolai, and there's nothing but cool air, the midnight noises, and the raging storm outside to inspire him.
He watches her, remaining still for the moment.
"Should I instead ask if you crave life?" And then, as if somehow slipping into the man he wears, he adds without thinking, "That sounds like a rather boring topic."
(Perhaps that slip will become useful later.)
no subject
She checks herself; there are a lot of reasons that could be true that she shouldn't get bold about.
“I think that depends on the life,” she says, instead. Probably someone with a boring life would still be as desperate to hold onto it as an adventurer. How many people sit around shrugging off the idea that they might as well die, for all that their story's worth? Even still. “And the capacity for imagination in the listener.”
It's hard to find absolutely nothing of curiosity in a person. Not impossible—
difficult.
“Generally,” she adds, “neither are hospitable small-talk.”
no subject
He doesn't reveal his face—he never does, not unless there's a high chance that the person seeing his face won't be able to recount it later. Instead, he uses the shadows to his advantage-after all, that's what he's born from. Still sitting perched prettily, the demon has a sense to… establish something.
This is the longest that anyone's spoken to him before.
Granted, this is the only time anyone has spoken to him. Others have cried. Many have screamed. No one's held a conversation with him.
"It's unfortunate he's not available to speak to."
Who's he? Him. The other him. The one who's a great conversationalist and can turn any small talk into riveting stories. The demon, while being him, doesn't seem to possess the skill. Perhaps he intentionally doesn't wish to.
no subject
instead,
“It isn't that I don't wish to speak to you.”
Although she is inclined to think she'd be well within her rights if it were.
Her shoulder aches where she'd landed on the stairs. She is tired, and it is dark, and cold, and she is difficult for the sake of being difficult. Maybe to leave her own clawmarks behind, I was here, even if she's remembered most of all as an inconvenience. At least, she cannot be ignored.
“I wasn't expecting company either.”
no subject
The floor creaks. He's lifted up and off of where he is and lands on the loose wooden panels of the floor—still shaded in shadow. The demon thrives in it.
Footsteps echo. The wooden floor is both empty and full. He doesn't move toward her, staying far away, knowing it's better for his survival… even though he knows he can attack. This sudden birth of a conscience prompts him to scratch at his arm.
Lightning slashes soundlessly against the dark, gloomy sky. The demon's human-like shadow (his wings are the only inhuman part about him) casts along the wall.
"The east wing's floors are caving in." He has no idea why he says it.
He intends to leave.
no subject
“I'll bear that in mind,” she says, gathering her composure and her dignity about her, tattered things but essential all the same.
Her life hasn't gone the way she envisioned it. None of the ways, even; her worst fears came to pass and she'd had to invent new ones. She has persevered, and persevered, and persevered, and now she is here and when she looks behind her every step had made sense and the sum of them all is—
clutching everything she'd managed to carry, alone with a monster in a storm.
Or: still here. With someone who had rather she not fall through a floor. If you don't like a story, tell a different one. She tacks on, “Thank you,”
and when she is relatively certain that she's oriented east and west, starts to move again, quietly determined. At the very least, she can wait out the night.