Of Secrets and Skeletons

[Victor Lark]

Victor’s smile fell for an instant. His protective mask, his emotional charade, every effort he put into the affect of his face faltered in the wake of a few familiar syllables, spoken from a sweet tongue that, for an instant, felt too much like the pale, frightened thing that inhabited Laszlo’s mouth. His straying eyes lingered on her lips for a second too long; when they rose again, so did his expression. By then, she had escaped him again.

Abalia. He skipped after her, happy to play the dog on the leash, the ignorant foreigner. He knew what it meant to live in Alvadas, what it meant to worship Ionu, illusion, mischief and deceit. But he forced his pride to take a hit for the mystery at hand. Abalia. He walked beside her again, but his steps were shorter so that he seemed to be rushing, always behind, inferior. His face flashed between her and the path before him, as if unable to decide which was more pertinent to his survival. Abalia.

She was not damaged, as the sputtering ethaefal had described her. She was not shattered.

But she had to be the same.

“I suppose you thought my truth would be a name,” he mentioned, and his voice shivered and bounced with each step. Dismissing the little trick, he went on, “If Alvadas isn’t a lie, then what is it? A trick? A game? A truth?” He laughed. “The truth?” He followed beside her for a few more paces, chasing, keeping up. The world was becoming normal again, or more so than he had been. Sound seemed dull and muted, but the thoughts in his mind were loud and burning. He took her by the wrist again, hoping that she was not keen or wary enough to resist the surprise in it, and pinned her suddenly against the adjacent wall.

“I know something you don’t know,” he sang. “And Laszlo knows it, too.”

"Don't you petching dare," Laszlo growled, and Victor swallowed.

[Abalia]

Whatever game they'd been playing, Abalia had never felt any real danger from this strange, amusing man who seemed to enjoy words like a plaything. When he caught her wrist, again, it didn't startle her overmuch, as he'd long since broken down the respectable barrier of personal space between them. When he pinned her against the wall, perhaps she was put off and skirting the edges of concern. It wasn't, however, until he dropped that name that her blood ran cold. Laszlo? Laszlo, who tasted like spicy wine and sex, and fit so perfectly around her the night before. Laz, who had become something so incredibly important to her, and of whom the mere mention of could make her skin tingle in flushed anticipation. Why hadn't she lingered with him, enjoying the mellowness of his daytime spirit, his unearthly beauty? "What?" Her voice was little more than a gasp, a quick intake of breath that completely betrayed her surprise and discomfort. The singsong melody was taunting and made her immensely uncomfortable. All of the fun had fallen away instantly from this little encounter, and now she only wanted to get away. "Get away from me," she said next, lifting her small hands to push squarely against his chest. The frightened look had hardened into a determined scowl, and she was already looking past him.

[Victor Lark]

Something changed in her, he could tell that much. The glint in her eyes was like a flash of lightning, beautiful for an instant and then gone forever; he missed it, whatever it was, and was left to discover her passions with the pieces of her reaction. Open palms rose in surrender as he stepped back, heeding her request instantly and impatiently. Brutish coercion was the tease, not the style.

“So fiesty!” His voice edged on laughter, but was somehow weighted with dark anticipation. “Donnot take me for an extortionist, Abalia, you little rose, whose thorns have pricked the heart of my friend and coworker.” Victor dared to approach her again, reaching a tentative knuckle to the bend in her chin. If she let him, he would touch the soft skin there as if in a lover’s caress—though anyone who had known love would recognize the falsehood in it.

He smiled sweetly, like the juice on a bitter-ripe fruit. “It’s only a riddle, darling. Solve it, and maybe you’ll win something.”

A pause for suspense, that was what it was, not a moment to discern the extent of this newfound disgust or a desperate glimpse into eyes that might have been afraid. But she was an Alvad through and through. There was a mask on her face, or at least a veil on his that made him see the old amusement instead of the reality of her hatred.

“I can tell you about Roxanne,” he mentioned, or pleaded.

[Abalia]

When his hand brushed her chin, Abalia reached up to smack it away quickly. Her brows were furrowed a bit and whatever privileges she had given him when he had been a mere amusement were clearly being revoked. In fact, the pretty Alvad was ready to wash her hands of him, unwilling to play puppet to a toy of Ionu meant to ruin her day, or worse. She had little doubts that the god she loved would do such things, for he was also the god she hated. Was there any other way, in Alvadas, with a prankster ruling over them all? "Roxanne?" She countered, drawing her lips up into a smile that was just short of sincere. "Laszlo, Roxanne. What else have you got? You want to provoke me? Or to hurt me? Which is it?" she asked, shoving at his chest once more. More confident with the space established between them now, Abalia edged to the side so that she was no longer positioned between his body and the wall. An avenue of escape to be had. "I've better things to do." Because Abalia couldn't believe that he was being genuine. Laszlo didn't know anything about Roxanne and Roxxie had never known him, so in the real world there was positively no connection between them. For this silver-tongued bastard to so smoothly and easily drop both of their names as if there was a correlation? It made it clear that nothing he said could be considered truth.

[Victor Lark]

Yes. Yes. Both. Victor thought, but did not say. His smile drooped, but he let himself seem caught off guard, defeated, if only for a moment. Victor hated that he could not know what she knew, whether she knew. Laszlo was craven enough to keep the truth from her, but so was he desperate enough to love her; people did stupid things when they were in love, like tell secrets that were not theirs to share.

The grinning Ravokian watched her closely, thinking hastily for a way to keep her. He had exhausted his supply of physical force, if he did not want to lose her attention entirely. He had truths, and that was more than enough. He could hurt and provoke with them. He could win this game, shaped by the wake of his sin. Victor stepped forward and his heel tapped loudly against the cobblestone. “I can tell you the truth,” he insisted. “But only if you’ll give me the chance to tell it.”

He stuffed his hands in his pockets like a shrug, bowing his head as if he did not care. Hopefully that would pique her interest. If it did, he opted to throw out one more line, one more morsel of bait, so that maybe she would turn her head back and he could catch a glimpse of fury.

“I was with her, on... when was it?” He knew exactly when it was. “The eighty-fifth. So was he. Didn’t he tell you?”

[Abalia]

There was a point where bravado failed and the intense, long-abiding love she had felt for the kelvic surged to the surface through the brittle cracks in her resolve. Her stern countenance, meant to be so brave and determined, softened, weakened, if only a little. But a man like Victor certainly wouldn't miss that, even as her wide eyes, so pretty and capable of innocence, flicked to the side. She was considering. "What..." she said at last, sounding very tired somehow as she did so. Her eyes lifted back towards him, distrustful, wary, and yet so clearly caught by her own curiosity and need to know. "Do you want from me?" Because clearly he was baiting her. If he really wanted her to know something, that simply, he'd have already blurted it out. He was toying with her, a game of cat and mouse, and having realized that she couldn't walk away without hearing his tale, she'd submitted to the idea of being that mouse. At least, for now.

[Victor Lark]

The question was more difficult to answer than he had anticipated. Victor could not name what he wanted, but he knew it was not nothing. Before that moment, she had been a tool in discovering Laszlo; when he hesitated to say that, he realized how ignorant he had been. Abalia was as much a person as he, if not more. She was a hidden rule to the game, which he had only just learned to consider, a piece of the girl that had died at his feet, and a reason to crave life. What had she seen in Roxanne, and what did Laszlo see in her?

“The truth,” he answered. “Do you trust him?”

Then he looked, and tried to see, if only for an instant. With a laugh, he dismissed whatever enthusiasm he might have betrayed. The smile was his front, his secret a less than desperate shield.

And just as the cat could strike fear in its prey, so could the mouse evade and frustrate. “You shouldn’t. She’s dead.”