the vampire and the goddess

[ourladytrees]

regis & julia

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bring me home again —

[ourladytrees]

and the weight of the world's getting harder to hold up (♫)

[ Magic is back. Those words echo through the universe as every being connected to it rejoices at finally feeling whole again — a celebration that is cut tragically short as the Wellspring of magic is siphoned off for control by the Library. It's a bitter ending to a quest that has cost them so much — that will cost them even more in just a few hours.

She manages to get away once they return to the Neitherlands, her captors paying little attention to the woman who can barely stand when there are a half-dozen much more problematic magicians to worry about. They're at the Library's main branch in the Neitherlands, the world between worlds, and with the wards not yet restored to full strength, she slips out to the plaza above. Down a row, through an archway, another two paths over. Moving as fast as she can, she stumbles, bracing a hand against rough walls of stone and rows of hedges to keep from falling. She quickly becomes lost among the fountains, not recognizing a single statue in this area, but she keeps going, hoping that her pursuers will be just as lost. If she can just get back to Earth; that's the thought that propels her forward, past one fountain and then another, on and on until—

The bolt of battle magic strikes the stone at her feet, sending her tumbling forward against the edge of yet another fountain. Another bolt arcs over her head, taking out a chunk of the carving to represent wherever the portal leads to. Is that— Is that a monolith? Julia's head whips around to take in the strangers chasing her, the ones she has no doubt will kill her for all she's done to thwart their plans, so she makes the only choice she has left. Pitching forward, into the water she goes, down and down, until she lands on the ground of another world, one she hopes will offer a measure of safety, even if just for a little while.

The moments that immediately follow her arrival are a blur of agony that she won't remember much of later. Everything hurts. Her veins are on fire, her soul burning from having her divine magic so suddenly ripped out, and she feels... nothing. No longer connected to the universe, but instead cut off and left bleeding out from her very core.

She can't think about it yet. Her focus has to be on getting to safety. Getting somewhere, anywhere, where she'll be safe in her present state. When Prometheus gave his power to create the keys, he'd known he would become vulnerable; his enemies had taken advantage of that vulnerability and killed him. She can't risk the McAllistairs or the Library trying that if they follow her here. So even though she wants nothing more than to curl up on the ground and lament about how shitty her life her become yet again, she doesn't have the time for that.

So she runs, choosing a random direction and just going, ignoring the chill in the air and the way her heeled boots try to sink into the earth. There are trees all around her, and stones, carved stone that— A graveyard. If that's supposed to symbolize something, the universe can go fuck itself. All that matters is putting space between herself and whoever or whatever might follow after her. Everything else, she can figure out later.

If she survives to see later.

She stumbles down the worn stepped path that takes her further into the graveyard, momentum propelling her much faster than she can manage on her own, and she finally falls to her knees at the bottom, landing in a patch of tall grass in front of a building. A mausoleum. A place to hide. Just what she needs. ]

[szpakowaty]

[ One half-broken, imperious tombstone near the vine-infested mausoleum of Mère-Lachaiselongue Cemetery reads thus: "Do not be sad because of people. They will all die." A favorite of Regis', second only to "Told you I was sick"― epitaphs to stave off the loneliness that comes with living shoulder-to-shoulder with the dead.

He's sitting on the edge of poor Conrrad Tomashckievich's sarcophagus ("Made up stories and bossed people around, when all he ever really wanted in life was to fly", this one reads) when he hears frantic footsteps flying over overgrown weeds. It's a strange interruption to the cemetery's preternatural state of abandon; the forest here is home to wolves, and most people don't choose to sacrifice personal safety to visit old graves.

An emergency, then. Regis lifts onto his feet, calm and measured, braced to converse with someone in some state of incontrovertible trouble. Past experience dictates that the stranger is an injured soldier running from assassins, or a bandit trying to escape justice.

He turns out to be wrong on both accounts: the young woman who crashes through the underbrush is neither armored nor armed (as far as he can tell), frantic but unfrenzied; she slips and falls onto the tall grass in front of his crypt-turned-home with the grace of a shooting star.

Well. ]

Hello, [ is soft and self-aware, a benign greeting when Regis is aware that the situation is anything but. ] I understand that my sudden emergence from between rows of tombstones may not inspire much confidence in my upcoming statement, but I assure you: I mean you absolutely no harm.

[ourladytrees]

[ Julia is too exhausted for a quick, startled turn at the man's sudden appearance, though her pulse somehow ratchets up regardless as she freezes like a cornered animal and looks at him like she's expecting him to sprout teeth and claws to devour her whole. Instinct tells her not to trust him, that taking her chances out there in the wild of this unfamiliar world would be better than risking staying here, but she's too practical to give in to that urge. She needs to hide, rest, and decide her next steps. The Library's henchmen could be right behind her, or just over the next hill, and there is no good choice here, only a lesser evil.

This is the best option she has. Putting her trust in a stranger who might offer her up on a platter to her enemies at the first opportunity. Or he might help her.

Please let him help her. ]

I need to hide. [ It comes out too small, too timid, and she steels her spine and becomes the tough New York socialite who never once took no for an answer. She might be weakened but she is not weak, and she refuses to be a victim again. Her fingers tighten around the grass, grasping at its roots, and then she straightens up, wobbling to her feet like a newborn horse fighting to live. ] There are people looking for me who will kill me if they find me. Is there somewhere I can go nearby?

[szpakowaty]

[ A-ha. Trouble. The package that it came wrapped in is different from what Regis'd imagined, but the contents are the same; no one stumbles into a graveyard because things are fine.

Dark eyes widen just a fraction at the forthright admission of her fugitive status. They widen a sliver more at the cavalier mention of murder, not because the topic is unexpected (anything but), but because he'd expected a bit more meandering before being presented with it.

"I appreciate your candor", Regis thinks to say, but that sounds a bit unhinged. Long fingers flex around the strap of the satchel strung across his body, and tug it closer to his chest. ]

There are many places that you can go nearby, [ he offers gently, ] but some may be more safe than others, depending on who you happen to be running from.

[ A roundabout way of asking if she'd be willing to continue being candid, or if she has her limits. The corner of his lips quirks in a thin smile, sympathetic. ]

We can speak further in my so-called-home, if you're amenable to conversing in crypts. And more importantly: are you hurt at all?