Keeping open weary eyes

[samuel-durand.livejournal.com]

Sunday, June 13
The Whitechapel, Front Desk

Sometimes it seems that I've spent half my life traveling under the open sky, sleeping under trees, in rocky overhangs, in clefts gouged from the rocky ground with the heel of a boot.  It's always an adjustment, coming back to civilization, and the lack of continuity from settlement to settlement doesn't help matters much.  Some places have running water and clean sheets.  Others... well, let's just say that dysentery might actually be the least of your worries. 

Still, I'm guardedly happy for the chance to sleep in an actual bed again.  Weakness of the flesh, I know.  Even the availability of luxury has a tendency to erode discipline, though I've generally found the benefits of the occasional indulgence to be worth the cost.

I deserve it.  I haven't lost my focus in a decade and a half.

When I tie Memory out front of the Whitechapel, I leave her mouth no more than three inches from the rail.  After a moment's thought, I hobble her as well.  I'd bloody blindfold her too, but she tends not to take it well.  "There, there, girl," I murmur, rubbing her ear.  She snorts and rolls her dark eyes at me, but it's all she can do.  "Be good."

I make my way into the building, adjusting my habit as I go.  "Hello?"

(Open)

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[shards-of-alice.livejournal.com]

"Secrets are important to me, Alice. You might say they're even part of what I do. Keep secrets for the world that others would try to tell." A secret keeper... I move a little closer, then, eyes gone big from all the wonder, and when he holds up a finger I nod. I understand. "A secret known by one is sometimes merely a burden. Your head cluttered up with words you can never speak. Things you can't admit you feel."

Words you can never- I feel my mouth open, a little, maybe those same kinds of words wanting to come out and stopping short. I don't move, though, no. I stay right where I am. I listen. I watch. And deep inside me, where things like to curl and whisper, something else is doing the same.

It seems to take forever, time stretching on, for Samuel to find my present. I stare at him as though it'll make him move faster, on my tiptoes, and when he opens his hand in front of me I gasp. A stone. No, no, it's more than stone, it's a stone with fire trapped inside.

Fire stones and secrets.

"A secret can cut you into two."

"Secrets can burn," I say, though I barely hear my voice because it's far away. The stone feels cold on my palm, though I only glance down once to look at it before my eyes go back to him.

"A secret known by two is a bond of trust. And power, for them both." There's a knot inside me at that, like the fire stone sitting in my stomach almost. A weight. "I want you to do a little work for me around town, when I need it. And other times, I want you to listen to my secrets."

"Yes," slips out and for a long while that's all, until I shake my head a little and that heaviness falls away. "I can do that. I know lots of things and- and lots of people, too." And lots of things about lots of people, I'm thinking.

I step back, I make myself step back, with both hands cupped around the stone. "You just tell me. And I'll help you. With your job." My smile's come back and there's some brightness in the room again, just when I'd started to think it had gone dark. "We can be friends!"

[samuel-durand.livejournal.com]

"Yes."

The word hangs there in the silence between us, the sweetest word, and I smile gently. She's all but mine. Oh, this is only the first sortie, I know, but it's clear the hooks are in deep. There is power in fascination, and the desire to be special. And this is true of no one more than the young.

So long as I don't push her too far, too fast. I will solve the mystery of this oracular girl, and she will help me solve the mystery of Excolo. After that... Well.

"I can do that. I know lots of things and- and lots of people, too."

"I know you do. I would never have chosen just anyone." You're special, anyone can see. The words are unsaid, but fill the space just the same.

"You just tell me. And I'll help you. With your job. We can be friends!"

She has stepped back and is smiling up at me. My own smile shows the gleam of teeth. Friends? But the twinge that I feel is not guilt, not really, but frustration. Frustration that she allows herself to be deceived. Frustration that she likes and trusts me.

I don't want her broken like the pack animal. She needs to learn the ways of the world. She needs to learn to resist.

"Friends," I say warmly. My head is buzzing. "Go, Alice. I know Mr. Laclos needs you below." I raise a hand in farewell, pressing a finger to my lips in reminder.

[shards-of-alice.livejournal.com]

Samuel sends me back to Valmont with a smile and I go, quick footsteps echoing down the hall as I run, but not before wrapping my arms around his waist and hugging tight.

Secrets. Secrets.

I feel a little dizzy, from the excitement bubbling up in my head, and when I slip the fire stone in my pocket it hangs there all day like a weight.