This is written for AJ
I don't own anything
Clyrnin, set during a fictitious Daylighters
Incandescent flames roar and blaze around her, yet Claire never hesitates in her quest forwards into the burning laboratory, her one mission clear in her mind: find and save Myrnin. Not until she decrypted some of the Daylighters' secret messages did she realise the punishment they had for the vampire who categorically refused to reform (and by reform, she means accept that he's a creature of the night and shouldn't exist) and it was something she could—can—never let happen.
She can't let him die, no matter what has happened between them.
In order to try and get to him alive, Claire forces herself to subdue the emotions raging within her, the conflicting feelings of love and anger, of fear and hatred towards herself for betraying the one she's supposed to love; it's difficult, but she's in a life or death situation, and having her wits about her is the only thing that could potentially prevent both of their lives from being taken in this room of smoke and flame.
The room seems to get darker and foggier, and it's only her intrinsic knowledge of the layout of the laboratory that helps her towards where she presumes Myrnin is being kept, her calls for him getting quieter as her throat begins to burn. She hopes that he can still hear her, that he hasn't been incapacitated and killed by the chemical fire, but somewhere within her, she knows that he hasn't. Someone like Myrnin couldn't just die like that, be a blot on a page that's just covered over and forgotten about: he's unforgettable and truly remarkable, something even the Daylighters should revere.
Flames leap out at her as she attempts to pass the stock of acids—a poor move on her part she soon realises, remembering the dangers of such chemicals—and she has to backtrack, almost falling over one of the decaying stools. She's surprised that it hasn't caught fire yet considering its age—it must be from at least the sixteenth century—and it almost amuses her at the back of her mind that this is something that sticks in her mind. Yet it does, because the memories the stool evokes in her mind are blinding, the only thing she's consumed by for a split second: her sitting on it when Myrnin explained how her method of titration was not only ridiculous but time-wasting (it was, though she argued that it wasn't just as a matter of principle); when she treated his silver wound inflicted when he decided it would be a good idea to stalk Oliver and leave 'treats' around his home; when she found out that everything was lost, that their resistance against the Daylighters was completely futile, though her mentor wasn't with her at that point to share the news.
Somehow, she forces down the bittersweet memories, her resolve to find Myrnin becoming stronger by the minute; even if she only finds his remains, it's better than finding nothing at all. She can't leave him down here, can't leave such an enigmatic yet clear puzzle to rot amongst chemicals and debris—he deserves more than that, at least.
(What she wants is to find him alive, to tell him that she's not stopped thinking about that kiss he gave her back before she left Morganville, and that she wants something to happen between them. Whether or not that will happen is essentially up to how well she can search.)
It's becoming more and more difficult to breathe the air in the disintegrating lab, and Claire knows she's got less than five minutes to get out of there before the smoke gets her. She keeps as low to the floor as possible, at the same time avoiding the stacks of books and nonsensical items Myrnin has always left scattered around, her intended destination his favourite armchair. Something tells her that the Daylighters' twisted sense of humour would consider it fitting for him to be destroyed in the thing that they thought he loved the most.
(Claire knows the truth though; she knows that nothing material is Myrnin's first—and only true—love. Knowledge is the thing he has desired since childhood, the thing he's adored the most, but those against them wouldn't have though to look so deep into what they considered a monster.)
It's unclear how she makes it to the armchair as all she can remember is twists and turns around burning bookcases and lab benches, but Claire reaches it—and it's empty. He isn't there; he isn't in the only place she thinks he could be, and that means that everything's over. She's probably killed herself in an ill-thought out attempt to save someone who isn't probably even here; it was probably a trick to get her out of the way.
That's what she thinks until she hears something which she knows means that her gut feeling was right and that she's done the right thing coming here.
She hears her name.
It's faint, and she knows that it means that he's probably in the most dangerous part of the lab—near the chemicals—but she can't stop herself. As soon as her brain processes that she heard him—she heard Myrnin alive!—her feet are moving her towards where she thinks he must be, somehow avoiding the dangers around her.
Time seems to slow down as she makes her way through rows upon rows of hazardous substances, fumes which are potentially toxic beginning to emit from the loosely sealed jars in response to the increasing temperature; it's potentially life threatening—more than potentially she thinks, especially as she can't conjure a portal to get herself out of the situation—but she perseveres. It's getting darker and darker, not just because of the smoke but also the lack of lighting in this area—she hadn't managed to sneak in the vampire electrician before everything started happening and she was leaving the town—and she's relying solely on memory and her hands to ensure she doesn't trip over and leave herself to the mercy of the fire.
She carries on this way for a good minute or two more, her heartbeat increasing as she begins to panic that she won't be able to either find her way back out of the laboratory or that she'll have no escape once she reaches the stairs. Claire finds herself reliant on the memory of where she thinks she heard Myrnin's voice, potentially the last time she will ever hear him saying her name replaying in her mind—until she hits something that isn't supposed to be there.
The first thing she feels is a surprisingly cold metal—maintaining its temperature difference despite the ambient surroundings—and then her hand reaches past that to make contact with skin. Unless she's mistaken, she's found Myrnin, a belief solidified when she strains her eyes to make out his familiar form (and the fact that her hands are making their way up towards his shoulders, feeling out territory she's felt before.)
"You found me," he whispers into her ear, or at least Claire thinks he's whispering. He could be speaking at any volume, but it's barely audible to her; the fire and the shock have led to that. "I was watching and I saw you falter but you never gave up, never. I am forever in your debt." He sounds more grateful than Claire has ever heard him, a note of gratitude he probably felt was lost long ago in the days when he was the son of a madman and the only one who viewed the world in his peculiar way. If all she's done is reconcile the brilliant, insane yet lost man with the boy he once was before he dies that's enough—though she doesn't want it to be. She wants to live, to experience everything she's not had the chance to do yet and re-experience everything she has to make it better.
She gets the feeling that he's becoming lost in history and nostalgia whilst she's getting ahead of herself and dreaming about things which might never happen, another thing which amuses her subconsciously about them. He's someone who's trapped in the past, desperate to see what happens next yet is unable to; she's someone who's making progress and changing things categorically, yet always wants to know why, always wants to know why this is better than the past—well, most things. She wants to know about societies and science, not that she much cares for political history, and this strange mish-mash of past and future makes for their present to be so much more extraordinary than other people's.
"Are you chained up?" Claire asks frantically, barely able to speak as she realises that her breathing has become laboured; the smoke's affected her more than she had previously realised. "Can you escape or do I need to whip out my portable—what are you doing?" she begins to make a sarcastic quip when his lips meet hers, desperation and something she doesn't quite understand fuelling the brief, yet passionate kiss.
Strangely, she finds she's able to breathe much more easily when they break apart, something which Myrnin quickly explains. "I took the smoke from you. I don't want you hurting—or dying—and that was the only way possible." After a second, he answers her other question. "I think I'm free now. The Daylighters used some strange science technique which reminded me solely of magic; they chained me with chains which would only break if someone was loyal enough to rescue me; if someone risked their life to save mine, I would be free." He makes a brief snorting sound. "That could all be rubbish, however, we must see."
Claire removes her hands from his shoulders and takes a step backwards as she waits for him to break free from the chains. Nothing happens, and she becomes even more conscious that the fire behind them is roaring closer, the flames getting more and more near to where they're standing. "Well?" she asks impatiently when, ten seconds later, he's still not free.
Myrnin makes an almost animal like noise as he strains his wrists apart, trying desperately to break the chains. "We're dead Claire, I'm so, so sorry. They lied, they never were going to let me go! I've killed you as well, and that's the worst thing I could ever have done." He begins to sob, a detached part of Claire also taking up this motion; the rest of her remains stoic, strangely absent from the situation.
Rather than panicking, she begins to think things through as quickly as possible, considering any way that the Daylighters may have kept their word without making it obvious that they were going to let a vampire escape. In their dealings, all Claire had noticed was that they had been honest with them, and that when they said something they meant it more than they didn't. The chance of someone coming to save Myrnin was slim—they certainly weren't aware of the feelings that had grown between Claire and Myrnin—so why wouldn't they have their bit of fun and have the key to freedom right in front of his eyes.
Key! That's it! Within seconds, the puzzle's unlocked itself in Claire's mind: the key's here, probably on Myrnin's person but in a place unreachable by himself. Another two seconds and she's ignoring Myrnin's wails and walking around him, reaching into the centre of his back for the small place where neither of his arms can touch—and there's the key. Their escape is here, placed in potentially the most obvious of places, if only Myrnin had had the logic skills of simple minded humans.
As she turns him around, forcing him to look at her (or at least she thinks she is considering she can't see more than his outline and he's a foot taller than her) she shows him the key. "It was obvious all along—or at least to humans," she says, feeling around on the shackles around his wrists for the place a key would fit.
Myrnin begins muttering things in Welsh, some words that she recognises but others that she doesn't—far, far more that she doesn't. He does so even as the flames creep up closer and closer, until Claire can feel the heat on her back.
"Faster, faster," she mutters to herself as she continues to search for the keyhole, continues to search for the end to Myrnin's captivity. She's more and more convinced that she won't find it before the flames reach them and Myrnin goes up in flames—faster than she does of course—whilst she's left to face a heretic's death. Perhaps this is her punishment for being a non-believer.
"You can do it, Claire," Myrnin whispers encouraging statements to her, switching from Welsh to English. "Find the hole and we're both free. Find the hole and we can run away from this rotting place and discover anything that you want to; we can be brilliant together, only if we escape!"
Strangely, his words help—normally his attempts at encouragement force her to throw a paddy because he's being too patronising—and perhaps it's some sort of divine intervention or perhaps it's just luck, but she finds the hole and forces the key in. The metal is still cool in this boiling room, and it's a relief from the sweat that's pouring down her face and the smoke that's now the cause of her clouded vision, or at least it is until it's falling on the floor.
Before she can even think, Myrnin's swept her into his arms and he's running into the flames—or, no, through the flames, as though he's some sort of avenging angel ready to plough through the dangers of the earth to save the innocent girl. They're moving and she can feel the heat on her skin, feel the way that it's enticing her to stay, feel how the fire's fingers brandish her skin as though they're one and the same—and then it's over.
They're hurtling up stairs which are crumbling beneath his feet, running into the densest black cloud she's ever seen, and Claire holds her breath, already aware that she's probably going to die prematurely due to smoke inhalation. She doesn't know whether making their way into the street will save them or if it'll just cause them to die by a human's hand rather than the flame's metaphorical one, because all she can focus on is the fact that she's in his arms and his face is pressed against her hair—and they're alive. They've beaten the fire, the fiercest of all the elements, and they've made it to the surface; they're no longer under all that earth, no longer at the mercy of yet another of the basic elements.
They're alive and they're together and that's all that Claire cares about.
Nobody's there to stop them as Myrnin runs down the path between another house and the Day one, no sign whatsoever that centuries of work is being burnt away at the minute, groundbreaking science and incorrect Alchemy, just because the Daylighters don't want to admit that some of the world's best advancements are because of the work of a vampire.
(They run and run and run until he can't breathe because of all the smoke in his blood and she cries until she can't cry any more, stopping only when they're outside of Morganville. Only then do they even think about the others, about Amelie and Michael and Eve and even Oliver, and only the feeling of the other's arms around them makes them think that everything's going to be okay even though it isn't, not just because he's a vampire and she's a human but because their whole world is against them.)
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