True Beauty
Basil loved Dorian when he was pure, but perhaps even more so when he was stained.
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I am an artist, an admirer of all things beautiful, interpreter of the foreign and creator of the known. I see art, I make art, I am art. For an artist is nothing without his art and art is nothing without his artist. Essentially, we are one and the same. The art and the artist. And for all my life, I would study, chase after beauty; capture each fleeting moment, embedding it in my works. With each stroke I would solve and define, developing the subtle secrets into the everlasting surface of my canvas. And I would have it. All things beautiful preserved as an image, woven with my dedicated hands.
The hands of an artist.
And for all my life, I would be overcome. Again and again I would see the ultimate beauty, the most exquisite thing in existence. So delicately made, so elegantly presented. And I would worship it like a slave adoring his master, enraptured, until I found something better.
Until I found true beauty.
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It is often the irony of life that when one seeks to find, he may never chance upon his prize and yet when he stops, whether to rest or surrender his hopes, he will increase his likelihood and discover, with greatest shock, all that he had sought and perhaps even more.
And I, for one, had never dreamed of chancing upon Dorian Gray.
It was at some party or other, an important social gathering much like all others, that I found my definition of true perfection. I had neither sought nor wished to look, but fate had decided to play. I was talking to Lady Brandon, who holds conversations more on her side than mine, and I almost wished I wasn't. But she too, is a window, a venture into the world, an opportunity for knowledge and experience. And she was the one that led me to my muse.
I looked away from out tête-à-tête with so much heard and very little learnt. And I saw, what I first deemed, perhaps a mirage or illusion created by the passion of my insanity who, like all of me, is so shamelessly devoted to love and beauty and all the treasures of the world. And yet I, who so wholly devoted himself, who so fervently worshipped, could never hope to replicate, or perhaps even imagine such an image with my mind. It could be a creation only by God and all things so pure and virtuous never to grace our world.
Dorian Gray, perhaps not even twenty summers was an image made of light and nothing else. An angel carved from the purest white, shaded with the softest tones of gold, pink and blue, blended and held with the deepest red. So finely carved, so delicately shaped, he looked so perfect. He was perfection. And if looks were not all that could win you, there is much to be admired. Perhaps men, women and all things in existence would seek to castrate themselves before him, flooded with envy and raging jealousy that the Holy Father could bless a single creature with such gifts.
We spoke and he had the sweetest voice, tingling with laughter, joy and boyish charms that would not last, but transform, maturing into the deepest tones that men have ever heard. And the topics! Oh, if men were ever so bright, agreeable and charming, they could not reach what he had combined. With a naive innocence he would speak; sharp views and such eagerness to learn!
There was nothing that he had that would present even an attempt against him, and he stood there, all things pure and light, like an angel sent from the Lord.
Like a muse created for my rendition.
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It was with great pride and joy that I began to trap him, all his youth and beauty, into the immortality of my art. Into his portrait.
For days, weeks, months even, I had toiled, desperately, fanatically, like a raging lunatic over this portrait. And which each tender stroke, each gentle line, I had wished only to redefine in exactly the same terms. And for all my efforts, I would be satisfied with only a replica. Only a mirror, held in time, as my Picture of Dorian Gray.
But then I never saw him again, or hardly see him enough to count as seen. And he left.
With both himself and his Picture of Dorian Gray.
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Dedicated to blood(.)of(.)a(.)phoenix, my (wannabe) artist friend.
First attempt in this fandom, which I must say is looking rather pitiful. I hope this is slightly in character seeing as my Naruto fics definitely aren't, but these characters are dark enough without me tainting them. Not sure if it sounds alright, and isn't beta'd. Two chapters in total.
R & R please.