(KAI) Um... Got a review..."From Aubrey, 'Update it'."
Well... Okay... I suppose I could.

Chapter Two: The Descent

I remember your face... oh, it's softness.

And your dark hair, so smooth.

I remember your skin against mine... I want more...

Raven bit her bottom lip, again, out of character, but she was beginning to see a deterioration of logic. Or... was it character? She shook her head, it was her imagination- playing tricks on her. Definitely. Wench imagination. And it was her imagination (it seemed an easy target to blame) that manifested those sensations, and the sensation of being drawn, or pulled, or even called toward the chest, was surely just as easily blamed on the imagination run wild against her. (This, at least, is what she felt. Or thought she felt.)

Her heart lurched in her chest. Raven groaned, standing to stretch (perhaps, she thought, it might help). (It didn't and never does, but one always hopes.) She extended herself in all plausible directions until it hurt, and felt that soft, delicate feeling come over her as the pain in her chest- the ache- did not abate, but intensified, and the feeling crept like the shadows on the chest. It was a weak thing, that made her feel trembly, and lost, and alone. To be fair, she did hate it, but she also felt perhaps she deserved to feel it after all she had gone through. Raven, even in the throes of heartache, could be responsible about her feelings.

The chest stared mournfully at her, as though it held more secrets than she could have guessed of from the get-go. Malchior... a man... Rorek... a dragon. Who had she fallen in love with? Who had betrayed her? It was so amazingly difficult now- after the facts- to piece together what had truly taken place. There it was- that doubt. That niggling disbelief.

'I was tricked by a dragon pretending to be a man. I don't love him... anymore.' A sort of confession that seemed to be more lie than confessionary truth. There was the problem right there- being in love with a dragon. Now, she was sure she had fallen in love (and this had become the easiest note to admit, that yes, she had fallen in love, and was apparently capable of it), that is, very much in love, with a dragon. Wasn't that bestiality? She frowned. That had been a ridiculous thought. An annoying one. She banished it.

He had been a man... when she'd loved him... Paper, but of a man-shape, at the very least. And he had tricked her. Told her lies. She felt her blood boil at it for a moment- betrayal. Sick, disgusting creature, forcing bile and sick at her throat from her own pent-up emotion.

Something about that reminded one of pizza.

The girl sat down on the edge of her bed- resolutely denying the urge to rush across the room and throw open the chest, if only to look at the book once more. Just to touch it- its soft, worn surface bubbled to her fingertips' memories, and the thought of the musty smell of age and magic wafting to her nose once more; oh, the imagining of such a thing occurring again, and the words, all inked, and pleasured to her eyes. Oh, to take it in again.

Because to take it in, would be to have his arms around her, his breath in her hair and his words in her ears. Sweet, nectarous words. She shivered.

Those thoughts, again at the back of her soul, surfaced and gently prodded at her, and reminded her... There might still be hope. You might all of you have been wrong.

And you might not be as alone as you think.

He paced. He paced like a fictional character might pace if he had a great deal weighing down on his mind. And he did. Malchior would stand, and crouch, and wander, amongst the pages, and think and wonder and remember- and most of all, want and wish and desire. But to no avail. Raven did not come back for him, did not release the binding lock he knew enchested him, did not grace his pages with her delicate, pale little fingers; oh-so Lolita. He groaned and pressed his hands to his flat stomach, butterflies and such a-wander in his gut. Oh, his little Raven- to fight a million dragons and curses for her only to come back.

Only to open the pages and let him reveal himself, in his own words, and ask her aid once more...

Rorek sneered from his pages, "Pathetic mongrel!"

The dragon called from the other depths of the book, as though concealed, as though trapped, and he hissed and threw himself about in anger and annoyance, in aggravation of himself and the man he was bound to the pages with. "I'll kill you! Eat you alive, mage! Oh, for a taste of your blood!"

The dragon was serious, but knew his threats were idle; in no time had they shared the pages, was Rorek capable of reaching Malchior, nor vice the verse. Argumentation ran rampant, and Malchior's pages would shake with the dragon's rage.

"Speak not to me, foul beast!" Malchior turned from the direction, empty-less and cold, that the dragon's heat came from and brought himself to words of comfort within the book. Of a soft bed, and candles to read by. He closed his dark eyes- eyes cold with ice, it seemed, so blue- and pressed a hand to his aching temples. Only to have the girl's hands across his eyes, shutter-fluttering them, and to kiss her at least once. Even after to die would be far from tragic after such event.

He sighed, and rested against the pillows of this place in the book- a scene enlivened and adorned with the inks of imagination, and thought perhaps he might live, just one more day like this, if only he could dream of the dark little beauty- so close. And very, very far away.