.

Ch. 2 – An Awkward Breakfast

The sound of the bathroom door being shut somewhat noisily behind him stole his attention abruptly away from the frying pan. Glancing briefly over his shoulder, his peripheral vision showed her standing at the bookcase; half his focus still on the pan and its contents, he didn't really see her well. "The lady rises!" he smiled cheerily, "Just a moment, it's almost done. Take a seat at the table there, if you like." Turning with the pan toward the table, and the plates warming on the inset hotplate, he looked up and saw her fully at last – standing tall as she could manage, and stark naked, with a countenance that looked less-than-pleased. Sensing her cautious, perhaps defensive hostility, he gently set the pan on the hotplate, and carefully came around the table toward her, consciously stopping at a respectful distance before he addressed her;

"Forgive me, it seems I've forgotten my manners-"

"Who are you?" she demanded curtly, a warning note evident in her voice; "What are you? What do you want from me?"

Taking a half-second to gather himself, he watched her wings appear from her back and atop her head, her aura flaring in a display intended to shock and intimidate; were he any normal man, he might have felt a certain terror in his very soul, as though he stared Death in the eyes. In response, he tried to project a sense of calm, openness and honesty, as he answered her as decorously as he could;

"From you, your ladyship, I want nothing, though I suppose I've been a little too familiar; I apologise for my impropriety. Please, allow me to explain. I am called Adam Ambrose ... though in truth, this name was given me by others, long ago; I have no true name of my own. My kind do not have names, as such, as either individuals nor collectively; our creators did not grace us so, when we were moulded and set upon the mortal plain, many aeons ago. We are watchers, witnesses; our purpose is to observe the progress of Man with our own eyes, from his dawning day until Gehenna come, and the souls of Mankind are duly judged, whereupon we shall serve as jury in the passage of that judgement. As such, I am functionally-incapable of death, and cannot be kil-"

He flinched a little as the six tips of her wingfingers, now arrow-shaped tentacles, impaled his center mass with staggering force and lightning swiftness; blood began spilling down his front from the wounds, spotting the floor with a brief hiss as the crimson plasma began instantly to boil; it quickly evaporated away, leaving no trace. Glancing down at the injuries with mild concern, and then up to her shocked face, her anger replaced with blinking surprise as he regarded her with slight incredulity for a moment, before continuing, "I am also incapable of pain, nor true suffering, no-matter the severity or lethality of any injuries my body may incur. My word of honour, for what it is worth: to you, I speak only truth, and I mean you no harm."

He grimaced a little as the barbs of her wingtips gently extracted themselves, tearing his flesh anew despite her obvious care; she marvelled, with a little guilt writ across her features, as the blood boiled into mist and dissipated like water vapour, even as the gaping wounds in his chest and abdomen swiftly knitted themselves closed, and the blood dribbling down his torso slowly soaked into his skin, to be reabsorbed.

He smiled a little, and quipped, "Not the kindest greeting I've received in my time, but certainly not the worst. No hard feelings, your ladyship."

"Stop calling me that," she half-whispered tersely, blushing a little shamefully in embarrassment at her hair-trigger attack reflex, then thoughtfully, "Why are you calling me that?"

"You are the lady Lilith Aensland, sister of her ladyship Morrigan of Clan Aensland, Queen of the Succubi and ruler of the Dark Realm, Makai, are you not?"

Her eyes cast down and away with a grimace at his description, before nodding with a reluctant sigh; "...I am..."

"Then as a duly-appointed retainer of the House of your father, his late lordship Belial, and servant of Clan Aensland, decorum demands I refer to you as 'Your Ladyship', and I humbly place myself at your service. That said, I think the rest is best discussed over breakfast, so if you'll kindly afford me a moment, I'll endeavour quickly to find you something suitable to wear, and then breakfast will be served promptly, during which I'll proceed to explain, and answer what questions I'm sure you have, as best I can. Pardon me,"

And with a short bow, he stepped lively into the bedroom, before returning a few moments later with a long black dress shirt in one hand, and a black elastic belt with silver-plated buckle in the other. As he approached she tucked away her wings, and he opened the shirt for her to slip her arms into the sleeves, and began buttoning down the front for her as she fiddled with the cuffs of the sleeves, which were a little overlong for her arms; as she finished rolling them up some ways, he handed her the belt, which she slipped around her waist to hold the cloth about her better.

"My apologies that I can't do better in the moment," he admitted; "I hope it meets my lady's approval...?"

She smiled a little bashfully at his formality and kindness, and nodded; "Thank you."

"Not at all," he smiled in return with a slight bow of his head, and gestured with his right hand to the table; "Please. Breakfast is ready."

Guiding her to the table, he drew out a stool for her and saw her seated, before placing a white plate before her and moving around the table to take up the pan he'd put down just a moment ago; the aroma of meat once again filled her nose and set her stomach gurgling proper; he smiled gently at her blush of embarrassment as he filled her plate with several rashers of bacon and two sausages, followed with a heap of scrambled eggs, before distributing the same to himself and setting the pan back on the hotplate; "Happy to make more if you want seconds," he offered, "Help yourself to some toast. I like my butter a little salted, I hope you don't mind."

She shook her head politely and thanked him as she started in earnest, and decided immediately with wide-eyed delight that the spiced sausage was to die for; reaching for some toast and a bit of butter, she noticed him produce a small, square box from the pocket of his dressing gown and set it aside briefly, before he turned to open the fridge, from which he drew two cartons of juice, one orange and one pomegranate, and placed them on the table. "I don't stock bloodwine, I'm afraid," he joked as he seated himself, "though I do have a good bottle of rosé, but perhaps it's not the best choice to start the day with."

After a few minutes of quiet as they ate, he slid the box across the short distance between them and said, "I thought perhaps you might want to see this."

Picking up the simple little cube, she realised it was made of demonoak, a tree that grew rampantly in the grounds surrounding Castle Aensland in Makai, the poisonous sap of which ran crimson, and whose black timber was traditionally favoured by the royal carpenters and artisans – the feasting tables in the Great Hall were carved from this wood, she remembered, along with much of the rest of the castle's furnishings. Turning it over in her hands, she found a seam that ran with the grain, and carefully-concealed hinges of blackened steel; engraved carefully over the top lip of that seam on the front of the box was a small crest, carefully detailed with gold leaf – the crest of Clan Aensland. Opening it gently with some trepidation, she found inside a gold signet ring nestled in a silk of rich purple, engraved with the Aensland coat of arms.

Taking the ring in her fingers, her senses immediately pricked to the powerful aura it was infused with – two of them, in-fact, one fairly overpowering the other; the greater signifying masterhood, and the weaker a sign of deference in servitude, being that of the one who bore the ring. The stronger aura she recognised immediately, as that of her 'father', Belial Aensland – the demon king who had sundered her from her sister's soul, a wound she suffered with still today, leaving her haunted by that powerful longing to be reunited with Morrigan, that they may be one and whole again; though she knew perfectly-well it had been a calculated decision to save Morrigan from being consumed by her own power, part of her consciousness still couldn't quite forgive their father for separating them so. The second aura, she also knew, though not quite as well: she had bathed in and drank it greedily only hours before; it belonged to the man sat across the table from her, and so, undoubtedly then, did this very ring. He was, as he said, then, truthfully a retainer of Aensland, and one of long-standing and deeply-trusted association to her clan. Looking up at him, his long blonde hair and odd, golden eyes, she began to reassess his value and worth to her as he spoke.

"This was granted to me many decades ago, as a gift of friendship. I've visited Makai many times in my wanderings, over the centuries; as part of my task, I've sought to try to understand mankind from many perspectives, including those of their predators. Belial offered me great insight in this way, and in return, I offered him my confidence, and counsel when he needed the perspective of an outsider, with no investment in the twisted tangle of Makai's politics. He entrusted me with the secret of Morrigan's power, and asked me to ensure that she be made whole again, in the event of his death, that she could oversee the rule of Makai with all her great power at her disposal..." He paused, seeming to chew on the words of what he had to say, as much as the food in-front of him; "Regrettably...I failed in my keeping of that promise...and so, the secret of you, sealed away in the wall behind his great throne, went unknown, lost and forgotten, until Jedah Dohma found you, and extracted you for his own purposes."

The sadness in his voice was deep, and earnest, she felt; he'd promised her that he spoke only the truth, and in this moment, though she believed him, she couldn't help but question him. "Why did you fail? I suffered for that," she asked with a quiet bitterness, as she placed the ring back in its silken nest with a certain reverent care, before closing the box just as carefully and sliding it back to him across the table; "Jedah gave me form so he could use me to harvest souls, and to get at Morrigan, and consume Makai. I gave myself to Morrigan so she could live, and she killed him in the end...but when she set everyone free again, her soul rejected me. She spat me back out, and after a while, she abandoned me, and I've been alone ever since. All this, because you failed. Why?"

She watched him carefully, as he rested his folded hands against his forehead and stared at his plate for a moment, his features contorting minutely as unpleasant memories woke behind his eyes; clearly, his reasons tortured him, though whether that made them any more or less valid remained to be seen. At length, he began again:

"My kind are an odd bunch; many centuries ago, a English philosopher coined the term 'Infinite' to describe me, and by means beyond my knowledge, this became the common term we use to describe ourselves, both personally and collectively. But we do not behave collectively or serve our purpose as a group; we are intended to wander and observe as individuals, that we should form individual views and opinions of Humanity, so that when the moment of judgement comes, we can provide as wide and varied a set of differing outlooks as possible, having come to those conclusions independently of each-other's influence. To that end, we are not intended to gather ourselves together before Gehenna comes, or indeed be gathered together against our wills by the will of any other; we are seemingly driven apart, we repel each-other like the poles of a magnet, and like powerful magnets, when we are forced to occupy the same space against the forces that should keep us apart, those forces react violently, wreaking great havoc until we Infinites are parted once again. Likewise, great misfortune inevitably visits itself upon anyone who seeks to imprison, or otherwise keep an Infinite in one place against their will, for any appreciable length of time,"

Giving her a moment to consider and digest all that, he continued at her nod of understanding;

"All that said, to answer your question; in the mid-1990s of this world's time, I was wandering in the region known as Saudi Arabia, when some minor hostilities broke out over the presence of foreigners in those lands; being perceived as a foreigner, I was caught up in these hostilities, and during the course of those troubles, a disreputable fellow with some power and influence, by the name of Al-Fayzeen, who viewed people as property, and...collected them as 'pets', discovered my unusual nature, and decided I would make an interesting curiosity to add to his collection. He had me abducted, and imprisoned in a cell beneath his home, where he kept me in chains for several years. He took a perverse pleasure in trying to find ways to hurt me, but of course, it never came to anything, and after a while, he simply left me there in my cage, unwilling to let me go.

"And then one day, misfortune inevitably found him, in the shape of a car bomb planted by one of his enemies, and he perished horribly, after which the son of one of his lieutenants, who'd grown a conscience, felt safe to release us all. To my great regret, I received the summons to attend Belial while Al-Fayzeen had me under lock-and-key, and though I knew from what little the summons was able to tell me that the matter was of grave importance, I could not answer, and I only learned later, when my liberty was eventually returned to me, that Belial had passed away during my imprisonment; that Morrigan had ascended, powerful but incomplete, to the throne of Makai; and that in her absence, Jedah Dohma had stolen you from the safety of the throne room and given you form, to use you in his campaign to subjugate and consume all of Makai into himself. I realised immediately that the summons had been for me to attend Belial in his last moments, and keep my promise following his passing, and though it was through no fault of my own that I was unable to comply, I still knew in my soul that I had failed my friend when he needed me, and feeling I was powerless to change anything, in shame and regret, I neglected to return to Makai."

Hearing that admission of seeming cowardice, for a moment her soul boiled with righteous fury, that this fool had abandoned his duty, even in the face of the circumstances being beyond his control... but as she closed her angrily-glowing eyes and took a breath, she realised, likely as he had, that there had been nothing he could have done; in-fact, if he'd returned to Makai and confessed his failure, that would likely have ended very poorly, and to no real purpose. He could no-more change what had happened than she could, herself; even though she had served Jedah willingly if ignorantly at first, hunting, seducing, killing and capturing souls for his sake, she had sought and found a means and opportunity to atone for that; in realising she was being used, she'd tried to warn Morrigan, and even though Morrigan had ignored and dismissed her in her typical fashion, she had still sought to deny Jedah his ultimate victory at the last moment, by rebinding herself to Morrigan's broken form and revitalising her enough to tear him asunder, freeing all the souls he had consumed. She had gained a kind of absolution for her misguided naivety, though in the balance it had cost her dearly, a price she continued to pay even now in her loneliness, cast aside as she was. But there was no means by which Adam could redeem his failure. Like Belial, the moment was dead and gone, and there was no opportunity for redemption. What was, was, and nothing could change that now. Her anger drained away, and she felt only pity for him.

"You are well within your right to judge me however you see fit," he mused quietly, jolting her from her introspection with surprise; "But know I am well-aware of my failure, and having had the intervening years to consider things, I've come to the conclusion now that it may yet still be possible to keep my promise, after all. I do not believe in coincidences, and though it was certainly serendipity that we encountered each-other so at the club last night, I could not allow that opportunity to pass me by, and that is why I sought to gain your company as I did."

"...What?" The wings on her head perked up, having wilted a little, at the sound of hope in his voice.

"I know why Morrigan's soul rejects you so," he told her, looking her steadily in the eye from across the table, "There is an imbalance between you, and I believe I can help you to correct that."

A cautious eagerness lit in her eyes. "How?"