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Notes: The Coldfire Trilogy and all its characters belong to the wonderful and talented C. S. Friedman.
Hey look, I fixed the ending! ^^; I may have stretched the rules of Gerald's agreement a bit, so forgive me for that, but I couldn't just let the ending stand like it was. Anyway, I'm not entirely sure if I'm happy with this, so this story may be subject to random changes. Or not. We'll see.
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Damien had tried to leave it be and walk away. He really had. But he found, to no great surprise really, that he couldn't manage it.
And so he sat down at a table in the small bar area of the Black Ridge Tavern, directly across from the youth who had approached him the day before. The other man appeared not to be surprised, despite the fact that he had not invited Damien to join him. But then, if this was the man who he had traveled with for so long, then he would know Damien well enough to predict his actions.
"I can't," said Damien by way of opening.
The man across from him arched one delicate eyebrow in a gesture that was far too familiar, and waited for the ex-Priest to elaborate.
"I can't just let this go," Damien explained. "I can't leave it open-ended. I need some closure, at the very least."
A small smile shimmered faintly across the youth's lips, like light reflecting briefly off of the water's surface. "I take it that the vague hope that the essence of Gerald Tarrant survived is not enough for you? What do you want from me, Mer Vryce?"
Damien shook his head. He could see Tarrant in every little detail of the man: his speech patterns, the way he was fastidiously groomed, the way his eyes were cool, calm, and appraising. And yet there was something about him that was indefinably different. Damien was at a loss to guess what it was.
Damien gave up on finding it for the moment. "Just listen, please," he said. "You claim to be a collector of myths and legends. I would like to give you a tale."
The youth said nothing, but leaned back in his chair, obviously waiting for Damien to begin. Damien took a deep breath and let it out slowly, nerving himself to start. Finally, he decided to just jump right in.
"I was in love with the Hunter," he began. "I don't think I ever realized it while he was alive, but it was undeniable after he died with the way my thoughts stayed with him. Near the end I was appalled at how close I had gotten to him. Or rather, I was appalled at the fact that it didn't bother me. And then at the very end, when he was finally and briefly human again... It felt like the most wonderful thing in the world. It felt like things were somehow right with the world.
"I'm not sure when it started. I'm not so naive as to think that I loved him at first sight. Perhaps the bond he created between us had something to do with it. Maybe not. When I think of the way I worried about waiting for him to accompany me across the ocean to the Eastern continent, I think I must have loved him by then, even so early. Though there are other ways of justifying my actions then, there is no way of justifying the emotions.
"With him gone, I don't know what to do with my life anymore. The church used to be the main focus of my life, before I met him. Then for a while our journey was the point of my life. And maybe... maybe he was too, in a way. And now he's gone. And I can't go back to the church. I'm lost. I feel like I'm drifting."
Damien paused, sighing, and stared at his hands, not willing to look up at this youth who may have been the Hunter. "I guess what's really bothering me, even more than the way I felt about him, is that he never knew. And I never knew what he felt for me." Finally he chanced looking up at the other man, and saw a small smile gracing his lips.
"Gerald Tarrant knew how you felt about him," the youth said quietly.
Damien goggled at him a moment. "He- he knew? How?"
The youth rolled his eyes. "How could he not? One thing you should have learned on that quest of yours is that every essence has its antithesis. Do you remember your trip into Hell, Vryce? Why do you think the Unnamed One let you go so easily? Did you really believe that it was your stellar diplomatic skills? No. The one thing that the Unnamed cannot stand is love. That is its opposite. And it felt that the Hunter was tainted by your love and got rid of him. After that, the Hunter was sure of what you felt for him, though he had suspected it before."
Damien stared at him and leaned back in his chair, pondering this revelation. Unable to come up with a reply, he changed the subject.
"What's your name?"
The youth looked suddenly weary. He hesitated before answering, as if trying to work out how to properly phrase his reply.
"You may call me Gerald," he answered at last. "But please understand Vryce, I am not the Hunter. I am a very different man."
"But you have his memories," Damien challenged.
"I do," Gerald admitted. "But that does not make me him. I am not the man you traveled with, and I never will be again."
Damien smiled. "No, you're not. You're the part of him that was human. You are, in fact, everything about him that I loved."
"What makes you so sure of that?" Gerald asked. "You think you know me, but you don't. I am a stranger, Vryce. I am the remnants of a man of whom there was very little left in that demonic shell. I am not the Hunter, Vryce. And even if I were, what would make you think that I loved you? That the Hunter ever loved you?"
Damien paused once again. This was the question that had worried him. He had thought long and hard about it, but had no satisfactory answer. He didn't know that the Hunter ever loved him. But that, somehow, was not the point.
"So you're a stranger. I would like to get to know you, then. If you are the man I think you are, then I know I will come to love you as I did him. And of course, it is your own choice whether you return that feeling or not. But I would like to try."
Before Gerald could reply, a voice called out from behind them.
"Vryce? Mer Vryce?"
Damien turned to look in the direction of the speaker before remembering that he had not given his real name to anyone here. But if not him, then whom was the voice addressing?
The speaker, a young waiter carrying a bottle of wine and two glasses, walked over to the table and, to Damien's surprise, stopped in front of Gerald.
"You're Gerald Vryce, right? The boss said you ordered this?" he questioned.
"Yes, it's mine," Gerald answered curtly, gesturing for the boy to set the items on the table. In the face of Gerald's glare, the young waiter hurried off.
"Gerald Vryce?" Damien asked, grinning.
Gerald sniffed, doing his best to look nonchalant, but Damien was sure that he caught a hint of sheepishness in his demeanor. It was entirely un-Hunter like, and only underscored the fact that this was not the same man.
"Yes, well," said Gerald, trying to cover the embarrassment at having been caught. "I had to call myself something, after all." He set one of the glasses in front of Damien and poured the wine. "I anticipated that you might try to find me again," he said, before taking a sip from his own glass.
Damien sipped the wine slowly, studying this unfamiliar and yet familiar man. He was different from the Hunter. The Hunter had been ice, but this man was different. Even his coloring reflected that. His hair was not the light, ethereal color of the Hunter's, but black, soft, and very long. Damien wondered briefly what it would be like to run his hands through that hair, let the strands play through his fingers. He wondered if Gerald would let him.
"Well?" Damien asked eventually, setting down his glass.
"Well what?"
"Will you let me try? Will you let me find out if I could love this new you?"
Gerald sighed and also placed his glass on the table. "I somehow doubt I could stop you either way. Has anyone ever told you that you're a stubborn bastard?"
Damien laughed. "Only the Hunter."
"And now me."
Damien smiled at him, knowing that he had won at last.
"Yes," he said, "and now you."
or
Oh God, that was hideous. Let me complain to the author.