A/N: I don't own Demon Diary. I'm not yet delusional enough to think I do. Soon enough, my friends, soon enough.
Anyway.
Everyone- thank you for the absolutely lovely reviews. Aww, you shouldn't have. Actually, ignore that last part. Reviews make Wintry a happy, happy girl, even if they make her want to write when she should be studying for finals...--;; Ah well, I have labored on this latest chapter despite Massive Need to Study and the icky end of the school year things that go on. I'm going to be away for quite some time this summer (Las Vegas, Virginia, and then Otakon- I'll be cosplaying Raenef!) so I'll try to get as much done as I can before then.
In the meantime, I think all you Rae/Eclipse shippers should like the end of this chapter. I never expected to get all that started so early in the fic... ;; Enjoy, though.
Love to: SnakeMistress, hm, ziggy pop eno, Lethe Seraph, Vampy-Chan, Spooky Mitsuko, God of Insanity, DaughterofDeath, Silverlie, and The Firebird!
How to Presume
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening.
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains.
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys.
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
Chapter Two: 'The Eyes That Fix You in a Formulated Phrase'
He fell into a deadened, dreamless sleep.
"Dreamless sleep, hmm? I'll be the one to decide whether your sleep is dreamless or not, old friend."
Finished with his business at the local pub, Lord Krayon had retired back to his realm. Amid the shifting outlines and impossibly tall columns of the dream world, he lounged upon his gilded throne. In one hand he held a half-eaten apple; a flat glass stone rested in the palm of the other.
As he worked his way through the apple, Krayon studied the surface of the stone. Two other stones rested on the table at his right hand. While his Seeing Stones themselves were nothing but clear glass, each of them, when in use, showed a different scene. The stone he held currently gave him a view of Eclipse as he slept.
It would be ten minutes, at least, before Eclipse passed through the first stage of sleep and into the second. It was then that demons were most open to dreams- not so with humans, but then, demons were different from humans in a thousand small ways.
Over the years, this had only become clearer. Krayon had found that most demons slept longer hours than humans, but most slept very lightly- by nature they were more alert and sensitive to their surroundings. As a result, they dreamt early in the sleep cycle and their dreams were always vivid, almost real. Those powerful enough could manipulate their own dreams, or choose when they wished to dream. Those who could travel through dreams without Krayon's permission were still more powerful- and only Lord Krayon himself could pull the unsuspecting into waking dreams.
The other powers- dream walking, manipulation, and the like- he accomplished with the flick of a finger.
Krayon sighed deeply before setting the Seeing Stone aside. Sometime during the night, he had picked up a migraine. Powerful as he was, there was still nothing he could do about those damnable headaches.
Rubbing his right temple, he reached for a second Seeing Stone. If anything could cure his migraine, it was the sight of his ladylove. Ah, Erutis. He smiled fondly at the stone, stroking the smooth class with one finger absentmindedly. She, too, was about to sleep. Hair haloed around her head the pillow, fingers curled with delicate grace on the hem of her quilt- woe was he, that he could not spend his every moment in the sweet glow of her presence.
Never mind that she had threatened to, well, shave her head, throw her sword into the deepest lake she could find, and join Chris as a cleric if Krayon set so much as a eyelash in that aforementioned glow. He'd then told her that his love knew no bounds, and that he would love her even if she did become a hairless, preaching, wimp of a cleric, but she hadn't seemed too pleased with that either.
Even so, he'd avoided her a bit lately. It had been a little more than four years since he had first proclaimed his undying devotion for his swordswoman. Since then, he had managed to put her in a position of power, put a solid roof over her head, and settle her into a comfortable lifestyle. And never once had she shown any affection towards him in return. She had never even thanked him. Never once.
He didn't mind all that much, exactly, but Krayon was beginning to feel impatient. He took whatever he desired, that was true- but stealing her heart was less than easy. Four years was ridiculous. Four years- he couldn't be expected to wait forever, could he? So he was getting impatient, and impatience truly annoyed him because, really, a Demon Lord was supposed to know exactly how to get what he wanted, when he wanted it, and how he wanted it. As one of the eldest, he'd thought that he'd perfected the art, down to a T.
Apparently not.
And so, it was time for more extreme measures. Krayon took one last bite of his apple and tossed it over his back- when it hit the floor, the core instantly disappeared. Things came easily to him in the dream realm. That was why the first stage of his plan would begin here, within his own territory.
"Sleep soundly while you can Eclipse." He laughed, a light sound that, once echoed through the halls, became strangely sinister. He winced. A familiar throb had started up again at his temples and the bridge of his nose. Laughing made his migraine worse. Well, that could be fixed. He stood up, Erutis's Seeing Stone still in hand, and as he whirled off to prepare for his task, he hummed tunelessly and gazed at his sleeping love as he waltzed.
"Let us go then, you and I."
There were cherry blossoms on the air, a late bloom perhaps. Somewhere distant, a flock of geese trumpeted in chorus as they passed overhead, and a spring ran nearby- he could hear the bubbling water clearly when he listened for it. During the past few years, he had learned to rely closely on his other senses to gain some awareness of a place. Wherever he was, it was someplace terribly familiar.
Eyes closed tightly, Eclipse racked his mind for some memory. Yes, he could recall this place, but he couldn't pinpoint it. He was so sure- he had been here before, heard those geese calling, smelled the cherry blossoms, sat by the stream with...
Suddenly, he had it. Eclipse opened his eyes in wonder- only to find, in a rush of realization, that none of this was real.
It was only a dream.
His homeland was exactly as it had been in the early autumns of his childhood. He sat in the wooded garden that surrounded his mother's castle. The pebbled pathway lined with ferns still wound parallel to the stream, a trickle of water that became a river as it journeyed down the mountainside- the cherry trees still spread their arms above the water and linked hands with the tall forest pines that stood on the opposite side. A bed of thick green moss covered the banks of the stream; he remembered playing there before he was old enough to talk.
He was faced with a bright light after living in darkness and it blinded him. After a moment, he was forced to close his eyes against it, and kept them closed. None of this was real, Eclipse reminded himself, no matter what his senses told him. He could only see again in his dreams.
The wind picked up, and when he opened his eyes, the forest around him turned to colored sand and was swept away in a whirlwind. The sand became a desert, or a memory of a desert- the searing heat and the landscape that climbed and shifted before his eyes were all too familiar. Within seconds, all the coolness of the forest had vanished and he was tossed into a place he had hoped to forget. His mouth and throat grew painfully dry as he waited. He knew what would happen next.
How many times would the nightmare come to haunt him?
Out of the sandstorm, a figure emerged, tinted in same matte gold as the landscape that surrendered him. He came nearer, nearer, until he was near enough that Eclipse could count his faltering steps. Several times he stopped, hesitant to go on, and once he even made to turn back, before shaking his head and returning to his original path.
He'll stumble next, thought Eclipse, frozen. One hundred yards away, he did- the figure fell to his knees and did not move for some time, until Eclipse couldn't help but think he was weeping, or had fainted from exhaustion. Worry clouded Eclipse's thoughts, a sort of smothering pressure in his chest that wouldn't go away, though he already knew that the figure was fine, and at any moment he would rise again.
He always recovered awhile later than Eclipse remembered. Each time Eclipse resisted the urge to run towards him in concern.
Nearer and nearer. Eclipse's eyes stung from the flying sand; shielding them didn't help at all and never had. Inevitably, he tried, and as the figure drew closer, close enough to reach out for and touch-
It was always a shock to recognize that face.
But- the expression, those eyes, darkened almost beyond recognition, but not quite foreign, no, that would've been too kind a mercy- it was like a dozen needles through the heart.
The enemy smiled back at him through those eyes.
Eclipse couldn't move as the stranger approached, because he was truly a wolf in sheep's clothing. The boy smiled at him, a thin, starved smile.
"I've found you, Eclipse. Don't say you weren't hiding. Even if you didn't on purpose, you know you wanted to avoid me. Am I right? Because I've changed like this, and you don't like it." His expression changed to a mockery of the boy Eclipse served, a caricature- wide eyes and trembling mouth. "I don't understand, Eclipse. You- you don't like me anymore? Did I do something wrong?"
He'll taunt me like this for awhile, and then- thought Eclipse, still frozen in dread, ready to shade his eyes in fear- then, he'll walk back a few steps and-
The stranger, the fake, did not walk back this time, but pushed forward. He slid his lying hands across the soft skin below Eclipse's jawbone, and teased the dark hair at the base of Eclipse's neck. Soon, he had gotten too near, his body- Eclipse inhaled sharply- his body just brushing, practically taunting Eclipse, and this was not the dream he had had so many times. It was an entirely different nightmare, but Eclipse didn't think of this as he felt the stranger's hot breath on his neck, moving up his chin, to his shocked, parted lips- his only thought, again and again, was This is wrong, this is wrong, this is wrong...
"I'm sorry," Raenef breathed before he kissed him.
His tone of voice made Eclipse sick.