III. When will the Flames at last consume us?

Niobe remembered.

Tall and strong… Those eyes of blue… Dark hair flying in the wind…

Memory… The distilled, compressed essence of time… It rested heavily on her mind.

That disdainful little smile curving his lips… His graceful way of strutting, as if he owned the world…

There were some things one would never forget, not if ages had come and passed.

He was very close now, and his eyes bored into hers, like augers of clear blue crystal. His presence filled her, just as she knew that hers filled him. As they stood so close that their bodies almost touched, the strong wind always blowing up here on the ramparts played with their hair, made it mingle.

Yes, she had met him before. She knew she had. She had met him so long ago that those days had even faded from myth, but she remembered. She remembered now.

"There is night in your eyes." His voice was very soft, very gentle, like velvet brushing lightly against her skin.

He had lost none of his gift of observation, she was sure.

"There is morning in yours… or maybe just the light of a dying star."

No, not a star. A dying world. She knew it now.

"Why would you say such a thing?" he inquired, his hand reaching up to caress her cheek lightly. "Why would one so fair proclaim for me a fate so cruel?"

The calm with which he had borne it… And the pain he had endured…

"The light of your eyes is changing. There is turmoil in your soul. I cannot read you."

Still, she had to admit, he remained a puzzle to her.

His smile was mocking, but ever so alluring. "And yet you can read everyone."

Yes. This was her. This was what she had once been, and what she would be again.

"I will yet read you too, my lovely boy", she promised, touching his cheek in return. "You are a very intriguing object of study, and I will enjoy getting to know you… closer."

Which she had. She knew she had. She could not yet recall the details – not yet, she reminded herself, not yet – but she knew that it had been so. She knew that she had had him… or rather, she suspected, though she was loath to admit so, that he had had her. It had been part of the bargain, part of the price he had asked.

Those crystal eyes were so bright, so clear, so fearless as they settled upon the one they all feared, and they oddly gleamed in the gloom of the dark chamber. "I accept your offer", he announced calmly. "I want everything we agreed on, and immediately after it's done. Yes, and a night with the girl, and before I do it."

The price for treason.

"What do you say now?" he purred, his breath tickling her cheek as he pressed her to the wall with his body. "What does it feel like, being part of the bargain, and not a subject, but an object? I always get what I want, you see, and tonight I will be wanting you…"

Not always, she recalled. Not always. Had it been so, there would have never been a bargain.

"I will be wanting you to be mine, mine alone, until I let you go again."

Had it been so, there might not have been an end to the days of old.

"And I will be most displeased with you if you don't give me exactly what I want. There might be no more bargain if I don't receive my due reward, you understand?"

What impertinence, what utmost, outrageous impertinence! Never before, and never again, had a man dared to take that tone with her. He was special, and in many ways.

The sleeves of his thin white shirt rolled up to his elbows, he was leaning against the wall, his head tilted back and his eyes half closed as he enjoyed the sun on his face. "You know, pleasure is vastly underrated, in my opinion", he stated. "All they ever care about is duty and responsibility. All very well, and very honourable, and I have not failed them one single time as far as all that is concerned. But clearly, it is not everything." One of his hands wandered up to thoughtlessly brush a long strand of dark hair from his face. "It is the goal, and the purpose. But it is not the way. What is a being without passion? Is it not a dead one?"

Passion, indeed. Wild, consuming passion…

"Yet you have been called cold-hearted." She watched him carefully as she said so, yet his expression stayed the same, and his eyes remained half closed.

Cold-hearted, but with a fiery soul.

Stretched out on his back, he was watching her; she felt his eyes on her.

And he was the one in charge. It would not work otherwise, or would it? No, of course it would. But she would have to change it. She would have to make sure he knew whom to serve. She would yet have to teach him submission, as it seemed. And it was obvious that he would really submit, if just handled correctly; her attempt to get at him via that girl he loved had shown it clearly enough; he had yielded straight away, then.

Suddenly on her back, she felt him over her, the touch of his hands as well as his lips, everywhere at once.

It was hard to believe that he could yield at all.

His teeth were grazing the side of her neck, biting and gnawing, just at the edge of pain. Forcing her chin up with his, he wandered towards her throat this way, the pressure increasing ever so slightly as his jaws closed around it, and he snarled softly. Mine, he seemed to say as he greedily ravished her, mine

Hard to believe, indeed. But he could. He could be made to do so. And if he could be, then she would. This time, she would be the one to possess him, whatever had happened earlier on… especially since he had no memories as yet, since he even refused to admit who he was. And since he seemed unable to draw from his own full potential.

She woke as the first morning light fell into the chamber, comfortable in his warm embrace, his presence pleasantly filling her.

But he was gone from her head. Very suddenly, the connection had been snapped, broken, severed as if with an axe. And then, for a brief period, she had reached out for him through the girl, and soon they had battled for supremacy over the girl's petty little mind. And then, he had pushed her out, and she now felt him no more. He was gone from her head, leaving a patch of emptiness where her awareness of him should be.

When she sat up, he growled softly in his sleep as his arms slid off her, stirring slightly, but he did not wake. Smiling, she regarded his unclothed form, only partially covered by all the furs and blankets he had piled up in his bed, making it more a nest than anything else. So pretty... There must be a way of keeping him, of having him all to herself.

He loved another, and he had always loved another.

She wished for him to be her own… and yet she knew the terms of the bargain he had made with the Herald of Fate. She had been there when he had accepted it, and then asked to possess her. And she knew that what he had asked of her ally was another woman. Another woman's heart. Another woman's love, a love as great as the one he harboured for her. Yes, he loved this woman, this petty earthling girl, he loved her with passion, and his love, and his despair over not being loved in return, had driven him to forswear his allegiances and sell his soul to the shadow.

She had felt how much he loved this unimportant little Christine, and all his pain for not being loved in return.

And when this all was over and done with, he would have her, his unimportant little earthling, and spend his nights with her, in her arms. There would be no need for anybody else for him, then. Beside that earthling worm, there would be no more place for her.

Why did the fool have to lose his heart to someone so utterly undeserving?

No, she could not permit this! She would not! She refused to!

He was hers. Hers.

And then, a plan formed in her mind, a plan to forever rid herself of the unworthy rival. She would just need to have a word with her ally; she knew just the reasons to convince him. And he would never know until too late, and in his grief, his need for comfort, he would be easy to take, and she would bind him to her.

Forever.

Because she loved him.

She loved him.

He was the first man she had ever loved, and despite the foolishness of this emotion, she would never let him go. He did not love her in return, but it did not matter. All that mattered was to have him, to possess him, to make him her own, and without him realizing what was going on until he was hopelessly tangled in her web.

He was being stubborn, but she liked that in a man. It would make him so much more enjoyable to play with.

And she would have him.

She would have him again.