There was a quiet.
It wasn't silence, for this place could never be truly silent, but the noise was that of dust caught in late afternoon shafts of sunlight, of smoke silkily twining its way through the air, of an ambience settling.
And the noise of many tiny purple wings fluttering.
"Do you believe in Hitsuzen?"
"I believe… I used to believe in a lot of things," He answered quietly, his voice almost breaking with unspoken emotions, "But now… I just want him."
The woman sitting on the chaise lounge shifted, tapping the end of her cigarette holder lightly. The smoke floated out the end in graceful drifts, spiralling into impossible fractals.
"There are many who would like to have others, and maybe they can, and maybe they can't. But nothing comes without paying a price."
"I just need to see him." He answered simply.
There was a pause, in which the soft flicker of the burning lamps could be heard, the noiseless sound of Fate twining, and the gentle silence of dust settling.
But it was just a pause.
"A simple request." She replied.
It was anything but, and the two of them both knew it.
The woman in front of him smirked.
Subaru wondered if what he was doing was the right thing. He couldn't help but think that this woman would be like a trickster spirit, twisting his wish around so that his heart's desire remained unfulfilled.
"My request is to see someone I am unable to… to… he's..."
She nodded.
"I need to tell him… Well," he looked down bitterly, "I'd like to talk to him. I'd like to see him…"
She didn't ask the young man why he needed to see this person, or why it was that the powerful onmyouji could not fulfil this wish himself.
And while the hush of time ticking passed over their ears, the two exchanged a look. It stretched across the room like a pianist's melody. In the young man's heart a desire unfolded like a flower, and the truth was plain to view. In the space-witch's eyes there was a simple understanding. Things were what they were, and things were how they were. And that was that.
"What was his name?" was all she asked.
"Sakurazukamori Seishiro."
If the name surprised her, she did not show it. As ever, she hid behind her mask of mystery, not deigning to note that the solitary member of the assassin clan of the Sakurazukamori was the Sumeragi's mortal enemy. Or that the powerful sorcerer had once placed a bet with death-wish stakes on the young onmyouji's heart.
Or that he was dead.
Instead, she held his piercing, empty gaze with her own firm, calculating gaze, eternity glittering in the amber depths.
"From one in the top of their profession to another, I don't need to remind you that this will cost you dearly."
"I don't know what I can offer you. He… he has all of me."
The space-time witch could see the effort it was taking him to keep going, to keep his mind from splintering into a thousand sharp pieces, but it looked as though he were long accustomed to it.
And of course she knew why. The fate of this man, of the two souls in question right now, was well known to anyone in the business of fate, just as the time-old classic story of Romeo and Juliet is passed around the world and through the ages. Theirs was a cruel and tragic fate instigated by none other than themselves. It was tangled, like a red string jammed in the shiny metal gears of a machine, stretched and twisted, but never broken. And perhaps the very fate of a world would be altered due to her interference, but that was her job. That was why people sought her out.
There were no coincidences, only Hitsuzen.
"There have been many things given to me in return for a wish. For something this great, I would usually require the thing most important to you. But I can see in this case, that price cannot be paid." The focus of her alluring stare shifted to the solitary butterfly playing in the snakes and swirls of smoke that framed her, and she thought carefully.
"Please. I'd like a day with him. Just a day" Subaru pleaded, anxiety showing through his careful façade.
The woman named Yuuko remained silent.
"Please," his voice wavered, "I just need an hour with him." Desperation flooded his voice, "Or five minutes even. I just… I need to see him." His voice cracked, and with it, his composure. A dry sob escaped, strangling his next words. "I just need to see him for five minutes, five minutes…"
Yuuko listened to his despairing pleas that were punctuated now by broken sobs. "Please, that's all I need" the thirteenth head of the Sumeragi clan said in a quiet, hoarse voice, "I just need to tell him."
He had managed to keep from breaking down, managed to curb the tears that must have filled his entire body, but still. It must have seemed a pathetic display to such a woman as the one in front of him. But such a woman was not interested in whether he was pathetic or not. It was not her place to judge whether a young man, albeit Sumeragi Subaru, should hide and hold a heart shattered thrice over. What was hers to judge was the weight of his request. The value of his heart's desire. The price of his wish.
And it was hard, because there was clearly nothing that the man valued any more, excepting this one wish. He had no treasured possessions, no ties to loved ones. He did not care for his memories, his future, his heart. But… there was something he had that always carries weight.
She turned her attention back to him. There was payment to discuss.
"There is only one thing you have, that can balance the weight of your request. Are you prepared to give it up?"
She stared straight into his eyes, her full intensity burning into his one emerald eye.
"Yes."
"Then so be it."