a/n: carlisle is super soft in this story lol also lydia is like...he's weird but...i'm okay with it. kinda like bella..okay any excuse for an indulgent twilight story hehehe i hope you enjoy!

two

Some hours later, Carlisle returned. He seemed a great deal more at ease, showing a lightness in his mood which served to unwind the ball of anxiety wedged within me. It could not be said that I was afraid of him. Rather he relaxed me without ever giving reason for it. I simply found myself sinking against the pillows, watching his approach to my bedside, waiting impatiently for the silk of his voice.

As if no time had passed at all, he said, "I do not think it wise to move so hastily."

"I have informed you of my grandfather's passing. I must leave."

"But you are unwell."

"Please, Mr. Cullen -..."

"Carlisle. I abhor formalities."

Had it not been for that warm glow of his eyes, and the compassion sewn in each of his sinews, his insistence upon forenames might have shocked me. I stayed myself, however, and replied, "Then you may call me Lydia in return. Please, Carlisle - do not misunderstand me. I am indebted to you beyond all measure. You spared my life; it stands to reason that you are my guardian angel of sorts. And it shames me to impede on your charity any further."

"It is no impediment," he said. "Quite the reverse, in fact. It is an honour. Ask what you will, though I believe I know very well what you seek."

"I must arrange a carriage and set out at once."

"There are no groomsmen on these grounds," he replied, "and no horses either."

Surprise forced speech without forethought. "None at all? Is this not a castle?"

Again his good-humour removed any threat of offence. "You are correct," he said. "It is a castle. But there is no staff."

"You mean to tell me you are all alone here?"

"Entirely."

"How do you manage?"

"I reside in the west wing," he said, "in a handful of rooms. The rest are vacant, and have been since the first hint of snow. You see, this castle is not my own. It belongs to a dear friend of mine. He is not fond of the harsh winters in this region, and each time winter approaches, he and his staff depart for a warmer climate."

"But you remained," I noted.

"Indeed. I cannot continue without underscoring the generosity of my friend," he said, "for he ensured that I had all I needed to endure a winter alone here. I subsist on the provisions he provided, and leave the confines of this castle but once or twice in a week for a stroll about the grounds. Otherwise I am content to immerse myself in my studies."

"You are a scholar?"

"Of sorts." Catching sight of my confusion, he added, "I study medicine."

"Then you are a physician. What fortune I had that it was you who found me!"

Again a smile graced his lips. I thought even cherubim could not appear as sweet.

"The fortune was mine, Lydia."

What little light was in the room latched onto the golden strands of his hair to set them flaring, marvellously, as a lock fell to his forehead. He leaned closer to me; his proximity disrupted the rhythm of my heart, for it beat madly, raucously, so that I wondered if he might hear it. But then I steadied myself, and sank back against a fluffed pillow as I recalled what had brought me here in the first place.

Quietly, I said, "Then I cannot leave to be with my family; I cannot see my beloved grandfather buried."

"I wish that it were possible. Know that it wounds me to deny you what you wish." There was such conviction in his tone, such fierce honesty in his eyes, that I was quite startled. "I apologise, Lydia."

"What folly! You have spared my life and offered me shelter. Mother Nature is not yours to control any more than she is mine. I must wait for the weather to clear and see what can be done. If I attempted so bold an excursion, I am sure I would be buried alongside my grandfather."

Carlisle winced as if injured and hurriedly looked away from me.

"What is it?" I inquired.

"Do not trouble yourself." He shifted. "Once that snow thaws, the friend of whom I have so fondly spoken will return. He will bring his staff in sundry carriages and I am sure he will be graceful enough to allow you to borrow one for your purposes."

Weakly, I smiled. "Thank you, Carlisle. I do not know how I will ever repay you."

"There is no debt between us, and never will be," he said sincerely. "Now I think it best that you do not extend yourself further."

"Have you assigned yourself my physician?"

"Indeed, I have."

"I shall assume you are as stubborn and relenting a physician as I am a person."

There it was again: his sweet, chiming laugh which lifted my spirits so swiftly that I felt myself raised from the seabed to breach the surface, sucking in one fresh breath of air. Carlisle swept across the room. He stood for a moment at the door, whereupon he turned and said, "Sleep well, fair Lydia."

x

Yet sleep did not find me as soundly as Carlisle had wished. It dragged me into all sorts of horrible nightmares in which I found myself in a brooding forest where thin pale bodies whipped through the trees to chase me, rustling branches, coming closer to the carriage. Inside its confines, I remained trapped. Fear thrummed the strings of my heart. I sought the silver-plated necklace gifted to me, but it was gone. I heard the creature climb atop the carriage and begin to shake it about, laughing - laughing -...

And its horrid mouth opened to chant: Lydia, Lydia, Lydia…

x

Fright woke me. An errant wind had seemingly rushed through the room and put out all the candlelight. Yet the door was shut, the windows sealed. The sense of being watched lingered, swelled, swallowed me. I pushed off the bed-sheets, stood - blasted dizziness, swinging me back against the bed as sure as a shove against my chest!

But I persisted and held onto the furniture around me at the point of passing. I reached the hall, which was fizzling a warm orange shade in the candlelight. Here was light and brightness which guided me forward.

I called out, "Carlisle?"

From one of the rooms came the rustle and shifting of furniture. A door parted. It astounded me that the sight of him could temper my heart. Immediately, I swept aside that dream; how silly I had been to sweat and writhe at memories of the carriage; how childish I had been to seek the host of this castle as if he might soothe me. Yet he instilled calmness in me. Again I thought I had known him a long while.

The third door on the right opened. Carlisle appeared. "Lydia?"

"Have I woken you?"

"No. Not at all. I was reading."

I stood, silent and unsure of myself. I could not tell him of such infantile dreams.

Kindly, he added, "Do you wish to join me in the study?"

Relief overwhelmed me. "Yes, please."

x

What a wonderful and comforting study it was, its walls lined in tall bookshelves, each filled with books as old as time. The furniture was walnut and ancient. I sat on an olive-coloured sofa while Carlisle prepared tea for us both on a small silver platter. He chased off all nightmares with only his movements.

He had such beautiful hands, and never before had I remarked upon the hands of a man; his weaved, swooped, rose, fell, as graceful as a bird in flight. I marvelled again at the straight line of his nose, the slight lift of his brows to form the intelligent front of his face, the slick dip of his cheeks to lips pursed in thought.

I asked, "Do you not detest being alone?"

"I neither adore it nor detest it. I view it as a necessity," he replied.

Carlisle handed me a cup. It was a delicious blend, and I sipped gladly, pausing for a length long enough to pose a question: "For your studies?"

Slowly, he stirred sugar into his tea and picked up the cup, cradling it between his hands. "Yes," he said eventually. "For my studies."

"I hope I am not disturbing you. I can leave you be, if you like -..."

"Lydia," he said softly, "I assure you that I am the most content that I can be in this singular moment, for you are in my presence."

Once more, his sincerity rang true and instantly satiated me. He was not offering cold, bland platitudes like those I had been served at aristocratic dinner parties. It was the truth in its purest form.

But how could he think of me so fondly? We were, for all the world, still strangers. Mere hours had passed since we had met, and our meeting had not been under the most pleasant of circumstances.

"You seem rather lost in your thoughts," Carlisle mused. "Might I be privy to what concerns you?"

"I was merely reflecting on the peculiarity of this situation," I murmured. "I admit I am content as well. I find it conflicting."

"Because you are grieving, and wish to be with those you love best."

Each word prickled like a nettle against bare skin. Those you love best, I thought.

Our eyes met.

"I must resign myself to what Fate has decided," I said finally. "I could not put another life at risk, neither yours nor mine nor that of any driver, if one could even be found. I deeply regret that I put that kind man in danger. I was selfish."

Even his frown could not detract from his handsomeness. "You were desperate."

"Selfish," I insisted. "Do you know I have always gotten what I want?"

His cheeks dimpled with his smile. "It does not surprise me. I suspect it is rather difficult to deny you anything."

I laughed. "So my grandfather often told me."

"You were greatly attached to him," Carlisle observed.

My voice quivered. "When one speaks of unconditional love, one speaks of what my grandfather held for me."

Carlisle watched me morosely. "Lydia," he said, "I shall see to it that you and your family are reunited."

"It is not my family I wish to see."

His eyebrows rose. "Why is that?"

"We are not particularly close. Naturally, they care for me, and I for them. But they do not approve of my - nature. I can be outspoken, more so than what they deem very correct for my station. My grandfather was the only one who encouraged me, woman or not, to do and say and be what I willed."

Carlisle observed me with a hint of amusement. "I see. Shall we add 'outspoken' to the list of adjectives for you?"

I laughed. "It is growing to the length of a scroll at this rate. But I appreciate your offer nonetheless. What makes you so kind? Why do you wish to help me?"

"It is only natural."

I smiled wryly. "For you," I clarified. "Natural for you."

"Have you not, until this moment, known others willing to assist those in need?"

"Certainly. But you have already shown more than your fair share of generosity to me. For another matter, I am still a stranger to you."

"Not entirely. There are few in this country ignorant of the prestige your surname carries."

"I see. Is that it, then? You wish to endear yourself to my kin."

"Oh, yes." Humour marked his speech. "I hear your family hosts the most exquisite dinner parties, and I do love a good feast."

Dryly, I replied, "Consider yourself invited."

"Please, Lydia. Restrain yourself. One might think you were being sardonic."

I chuckled. "Heaven forbid."

"You care not for dinner parties?"

"I like them," I said. "Given what I have told you about my family, I think I should like them more if you are in attendance with me."

His eyes were bright and alert. "Now I think you are the one who is too kind."

Silence reigned. It was comfortable, pleasant. Like those books he studied around him, I studied his pale face for what seemed to me the hundredth time since I had met him. I could still not shake that familiarity stirred by the sight of him. We had known each other in another life, I mused to myself, and it was likely he had saved that life as he had saved this one, too.

He glanced at me. "What preoccupies you so?"

"That is twice now you have asked to know my innermost thoughts."

He laughed. "I suppose I find you a fascinating subject to analyse."

"Subject? Analyse? I ought to have guessed that you are a scholar given such cold speech," I teased, placing my cup on the table between us. "All right. I shall tell you, though it might strike you as peculiar. Sometimes I feel that I recognise you."

"Recognise me," he repeated, a hint of question in his tone.

"Yes. As if we have met each other before."

His cadence was slow and purposeful. "But we have not."

"No," I said. "We have not. And yet…"

"And yet it seems the most natural thing in the world to be together," he finished.

I was startled that he had filled in the blanks so easily. "Yes," I said again. "It almost frightens me. But I cannot deny it."

What sparked in his eyes upon hearing those words? Tenderness, perhaps, which blended into sympathy and finished in a curious flash of relief. I found myself drifting into that warm glowing trance, for it was wonderous to look at him. I thought nothing else could hold my fancy ever again; that I would, for all days and all nights allowed to me in this life, imagine his face whenever others spoke of pure beauty, hear the sound of his voice if others spoke of symphonies, sense his touch if they evoked gentleness.

Quietly I asked, "So you share this sentiment? I am not mad?"

"Stubborn and relenting, I should think." His lips rose. "Perhaps even selfish and outspoken, one might say. But assuredly not mad."

Again, I said, "I cannot deny it. I cannot explain it either."

"Must it be explained?"

His humour was such that I was not afraid to make light-hearted, airy statements. I bobbed my foot and said, "I once read that humans used to be created with four legs and four arms and two heads until Zeus feared their power. He shot a bolt of lightning and split them apart. Perhaps you are the other half I lost so long ago."

Carlisle slouched in his chair, his long legs stretched before him, an absent hand resting beneath his jaw. "You know," he mused, "it certainly explains the faint scent of smoke on my shirt this morning."

"You jest. Do you possess a better theory which you can deposit?"

His eyes sparkled. "Oh, no. None that rivals one so sound as yours."

For several hours afterward, we spoke of this and that. Carlisle was well-travelled, well-learned, a man of wit and culture and still somehow not at all arrogant unlike so many gentlemen I had met at those same parties to which he had alluded. No poet had waxed prose unfamiliar to Carlisle; no artist had produced paintings unknown to his eye; no musician had woven music which had not touched his ear.

Passion stirred in his breast and coloured his speech. I marvelled that no colour reddened his cheeks. Cool and white as marble he remained, though excitement rose in him, causing him to dart about the room, searching out a book he wished to share with me.

At some point my eyelids dipped with the heaviness of sleep. I leaned my head on my arm, itself perched on the rest of the sofa beneath me, lounging across its length. I battled that beast called slumber for quite some time. Carlisle had been rummaging in a drawer. Upon turning, he immediately spotted my drowsiness which dissipated his eagerness to find the book.

"Lydia, you must return to your bed at once."

"Is that my physician I hear?"

"It is," Carlisle replied, "though you should consider dismissing him at once. He is a fool for having forgotten that you need to rest."

"I am much too fond of him for dismissal," I retorted. "And I can sleep right here."

"Nonsense. Come, I shall escort you to your room."

Carlisle strode across the room and aided me in standing from the sofa. As before, he cupped my elbow with one hand while the other lay gently on my shoulder. In this manner we walked from the study into the hall until we came to the bedroom. All the time I wondered how it was that his skin was so cold, colder than stone, and hard like it too.

I was in the throes of a sleep-soaked mind, and compared his skin to adamantine, that mythical substance. Twice I caught his eyes in the light of the candles and noted that they were a light shade of gold.

Sleepiness made me say aloud: "Your eyes seem different today."

His smile was weak. "It must be the light," he said.

The bed welcomed me. It seemed warmer now than it ever had, for I sank into its folds with a sigh of delight. Carlisle stoked the fire which burst into a biting, energetic flame beneath the poker. It haloed his outline and seared him into my dreams, for he followed me there to chase off the malice of nightmares.

x