02: A Tormented Mind

When Steffan had finally lain down to sleep, exhausted but with thoughts racing through his tired mind, it would take hours before sleep reached him. He had been agonizing, the scenes playing in his mind over and over, as though with no end…

His sleep on the other hand had been surprisingly peaceful, no dreams terrorizing him, and when he woke up it had been like any other morning. He'd been lying in the bed gazing out through the window at the sky, which then had been clear blue with no clouds, squinting a little when the sun hit his eyes. There were no thoughts, no memories, no problems, just an absolute serenity.

But that calm state of mind had been ruthlessly shattered when he crawled out of the bed to sit on its edge. He froze at the sight of the costume lying there in a heap on the floor, abandoned after having been shed.

Steffan had buried his face in his hands, squeezing his eyes tightly shut at the memories.

Now an hour or so later he sighed looking down into the glass he was holding in his hand. It was about ten a.m. but he'd already started to drink, his thoughts compelled him to do so. Though, the 'drink-and-you'll-feel-better'-plan seemed to have backfired on him, it only made him feel worse.

He raised the glass, but instead of drinking he gazed down at the liquid held within the walls of the crystal. That's how he felt right now, like a prisoner trapped between the walls of the mansion – walls that only seemed to be closing in on him. A part of him wished that he had never returned, and maybe it would have been better if he and his mother hadn't been invited at all…

Steffan shook his head. It was too late for wishes now. Once upon a time he'd solely had one wish, a wish for him and Anton to have a future together, but now there were so many other wishes crowding casting the single on into the background to disappear into the shadows.

How could he have been so stupid, thinking that he was in control, that he could just reach out and Anton would be in his grasp? All while they'd been dancing, all while they'd been talking, Anton had been the one in control but Steffan had missed that completely. He had been too focused on that blind hope.

"Looking for something?"

Steffan blinked confused. He'd been sitting staring down into the glass that was now sitting on the table cradled by his both hands. Blushing slightly being caught off guard, he turned to see a young woman standing by the table. She was pretty short and her skin had the light blue tone of an Islander, her deep red hair fell in soft waves to her waist and her eyes were green and held a sparkle in them that he couldn't remember the last time he'd seen in his own.

"My dignity," Steffan replied, and there was an edge of bitterness in his voice. "You've seen it anywhere around?"

Alana sat down by the table, giving him an empathetic look.

"It can't be that bad," she said. "Can it?"

He grimaced closing his eyes, feeling memories return threatening to drown him.

*Steffan led him onto the dance floor, his eyes never once leaving the ones of the other man – even if he'd wanted to it wouldn't have been possible. Those eyes…

"Beautiful eyes…," he murmured as they moved to the music, lost in the hazel orbs half-hidden under their lids. "Beautiful eyes."

"What do you want, Steffan?" Anton asked, the sharp tone in the voice shaking Steffan out of reverie.

"Why… nothing," came the reply, along with the most innocent look Steffan could muster.

"I don't believe you." Suddenly the dark eyes were guarded. "There'll always be requirements… conditions."

"But I've learnt… I've changed," Steffan tried to protest, but it didn't take much to see that Anton was far from convinced.

"Have you?" The tone in his voice confirmed that Anton didn't put much faith in Steffan's claim. "If I said, 'let me go', could you?"

Steffan stared at him, not quite following, he couldn't understand why Anton would ask him that.

"… … .. No! I… I-"

He struggled to find ever elusive words.

Anton pushed him away slightly, his eyes not quite meeting Steffan's.

"-Then we're right back where we started…," he sighed. "Here in this room… With you trying to force my neck into your yoke."

With me trying to force your… into my..., Steffan thought stunned. What the hell?

"It chokes… It stifles!"

For a moment all Steffan did, all he could do, was to stand there transfixed by what he had just got thrown at him. His eyes went narrow and the beautiful face turned into a mask of anger. How dared he talk to him like that?

"I don't want it!"

That's it!

In the next instant Steffan's fist flew up to forcefully hit him in the face, a part of him enjoying the cracking sound that followed. The music immediately stopped playing and everybody's attention was focused on the couple.

That should teach him not to screw with Steffan Kabala, he thought in furious triumph.

But that satisfied feeling the punch had given faded as the bruise on Anton's cheek did. The dark-haired man turned back to smirk at Steffan…*

"It could be better," Steffan said. He picked up the glass and downed what was left in it with the intentions that it would help him forget, but it was as unsuccessful as before. He could still feel it lurking on the very edge of his consciousness, where he couldn't reach it nor could he push it further away.

Even though the memory had stopped playing in his head for now, there was still this one scene that seemed to have been burnt into his mind, stubbornly refusing to fade back when all the other had. No matter how hard he tried to evade it, that obnoxious smirk just wouldn't leave him. At that agitating mental visage his hand tightened around the glass still in his hand and if he hadn't been too preoccupied Steffan would have noticed now close to the breaking point it was.

When the one memory made him lose control another one choose to make appearance, not making it better.

Beautiful eyes, if I've got you this upset – who has the power now?"

Fuck!

He'd just barely been able to restrain himself, and instead of bursting out startling them seated nearest to him in the room he let the word resonate in his mind, and he was almost able to taste the bitterness this new revelation filled him with. That with that smirk, that infuriating smirk, Anton had taken Steffan's words and used them against him.

Coming to senses he noticed that Alana was staring at him, from the tightly grasped glass to the thin lipped expression on his face, not sure what to say or do.

"Do-do you want to talk about it?" she asked cautiously.

"No," he replied. "Not now." He still had a little faith in his plan to drink himself into blissful oblivion. "Why don't we talk about what's bothering you instead?"

"I… I…" Alana hadn't seen that coming, and taken aback she tried to find the words. "What make you think that there would be something troubling me?"

He gazed at her, eyebrows raised, an almost amused look on his face.

"You all but ran in your eager to get away."

"Well," she said after a brief silence. "There is some difference in opinion between me and my sister. I didn't want to start another argument."

"What about?" Steffan wondered.

"We're unable to come to an agreement on how enjoyable eternal life really would be."

"And you're speaking against it," he guessed. "That's the impression I got from your sister last night." That and he also thought that he could remember seeing her in one of the chambers.

"Yes," Alana sighed. "Always when I suggest that it would not be that happy-go-lucky blissfulness she imagines it to be, Sofi gets really upset. She doesn't want to hear a bad word about it.

She watched as Steffan reached for the bottle to refill his glass and shook her head.

"Your problems won't go away because you drink yourself senseless," she said.

Steffan shrugged.

"Have you tried?"

"Yes, I have." Alana reached out and plucked the bottle from his hand, unaffected by the protests that followed. "It failed." He fell silent watching as she put the bottle down well out of his reach.

He didn't really understand how he could be as comfortable as he was with that girl he'd by chance run into in the middle of the night. But there was something about her, maybe it was that she'd seemed to be sad too, that it was what had made him open up to her telling her things that he hadn't talked to anybody else about. It had slipped out of him leaving him stunned, though not as stunned as when she'd listened to him letting him speak uninterrupted. Even reassuring him that he was not to be blamed for what had happened. Nobody else had, not even Bunchh, she preferred not to speak about it at all.

But why, he thought, why had she been so ready to listen? Alana didn't know him, but still she'd stuck around to listen to the confessions of his tormented mind. Had it been because she cared? As much as he wanted to believe it, he was skeptical as with much lately.

In the past, before Penumbra, it had always been easy for Steffan to get close to people, but his experience here on the island had changed him and he now doubted whether to trust the people around him.

He recalled that he had, when he was younger, gone out in search for friends, but then he learnt the rules of the game; that nothing and no one was like it seemed as all was hidden behind masks of falseness. He had adapted to his surroundings while at the same time making sure that he remained himself under the surface. With them it had been uncomplicated, you could always predict, always trust, what their actions or their reactions to something would be, but then he'd arrived at Penumbra and nothing would ever be the same again.

Alana appeared to be different from them though, Steffan noted watching her. The only thing she seemed to be hiding was the sorrow that he had seen at their first meeting, now it was concealed behind a contemplative calm that went very well with her. But he saw none of the falseness that was just all too clear in others.

She was friendly, that's the impression he'd gotten this far, but was that who she really was or did she have an angle for befriending him? Maybe she –

NO!

You can't think like that, Steffan berated himself. That's how Anton would reason, that everybody got a hidden agenda, but you're not like that.

He met the woman's eyes, still a little on his guard but deciding that he would – as she hadn't given him any reason not to – trust her, and returned the smile she aimed at him.