The Distance Between Me and You

[rassafraggin]

The sky is red and the sea is blue. It must not be a coincidence that these are the colours of House Morfilod. All other objects, whether distant or close, take on a mixed shade of those two, absorbed into the saturation as they pass from range.

Dressed in a sleeveless shirt of blue over cut-off shorts of deep crimson, Maggie almost blends in with the landscape. For a moment it seemed as though the colors were going to be reversed but the red might have clashed with her hair so it fled south while the blue took its place. At first her hair is loose, flowing the way it used to in a cloud about her head but then it moves of its own accord, weaving into a braid that then curls against the base of her skull. It is not an elaborate 'do' but it does keep her hair from getting all a-tangle. Once that is settled, she finds that she is walking along the deck of a small yacht or pleasure boat. It is too small to be her Dancer, certainly and not the right configuration to be Quinlan's 9-tailed Red.

A stand of glassy rock formations indicate shallows without giving way to an island. Only those dark snarls rise like the cruel points of a monarch's crown. Moody purple shapes pass quietly among them, a small fleet of buccaneers, perhaps, laying in wait for unwary pleasure craft. They do not acknowledge one another, although they stalk so close together at times they might collide, and yet seem to safely pass and disappear behind the next jutting spire.

The ship glides forward as Maggie moves to the forward railing. One hand extends to the side and a glass is placed in it. When she turns to offer thanks, there is no one there. Looking down, she flexes her hand around the glass. The metal is blue etched in red filigree and banded with red. Extending the glass to its full length she holds it against her eye to train it on the ships amid the jagged upthrusts of stone or glass.

In the lens there is revealed something oddly identical about the ships, the same stark triangular crest of the forward sail, and the same belling within all sails despite their moving in opposite directions in such close proximity. A look at the somewhat ragged flag, and its the same image of the wave caught on the ray of the sun. As another near collision occurs, there's an anomalous effect in the air amidst the rocks, just a small margin of opacity as one ship comes and the other goes... Very much like the thin layer of glass that ever keeps one from touching their own reflection, skin to skin.

Maggie lowers the glass, a frown growing on her brow. Signaling the ship's silent, not-visible crew, she lifts her voice, "Draw in close to the rocks. I want to hail the other ship. They may need rescue or aide." The crew does as bidden and their little skiff swings toward the outcroppings. Their movement slows as they come nearer either due to the dying wind or some other agency giving her less chance to smaxh on the sea's crown. Lifting her hands, she shouts, "Hello!" Whether heard or not, her voice sails out over the sea. Her power over breezes might help some, but might not.

The ships cruise in their unending waltz within the maze. So many ways out of those shallows, but whenever one makes for the gap, she appears to change her mind, running from the egress in a turn that takes only a blink of time to maneuver. As the hail from the approaching craft emanates across the waves, there is no indication at first that either it or the breeze had made it past those rocks. Then a figure comes into view on the foredeck. On all the foredecks. They do not agree on which direction that shout had originated from, each gazing out at an angle over the railing. It all matches, however, considering they are all images within different angles of broad, flawless glass. Almost all... for one of them must be the real deal. After a moment, all the figures raise an arm in response. And then: "Ware the shoals as I did not! Do not enter the trap!"

Maggie lifts her hand and the ship comes to a stop. The splash of an anchor being dropped into the sea can be heard. Shoals. Maggie leans over the ship's side to try and guage the location of the shoals. Lifting her voice again, she calls, "I am here to help you. How can we get you out of there?" Narrowing her eyes, she lifts her gaze to study the maze ahead. The strange glassy sheen of the stones and the weird blip that keeps the ship from hitting itself is noted. "Mirrors. He's stuck in a mirror thing." Glancing over her shoulder, she taks stock of the weather. Lifting her hand, she begins to build a fist of wind. Calling, she offers, "I'm going to try and break one of the mirror stones."

Again the figure standing forward on the Corsair calls out from the rail. Each reflection leans to call in a different direction than straight towards Maggie's small craft. It takes but a moment for her perception to single out the one cruising ship upon which the man is gazing directly at her. "But to end one is to end all! I will not survive it to escape, as the sorceress has promised!" Gazing up and around at the fractured horizons, with an Eclipse on every front, Lirre adds mostly to himself in a wondering tone, "Where she went off to herself, I did not see... but it means escape /is/ possible..."

Of course it is. Dreamers can do whatever they want in their own space, can't they? It's rather odd that he could be trapped by another in the first place.

Maggie's wind fist begins to uncurl as she considers that, "Well... Okay." She tries to keep the one looking straight at her in view even with the circling reflections and peculiar shimmers that define the trap. She cannot quite hear what he says in that softer tone though she leans forward, straining to catch the words. "I am going to send you a line to follow." Like a trail of breadcrumbs or something. But, what can she use? Her ship is small, light and fast, held here by the anchor's strong chain. Can't use that. She looks around the deck. Rope, there is in plenty, but somehow that does not 'feel' right. As she looks around, she spots a pair of small, delicate sheers stuck conveniently in the railing near to hand. Plucking them up, she snip-snaps them twice but frowns over them. Her free hand lifts to her head, running down the length of her hair to the top of the braid that falls down her back.

Soon enough, the ships, including the one tagged as the original, pass from view, either slipping behind one of the great standing stones, or narrowly missing itself before essentially becoming itself in the opposite direction. But on the next pass-by, he is spotted again, eyes following her boat and centered on her, like he'd never stopped looking. "A line..? Like a towline..?" He considers that possibility for a second, while his gaze slips over her actions with wary confusion, and focuses on the braid, so red. "What are you doing? Your - hair.. you can't... Flame." Abruptly, outrage and realization wed desperately in his tone. "...Flame! Hell's Blue Bells, I've been dreaming! Or - is this not a dream, itself?"

In one moment, he is a man confounded by deceptions and mirages. Then.. the trap of glassy rocks starts to shudder and sink, falling in slow pieces into the enlivened waves.

Maggie lifts the sheers toward her hair as the boat vanishes and reappears in its dizzying dance around the rocks. She smiles at him when he returns from behind the obstruction. Her curiosity and his despiration stay her hand before even a single strand of hair is cut. She lowers the sheers slowly in a sparkling arch that leads from the base of her head toward her hips. She nods a mute answer to his query for it is a dream. One that they share. Not that he really needs the verification. Watching the rocks begin to sink, pieces splashing into the waves, her smile grows. The sheers are released into the air. Silvery metal shimmers in a tumble that sends flickering light dancing out and away. In the space betwwn one flash and the next, the sheers vanish and a flock of tiny, glittering butterflies rise like a curl of smoke into the air.
Relief flares in her emerald eyes as she steps to the very edge of the deck and leans forward against the railing as though she would go to him, "You did it! Come, sail away?"

There's only one ship, one Eclipse, even before all the rocks fall to the greedy depths. Surging forth on the swells of sea and wind, she tacks and turns gracefully to show broadside to the smaller vessel. Lirre walks beside the rail with long strides to center on Maggie, always watching, with the dazed, hollowed stare of a shipwrecked sailor always keeping that smudge on the horizon in his sights. Still no red coat, but he does rock a full beard now, dark gold that lightens around the mouth. "That was entirely too weird a trick. A trap of my own making, though I imagined it the work of another..." He shakes his head slightly, abandoning those thoughts. "You have rescued me, dear Huntress. What reward would you ask from me?" he smirks, even through the beard. His hands are fisted on the rails, and the red-metal gleam can be seen on one finger.

The small sloop shivers in the wake of the Eclipse's movement over the sea. Maggie's heart swells, her eyes lighting with a strangely powerful inner joy as she watches her pirate captain stalk back along the deck of his ship toward her. The air that fills her lungs is cool and bright, sharp with the tang of salt. Looking up at him, taking in his dashingly handsome form, his face, his eyes; enjoying the way his beard softens around his jaw and chin, her heart begins to beat a rapid staccato rhythm. She could ask for anything; a touch, a kiss, a night of passion beneath the stars. The realization yearns within, for her need is great. She breaths in her desire, letting it fill her body from between her thighs, up through her core to her heart, her breasts, her lips. The heat of it rages in her gaze. There was a time not long ago when, lost in her own need, she would have given that need voice, would have asked for those sweet, secret; or overt, desires to know fulfillment. But, that girl is slowly being lost, winnowed away by the need for caution, for thought, for? a more circumspect outlook. And she does need something from him. The need is hiding there, desperate and more important than her own desires. It peeks up from behind her desire and she can feel it, she knows it. In those moments, her desire is once more sent to hide beneath the bed, tuck itself into the nooks and crannies of her mind. It is harder this time. Harder than it has been for a long time. Perhaps it is the beard. It is a damnably wonderful beard. With that thought, known to be as much truth as an inner lie, her smile softens as the inner fire dims even as her eyes retain their light.

Slowly, the other realization grows to fill the spaces left bereft and empty, emotionally shredded. But, this? She knows that this is more important and more perilous. She needs it, not for herself, but for him. For all of them. "A boon," she beings, her voice weary and resigned, "Yes, beloved Quarry, I will have a boon of you." A niggling little doubt cries that, in truth he saved himself. But that is shoved aside, for the need is actually great. "Stay away from the white tower, my heart. It was forged when the Dreaming was young, by mages far more skilled than those we have now. It was set to defend the woman within, to protect her against all comers, friend or foe alike. There is no discrimination in it, nor consciousness, nor will. It lashes out at anyone who comes close. So, please, dear one, trust me to bring us all through until you can wake and we can be together again." Which, she knows, is technically two boons, but it is said. Deep within, she prays to whatever gods may be listening that he does not hate her for it.

Watching from the taller deck as the woman of this and all his dreams considers her options, Lirre's habitual smirk slowly fades. Is it all a fancy to read from the initial shift in her posture, the want and the need, held out, only then to be put painfully aside? Holding her gaze, he leans into the rail with one hand, and half-vaults so that he lands seated athwart, perched forward and measuring every peak forming in the waters between their crafts. He listens to her reply and nods to encourage the boon request, in all seriousness. At the end of it, he inclines his gaze over to the horizon, considering. "So, instead of 'keep fighting', we're back to 'keep away'," he says, but without irony. "That is a new discovery about the Tower, however, that must change things.." A slow blink, a sigh, and he nods. "I will do it, Flame." His eyes have seen just how much it means to her.

She watches him, knowing that she wears her heart on her sleeve and he can see the way her need shifts from 'something for her to hang onto' to 'keep him safe' even if he does not know her thoughts. When he vaults up to sit on the railing keeping his deck hands safer in a storm, she inhales, one hand lifting to rest just at her throat. Keep breathing, Maggie. Yes, he looks like a dream come true up there but now is not the time to dwell on that. As relief floods through her, she takes hold of the railing before her to keep herself upright as her knees threaten to buckle. She needed this agreement more than even she was aware of. Within, her heart sings that he will be safe now and the joy of it bolsters her. Finally, she tries to address his comments and the 'why' of the change in plan is really sort of neatly encapsulated in the initial request. Rather than belabor it, therefore, she breaths a heartfelt "Thank you my beloved Merrisol."

He nods a little, then slips back into a light manner. "Yes well.. it would have to happen someday, wouldn't it?" Lifting his hands from the rail on either side, he weaves his fingers loosely, resting forward on his knees, in a somewhat more precarious posture. But he doesn't look at all in danger of tipping over into the drink. "That I would please you."

Maggie breaths more easily after the agreement has been formalized. Her breath pauses for an instant as he begins to speak again. A brow lifts slowly as she watches him get comfortable perched there above the sea. When he finishes, she laughs. It is a warm, living laugh, startled from her by the absurdity of the comment. Leaning forward, she rests her forearms on the railing, hands clasped in front of her. Her gaze falls to the sea, then lift slowly up to meet his gaze, "Oh, my darling pirate. You do please me. Clearly more than you know." She quirks a smile, a blush beginning to tinge her cheeks toward rose, "We just clash more than I like." Honesty coupled with freckles. They are both dangerous in different ways.

The sea becalms around the Eclipse, so that Lirre doesn't miss a single heartbeat, tracing the soft lines of her moment's happiness. "Is there a right balance of clash and concordance, sweet? How do you know where that is?" he teases, the jewel gleam coming into his eyes briefly.

Maggie's heart thumps at his endearment and that brightening of his eyes. She draws in a bracing draught of salt-ladden air to calm her yearning. Holding his gaze, her smile softens and she shrugs very slowly, "Maybe?" She recognizes the teasing for what it is, but does not mind really. An answering glitter sparkles in her eyes and on her lips, "Let's see... Where is the balance?" The smile warms a bit, "I guess that as long as both people feel happy most of the time, things are about right. If not, then communication isn't happening somewhere."

"Yes.. that sounds safe enough," he concedes, ruminating over his clasped hands. "But if you and I have had our hellish years.. for a handful of truly blissful moments..." He steadies his gaze on her again, the smile still there in his eyes, though quieted by the vulnerability so often concealed. "I would.. and have.. considered it even."

She watches him as he studies his hands, then pauses over the vulnerability showing in his eyes. Her gaze meets his and holds it. For a heart-stopping moment she seriously considers his words and what may lie behind them. The teasing in her smile fades to something warmer but softer and certainly more sober. A lock of hair lifts to sail from one side of her part to the other, falling in a soft slash across her brow. Lifting one hand, she catches the red strands, drawing them back to the right side again. Tucking the hair behind her ear, she finally speaks very softly, "Safe. When were we ever safe?" Her sigh is quiet and sort of introspective. "I... never thought about it that way, to be honest." Pushing up from the railing, she rests her hands where her elbows were. Leaning forward, she presses her hips against the railing. Her gaze remains upon him as she considers the man before her, above her. Questions of balance, of safety, are thrown to the wind, "Agreed, sweetheart."

He is leaning about as far as he physically can without actually defying nature. He watches the fine detail of her hair strands floating free with a poignant fascination, and his own fingers unweave so he can caress and roll the red metallic ring at the base of his index finger. His next smile ripples to the edges of his beard. "And they said I didn't deserve you," he drawls in soft laughter.

Maggie shrugs again, just as slowly, slowly, then dropping a bit more quickly. Her gaze drops to the ring and her smile warms to see it there. Even though she noted it earlier, it warms her heart to see it now. Still, mischief dances in her eyes and she lifts her fingers to blow him a kiss, "You don't, beloved pirate." Her tone is as warm with that mirth but she adds, "Nor do I deserve you. But we'll make do."

Lirre squints over that. "As long as we're dissolving completely into romantic nothings," he chuckles somewhat sourly, making as though to catch the errant air-kiss, and waggling it between thumb and two fingertips. He places it crookedly upon his lips, with a bit of extra pressure to make it stick. "Now what shall I do with the rest of my life, if it is not attempting to seige and storm that Tower?"

Maggie rolls her eyes, "Nothing wrong with a few romantic nothings every now and then, darling." Standing a bit straighter, she tucks her fingers into her pockets. Shifting so she can lean a hip against the railing, she slides one leg over to hook her booted foot on the middle tier of the railing to face him a bit more. "What do you want to do, Merrisol?"

"To seige and storm the Tower," he responds simply. His hands steal back to the rail as though becoming unsure of his balance. "Don't worry though, I won't. The little brother will be glad to hear it, too. He can barely keep that brass wreck above water now."

Maggie nods, listening. The reply causes her to flinch, a frown furrowing her brow as she looks down into the still sea. "I can't..." The sigh releases the guilt into the ocean's reflective surface, "Thank you. He will also need to be warned. But, I will tell him. I don't know that he would believe you." Looking up again, she half smiles, "You know... You could try to make peace with your brother. Or is that... wishful thinking?" She sort of feels as though she knows the answer to that but it is a night of impossible risks and potential.

Gentle currents conspire to send the Eclipse into motion once more, slipping quietly on a passing trajectory with the sloop. Lirre backs over the railing a bit, now sitting with one leg bent and propped while he observes the portentous reddened sky. "It very much is, sweet Flame," he replies, casting his attention back to her, measuring the shortening distance between their decks for a few seconds as well. He lifts one shoulder casually in a partial shrug. "While I only find him pigheaded, insufferable, and sanctimonious.. *he* truly despises me. As well he should." His eyes track her as the vessels draw slowly alongside. "It was I who got us caught. I who got us killed. And I who got us lost."

Watching his ship begin to pull toward her's, eyes sliding along the decking as he moves back to keep her in his sight. The red and blue of Morfilod's colors gleam above and below the horizon's demarkation. Slipping her other leg over the railing, she looks up at him again. As the ships move closer together, she lifts her head to look higher to keep him in her range of vision without sacrificing closeness. She nibbles her lower lip as she listens. She knows some of this story from a number of different sources. But not from his and this is as important to her to hear as the boon she asked of him. "Tell me?"

The man leans and torques a touch, as though they merely sat across from each other on a picnic blanket, rather than two rails of two different ships. "I couldn't say for certain, for any of it," he admits after a pause. "Just seems my lot to accept blame, you know? I can't prove otherwise, and anyway, the kid is like me in that he just doesn't listen," he flashes a grin at that, winking soberly.

Maggie licks her lips slightly when he turns toward her, leans closer, comes almost close enough for her to breath his scent in. She tightens her hands on the railing, leaning closer as he does. His words flow around her, pinging against her. Some add neuance to the story she knows and she smiles a faintly ruefull smile. "Yeah, I know." Her gaze again focuses on his and she blushes at that sober wink. Reflexively. Joyfully. Quietly. And then it is lost along with the flickered grin that answers his, "I fear that is something that we all have difficulty with. Listening, that is." She purses her lips slightly and she speaks more softly, "I... can tell you what I know. Or... you can tell me what you remember and I can correlate."

Lirre frowns. "Try as I might to dredge up the details, they slip from my fingers. Only the memory of emotions remain. The surety of moments." His eyes rest on her, savouring the blush but thoughtful in his explanation. "...He will always hold me responsible for everything - that's all he has. That feeling of certainty. And I am no different, Maggie." Uttering that name, he turns a little more on his hip, and extends his arm into the gulf of space, fingers outstretched for the faintest touch from hers while their vessels slowly pass. "The anger and the desire, the pride and the pain... they'll be part of me, forever."

Maggie studies his beloved, oft thoguht on, oft dreamed of, features as he speaks, her eyes roaming from his eyes over his face only to return to those oh-so-beautiful eyes once more. She inhales sharply when she hears her name spoken, her heart fluttering, perhaps more than it should. It is a distraction though, one that almost sends her attention down more physical pathways than it should take. Almost. Gripping the railing with one hand, she leans a bit farther out over the water, the other hand lifting to bridge the remaining gap. Her fingertips touch his, brush with an almost electric hush of bottled anticipation and love. She could tell him much in this moment, but suddenly the actual story of how they came to be sharing a body is less important than other concerns. Her voice turns thoughtful, softer, "Those emotions are part of you. They are not evil or wicked in themselves for they can build strength of purpose and fierceness of passion, Lirre." Her hand tries to linger in that touch and at least for a moment, her ship's movement slows to allow it. "How is it your fault that you are lost?" The query is gently asked for what could come of its being asked.

Crooking his fingers that make the contact, he keeps hold of hers and the Eclipse is thus improbably halted on her course. There's something he holds back from saying as well, by that point.. but perhaps that is less for strategy than it is about those selfsame faults.. or strengths. "I told you, I don't know how.. what I do know, what both of us do know, is that we did lose." Slowly, leaning a little more, he slides his touch until their fingers begin to weave. "I don't know how it's my fault we lost it.. I just know that I want it back."

Maggie's small sloop eases back a bit on her course until the two people reaching across that now narrower gap are as close together as can be. Maggie's eyes linger on his gaze though she resists drowning in them by forcing her attention to linger on him, on his words, rather than letting it slide into the depths. Her fingers do not hesitate to weave in with his as she leans closer still. Curiosity flares in her gaze as the absense of his withheld comment flows over her. Shifting again, she stands in a fairly fluid push, hooking her feet beneath the railing rather than holding it with her hand. It brings her closer to him, lets their palms touch. For a moment, she feels a bit like Romeo in an ancient play with her Juliet glowing like a bearded, piratically minded sun above her. "We will all be together again, my heart." Soft as a prayer with the hope that she has not misread his desire.

Lirre headtilts in bemusement, smiling a bit more when her hand all but disappears beneath his. With a turn of his wrist, he crosses their palms so that there is a fleeting moment for a true handhold. "But it's not up to me, it would appear. I must wait on my enchantress, my lovely Huntress, for rescue," he smirks. They're holding on by their fingertips again, a force as inexorable as attraction is irresistable. "Don't let me wait another ten years. I mean.. I will. But. Don't?"

Maggie's hand is warm in his, the pressure of her palm against his brief as momentum or the tides begin to draw them apart once more. Tides or time or both. Her desire to hold on can be felt even as her hand slides inexorably against his skin until, no matter how hard she tries to keep that small bit of ocntact intact, it is her fingertips that cling to his once more. Her eyes linger still, soaking up his nearness, his changed appearance and the difference in how he is, "I will do everything in my power to keep this intolerable separation as short as possible, my beloved Pirate." She sighs, knowing that her fingers will not be able to keep that contact for more than a moment more, "In the meantime, look for me in dream?"

There can be no doubt that the dream interminable has taken its toll, though how can it be a really bad thing if the result is a mellower, wiser soul? Even his vanity's taken a hit, not that a golden beard isn't equally preenable... His lips tighten in an uncertain, guilty instant. Then, as their ways part and the distance grows between his hand and hers, he nods his response.

The smaller craft increases its pace, for her dreams are but fleeting things in the grand scheme of things. Her hand is still reaching for him as a white fog begins to rise, swallowing the prow of her craft first. She jumps back onto the deck to run aft, hair flying behind her in ripples of crimson. Leaning against the railing again, perhaps struggling to remain asleep in that other land, she calls, "Thank you, Lirre. I do love you." Then that fog swirls, swallowing her boat, her form and finally that uplifted hand with an almost apologetic sigh.