Sometimes I think you're crazy and sick

And other times I think you're so fine

But I know I'm in danger 'cause you feel like a stranger

And I know that something's going to give

(from dolphin poe, hello, 1995)

Something was very, very wrong with Tom, but Metis knew better than to speak it.

The wrongness crept in like a thief to steal and stayed to whisper in her ear. Lover-like, and she welcomed it because it filled the blackness. It filled the ice and wind-howled evenings, kept her company through the long winter middle-nights. She held it about her like a blanket, warm and soft and gilt brocade that matched the blue of her bed (of her eyes).

This night, a train whistle screamed through the evening dark. The last train out, the last train away from here. But Metis sat fireside wrapped in everything wrong, and warm and safe besides.

Tom wasn't so far from her yet. She could go to him and put her hands on his and make this right. But she didn't. Instead she sat by candlelight picking hollyberries from the mantle garland and tossing them into the flame. They popped and sizzled, drops of blood that skittered and flirted with the fire. The fire danced with her in turn, beckoned and welcomed. She had a memory of other light, other fire, and wished she'd lost herself in it then.

She wanted fire, so of course what called to her then was ice. Ice from below her window, pale and reflecting the surface of the moon, slick beneath the winter stars. She dreamt of ice, crystals and snowflakes. She dreamt of coffins made of glass and the blue-lipped virgins who slept inside. She dreamt of sleep and death and mid-winter and never woke to a kiss.

The train's whistle cried again, even though it should have been too far to hear it, and she went to the window. A shadow danced across the lake, shivered in and out in the cold light. Part of her knew what it was, but she held the knowing captive, silenced it, grabbed her heavy cloak and went down to look.

The winter had been mild, almost Christmas and there had been no snow. The lake froze half-heartedly, the surface deceptively smooth. Metis stood beside it and looked for shadows.

One found her instead.

"Everyone ends up here sooner or later," Tom said, and she jumped to face him. He stood close to the lake, watching her with a curious expression on his face.

"I thought you'd have come to look for me before this," he said mildly, and stepped out onto the ice.

"What are you- Tom!"

"Does that frighten you? I can't imagine it would. I won't fall through, you know. Do you really think I could?" He slid graceful across the ice, his slick-soled shoes scraping crystals and sparks as he went. He put his hands in his pockets and looked up at the sky, clear and picked with stars. Cold and hard and beautiful, like his face when he looked at her.

"Come here," he said, still watching the stars. Metis simply stood on the bank and stared at him.

"Won't you?" He reached for her, hands pale as death under the moon. "I think you will. I don't think you know to be afraid."

"I know more than you think," she replied, and then wondered why she'd said that.

"Do you?" He was laughing at her, just a little. "Do you know, Metis? How could you, when all you've ever done is hide from knowing. Which is why you hide from me now. You may know something, you may feel that something is coming, but do you know what? Do you know why? Of course not. And the fault of it is all yours."

He continued his spin, his slide, perfectly balanced with easy grace, never taking his eyes from her. Metis wisely kept silent and let him have his say.

"I would make the world burn for you," he murmured. "I would make the world burn and walk through the fire of it for you. And the fault of that is mine."

She was moving toward him before she even realized what she was doing. "Tom."

He looked up as she reached him, as she put a soft hand on his forearm. "I thought this was meant,� he said. �I thought it was so perfect. I thought it was my right, I thought you were. But I was wrong. I've been very wrong." He looked up at the sky again, then down into her face. "Will you love me always? Will you offer me your heart with a smile? I wonder."

"You should know better by now," she said softly.

"Oh, but now is different than before, and that's why I ask the question."

"The only one who could make me stop loving you is you, Tom," she replied, realizing how true the words were as she spoke them. "That power is all yours."

"I suppose it is, isn't it? I wonder how I would do it."

The ice creaked beneath her feet, the warning of falling into darkness and cold, of falling down and down. Metis found it didn't worry her anymore. She was already falling and had been for as long she could remember. But, for form's sake, she said, "We'll fall through if we stay here."

"Walk with me then. Dance." He pulled her close. She gasped at his touch. He burned like a thousand fevers, his eyes wild and too dark, too wide. "If we keep moving nothing can touch us. We'll be too fast. Won't we, love?"

"Tom..."

"Stay with me." She looked back toward the castle, but he caught her face, turned her back to him "No. Don't look there. Don't look anywhere." He caught her wrists, spun her on the black ice, his breath gusting in the night air. "Stay with me, stay with me. And if we fall... then we fall."

***

~curious about the meanings of the tarot cards in the images for each series? find out why the tarot card for dreamwalk blue is "the lovers" here~

metis ~ june ~ minerva ~ fan ~ owl ~ hits ~ boys ~ dreamwalk ~ serenade ~ love ~ join ~ link ~ blame

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