(BEFORE)

...Dorian nodded, took her hand and led her away, moving this way and that, able to find his way through streets like a phantom. He was never seen when he didn't want to be and tonight he didn't want Danae to be seen either. She would have enough trouble when she went back to her friends and those she worked with. Oh well. Women were far smarter and more clever than men. She'd think of something...




Dorian had plenty of places to lay down his head, plenty of places to amuse himself during the deadly daytime, plenty of wonderful places to bring his friends and lovers. One of his favorites was a basement flat that he'd decorated with his trophies and knick knacks from the Old World. From France, from Spain, from England and Scotland... old paintings and pots and pens, all sorts of strange and assorted items. They had an order about them that only he could create, a magical order. Dorian liked things to be beautiful and lush and perfect, and this reflected that need.

He led Danae down into it and let go of her hand, silently encouraging her to look around. There was plenty to look at, including a stack of ancient books he'd rescued and even tried to restore a little.

"This belonged to our last Queen, back in those days..." he said and held up a leather-bound book. "Her diary... some of the pages are missing but still... who doesn't want to read the personal thoughts of royalty every now and again?"

Of course, he was a sort of royalty. Royalty to beings who weren't supposed to exist and who had no real place in any time or era except to hunt and be hunted.

Even the bed had an assortment of posh items from here and there. A blanket from a king, a pillow from a prime minister... He stretched across it, leaving his feet to hang over the edge. "Now I feel as if I've collected all of this just for your enjoyment. In anticipation of your arrival," he said quietly, amused with himself. "But what a long time I've been collecting it... most of it was holed up in London but I moved things here after the change. The world tried to destroy all of this but I fought. Next time I might not be so lucky, so enjoy the treasures while you can. You may be the last to ever look at them."

For a vampire, Danae knew that they harbored many things...Riches, old scores that might never be settled, secrets...Loves. Stepping into his chambers, she knew, was akin to stepping into the lion's den, and yet, she did not flee.

Danae could feel the darkness growing inside of her, tainting her, and for the first time in her life, she let it. It would become her horrible secret, kept hidden away from Antony and Marcus and Raelin, but she was darkened...on the inside. And what did it matter if she did hide from them? Did they know her? Did they care? Though her heart screamed yes, the callousness that had slid into place whenever Dorian's hand took her own...That was what answered, what she heard.

And yet, he had been ensnared simply because she did have heart, because she was not afraid to stand before him and tell him her thoughts with no consequence.

Looking around the room at the borrowed fineries of forgotten times, Danae wondered if she might one day become such a trinket, a living doll set upon a shelf for the world to see. Closing her eyes, her hand splayed against the blanket on the end of the bed, she turned her head away and wondered when she had become so lost...

"Is that so?" she finally responded, almost uncertain of the topic, his words a lulling drone in her ears. "Then perhaps they weren't meant to span the centuries, perhaps they were meant to be destroyed..."

"Perhaps," he whispered in return, and stared at nothing at all. Foreboding and a sense of danger had started to darken the corners of his mind, of his future. Something tugged at him and said that trouble was on the way... "Maybe I was meant to be destroyed too. Like all of my kind. I guess ancient things survive as long as they can, because that's our only purpose. That's what makes us ancient..."

Maybe it was something to do with Danae being here. Maybe this bad taste, this gnawing thing (fear? maybe? almost?) had to do with her. Perhaps she was going to be his undoing.

His words, so melancholy, and yet so true, made Danae sigh almost silently, her gaze dropping to the floor as she eased down onto the edge of the bed, not daring to sit on the throw he had mentioned...Some things were meant to be treasured.

But not her...

With her hands clasped in her lap, she shook her head only slightly before glancing back over her shoulder at the creature so near to her side. "If you were meant to be destroyed, then my kind would have gotten rid of you long ago...When your times comes, your wrongs will be forgotten, just as you will be forgotten. None of us can escape the hands of time...Not even immortals," she whispered back to him, not daring to raise her voice above the level he had set.

It seemed as though some sort of holy silence had set in, a silence she would never dream of breaking. Instead, she slowly laid back on the bed, her hands resting on her stomach, linked together by her fingers. Her eyes stared upward, at the ceiling above her, and for some time, she did not move.

Lost in her own thoughts, Danae finally turned her head to meet Dorian's gaze once more. Pulling her hands from their own grasp, she reached for him, fingertips lightly brushing against the top of his hand. "Do you regret it, Dorian? The darkness? The immortality?"

Her questions were ones he was supposed to have an easy answer for. And truly, he usually did have an answer... but something had shifted a little in him ever since he met Danae. And maybe that in and of itself was what he feared would be his ruin. He'd started to almost doubt a few things he'd never doubted before.

Dorian thought of his mother, so cold and so sure, so darkly magical, evil and yet beautiful all at the same time. She'd raised him with her coldness and surety. He was supposed to believe in his place, to fight for it, to kill for it. He was supposed to be. And remain. He was her blessed little son, her precious one. Her beautiful one...

Dorian felt Danae's fingers on his hand and was surprised when he shivered a little. As if he could still feel or sense anything at all, in the old way.

"Sometimes." he whispered finally. Better not too loud, no... she might hear and come back from the dead. Or he might lose his edge and nerve and walk into the sun one day to save others. "Sometimes I regret... and remember when I was young, truly young. When I wanted nothing more than to survive, and would kill for it... when I felt my own blood inside me, when I was driven and would do anything, mercilessly. When I just wanted to be able to eat." Not so different from now, it might seem... but it was. "I was very poor. And many days I didn't eat, but I never stopped working, plotting. And I was young..."

Her hair spilled over, falling in waves against the bed as she turned her head to watch him, emerald eyes roaming over his face, watching each and every emotion that danced behind his eyes. He was mesmerizing, no doubt, and he was beautiful, however dark he might have become.

"I knew you did..." she whispered, daring to raise a hand, brushing slender fingers over his cheek. "You're not as they've painted...as I had painted you. There's far more to you, but you've come to exist as those against you expect. Would it be too much to prove them wrong, Dorian? To be the fiend with a heart, with a soul?"

It seemed as though she was asking for him to do so, to give the life that still lingered within him a chance to live, but would he? Danae could see in him the same thing she saw in Marcus...but still, there was far more determination within Cael's eyes than she had ever seen in Marcus'. She couldn't help but wonder what he would do if he had come to love a mortal...

A heart. A soul.

He could remember bright morning sun on his wind-burned face, sweat on the back of his neck, his fingers cold and stiff, a scarf knotted around his neck, standing in line with all of the others for work. He'd been desperate, foolish... he'd talked his way into a job and then talked his way up higher. A man's wife had spotted him and he'd followed her, dedicated himself to a new life. He'd determined never to be hungry or poor or cold again. But back in those days he could sit outside at noon, squint into the sun, walk the beaches in the warmth of evening...

"People say a parent should not bury their children. I saw one of my daughters to eighty-three years old. I saw my grandchildren die... I've met their children and their children after them and know that all of them will leave this life and I will have to remain." He turned onto his side, gazing at Danae, thinking that she would get old too. And her children after her. "Keeping a heart is dangerous after so long. When my son was sixteen years old, he died at the hand of another young soldier, for nothing more important than shouted orders and the laws of fat old men. And your mother-" He stopped, not having meant to mention Danae's mother or the night he'd met her.

Danae tilted her head, propped it in her hand, her elbow resting on the bed as she listened to him. For all his eloquence, for all his trials, he was not the fiend they imagined him to be. Yes, he had commited terrible crimes and wronged countless people. He had murdered and tortured, but hadn't it all been in the past? Even as she thought of the possibility of forgiveness, she knew it would never be so. He had performed his acts with a smile, with dark intent, but now, as he spoke, she could only wonder if it had not been out of instinct, out of sheer survival that he knew he must live, exist...for another night.

"Your losses outnumber mine, and though they were ages ago, I can see they still pain you. You see, Dorian, it's all in your eyes..." she whispered, but fell silent when he mentioned her mother...Her mother. Danae bit into her lip, her eyes growing darker as she stared at him. And just what did he know of her mother? "I beg your pardon...What of my mother?" she asked, her voice quiet...

Her mind danced back to the first time she met him, when he had tricked her into the cavern on Kisendoth Island...He had mentioned a woman like her, and yet, the subtle differences had deterred his speech. Now, Danae could only wonder if this woman he had spoken of was truly her mother, if he had known Muriel...

She could see her mother's smiling face as the woman held her in her arms, spinning around, the dark hair falling around her shoulders. Danae turned her head away from Dorian and shut her eyes before the tears could come...How she missed her, still...after all this time.

"What do you know of my mother, Dorian?" she asked again, quieter, her voice barely above a whisper as she moved to sit on the side of the bed, her back to him.

Muriel. Her face and hands and hair and smile and mouth and voice and smell all washed back to him like quilt panels, sewed quickly together into a real, breathing person. A person in the body of this Danae Walker.

"I met your mother one night and spoke with her... of many things. She was fierce and alive and angry. It didn't matter what about... she was just filled with passion and righteous fury. She thought for herself, that one, and didn't care what I was. We were just strangers."

Perhaps he was cruel and evil and a monster in the truest sense, but Dorian Cael remembered people and he kept promises. Even if he'd been with countless women and loved more than any man was supposed to, he didn't forget.

"She had some terrible secret she was keeping but don't think it worried her. She was grace. Bottled grace, too much grace. She was altogether different from anything on the earth. You look a lot like her."

She had heard all the stories of her mother from those who respected her, feared her, and still, hearing the rest of these words, these secret tales...Her emotions became strained, conflicted as she sighed and gave a subtle nod, not daring to meet his eyes.

"I see...They all say I look like her," she finally answered, drinking in his words though she would never admit to such a thing.

It seemed that they shared far more in common than Antony had ever told her, and still, there was a difference, a great difference, because for all the things her mother was, she was certain that the investigator would never have considered the dark thoughts that danced in Danae's mind. Becoming a creature of the night...It was an idea that had been gnawing at her for quite some time. It seemed the perfect solution to the problems that plagued her, and still, she knew the opposition she would face. Her own mortality haunted her and the memory of her mother only strengthened it...A woman, larger than life, and the very thing that she was supposed to slay was what took her life...

"Did you see her again? Before she died...." she asked in hardly above a whisper, folding her hands in her lap as she cast her gaze to the floor once more.

Dorian's eyes flickered over Danae's face. He didn't read her thoughts, he would never do such a thing to her, but there were so many subtle hints she gave away without meaning to. She was a woman, and he knew plenty about body language, facial expressions. Sighs. Tones of voice.

This girl was far more interested in hearing about her mother than she let on.

"I only ever met her once, my dear. It was enough, though. She couldn't last long in this life... people like her don't seem to stay on earth long enough. They either fall prey to the greater evil or give in and become immortals how they must. Like I did." He paused, moving closer to her and looking into her face. His hand reached out, he touched the bare skin on her neck with careful, light fingers. "Like you perhaps think you should..."

Once upon a time, she had been an enigma, a mystery. She couldn't be seen through and her thoughts were not known to those around her. It was simple to hide behind her smile, easy to feign the sparkle in her eyes, but now...Now, she seemed to have lost the heart to bother at all. She saw no reason to fake who she was, what she had become...what she would become if she let the world take over again.

She nodded just once as Dorian spoke, then slowly, as she felt his touch fall to her in that way, she sighed, turning her head back toward him and meeting his eyes. She shivered under his touch, but to his statement, she could not deny the truth... "Why should I think I've any other choice? I will die, but those around me will remain...forever. Morpheus, Marcus...Antony will live far longer than any human. And...who am I think that I can combat the evils of this world and live?"

Turning her head away, she sighed and rose from the bed, her arms crossing over her chest as she walked to the closed window and bowed her head against it. "I should have been born immortal, should have been something greater, something more. I used to think I can change the world, Dorian, but now...now I think I'd serve more good if I slipped off to Kisendoth Island and remained for the rest of my days...My parents died protecting me, My uncle died protecting me...Should any of those near to me find out about you, it would change them and the way they view me forever...And Marcus...My God!" One small hand beat against the wooden walls as she whirled away from his line of sight to hide herself. "To know immortality and be not of it is a curse, Dorian...Especially when it surrounds you in every place you look..."

Dorian slipped from the bed, silently moving across the room and coming to stand just behind her. He put one hand on her shoulder and the other on her waist, his chin on her shoulder and his mouth by her ear. More gentle than he would usually be. He made no move to intimidate her or to work any response in her at all, except to be a kind of comfort.

"You have done nothing wrong where it concerns me, Danae. You've discovered for yourself what I am or am not. What evil is there in that? You've done nothing to feel ashamed of or for anyone to disregard you for."

For once, Dorian didn't have to pretend to care. Damn this girl. She really had found a little compassion in him... she'd found something in him that he didn't think was left.

"A gift from the gods is what you deserve, my dear, same as your Antony Piers got. You don't deserve a life of wickedness and darkness, though... even Trellan would tell you that. Even Trellan, who would be able to be with you forever, and not know the sadness of loss... he would never want you to choose this life."

When he came to her, his touch falling upon her, she was neither startled nor taken aback. If anything, she leaned back against him, into the comfort he offered, and she sighed. His words rushed past her ear, but no shivers traipsed down her spine.

Closing her eyes, Danae laid her hand over his that rested on her waist and turned her head back toward him, opening her eyes to glance up at him for a moment. "But a gift from the gods will never come to me, Dorian...I am mortal and without being turned into what you are, what Marcus is, there will be no divine intervention that will make me live any longer than fate has already planned..."

Closing her eyes again, she knew she could not look out the window, and the thought crossed her mind that if she were turned, she would never look upon the sun again...But then, hadn't she always lived her life in the night, in the darkness when the very things she hunted came out to play?

"If I asked it of you, would you turn me, Dorian?" she finally whispered after a long, lingering silence, her heart nearly ceasing to beat as she wondered what his answer would be.

Her question surpised him. Utterly. He hadn't expected her to be sure enough yet, to just say it in so many words. But he'd somehow known that was what she was thinking, imagining.

As much as she'd been around creatures of the night, around evil, around vampires and monsters, she had no idea what it was to be one though.

Dorian traced one of his long, cold fingers up and down her neck, considering her, feeling her. She was so fragile in her human state, as a mortal. What could she be if she was a vampire? What kind of person would she be with supernatural strength and vision and power?

Part of him wanted to sink his teeth into her neck, take her life from her and then share his own... to father her into his life, to make her child and lover and student. He could feel her pulse and imagined what her blood tasted like...

Dorian stopped himself before he could do more than press his lips to her neck though. He froze there, willing himself back to utter self-control.

"Could I? I could... and would enjoy it, but should I? I don't think so, Danae... I worry you would owe too much to me, and I worry of what others would do to you for that very reason. And how you would survive, having to kill others." He paused, closing his eyes for a few seconds. "Even so... you must be careful; I'm no great warrior to temptation..."

A year ago, Danae would have never considered such a thing. A year ago, she was content in her library with her books, or in the field with Marcus and Raelin, acting as their line of defense for whatever horrors they faced in the dark of night...A year ago, she was content. A year ago...she had somehow quelled the feelings she had for Marcus Trellan, a feat she could not do any longer.

As his lips brushed her neck, Danae felt a shiver run down her spine. Closing her eyes, she gave into it, into him, leaning farther back against his frame as he stood behind her, listening to his words and wishing that he would lose the war against temptation, wishing with all that she had that he would turn her now. At least then, she would not have to wait. If he turned her now, she could only watch as mortality slipped away and wait for the sun that would never rise and the eternal darkness that would shroud her.

But somewhere, deep down, his words did strike a chord within her and she did know that for all that he was, his words were truthful and from the heart. If he turned her, she would remain his companion for a time, until they drove each other to the brink of madness and she left him once more...She knew the ways of the vampires, but that was not what she wanted. She wanted to live amongst those in the light and somehow last forever.

"I understand..." she whispered, and it was then that she disentangled herself from his arms, stepping away, against the stone wall before her with a sigh. "I know this life is not meant for me, but in this cloud that I've stepped into, there is no silver lining, Dorian...There is only a storm of pain waiting...for me, for those I'll leave behind..."

A quiet sigh rust past her lips as slender shoulders trembled almost visibly. She knew that being turned would take away all the things she valued, and yet, she still saw no other way....

"I don't know what to do, Dorian," she confided, her eyes shut. Slowly, she turned to face him, her eyes open as she tipped her head back to look up at him, lost, and yet, still standing strong. She would never admit to defeat, but inside, she was slowly breaking...

As Danae leaned back into Dorian, as she fell so still and open in his arms, he found it harder and harder to control himself. Her pulse sounded like thunder in his ears and she felt warm. Soft. She had in her exactly what he needed and surely she would be so sweet. Surely he could take her to the edge of death and then bring her back. Rescue her... walk with her on his arm and...

But when she pulled away, a few shreds of sanity came back. He folded his hands in front of himself and forced his thoughts onto her words. He wouldn't take her. No.

I don't know what to do, Dorian

That made two of them. He knew she would be a miserable vampire. Killing was against her nature, and darkness and sadness and regret weren't suitable bed mates for her. If only she could see... if only he could give her some alternative.

"Oh my dear," he said at last, shaking his head. He moved forward without hesitation, took her face between his hands and looked down at her, seeing the hurt and frustration that she'd been so good at keeping from others. How that goody-goody Trellan had ever managed to overlook Danae was far beyond Dorian's comprehension. "I would give you the sun and all of time with it. I'd give you long life and someone to share it with... But tonight all we have is this little place. Antiques, ancients... some stories and some old pillows." He reached down and took one of her hands, pulling her back towards the bed. He gently pressed a kiss to her forehead, still fighting his rising thirst.

He was a far greater man than most mortals that walked the Earth, and yet she knew in the eyes of those that would destroy him, he would never be seen that way. Perhaps she had tamed the beast, or perhaps Dorian Cael was not the beast at all.

As cool hands fell to her face, Danae looked up at him, wide-eyed and innocent, just as Marcus had always told her she was. At his insistence, Danae followed him, closing her eyes as his lips brushed against her forehead. His promises, however impossible, made her wish with everything that she was that it could come true...That he could give her forever and somehow, she could hold onto the things that made her who she was. She had been intent on becoming a vampire, certain that she would walk amongst the creatures of the night, but one of their very own knew that within her, she did not have the darkness to become such a thing.

Nodding to him, Danae touched his cheek,and as she laid down with him, she leaned over, daring to press her lips to his. There was a part of her, deep inside, that would love him for what he was, and while her heart still belonged to Marcus, she could not deny that she felt something for Dorian Cael.

"Perhaps I'm not meant to live forever..." she whispered against him, pulling back only enough to let emerald green orbs stare into his, no hint of a smile on her face, but the innocence that had faded from her eyes seemed to slowly seep back in again. "Will you miss me when I've gone?" Danae asked him, her hand running slowly through the cropped locks of golden hair before it fell to his shoulder again...He was beautiful, she had decided long ago. If not for his charm and grace, then for the heart and soul he possessed that he kept so securely locked away.

Dorian was surprised that Danae dared to kiss him, that she pressed her lips to his so gently, so innocently. She was nothing like the women he'd spent most of his unnatural life around. She was something fresh and precious. He worried for what he could do to her, how he might change her.

Will you miss me when I've gone?

"My dear." he whispered, shaking his head, "Don't wish yourself away just yet. I've no want to ever have to miss you. If I'm given a little help from the gods, I'll make this last long enough that neither of us will miss anything. I'll make tonight stand for a lot longer than it should..."

She could have no idea how many times he would have cried, had he been able to make tears anymore, for all of the things that passed away. For the death of so much beauty and grace and order and law and chivalry and manners. For the ruining and changing of the earth. For the generations he'd watched vanish. For a person here or there who's face stood out among the rest.

"You were Queen tonight," he reminded, smiling a little. "You should be able to help me command time still. And you should stay here with me."

Even as she watched him, she knew they would fault her and condemn him for this secret rendezvous...And yet, she could not stop the stirrings inside of her, anymore than she could calm her fluttering heart. Danae watched him as he spoke, fingertips trailing down the contours of his face...For all the stories told upon him, he had captivated her with his very soul, a soul that he was rumored to have sold to the devil, to the matron of the creatures of the night.

Her hand rifled back through the shorn locks of blonde hair and as he spoke, she could only shake her head and smile. He would not miss her...She would pass, fade into the iron clutches of her own mortality, and she would be forgotten just as millions and millions before her...She would not be missed.

Danae forced back the thoughts, lowering her head to the pillow by his, her dark hair spilling over her shoulder, all around her as she touched his cheek once more.

"You will be King...and I will be Queen," she whispered, somewhat in melody as she offered only a subtle nod. "Tonight is ours...You've made me smile more since the sun has fallen than I've smiled in more than a year." It was the truth...In the past year, she had become stoic and passive, but it seemed that the undead before her had set her heart to beating again..."I will stay...because despite what I should feel, I don't want to leave you..."

You've made me smile more since the sun has fallen than I've smiled in more than a year

This had truly been his goal if not anything else... such a strange goal compared to the ones he was used to. Take, steal, trick, seduce, befriend... he was good at many things but this was something he could actually take a real pleasure in achieving. He'd made her smile.

I will stay...because despite what I should feel, I don't want to leave you

Devestating words. She didn't want to leave... this was, once again, way out of his usual circle. He was used to saving words for later, for jumping right to the sin and the secrets, the rush. This was all so different.

"You'd be wise to leave, because if you keep touching my hair that way, you may get in over your head..." he warned, only so he could say he'd warned her, but he didn't really give her time to react. He just turned fully against her and kissed her, bringing his cold fingers up into her hair, to her face.

She should fight him...Shouldn't she? As he turned her around, words uttered in a rush before his lips found hers, Danae could make no motion to protest. No cries rose up in her throat. Her arms did not move to push him back. Her body did not inch away as he came nearer and nearer, time slowed to a crawl.

Instead, she looked up into the icy eyes and in what should have been hollow, she saw the sparks of a soul dancing back at her. Her hands sliding up his neck, Danae slid her arms around him, feeling the cold chill of his hands as his body pressed to hers.

Her eyes shut of their own volition and she returned his kiss...Returned it with fervor, with forbidden passion, with the truth of a liasion that could never come true...But tonight, tonight she had been a Queen of the Undead; tonight, she had walked by his side as if she belonged along the darkness and shadows; and tonight, if only for a little while, she could linger in her imaginary world where side by side, vampire and mortal could walk hand in hand.

Slender fingers slid through his closely cropped hair as Danae opened her eyes again, emerald orbs dancing in the lackluster light of the fading night. Pulling back ever so slightly, her breath ghosting across his lips, Danae watched him in silence, in awe...in regret. It could never be, and yet, deep down, the darkest side of her that wished for such a thing, for such a life...Ah, that side craved the night...longed for Dorian Cael.

Dorian stared back at Danae as she pulled slightly back, and he wondered what she was thinking. He wouldn't dip into her mind, but he couldn't help wondering. She had returned his kiss and her face showed acceptance and openness. She was letting him in.

Dorian placed his fingers against her cheek. Maybe this was wrong, maybe he would corrupt her. Maybe his very presence corrupted her and ruined her, but somehow, he didn't think so. She had the rare ability to enhance the things around her, to bring light instead of swallow darkness. She'd even been able to melt a little of his coldness.

"I'm selfish... so selfish that I wish I could be with you longer than just one day." He pressed his face against her neck, trying not to let her pulse hypnotise him. He didn't want to lose control- "But you already love someone..."

As cool fingers touched his cheek again, Danae turned toward the gentle carress, biting into her lip as she shut her eyes. Oh, Dorian...She did love someone, and she loved him with all of her heart, but...for years, she had not seemed to be enough. For years, she had no been worthy of Marcus...For years, she had worked side by side with him and even on those rare moments when they stepped over the line of merely partners and only friends, he ran away from her...She was the mortal who should have fled in fear, and yet, it was the vampire that was always running into the shadows to hide.

His face pressed into his neck and as his words echoed in her mind, Danae cursed herself, raising a hand and laying it agains the back of his hand, twirling the flaxen locks of hair around her fingertips as she lay with him. "I'm sorry, Dorian..." she whispered, remembering the night she gave up on Marcus and the night she gave in to the man before her now.

Tears welled in her green eyes as Danae turned her head into his hair, her slender arms sliding around his frame. "It isn't merely someone I love...I care for you as well, and while the feelings do not run as deeply, it will kill me should I ever hurt you, Dorian." Danae pressed a tender kiss to the side of his head as she took in a slow breath, shaking her head at the current predicament she found herself in, caught and torn between two very, very different men. "We have tonight...I cannot promise you more, but I can say that I will stay as long as I can...and I will return...That's all I have to give you."

She nearly asked him to turn himself in to Antony and she would cry and beg and plead to the Mendecant Superior until some mercy was shown. She would fight against Marcus for all that she could, knowing his intense hatred of Dorian...She would argue on his behalf against the Dreamwalker himself should it come down to such a thing...For all that Dorian Cael was, he had become her friend...And in her eyes, would always be. A friend...And slightly more. Forever.

She was obviously thinking something, debating something other than her love for Trellan. Something else was filling up her mind and bouncing from ear to ear.

"You're welcome to stay as long as you will... and to come back whenever you want. But something else is on your mind. I can't read your thoughts as I might read a strangers... what are you thinking?"

Dorian ran his fingers again across the softness of her face. Her warmth and life was beautiful to him, and delicate at the same time, something he both wanted to eat up and protect. The hunter and beast in him wanted to take things from her that he had no business taking. But a quiet voice kept him from his, helped his control stay in check.

He dropped another kiss to her neck, wondering if she could possibly have any idea of the fight within him. Still wondering what she was thinking...

What was she thinking? Standing in his arms, she was torn...She thought of giving herself to the night, but in that, somehow she knew that she would be giving herself to him...Marcus would never welcome her with open arms if her heart ceased to beat, if she never took another needed breath...As his lips pressed to her neck once more, Danae bowed her head and took in a quiet breath, hardly noticeable, save for the silence of where they stood.

If she chose to walk the moon's rays, she would choose Dorian Cael...A relation of convenience, a marriage of kindred souls...Ah, it could work and they would rule the night, but with him was not where her heart rested. There was another, as sure as the sun would rise...Another that had stepped in from nowhere, cosmic destinies aligned, and she had fallen for him...

Biting into her lip, Danae shook her head and leaned back against him, taking comfort in the chilled embrace. "What I'm thinking...does not matter, Dorian. It is not the thought by which you come to the decision, but the decision itself that matters, and right now, I have no certainty and no decision."

Her spine still tingled from his touch, cool lips against her warm skin. Danae's fingertips slid over his arm still secured around his waist before she turned her head back to glance at him over her shoulder. "But tonight...You've brought me here, knowing what could become of us...And tonight, I'll stay with you."

Turning around, Danae slid her arms around his neck and looked up into his eyes, guilt already filling her heart and soul. She cared for him, no doubt, but her destiny, she knew, rested with another...Ah, but to choose? To decide when it all seemed so hopeless? With Marcus, it would be the hardest...but with Marcus, it would last...

If only he could show her all of the things he'd seen. It was sad that all that was left of his adventures and years, was a collection of old, broken trinkets, worn-out books and his own memories. Sometimes he wished he could bottle them and give them as a gift to someone important, someone who could take better care of them than him. Or... someone who could agree with him, yes, the past existed. Yes, the world used to be different. It seemed now that no one would ever believe him.

Taking someone like Danae into this life wouldn't help that at all. She would only know this sad life and an even sadder one. Even if she'd been with him since the beginning of his own dark journey, she would surely be tired and sad by now.

"My mother would have a field day with you," he muttered and sighed, half-smiling. "All purpose and so innocent, still. My mother was what they used to call a witch, a very powerful woman. She told me to never settle for anything less than a contract with a goddess or something." He snorted.

Danae watched him, a hint of a smile lighting her saddened green eyes. Listening to him speak...about anything, it seemed as though he knew it all, the otherworldly air encircling him, reminding her time and time again of the truth behind his smile.

A mild shake of her head, she stood gladly within his arms...for the moment. For the moment, it seemed, was all that she could ever have these days. She could smile...for the moment. She could cry...for the moment. For the moment, she could laugh; she could scream; she could silence herself into oblivion....But only for the moment.

"Would she now? It is a shame we cannot meet then...But I believe you'd prefer it that way..." Her smile brightened with the teasing tone that graced her voice...for a moment, but just as quickly, the sparkle within her eyes faded. "A goddess? Then you've stepped below your threshold, Dorian...I'm no goddess."

Her hands rested on his sides before her arms slid around his waist once again. Forbidden...Yes, it was forbidden, and perhaps that was why he called to her so. For as long as she had been breathing, she had been the good child, the one who did no wrong. She followed the orders given to her, and for every ounce of protocol that Antony had ingrained in her, she accepted it as law and followed it to the last detail...

Until now.

"I...I can see why my mother spent her time with you...Everyone tells me I'm like my father, but I...I would much prefer to be like my mother, however jaded she might've been." Bowing her head at that, Danae silenced her words and her thoughts, closing her eyes to force back the last memory she had of her mother, the free-spirit...the wild child that her father sought so hard to tame.

If only Danae had some idea of everything truly exciting about herself... but maybe her strange innocence only made her more appealing. He had seen and been with plenty of women over the centuries and the ones who were charming without meaning to be... ahhh, those ones were always the best.

"You're a goddess in your own way... you've got a certain magic about you. I'm sure it's mostly from your mother, so don't worry there. You're every bit of her that you wish you were. I can't help but wonder what this father of yours is like though. You don't speak highly of him." Dorian scoffed, shaking his head. "I never cared for mine. He was around long enough to create me, and that's all I ask. He rightfully died soon after my sister was born and left all of us to our destinies. My mother never cared much for him either but he was good breeding. You know." He said this with a certain matter of fact-ness that wasn't really cold... just calm. Benign.

"Besides, it seems to me like that Piers fellow is father enough for you."

It all seemed to fall down around her...The life, the things she had known...All tossed into a spinning spiral and twisted out of control. She felt confused, angry, but somewhere, skimming over the surface of it all, she felt numb.

But Dorian, his voice, it was soothing to her ears, to her tormented mind and rattled soul. Closing her eyes, she leaned her head in against his chest and felt the rise and fall of each unneeded breath as the gentle quake of his voice echoed. All that he spoke up, it was nonchalant and matter-of-fact, but as he spoke of Antony, she could feel the sinking lead weight of the guilt plummet inside of her again.

Drawing back, Danae hung her head. What would Antony say? For a moment, she shut her eyes, but then, she wondered what could Antony say? He had raised her, cherished her as his own, but in the end, hadn't he always told her that she was her own person and her decisions and mistakes were her own to make?

Glancing up once more, Danae looked to Dorian, his blue eyes entrapping as she tilted her head to the side. By the gods, he was gorgeous, but by the demons of the night, he would be her downfall. Danae knew already that no matter how much love she held for Marcus, where her heart was so firmly planted, Dorian would always be the unanswered question, the mystery, and on some dark night, she would crave tha forbidden again....

"You think me a goddess, and yet, I've no way to live forever..." she said again, the one desire she so firmly held dancing in her mind. Immortality...or something near to it. Stepping up to him, Danae laid her hands against his chest, her head tipped back to meet his gaze, chestnut hair spilling down her back. "Dorian...Is there a way, that I might live forever, or for longer, and remain who I am? No darkness, no loss...Just me, in the cask of immortality?" She prayed that he knew a way...A way that would not taint her, that would let her live until the world all but faded away....The sorceress' son, surely he knew...