Uneasy Truce

[themorbidsocialite]

 The Morbid Socialite returned home from a thoroughly unsatisfying dinner with a selection of devils and their guests and the first thing he did was check on Persephone. She was still collapsed on her bed, dead tired, curled around her pillow like a lifeline. Mori lingered in the doorway, watching her breathe, and sighed. He eventually closed the door and moved to the chaise lounge just under the parlor window. He collapsed under the false starlight, arm draped over his eyes and breathing out.

 

He was still so hungry… Something about that dinner hadn’t been right and the odd behavior of the other guests was just the start. He knew Abstraction was an attractive fashion at the moment, but this was beyond odd. The food was entirely unfulfilling and one of the guests had miserable table manners, but the rest of the guests seemed to ignore it.

 

Curiouser and curiouser…

 

Mori didn’t have the energy to get up and move to his bed, so he simply closed his eyes and let himself fall asleep draped over the chaise. He could deal with his sore back in the morning.

 

Robes the colour of salt… Trimmed in red fox-fur… The only one to bring a gift rather than take one… His breath is saccharine sweet… It drips like rot and coats the tongue… His voice is the sound of a hungry well, bottomless and cold… So familiar, so familiar… Don’t take them, you cry, please don’t take them… They’re only a child, they’re only a child… You know this hunger and cold like a distant kin, a memory held by someone with your face and name and nothing of yourself… You beg… What do you want… You will take his heart, you will take his robes, you will take his cold, you will take his face, you will take his flickering, sputtering candlelight, you will ensure it lasts forever… He reaches within and pulls and you are cold… You are drowning and you are cold… You are dreadfully hungry and so very cold…

 

Mori awoke with a start, face wet with frigid tears, hands grasping for something he’s unable to feel. A burning flame? A set of robes? The sleeve of a loved one? He couldn’t remember, but he felt a hunger and a sadness choke him, scrubbing the chilled tears away from his face.

 

They smelled like ammonia…

 

Taking a moment to fully wake up, Mori realized he and the chaise and the window ledge were soaked with the slow dripping of melting lacre, piled as snow along the window that had been left open. Mori’s breath stuttered, wondering how much of that had been a dream… There was no time to dwell on that. Mori shoveled the lacre from the window into a pail and shut the window. He used a towel to mop up as much melted lacre as possible from the chaise and moved it to sit just in front of the fireplace, setting up a fire. He changed his clothes and pinned the lacre-soaked set before the fireplace as well. He mopped up the ammonia-smelling tears that puddled on the floor and the windowsill and hung the towel before the fire as well before seating himself there with a sigh.

 

The fumes of evaporating lacre were unlikely to be good for him, but he had to dry off somehow. He sat on the chaise with his head in his hands, propped up on his knees, and stared into the fire. That dream… That dream that wasn’t a dream…

 

A letter slipped through the mail slot and Mori sighed, grunting as he stood to fetch it. He looked it over at the door. The seal of Mr. Iron, the note reading: ‘You are pursuing a name. End your pursuit now.’

 

It took him a moment to realize he hadn’t heard footsteps retreating. He read over the note a couple times, becoming certain of what it meant, then sighed. “Inform the Masters of the Bazaar,” Mori started, propping the mail slot open, “that I have no intention - nor will I ever have any intention - of pursuing any names unless they refuse to leave me alone. Ensure that Mr. Iron, in particular, is aware of this fact and that my continued control of the situation is based solely on my good favour towards the spare few Masters that still maintain it. If they could have some amount of patience, I will be rid of what plagues me in a day’s time. Good day.”

 

He let the mail slot clack closed and listened to the sound of footsteps retreating from his door. He sighed, his hand running through his hair and his stomach growling as he returned to his seat before the fire. He considered the note and folded it gently, since he was evidently being watched, and set it aside. Mori scrubbed a hand through his hair and looked up at the mantle. The clothes had slowed their dripping, the fire sending a glow up the chimney, the red and gold lizard almost seeming to purr like a cat with the gentle warmth stolen from the bricks.

 

Mori smiled and hung his head.

 

Wait!

 

Mori straightened again and locked eyes with the red and gold lizard that certainly wasn’t his beloved Fig. It licked its eye and stared back, curled up gently on the bricks. Over several moments of staring, Mori slowly loosened, eyes still locked on the lizard, but the shock and fury fading into a simmer.

 

“If you can wait for me to be dry and fed,” he started in a quiet tone, exhaustion seeping through, “then I can let you soak in the fireplace for as long as you wish.”

 

The lizard continued to stare, the crackling of the fireplace filling the silence between them, before it laid its head down again and closed both layers of eyelids. Mori sighed and turned his attention back to the fire, content with this temporary truce.