A Husband in the Pile.

[gothicwords]

Lee stood in the entry to Rose Manor and blinked. A finger poked into his ear as he twisted it about in a mocking gesture. Not sure he heard the man right.

In front of him stood a man a little taller than himself. Bronze skinned, but not by the sun, it was dark by nature. He could be taken for handsome, if a person was fond of the slender figure but muscled physique and high cheekbones. Even with the black flesh, he had an almost 'Italian' look. Alluring, and it spoke of adventure, danger.
Silver strands of lengthy hair hung random with a prism's sheen down the stranger’s spine. The wind dancing with it over the slight tip of pointed ears suggested a strange truth.


"I beg your pardon?" Lee's replied as he blocked the door of the man challenging him with such intense teal eyes. Sharp and contrasting to his pale brown ones. Running a strong hand through richly messed blonde locks Lee held his ground.

"I said I'm here to see my wife. Madam Alexi Rose. She -is- here isn't she? I can smell her perfume on you. " He took an arrogant lean forward and whiff of the air through his nostril. "Like sugared fruit" The dark fleshed hand of Rico took a hold of Lee's shirt at the shoulder and ushered Lee to the side as he stepped through the thresh hold of His Manor.

Seeing the protest, and the flexed bicep of the younger man Rico continued;

"What? You must be half Lexi's age? At least? I really can't blame her; my absence has been rather cruel. Now where is she?" Rico Pryce knew Lee was frustrated by this uncouth introduction of his "employers" Husband. The look on the youths face was stricken with utter shock. A quirky smile came from Rico, as he pushed his way through the hall towards what would be the music room.
Yet before he reached it, Alexi came lazily out through another door two goblets full of wine in each hand. And before she could stop herself the words rang out, and her scantily clad frame came full force around the corner into Rico's own.

"Tell them to go away." Had been Alexi's words as the wine slopped over the side of each goblet. Upward he gaze went into those teal eyes of Rico. A handsome expression on his face, he was chuckling, seemingly amused at the whole spectacle.

However Alexi was frighteningly startled by the fact that she was gazing up into a very fimilar teal gaze she certianly hadn't been expecting at this hour. The front of her loose night gown wet with some of the wine stuck to her bosom.

"Rico" she uttered in a surpised whisper.

Lee however was reaching for his sword, tucking in the loosened shirt. Bared feet slapping the cold marble of the overly large entry. Could this be true? He seemingly hung his head as if trying to figure out the truth.

"Oh Lexi, you mean you didn't tell the boy you had, HAVE a husband? He looks shocked to see me? " A brash gaze to the muscular youth that Lee was, Rico shook his head, tis tisking Alexi with disapproval.

"Who else haven't you told? " Asked Pryce.

Lee moved forward staring at Alexi. His eyes were wild with disbelief coming to grips with this situation. He thought he knew her, he thought she was different, she'd been so kind to him, taking him in, giving him everything he'd wanted. He'd fallen in love with her, how stupid. But he wanted to hear it from her.

"Is it true? Is this man your. Your husband? Alexi?"

Lexi swallowed a hard lump and then took several gulps of wine, eyes going from Rico to Lee. Quiet. She didn't owe anyone anything. Lee had truthfully gotten the best deal of all. What was he all watery eyed about? For gods sakes he acted like was in love or. Or something. Oh for the love of God. He was. His next words hitting her smack in the forehead like a two by fore.

"And all that in the Town Square this morning. What was that all about? You nearly fainted when you found out the Governor had married, weeping and going on about how you'd trusted him, heart broken. And here, you are married? Married? Tell me it isn't true Rose. Tell me."

Alexi gave Rico a rather annoyed glance. And motioned him out of the way as Lee stood there awaiting the truth.

"Yes Lee, it's true, this is my." She couldn't say it; her eyes went up to Rico's gaze who was crossing his arms over his muscular chest. "Husband. Rico Pryce. "

Lee felt betrayed and stormed past the two. He yelled over his shoulder, embarrassed, angry.

"You'll pay for this Lexi. I know the truth I know you loved that fast bastard Of a Governor. I know you did. You can pretend you didn't but you will be sorry, I'll make sure everyone you care about suffers!" He bellowed slamming one of the many doors. Which caused Alexi to stiffen.

Left facing an amused husband she glared up into his handsome face. Her half flared nostril pulsing, arms wrapping around her, goblets dangling from each hand. Returning to that familiar, awkward silence between she and her spouse.

"What Alexi? No welcome Home Kiss for your dear husband?" Rico taunted plucking up one of the goblets from her dangeling fingers and taking a sip of her would be lover’s glass of wine. Followed by what can only be described as a satisfied ear-to-ear grin and devilish wink for his wife Alexi Rose Pryce.

[emmy]

It had just been another visit to the tavern, but it had left a smile to linger at her lips. Leaning upon the arm of her carriage driver, Paul, Messina ducked out from the small chamber of velvet cushions, soft sconces and the scent of vanilla, and he hurried her toward the manor. Meanwhile, above their heads, bruised clouds swelled and grumbled, their bellies glimmering with unshed lightning. Large coins of cold prickled the bare of her arms and the crown of her sun-dappled tresses, and her slippered feet brushed clumsily along the path. Her skirts were dragged back from the ground within tight knuckles that shone with rings - with gaudiness - with wealth. The upset skies should have all been a big, bright bloody sign for Messina. It really, truly should have. But then she could be so very oblivious sometimes.

What usually is brought in with a storm? The sea.

Cold fingers pried the doors open, and as Paul returned to the carriage to move it to cover, Messina fit her slim, skirt-twisted figure in through the doorway, and into the front hallway. She intook a deep breath, which was cut short with a sharp pain from her tightly-laced bodice, and drug her fingers amid water-snaked curls.

It was then that she heard the unfamiliar pattern of a stranger's voice. Her heart grew to stone and thumped to a spot deep within her chest, and her fingers drew to her lips as she listened closer. But before she could reach around to grab a candle stick, a second voice chimed in above the first - and this one was, to all degrees, a most recognizable voice at that. It was Alexi's! Messina pursed her lips, wondering vaguely who her sister's male visitor could be, and pushed open the music room door. This was, afterall, where she thought the conversation was coming from. And what good was a sister if she didn't make herself a nuisance in front of her sibling's boyfriend?

"Excuse me? I hope I'm not interupting anything," she began, her voice apologetic and inquiring, as she prepared to look around the edge of the door.

[gothicwords]

"Sit down. You are going to want to be seated for this Messina."

Alexi pulled out a chair for Messina and motioned for her to have a seat in it. Pacing back and forth so many times Messina lost count she finally pleaded with her sister. "Stop that Lexi. Tell me what is going on. What is really going on!”?

Nearly a week had passed since Messina had walked in on Alexi and Rico.

"I'll start from the beginning. Or the middle, no some place near the end. Oh Messina what have I done?" Alexi dropped down on her knees placing her cheek in her sister’s lap.

"I can't divorce a man I'm not even married too. So I panicked. I hired an assassin to kill him. " At the moment she was pulling back the pink sleeve that covered her shoulder. In the front was still the wound, healing where the arrow had hit her instead of Rico.

"He hit his target alright." She scoffed. It was part of the plan. The assassin would hit both of them in an attempt to keep the assault from appearing to be what it truly was.

"I can't keep doing these things Messina. I don't know what's the matter with me. "

A slow breath escaped the noble woman who knelt at the floor in front of her sister’s lap. Arms draped over the overly spun silk of Messina's skirts. Heaving in protest to a life that was spinning out of control.

"You realize I can't stop? I won't stop? I truly tried Messina. For a while, I even committed myself to a monastery in hopes to find some sort of glimpse of peace of sanity. Yet nothing thrills me more than this life I already have. I could go back to Sea again? You could come with me." She seemed to be getting excited but from the look on Messina's face she could tell "that" would never be. Messina wanted the life of the Court. The nobility. The suitors and the men. But Alexi knew if they stayed, nothing would ever be, as it seemed.

"Then we stay? You and I together? Even though you know I'm going to murder a man? And destroy anyone who comes in my way of getting what we so richly deserve?"

She posed the question. And as always Alexi put it in such a dramatic way that it could mean the end of sisterly secrets or the beginning of so many more.

[emmy]

Messina perched upon the sleek, low piano stool, legs tucked elegantly, and skirts a frothy, blue pool at her feet. She bent, her spine a delicious curve against the silk of her gown, her shoulder blades brushed milken, and gathered her sister's head in her arms. She stroked the woman's chestnut locks tenderly, slim digits teasing lush coils from her forehead and cheeks. Her eyes were wide, and they glowed in the faint light that the room offered, in the lull of early evening. She was in indecision.

Her lips fluttered. Those twin petals, soft and colored like fresh, pale spring Roses, parted thinly. She was about to suggest that they leave. That they pack up their very best things and ride off in their carriage, leaving the worries of Myrken behind. They would be forgotten soon enough, she would argue. Nothing was important enough than this. Than her sister's happiness, than her *own* happiness.

Nothing, except for the manor. Their whole lives were this manor, its rooms, this piano chair and the paintings that gleamed within their gilded framing. And so she pursed her lips, and thought better of what to say. A single ring, rimmed in fine jewels, caught a snag of light. It spilt a pale, pale thread of golden glow across the expanse of Alexi's cheek, and as her older sibling glanced up upon Messina's face, haloed in the soft corn-yellow of her rich tresses, she began.

"I thought I would find happiness away from here, but not even Amasynia could tame me. This is our home, Alexi. These damned walls, this blood." She reached to draw her sister away from the wound at her shoulder, lacing her fingers with Alexi's. She squeezed her knuckles gently. "Tell me what you're planning to do."

She would do whatever Alexi wished to keep her happy. Whether that would be the downfall of Messina or not, would simply be left for the Fates to decide.

[Dhugal]

A Flame in The Night
It happened in the deepest part of night.
It was a rest break for the workers and they
had left the still rising orphanage walls
for the food so nicely supplied by Alexi Rose
for the crew, so no one was near them when
the clay pots hurtled out of the darkness to
shatter against wood and stone.
Before anyone could run back to investigate the
source of the sound,a flaming arrow arched
out of the woods, to be followed by a second
and a third,and flames sprang to life all along
the construction.
They burned hot and hard,and one of the older
workers screamed a dreaded word.
"Naptha!"
Not a man was injured, for none even dared try
to quench that chemical spawned fire.
The fires would still be burning well into the
next afternoon.

[gothicwords]

Alexi held Messina's hand as they tipsy toed into Rico's chambers. She had given him a room of his own while he played the part of her husband. It was one of the nicer rooms in the Manor. Why not let him think he was someone important. This idea that they would actually be bedding down together was simply out of the question. She was not paying him for -that-. Only the act of illusion. Which he had pulled off quite wonderfully?

However, every good illusion must end. He had filled her purpose. A husband gave honor to a pregnancy. With out a husband it was simply a bastard, without a real name, or so the world would deem the child. Alexi knew better. This was not going to be the case. Not with Alexi Rose in charge of her own life. - She had always wanted a child, but had never married. Not because she did not fall in love, but because when she had, they all ended up on Death's door. Death was after all a Jealous Lord.

Time was against her. The need for a child was as pressing as any need a woman could have. She grew older with every year, fruitless. The fruit of her womb, empty simply because she had not married. She would not face the shame of that. But she would have her child.

The town believed the lie of her ten-year marriage. As did those in the noble court. Surely they would buy into the accidentally death of Rico Pryce.

"Accident's happen Messina." She whispered across the soft lobe of her sister's ear. So close she breathed that Alexi's lashes fluttered across the crème flush of her little sisters cheek.

Alexi held a clear jar, tightly screwed on top a copper lid. Inside crawled something small. A bug. A bug with poison for its kiss. A scorpion.

"Lexi!?" Messina gasped as she saw the thing crawling across the glass. "Lexi no.." Was the hushed warning but Alexi would mot listen to her sister's warning.
Out of the corner of Rico's matress a bare foot stuck out of the bed sheet. Alexi lifted it, and unscrewed the lid of the glass jar. Watched with hope, as the scorpion disappear into Rico's covers.

The sisters moved out of the room as the light of the sunrise began to pour into Rico's bedchambers.

[Tyralor]

Some tasks, were of simple natures. Some tasks were of painful endurance and little reward. This one, was a task of pleasure to be collected. The tale, he had little doubt upon. The source that had told him the information, was beyond reproach. And it was with this knowledge, that he passed on a tale.

The election itself, was the perfect market for such an enterprising task. Of all things to begin muttering about now, this one would invariably be one that would circulate, based on the prominence of the name in the news.

His craft was cunning, and he took deliberate efforts. A couple of taverns visited. A number of drinks, by accounts consumed, as he sat in his disguise and recounted, in drunken slurs, the knowledge that he'd gleamed.

Merely a thorn in a woman's side, and one he enjoyed pricking on so many numerous occassions. The drunken impression he portrayed would have little reprecussions on him or on others. If identified at all, he was known as, quite simply, "one of Miss Rose's stable lads"

The tale which the stable lad spun? Well, a simple truth truly. He'd been doing his duty as always, when he caught sight of a man of noble repute and prominence, though he dare not say who, emerging from Alexi's room. Caught with his pants down, one might say! And now, now the midwife is saying that she's to birth twins! Twins, surely not of her husband's seed.

Ultimately, the stable lad, made his way, staggering up an alleyway, surely meeting an unpleasant end of his own, for all know that drunkards and dark alleys are not to be had together. Most unfortunate end for all those involved no doubt.

No doubt at all. However, tales always spread more rapidly, when there's good gossip involved.

[gothicwords]

I can't begin to recall exactly how this all started. I was a noble with a cause. An orphanage. A care. I thought I could make a difference. I thought I could forget about what I’ve often wondered about. The night I first encountered Varian. Haven't I always feared the dark? And clung to my faith because of the fear that such wicked existed. And late when the candle grows dim I search my scriptures to read of Cain, the man of murder. Marked and set apart.

I surely don't believe in such things as vampires. How can I? Tis madness. Insanity. When men die, they either go to heaven or hell. They do not rise again. They do not live from the blood of others. That is wicked. How can it be truth?

Yet confusion sets in because he has not changed in 15 years. Or do I fool myself to think he is cold to the touch? When in fact it is simply my own sin, which has left me wanting sleep, and feeling cold so very often.

Fearfully I haven't even begun to reach into the pit of sin I shall sink.

I remember the days of defense. Phlynn, Ahmed, Angelina, Aeri, Quincy, Tyralor - Dhugal.

And than I began to sink. I go to sleep a great deal of the time. Whispering words, of such things that I have never beheld or heard. And I'm finding that I can't wake when I wish to. Some times I find myself beating at the air as if I am trapped inside a dark coffin. Pleading to rise from the sleep I've befallen. I wish these dreams would go away. Yet, they need me. They have no name, but there are many there with me.

When shall someone save me? Frozen in this life, I sleep. I watch on the sidelines as my hands and feet work to murder. I am going Under. Rico's blood shall run cold. Hell awaits me.

I repent and plead to the Almighty more than any, in a pew until my knees bleed in protest. The hours drag with my confession. But even then I am visited, and haunted by seductive shadows. When will I be saved from this life? Who is my Savior? I know his name, but he will not have me as his own. I want to wake up for once. Yet, now there is no end to what I may do. Even my children are at risk of my sin. I must awake and be born from this flesh. For them. For Him. God Help us all.

They rumor in the streets of the truth that I have gone through terrible pains to keep a secret. In a distorted fashion. I don't know how much longer can go on living so many lies. There is only one thing I truly want. It is to wake up. This is not my fault. When will they all see that?

There is so much that time can not erase.

There is only One I worship.

(( And I request that this Diary page is not found or taken by some Diary theif. ))

[emmy]

The roses had just begun to overflow from their thorny branches, brimming with unfurling blossoms of every color imaginable. It was, alas, one of the last remaining cheerful qualities to the Rose Manor, and their delicate folds of rich sanguine, creme, orchid, swayed gently against the warmth of the early summer breezes. Their buds bumped gently against the darkened panes of the Manor windows, and their crimson-taloned stems mumbled jagged secrets unto the murky glass, spurned slowly by the words of the breeze. Slowly, for they could bide their time.

Rico could not.

"Oh, Rico?" The voice was sweet and drenched in tendrils of the palest honey, tinging the humidity of the air with the trailings of sugary sweetness. Could this Noble Bell truly have tricks up those lace-trimmed sleeves of hers? Messina's face upturned to the man as he approached, bright eyes brimming with the melting gleam of the coolest of glaciers. At one elbow was slung a low basket filled with crumpled rose stalks, their shorn ends raw and milky with their own waning life. Messina herself was clutching a pair of pruning shears close to her brest, handling them as if she herself didn't know quite what to do with them. She was reaching on tip toes, the hem of her luxurient skirts a wash of pink about her ankles, and for a moment she angled her shears at a point a touch too high for her to reach.

Rico ambled over with his own shears - he had been helping the Lady trim their beloved rose garden that afternoon, and he gave her a smug look. "Let me, Messina," he offered. She batt her lashes, their plump, rich soot-colored lengths a curl against her cheeks, and drew back.

"Oh, thank you Rico. I'll just trim back these here--" she begun, and as the man stretched to reach the aforementioned stalks nestled beneath a window, Messina opened her own shears fully. She eyed a rose stem beside Rico's arm, but as she moved to lop it from its bush, she missed her mark entirely, the jaws of her pruning shears plunging down at his arm.

[gothicwords]

The sound of Messina's cries for help and Rico's screaming for her to stay as far away as she could filled the open window where Alexi was cleaning up the destroyed music room.

Oh for the love of God. - Alexi ran to the window, flinging herself over the edge of it to see the sight for herself. Rico was rolling about the ground holding and nursing his injured arm, while Messina screamed in a horrified manner.

"Don't touch him! Don't let the blood touch you Messina." Alexi yelled out the window for her to wait and she would be right there. What had her sister done? Had she only known Messina would take such a savage means to try and kill Rico she would have warned her.

She took her time moving through the Manor fetching large rags. Wiping the sweat off her own brow from the work she had been consumed with after Varian had broken every object within the beloved Music room.
Even a cool drink of water came to her lips, as she knew more and more blood might seep from the man's wound. A private smile rested. She hurried her pace though as she came through the front gate towards the two. Messina was still screaming. Her eyes met her sisters in a knowing look.

"Don't touch the blood Messina. It's pure acid." Alexi warned as she wrapped the near severed arm with the rag, making a tourniquet. Rico yelled out in utter pain. Alexi could not look him in the eyes she just kept pulling it tighter and tighter until the blood stopped flowing. He would loose his arm.

"Damn it Messina. What were you thinking? You could have killed him."

Upward as her eyes settled on Messina's own she held her husband tight and a smile rested on her full mouth, just ever so slightly.