[Open Post] When the Wolves Come Out of the Walls...

[77th_emo_earl]

For the first time since his abortive attempt at escaping back in November, Titus no longer feels so much at home in this place. Something nasty has come out of the woodwork, and he's wondering now if trying to escape was the better course of action. He cannot be alone, not after nearly harming himself, and so he's headed for the kitchen, hoping to find *someone* who hasn't been affected by this madness...

Backdated to the night Morgoth tried to break his mind

Comments

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

Fuchsia wouldn't know any better. She rarely knows better about anything.

"But how did you lose Ahiru? Where did she go?"

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

"There are times, it seems, when people find their way back to the world from whence they came," he says. "But the thing that was whispering to me claims that it took her."

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

"I wouldn't want to go back. I'd be in the moat," she can say that like it isn't disturbing in the least.

Though, entirely incidentally, Fuchsia might find something comforting to say. "If people find their way back to the world they came from, then how do you know she didn't? How do you know the whispers aren't lying?"

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

He blinks, looking at her, and the words click in his head. "You are right: how can I know these whispers were telling you the truth? It could well have been a figment of my distraught imagination."

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

"Oh, don't be distraught, Titus," Fuchsia does not approve of this idea, in the least.

Wracking her brain for something not upsetting, Fuchsia says something that will probably be the worst possible segue in all history.

"We should have tea, with the man who teaches about non-sparkly vampires."

Titus may want to talk his way into thinking he was hearing things about that too.

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

"I'm not distraught now, but I was earlier and I suppose that I merely needed to speak to someone about what has troubled me," he says. He's not about to tell her that Morgoth tried to make him harm himself: he doesn't want to worry her, if it really happened at all.

"Who is this man you spoke of?" He doesn't add, 'What, by the Stones, is this about non-sparkly vampires? Would that not imply that there are sparkling ones??'

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

"You can always talk to me, Titus." She will, in a way, though she would be unable to understand it, always try to make up for the distance between them the last while in Gormenghast. That, in Fuchsia terms, means being extra fussy about his happiness.

This would also mean, should she ever learn about the attempt to convince Titus to harm himself, Morgoth would be in for an earful indeed.

"Dr. Muraki. He's invited us to tea because he wants to meet you. He can tell you all about the vampires too. I'd rather meet a sparkly one, but I met one of the others, and he was a monster Titus."

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

"I suppose we could arrange that," he says. He almost starts to say that he has no reason to learn about vampires when dealing with demons might be the more practical thing to learn about, but he stops and says, instead, "There is a vampire here? Are you unharmed?"

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

"There is! He's the most terrifying thing, but Captain Reynolds threatened to kill him." She should sound downright traumatized, but she sounds much more like she's telling a fantastic tale.

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

"Captain Reynolds? I do not think that I know the man, but if he protected you from danger, he has my thanks and more than that," he says, relieved to hear that.

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

"You should meet him. He's not my champion but you should meet him," Fuchsia makes it sound like there's a connection there, even if there isn't.

"He's the one who suggested I ask Dr. Muraki about vampires."

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

"It seems there are still many folk with whom I have not yet crossed paths," he notes. "But perhaps we should start with the man who is teaching you the lore of vampires: perhaps he knows of ways to keep them from coming near to your rooms."

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

"My rooms?" Her eyes go wide. While the sparkling vampire she so admires would go to his love's room, she can't imagine the hideous creature that so frightened her would mean anything but harm.

For all that Titus has been upset, Fuchsia looks rather stricken.

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

"They are hunters, are they not? I would think that it would not be hard for them to track you there," he says, concerned for her safety. After being attacked in his own rooms by Morgoth, he's not sure that even one's room is a sanctuary.

[drownedfuchsia.livejournal.com]

It may take Morgoth attacking him in his own room, to almost break Titus, but the mere idea of the same thing occurring (she doesn't understand it's not really comparable) terrifies her.

"We must do something, Titus. I'll have to ask Dr. Muraki how to keep them out." After that perfectly reasonable suggestion, she asks, as though she said nothing at all, or nothing of note. "What do we do?"

[77th-earl.livejournal.com]

"I will have to meet this man first, if he is to arrange some means of creating protection for us," he says, patiently. "Perhaps in a week or so? I have rehearsals for a play that is being performed here and it shan't be till then that I can spare a day."