The Gift of Malleus

[Morgan LaLuna]

The captain that was ever-wandering was doing so down the paths of Old Temple Plaza, transformed into an attraction for all. Snow and ice sculptures were dotted everywhere, and this early there were no skaters down below the bridge he slowed to a stop on. In both hands was a rather large cup of something hot and rich, likely cocoa, and he held it close to his face as if to thaw his bleary eyes, fresh from sleep. He'd hunt for breakfast... but didn't have to. He could simply turn around and disappear into a certain gate tucked between buildings and have perhaps a fresh muffin or five and a rather fine tea. But no, he had wanted to watch everything glimmer in the morning light, overcast as it was.

Leaning against the railing of the bridge, he was a small and lone dark figure that quite stood out in loose black harem style pants, the black boots with silver buckles they were tucked into, and a rather thick coat with a fur-lined hood that was pulled over his head. Elbows rested on the banister as he took up the relaxed lean, and he slid one foot back to tap the tip of his boot idly against the bridge below him in a slow rhythm almost reminiscent of a heartbeat. Amber eyes drifted closed, and he let the steam coming from the spout of the lid on his cup envelop his senses. Well. Most of them. Wasn't exactly something he could hear, now was it?

Maybe it was the soft crunch of snow that silenced the faint whisper of steam from his cocoa into the chilly air, as people came and went from the Hakodate Snow Palace. One figure leaving was seven or eight inches taller than the captain, thin, with a familiar figure, and tattoos of indistinct black ink that peeked out from their wrists and their throat seemed to writhe into a new position whenever someone looking close shifted their perspective, even slightly. Platinum hair hung loose over black horns, nearly covering them. They came to a stop five feet past Morgan and turned to look back at the Palace, hands sinking deeper into the pockets of a shapeless wool coat. Red eyes blinked slowly, calmly, and the twist of their lips hinted at amusement.

Morgan's head tilted when that form passed by him. He hadn't seen them, nor heard them directly. More of a... gut feeling, perhaps. A gravitation. His eyes opened slowly, and he took this as perhaps he'd simply started dozing off, for it was a familiar dream-like twinge of recognition. The cocoa lifted, and he took a liberal sip as he turned to lean his back against the rail, now facing away from the beautiful palace that, when the sun actually managed to break through clouds, shone like a beacon in the middle of the Plaza.

His eyes were caught by the combination of white hair and black horns... not something he was altogether unused to existing in the very corner of his eye in a certain plane, or drifting just out of clear sight in strange dreams. He decided to try a little experiment... and looked directly at them, quite boldly.

Blood red eyes met his, deeper than any of Mallory's summons, deeper even than the gaze of her Sight. Now the crunch of snowfall was drowned out by the sound of a heartbeat, sourceless yet all around him, and a feeling of warmth far stranger than the drink he sipped. Like bathing in hot blood.

They blinked again, slowly, and allowed the scrutiny. There was something so perfect about their features, a more perfect mirror; yet they bore three familiar scars along their throat. Charon's furious grasp, the same as Mallory.

There was a breathy exhale, a cloud of steam that bellowed from his mouth when he took in the being. His lips pulled into a smile, and eyes half-lidded. Strange that one might find comfort in the feeling of floating, just for a moment, in the very heartblood of something so powerful, but comforting it was. Perhaps something like the warm embrace of a mother's protective belly encasing the child.

Morgan did not take his eyes from the other. "I never got to look at you like this before." He said. Perhaps to a passerby it would sound casual, but there was, to those that knew him, something like reverence in his tone. "I didn't know you could..." he trailed off. There were many things Morgan LaFey did not know.

"I know." Their words were gentle. They drifted to the railing beside him, as if to be out of the way, but strange how others seemed to part around them without any acknowledgment. Couples broke their handholds and reached out to each other again just past them without glancing back. Silence, for a long moment. Was the avatar thinking?

"Only with true believers." Another beat. "Knowledge... shrines... followers... yet you would have given more still, had she allowed you." Red eyes were not studying the palace or anything else, only him.

Morgan's gaze finally broke away from the avatar, and his fingers tightened slightly around the cup, thin Styrofoam giving the softest sound of stress before he nodded. "I would have given her everything, a million times. Now I just give her what I can. And you." He added. The cup lifted to hover just before his lips as he stared past people on their morning strolls to the ice below and beyond the bridge.

"I'm okay with it this way, though. I know that I'm not..." he paused, thinking. "I'm not her type. In that way. I'm not smart, like the others. I'm not..." he took a sip of the cocoa, and licked his lips. "The least I could do is fill your library from what other people know."

Their gaze was unflinching. "You think it is because you are lesser in her eyes." Their head tilted slightly... and they smiled. A gentle tease, but so much warmer. The heartbeat was louder, and closer. "You are extraordinary, Morgan LaFey. And you would have given her your soul... but it belongs with another. It is Fated."

Morgan's eyes closed again, this time perhaps to hold back a moisture that was threatening to gather in his lashes. "She helped me with that. She made me extraordinary. You did." He gave a dry sort of laugh, and broke one hand away from the warmth of the cup to curl fingers around the hem of a coat sleeve, dragging his covered wrist over his nose as his head dipped. He was trying to be subtle about it. "I used to hate that word." He said with a croak, before clearing his throat. "But you know that, probably." He looked back to the other, locking to their own gaze almost brazenly. "It's scary to think about. That there's this... path, and you're going to walk it, no matter how many times you try to run into the woods. But then..." he shrugged. "The end of the road isn't always so bad, is it?"

He crossed one ankle over the other, and swung an arm out to the side slowly to rest on the railing he leaned on, along with the cup that was no longer steaming quite so heavily. "Is it working?" He asked quietly. The other would know what he asked. "Am I making a difference?"

They listened. Listening was taking knowledge, after all. They said nothing until he asked a question. "You are." Another beat. "That is important to you... upholding that ideal. How do you see hers?"

They placed a hand on his mug, perhaps concerned that it would tumble when he left it on the railing.

There was a pregnant silence from Morgan as he thought this question over, turned it in his head. How did he see Mallory? His mouth opened a small amount, and he couldn't help a smile as he spoke, softly. "She's not perfect. She can get angry, and she can be wrong. Not often, but it can happen. She makes herself better, by learning. She knows when she makes a mistake. She owns it." He tilted his face down, chin tucking into the collar of his coat. "But at the same time, she's perfect. She's patient, even with me. She's willing to teach me. To help me make myself better." A beat. "And not so she can get anything from me. Not because I can make her money, or push her up the social ladder or whatever. She is exactly what I want to make her. It's the least I could do."

"You want to help her reach those, and teach those who need it. As you feel she's done for you. Do you know why she does it?" they asked as they examined the mug idly, not with their eyes but with their grasp.

He shook his head. "Not really. It's not something I ever asked." He looked over to the mug briefly, before letting his eyes wander back to the horned avatar. "Why?" Because now he had to know.

"Because she needed it, and didn't have it." Lips tugged towards a smile, humorless. "Child who loved differently and needed to be differently... street rat, surviving... mageling in desperate search of that spark... who found and provided solace at Wayside." Their expression turned sad but fond now, regarding Morgan. "And now, protecting the knowledge that is lost and forbidden... that they all need as she did."

He nodded, thoughtfully, and turned his face back to the other side of the bridge, looking at nothing in particular. "Even for us dummies." He remarked with a hint of humor to counteract the seriousness of the knowledge he'd just gained. "She's a lost boy, showing the rest of us the way." The term he'd used, of course, was more reference than it was gendered. "Like a proper goddess." He shifted his lean, and let his head tip to nearly touch his shoulder. "Where I come from... for someone like me, all of it is off-limits. You're allowed to know things when you know the right people, grease the right palms. It's better when the sheep are stupid."

Malleus absorbed that for a long moment, and did not opine so much as simply observed, "It's wrong. And we want to make it right." They offered the mug back to him, seeking his gaze as they said, "Help the lost boys, protect what they need to know, and make that wrongness right... you'll keep doing that? You promise?"

He took the mug back in both hands, and gave a solemn nod, going so far as to push off the railing and turn toward Malleus. "I made that promise the moment I set her face in stone." He replied. His right hand lifted slightly, and he turned the back of it to the other, inked skin visible. They would know, of course, what it led to further up. "I don't know how to say a pretty oath. Big words make my brain hurt still sometimes. But if I ever break my promise..." he thought a minute. His lips split into a grin.

"Then may all my blood turn to spiders."

They smiled, as red eyes seemed to see right through his sleeve. "Our knight... it won't ever come to that." They looked back at his eyes, blinked once-- and they were gone.

His mug was as full now, and as hot, as when he'd first glimpsed them. The only sign that it hadn't all been a dream were the bootprints next to his. But no one on the walkway glanced or started when they disappeared.

Morgan stood quiet for some time, staring at the space Malleus had occupied, and clutched the cup closer, curling in on himself ever so slightly. The cocoa was warm in his palms, but he didn't notice it quite so much anymore. The warmth that lingered from the experience of speaking to the horned avatar left him with a comforted sort of feeling. Was this how those people in stories felt when they were visited by angels? No, probably not. Those started with fear. The believers always fell to their knees and wept at the words of their God from the mouth of something they could not comprehend. This was objectively much more meaningful. It was no force of pure light, no burning bush. It was blood, and a heartbeat, and warmth, and familiarity. There was, perhaps, one similarity. He did not fall to his knees, but as he lowered his forehead to settle on the lid of his cup...

He wept.