She fluffed her feathers, shifted her weight from one talon to the other, and huffed. Turning an empty eye socket up to him, he could feel her displeasure once more. They didn’t speak in words. Words weren’t necessary.
“Do you really want to be like this forever? I certainly don’t. Constantly worried that today might be our last. Wondering if we’re to be cast into the void once and for all. Rather hard to make plans.”
The morning had been…interesting. Marguerite was still broken, very much so. But he now had a glimmer of hope—real hope—for the first time in a long time. She had joked with him. She had taken both his, and her, conditions in stride. She had accepted Algernon.
He chuckled. The jokes were unexpected, but very welcome. They were a new development. Or perhaps they were an old one. One that had been absent for a very long time. They said that when a body was dying, the brain could muster up a few last moments of cognizance. Victims of Alzheimer’s who could suddenly recall their past and family moments before death.
Perhaps that was merely what was happening with her. The last throes of a dying mind.
No. He would choose to cling to hope.
Done with listening to his prattling, Eurydice let out a loud “craw!” and took off from the railing, likely to go murder some more pigeons. It wasn’t that the vulture needed to eat. Oh, no. She just liked the joy of the kill.
It left him alone with his thoughts. He enjoyed the peace and quiet. He had given “Harry” his own hotel room—which was mutually beneficial. The useless lump of dried bones was probably asleep as usual. It was for the better. It meant the childish thing wasn’t around to harass, insult, and badger him.
The morning had been interesting. And if the day went in any kind of fashion as he expected it might, it was only going to get more interesting as time went on. Plopping his cane on the bed, he shrugged out of his coat and vest, undid his tie, and kicked off his shoes. It was going to be a late night. A late, long night.
And possibly the last of his life if things went poorly.
Or perhaps it would end with Marguerite being enslaved to the Catholic Church. Joy. He yawned, and lying down on the bed, shut his eyes. No, in that outcome, he would probably wage a full-scale assault on the Vatican. He would rather not do that if he had the choice.
It would be messy. It would likely end up with him in chains in their vault. But he would not let her rot in a cage without attempting to free her, or ultimately joining her.
The third option was that Marguerite chose to help him. To help both of them. But if he were a betting man—and he was, and he always won—he would wager against that outcome, even if it was what he wished for the most.
I am no more or less than a mortal man. Reaching for that which is the most impossible for me to achieve. Desiring that which I cannot have.
Fourteen-hundred and twelve years of life and I am still an utter fool.
He chuckled and let out a long, tired sigh.
Some things never changed.
Some things never, ever changed.