Fit for a Queen

Amora was bored.

She still had no idea what she was doing here, but it was the sixth night of vi's latest disappearance. She didn't need to be worried yet.

But she was.

Shed taken to wandering the lair during its sunlight hours, loving that she hadn't come across anyone yet. She doubted it would last.

Stepping lightly, she came upon a set of doors that looked vaguely familiar from her first day here. Shed never gone inside before, so this was as good a time as any....

She pushed open the door. It was a big room, empty of people, but her eyes automatically went to the throne. There was a king here? She hoped it was vi's maker and not her's. At least Vi's wasn't...

She drew closer to the throne, her eyes glued on it. She wanted to sit on it. She wanted to feel all queen-like. she deserved to, didn't she?

Merle stepped out of the storage room and stopped to watch as Amora entered. Casually he moved to lean against the door frame and folded his arms. "I wouldn't... not if you wanted to live." He said pushing himself up straight so he could walk over to stand beside her.

"The thrones cursed. Anyone besides myself that steps onto the platform without my permission will die. Think of it as being struck by sunlight only this sunlight you cant escape." He smiled taking a glass of warm blood from a server.

"Grazie."

Mora froze at the sound of his voice. Damn him, ruining all her fantasies just by appearing. She stopped on the edge of the platform, her eyes still on the throne.

She'd sit on it, dammit.

"Can I have your permission, then?" She asked, her tone nuetral. She bet it were comfortable. She bet that if she did sit on it, all of her problems, including the maker standing next to her, would go away.

He stopped and thought about it for a second, tilting his head to the side as he considered her. "No." He said simply, moving to sit on the throne himself. This chair had always been his and no one could take that from him.

"Give me one reason and ill consider it."

Mora bit her lip and looked at the platform. It didn't seem that dangerous, but she knew that which was obviously dangerous was usually less so... because you knew about it.

"Because..." she shrugged. "Because I want to touch it, and I don't remeber asking you for anything else before?" She didn't like being this submissive. Maybe later she could slit his throat and laugh about it. That would be fun.

She cocked her head to the side and studied him. He looked good on his throne, that was for sure. Made him look regal, a talent she wouldn't admit she thought he had unless seated on a giant chair. Her eyes darkened a tinge.

"And I would be closer to you."

Merle narrowed his eyes, taking her in for a second before sighing and sitting up straight. "Is that what you want? To be close to me? Or is this another one of your tricks to get what you want?" He asked.

"Immortality, my blood, my throne?" He asked naming a few of the things she'd wanted from him.

Amora tilted her head to the other side. "That is the million dollar question, isn't it?" She asked softly, taking him in. Did she want to be close to him? Did she?

She wouldn't allow herself to answer.

"Immortality... never dying... have that already don't I?" She asked, looking down at her nails. "Your blood... it does taste good, doesn't it? But it doesn't seem to be that important when I'm not hungry..." she glanced back up at him. "Your throne? Id love to sit in it, sure, but i'd rather have my own. I'm more for earning things than stealing them." This was only half true, she was all for stealing things if it were easier, but she did want her own throne. Right beside his.

Not that she'd admit it.

He nodded and brought his hands together in front of him. "I gave you immortality, yet now you are no longer thankful. I gave you blood once to keep you slipping up and now you expect it on a plate." He said playing with his ring with his thumb.

"What i don't get is why you're sticking around? It's clear you aren't willing to reason with me, yet here you stand wanting." He said, she was always wanting something from him.

He nodded. "Stealing is more your style."

She narrowed her eyes at him. "There is a difference between being thankful for my immortality and wishing you hadn't wiped my memories." She growled low in her throat. "There is also a difference between wanting your blood and wanting to share blood with..." her voice dropped off, and she looked away from him. She was not going down that road. Not now.

"I am here for Vi. Not for you, not for Master Ethon. When she is ready I will go, and be out of your hair for the rest of eternity." She glared up at him, her eyes darkening with fury. "I don't want your bloody throne! Keep it for all I care. Burn it, sit in it, do whatever you want with it!"

She turned away. "A thief, if that's what you think of me, no wonder you wiped yourself out of my memories. Less of a burden, I'd say." She walked away from him. "Trust me, if I wanted to be close to you at any point at all, you've pushed me far enough away."

"When are you going to realise i only did what was necessary? You really think i'd rather live alone for the rest of this god forsaken life?" He asked getting to his feet. "I've lived for so long i have no idea how old i am anymore. I've faced things even you would never believe. I've done things im not proud of but if i could go back i wouldn't change a thing. You know why?" He asked dropping his glass on the floor. "Cause it kept you alive!" He spat.

"And for that! I am not sorry!" He said walking past her to go to his room. "If you need me i'll be in my room!"

"You really ought to be less inflexible," Ethon remarked. He stepped from the far doorway, attention on a hand puzzle that he twisted this way and that distractedly. "Watching the two of you is like watching a couple of teenagers. Aur has an excuse, in any case. He's only eighteen. Forever. Weren't you older? And a woman. Well... I suppose we can't all discuss things like adults."

With a final twist, he solved the puzzle and tossed it to her. "Though, I suspect your lack of communication has far more to do with hurt feelings and the inability to see past that which is admittedly small to the larger picture. Fact: he wiped your memories to protect you. Fact: he convinced me to leave Vi where you might find her - against my better judgement - to give you company and protect you both.

"Fact: he is, for whatever reason, inexplicably attached to you." Ethon shook his head. "I don't get it, really. I find you needlessly difficult."

Mora watched her maker go, her eyes inexplicably sad. She turned her attention to his brother, and dropped her eyes to the floor. Inflexible? She wasn't inflexable... not really. "I died on my eighteenth birthday." She said, looking away from him. "A great tragedy, all the heralds kept saying..." she ducked her head, trying and failing to ignore his words.

She caught the puzzle, her attention going to it. A cube of many colors. Had he known her fondness for them? "Doesn't he understand that i'd rather have died by his side than been forced to forget about him?" She asked, her eyes still on the puzzle cube. She twisted it a few times this way and that, her eyes on the patterns the colors made as she twisted. "He taught me one way to live and then completely went agaisnt it." She looked back up at him, her fingers on the puzzle going still. She gave the cube a savage twist, almost breaking it in half. "Without him, I had nowhere to go but home." She spun the puzzle again, her eyes distant. "Missed a day of hunting, killed my entire family, including the younger brother who'd hid me in the attic during the day. Heralds kept screaming about it, had to leave Firenze just to get away from it, left all of Italia, just so I wouldn't have to hear how some demon had been let loose on Firenze's elite..." why was she telling him this?

"Easy for you to say. Your creation ended up meek and suicidal. Do you honestly believe this is the first time she's walked out into the sunlight?" She looked between the puzzle and him, clearly debating something. "You take good care of her." She said it in a way that was half way through a statement of fact and an order. "You take good care of her, Master Ethon, or I swear I will come back and rip your head off until you die the True Death."

She tossed the puzzle back at him, pleased that every side now had a different color in the center, but the rest of each side was the same color. "I don't get it either." She said softly. "I don't know if I did something I no longer remember, or if he just decided upon my rebirth that I would mean something, or if absence just made his heart grow fond. Whatever it is..." she looked away from him. "I don't deserve it, so it must not be true."

Ethon's eyes narrowed as she spoke of Vi. "Vi's faults are not for you to pick out," he intoned. "I will find a way to mend her. If you hadn't disappeared with her, I might have done, already.

He gazed at her, expressionlessly. Catching the puzzle without looking, he then tossed it into the seat of Aurmerle's chair.

"A couple things," he stated calmly. In a blur of movement, he'd moved in front of her. "One - you do not threaten me. Ever. I may not be my brother, but that does not make me less of a threat to you. Two? You... know... nothing... about us.

"You'll die at Aurmerle's side? What a noble sentiment. Very noble. But only you can die by Aurmerle's side. He can never die by yours. For everything else of this world there is a True Death, but not for us. We don't die. Ever. Not in truth."

Ethon made a slow circle around her. "I don't pretend to understand the workings of my brother's mind," he remarked. "He has so many progeny. More than any other vampire - certainly more than myself. Why does he think you are deserving of special regard? You're hardly unique, in the grand scheme of things.

"It is enough for me that he does." Ethon paused to look her in the eye. "It should be enough for you, as well."

Stepping around her, he strode from the room, leaving his words for her to take however she will.

"But I-" And he was gone.

Her gaze returned to the ground. He was right. He was right about everything. Stupid immortal older brother with his stupid immortal logic and...

She looked back up, her eyes returning to the throne. She wanted the cube back now, so she'd have something to do with her hands.

She should go see Aurmerle.

No.

She should go apologize.

No.

She should go say goodbye before she left.

Yes, grand idea. Let him push her away again. Might even erase her memories again...

She was going to his room.

No she wasn't.

Yes she...

No.

Yes.

She left, no really sure where she was going to go at all.