They stood, facing each other, over emptiness. Being what they were and as stripped of titles and trappings as he had made himself it seemed appropriate. She had questions, more of them since her boy had turned up. He had answers, and a waxing and waning itch to scratch.

"I do not understand."

Though her lack of understanding, however great or small, did not grant her humility. He cocked his head at her and didn't say a word. Left it to her to pick what she would ask next.

"Why would you choose a life of conscious distress and self-destruction?"

That was the question, over and over again, and the answer was the same as it had always been. Would he ever get tired of it? He had been tired of it from the first tie he had stepped out and said so.

"It is what I am. If they did not exist I would not. If they were not what they are there would be no need for me." Repetition, in this case, did not work. There was no outward sign. "You are dependant on your followers."

Her body stiffened with anger, though that and a slight widening of the eyes were all the sign she gave. "I am not dependant on them in the sense that you seem to imply. My power increases with the strength and number of my followers, that is true, as it is with any ruler, divinity or not. I am not made up of them."

"Similar enough." He waved it away with a careless hand.

"Not in the least."

"I am the whole, made up of individuals. You are the physical representation of the whole, I am the physical incarnation." Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. But he didn't say that either.

She was directing him with her stare to make his point, and make it quickly. He sighed as though bored, which was of course geared to make her even more annoyed.

"To ask me why I am as I am is as irrelevant as asking a plant why it gathers sunshine, or an animal why it gathers food. You may as well ask any star why it shines. I am as I am because it is in my nature to be so. Only my nature is infinitely more complex than a star, shining."

They stared at each other some more. It was hard for her to ask, but it would be even harder for her to understand. So few people understood until they experienced it for themselves. If they were lucky, it was a second-hand experience and not an intimate, personal one.

Perhaps an intimate, personal experience.

"You have touched many of mine in your lifetime. Glaucon was only one of them."

Interesting the way his name brought an automatic reaction from her, or at least as much of a reaction as she ever gave him. It seemed as though she was bracing herself for whatever he had to offer her of Glaucon's past, his memories or his nature. Also to rebuke him strongly if he tried, which of course he didn't.

"Wesley."

It caught her off guard.

"What of him?"

His reply was almost kindly, and certainly patronizing. "You know he's one of mine."

"And what is that supposed to mean?"

He ignored her angry tone and stepped into her, up close. "You are drawn to me." It was a royal me. "Wesley. Glaucon. There have been others before. Would you like to know their names?"

Her mouth opened, closed again. She stared at him with an expression that was far too empty.

"You are drawn to them. They give you a part of yourself that you cannot find on your own, a kind of power that comes from instincts that are contrary to your logic. The visceral, the hand that reaches out to grasp out of whim and impulse and is somehow, despite this scattered mind, always, always correct."

Her fingers clenched a little. Her face started to curdle into fury as he leaned in closer, but it was jeering and taunting and daring her to cry off. She didn't move away.

"I could tell you anything you want to know about any of them that have known you. You don't remember, do you, not truly. You remember the facts of what happened and the experiences but there were details that you missed. You used to be so alien to my kind..." His voice sank to a whisper, over her ear, and she didn't move away. "You used to be so contrary. And yet you were still drawn. Here you are now."

That got him shoved in the chest, hard, away from her. "And you still have not learned. You overstep..."

One hand shot out to grab her wrist. Strength, really, was meaningless between them. Neither of them were anything close to human.

"Has it ever occurred to you that I know exactly where my place is, by any name you care to call me? I have seen you, Goddess, through dozens of pairs of eyes. I have known you by half a dozen names at the very least. Illyria."

And there was the first touch of relief on that itch, because he said it in Wesley's voice, and her eyes widened with shock because of all things that had been something unexpected. Perhaps she had braced herself to hear Glaucon telling her things she refused to admit to waiting for.

"He does love you, you know."

Except it was still in Wesley's voice, and she didn't pull away because to do so would be to admit confusion and defeat, and his hand grew gentle on her arm. Slid upwards.

"He misses you."

She was learning.

If he did his work well, if he was right, she would hate him for this for a very long time. And that was likely as it should be. This, as much as anything else, served as the best warning he could give and even if it was only the memory of what had happened the last time he had done this that spurred him on, it seemed to be working.

His eyes paled. His hair lightened, just a bit, lengthened to a scruffy shape. His face slimmed down and shifted just enough to be familiar.

"Illyria."

Hypnotic. It was hypnotic and disarming.

"I have known you so well."

Not Wesley's words. The Sorcerer's words in Wesley's mouth but it was something so much like what he would say, if the circumstances were right. Too arrogant to be Wesley unless he was being cruel. She still hadn't said anything. He wondered if she was trying to find her balance, and decided to knock it out from under her.

"I love you." Right over her ear.

"Stop that."

It came out in a snarl and a shove, and as he fell backwards he tugged more sharply on her wrist and tumbled her on top of him, laughing.

"All mixed up and nowhere to turn," the Sorcerer's words again, more distinctly, in Wesley's mouth. He caught her other hand as she fought. "This is what I am. This is what I've always been, Illyria." And now his voice was sad, and earnest, Wesley trying to explain to her the way life was and why it was dangerous, and the similarities only drove her further mad. "This is the way it's always been."

"You're not him," she snarled, but it was quieter. "You're not."

"I am." Both Wesley and the Sorcerer were sad this time. "I am. This is what I am, Illyria, this is the way it's always been."

She was straddling him, reaching out to pull him closer or pound him into the shapeless ground and he caught her wrists in his hands, pulled them closer until he could hold both tiny wrists in one hand. It was a little awkward but the Sorcerer under Wesley was stronger than the Goddess, at least for now.

He would hate himself for it afterwards.

Two wrists in one hand so that the other hand could come up and slide along her cheek, stroking through her hair. She pulled one hand away to slap him and he was back to holding her wrists in the next moment.

"You need me," he told her, and it was Wesley, and it was Glaucon, and it was half a dozen of those others, those unnamed others. Reach into her heart and pull the strings she refused to admit were there. "You have always needed me. Not essential, no, but desperate. You need me in your life to make you feel. To make you alive instead of merely living."

She was fighting for the stony reserve again. He couldn't let that happen. Hips shifted upwards, spreading her thighs. Mouth curved into a very Wesley-like, un-Wesley-like smirk.

"You need me."

Her head came forward and down and cracked him in the face, and then again, and on the third time sparks flew in front of his eyes and he pulled her down on top of him. It took a moment for it to sink in that there were breasts over his body instead of armor. Of course there were.

"I miss you," he whispered, because she needed to hear it. "I don't want it to be only the once." Because if he admitted to weakness it wasn't hers. "I need you."

That part, at least, was very much evident with his body pressed upwards and into hers so correctly.

It wasn't violent. It was a blessing. It was a lie and they both knew it, but he pleaded so well in Wesley's voice and the confusion annoyed her. To admit she was confused and upset by his deception was to grant that he had power over her, and that would never happen. To tell him to stop would admit that he was tempting her, and that would never happen either. She would pursue it until he got tired of the game, before she did. Until something broke the deadlock.

His hands slid up to her shoulders and down to her hips, yielding control of their bodies to her as long as she was still under his leash. Trapped in his noose. Hands at each other's throats, not literally, not yet. An itch that needed to be scratched. Her body moved with undulating grace in ways that were unaccustomed to her and yet well known to the muscles and spine that slept beneath the consciousness. Perhaps it still startled her when he filled her, because she gasped.

There were kisses. They weren't gentle, but they weren't combative violent things either. His arms locked tight around her back and forced her to move against him and make it deep, make the strokes long. She responded with little cries into his mouth and Wesley's voice murmured her name when it happened.

There were tears. He wasn't sure whose. Neither of them spoke, so no one would say. And no one would know.

She pulled her armor back on as though it could hold the pieces of herself inside, and he didn't let go of the lie until it was all there. Even then the moment slid away like ice melting. She couldn't look at him. Or wouldn't. The effect was the same.

A Goddess would never admit defeat but his mouth shaped words of rebuke and asked her what she expected from him. This is what I do, my love. This is what I am.

Everything was shifted to one side and sliding against each other, tectonic plates jarring the surface and rippling cracks along the shell. This policy of truth after the lie had already set in was useless. He thought she paused when she turned to walk away but he couldn't much tell, and when she was gone it didn't much matter. Too late. Far, far too late.

Go to the top! For you have reached the bottom.