RevelationsIndex | Time Under Chaos | Player Characters | Helena | Revelations [Warning: Possible spoilers.] [Timeline: This takes place after the events in Opening Moves and Places in the Heart.] Two days after her conversation with Amba, Helena received a message to attend her stepfather in his study. The fact that he had dispatched a demon to give her the message, and that the demon used the title 'Lord Ishtar' suggested that this meeting was unusually formal. Puzzled—for she hadn't knowingly been in any trouble that would come to his attention—Helena nonetheless complied with the summons and even made herself presentable for the occasion by wearing a dress. She stood outside the closed door to his study, adjusted her skirts, then took a deep breath and knocked. "Come in!" her stepfather father's voice, deep and resonant. But no friendly name added, nor even a teasing epithet—'brat', 'minx', 'mischief'. Torren stood over by the window, looking out. He gave no sign that he had noticed her come in, but before she could say anything, he spoke, his tone cold. "I trust your shapeshifting has improved to the level where you are able to take adequate precautions against spawning." She hurriedly shut the door behind her. Helena's prepared defense on how safe she'd been lately on the sword dancing field died on her lips, unspoken. She blinked. "Wh-what? How did...? I..." She stopped talking and paused momentarily to regain her composure. "We talked about that. He's taking care of...that aspect of things." Torren turned and looked at her with contempt. "And you believe him? On so slight an acquaintance you trust him so fundamentally? I assumed that your mother's daughter was not a fool, Helena." Helena flushed and lowered her gaze. She cast about the study, wanting to look anywhere but at her stepfather's disapproving blue eyes. "You married Mother knowing less about her than I do about him," she countered evenly. "She was far more dangerous, yet you did it anyway." Torren raised one eyebrow. "And what makes you so confident that I have ever trusted your mother? "Sit down, Helena, and roll up your sleeve. First we need to establish whether you are spawning and then, if necessary, deal with it." "I am not spawning," Helena replied indignantly. "Really." She sat down nevertheless and presented her arm to her stepfather. "This is a waste of time." He moved forward, a long fine needle in his hand. "I think," he said grimly, "I should be the judge of that." There was a sudden, fierce burning pain as the needle made contact. Then a long pause as he drew the blood; this was not his usual, gentle method. He meant her to hurt. Helena inhaled and looked up at him incredulously. "So," he said, as he stepped away, "what was it that was the attraction? The desire to be a political pawn? Or just the desire for a certain bone-headed bravado?" Helena rubbed at her arm, feeling herself get angry. "Neither," she replied, puzzlement at her stepfather's behavior evident in her tone. "I was curious. Is that a crime? Why are you so upset?" "It's not a crime," he said curtly. "But you disappoint me when you do something so commonplace." "I'm sorry, then. I thought we were being discrete." She thought back. "Well, discrete after the restaurant." He was examining the blood he had drawn, adding various droplets of different substances and smokes that he drew up between his fingers. There was a long pause. Helena set her chin. "Father, please don't be dramatic—I'm not spawning." He moved to the table and set down a glass sheet before her. A small circle of iridescent liquid swirled against the grey glass. "Not spawning," he said. "But fecund. One slip on his part—or a moment's political calculation by his kin...and your mother would even now be making excuses to avoid knitting bootees. "Helena—how could you have taken such a risk? How could you choose..." He broke off—and she saw the cold crow light in his eyes. "No matter," he said. "He will be taken care of." Helena flushed again at Torren's mention of choosing and looked down at her lap. She sat quite still. "Father, I will stop seeing Pavlo. Please. Don't... Don't get involved. Pavlo didn't start this—I did. And I will end it. Quietly." "It will end," he agreed. "And you will choose the manner of it. I have some influence in the services. Young Pavlo Barimen will shortly receive a new posting—and you can choose where it is. "You can keep him close at hand...and he'll serve as guard in a pit diver camp. Or he can be sent on a five year foreign posting. An obscure Shadow at the far end of the universe." "That's not fair!" she retorted, looking up. "He's done nothing wrong, and if I tell you I won't see him anymore, I won't see him anymore. If you're angry at something I did, then punish me, not him, dammit!" "That is your punishment," he said coldly. "To decide his fate. Get used to it, Helena. It's the taste of power—and you were born to it." "No," she said, shaking her head. "There's nothing to decide—both are equally hurtful to him. This isn't about me making a decision. This is about you angry at me and vindictively taking it out on Pavlo. Why? What is he to you?" "That puppy?" said Torren contemptuously. "He's nothing. And if you won't decide, then I'll decide for you. And you won't like it." Helena stood angrily and with great force slammed her hand down on the table in front of her, inadvertently smashing the glass sheet into shards. One cut into her outstretched palm and she sucked in her breath at the sudden sharp pain. "Dammit!" she hissed, drawing the injured hand to her. Blood welled up and started to run down her arm—the cut was deep. Torren was up at once and moving towards her. "Relax," he said. "Relax your will against mine so I can shift it away." His hands hesitated, and then came to rest on her shoulders. Helena looked down as Torren's hands touched her, reluctant to meet his eyes. Strong emotion washed over her and she shuddered at the effort to control it and find a center of calm, her palm momentarily forgotten. She closed her eyes and took several deep breaths, letting each one out slowly and concentrating on releasing a measure of the anger and emotion along with it. Her efforts didn't result in a total solution—the anger and emotion were still there, but they were forcefully quelled for the moment, leaving her mind quiescent. She became painfully aware of her injured hand once again. The delicate probing that was her stepfather nudging at her mind as he sought to shift her wounds was familiar—he had taken care of grazed knees when she was a child and, later, the occasional sports injury from sword dancing (not all, for many he regarded as lessons that would be wasted were they to be simply shifted away). But now there was something more—an intimacy in the mental touch that had doubtless always been there—but which she had never been aware of in quite the same way before. If she was vulnerable to him, so was he to her...and she could feel his anger. But she could also feel his pain, his loss. "I'm so sorry," Helena whispered, heartfelt. She leaned her forehead against Torren's chest and closed her eyes. "I want...something I can't have, and I went looking for a semblance of it with Pavlo. I didn't realize you would be so hurt by my actions. I didn't know..." ...that you cared, she finished in her thoughts. Confusion set in. Did he care for her in a way beyond that of father toward daughter? Or was she reading too much into the situation, coloring it too much with her own wants and desires? Where did she stand here? And how much was Torren realizing from his contact with her? Mortified, she immediately closed off her thoughts and feelings, shutting herself away from her stepfather's mental touch. "Don't," he said immediately, and gently. "Don't close yourself to me...how can I help you if you shut yourself away?" He did not release her hand. Helena tugged at it, but the effort was half-hearted. "This scares me," she whispered, still avoiding looking into his eyes. "I can have Brogan take care of my hand." "Yes," he said, his eyes fixed on hers—and they were glowing dark gold. "Yes, you can. Or you can stay here...with me." Helena looked up at his face then, risking losing herself in his eyes as the blood dripped onto the floor between them, forgotten again. "This can't continue," she stated in a quiet, almost detached voice. "My mother... But we could have this one time. This one time only. Would you give me that?" Torren looked at her for a long moment. Then, very slowly, he shook his head. "No," he said. "I cannot give you a single time. I can only give you forever." Helena stared back, stricken, her mind casting about for a solution but finding none. "I can't," she said simply, her eyes watering. She pulled her hand from Torren's grasp and cradled it against her chest. "I will go find Brogan." She turned to leave, then paused and looked back up at Torren pleadingly. "Please don't punish Pavlo, I beg of you. I promise I will end it." "Yes," said Torren. "You will." A spark of her previous fire returned and she set her chin. "Your word, Father?" Torren looked at her, the gold fading from his eyes to leave them unfathomable. "If you will keep yours." "I will." Helena gazed back at him for the space of a few heartbeats, watching the glow fade from his eyes, then turned away. She left to go find Brogan. |
