Private Tales A Taste of This World

[Coran]

Coran mused for a moment.

Like Genevieve, Coran rarely traveled by mundane means. He could transport himself quickly enough through the aether if he wished to do so, and more often than not it wasn't in his best interest to move through mundane means.

He suspected however that if he attempted to slip through the veil with Genevieve things would go...very wrong. And the portal stones were certainly not an option. "What would you like to talk about?"

The Demon asked, leaning onto the armrest with no small amount of amusement.

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

Genevieve could tell he was amused and she just frowned before looking back out the window. "Why do you need to change bodies?" She asked after a few minutes of listening to the sounds of the horses and the carriage.

She supposed that picking his brain was a good way to start. She had noticed that her enthusiasm had faded some and she couldn't put her find on why. It didn't matter though because she was here with Coran and that was all that really mattered. He wanted her here with him and she made him happy.

If only she knew the truth of everything.

 

[Coran]

He mused for a second, wondering how to explain. "This..."

Coran gestured to his body.

"Is...a container." That was the best way that he could put it. In his own tongue it might have been easier to explain, but the common word would have to do. Perhaps one day he would simply touch her mind, but for now he would simply speak. "My true form cannot exist here on Arethil, least not without...significant effort on my part."

The thing that ruled this world, whatever bound it's magic bound him as well. "So it is easier to place myself within a vessel."

He grimaced.

"Unfortunately, the people of this world are...fragile." Far too fragile. "Most bodies only last so long before they are burnt from the inside out."

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

A soft hmmm floated from her lips at his explanation. It made some sense, she supposed. He stole bodies so he could survive her. It still made no sense why he would want to come here but that was not something she particularly cared about.

"I wonder if a fae body or an elf body would be different. Humans are fragile and they live such short lives. I am not even considered an adult by fae standards when they die of old age. Elves live longer than humans and we," she gestured towards herself, "live even longer than them."

It was really the most insightful thing she had said in...well...her life probably. The Summer Court had a tendency to cause its inhabitants to stop caring about things like knowledge. Party, gossip, drink, repeat. That was her hell.

 

[Coran]

He mused for a moment. "I cannot speak for your kind."

Though he was most certainly willing to try. "But I have inhabited the body of an Elf before."

Coran could still remember the man too. He had been a warrior, a fierce fighter during one of the wars that Mortals were so fond of. The Demon had taken his form on the battlefield, and had reveled within the death and killing.

"The magic that flows through them is strong, a conduit for my own abilities." He explained. "Their strength focuses mine, and thus I burn their flesh even faster."

A human could last weeks, sometimes months. An Elf? Days at most.

"Perhaps it would be the same for Fae." Oh but how fun that would be.

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

"Perhaps," she agreed.

"The fae harness our affinity as well as celestial and elemental magic. Oh and we all have an animal form as well. We are magic while the elves are still mortal..."

More information about her kind for the Demon. More information than the giggling girl had shared the first time he gave her his blood. This time was acting different but she was still just as enthralled with him...she was just more herself. Her real self. Not the self she put on for others.

Genevieve was much smarter and cunning than she ever let anyone know.

 

[Coran]

He wondered about that divide. Mortal and Immortal.

Elven lives were longer than humans, and Fae lives even longer. Yet they still died of old age, still met their end. At least according to what Genevieve had said. That dividing line seemed desperately thin to him, something born of arrogance.

The same arrogance that was fraught within his own kind. An irony that did not escape Coran in that moment.

He and his kindred had often claimed to be better, more evolved, and yet they fell to the same base desires as any human...or it seemed, fae. "Something to find out one day."

The Demon mused.

"But I think we'll settle for a human for now, no?" It would certainly be easier to do.

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

She drank a little more of the wine and crossed one long leg over the other. She looked over at Coran and let her eyes roam his face. She was not going to complain about him changing appearances because, honestly, she liked men and she was okay with looking at a different one every few weeks. Weeks...her mind set on that word. She had things to do but they didn't matter anymore.

Coran was all that mattered now. What he wanted. What he wanted her to do.

"We need to make sure he is tall like this one," Genevieve said absently. "Or taller," she was tall for a human or elf but on the shorter to average side for the fae.

She looked back out the window and drank some more wine. "What else do you want to talk about?" This was going to be a long trip indeed.

 

[Coran]

Coran chuckled. "I'll let you choose."

He had never much cared about the appearance of his bodies. In fact there was something found about the...randomness of whom he inhabited. Once, near a decade ago, he had traipsed around in the corpse of a rather portly old man.

The look on the faces of those whom he consumed was something that still brought a smile to his lips.

"Your people." He began. "They take mortals?"

That had been her job, she had said. "How often do they walk among them?"

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

Genevieve nodded at his first question. "Yes. It is frowned upon by some but many do it. Slaves, servants, food...mortals are useful to us."

The fae raised a brow at the second question. "We walk among them all the time. Many just cannot see through glamours. Some fae love being among the mortals. Some never travel far from their home. It's all preference. I do not like mortals but I do this job so stay on the good side of the Queen."

The Summer Queen was known for her cruelties and Genevieve was not someone who wanted to be on the receiving end...ever.

 

[Coran]

Coran considered the words for a moment. "Why are you so afraid of this Queen?"

He was sure that he recognized it.

Genevieve hid it well enough, that instinct of trying to be more than you were. That slight of power, yet in her tone lay something which spoke more than her words. She did not want to displease this woman, that much was clear.

"Who is she?" He prodded. "To demand so much of you?"

Coran continued. "You're so much more than her."

The Demon praised, coaxing and twisting.

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

Genevieve smiled at Coran. His praise slinking into her ears and warming her body like she had always wanted to be appreciated and loved. He treated her so well. He cared about her. Of course he did. He would never lie to her.

"She has the ability to not only exile me from the only home I have ever known, but she also likes to magically scar those she exiles. She is a Queen who acts like a child. She will throw a tantrum and the Court suffers. She exiled her own uncle and the rumor is that she recently found out she had a cousin. Her uncle's bastard son. She scarred his face and exiled him. He has no home, no family. I am sure he is looking for his shameful father but who cares..."

Genevieve drank some wine and continued to speak.

"She has killed several of my friends for the tiniest mistake. I do not want to join them!"

 

[Coran]

Coran considered the words.

Such things were not foreign to him. The Abyss had a constant struggle for power, though those in charge rarely stayed there for a long. Tricks, traps, and backstabbing were a constant within his realm. Another fact that set them so close to the mortals of this plane.

It seemed to be the same for the Fae.

How amusing that was. "Why not kill her then?"

The Demon asked. "Surely there must be those equally displeased. A well places knife, a slip of something..."

Coran trailed off in curiosity.

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

A harsh laugh slipped from Genevieve's beautiful lips. "It would be impossible. People have tried." The tone of her voice told Coran that she was done speaking about her Queen.

"How long have you been here?" She asked him. Here obviously referred to this world...plane...whatever. She still did not understand his whole thing.

 

[Coran]

"Maybe they just haven't tried hard enough." Coran mused, leaning back in his seat.

Briefly he pondered on the politics of the Fae. There was a depth that he did not expect, it was a hook that he couldn't help but want to grab. Such intrigues always amused him. It was the nature of his kind, the want...need for chaos.

It was half of what drove them. "This time?"

Coran mused.

"A year...maybe a little more." Time was such a strange thing in this place. "They all sort of blend together sometimes."

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

Genevieve chuckled. She actually knew about time blending together. She had lived for over four thousand years and there were many parts of her life that were nothing more than a blur at this point. The things that had not really mattered that much and she had pushed elsewhere to make room for the important events.

"Yes, I know that feeling well. It is difficult to do the same thing everyday for millennia. It gets boring and then you run into a Demon who promises you the world," her laugh held no amusement in it though.

"He promises you a castle and to travel and to not be beholden to anyone...he is kind..."

Genevieve's voice trailed off as she just smiled at Coran.

 

[Coran]

Coran smiled. It was a soft sort of smile, the kind that for a human might have told a story of it's own. For the Demon though it only lingered, staying as he leaned forward. His hand gently passed under Genevieve's chin. A gentle caress.

"A promise." He told her softly. "I intend to keep."

He had given her the castle. The world, and so much more would come. "Perhaps even one day, My dear."

The demon coaxed softly.

"You can call yourself Queen." Coran would have to know more. Would dig further, but the idea...oh the idea was so tempting. The chaos and taste that could be drawn from such a thing. It sounded almost too perfect.

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

Genevieve smiled at Coran's touch. So gentle. He was so gentle with her.

"And you my King?" She asked him knowing the answer was no.

He would never make her Queen but she could hope. He could hope. She was nobody though. He only kept her because of her blood. She was nothing more than that to him but she still had no issues with it.

 

[Coran]

Coran smiled. "I've never thought myself a King."

The answer was not a no, but a simple truth.

In the Abyss he had never ruled, but that was not because he couldn't. The constant struggle for power, for strength within the other world was tiresome. A nuisance. Once he might have sought it, but now? Now he had found a world that was so much more...fun.

"Perhaps we will see." He mused. "What more we can take from this world."

Because always, always he would want more. That was what separated him from the others. What marked him as what he was. The pure and utter greed that sat within his very heart. "And yours."

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

"Everything...we will take everything..."

Genevieve said with an evil smile. She wanted to give Coran every single part of her and she wanted to them to take over the world together. Hand in hand.

They would burn this world to the ground.

"Together..."

 

[Coran]

Coran's fingers slowly traveled under her chin. "Of course."

He told her softly.

So their days went. The carriage was utterly boring of course, but it suited them well enough for short conversations and trickles of insights. A day or two passed, stops were made, until they finally reached a small town at the base of the spine.

Not a city, but not a village either.

Whitebridge it was called. With more than a dozen taverns and manors owned by rich merchants and at least one Mayor. Coran stepped from the carriage first, offering up a hand to Genevieve as he peered at the street around them.

"Lets find me a new mask." He said, his body now looking slightly more ragged. "Shall we dear?"

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

Genevieve had never been more thankful for ley travel by the time they had arrived in Whitebridge. She officially hated carriages and how fucking long they took. She had better things to do than sit in a carriage for days. She could have made it here so much quicker without Coran. There was the issue though. She did not want to leave Coran so she traveled like he needed to.

The fae took his hand gently and stepped down from the carriage. Her eyes took in Whitebridge and she was not over impressed. She had definitely been in worse places so this would do for now.

"Yes, I do like this face but I like the idea of picking out what I want." Genevieve smiled over at Coran. "Where should we start looking?"

 

[Coran]

"Well that all depends on the face you'd like." He told her.

That was the lovely thing about humanity, they offered such a wide variety. One could really choose anything and anyone, though it all depended on where you were in the world of course. He smiled at her, glancing around Whitebridge.

"Some thug from a workhouse? Handsome in his own way?" He mused. "A bard, coming through town to sing and sleep with everything he lays eyes on?"

Coran teased. "A Mayor, elected for his face as much as his politics?"

There were so many options.

"We live in a world of choice, my dear." Especially now.

 

[Genevieve Belisario]

A thoughtful hmmm came from the fae but she just ended up shrugging instead of offering anything insightful.

"What seems the most fun for you, Coran?" She asked and kissed his hand softly. "You are the one who gets to kill them after all."

He seemed like someone who wanted a little bit of challenge in his murders.

 

[Coran]

Coran smiled. "My dear."

His hand gently caressed beneath her chin.

"They're mortals." This whole town was filled to the brim with them. He could smell it, the scent of constant decay. The inferiority and the touch of malaise at the life that they still had to lead. It was disgusting.

"They will die as easy as the next." His thumb traced against her lips. "Choose a face."

Coran assured her. "And it will be mine."