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Fenzhal is the king, and he has been for longer than he can count. He should be used to this, to being harassed and crowded by people who demand their way from him. He knows how to say no, how to impose his will onto those who cannot listen or need direction. No matter what the people may say of him, King Fenzhal is not a fool, nor a pushover, nor weak. He is the Untouchable, a guiding force for his people, never faltering to the crushing pressure of the world around him.
And yet, here in his study, pushed to the wall by one of the spirits that has possessed his wife, Fenzhal can't find the words that will work to refuse him.
" I don't understand."
Allia-- no, Rain , this is Rain, he can't keep slipping up like this-- is staring at him with a gaze that could turn anyone to ice, blue eyes cold as the weather he's named himself for. He won't step back, crowding Fenzhal close to the fireplace with hands outstretched; no contact, but fingers splayed wide on both hands, held out to Fenzhal curiously.
"The mind is different, but the form is the same. To say you love me, that's the same as saying you love her. Isn't it, Fenzhal?"
"No. It isn't at all." He defaults to the voice he uses on criminals, authoritative and harsh. Rain doesn't even flinch. "That's enough, Rain. Please bring her back."
"But why? Please explain. I don't understand. You say you can't love us, but we are her." When he speaks like that, her voice, her face, so disarmed and helpless, it sways him. Fenzhal forgets in moments, in pieces, tricked by things he can see versus things he can't… He sighs, somewhat helplessly, and does his best to move a little further from Allia-- Rain. Curse it.
"You have her body, yes. But Allia is more than just her physical form - at heart, she's my Melusine, and you aren't her… You're very aware of that, Rain." He forces himself to look over, staggered again, briefly, by the sight of his maid looking back at him so pitifully. "You have your own mind, and your own name. You were never meant to be part of Melusine. You know that."
" …I do sometimes. " Rain sighs, slowly turning towards the wall to stare at nothing at all - that distant look in his eyes that tells Fenzhal he's looking down a branch of reality that the king himself will never be able to see, a stream of the future where perhaps the unthinkable could happen.
" But many times, I am nothing. " He waves a hand, Allia's hand, somewhere to the left. " Many times, I am only what I can remember. Nonexistent, without form. Perhaps inhuman. I am not certain. " Both his arms are spread, wide open and reaching out for nothing.
" I am more and less than whoever I used to be. I am my own person, but it is so easy to forget. And so easy to hurt for lack of identity. "
Rain turns to him, arms still open wide… There are tears in his eyes, in Allia's, and it's all Fenzhal can do to hold himself back from holding them in his arms. It's not that he doesn't care for Rain, nor that Melusine would mind another in their relationship - but for his own sanity, he needs that separation. These things, these spirits…They cannot be his wife. They cannot take her place, or attempt to become her. He won't fall to these temptations, he can't, he--
" I am not her, Fenzhal. But I feel loneliness just as much as she does. And this form loves you, wants to be close to you, every hour of every day. Even if she is not the one in control, this heart always longs for you. And that longing reaches to all of us. "
Rain takes a small step forward.
Fenzhal does not move.
" I want to feel close to someone again. I want to feel as though I am not such a burden, just for one moment. "
Allia's body moves closer, arms still out, fingers still splayed. Rain's cold blue eyes won't leave Fenzhal's. The tears slip from them, but he doesn't blink.
" Please hold this form. Please hold me . I am so lonely, Fenzhal... I do not want to be anymore. "
Fenzhal damns himself silently as he closes the distance between them in less than a second, nearly dragging Rain into his arms as he holds the other man close. The clocks in the room have all come to an abrupt halt, and just out the window he notes that even the wind in the trees has ceased. For that moment, it is only them - he and Rain, locked together in his study, suspended in time and space.
He can see almost immediately how this sort of existence could become painfully lonesome.
Rain’s embrace is nothing like Allia's, hands resting so lightly against Fenzhal’s back that it's like he's being held by a ghost. And, well, perhaps Rain is one. He doesn't know. He can't know.
But he knows, without a doubt, that Rain is not Allia…
" Thank you. Thank you very much. "
…but at least Rain seems to know that, too.