A Magic of Nightfall

Varina ci’Pallo

Karl was sitting in the dark on the rear stoop of Serafina’s house in Oldtown, staring across the small garden planted there toward the rear of the houses a street over. His gaze seemed to be penetrating all the way to South Bank, far away. Above him, the moon was snagged in a lacework of thin, silver clouds through which the stars peered. A cup of tea steamed forgotten at his left side.

He was rubbing a small, flat, and pale stone between his forefinger and thumb.

Varina came up and sat beside him on the right-not quite close enough to touch, not far enough away that she couldn’t feel the warmth of his body in the night chill. Neither of them said anything. He rubbed the stone. She could hear faint, muffled music from the tavern down the street.

When the silence between them had stretched for more breaths than she wanted to count, she started to rise again, feeling angry with herself for having come out here, and angry with him for not acknowledging her. But Karl reached out and touched her knee. “Stay,” he said. “Please?”

She sat again. “Why?” she asked.

“We haven’t… Lately… Well, you know.”

“No, I don’t know,” she said to him. “Tell me.”

“You’re trying to make this hard for me?” He flipped the stone over in his fingers.

“No,” she told him. “I’m trying to make it easier for me. Karl, being with you or being without you-those are both situations I can deal with, one way or another. What I can’t handle is not knowing which it’s supposed to be.” She waited. He said nothing. “So which is it?” she asked.

“It’s not that simple.”

“Actually, it is.” She hugged herself as she sat, leaning slightly away from him. “I thought when I finally took you to my bed that I might have everything I’d wanted for years. But I discovered I still only had a part of you. I want all of you, Karl, or I don’t want anything. Maybe I’m asking too much of you, or maybe I’m too possessive, or maybe you think I’m pushing you into something you don’t want.” Tears were threatening, and she sniffed them away angrily. “Maybe it’s my fault that this won’t work, and if that’s the case, then fine. I just need to know.”

“It’s not you.”

She wanted to believe that. Varina bit her lower lip, forcing back the tears, her breath shaking in her throat. “Then what is it?” she asked. “You go after this Uly on your own and nearly get yourself killed, you meet with Kenne without telling me, you’re even making plans with Talis. But you’re not talking to me.”

“I don’t want you to worry.”

She wanted to scoff at that. “I worry more because I don’t know the situation. I don’t know what you’re planning, don’t know what you’re trying to do, don’t know what the real dangers might be.” She stopped. Took a breath. “I won’t be your mistress, to be there whenever you want that kind of comfort but conveniently forgotten otherwise. If that’s all you want from me, then I made a mistake. I’m also not Ana, only wanting you as a friend. Again, if that’s all you want from me, well, you can’t have that either. Not anymore. So if that’s the case, then tell me and as soon as this is over, one way or the other, I’ll go my own way. I’ve wanted you to open the door between us for a long time, Karl. Now you have, but you can’t stand there with one foot in and one outside. I need to either close that door and lock it forever, or you need to enter all the way in.”

“How do I do that?” His voice sounded plaintive in the darkness. He pressed the stone between his fingers. How can you not know? she wanted to rail at him. Can’t you see it as plainly as I do?

“ Talk to me,” she said. “Share what you’re thinking. Let me accept the dangers you’re willing to accept. Let me be with you.”

She thought that he wasn’t going to answer-which would have been answer enough. He sat there, still toying with the stone and staring outward. She started to rise again, and this time he took her hand. She could feel the stone as he pressed it into her palm.

“Wait,” he said. “Let me tell you what I’m thinking…”

And he began to talk.