Afternoon, December 6th, 1894 — Crowdy Memorial Library of Writing & Witchcraft

Two weeks. It had been two weeks now. Her lungs expanded in her chest, remembering their purpose, but the result still left her hollow. Themis rarely bothered with her free weekends; the castle was her second home and had nearly everything she needed. Now, it held all the cheer of a tomb. The students were squirrely, the Christmas holidays destroying what focus the children had. This was the time of year for her lectures on focus and finishing what you started, a reminder that her standards were still as high as the ceiling of her classroom. She had no lectures for them now. She missed Samuel terribly.

When he woke her to say his goodbyes, she was temporarily stunned by the light in her room and her dark angel blocking the sun above her. She didn't remember falling asleep. At some point, exhaustion had claimed her. The last thing she remembered was Samuel curled against her, her body pressed against him, tucked beneath his chin. It was domestic, euphoric, perfect. And it was over. He kissed her, reaffirming his promise to return. Then he was gone. The castle continued around her, the effort to keep her grief hidden somehow making days stretch longer, the nights suddenly colder than the stars ever were for her. She had never minded being alone, until she did.

She had promised her son she would join him in London for dinner; the promise of seeing Justin gave some solace to her. Despite the confusion in her heart, there was no question what man came first in her life. Justin would always come first, and it gave her peace. Her boy might be the best of her. She'd settled into the library, books had always been a sacred place for her. How she ended up in the public records, she wasn't sure, but she followed her feet deeper into the stacks, the silence welcome. Turning a corner, she almost jumped to see another person this deep in the stacks, nearly turned around to leave them be, until she recognized him.

Heart slamming at her ribs, as if it could reach for him. She swallowed around her suddenly dry mouth. "Professor Griffith, what a surprise." What a painful, unfair surprise.

---

Samuel stood in the Crowdy Memorial Library and stared at the files on the shelf in front of him. He was looking for a certain name, but his focus drifted and he barely retained the many surnames starting with the letter S. It had been another dreary day in London.

He woke in the Griffith's townhouse feeling abject nothing. His sister Agatha made him breakfast, with much care and attention. She knew that something was wrong with him but did not ask. One did not ask such direct questions in his family. So she likely worried quietly and made his tea how she knew he liked it. His mother was still asleep. She slept a lot lately, and long. Perhaps she was slipping into melancholy, caused by the sudden decline of her husband. Or she caught up on rest after a lifetime of torment. Samuel prayed it was the latter. He, too, was unable to ask her directly.

Samuel spent much time now in London, returning to the school only for the three days a week he taught classes on. All other responsibilities like tutoring hours he put on hold and cited having to take care of a family matter to his colleagues as the reason. The rumour that his father was dying had spread across the faculty by now, and he did not deny it. When asked, he only confirmed that Mr. Griffith senior was indeed in ill health, and he did not elaborate. His father, in the meantime, languished in his bed, remiss of his free will but otherwise in solid physical condition, as far as one could expect from a man in his 70s who had cared for nothing else in his life besides earthly pleasures and cheap thrills.

Speaking of cheap thrills — it had been four days since his ill-advised foray into the East End. His reason for going there was already very bad, and the madness that unfolded after finding Don Juan Dempsey, scandal-haunted brother of the Minister of Magic, passed out in an opium den — well, it was incomprehensible even to Samuel himself what exactly he was doing with the man. He had been sure to be done with it after regaining a semblance of mental clarity the next day. However, it did not take long until Dempsey found him in the city and begged for more. It had not taken long until Samuel relented. He did not understand why, and he felt powerless to go back on it. Today he would see him again, to supply more. He already dreaded it. He was cold with contempt for Dempsey and appalled by the both of them. At least Sam had not taken any more. He would not and could not allow himself to slip down that path. Handling the substance, watching someone else on it; all of that activated ingrained old pathways. Lit them up and increased the risk for him to falter under his convictions.

All of these considerations tangled together in his mind into a dark coil and made it no easier to retain any memory of the court cases he looked at. When a voice addressed him from the side, he was utterly unprepared.
He turned, and looked at Themis; she had caught him mentally unguarded and seeing her pulled something taut in his stomach, like someone pulled a seam in him apart by a thread. It took his voice away.
"Professor Lyra," he finally said, and the guarding walls went up and shut away everything that could be gleaned from his eyes. He feared that they did so too late.
"You caught me unprepared," he added flatly. It was difficult to look at her. Seeing her at meals in the great hall was painful enough and he avoided it where possible. He wanted to extend his hands towards her and open back up the current of light and bliss that he knew now to be a reality. And at the same time he wanted to be far away from her. He was not ready for this.

---

His eyes spoke so many things to her; she was sure her eyes answered. He was safe, at least by appearances. Themis wasn't foolish enough to think libraries or any source of knowledge as lacking danger, but she was relatively sure public records slaughtered few alchemists. A small smile pulled at the corner of her lips before she could think better of it. She was relieved, dispositionally so, to see him somewhere as mundane as the library and without injury. Her smile was gone as soon as it appeared.

She could feel it the moment he picked up his mask and shut her out; the warning she had seen in his posture with so many others now directed toward her. She hadn't prepared for this. Letting the sting of his cool response snap her back to reality, Themis schooled her own expression. It pained her to do it. It felt like a contortion to thin her lips and veil her eyes. It seemed farcical to lengthen her spine and slightly raise her chin. With Samuel there was a melting, a softening of her posture. Without intention, she would find herself leaning just a measure too close, her head inclined as if to share secrets. When they stood together in contemplation, she learned how she seemed to fit so well at his side. But warmth gave way to ice, her body rigid. This was not a safe place for her softness.

"My apologies. I did not mean to interrupt you." And she should turn and leave. Why wasn't she turning to leave?

---

For a moment it looked like she would smile at him, then she went cold and very upright. He did not expect how viscerally uncomfortable that felt to him. It was like someone drew the muscles of his thighs too tight to stand without discomfort. He shifted his weight slightly from one leg to the other, trying to shake off the sensation.
His hand, holding on to a folder, tensed.

Samuel suddenly learned that Themis was the one dictating the emotional climate between them; she had, it seemed, always been the one to rule that domain. Usually he basked in her airy light and warmth. Now he froze under her gaze.

"Will you walk with me for a short while?" he finally asked, aware that this was a place where anyone could listen to their conversations, obscured by the shelves and stacks of documents. "If it suits you, Professor Lyra. I could use some air and light," he added politely.

---

She braced for him to walk away or, for some sense to return to her limbs and to turn away herself. She still didn't move. She disliked the tension in her limbs, this false armor of civility they both wore. This felt false, a lie she told as she stood apart from him when she was meant to reach for his hand.

But she had no right to reach for him; had no reason for the tightness in her chest as she watched his posture stiffen. She averted her gaze to do them both a kindness, but they snapped back at his words. For a moment, they remain unguarded, her surprise and question visible as she watched him. She'd expected dismissal, not time with him. She was unready for how giddy the prospect made her. She disliked this immensely.

"Thank you. I would be glad to accompany you." Polite, amiable, mundane, and painful. She couldn't ask what she needed to know to sleep better at night. She had no way to aid him or ask how he fared. The word was his father was unwell, but the relationship between father and son was a contentious one, she'd learned. And she couldn't ask him anything here; she couldn't risk burdening his mind with questions he wouldn't answer for her. She was so limited, and it vexed her, but she wouldn't sacrifice a second of her time with him. "Lead on, Professor Griffith." She took care not to caress his name and tried not to let fondness lengthen vowels, but it felt like a costly exercise.

---

"Lead on," she said; and so they went. He led them out of the section for public records and through the main hall into the corridor that led out into the gardens and courtyards, where in the warmer seasons visitors of the library gathered to enjoy their lecture in the sun. Now there was little warmth and light to entice them; consequently, it was rather quiet.

Samuel glanced over to Themis. Her eyes were wary. Prepared, it seemed, for pain. That saddened him, although he could hardly say she had no reason. "How have you been?" he asked, while they walked. A very simple question—dull, in its proximity to small talk. It was nonetheless one he thought about every day.

---

Themis considered herself agnostic at this stage in her life, but Samuel drawing her into small talk, knowing nothing honest could be shared between them, amounted to hell.

She would bask in what light was allowed her, knowing she would have few moments like this, where they could exist together, and she could guarantee his safety. She would take in his warmth from the respectable distance of a colleague as they walked, her posture suitably loose for the situation.

She did not look at him when she answered, as lightly as possible, "I have kept busy. The children are especially rambunctious near Christmas. I go from adoring them to wanting to hex the entirety of the castle." She'd measured her words as they walked, the lights of the library dark until they approached, fueling Themis' tongue, though she delivered her words lightly. There had been no one she passed on her journey through this floor of the library, but she left nothing to fate.

"I hope you are well." She offered gently, uncertain how to extend her olive branch to him. No demands of propriety could dull her concern for his well-being now. Fighting the urge to reach for him, her fingers twitching to reach him, she clasped her hands firmly before her.

---

He listened to her answer, gleaning little of the information he really desired to know. It was like a smooth field of energy surrounded her, one that did not permit penetration. He found himself on the outside of it, thinking grimly that this was what he projected outwards to people too, most people — but usually not to her. It was certain she felt just as closed out by him, and he did not have a way to remedy that. Telling her about his dilemma, his pains and troubles, was not a possibility. After what happened a few nights ago in Whitechapel, things only seemed more dire. The night left him shaken, and cast doubt on the progress he thought to have made over the past years.

Samuel still gripped tightly on to the records he had taken from the library. There was this matter, too.

They were walking through the archway along the courtyards. When she returned his question, he abruptly stopped. Their shoulders brushed past one another and he caught the scent that always clung to her hair. The painful, contracting feeling in his core returned.

"Let's go out into this courtyard here," he suggested. "Find a place to sit. If you have the time, Themis.", he added, offering her a way out. Perhaps it would be better to part ways than to commit to this exercise in self-torment, he thought. But it seemed now just as out of reach to get himself to do that.

---

She hadn't been listening. Or, perhaps she listened too well, her focus on what she didn't hear. She listened between the words, and searched deep into his silence. So much so, that she collided with his shoulder, literally bumping her back into the present. She could smell the smoke and deep musk that she identified as him, the scent she grieved when she could no longer detect him on her pillows. She took a deep breath to steady her nerves and ended up inhaling him. He made her dizzy, the spice of him triggering a cascade of longing fully inappropriate for the setting.

For her own sake, she needed to put distance between them. She needed to be free of her longing, of her loneliness now in stark relief against the reality of him. She needed to walk away, for both of them. She was doing so well in her self-talk until he used her given name. Why did he have to caress the word as he did her? Why did he have to say her name at all?

"I think the courtyard would be lovely. It will be a reprieve from my research. Lead on, Samuel." She couldn't help it, she had to feel the word on her tongue. He was welcome to lecture her at his earliest convenience. The idea of that lecture, did crack her facade, a smirk breaking through.

---

He lowered his gaze, both in relief at the fact that she stayed, and in uncertainty; he did not have a plan for what was to happen and to what end. They were prolonging the inevitable.
The courtyard was grey under grey clouds. Remnants of this winter's meager snow lay swept into the corners. They were the only people out here, except for the occasional passers-by in the archway.
On the opposite wall stood a stone bench under a bare tree, and that seemed the point to head towards.
Samuel looked back at her briefly, then walked next to her across the courtyard. He fought the urge to cross his hands behind his back, to keep them under safe restraint. Don't cross your hands behind your back; don't keep them in your pockets; don't touch your face or hair; stand straight -- he heard his mother's voice in his head, echoing a hundred times over from his earliest years. Muggles, she always told him, are better mannered. Your kin should invent a spell for that.
Now that they reached the bench, his hand went out along those ingrained habits, to offer Themis assistance in getting seated. He looked at it, and resigned himself to the fact that this was not getting any easier. "It must be the coldest day yet," he said absentmindedly.

---

There was no guidebook or answer to what she was doing. This was all well and good, but the truth was Themis was ready to implode. It was ridiculous that a walk behind the library should have her so out of sorts. She felt like a girl again in the worst of ways. Her arms felt too long, her legs eating up the ground as she focused on slowing her stride. And what was she to do with her hands? For a moment, the basic mechanics of the body seemed overwhelming. Walking, talking, and thinking at the same time, suddenly feeling monumental.

As she mentally fretted about things that hadn't concerned her since puberty, Samuel had led them to a lonely tree and its bench. He offered her his hand, and her emotions did another burst of fretting. It would be rude to deny his offered hand. That's how she would justify this unwise decision. She took his offered hand, and the gentle squeeze she gave him was the best she could offer. I'm here. I'm here with you. Letting go took more effort than expected.

The day felt colder as she released his hand, now sitting beside him in the stark courtyard. "I do not mind the cold, but I am eager for the spring. The world looks too bleak like this." A silly statement when everything in the last two weeks felt sterile and miserable.

---

"It is dreary," he conceded. There was no use in denying it, things were not going well. Everything was more difficult, more complicated, more cruel than expected. He suddenly felt the urge to tell her, and he cut that off and threw it away. It was hard to let her hand go. He released it very hesitantly, and only because he felt there was no other choice. Its gentle pressure gave him more than he would like to admit. "Well—" he said. "This winter will pass, too. As little as it feels like it, right now."
He looked at her and it was very still for a while. The wind made strange sounds in the courtyards of the library, caught between the walls. It made one want to shiver. His hand moved, but he stilled it. It wanted to take a cigarette out of the étui in his coat pocket, but somehow that seemed impolite. He wanted to tell her that he missed her. He wanted to explain why this was necessary, but it was a process that seemed unfinished, his chain of arguments full of holes. He just knew there was no other way.
"I am thinking a lot lately," he said after a while, "on the cyclical patterns all around us. I suppose we talked about this before."

---

They were no longer talking about the weather. Themis felt the words that passed between them, simple mundane comments about the season, but it wasn't the passing of winter that left her feeling cold. The season she existed in now was colder than December, biting at the heels of her loneliness. It was an odd sensation, to miss someone that was sitting in front of you, but there was no other word for this. She missed him, missed the sensation of freedom and adoration that came with him near her. Her own magic felt duller, colder when it stood alone. She nearly resented it. "I look forward to this all passing." She let the words linger, allowed him to paint for himself the picture of life when he returned. She didn't know what the truth of 'later' looked like; she had no point of reference for what she hoped. But she did hope. Whatever task had forced him away, he would overcome. He had to.

"Life is lived in cycles, but I would like to believe there are patterns we can interrupt." It had to be true. She refused to believe the ache in her chest now was part of some pattern or plan. She dearly hoped to be rid of this feeling and never experience it again.

---

He thought on that and said: "I would like to believe that, too. Very much so." He shifted a little on the cold bench. It was not a comfortable place to pass time, but he barely felt it. His senses were focused on taking in her presence next to him. "At the same time, I keep questioning if the end of a cycle guarantees the beginning of a new one. I want to believe that the darkening of light is the precursor to its return."
If getting through this and seeing the new day was given, he could trust the process. It was not, he feared. And yet, everything he did seemed predetermined. "As you see," he said to Themis with a slight smile, "I have learned nothing. I am caught in my old struggle with the stars."
Samuel glanced over to her again, then looked away. He felt as though he had gazed into something too bright. The archway was empty now, and the courtyard too.

---

"Spring will come, Samuel." His name would suit, as 'dear one' could not in this circumstance. "The light will return; it is up to us to decide what it will mean." She believed this wholeheartedly; she had to. It was how she'd endured every obstacle that faced her: she lived. She continued to live and function in the face of death, darkness, and despair. What else was there to do? But her own advice felt hollow when all her body wished to do was rage at this present circumstance.
She did grin at that, even if it was slightly forced. "Oh, I think you've learned. It's just your nature to challenge fate." She cast a glance to his profile, she couldn't help it. Her glance became a look and she watched him intently as she added. "I am also of the belief that if anyone can succeed at such a venture, it will be you."

---

"Hm," he said, conveying agreement and also uncertainty. He felt her look but did not turn his head. Her confidence pained him. The endeavor he was setting his sights on was a crime by all definitions of the word. Did it count for something that he had good reasons for committing it? In his estimation it did, but it did not change the gruesome nature of the matter. He suddenly had the premonition that it would not be the last time life would confront them with doing the unpalatable in pursuit of a goal they believed to be worthy of sacrifice. His gaze fell towards the cobblestones before it returned to her. "I miss you," he said very quietly into the empty air of the yard. The archway lay deserted. He looked at her hand, which lay white and still on top of the fabric of her cape on the bench. He observed his own hand settle next to it, grazing hers with his fingertips.

---