The things most worth doing — It felt like she taunted him. He stiffened and his face darkened and his mouth grew bitter. Of course, Themis had simply no idea what she was talking about. He looked at her and she transformed into a stranger in the turn of a second; she might be oceans and mountain ranges away from him. You have no idea who I am, he thought. His lover and confidant did not know him, and how could she ever come to know him? How could he ever tell her the truth? He was attempting to build a future on a base of quicksand, that would devour everything in time. There was no sense to it.

Go now, said the voice living in a burrow under the arches of the left side of his ribcage. He ignored it. Anger spread through him; it pulsed from his core outwards into his limbs and head. He was glad about that. It seemed to increase his firmness and density, his ability to stand upright. For the first time since that accursed night, he felt like he was real.

With two steps, he closed the distance to her. He took her wrist and held it up between them. The sleeve of her dress fell back and he stared at the scar she had given herself a week ago, in the shuttered laboratory.
Samuel looked into her eyes.
"What if what I am doing is not worth anything? — Not to any sane and moral person?" he asked and he heard his own voice, level and cold.

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   Themis Lyra

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She'd said something wrong. It happened in a blink, Samuel's demeanor changed like clouds obscuring the sun. He was a shell of a man one moment and a threat in the next. She had seen exasperation and annoyance but never anger from him, never something truly frightening. This made Samuel larger; his presence suddenly outsized in the room. And then he moved.

Themis would swear he apparated, he was across the room, and then he was in her face. She startled, this approach full of passion but lacking the affection that she was beginning to associate with Samuel. When he grabbed her arm, she initially resisted and discovered quickly how strong his grip was. Her arm did not pull free; she barely moved him. For a second, all she could do was fear. When the adrenaline fueling her realized there would be no fleeing, her energy redirected to defiance. She raised her chin and met his eyes, a warning fire flickering in her own. She would not cower for him; she cowered for no one.
Themis didn't look at her wrist; she knew the evidence that he had found there. Her scar, as it now and truly was, had faded to a softer pink, less startling but still a strong contrast against her pale skin. She cocked an eyebrow at him, daring him to comment on the wound. His voice raised the hairs on the back of her neck, her unease growing when the voice that challenged her was barely Samuel's. She didn't know this side of him, but there were facets of her he was ignoring if he expected her to wilt now.

"Then you had best reevaluate your course of action. Or reexamine your definition of morality." She forced her tone to remain level, the chill of her words a careful warning that he wouldn't like what came next. "I also refuse to believe that anything worthless could unsettle you like this. You are not that fragile." There was part of her that expected violence. Daniel had attacked her once during an argument. She felt something sour in her chest at the comparison. Daniel and Samuel were polar opposites, but she would not make the mistake of underestimating what a man was capable of. She also wouldn't sugarcoat her words for him. He would prove himself a man of quality or he would disappoint her. She was bracing for either possiblity.

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   Samuel Griffith

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Lou made magic!

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"It is not worthless in terms of impact. I do nothing ineffective" he returned grimly. "But on the contrary, it is you who needs to be prepared for moral questions—take it as my warning." He still held her wrist and he turned it upwards to them. The curved mark stood clear against her white skin. "You too can go too far to turn back and regain your innocence; know that. I am way past that point. There is no going back for me. You want to know what I am doing? You won't like it."

They were getting to the root of it, weren't they? If she wanted to be with him and to hold on to her convictions and to her image of him, she would need to back off and accept that he could never tell her the truth. All he could hope for was that he would succeed in wiping the slate clean to start anew. Get rid of the husk of his father, get rid of Don Juan and the substance, exorcise the festering sickness of his past—Merlin knew how—burn it all down in a great and cleansing fire. Or she would get to know who he really was, who he was right now, and she would need to make some hellish compromises to her own values to make herself fit around him; that was assured. He did not think she would accept him if she knew the truth—he did not think the truth was acceptable. If she loved him, that might not survive getting to know him at his worst; he was approaching his worst at high velocity. If he loved her, it was his duty to protect her from the senseless suffering he was presently inflicting on himself and everyone close to him. So how the hell was this supposed to work?

Samuel was glad at least that she did not falter under the pressure. He stared into her glaring, blue eyes. Good. She should be angry. That was honest, at least. He much preferred it to her misplaced offers of help, or to her worry.

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   Themis Lyra

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"My innocence?" She seethed at the implication—the very condescending notation that her morality needed protection from some hidden truth to the world. "I reject the notion that knowledge could be inherently corrupting. I reject that there is such thing as a point of no return for your soul, Samuel. I do not believe we exist in some state of saved or damned." It did not mean humans were incapable of going too far. There were points when harm was too great, and justice was necessary. She believed this without hesitation, but justice was not so simple a creature. What was just lived in a world of grey. She existed there, too, trying to bring some sense of balance to it all. But pushed to confrontation with Samuel, she'd lost her center of gravity. This was a freefall, and she loathed the feeling of falling.

"Of course, I want to know what you are doing, but I won't ask. You have decided I cannot know, and so I won't." Her eyes were hard as she met his gaze, needing him to know how serious she was. "I already 'don't like it,' thank you kindly." She added with bite. "I think your warning is an attempt to keep me at arm's length, and that is your prerogative, but do not lie to me or yourself and say it is for my benefit. I have told you already, I would give you the world if I could. If it is so bloody important to you to keep me in the dark, I will tolerate it. Do not think me so irresolute. You mean more to me than that." That shouldn't make her so angry.

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   Samuel Griffith

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Lou made magic!

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They stared at each other. Samuel's eyes searched her face, he did not know entirely what for. "Saved or damned — that is not what I am saying," he said wearily. He could never make her understand it. His experience of life was incomprehensible. He felt alien. He should have never left his laboratory in Whitechapel to become a teacher. He could have remained solitary and despicable and himself. Now he did not know anymore what would become of him. Or of the two of them, for that matter.

The light behind the high tower window turned hostile. It glared at him. How could a night sky glare? A sorrow entered him, suddenly and violently. He wished he could bridge the howling distance between Themis and him and he wished that he could let it be in her power to rescue him from the depth he was descending to. It was only love which could accomplish such feats for people, and love itself mostly failed. And with every moment that Themis was being driven farther away, something else was approaching, was conquering all the water he submerged it in, wrapped up into a new reality, a corpse wrapped in a new shroud. "You are right about one thing. I am, really, protecting myself by keeping you away." He let go of her wrist. He sensed a mysterious sort of defeat coming for him. She had the advantage of him now, for he did not know what more to say.

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"You are speaking in riddles." She chided. But he seemed past hearing her now, not when she watched his eyes sink leagues away from her. It was frightening how far away a human could disappear into themselves, physically present and still worlds away. Themis was no closer to understanding the source of Samuel's dark doubts. What could have him so tightly in its clutches that he seemed like a man half-possessed before fading away into a shell of emptiness? This was not a fight she understood, not a fight that seemed fair. She was watching the man holding her heart drown, and he'd decreed she would stay on land and watch. It was an unconscionable act.

Relinquishing her wrist felt like resignation, and something very near to dread slithered up her spine. This was not an improvement; this felt like rejection. "If keeping me away was conducive to your health, you would not look so hollow." It was her turn to demand his focus; her freed hand reached for his, lifting their joined hands to her chest and pressing it over her heart. "Look at me, Sam. This," she pressed his hand hard over her heart, "Will not let me stand aside and watch you self-destruct. Whatever this quest is, abandon it or continue; it is your decision, but do not assume you act in a vacuum. Keep your secrets, but share your burden, and I will help you. Do not abandon me now. Not when I can support you." Her conviction steadied her voice and stoked her resolve. She imagined many things when she pictured Samuel's secrets, all of them some version of sordid, but her mind had yet to conjure a scenario where she responded with hysterics or sent him away. Removing him from her presence was about as pleasant as removing a limb. As gently as she could, doing her best to rein in her own energy, she reaffirmed her core promise to him. "I am not a coward, Samuel. I am not running away. Please don't ask me to."

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   Samuel Griffith

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Lou made magic!

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His hand in hers felt like it did not really belong to him. A part of him wanted desperately to be understood and known by her, but he also knew she was only so steadfast in her image and support of him because she lacked the frame of reference to imagine his life and his choices. Themis had gotten the best of him, his best version, and with her in his sights it was easy to avoid confrontation with unpleasant questions and with the fact that he was not right, something about him had always been off, and in the course of a life totally dedicated to power, he had accrued debts that demanded repayment; the nature of these debts was simply beyond her scope of comprehension. He thought of her scar and he prayed that it was not too late for her. Was it terrible that he loved her for her willingness to do something gruesome for him? It was terrible, it was reprehensible. That night, his desire for her had been all-consuming. Now he could not bear to touch her, he felt too hollow, too dirty and too ashamed.

I need to find a way to break her hold over me — that thought was in his head that dreadful morning, when he recognized what he was doing with her and what she egged him on to reenact with her. Suddenly he questioned if that was the goal he was accomplishing with the sordid business of his relapse. He was breaking her power over his heart and his body. Entertaining that idea made him as guilty as the physical betrayal of their bond.

"You are no coward," he confirmed. But he might be. Exasperatingly, what he wanted most now was to lie down in her bed and deny the world any claim on him. Despite what he was doing to her and himself, he also, still, wanted to make her his steady ground, where he would be renewed. But one could not invent a new life for themselves, nor invent their mooring posts. "I am being very unfair, I know that. I hope that one day I can bear to be truthful with you." It will be the day you leave me, he added silently. "It seems I have bitten off more than I can chew; certainly more than I am willing to swallow."

He was silent for a moment. He felt faint, but his body would carry him through without mercy. Someone once said to him: "It can be borne, everything can be borne. Don't be afraid, it will help me, to not be afraid too." It was a thing said in a moment of insurmountable pain, but he could not for the life of him recall who said it, and when.

"You are already helping me," he heard himself say, like from far away. "By giving me a place to return to. I cannot tell you how much that means to me. I certainly am not deserving of it, nor do I expect you to sit around and wait for me. But I still hope that you will receive me, when I come to your door."
When I come crawling up these stairs. I might really need it, soon.

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   Themis Lyra

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Themis wasn't a coward, but she was human. This hurt; every ounce of her ached to solve this puzzle and right what was out of place in his mind, help him find the solid ground he needed. Selfishly, she wanted it to be her. She listened intently, not soothed by his words but appreciating his exercise in confiding in her. She listened, both to his words and what he left lying in the space between. What could be so terrible an undertaking that it wrecked a force like Samuel? No scenario she'd concocted, and there had been many, explained this change in a man who usually moved with the force of a hurricane. Samuel's presence could fill a room. She could feel him, her eyes seeming trained to find his. That was not the man she found at dinner tonight.

His hand was still firmly to her chest, yet he seemed miles away as he spoke, his eyes seeming hollow. It was unnerving, at best. She had not expected his request because that was the heart of it. He did not expect her to "wait for him," but she would have to hex him if he suggested she would take another path. No, she would not sit in her tower and cry the days away awaiting his return. She would live and hide her fear; that was how she moved. She would teach and invest her energy into the students because that was what she knew how to do. She would not stop living in his absence, but the world took on a grey pallor she couldn't clear from her eyes. She loathed it, but she would endure it. There was no other option.

"Do not tell me what you deserve from me; that is my choice alone," she warned him. She would not accept his self-loathing, would not hold it over his head so that he may wither beneath it. "You do not need to ask." What he needed, what she hoped to give, was refuge. "This tower is my sanctuary; as long as that is true, it will be yours as well." In an impulsive move, one she had not given her body permission for, she released his hand and embraced him. She surprised herself with the ferocity of her embrace, the need to press him close as if to memorize his shape because there was no question in her mind; soon, he would be beyond her reach. No man is an island, but Samuel had decided to set off alone. She would watch from the shore as long as she was able. "When you are ready, come home. Come home to me."

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   Samuel Griffith

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Lou made magic!

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He leaned his head against hers when she took him in her arms. He was very tired. She was upright like a soldier. He was grateful. But he was also full of doubts. Unconditionality was not something he believed in. There would be more time for them, he hoped. Time to figure it out. He wanted to be in her tower again, knowing where he was, and with his integrity unquestioned. It had been so once and it could be so again. It only demanded a decisive act of strength for him to become himself again.

He saw a light burning behind the high windows and questioned if it was the moon or the setting sun. It was high time to leave, but he could not move. Staying would be another unpredictable strain to put on them. His body seemed to deny him the momentum to shake off her embrace. "I will leave the school tomorrow, for a while," he said to Themis. "Until the new year."

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There was no instruction to take him in her arms. There was no mandate to soothe him, but she didn't need instruction to treasure him. There were no guidebooks on how to cherish a man you never married. But treasure him, she did. Themis could only pray for tomorrow, that maybe whatever was ahead of them was brighter than their present. He was her lodestar, the compass she followed into the great unknown. Watching him tremble, watching him struggle, both made him more human and frightened her. She pressed gentle kisses to his hairline, whispered his greatness in his ear, anything to reassure the exhausted man in her embrace.

She reluctantly relaxed her grip on him, freeing him from her worried hold. She tried her best to smile, but it was watery and halfhearted. "I know. I know you have to go. I will be here when you return. I promise you that." And perhaps she should have been kinder to the women that came before her, the ones that maintained a brave face as the men in their lives vanished for adventure, because Themis couldn't currently think of a fate worse than staying behind as the man she loved walked beyond her sight.

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   Samuel Griffith

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Lou made magic!

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