milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Jadis is sitting by the window, today, not the fire. She has her own fire. No golden warmth for her though, but a fierce blue searing cold. Just one sole flickering flame, small, curled in the palm of her hand. She's staring at it with an odd mixture of fascination and fear. Perhaps obsession would be a better term.

It is still her magic, that much is certain. But it's more alive. More a thing of it's own. And more powerful.

It scares her.

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Scare her it may, but it has drawn the sudden sharp focus of attention from a woman sitting at a table not all that far away.

Ice-blue eyes, bright and cold as the fire in Jadis's hand, are gleaming as she watches.

Jadis sighs, and the flame flickers sadly. For all that it's becoming a thing of it's own, it is still her magic. A part of her.

Perhaps it is the sigh that draws her across the room, or perhaps not.

She rises from her chair, knitting bundled together and tucked in the crook of her arm, and approaches the other woman.

"My goodness me," Blodwen says softly, watching the flame. "Such a pretty thing."

Jadis looks up and smiles, and the flame in her hand brightens, growing a little larger and steadier.

"An odd phenomenon, wouldn't you say?"

"Oh, and I suppose some might," she replies lightly. The soft musical voice is almost a bell-like chime, the sound of icicles in wind.

"But a lovely gift, I find it to be."

Jadis nods throughtfully, and closes her hand. The flame winds between her fingers for a moment before dying - or rather, fading back into her skin.

She raises an eyebrow at the woman.

"And who might you be?"

Blodwen smiles at her -- and the smile is warm enough, but those blue eyes are cold as winter's heart.

"Blodwen Rowlands it is that I am usually called here, cariad."

Jadis smiles, and in her own eyes burns that same blue fire, 'though it is darker and more infinite than it had been in her hand.

"I think I have heard of you. I am Jadis."

"Have you indeed, dear?" The White Rider looks pleased at this. "Why, I am glad of it, to be certain."

"Something it is that we may have in common, I do think."

"In passing," she says, with a light laugh, "and they did not intend to b flattering."

She looks Blodwen over, again, a little closer this time. "I do believe you are right."

"The more fools they," she says. "But the world is full of ffyliaid, or at least mine was."

"Where is it that you are from, dear?"

"Charn," simply. It's still home.

"Charn," she repeats, thoughtfully. "What sort of land is that, cariad? Why, I do not think I have heard of it before, ever --"

"A land that is no more, save that it still has physical form. There is no life there. Once, though, it was hot, and dry, and beautiful."

She tilts her head a little to the side, sadly. "Now it is dust."

"I am sorry, dear."

Gently said.

"As am I," quietly, "But what is done is done. I cannot undo it now."

"So certain it is that you sound," Blodwen murmurs. "Are you sure, dear?"

Jadis laughs, bitterly.

"The Deplorable Word cannot be unsaid. All that is left of the life of Charn has been dust for a thousand, thousand years. It could be made to live again. But it will never be the same."

Charn will live again. That much she has decided to make so. It will not be her Charn as it once was, full of life and sound and heat. It will be solitary and cold. A beautiful place, but so, so empty. Fitting.

"A loss indeed," she says. Silver bells chime in the soft musical voice. "A thing of great power it must have been, to destroy your home so."

"Indeed," she agrees. "Power greater than any one my world weilded before or since." She does not brag. It's the simple truth.

That chillingly bright gaze drops to Jadis's hand, where the blue flame had danced so recently.

"And other power it is that you have as well, of course."

A touch of cool air spins around the White Rider, reaching out toward Jadis as well-- in recognition and identification, too gentle to be a threat.

"Of course," she says, and the falmes flare briefly for a moment about her fingers.

"There will always be that."

"Provided you take proper care, here," Blodwen says gently. The blue of her gaze seems to match the chill azure of the flickering fire.

"Especially if they think you are like me."

"They already do," she says, with no bitterness, not really.

Perhaps the blue in their eyes is duelling, perhaps it is simply gald of partnership, but her own eyes glow bright.

"They are right, I think."

"Truly?" Her smile is very bright. "A lovely thing it is, to know those with similar interests."

"Yes, indeed," the witch says, with an equally sharp bright smile.

"There are more who share my likes and dislikes here than I would have expected."

"A pity it is, that it is so warm now," she muses. "Although there are ways, of course, to manage things."

A curious pause, then.

"Dislikes, cariad?"

"In truth, the weather itself is of little consequence, although winter is of course the most beautiful of the seasons."

She raises an eyebrow.

"Indeed." And declines to comment further.

"The most beautiful and the strongest, as well," the White Rider agrees. "Nothing else there is to match the deep cold of winter, the chill silver of the frost."

Echoes of frost shiver in her tone like sharp shards.

"Even this green season can be managed and weakened in its own way."

"Everything has it's weakness. Only Nothing has none. And it has no strengths."

Her own tone is mild, matter of fact, for all that there is something terribly bleak in her voice.

"No?"

Her smile is darkly knowing.

"No." She says. "It is Nothing. It has no strength, no weakness. No flaws. It is simply an absence. It is not even really correct to speak of Nothing as an entity in it's own right, when it is simply the absense of anything else."

"What is empty can be filled, cariad. Or it can be used."

"You are speaking of a vessel. I was speaking of the Nothing itself." She nods.

"You are quite correct."

Jadis smiles one more time, and her teeth are sharp and white.

"I will be sure to see you again, my dear." She stands to leave, and a bare flicker of blue flame licks across the space between them, gently chill.

Blue flame is met by an answering touch of chill wind that briefly teases the fire into an upward spiral.

The White Rider smiles back at Jadis, ice-bright eyes gleaming.

"I look forward to it, cariad."

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