"I remember you in moonlight," he murmurs. "I remember you so drunk you could not stand. I was there. I folded your clothing. I cared for you then. I will care for you now. Show me."

     It is a sight that those on Philosopher's Island have come to expect. In the retreating afternoon sun, a lone, familiar figure walks from harbor, past the campus and up the hill. He doesn't stop for drinks. He doesn't shake hands or exchange greetings. They all swear the figure is the ghost of the king.

     Iowerth rises, his eyes full of grit, his throat closing with the silt of a king's guilt. He puts a hand to his eyes, pressing and rubbing. Oh, there is anger -- but it's not at God, and it's not at Tiernan, and it's not at you. It's not even directed to Fate. The sea is angry with itself.

     "Ultimately, you cannot make someone happy. Happiness is a choice each of us must make. But you can be there to remind him of the goodness of the universe, of how much he is loved, of how much he has yet to offer his children, and their children. You can love him. But you cannot fix it, Gwilym."

     His thoughts slap him like waves, and the spray of it leaps from his eyes in his anguish. Swift, swift salty waves: the ocean of this has no ending...

     He exhales, and then he drinks, and if it weren't for the refilling, it'd be empty now. Ordinarily he might make some crack about Cuchulainn and the sea, but not today. There was a time when I was almost have welcomed this news, except for the pain it will cause my brother. And now? What do I do now?

     Aeron looks to you, his famously bland face still quiet in aspect. "I have been his pantomime. I know the dance." He gives you his hand momentarily. "What is to be done?" he wonders as if idly curious.

     "...I did what I sat here, in this room I think, and told you I wouldn't do. I abandoned you. For reasons that are no longer clear to me, actually. I'm not sure what all the fuss was about. I guess... I saw rocks and hazards that weren't really there."

     "My occasion is... the chef threw me out of the kitchen. It's the last day he can really do that. I had to let him get one more in. My brother appears to be sweating out a ... fever..." He nudges his brother with a toe. "Naked..."

     Gwilym smirks again, and he moves through the gap, bringing you with him. There's a brief and blinding flash, and when vision returns to normal, you - and he - are in the shadows outside what appears to be a tavern, at night. A string of red paper lanterns dangles above the doorway, and red lightbulbs show behind closed shades.

     Gwilym relaxes back on the sofa again. His look towards the ceiling is that of a man who knows full well he's unleashed unspeakable mischief upon the world.

     Gruffydd rises, donning his hat and veil once more. "There has never been a more devious Cupid and Eros than we." The veil is pulled across his face, covering all but his eyes. His eyes fix on you with wicked humor.

     Gwilym sighs, closing his eyes and then reopening them, looking at you. No point in putting it off. "I'm feeling the need to start popping out heirs," he says bluntly. "And t' do that - well, t' do it right, that means getting married." A pause, and he adds helpfully, even though he knows you don't need the help, "To a woman, I mean."

     No sooner do I think I have myself together when something happens, and I am thrown into confusion. Now, mind you, I am easily confused so... take it as you like it.

     Love must prostrate itself, sacrifice itself, to be known. It gives, without asking for return. It surrenders, without thought of victory. And it conquers all in the end.

     Aeron will allow you to grieve. It is important. He will allow you to sulk. At least a little. He will not allow you to run, or to quit. Wherever you go, he will be there with a mirror.

     "I think now is a good time to meet... to discuss what might be, what I hope to do, and how I would like to work with you, uncle. Is now a good time?"

     It will disappear, just like everything else does in Time. Footprint, fingerprint, fine art, and memory. I just want to be alone...

     "...I have to find a replacement - sommat else, to fill the gap, before anybody takes too much notice. I have to do it yesterday. If you spot someone before I do - send word that nobody else can hear or see."

     Aeron sobs into your mouth, the kiss a tangle of mouths and breaths and a quiet groan of despair. I have designed it, built it since I was ten years old. And a bright shining light has ruined it all.

     "The Birth of Venus," Gruffydd says suddenly, grand peacock wings making themselves known, spreading with relaxation. "You remind me of the Botticelli painting." He shimmers in his own exotic grandeur, made more so by merely being in your shimmering presence.

     "You don't behave well enough to be a trained monkey," Davydd notes, "...now...shush... listen to your mother. She's onto something. Besides which, even if it's utter rubbish, you'll not get a word in edgewise against it so you might as well relax and pay attention."

     You're so good to know that there's always a Story.

     He looks between brothers and eyes them with the internal weariness of a man who's never had kids. "Time out." Gwilym does the internationally recognized signal for it of the tee of hands.

     He drinks his coffee slowly. "Working backwards--magic still exists because it has no reason not to? I don't know, but even allowing for fun with entropy, things don't just stop without a reason. So there'd have to be a reason for that to change, and all you need for it to keep going is a lack of that reason."

     "Sex is a joy and a comfort. It's also fun." Gwilym grins and sits up now, looking over at you. "And it's also entirely possible to fuck up human relationships without it, so not having sex isn't a get out of trouble free card."

     But he's not worried about Loki just now. He'll visit him later. Aeron's gaze and Aeron's thoughts are on his king. "Brother-king," he murmurs, "...you are too hard on yourself. Do not do the Universe's work for It."

     He glances to you and then to the dog. "Intelligence is a curse. But you have earned a right to know things, Loki. So - go ahead and ask."

     "The legends do say I was born at night," Aeron's voice is a somnolent murmur, dreamy and even and droll. "But not last night."

     "Run."

     "I could slay a dragon for y', if that's what you want," Gwilym offers easily. "Or I could show you a dragon. One I'm not related t'. Why are you standing in the dark watching trees?"

     "Faith," he answers quietly, a hush between. "What you need tonight is faith. And so... I will give it to you."

     "Psychologically, I'd say the significance of the snow is your lack of resolve. You're confused, and you don't want to make a decision because the choices available to you either suck or are too unknown in their long-term consequences. You do not want to shut the door, but you have not yet decided to open it, either."

     "I happen to like portions of my so-called life," Loki says, and leans back on his hands. "But by all means, let's pick up where we left off." The very brief flush covers where leaving off happened, even if that's not quite what he meant.

     "...Sleep, and realize that even for all the troubles and sorrows you have taken upon yourself, this one sorrow has been answered. You are not alone."

     Loki follows Gwilym without further question or complaint. Maybe one glance to Aeron, before he moves. The promise of coffee ahead helps, but more of it is that he only has so much energy to give to irritation at his own confusion when the world is busy being very strange around him.

     There is little that is more enjoyable than the prick of the holly leaf. Little that is more potent than the bitter balm of the holly berry. There is little that is more stinging than the potential loss of the Holly King's favor...

     Loki watches the bird a moment, then turns away, taking his cup with him. Whiskey goes better with coffee than alone, especially at this time of day. If you say so. There's only a faint undercurrent of the weary adolescent, Whatever.

     Loki slides back, dragging his foot away. "Sure." And on tonight's episode of Seventeen Synonyms For Yes... He stands up, momentarily shaky for reasons that have nothing to do with general ability to walk.

     Gwilym takes another step forward, his hand on your shoulder and his other hand threading into your hair with electric speed. One moment he's out of range, the next, he's in range, bending in close with unwinking attention. "Get over it."

     "...You could have been Adonis and Casanova rolled into one, Balthazar, and if it wasn't what she wanted, she'd still have run. I know because I've done exactly that, in the past."

     "Actually, it seems like I was having a perfectly good picnic in the middle of a city park, with a nice girl, and then all of the sudden it was fucking Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds. That's what it feels like, uncle. And the girl's chosen the birds over me. So at this point, I really just don't care."

     "Well, that presumes you really are driving, and that changing stations isn't better done by the person who isn't supposed to be keeping his eyes on the road and his hands on the wheel," Gwilym answers promptly. "No man's an island, Loki, no man's son."

     "They both have a problem with doing. One is doing well, but thinks he does not do enough. The other does too much and thinks that everything he does is suspect. So... through doing... they will learn. You were right in throwing them together. The future Oak King must know the ways of the Holly King if he is to take his position."

     "Tss," Davydd whispers, "..you're going to burn a hole in my fancy rugs with that temper. Go get some air. Fetch Ani," Davydd pats him on the shoulder. "Tell him it's time for supper."

     "You know," Gwilym tells you, his face upside-down relative to yours at the angle he's bending, "this isn't satori you're building for yourself. It's not even a very good escape, is it? It doesn't defend y' from feeling a damned thing."

     Gwilym smiles again, and he stands straight, moving to your side of the table, moving towards the corner behind you, looking over his shoulder and down at you. "So. Now what, Loki, no man's son?"

     "...I think we can ...work around one another. I will be sensitive to what you need with Loki. And... I will just... work around it. Whatever it may be or mean." Balthazar smirks, his hands returning to his pockets. "It's just rock and roll, uncle."

     "I am glad we talked. We will continue to talk, oes?" And now he is the one with a hand on Bran's shoulder. "I am sorry, Bran, for the exile. It was wrong of me." He lightly pats Bran's shoulders and turns, leaving a stunned Bran in his wake.

     "I had no idea that they were," he frowns deeply, "... set against us. I do not like being treated as a criminal. What have I done but give my life for their kingdom?"

     He sets the empty glass aside. "And you still have not said who this person is, this project and this catalyst. Does our... intersection have a name?"

     This news is to tidbits what the Hope Diamond is to rocks...

     Okay. So this isn't precisely what usually happens. But the principle is the same. Candy, strangers, see "Do not take" and go from there.

     "My father would kill me if he knew I were taking rides from strange men I met in clubs," Loki says, either oblivious to any potential innuendo in what he said or prepared to pretend he is. "Let's take your bike, save the cash for the good drinks."

     "...You exist," Aeron posits philosophically, "...merely because we think you do, and thus in your reactions," he glances back to the healed wardrobe, "...do you find solidity. You are the shadow of the shadow, brother."

     "I have never closed my door to you. It has always remained politely ajar," Iowerth notes. He speaks his own truth. "You're my brother. It isn't so much a door as it is a curtain."

     It has been a hell of a three-day night. Three dog night? Whatever it was. Gwilym stirs, body as close to entirely limp as it is possible.

     Ravens and years both fly, and flocks like months have ticked across the sky of time. You are king of ever growing territories, hillocks and mounds, meadows of former chaotic and corrupted earth, now transformed to the renewal that the Holly King brings, always with the sacrifice of blood and toil.

     "You've made a right mess of a perfectly evil tower," Aeron says, leaning back with his hands propping him upon on the stone.

     "When do you get started? Right after Yule? Father Christmas Strikes Back?" Davydd cackles at that and reaches for his whisky. That was so good, he has to drink to it.

     "Brawd." He rises and he takes a look at you. You, Your Majesty. He felt the crowning.

     It is the dead of winter. I am coming closer to you, and already, I miss you. And already, it is a distant ache. Am I detaching to protect myself, I wonder? Or is this ... another machination of fate...

     "Come with me," the Holly King tells you, wine running like blood down through his hair and dripping from his mouth. "I will guide you and show you the way."

     "... I have chained my every dancing atom into a divine seat in the Beloved's Tavern. What I have learned... I am so eager to share..."

     "No matter the temptation," Gwilym murmurs, "I do not want to hurt you, Prospero. Or us. I try to funnel my temptations into what you will not be harmed by, even if exasperation might occasionally make your eyebrows lift at me."

     "You have no idea how brightly you shine. How ...tempting your energy is. How to tame it, for an instant, is one of my greatest pleasures and delights. You are like holding lighting. Like putting one's head in the tiger's mouth."

     Hope you allow yourself the odd bit of happiness, even though it's scary. That's all I want for anybody. I just want everyone to be happy. I must be the biggest masochist of all.

     A moment's pause is all there is. I'm not trying to make you feel guilty. I understand your part of the argument. I can understand his regret. I ...appreciate it more... what he was going through, or I imagine he was going through, when we were young.

     "...In either case, we should take our fates into our hands, make our choice, and deal with it. His hatred is not an inevitability."

     Here stand two kindred spirits, bound by family, blood, bad habits and emotion. But though they speak the same language, and though they stand not ten feet apart, there's a chasm between them, these men, neither of them a bridge-builder.

     Rhodri clasps his son's arm and then draws him in for a hug. "It's good to see you, boyo," he murmurs. "You look ..." balanced, he finishes beneath your skin. Your father's smile hangs at the corners of his lips and in the emerald of his eyes.

     "Now," he murmurs in reply, "...you have a tiger who walks alongside you. In the shadows, you walked by yourself, and at first you were startled at the sound of my approach, an unexpected thing in your world."

     "But," he exhales, a smirk trailing after his breath. "I cannot sit here while he is possibly bleeding somewhere, can I? So I will stay in the royal palace and demand special treatment from mother. It won't be a completely wasted endeavor."

     While his steps are definitely in shadow of the prince's more blazing trail, Prospero does not seem to be in a hurry. His motions are purposeful, carrying him forward, propelling him after you. Two quarters of the orange are eaten, and the citrus scents hover around him in his stroll.

     I could cheat. I could cheat so well that I could rob you blind and you would never know it. I have diced with such devils and won, kept my skin and bones intact and lined my purse with money not only from rascals but from reprobates.

     "Consider this your invitation," he says after a moment. "When you're ready to join me out here," his gaze trails across to the wide horizon of Infinity, "...you will. When you are meant to. It will be good... not to walk the shadows alone."

     "My life has been one drama after another, like I've turned into a stage and I've got Shakespeare on my back and Plautus up my ass."

     "My phone rang all night. Fairies, vampires, wolves, shivering nuns -- you name it, they rang me."

     "It's a good deal more goddamned interesting than cricket..."

     When they shake hands, it is like the Captain of All the Ships of the World shaking the hand of the Pirate King...

     Iowerth looks to the heavens and shakes his head at himself. You are so stupid. How can someone so smart be so dumb? Shall I be doomed to my heredity? Really?

     The body disappears, pulled into the darkness by loyal hands, and Iovis Macarelli strides away from his evening's correspondence.

     It was good that they removed themselves. The energy was stifling between them, despite their good intentions. What they needed, what they always need to clear the air, was a battle.

     "...One night, one day maybe you will look up and you will understand why. For now... just... believe it."

     "Well, I have a heart like a raisin. A prune. But... I will tell you something," he whispers now. "When I am with you, I can feel it growing plump again with blood, Gwilym. I can almost feel it beat again, like it did when I was young. And alive."

     "I feel like Jove," he says, his gaze going up and down and over you again. "I am the boss, yes? Tonight, Jupiter was challenged. So I had to fight. Sometimes, amice, we have to fight like the dogs we are, to see who is the boss. And you know who that is? Me, that is who!"

     I hear it in you, amice. I hear the drums of a ritual. The bacchanal, orgies beyond human comprehension. They twist in your gut. You want to lose yourself, you want to find yourself, you are afraid of who you will find there in the dark, are you not? Not me, no. But you.

     "Would I be happier in knowledge or ignorance? Let's ask Adam, shall we? I believe that is the quintessential question of the universe, my brother. For now, give me the illusion of ignorance. If you are still seeing him in a year, then... come confess, my door will be open for you as always."

     Amice, my heart is like a fig left to dry in the sun. It is shriveled and small. You could serve it like pesto on a cracker, it is nothing. Flavorful but then gone in an instant. And yet, in it is pumping new blood, humming with the power that is in your blood. I feel something. I do not know what it is. But I feel it like pleasure and I feel it like pain. It is a confusion, a puzzle. What is it, what is it -- it beats with that question.

     "You are in my blood," he groans, "... like Caravaggio's disease. You burn there, and I find no rest from my want, amice."

     Havoc's son rushes at you, its various mouths clamping. It lets loose gargling strangles, like someone choking on blood. Its breath is worse than even Iovis can describe. It smells of chaos, fear, and disorganized guts.

     Now you see it. Now you don't. He is a veritable illusionist in the exchange, the sleight of hand and redirection covering the slide of the envelope into the inside of his coat.

     A guitar pick rolls and flips, finger to finger, leaping, effortlessly leaping, faster. And faster. It is a blur of motion, faster and faster until it becomes a streak of red and blue hovering above his hand like an aura. The pick, a guitar. Are you playing me, shadow-lord?

     The alley's darkness surrounds him until he dissolves in it, a glance given in the direction he believes you to be. And he slips away with a taunting chuckle. You want me? Catch me. Kill me. Thrill me. Iovis Macarelli steps into the Void.

     He moves faster than any human. So fast, that human eyes would catch only one motion in five -- and this is all without breaking into a run. He is simply walking but at the speed of shadow...

     There is something on the air that runs from him to you. Without calling you by name, it invites you. Charisma backed with something else, indefinable.

     "No whining on the astral plane," comes the intonation of his voice. Rhodri looks at you, cocking up an eyebrow. He saves whatever other commentary he may have for later. "What are you drinking?"

     Putting the hearth's poker back in its stand, Iowerth turns to you. "It is an outer cold," he assures. "Winter is a season for contemplation."

     Iowerth smirks. "Worried, Distressed and Confused." His eyebrows arch up and he exhales. It does sort of suit him at the moment...

     Until the time that this island teams with life, you and I will have the full freedom we deserve. And once the crowds begin to press, then my brother...you and I will simply have to... put our heads together and devise other solutions. I have no fear... for we are clever...

     From the labyrinths of London's shadows to those that exist Between Places, leading lastly to Otherworldly covers of darkness, I began to walk.

     Gwilym rolls his eyes, his hands lifting to scrub at his face. "He looked ... almost Arabic, or Greek, or - something. But not quite. And I looked at him, because he was looking at me, and he didn't look away when he saw me looking at him. And his eyes reached out and hit me. And oes... oes, my ears are still ringing..."

     But what's he to do? Force his way in? Reveal the forbidden relationship out of jealousy? That is not his way. You wanted to be with your General, he understands that. And your General wants you -- he can very much sympathize.

     "She offered me a game of chance. If I won, she would grant to me access to a realm beyond my imagining; if she won, she would get me to do with as she saw fit, her slave forever. My soul, essentially. And we played at dice."

     To defeat the darkness, one strikes a light. The poisonous shadows swimming in his blood cannot bear such light; purity is the enemy of poison. Gwilym cannot see, cannot sense it; cannot hear the howls of terror, defiance and finally, defeat as that light shreds away at the dark.

     I am your Star, oes? And maybe, just maybe that is part of the problem, Io. Your boy ... you made him your chamberlain, your seneschal. But what is he to you, in that sense? It isn't enough to love, sometimes. Sometimes, it needs to be given a name.

     As you napped, your father stood over you smiling a moment. You look like you've worked hard. You've at least worked hard at looking like you worked hard (he knows the well from which you sprang).

     "No no, Gwi, you're working too hard," Iowerth drolls low and wry, "...you should slow down, brawd, before you pull something."

     It has almost been a temptation to ask you to meet me on the material plane, brawd. Back at the apartment over Black Jack Davy's. But just as our mother now is reluctant to come here, so I am reluctant to go there; the noise I have in my head, I do not know if it will come back or not. And with you...

     I do not know how to define it, nor myself in reaction...

     So goes the dictation on a busy, busy night. At the borders of the corrupted kingdom lies a great and untamed wilderness. No kingdoms or queendoms hold sway here, but the loose confederation of subjugated villages, villages that now suddenly find themselves free of their dark burden.

     "Your mother has commanded a battle tonight," he begins, no time for endearments or blandishments now. Ramanthus outspreads his arms, his legs also as he stands. "We are raiding the corrupted kingdom of Winter Diamonds. In a matter of hours."

     "... You call the shadows to you, pluck them like strings, and play a tune -- whatever is to your liking. Will you one night cloak yourself thusly and become invisible to all?" He smiles a little, quizzically. Not confused by your gifts but so curious.

     Duw... I want and I want, and I go on wanting. Io, if ever I could hate you for falling for a man, now's the time. What would you think, to see me here, to know what thoughts are going through my mind? I don't dare put them into words, not even to myself.

     "...You? Completely different. Sleight of hand, hide the heart. You have the concerns and the questions of a master spy. The Thief King. Your brother is the drowning waters that fill the lungs. He daily seeks to avoid drowning. Himself. Others. You..." He narrows his eyes in studying you. "I believe you are in danger of making yourself a figment of everyone's imagination. Including your own."

     "You are important to me, Io," he says quietly. "Y' are, oes? But ... I need to learn this, this thing. You - are going to go off in other directions. I've been ... using you for balance, all my life. And now ..." You have gone off in another direction. And my equilibrium is suffering.

     The metallic steel crash of strings rattles through the amplifier in the flat above Black Jack Davy's. It's an hour past noon and Iowerth and his ... companion ... are out for the day. Gwilym Gwyn Garu is taking advantage of the opportunity to break the silence in a noisy fucker sort of way.

     He crosses to one of the other tables, sitting on the edge of it, letting his legs swing. "I'm scouting for an apartment over one of the little clubs. Music in the evening, cheap vodka, easy women - all the things mother'd warn me against. I don't plan on avoiding you, Io, I just ... I don't know. I have - things to figure out."

     I'm lost, and I don't know how to find myself again...

     Drink ... I need a drink. My head aches, and my mouth is dry - a hangover of the soul. I am restless. I hope someone attacks me tonight; I could use a good fight.

     His hand had already fallen away. If it hadn't, it would now. You receive an astonished green-eyed stare. He doesn't move; not even to drop his jaw. You're kidding, right?

     For all his droll humor and his reserve, even his stubbornness (and he's most stubborn about the topic of love and all you have had to say. It'll take a while to sink in. Like father, like son. Poor boy), he comes to you with a look and he bends to give you a hug and a kiss. "I'll keep my eyes on him," a nod back to Gwilym. "I am my brother's keeper..."

     "I... treaty with older women," your twin continues, "... but they're not icy fingered death maidens sittin' in a dark room with cowls," he inherited this ability to rant and rave from his father, "...you must be mental..."

     Now, the corgi is rigged to the contraption just like a horse would be, and he trots as proudly as if he were the queen's own prized arabian, decked out in Christmas (alright, Yule bells) and grinning madly.

     It is the kingdoms of fairy and dreams dotting the Imaginary Landscape, with the dark oceans of future dreams dotted with heavenly stars and creatures. There, the plains of chaos, roiling midnight blue clouds of Unknown Possibilities -- both Good and Evil -- both unformed and waiting for God... or the dreams of Man... to shape them.