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"I grew up a warrior, fighting for the glory of the Goths. But a man cannot fight his whole life, so when I was the old age of 19, I married another." He reached his arm towards the ceiling, his ring catching what faint light there was as he stared at it. He could still remember that day, but it seemed like his memories were of an onlooker, watching a man named Hathus get married to the prettiest girl of the city, his tempered Ado. "Adosinda and I lived together, as any warrior and wife could be, but we barely lasted the year before I was captured and enslaved." He paused, the ring no longer holding its luster to him and he dropped his arm back down to his side before his head turned to face Angel, looking up at her.
"For two years I was forced to do the labour others, until the day of my changing at the hands of two gentlemen from the Blood Dragons: mind you, this was before their reformation, so they were not as disgusting as when I brought you to them." He paused, a small smile coming to his lips as he remembered all of the training, the bonding, the friendship. "Thing was, I knew I had to go back home, find Ado. But after 5 years..." Garth paused, a sigh escaping his lips. "She had given herself to another, and I returned to the Orient alone and as Garth."
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But how would she comfort him? Intimate contact? Wouldn't that simply offend him and make her seem uncaring of his previous relationship of which he still seemed attached?
She sighed as she flitted, placing his head within her lap as he often did with her. Her manicured nails ran through his hair and gently traced figures over his flesh as she hummed, thinking of what to say. “I would love to give you advice...But I don't know how. I still can't even face my own demons, so I am in no position to advise another on how to face theirs. But I will say this.” She looked down at him, gently holding his face between her hands. “Whatever you need, you need only speak the words.” She leaned down and placed a kiss on his forehead before sitting back up and humming as her fingers played an invisible piano on his cheeks.
"I wish I could say that was the end of my troubles, but I must confess it is not." He looked sideways some, averting his gaze as he spoke. "When I was roughly 400 years of age, I thought I would be able to make it on my own without a coven, so I left to explore: only to realize that being alone was the worst experience of my life." An involuntary shudder ran through his body as he turned his gaze back. "Without a purpose, I was useless, clinging onto my bleak existence: until I met her. An extravegant, beautiful vampire of power drew me in, one that I..." This time, he couldn't bare to look at Angel without feeling horrible. "Hindsight allows me to realize my stupidity, but at the time, I didn't care who I was with, just that it was with somebody. So I ended up in a relationship with Aphrodite."
Garth gave a pause involuntarily before continuing. "She left me without a trace when it became apparent that I would not Fall for her. So I was left alone again, and returned to the Coven; once again, broken and without purpose." He slowly looked back at Angel with a look of sadness tinting his face. "300 years later, I was forced to kill the Coven leader, as he had Fallen - and the Blood Dragons were reformed." A ragged sigh escaped his lips.
"There was no home left for me there, so I left without hope of life. Until I stumbled through a forest in Sicily."
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Her fingers went back to running through his hair and massaging his scalp as he continued before she offered a soft and bashful smile like a shy child. “And I...became your new purpose?” It felt good. To know that he needed her. She never knew that before and to know now that he cared that much made her absolutely glow with joy. Though, she couldn't help but feel for a fleeting moment a pang of..hurt? The other women he had actually had relationships with. It did not help that there were few times when he had flirted with Delilah. It didn't bode well for the confusing feelings that made a knot in her chest.
A pause settled its way into the conversation accidentally, and Garth let it sink in for a bit. "After a while, you stopped relying on me for protection and began to explore, and he... well, Fell. So even though you were still there, I was losing my purpose to protect you, even though I knew I would never stop. I needed a Leader to protect, a sense of duty again just like back in my days in the Orient. The rest you know." Garth looked back up at her, barely bothering to decipher her emotions and just content on looking up at her. "I became the Protector of an Egyptian, you became an Enforcer, things went somewhat south and we left." Garth gave a sigh, and looked back into her eyes.
"Now you know my story: why I own a villa in Toulouse, why this ring is on my finger still. I cannot forget the past, but I hope not to be ruled by it."
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She whispered softly, her grasp lightening some before she flitted away to the dresser, staring into the mirror. Here she was, over five hundred years old. Yet she clung to her Maker as a child to a father over nightmares. She knew she would never feel that pain at the hands of another man again. Yet her fear remained pathological.
She then flitted back to her spot, holding his head in her lap once more. “Oh...I'm sorry we couldn't feed earlier.” She sensed that the subject wasn't exactly like talking about the weather and she was quick to change it. Hunger was usually a rather easy topic.
"You're changing the subject." He wasn't being condescending, witty or snarky; just realizing what she was doing. "Don't apologize - we are in a hotel, food is everywhere." His eyes were still closed as he spoke, the tension still leaving his body somewhat until he reached a stage between rigid and relaxed. Garth could never achieve true relaxation in any form, regardless of what he did or tried. Even meditation was often interrupted by his protective instincts.
Speaking of which, were kicking in right now. Garth finally opened his eyes to stare at his little huntress, the only emotion conveyed in his eyes concern. "Nightmares again?" Again, Garth left out all forms of tones that could change his words into something they weren't, and stuck with a more monotonous/concerned tone. It just worked a lot better for him when people knew exactly what he wanted. Granted, he rarely spoke with others that weren't Angel.
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Though her fact about there being more whores was probably an embellished realization, he couldn't ignore her point. Garth also noted that she spoke of 'people like us', which slightly confused him. Were they the 'us' or was that vampires in general? He didn't pry, just answered the question.
"We live; find our purpose for existing in this world. Once found, eternity doesn't seem so long." He mused, his eyes meeting hers. Garth suppressed a random dispatch of feelings that were directed at his heart and head, confused as to what he would be feeling at the moment. "The only difference between us and humans is our perception of time." Truly though, that was how Garth saw it. Garth had always seen vampirism as just elongated humanism, as both vampires and humans needed the same things: they felt the same when rejected, cringed at their past life and dread their future. Vampires simply had eons to do so.
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She suddenly felt...empty. She realized that she wasn't really doing anything with her life. Honestly, all she did was run and work on her arts. Her barely tanned features creased with a frown as she tried to figure out just one thing that made her feel useful. The only time she felt useful was when she was bringing Garth sustenance. She genuinely only wanted to make him happy. That's when she felt the most useful.
So in Angel's statement, his protective instinct was just getting warmed up as she frowned in what looked like thought. Garth knew that it was now his time to act, so he looked up at her with his concerned eyes once more, and spoke. "Be content, my little huntress. One's purpose is rarely found through search; if you have to look, it is already in front of you." Garth spoke only the truth as he had seen from his own experiences with uselessness. Once he started searching for his purpose, it lead him across the continent in anguish, hooked him up with Aphrodite only to be dropped months later, and returned back to where he started. It was only when he returned that Garth realized that he simply wanted to be back at his coven being a Protector, and his entire 'life search' had been in vain.
Thing was, Garth knew that if she asked to leave his presence to find her own purpose, he would be powerless to stop her own wishes, regardless of how it would be letting his own purpose walk right out the door.
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"In truth, I have no idea how I suppressed it." Garth opened his eyes to look at Angel with a slight sympathetic look, understanding her predicament. "Unlike you, I clung to whoever I could to survive through those years, regardless of who it was." He looked away from her for a bit to speak in a soft voice. "You are stronger than I if you have been able to cope for so long."
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A frown etched itself into her expression as she could not define what it was. Not for the life of her.
Regardless of his own trivial thoughts on the matter, Garth was trying to figure out a way to soothe his little huntress. So far, he had just driven her into a chasm of thought, confusion and indecision: all three characteristics of the man he never wanted to be. So Garth solidified his mind into one thought process, in the hopes of helping to find her answer.
"Do not rely on the mind to solve a problem of the body, little one." Garth reached up to her face and grasped her chin from below, tilting it towards himself before running his own hand through her hair. "The solution is to think with your instincts; it is how I have made every decision of my life, changing you being one of them." He gave a small smile before letting his arm fall. "I have yet to regret such decisions."
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She sighed, her head again tilting into his rough hand as his fingers sifted through her chocolate locks. Her blue eyes closed as the frown disappeared and was replaced with an apathetic expression. She shifted her body and lay his head down gently, snatching up a pillow and setting it under his head before laying down next to him. She shouldn't feel any pain in her gut, but she did. She felt like she had the time Garth punched her through a redwood during training. Her head ached now and she let out a soft hiss of discomfort.
The other two times were with two separate vampires: Aphrodite and Angel herself. With Aphrodite, the feelings only surfaced a week before she left, when he thought himself smitten with her. With Angel, Garth only remembered a flicker of said emotion when she left him to explore, fearing for her safety.
He turned his body on it's side, bringing himself closer to her and facing her completely, before he spoke in a soft voice. "I know not of a cure, my little huntress: but what I can offer, I will gladly give to see you happy."
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She muttered to herself before rolling over onto her stomach and burying her face into the pillow. Did she really just say that? Why the hell would she say that? Was that the hole she felt? An unrequited attraction to her Maker? All logic pointed to yes; She was jealous when other women showed him affection, she didn't like him showing other women affection or flirting, and she always preferred being with just him. It wasn't a far fetched theory. He was the only one who made her smile and laugh and talk. He saved her and stood by her for centuries.
But the thought of him picking up what she was putting down but not feeling the same...It hurt. “I need a bath.” She had stood quickly and left him there, flitting into the bathroom where she closed the door and quickly began to fill the large tub with hot water and bubbles before ditching her shirt and shorts to slide in.
Does... she feel this unrequited love... is targeted at me? The idea sounded prepostorous to him: Angel was always one to be able to stick it out on her own, be independent. In his initial dismissal, GArth thought that maybe she was loving another man, but he didn't love her back. That would have set off a spark in him that would have beaten said man into a pulp, and yet Garth knew that his thoughts were fiction: the only other man she had ever taken a liking to was her Brother, and he was gone.
The real question, however, was simple: did HE love her? Garth stared at the ceiling, his thoughts jumbled. Ever since Aphrodite and Adosinda, love was a concept that he believed to be a weakness. His flirting with Delilah was for companionship and comraderie, and mostly because at the time, his concept of love was a protective love, which is what he gave her. Yet with Angel, his emotional value had always been a little more skew. He spoke more with her than most, breaking that stoic nature he normally had. He would go out of his way at times to see her happy, even if it meant his own happiness was squandered. His urge to protect her was even strong enough for him to ditch covens to see her safe. Was that love? Garth was unsure.
What he did know was that if Angel did love him and it was one sided, then he was creating a hole in her heart that wouldn't be filled for years. He would fail as her protector, and ultimately as her mentor. Failing her was what he feared most: so did that mean he loved her? Garth knew not, but he got out of the bed and leaned beside the door to the bathroom, his thoughts wandering.
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She was quiet on their way up to their room, restraining herself from running and jumping onto the bed. It had been ages since she last slept on a real bed. The room she looked into now was large and beautiful. And apparently expensive. There was silk! She didn't know if she would ever want to leave her bed!
But, even more enticing was the steam rising from the hot bath. There was a small rack from which an array of lovely fragrances arose and tempted her. It really didn't take her but a millisecond to lose her clothes and slip into the wooden bath. She squealed in delight, sinking in until her nose was just above the water level. She reached out and snatched up multiple vials of perfumed soaps and bubble makers, trying to decide which was her favorite. Which happened to tie between apple spice and warm vanilla.
She put the others back and poured in the warm vanilla before drowning her own self in the apple spice. She was like a child, laughing and splashing and twisting and turning in the water until nothing but bubbles could be seen. She finally stopped and glanced over to Garth as he announced he would buy her new clothes. “Niente scarpe. Non come loro. Non hanno bisogno di loro.” She huffed, before her expression grew softer. “E ... grazie. Per me in difesa. Ma io non sono un bambino, quindi non ti preoccupare bella testa sulla mia costante benessere. Posso prendermi cura di me stessa.” She grinned at him. È per questo che hai scelto me, ricordi?” She gave a light wink before resuming her frolicking about.
She smiled, lifting herself from the water, but still sitting in it. She rested her head against the wall behind her, opening her eyes again. “I know you're right there...” She whispered softly. “I apologize...I had no right to speak that way to you...”
"Do not apologize: I told you that I would always listen." He gave a slight exhale before staring up at the ceiling. "Love is a fickle emotion, little one; I cannot ever hope to understand it. However, I do know that without taking risks, there is no reward. The potential of something is only a figment of imagination until it is placed into action." Another pause was thrown into the mix. "In a book, if one is too scared to read the ending, then they should not read the book, and forget it ever existed."
Garth cocked his head, his philosophical and methodical outburst surprising him as it gladly drained out of his mind. "Simply put, sometimes the pay off is worth the risk." His voice was oddly quiet at the end, lower than the whisper that he had given before. Garth had to say that it was quite peculiar: was he insinuating that she should just confront said person? A pang of regret ran through him as he started to second guess himself. What if she took his advice, told this man that was causing her grief, and left him completely? Was that what he wanted? Of course not! So why did he give such advice if it could possibly lead to another 300 years of loneliness?
All Garth could come up with was because he cared enough about Angel to give her his honest opinion. That was it.
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Time to scrub the mission.
Angel appeared in front of him, staring straight into his eyes before touching his cheek, only to rush into bed and hole herself in. It was as if the pieces were slowly becoming noticeable, and Garth turned to stare at the wall before muttering a word below his breath.
"Fuck."
Garth was one to rarely swear in English, let alone most languages, but the pieces just came together in a horrible way. Garth finally saw it from her perspective, and the realization that she held love for him hurt. It certainly didn't help that it also meant that Garth had directly failed as her Protector, as he did not keep her safe from the emotional pain that she may have been feeling.
Sauntering over to the bed, Garth lay down for only a few seconds, before getting back out. Regardless of whether or not she was asleep, he moved to the door and exited it, making sure the 'do not disturb' sign was hanging on the knob. For the next 20 minutes, Garth simply looked for a room that contained an able target; yet he found none that were to his interest. It certainly didn't help that his hunger was fleeting today. Garth soon returned, and lay down on the bed to stare at the ceiling. As it was always, sleep never came.
"No."
That was all he said before moving his body upwards, getting right beside Vani, and wrapping his arms around her to pull her close. He rarely hugged people, as he found the intimate contact to be quite odd and impractical - not to mention, gave off an emotional vibe. Right now, however, it seemed highly appropriate. "Never apologize for my naivety, little one. I told you to tell me everything, and you did: even if your blunt tone wasn't enough."
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