forum Immortality is a curse//Private with Magician//

Started February 19, 2021 by @gracehustle

tune

“I’m sorry, what was that?” Marcus asked, cupping his hand around his ear. “It’s rude to whisper you know, why don’t you share with the rest of us?”
Andre stared at Caligo as if he were watching a puppy being slaughtered. His heart rose to his throat while his stomach dropped to his toes, and despite the wide spread of food being set on the table, he no longer felt like eating.

Last time Andre had seen Caligo, he had promised himself that would be the last time the two of them were in that much trouble. He kept telling himself that it was safer for them to part ways, no matter how much it hurt him to leave her behind. Now she was here he could only assume that Marcus meant for the two of them to work together—but in what way would he use them?

Marcus raised a brow as he looked up at Andre out of the corner of his eye. “Well it seems like someone has missed you, Caligo.”

Caligo shook her head though her eyes never left Andre. No matter how much she wanted to think that it wasn't him, there was no denying that it really was.

"No." Her voice was louder as she spoke, finally tearing her eyes away from the other immortal as she looked towards her master. "I can't-I need to leave…Please. Do what you want to punish me…but I can't be here with him." Panic laced her words, panic that she was still untangling in her mind.

She wanted to cry and scream, run to Andre and run away from him. She hadn't seen him in hundreds of years, but the loneliness had gotten comforting. Seeing any of the Immortals, especially him, was tearing apart the lies she told herself about her past. It brought up memories she didn't want to unpack, especially not over dinner around Andre and Marcus. Not if the most recent ones involved Andre leaving without hesitation or reason.

Caligo's hands trembled as she waited for an answer, her heartbeat speeding up as she glanced between Andre and Marcus, unsure of who to watch closer. Both were watching her, and it was just adding to her panic.

“Permission to leave?” Andre asked Marcus, although he wasn’t really looking for permission. He was already bracing himself to get up and go.
“If you must, but Caligo must stay here.” The man waved him off dismissively. “I suppose you can eat later.”
Andre marched out of the hall, closing the door behind him. Despite feeling like he was about to throw up, and that the floor was slipping out from under his feet, he leaned against the closed door to listen in on the conversation as much as he could.

Marcus sighed as he stared at the woman across from him, tapping his fingertips on the tablecloth. “Now why would you have a reaction like that? Andre hasn’t told me much, if anything, about his past with you but it must have been bad if you started freaking out like that.”

She watched with full focus as Andre left the room, and yet, she didn't feel any different once he was gone. Her heartbeat was still high, and she still felt like she wanted to cry, but at least Andre was out of the room. She sighed heavily, forcing herself to walk towards the table.

"It's…our past is complicated," Caligo stated, pulling out a chair and sitting down before her legs crumpled beneath her, "It's best to leave it at that."

She closed her eyes, dropping her head in her hands while her mind reeled. Why was he here? She knew it had been years since she had seen him, but it was still too soon. Her stomached twisted and growled while she sat there, adding to the unease she felt.

The last thing she wanted was to tell their past, but it was going to come up, with or without her compliance. Marcus didn't seem to know anything, she could only assume Andre truly hadn't told him anything. It was good to know that. Even if he had abandoned her when she was so close to breaking, and even if he had stolen all hope of freedom from her captors, he still had standards for privacy. Lovely.

Andre had been the last Immortal she had seen in three-hundred years. She had run across him during the revolution, when he was on the side of the rebel's, and she had been enslaved by the English. It was a point in her existence when she truly didn't want to exist, and she had begged him to help her. Being himself, he did help a little, but when she asked for help to run away, he drew a line in the dirt. Getting her out was an impossible task, and he realized it would ruin everything he was helping fight for. So he left her, believing she would find a way out without him, claiming she was strong enough to break free. Yet she didn't. And it broke her.

"What has he told you about our past?"

“From what he has told me that I know involved you specifically, he walked away when he knew you needed him the most. He didn’t say why, although the look in his eyes spoke more than his words.” Marcus stated, staring pointedly at the woman. “Of all that I had him tell me, his facial expression and tone changed only when he mentioned you. He tried to shut himself down when I pressed on so in the end all I have been able to confirm is that yourself and he have a bad past together—a very small point in the large map of things I have come to assume.”

She grimaced and nodded not daring to meet Marcus' eyes, "Our past hasn't been all bad…but I'm not over what he did. It's not the first time, and I'm far from perfect either." Caligo picked at the seam of her shirt, finally meeting his eyes, "If it's possible, I want to eat at a separate time from him. At the very least don't force me to interact with him." Even in her bad physical state, it seemed she still had some desire to speak up for herself, even if it seemed that she would follow what she was told no matter if it violated what she wanted or not.

There were many more things she wanted to say, but she held her tongue. Going into their past would make her cry, and she knew asking to stay away from Andre would be impossible. It was clear even to her that if he had both Life and Death in his hands, Marcus was planning something with both of them.

Marcus’ lips twisted in frustration for a moment before he nodded. “I suppose I can allow that. On one condition— my sister is coming to visit, I want you to be her handmaid during her time here.”

Loud sirens rang in Andre’s mind almost instantly. Marcus’ sister wasn’t a very nice woman, if anything she was worse than her brother in more than a few ways. Caligo was going to be worked to the bone while Andre’s services seemed like a dream in comparison.

"Deal."

Caligo agreed without hesitation. If all she had to do was work as a handmaiden in exchange for what she asked, she was being handed a deal on a silver platter. His sister couldn't work her that hard. And even if she did, she was a god, she could handle it. "How long is she here for?" She guessed the woman would be here for a few days, maybe a week at most. Anything longer than that seemed improbable. Caligo's eyes ran over the table of food while she waited for an answer, her appetite reappearing as things seemed to go better.