The Sigh Of Things (25)   This desert sun, a hot beast mad with beating, did always seek a softer shaft, did always sigh to find the sea… What best becomes an enticement? Is it the surrounding, like the black velvet cloth on which a jeweler lays his wares; a diamond glittering, a ruby resplendent, an emerald greener for its contrast to the soft, dark bed at its back? Did one buy the stone for its display? Because she had been displayed. She had been placed in every setting to be found on the grounds of this estate. She had dined by the fountain, read a book by the reflecting pool and wandered somewhat aimlessly down every winding path of the delicately ancient rose garden. Perhaps it was the adornment. These clothes, so elegantly brazen; Helena's sensual silks and gratuitous gauzes that were less the sly wink of an eye than a poke to the ribs with an elbow. A high-end whorishness meant to exude the distinct fragrance of availability. Their style was obvious and obviously not what Regret herself would have chosen to wear. And had it brought him forward? No. Of course not. Four days dangled like a prize before his nose and they had less to show for it than when she'd started. Yet that was four days more for Laura. And four days more for Stefan as well, though how long Helena would continue this caprice remained to be seen. Did she really imagine he would fall like a pig to the rutting given the slightest opportunity? If so, she didn't know this son very well. Or had discounted him altogether and, instead, laid her own impressions over the truth. No matter. The ploy was not hers to refine. She had only to go and wear what she was told in the going. Better today. This white shift, though it fell off the shoulder and threatened to do more, was at least full and allowed for a range of movement. When she reached the short stretch of beach at the cove, she removed the sandals with those hellishly heavy gold coin straps and the day became even more bearable. Helena's advance team had been here, as they had been at every location before - setting the scene, orchestrating the feel, crafting the look of an imminent seduction. And there, she'd even erected a tent! Some harem motif inside, no doubt, strewn with plush satin pillows and caravan rugs. She didn't bother to check. Of the choice between that shameless shelter and a simple towel on the sand, she'd chosen the sand. This is where she would wait. Read. Ruminate. And, if she could, try to relax until the sun came to set on Day Number Five. The power of it though, that sun, still high in the sky and warm on her skin, was a force she hadn't counted on. From the moment she settled to the blanket that heat began to soak into her skin, slowing her blood and calming her heart with its languid, sedative effect. Every stiff muscle melted, every hard ache soothed - even her spirit grew soft beneath it; sluggish and sultry and surprisingly satisfied to rest within this fevered embrace. Sleep, her body begged as that hot caress, coupled with the gentle crash of waves on the shore, lulled her mind to a deep and drowsy stillness. No, she insisted, denying herself the lure of this senseless refuge. She drew up a book and tried to read, but found the light too bright. She turned on her stomach yet that sun still denied her, blinding her to the words on the page. Regret set the reading aside and brought her hand to her brow; the movement requiring more energy than it had just seconds before. Her resistance seemed to be evaporating, drifting away like mist on the idle current of a breeze. She was so tired, so undeniably fatigued by it all. And, almost without realizing it, she lay her head to the towel; determined she would close those eyes for a moment only, a single moment in time, just the one…which was, of course, how all the most dangerous fairy tales began. If you have the dream often enough you will know it is a dream though every softly-slumbering sense tells you no. Oh, they will try to outwit you, these dream-senses. They will try to fool you with the sights and the sounds, the clever little visions of the things you so desperately want to see. Every imaginative trick you own they will use against you. But if it is the same dream, the dream you have had over and over and over again, you will know. You will always know. So when she saw Stefan she knew he wasn't real. She knew he was a dream. And her heart bled for the knowing. He wore his brown suit, then the black, then the white linen shirt she'd given him in Belize. Standing, always standing right in front of her, just out of reach as he turned. The smile, yes. Here, the most precious image of them all; that slender smile he offered and the way his eyes seemed to join in; to advance that welcoming toward her. Regret. He never said it. She never heard it. But her name was on his lips all the same. Why? Why are you crying? As if it were an absurdly misplaced reaction to the dream, again the dream, it was a dream. His expression would change, would become one of doubt, then disdain. And as he slipped away she would think to lift a hand, to call him back. But her arm never once rose from her side. Sometimes, if she held herself motionless at the very center of the illusion, he would return. It happened on occasion. He would appear for an instant in the space of her peripheral vision. And though it took many dreams to learn this, if she did not turn her head he would remain in that place; at an angle where she could almost see him. There were even instances, and this was one, when he would move in behind her. He would close that distance between them until she knew he was at her shoulder, could almost feel his breath at her back, could almost fall and find him there to catch her. He would touch her then, as he was now, lifting his mouth to her ear, leaning close to whisper some word, some important word she knew she had to hear to make sense of it all. A word that was an answer to everything. Then, in a singular twist of time and space, she was in his bed again, in his quarters again, having never heard the word and not caring in the least. She lay on her side, facing away, because this is how it had to be in the dream. This is what it took to stay. This is what it took to feel the back of his hand running down the length of her arm, his touch a chilled grace dancing the distance to her wrist, his fingers weaving between her own to lock them in place, each hand now a captive of the other. This is what it took to feel those cool lips slide beneath her hair, to press against the flesh at the nape of her neck and travel in sudden, soft kisses down the very center of her spine. She would have that. And if she were careful enough, quiescent enough, her actions so painfully deliberate as to be imperceptible enough, she would reach for even more. His kiss would return. It had to rise, had to find her shoulder, the crest of its blade, up and around to the hollow of her ear - his breath a low roar of sound now; she could hear it in the magic of her dream. And as he lifted to retreat, parting from that place to vanish once again into the dark, unfathomable depth of her mind, she chose her moment. Slowly, so very slowly, she tilted her head to the side. If his desire held, if he was still there, if he still wanted her, he would come. And he did. Disbelief at first; a raw astonishment that folded into the feel of his mouth as it fell to cover her own; those lips no longer pressed tight shut - not flat or final like a last, remorseful tribute - but full and febrile and possessed of a palpable greed as they came to take what had always and would always belong to them. She submitted to this avarice willingly, with a true and abiding awe. Her arm lifted to twine his neck, her hand finding its curve for balance as she turned to lay on her back and take what God or the devil or any primitively placable fate had found the mercy to provide. She would not lose him now. She would not lose this kiss. Take every honest conviction, take every cherished treasure she owned, all of it, all of it would be sacrificed on the threshold of this impossibly exquisite dream. And as she made that solemn vow at the altar in her mind his kiss deepened; his tongue slipping not gently through her teeth but confidently. Boldly. As if it were returning home. And she remembered this fire, burning a little brighter now, flaming in a familiar way. This hunger had held her once, this need, this same hand come to brace her jaw as he injected his soul into her mouth and held it there; the breath of him passing like a desert wind through every empty chamber of her damaged heart. This beard grazing the plane of her cheek, that indolent lock of hair falling from his forehead to her own - she could smell the sea on his skin, taste the salt on his lips, hear the ocean in his sigh. The sensory truth of this kiss was astounding, and in every way magnificent enough to gain a gratitude so pure it perched on the verge of tears. Her hand came up in the dream - her palm to his cheek, she thought, because she couldn't see, she couldn't think, she couldn't know anything beyond that sound he was making deep in the cavern of his throat. Here sang his longing, this low keening moan that crept through the fabric of the kiss and compelled her to touch his face; to hold the instrument that could produce such a sensuously resonant lament for her and her alone. And he took that hand in his own, that hand at his face, his fingers slipping down to her wrist where they caught and held…what? What was it there, beneath his hand? Nothing, she told herself, already sparked to an awareness of the end of the dream. Nothing, no, nothing beneath that hand, nothing against the skin, nothing hard and dangerous there. No metal band. No silver shackle. Nothing. Nothing real. Nothing at all. Yet the more she pushed the truth away, the more she lost her footing in the dream. Rising, she was rising now, fast, faster…NO! She clutched at the kiss, pleaded with his lips…no…don't leave me…no…no… And her eyes came open, finally, to the challenge of the day. "Regret," he murmured, pulling away to lift a stray strand of hair from her face. "Stavros. Forgive me." Because she had kissed him and it had been wrong, in so many ways wrong. And he was close, too close to her now, too solid above her on that flat piece of sand. His regard, also, too strong; too intent on her expression and the aspect of every reaction it might inevitably contain. "I…I was…" "Sleeping, I know. I was here," he offered in a tone so carelessly intimate that the part of herself still languid from the dream yearned to fall back into it. And as if he'd read her mind his head bent once more, his gaze fixed and commanding her to look, to see the man whose kiss she'd taken and would take yet again. It shouldn't have been hard to hold his eye as that mouth came to brush against her own. It shouldn't have been difficult to focus on the color or the curve or the shape of a lash as his tongue ran along the cleft of her lips and slipped in-between. It shouldn't have been any trouble at all to maintain that confounding stare of his through this single, meaningless act…and yet it was. Her desire, though bruised by the waking, remained intact just beneath the surface of her skin. She could feel its pulse, its need, the way it chafed and strained to sate this craving and be free. So when she surrendered what was left of her will to close her eyes against him, she understood the weakness he was bound to perceive. She understood what it would mean, what it meant to them both. And for him this was enough. He released her then and rolled to his back, turning his attention to the sky. She could tell by the quality of the light and the angle of the sun that it was still afternoon. And while she couldn't know precisely how long she'd slept, it had been long enough for him to creep on his great cat's paws to her side, to watch her in silence, to select his moment and advance into her dream. That he had taken his brother's place might not be evident to him, yet it could certainly be suspected. If he resented this he didn't show it. He wouldn't, though. And if she resented it? Would he care? Regret threw her arm over her eyes to block the sun. "She's hung me like a plum, I'm afraid." "Yes." And just as she thought he'd said all he intended, his voice came to add, "I'm surprised you've permitted this." "Laura." "Ah," he replied, as if the name answered every question, which Regret was sure for many years it had. "Your mother seems…frantic is the wrong word…" "No. You have a clear sense there. She is quite frantic at the moment, I'm sure. She had a plan. She has a plan no longer." "You've taken it from her, then?" Regret turned her head to peek at him from the shadow of her arm. "My father has taken it from her. And his father, and his father's father before him and on and on back to the point where one wonders if she ever had a plan to begin with." He took a deep breath and turned on his side to face her. "Suffice it to say she should have known." "Should I tell her this? She wants every word, you realize. Every scrap." "And you would hold something back?" He offered her a smile then, wide and white and filled with a kind of reckless amusement. "Any other day, Regret, in any other circumstance we could play at that. I would enjoy it. Would you?" His hand traveled across the blanket between them, his thumb coming to the side of her arm to trace its soft, sun-colored skin. She allowed this, and ignored it as best she could. "I've also been ordered to prevent your issuance of the Summoning. As I don't know what this Summoning is, I must admit she's left me at a distinct disadvantage." "If you have ever wondered where Stefan acquired his habit of withholding information, wonder no more." He eased toward her, close enough to run his hand the full length of that apparently captivating arm. "The Summoning is just what it says. I would call them to me, the heads of every consequent Cassadine family currently alive on the earth. There are, perhaps, sixty. Possibly one or two more." "And they would come?" His touch was distracting. She stole the temptation from him by turning to rest on that arm, but he simply raised his hand to attend to the other. "They must. Once the Summoning is issued they are given three days to respond. Those who do not respond will be killed. Those who do not accept will be killed. Those who do not attend, as you must surely guess by now, will be killed. It is not a choice, Regret." "And who will do all of this killing?" she asked, intrigued by the archaic nature of the custom. "They are called The Prince's Hand," he informed her as his own ventured over the crest of her shoulder to toy with a dangling curl of hair. "A group of men. There may be women now. I can't be certain." "And what if those you've summoned decide to run?" "They will be hunted." He took a breath and began to recite what had obviously been taught to him a long time ago. "Flee and The Hand will find you. Hide and your sons will be crushed in its grip. Go to ground and The Hand will dig your family's grave." Regret weighed the barbaric cruelty of the tradition and found it full with the fear it was meant to inspire. Yet there was more to this. More she would have him explain. She raised her head, seeking his eye for the question. "And what would you summon them to, Stavros? What is it that requires this convocation of Cassadines?" He grinned ruefully, bemused by her choice of words. Yet also, she could see, in some way unsettled by them. "Another question for another day," he said as his fingers pulled away from her skin. She watched as he pushed himself up off the towel. "Come," he ordered, extending a hand to help her rise. "We have plans." The Sigh Of Things (26)   …she'll seed a revolution and weep as it ripens into war. Finally. Yet when she caught them at the corner of her eye her fragile porcelain cup held its course, pressing its journey from the saucer to her mouth without pause. And as the rim tipped to meet her lip, the warm liquid swirling over her tongue, introducing its blend of flavors to her palate, she made no move to turn. Not even a sidelong glance would she spare for the pair she had induced (and so laboriously brought forth) to provide her access to an undertaking that, by all rights, had belonged to her from the start. There was a view, after all. There was an ocean. There were sailing ships drifting across the line of her horizon. There was a soft summer breeze sifting through her hair. There was so much more to the experience of an afternoon tea on this broad stretch of patio than the two figures crossing her lawn; so much more that might have held her attention through the restless anticipation of their approach. That these distractions did not distract was of no matter. They might have. And this was enough to maintain the illusion that they did. "Mother!" he hailed, as if he were pleasantly surprised. Helena turned from the sea with all the reluctance of a tourist turning at last to pay her bill. An arbitrary eye fell to his attire, noting the careless cut of his linen pants and the rippling of muscle visible beneath the weave of his shirt. Her gaze drew down to fix between them, purposefully seizing on the sight of the hands they held. An eyebrow arched with such precision that it forced the girl's embarrassment enough to have her break that tactile connection and fall away from his side. Her son bridled at the loss. Punishment enough for the moment, she judged, as she finally offered her smile. "And I thought you'd forgotten all about me," she announced in a tone of grievous reproach. "Five days, Stavros, and only notes to the servants to fetch you food and replenish your supplies. Now that your stores are sufficiently stocked will you simply sail away? Or have you found some modest amusement to prick that interest your mother no longer excites?" "Regret has come to change," he replied, ignoring her complaints completely. A curt nod of his head and the girl disappeared through the patio doors. His eye trailed after, his voice pitching to a whisper. "We simply must buy her some clothing, Mother. Have you seen what she's been wearing of late? Vulgar is not too strong a word. May I?" Helena granted him permission to join her at the table and worked to bury her pique as he pulled out a chair. "You look well," she allowed. "But?" he prompted, slipping into his seat with a casual ease. Her hand swept an invitation toward the tea and he shook his head, a small smile playing at his lips as he awaited the rest of her assessment. "But what, Stavros?" she replied dryly. "You've made it more than clear to me that my opinions have lost whatever value they once possessed. Why should we waste this precious time of yours with my ridiculously immaterial observations? Surely you have more profitable ways to spend these sunny, summer afternoons than to listen to the pointless prattle of a voice from which you could not derive a single, solitary benefit." She watched that smile fade and was encouraged by its absence. "I am convinced you have everything in hand. Every detail has been seen to, every potential problem addressed. Why, you appear carefree enough to convince the most fretful among us that there is not a worry to be had in the world!" She lifted a spoon to stir her tea and nodded in serene satisfaction. "I knew you were a clever boy. I told them all, I said, 'Watch and you will see. Stavros will be a man with an eye to every contingency. Out of a youth mired in the bog of bad experience will come a man who never makes the same mistake twice.' This is what I told them. And here you are, the very proof of that faith. I could not be more proud of you than I am today." "You could suck the marrow from a martyr's bones and call it a feast, so savage are your tastes. I forget that, Mother. I truly do." She had him growling now, shifting in his seat, bleeding off an air of sourly-tempered truculence. "I've met your challenge," he snarled. "That the means come short to your liking cannot be helped." "The means can be adjusted, my darling. There is still time." The spoon was removed from her tea and set to the saucer carefully. "In fact, I am mystified by your desire to engage your cousin so precipitously. He has had four years, after all. You, on the point of your formal declaration, had a mere four hours as I recall." And the cup drew once again to her lips. "The answer was clear," he declared, a thread of defiance woven into his tone. "Ah, the vision of youth. So sharp and all-encompassing!" Helena set down her tea and produced a rueful smile. "Such was the vision I used to allow your father his way with me on the night Stefan was conceived. I often wonder at the brother I might have produced for you had I resisted those advances just a shade more forcefully. How different might our lives have been? But there are some paths that, once taken, cannot be traveled back." "And this is one." "Oh, surely your foot is not so far down that road? Think, Stavros. Remember what it was to meet Cyrus as we did. Victory was ours, but at what cost? What cost to you, my son? Does your memory hold that time, or must I pull it forth once again like a thorn from my heart?" She paused for a response he would not give, then brought her voice soft and laced it with the anguish of her ancient recollection. "Two days it took to wake you. Two days. I wouldn't eat. I wouldn't sleep. No force could move me from your side. And when, at the last, those eyes opened…well, I thought I might return to a belief in God. My prince had been preserved! The future of our family was secure! My boy would rise like Lazarus from his bed and stride forth to rule The Empire, as was his right." Helena drew her hands from the table, her expression weary of a sudden; as if one pain, an old pain, were once again tormenting her soul. "I don't know who rose from that bed, Stavros. Do you?" She pressed a palm to her chest and began to take measured breaths, as if the air itself were suddenly subject to a ration. "Cecile, she was the first I think. Little Cecile, my maid of chambers. We found her in the cellar, in the dark, her lifeless eyes still wide with fear. Next came Gabrielle, the laundress. What had she done except, perhaps, to have asked after your bedsheets? And Marco. Beautiful, masterful Marco, whose talent in the orchards has become the stuff of island legend. They enshrine his grave at harvest now, did you know?" She watched his gaze move beyond her then, stretching some long distance away. "Three, Stavros. Three before the doctor could arrive with his medicines." "That was a long time ago," he remarked, his voice an echo of what it might have been. "You remember the roses, I know that. The roses in Laura's hair." A lancing pain there, in those eyes, as she called forth his wedding day. "She was mine then; coming as she had in panic the night of your collapse. Skittish as a colt at the door of a burning barn. But I brought her around for the bit. I led her up that grassy aisle and lay those reins in the palm of your hand. You remember a floral adornment. I recall the trouble it took to hide what her groom had become." "A very long time ago," he imparted in a whisper haunted by that old, outcast truth. "Not so long," she disputed, her tone persuasive enough to draw his mind to her purpose. "There is the matter of Stefan's aide, that boy whose neck found its way into your hands. Yes," she soothed as he shot her a glance from beneath a troubled brow. "And if I were to hazard a guess, I would have to say you were in some manner…bothered…by the way he looked at you." "I am a prince. I earned this." Fractious now. She could feel the forces contending within him. But she knew this storm; was accustomed to its winds, its rains, its sudden bursts of thunderous fury. She walked into it unafraid. "You are prince at a price, my love. Cyrus was buried at great expense to us all. Would you pay as much or more to lay Argos to his rest? There are alternatives to the path you've chosen. I would have you entertain them." Helena offered a hand to her son over the length of the table. A wealth of minutes passed before Stavros stretched his arm across, brought his fingers to cover hers and began, ever so slowly, to turn to stone. What was it about this scene that made her pause in the doorway, her breath catching like a hook in the hollow of her throat? Was it the sight of his hand braced over hers with the force of a forged connection that brought this disconcerting tumble of fear? Was it the way this mother's head cocked toward her son, its angle betraying an ascendancy acquired in the handful of minutes she'd been gone? Was it the rigidity of his posture, the way he seemed carved into the landscape; immutable now; dark and dormant at the heart of this perilously potent maternal regard? There was menace in this pairing; an ominous element to their joining that she couldn't dismiss or think far enough beyond to imagine the act of putting one foot further forward, closer to the corruption forming in this soft yellow pool of afternoon sun. As Regret's attention shifted from aspect to aspect of this tortured tableau, she startled to discover his eye upon her. When had that happened? What subtle muscle had moved, of its own accord, to focus on her presence at the threshold of this scene? She found the look distinctly unsettling and wondered at the reason he made no move to rise. Did he truly see her at all? Possibly not. His gaze, as he gave it, appeared to fall flat; inert to its object - as if she were a part of the door itself; its frame, its glass, the canting brass curve of its handle. She was nothing to him in that moment; nothing bright or breathing, sparking with the fire of life. And she could hear her common sense screaming: Now! Now! Grab this chance and run as far and as fast as you can from these nefarious Cassadines! What held her in place, she couldn't say. Perhaps it was the kiss he'd left unpursued, or the way he folded her into his day as if her presence could still be desired. Perhaps it was the respect he'd shown in the aftermath of her ill-conceived plan to liberate Laura. Perhaps it was merely the fact that, given the chance - and he had been given several - he never once slandered his brother or mocked the depth of those affections she possessed, no matter the many proofs given to show they were not returned in kind. These were blessings all and, considering this, it was not so terribly mystifying to find she was inclined to remain with this man; to assist him in this battle; to provide him whatever small support she could. As so she stood - not knowing what else to do - she stood in the frame of that doorway and fastened on to his stare; will to will, strength to strength. Her focus sharpened as she cleared a path through her fear and agitation; her instinctive revulsion for what Helena was doing to her son. Once her mind stilled and her intent came true, she bent to the task of working her way beneath that blindness; as if it were possible to discover where it was he'd imprisoned himself and somehow set him free. Absurd as it seemed, she could feel him there; abandoned just behind those eyes; stalking that barrier and howling for release. Regret answered his forsaken cry the only way she knew how. With all the power she had left in that crumbling ruin she called a heart, she issued forth her own brand of summoning. Stavros, she called as clearly as she could in the body of her silence. Stavros, it is time. Come. It was the wind. It had to be the wind. A full, fresh gust driving up from the sea that rushed across the lawn and swept down the slate of this patio; snapping the canvas of the awnings, billowing the cloth at their table, stirring their clothes and their hair and, just as it blew its last, causing him to blink. And as his vision sought its focus he blinked again. And again. And again. And each time he opened his eyes she was there, standing as she had the moment before; sure and fixed as a truth. Regret saw the recognition dawn as he severed this spell; as he fought through the anesthesia of his mother's mesmerizing words; the fundamental force of this barbaric bond; the ancient curse of her subtly subversive craft. She watched as he awakened, perhaps not to the time or the place but to the fact that he had gone absent from them both; had lost himself to the tidal pull of Helena's rapacious regard. Like a swimmer to the surface, he broke to an awareness so filled with fury and pain and despair that she very nearly turned away - too close would it cut to the bone of his pride to know this had been witnessed. Yet she held those eyes even as she knew he saw her, even as she knew his mother was turning, even as she knew she would somehow come to pay for this wholly unwelcome intrusion. Stavros cut both connections at once, pulling his hand from Helena and his eye from Regret as his head drew down to attend to the matter of rising from his chair. His mother left her abandoned hand where it lay and brought her full attention to the face of the intruder. "We are not finished here," she announced, her tone edged with such venom it caused her victim to take a step back. "Yes, I believe we are," replied her son, skirting the table to cross to Regret. He offered his arm for balance and she took the shallow step down to the slate. "What could you possibly have to do that is more important than this?" Helena derided rhetorically. Her son took that leading question and put it to his use. "First a tour of the yacht, I think. Then a turn on the powerboat." "No," she rejected outright. "That band on her wrist precludes travel beyond a three mile radius. Her life has its limits." Stavros spun on his mother with a smile. "And as you in your eminent wisdom have just seen fit to remind me, I have none. I suggest you factor that fussy fact into your equation. I am not so sure today is the day for killing two birds with a single stone." He left her there without another word, drawing Regret to his side as he made his way off the patio, over the grass and down once again to the cove. He was silent to the launch and throughout the crossing to the great Cassadine yacht. Regret would have paused after boarding - if only to take in the sheer opulence that presented itself to her eye - but he did not stop and she was forced to follow by his continuing grip of her hand. Finally, at the innocuous door of what she imagined was a stateroom, he released that grip and brought his hands to her shoulders. "Forgive me," he said, searching her face with remorse. "I wish I could spare you this. It's a miserable return for your kindness." Her puzzlement seemed to pain him, and he drew her forward to press a kiss to her brow. "I will make this up to you. You have my word." Then, without further adieu, Stavros opened the door and gave her leave to enter. Completely bewildered now, she followed his direction and entered the cabin. She heard him close the door behind her, heard its click as the latch snapped shut. And this was the last noise she heard for what seemed to her an eternity. Not even the sound of her own voice came to register in her mind as that name slipped once again through her lips. "Stefan." The Sigh Of Things (27)   Of a sudden time has weight. Breathe. It was him. And then it was not. But it would be him again she was sure, because her heart won't allow for the change - as eager as it is to drop her like a missing piece back into the puzzle of his life. She must still fit, so he must still be the same enigma, the same conundrum, the same riddle he was when she left. There hadn't been days enough passed in between to alter this man on such a fundamental level. He was the same, felt the same, saw her in the very same way he always had. Just give him a minute. It would come. This was her love speaking, of course. A love that needed him to be what she needed and fast. Breathe. She would choke on the tears she swallowed as she stood beneath that negligent gaze; her throat a constriction of fire; the acidic sizzle of her agony now burning behind her eyes. Her chest grew tight, her ribcage closing in on her lungs - no air there, no air. And she could sense it now. She was on the precipice; the very verge of a rapid cascade of muscles failing to hold their mark. Her chin would begin to tremble, her hand to shake, her knee to lose its lock and give gravity the edge to take her down. And this was her body, of course. A body longing for nothing more than the fall to earth, than the curl to anguish, than the luxury of suffering plain and true until the ache of his absence, even as he stood before her, came to dull. To still. To stop. Or until she died of the pain. Breathe. All was as it should be. As she'd known it would be. This wall he'd thrown up, so familiar by now. Useless to scout for a weakness or some secret niche hidden in the pattern of his stone. He would leave no entrance, and worse, no exit he might use at the sound of an apologetic word, on the thrust of a penitent feeling, for the value of an adequately redemptive act. No one in. No one out. And he would find a home in the loneliness of this. His sufficient singularity. His autonomous totality. His sanctified solitude. It was over, all of it over between them. Consigned to the book of a memory; a page acknowledged as already read, known and left behind. This was her mind, of course. A mind that could process the loss of him, the reason for it, and every sad truth it contained. Yet when his eye fell away it was as if his hands had dropped the strings that held her life aloft. "If you would have a seat." No more a question than it was a request; the words were spoken with all the dismissive informality of an instructor passing out a test. His concentration fixed once again on the labor she had interrupted; these instruments he was laying out on the table, the plugs he was fitting into outlets, the fine felt envelopes he was removing from his bag. She took her steps forward, unnoticed as they were, and pulled out the chair across from his. "Here?" An imperceptible nod as he cleared a working surface between them. His ear, if it caught the croak of that question, came deaf to the injury it held and the way her voice pleaded of its own accord for a single ounce more of his attention. Every attempt at expression would betray her now, she knew. Each sound, each action, each look she would not intend to charge with her need; each feature of her face unconsciously imbued with a hunger for even his most cynical regard - that he meaningfully acknowledge her presence in the room, in the chair, in this moment they shared. His meticulous indifference hurt her more than any weapon he could choose to use against her. And perhaps that was its design. If he had given even this much thought to their meeting which, of course, it seemed suddenly possible he had not. Away. She would turn her mind away. She would focus on the late afternoon sun spilling through the cabin window, its shaft cut by a dozen sharp blades from the bamboo blind controlling that light. She would mark the texture of the raw silk upholstery encasing the small settee and stitched into the cushions of the matching cane chairs. She would examine each of the ebony African carvings set to rest around the room; these graceful beasts of the Dark Continent; the ibex with its backward-curving horns, the giraffe with its long stretch of a neck, the leopard, the rhinoceros, the imposing great ape. She would turn her gaze to the primitive batik mounted on the wall behind him; its boldly-blocked design a savage chant in black and red. She would force herself to ponder the well-traveled history of this décor; the many cultures observed by the calculating cognizance of a Cassadine eye; the world as seen by its would-be conqueror. In a separate part of her brain she contained this intent, this desire to move beyond the pain of the man who was now taking his seat. She wanted and, in many ways, yearned to move past him in this manner. Yet she found she could not. "Sancia works against you." These the only words she had left to tell him; the only gift she could give that he might actually take from her hand. "Your wrist," he ordered, as if he hadn't heard her. His arm came across the table, his fingers curling angrily to call it forth. She gave him the wrist without thinking, mindless of the perfunctory manner in which he received it, twisted it, and pressed it flat to the surface of the cloth. "Are you listening to me, Stefan? Sancia works against you. She is Helena's agent. She has been all along." "And you told this to Stavros, of course," he replied, adjusting the focus of his examining lamp and drawing a jeweler's loupe to his eye. She could feel the heat of his breath as he bent to inspect the seam of her band. "Why would I? Stavros has believed this from the start," she noted, refraining to add that he had been right. "You told him of the shackle, though. The band she wears. The one so similar to this." He wiped the surface of the seam with his thumb and drew a self-standing magnifier into position, adjusting the lens over her wrist. "I told him nothing," she avowed, then stopped short as she registered what he was revealing. "You know, then. You know all of this." She could hear the note of defeat in her tone and felt all the more ridiculous for imagining she possessed any knowledge that might still be of value to him. How many times did it need to be proven that she swam in a current too strong for her skill? That she had long ago fallen beneath those waves? That it was only a matter of time before she sank like the ignorant stone she was to the hard-packed crust of the ocean floor? More times than this, she conceded darkly, retreating to silence as he finished his inspection. He pulled back his sleeve and looked at his watch. "You came here directly? Straight from Helena?" "Yes," she replied, her mind finally snagging on the obvious question. "What are we doing here, Stefan?" "He didn't tell you?" She detected a crass amusement in his tone and refused to rise to the bait. That she would not participate in making herself feel any more obtuse than she already did seemed to irritate him. His answer came clipped. "I've come to remove your band." Regret resisted the instinct to pull her arm from the table and thrust it behind her back. "You can do that?" "It depends. Did Stavros manage to convince our mother to turn her sensor off?" "I don't…" she began, initially believing she had no way to know this. She had not been present for the course of that conversation. Yet it suddenly struck her; those words he'd said at the end. His having no limits. This not being the day to kill two birds with a single stone. "Yes. Yes, I believe he did." "And you trust that he was successful?" There was a time she might have smiled at his deft insertion of such a loaded question. She might have teased that jealous thread and said: What if I do? And he might have given his sour grunt as he responded: The more fool you. But that time was gone. She knew what he was asking and resented it deeply. He had no right to plumb the depth of her relationship with his brother. As she saw it, this was no longer any of his concern. She spun his inquiry on its head with a deft precision of her own. "Do I trust your mother has turned her sensor off? Yes, Stefan. I do." "Then I suppose I must trust you," he countered; his voice mocking her, himself and the utter irony of stumbling upon a circumstance in which trust was in any way required or could possibly be expected to exist. "But you did always say you couldn't live without me. If you are wrong about this, you won't have to." He wanted that tear she felt pooling in the pocket of her eye. Blink and he would have it. Instead, she took her long-awaited breath and called it back. And for the first time that afternoon they looked at each other in full - Regret seeing that her loss was no more than he could manage, Stefan that his rejection was no more than she could bear. They would, the both of them, move past this. And that one simple truth, she thought, might honestly be ranked as a minor miracle. "You will release me, then? Remove this band and send me on my way?" In lieu of an answer, he plucked up a small felt envelope and brought it to the center of the table. His fingers slipped inside, withdrawing a replica of the bracelet she wore. He popped open the clasp to show its hollow interior. "I plan to remove the tracking device from your band and install it here," he said, indicating the metal lining of his facsimile. "She will still be able to monitor you within that three mile radius and know when you have moved beyond its range. But there will be no explosive charge. Your life will no longer be in danger." She weighed the explanation and found it wanting. "Then you would have me stay." "We would prefer it," he replied curtly. "There are two more victims here, Regret. Your continued presence would provide us the time we need to free them. It is, of course, entirely up to you. You may leave, if that is what you wish. We will not hold you." So it was true. These lifelong opponents had crafted some sort of truce, at least in the matter of Helena's devices. This was an odd development, and one that might have peaked her curiosity had she been given time to think on it. But she had other, far more pertinent questions to ask. "Why me, Stefan? I am, by far, the least valuable of her hostages. Sancia is her spy. Laura, her bargaining chip. My worth is negligible in comparison to both. Why take this risk for so poor a prize?" Yet even as the words formed in her mouth she could see his logic. She could understand his purpose, as coldly pragmatic as it was. "That's the reason, isn't it? I can afford to be lost. You can afford to fail with me. I am counted as less than even Sancia now. True?" "Sancia's wiring is too dense for this procedure. Also, it is unlikely Helena would shut that signal down, even if she could. The trigger mechanism complicates the matter. As for Laura, well…we would be sure first." Which made her the guinea pig. The lab rat. The trial run. "But you would die here? On this attempt? With me?" He shook his head once, then twice, as if still grappling with the idea of that. "I don't think so. No." His thumb ran along the edge of his fraudulent band and he drew a deep, decisive breath. "In the end, this is the only way." To save her, she added, finishing his sentence in her mind. Laura. This was all about Laura. Once again he would stride forth to take his place as her champion. The risk of his life would not matter to him. Nor the risk of hers, apparently. Regret studied him then; watched his fingers fret with that hollow silver ring; observed his silent struggle with the desperate need to have this work. To have her go along. She was nothing more to him here than an element of a battle plan. How small their love had become. Now merely an errant thread to pull away from the finer fabric of his passion for Laura Spencer - a woman whom, Regret suspected, given a million years to weigh the prospect, would never love him back. And she knew if a tear came at this moment to spill down the curve of her cheek, it would undoubtedly be for that. Holding the thought, she pushed her wrist to the very center of the table. "Perhaps it's time to begin."