The Sigh Of Things (28)   With him you're in before you say you're in and you never say yes… The hull of his boat smacked hard against the swell of each inbound wave, its bow crashing down like a fiberglass fist atop every wrinkle in the sea; as if he could somehow pound his path flat through speed and the sheer force of his will. Over and over he battered this water; a fleeting second in the air then whack into the surf, her body pitching forward again and again through needling curtains of salt sea spray. She knew there was no escaping the resistance of an incoming tide - that a more modest pace would just increase the rocking - yet his piloting held a ruthlessness no sane mind could ignore. There was anger in this; a desire for dominance; a thirst for the taming of a power he deemed comparable to his own. The ocean had presented itself. The ocean would be met. And anything met by the dark determination of Stavros Mikkosovich Cassadine best be at the top of its game if it expected to find itself standing in his wake. To Regret's view, the most that could be hoped for between these combatants was a draw. If the sea were lucky. Or perhaps his wrath could be pinned to the fact that he abhorred the way she clutched at this band; her right hand forever at the task of gripping it, twisting it, covering it up. So unconsciously intent had she been to keep hold of his brother's handiwork that Stavros found himself obliged to take her elbow to assist in the boarding, her arm when she tripped across the docking line, her shoulder to steer her to her seat. Displeasure became annoyance, and annoyance an infuriation so pure it put an end to all attempt at polite conversation. He had given her a full five minutes to indulge in this exasperating behavior before throwing his throttle down and forcing those hands apart to brace against the hammering fury of his purposefully wild ride. Did he think it was a treasure to her? Some kind of coveted keepsake? A tender tie to an eternal love? Because it was. That last? It was. Here was Laura Webber Spencer welded to her wrist for the rest of the foreseeable future. Here, in this circle of silver, was forged his brother's perpetually unrepentant devotion to a woman who only existed in his mind. Here, fused to her skin like a ring of blistering hellfire, was a genuine memento mori. Its whispered translation? Remember that you have to die. She could laugh long and hard at the irony in that. He had saved her life so she could live dead to him forevermore. This shackle, this manacle, this mean metal bind would stand as a reminder of the last time Stefan Cassadine would bother to touch her with a purpose. Might as well put a razor to her vein and call it a cure. She could not deny that this counterfeit cuff distressed her in a way Helena's never had. Stavros could think what he wanted. The minute his brother's bogus band was fixed to her wrist she itched to have it off. And that was not a thing that could be beaten out of her, no matter how hard he tried. When, finally, he turned his course to ride the lazy drift of a current bearing south, land was a slim grey thread in the distance and her temperate mood a memory. What this violent exercise may have released for him in terms of ire and aggravation, had only served to convert her distress into flat-out resentment. She could feel the antagonism bristle beneath the surface of her skin, its hostile thorn drawing blood at the sight of his pompous stance behind that wheel and the arrogant drape of his hand over the controls. She hated him now. Hated his preposterous powerboat, his ridiculously riotous ride, his useless expedition to nowhere. She hated the whip of wind on her face, the damp tangle of her hair, the corrosive sting of salt in her eyes. And she knew if she spent one more minute looking at him, one more moment dwelling on her enduring role as slave to each and every selfishly belligerent Cassadine whim, she would not hold herself responsible for what came next. Regret snapped up the first opportunity presented by this calmer course to slip from her seat and escape to the afterdeck; sliding to the corner of a cushioned bench as far from that overweening ego as it was possible for her to get. Here she remained, inwardly seething, as they traveled several miles down the coast. She was less than pleased when he brought the boat to anchor inside the jutting curve of a half-moon bay. She pretended not to notice his disappearance below, or his re-emergence with two bottles of beer, one of which he set on the table at her side. When she did lift an angry eye, she found he'd moved off to the starboard railing, his attention fixed on the sun slowly sinking toward the sea. "What are we doing here?" she sighed, her tone betraying a patience tested by the pointlessness of this maritime exercise. "What do you care?" He took a long swallow of beer and turned to face her, leaning casually against the rail. "Do you have a better place to be? Some meaningful act to perform? Does anyone require your presence? Anyone at all?" "Don't," she ordered, rising from the bench; her finger drawn to warn him off. "Now is not the time to bait me, Stavros. You have very few friends in this. Be smart and keep the one still willing to stand." She spun on her heel and crossed to port, grasping the railing with both hands and watching her knuckles go white with rage. Not a moment passed before a third hand came to rest on that rail, its arm aligned aside her own; enclosing her in an artless embrace as he moved to stand at her back. "Is that what we are, then? Friends?" The words came clear to her ear, not too close yet not far enough away to mistake the sincerity of his question. "I don't know," she answered peevishly, twisting her body to force him back. "Do you have friends? Do you know what a friend is?" "Probably not," he responded, amused by her efforts to shake him off. He waited for her to settle, then returned again to his place. "Look," he charged, throwing his free arm over her shoulder and bringing his hand, bottle and all, to point in the direction of a star. "Do you see her?" "Who?" she muttered, reluctantly lifting her attention to a cloud in the gathering dusk of the early evening sky. It took a moment before she fixed on the blinking light of a very tiny plane. "Mother, of course." His mouth drew alongside her ear. "Should we wave, do you think? She's gone to so much trouble, after all. It can't have been easy to find us. Such a small boat. Such a big sea." Regret watched him lift three fingers from the bottle to salute Helena's success in reconnaissance and felt a prick of annoyance. "Cassadines," she grumbled. "Everywhere you look there are Cassadines - land, sea and sky." "You've had enough of us today, I gather." He untangled himself to pull apart and retreat somewhere behind her. Somewhere else. The loss of his shielding brought a brisk ocean breeze to chill the skin left bare by her blouse and buffet the cloth of her white linen pants. She had not dressed for the open sea and now would suffer for it. She sidled down the rail, drawing closer to the bulkhead for what small protection it might afford. "Is she worth it?" she asked the water, her question carried away on a great gust of air. Regret startled at the drop of an unexpected weight to her shoulders and took a moment to recognize the heft of the canvas windbreaker he'd brought to wrap around her. "Is who worth it?" he inquired, spinning her to face him and lifting her chin with the edge of his hand. The last of the sun spattered the sky with color. Great arcs of lavender, rose-pink and orange stretched across the heavens above his head and limned his features in muted tones of bronze and gold. She felt the shadow of night crawl up behind her and watched as it faded those colors, cooled them to blues, then greys, and darker still until all that glowed in that face were his eyes - eyes far too intent upon her own to let this silence stand a single second longer than it had. "Laura," she said, half-imagining this would be proof against the presentiment she sensed flickering at the edge of her mind. Stavros paused, caught for a moment by the name, and she became aware of the amount of will he applied to force himself beyond it. This was not good, not good at all to find she could intuit his mind in such a manner; to discover she had, somewhere along the line, acquired the ability to read him on any level, with any skill. His was not a splintering then, not a superficial scratch to the skin of her everyday consciousness. No. He'd sunk like a knife straight to the hilt, angling to rest too close to the core; so close she could actually assign his actions a meaning, his objectives a purpose, his motives a cause. To know a man in this way was to walk with him forever inside you, granting his passage through the heart of your life and respecting his presence there. How had this happened? When? Why? And hidden beneath those questions, for the very first time - for reasons no one had ever seen fit to warn her about - she found her fear of this Cassadine prince. A fear sparked more by the knowledge he gave than any of the number of unconscionable acts he was accused of having committed. "Don't answer that," she charged, pulling her chin from his hand to turn to the side. "I don't want to know." "What did he tell you?" She sighed wearily. "Stavros, do you really imagine anyone has to be told? You took her. Stefan stole her from you. Helena trumped you both. This is enough to speak to her value. I shouldn't have asked." "What did he tell you?" he repeated, this time pulling her head back with the crook of his finger. That he could invest so much in the mention of her name was more than Regret could handle at this juncture. Better to share the story than to have him assign it an importance it never truly possessed. "He said you would both be certain you could safely remove the device before you made an attempt with hers. I was to be your practice run. He didn't say the words, but the intimation was there. I was expendable." "And how much of that do you believe?" She grew uncomfortable beneath the weight of his stare. "It made sense…please," she protested, pushing his hand away. "I realize I'm the least important element in this equation. Let's leave it at that, shall we?" "Let's not," he taunted bitingly as he maneuvered her back against the bulkhead and effectively trapped her there. "You mistake my brother's reasoning for my own. Do you actually believe Stefan would have wasted his time with you had I not given him the incentive he required? That sad piece of logic he needed to screw himself to the task? I set his foot on the path and provided an object his obsession would follow. If you imagine I did this for Laura you are sadly mistaken." Regret chose anger over this fresh pound of pain and raised a contemptuous eye. "I assume you mean to suggest you did this for me," she offered scornfully. "Not at all," he replied, his voice growing dangerously soft as his gaze began to travel her face with an oddly-dispassionate awe. "I did this for myself." And upon an assurance born of his ownership of the moment, he leisurely leaned forward to collect its asking price. His lips were cold from the wind, his tongue warm as it slid through her surprise to enter into her mouth; a terrain all too familiar by now to merit the effort of further exploration. Here he trespassed with deliberate impudence; pushing past what resistance he met to indolently trace the trim of her teeth, flick a restless invitation to her tongue and draw back, content to idle at the soft swell of her frown - tasting the spark of a fire he knew he could ignite with a gently-whispered ease. Her hands came to his chest with the intent of pushing him back yet, once touched, she found she could not. Instead she took hold of this sculpted stretch of muscle where it pulsed, ever so faithfully, in rhythm with his heart. She could feel the power there; the smoldering rage, the inflexible will, the arrogant resolve he used to propel himself through the conflict of his life, and she knew she needed this. She would capture it; clutch it in her fist; lay claim to the strength she sensed thrumming just beneath the surface of his skin. What tactile instinct sent her fingers to wander to the collar of his shirt, to locate the first flat button, that second, this third, and pop them from their sleeves with such perfectly practiced precision? Heat, it was all about the heat she knew lay beneath this cloth; heat she would find and feel against her flesh; a companion to the heat he brought to scorch her blood as he bent his restive growl to her ear; his primitive demand for a yielding to her own inescapable hunger, her own undeniable thirst, her own remorseless yearning to feast on this man; his mouth, his tongue, his lips, his skin, his lust, his rage, his heart, his soul and the purely potent force of his wickedly impetuous desire. She became aware of the coat falling from her shoulders as his arm circled her waist, his palm coming to the small of her back to urge her toward him. His choice to make her work for this, to have her play a part in her own seduction, was both unexpected and unendurable. Better to take, just take, but no, he would not bend to that. And so she slipped into the sin of him, melting into this embrace and filling every empty space his body offered. She began to sway against him, her head drifting to rest on his chest, her mouth descending to deposit a trail of tender kisses that rode the bone to his shoulder. She could feel the heels of his hands press down the length of her spine and rise over the plump curve at its base, coming at last to grasp her thighs and, in one fluid burst of strength, hoist her high to his hip. Her legs wrapped tight around his waist as her fingers spread to tangle in his hair, wrenching his head back to return that mouth to her reach. Above him now, she brought her lips to cover his, softly at first, gently, her mouth barely grazing his own before rising to lift away. A swift second passed before she fell again, this time dropping deeper, the kiss a bit more insistent. And as she retreated a second time he strained to follow, but she had the angle and he no choice but to allow this agonizing theft. Yet she never broke apart, never quite let it go, and came once more to fall deeper still, stealing his breath as the thrust of this pleasure intensified. Over and over she returned to him, sinking her soul further and further into the magic of this, until she was on the very verge of losing whatever self-control she had managed to retain. His, of course, had already fled. She groaned as he slammed her into the bulkhead, balancing her weight on an arm in order to free the hand he used to fumble with the tiny seed buttons of her blouse. And as he worked to uncover her, she brought her mouth alongside his ear and released his name on the softest of sighs. Stavros. Just a small susurration of air. Stavros. A yielding shimmer on the breath. Stavros. A murmur to the silence in his mind. And the man went wild. He snarled as his patience vanished from the task of preserving this obstructive piece of cloth and, with one furious, frustrated claw, he ripped the shirt apart to shower the deck in tiny bouncing bits of pearl. A greedy hand came to cup the curve of her through the silk of the camisole, a thumb to dive beneath its lace, a tongue to play with what it found. But this was not enough to hold his attention for more than a moment. He howled with the bitter misery of this and spun from the wall to stride across the deck, in the general direction of the hatch. There, she imagined, they would find a berth; some soft, flat plane of a mattress on which all of his needs could be met. And as he paused at the top of those few deep steps she bent once again to his mouth, found the fever in his kiss and matched it with a fire of her own. There would be no question of compliance here. There would be no doubt they came, intent to intent, as equals to this act; unified by passion in both purpose and principle. Reluctant to release her lips, he pulled her closer to him, turned in place and began to step backward down the stairs. The first step went well enough, but she felt his balance shift on the second as his foot fell awkwardly to the stair. An arm reached out to grab the rail but missed and by then it was far too late to stop the fearsome drop to the deck below. In an effort to cushion her fall, he'd angled himself beneath her, yet not quite straight enough to miss banging his head against the beveled edge of a locker door. By the time they'd crashed to the bottom of the well and untangled themselves to switch on a light, blood was running down the side of his neck. Regret stumbled down the passageway and located the powerboat's galley. Scouring the cabinets and drawers, she finally found a stack of dishtowels and ran with them back to his side. Stavros had risen to sit, leaning against the loathsome locker door, his hand pulling away from his neck to examine the blood on his fingers. She tossed a towel in his lap and shook out another to dab the wound at the base of his skull. "I might have come down those steps on my own, you know." "Couldn't take the risk," he replied, bending his head forward to give her a better view. Regret was gratified to see the cut was small, less than a quarter inch for all the blood it offered. "I never thought I'd say this to you," she grumbled, peering closely at the wound. "But Stavros, you do underestimate yourself." As she mopped up the blood from the back of his neck she noticed an old white scar. "What's this?" she inquired, running her thumb down its jagged length. "Another set of stairs. Another life. Come here," he ordered petulantly, pulling her around to his lap. Her brow knit with irritation as she sought to keep pressure on the wound. "You haven't stopped bleeding," she admonished, removing the soiled cloth and replacing it with another. "I never stop bleeding," he murmured, pressing his lips to her neck. "No. Now, don't," she snapped, arching her back in retreat. "Why are you resisting?" He raised a taunting eye to hers and smiled. "You can't be rushing to return to your captivity, no matter how soft she's made it. Or are you bothered by what they'll think? This time. Alone. With me. They're bound to jump to the obvious conclusion. And, really, who are we to disappoint?" She tilted her head and presented him with a reproving look. "Oh, by all means, Stavros," she chided. "Let's be predictable." This made him laugh. "Are you hungry, then? You must be. I have supper in the galley." He took the cloth from her hand and pushed himself up off the floor. "Just a cold meal, but it should do. Come. Time to feed you." Regret hadn't known how hungry she was until he set the dish before her; a generous bowl of pasta salad tossed with thick, seasoned strips of grilled chicken breast. Her fork speared spiral after spiral of tender fusilli, chunks of tomato and white meat soaked in a spicy Italian vinaigrette. The dish had gone half empty before she broke the heel off a loaf of French bread and took a sip of the wine he'd poured. He may have smiled throughout the repast, she wouldn't have noticed. In fact, it wasn't until the plates were cleared and he came to lean against the edge of the table with a container of God-knew-what that she bothered to look at him at all. He was smiling now. That she saw. "Are you a fan of granita?" he asked, shearing off a curl of this dark confection and bringing the spoon to her lips. He saw her eye it suspiciously and added, "A variation of Italian ice. Blackberry." Her mouth closed over the treat and, once he pulled the spoon away, she let it settle on her tongue; the flavor melting fast to trickle down her throat. "There's liquor in this." "Just a bit of cassis. Do you like it?" In lieu of an answer she reached for the container but he pulled it back and cocked his head, suggesting she stand. Once she had he thrust the spoon into the ice, handed her the dessert and took her in his arms. "I suppose you want me to feed you now?" she teased. "The choice is yours." And by the look he gave she could tell it was either feed or be fed upon. The granita soon found its way through his lips. It wasn't until she brought the spoon back to scoop out more of the ice that she noticed, for the first time in hours it felt, the glint of the silver band his brother had strapped to her wrist. The light seemed to dim, the air grow old and thick with despair. Her carefree mood collapsed in on itself; a familiar dread rising to take its place. Whatever distraction she'd found on this boat had been only that. A distraction. She remained a captive of the Cassadines, as did Laura and, in a certain way, Stefan. And while Helena strove to make the most of the illusion of control, Regret suspected the true force behind all of this maneuvering was currently angling his mouth to take food from her hand. She slipped a second shaving of the ice through his teeth and released a shallow sigh. His eye narrowed at the sadness he found in the sound and the unmistakable change in her demeanor. He ran the back of his hand across her cheek, tracing a finger down the curve of her jaw. "What?" "It's not important," she demurred, offering half a smile as she bent to scrape up more of his dessert. "Just the effort it takes to put yet another foot forward in the dark. No," she said as he moved to respond. "Give me nothing for Helena. Nothing at all." He took the container away from her and set it on the table at his side, then pulled her toward him. Regret fell into the embrace and stilled, her head resting on his shoulder, her eyes closing to find the comfort in this. "Will you trust me now, for the next handful of minutes?" he asked, stroking the back of her neck. She made an agreeable noise against the fabric of his shirt. "Just trust that everything I am about to tell you will be nothing new to her. If you like, you may repeat it word for word." She felt him take the breath he required and, at long last, settle into the telling. "A rival comes once, perhaps twice in a lifetime to challenge a prince; inevitably in his locust years - those brutally barren days when he is either too weak or too ignorant to keep control of his power. This is such a time and the man who comes is my cousin. Argos. Already he has taken more from me than it should have been possible to take. The situation is serious, the threat quite real. To my mind there is only one response. I have decreed a Deciding." She heard his voice catch at the end of the word and, through some sense she couldn't name, came the distinct flavor of fear. After a moment he moved past this. She did not. "The Deciding is an old Cassadine custom having, as its grace, a decidedly democratic form. Each family member of consequence is summoned into the company of his Prince where, during the course of a single evening, he will be given the opportunity to declare his allegiance. He may pledge his fealty to the reigning royal or he may turn his loyalty to the challenger. By the end of that night one man will gain, or regain, the title and reign as the acknowledged Cassadine Prince." Regret lifted her head from his shoulder to settle closer to his heart. "That sounds far too civilized for your taste," she noted quietly. "There's more to this, I'm sure." "Ah, well, yes," he conceded in a tone that could best be described as laconic. "The fun lies in the manner of choosing. My Uncle Victor had an expression he would use when he wanted to goad his brother, my father. He used to call him Prince-By-Poison. That's how it's done, you see. You choose through the use of powders. Each guest is given his share to deliver as he sees fit. No one share is enough to kill. A man may live through as many as thirty. Great-grandfather Mikhail was said to have survived forty-two, but then he counted every Cassadine he killed as a suspect. Some may have been falsely accused." The silence that followed this revelation stretched out so far and so long that Regret found she could no longer remember the last words he'd said. He'd grown so still in her arms she'd been afraid to move, afraid to break into his thoughts, afraid to crack the crust of this ritual that was still just a concept to her with no bearing whatsoever on reality. Yet after a time she found the courage to give voice to an observation. "You've been through this before, she says. She says you suffered. You were…changed." "Cyrus died," he stated flatly. "That was all that mattered." He bent his head to catch her worried eye. "Argos must die as well or Nikolas will never be safe." Her mind made the correlation at once. "Nikolas is prince. This is his challenge, isn't it?" "No. Not yet. Not while I'm alive." With this declaration Regret knew the subject had been closed; the door to his reasoning firmly shut and locked against further analysis. As if to prove the point, he deposited a kiss to her brow and gently pushed her back to stand on her own. "Our cages await. Are you ready?" She blinked at the abrupt end he'd put to their evening and tried to cover her surprise by scanning her surroundings for something she could not possibly have left behind. Her attention fell to her attire and the sad state of her newly-buttonless blouse. She met his gaze with chagrin. "A little worse for the wear, I'm afraid." He smiled ruefully. "I have a few things to collect on the yacht. Perhaps Helena's left a blouse in the closet? Of course, if the thought of wearing yet another piece of her clothing gives you pause, you are certainly welcome to anything of mine." "Anything?" she said mischievously. "Well, except the crown," he teased, pulling her back into his arms. His fingers brushed a stray strand of hair from her face and he stared at her for a moment, as if he were searching for something he'd lost. "I have what, at this late date, can only qualify as an odd question. Your family name, Regret. What is it?" She looked away sheepishly and prepared herself for the laughter that was sure to follow. It always did. "Derniere. My family's name is Derniere." He didn't laugh, though. And when she recognized that absence she raised her head and noticed the strange, sad light in his eye. "You may be," he observed softly. "You very well may be that." Author's Note: Le regret derniere. Loosely translated from the French: The last regret.         The Sigh Of Things (29)   Should his passion dare to target an eternity let it fix on my reflection; a body born and bred to seduce through the abstraction of its infinite absence. The same line. The first three or four words, perhaps, of this same line. Over and over again. This same line at the center of this same page, at the center of this same book. It was as far as he could go; as far as he could get before his mind lifted from the print to travel the road toward a thousand more complicated constructions - none of which could be adequately examined or addressed from the cold comfort of a leather chair in Helena Cassadine's library. While it took him five minutes, sometimes ten, to recognize he had once again fallen to distraction, what did not escape his notice was where his sightless eye unerringly came to its rest. He wasn't sure why it should surprise him, this instinctive return to her face; this constant awakening to her presence in the room, on that small sofa, curled to her task of flipping through a crooked stack of picture books. Yet it did. Forget that he had dreamed this moment too many times through the course of his life, this quiet evening of companionable silence, the shared tranquility of an hour that fell, for once, affectionately to his heart. He felt as if there might somehow be more to Time with her; more than precious seconds used and wasted and lying in a pile at his back. That somehow, with this woman at his side, Eternity could be stretched beyond the idea of endless, unendurable adversity and into a kind of bliss. These were old thoughts, ancient imaginings. He should be accustomed to them by now. And he supposed this was what caught him to the hook of his astonishment - that he was not. They had agreed to toss these balls in the air, the brothers Cassadine. One would take Regret past the limit of her signal, the other come to dine with her "motivating force." In this way their mother's attention would, at the very least, be taxed by the effort of standing watch on dual fronts. As she may rightfully fret upon her prince's maritime excursion with a woman she imagined still bound by enough explosive to kill, so could she also bend to the burden of keeping vigil over the visit of her meddlesome second son - whose demand for time with Laura, while late in coming, could not be counted any the less suspect of intrigue. There was pleasure to be had in the sight of Helena restless at the head of that table, eyes flitting from the face of the clock to the angle of the sun sinking through the glass, all the while having to cock an ear toward the meaning hidden beneath his words. She'd hardly had the spirit to mock him through the service of the soup and by the entrée seemed to have lost her taste for it entirely. Stefan, of course, had added his part, investing his energies in an overly-solicitous attendance on Laura. Her plate, her cup, her napkin, her spoon - the ebb and flow of every labor made with the food and the drink set before her - were assiduously monitored and accorded such a tender patience that one thought Helena Cassadine might just sicken her meal all the way up and out again onto the table. So quickly had she risen on the last bite of cake that her own damask napkin fell to the floor and was left like refuse for a servant to retrieve. Once she saw he would retire to the library, Stefan was not at all surprised to find his mother opting to end her surveillance; judging it preferable to fish for his motive on another day, when the seas were more amenable to her craft and not quite so filled with devotion. With Helena gone he had no reason to delay his own departure. There were hours left in this day that might still be used to productive purpose. There were reports to be read, after all; calls to be made; updates delivered on the mischievous movements of his dear cousin Argos. Regret's band had certainly been examined by now, picked apart for its every secret. That fact alone should have been enough to propel him toward the door. Why then had he stayed, anchored to this chair, his eyes scanning the same four words over and over and over again? Could it be as pitifully simple as his refusal to relinquish the experience of having her alone to himself? The rare luxury this moment afforded was hard to deny. Here the gift of an intimate interlude and the sudden ability it offered to indulge in those fantasies forbidden by the world at large; by their families, by their histories, and most often by themselves. Here he might pretend there was hope for him yet; forge himself the fine lie of a future fused to her own; dive down deep into the heart of the deception that their day was meant to come. That there was a day left in his life to fix his focus upon. To aim at. To prepare for. A hard and fast folly, that. A waste, though it pained him to admit it. A complete and utter waste of his time. And so the book closed with a sturdy thunk. As he went to his knee and took her hand - a hand weathered now by all the years gone missing, all the years they'd lost and would never find again - he turned his mind to the task of composing his farewell. Should the words be simple and plain in the hope they might catch some stray sensibility gone drifting through that childish mind of hers? Or, instead, should he offer a sentiment worthy of the woman she once was; the woman he had resolved to retrieve; to restore to herself as proof that one Cassadine, at least, could still be counted true? In the end he thought it best to incorporate them both and, after a moment given to searching her now familiarly vacant expression, he bent his lips to the fingers he held. "I will save you, Laura." "Really? I somehow doubt that, Stefan." In truth, he thought for a moment his mother had re-entered the room. This thought went by so quickly though, that he failed to assign it any meaning. Instead, his attention lifted to her face; a face suddenly cut sharp by the blade of awareness; its blue eyes stern, its jaw set with the unmistakable force of a cognizant resolution. "Laura!" Her free hand rose quickly to his mouth, a freshly-keen gaze casting toward the door. Her posture straightened as her ear came forward to sift the silence for sound. Finding none, she turned back to the man kneeling at her feet and removed her fingers from his lips. "Do you have a phone?" "I…yes," he stammered, automatically reaching inside his coat. The motion stopped short, however, as his senses came to temper his awe. "Who would you call?" "Luke, of course," she replied impatiently, her hand extending as she shot another look in the direction of the door. When the telephone failed to fall into her palm, she spun back to urge him on. She was less than pleased to find his arm had dropped to his side. "Stefan," she admonished, leaning toward him to reach for the prize herself. He fell backward, beyond her reach, and watched her lips press hard into a line. "How long, Laura?" he asked, the pain lending a brusqueness to his tone. "Better yet, when did you plan to tell me?" "I'm sorry," she snapped derisively. "Did I miss your visit? Was I sleeping the day you came to rescue me? Because, frankly, I don't remember seeing you here." The truth of that accusation sliced straight through his pride and added its weight to the burden of his blame. She had been waiting for him and he had not come. "But when? When did you recover your awareness?" "Exactly? You mean the very minute?" Her expression curdled with contempt, her voice the prick of an envenomed thorn. "Let's see, Stefan. Perhaps it was the day I woke to find your brother sinking a needle in my arm as you watched calmly over his shoulder. Ah, but that happened everyday, didn't it? Maybe the picnic on the beach, then, when your maid tried to slip me the punch she'd drugged. Maybe that was the day. Or maybe, just maybe," she seethed, her eyes filling with anguish, "maybe it was the night your mistress brought me like a house-warming gift to Helena. We received such lovely party favors. Would you like to see mine?" She thrust her wrist in his face as an errant tear spilled over her cheek. His hand came to cover that silver band as he rose from the floor and took a seat beside her. She resisted at first, but finally fell into his arms, her shoulders shaking gently as she wept. It was hardly easy to reconcile himself to the fact that she'd returned, and in such undeniable pain. His vision of this moment, the picture he'd held in his mind from as far back as the hour he'd chosen to steal her from Stavros, had been so different. There sat the dream of a tenderly-effective revitalization as she grew to respond to his voice, his presence, his touch. She would blossom like a rose before his eye, smiling with relief that he had cured her, respecting the effort he'd made on her behalf and yes, in a way, grateful for the labor. He'd held no illusions about her heart - that her love for him might somehow awaken with her mind - and he imagined this sufficient protection against the disappointment of a dashed hope. It appeared he had been wrong. And as he cradled her head in his palm, drawing the other down through the length of her hair, his thoughts turned yet again to the matter of how he could make this right for her. For Laura. "I can't, Stefan. I can't," she wailed into his chest. "You know what he wants to do. You know I can't go through that. Not again." A troublesome thought struck him. "Does Stavros know, Laura? Does my brother realize you've recovered?" "Where were you?" she moaned, beating her fist on his shoulder. "How could you let him come into my room? How could you let him torture me? How could you force me to face him alone?" Another mark against him. Another sin to add to the rest. "What did he do? What did he say?" Her head pulled away, her eyes rising with dread. "Do you think I've forgotten? How could I forget? A room full of Cassadines, laughing, joking, distracting you as they slipped their powders in your wine. 'To you, Laura.' That's what he said, and he smiled as he lifted that poison to his lips and drank it down like the devil he was. I won't go through it again, Stefan. I won't!" Her chin thrust out for an instant in bold determination but soon fell to quivering as she slumped once more to his chest. "Why should you have to?" he soothed softly, wrapping an arm around her waist. "No one expects you to attend. Even Helena would find it inappropriate in the extreme. The Prince and his catatonic wife? No. There's nothing to worry about. Nothing at all." "I have to call Luke. If not Luke, then the police. I have to get out of here, Stefan! I want to go home," she groaned. "I want to go home to my life, my friends, my family. Oh God, my family!" "Your children are fine. Even Stavros is taking measures to assure Nikolas remains apart from this. No danger will come to him. No danger at all. I will see to that." He removed a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed the tears from her cheeks. "Laura, no one is in jeopardy. No one is even aware you're here. Everyone believes you are ill and convalescing in a hospital." "I know that," she spat, bristling in his embrace. "Your Regret drones on and on about it all the time. She tells me everything. Twice. She's a chatty little thing, isn't she?" Stefan closed his eyes for a moment, unsure of how to respond to this. In the end he decided to ignore it. "I am working to get you free of that band. I will find a time and a place to release you. Until then you must hold on. You are a very brave woman, Laura. You can see this through." She craned her neck to catch his eye and said, in a tone filled with foreboding, "What if he fails, Stefan? Have you thought about what happens then?" He sighed heavily, bringing his lips to kiss the top of her head. "You know me better than that, I trust. I have a plan for every contingency. I always do." A shout from the rear of the house drove them apart, Laura retreating to the arm of the sofa as Stefan slipped his handkerchief back into his coat. "Mother!" cried Stavros, louder now and closer to the door. He saw the terror in her countenance and watched, with pure amazement, as it slowly faded away to be replaced by the empty expression of a woman who had long ago lost her mind.   Helena was distinctly unimpressed. If it were not enough to have been bellowed up those stairs like some haggard little housefrau enslaved to the whim of every feeble family need, then it was certainly beyond the limit of her humor to forgive the pitiful presentation they made. Why, Stefan appeared positively crumpled - the lapel of his jacket falling observably askew, one collar point left untucked above it. Laura had a new crease to her skirt and a face that, while still pleasantly blank, bore signs of a recent weeping. Stavros himself appeared all-too-quickly dressed, and there was something wrong with the lay of the hair at the back of his neck. Regret…well. That one of her finer silk blouses came to serve the girl's beauty better than her own was not a truth she could appreciate at the moment. All in all she found the picture so distastefully unattractive that, were these not her sons, she would have instantly ordered them from the house. As it was, she simply sent Louis on his way back down the stairs to re-initialize Regret's shackle and Mrs. Garber up to the second floor to turn down her prisoners' beds. "I take it you've finished with her, then," Helena remarked to her eldest son. "And you," she said, turning to the younger. "I think you've had your fill as well. Regret, please see Laura to her room." "Not so fast, Mother," Stavros interjected. It was only then that she noticed the white linen envelopes fanned across the surface of the library desk. Her gaze sharpened, her mind prickled by an apprehension. "What have you done?" "Only what I promised," he replied evenly, slipping two of his missives from the stack. "Stefan, as you know, you will stand as my bondsman. You will see to the Oath of Abjuration, provide for the needs and placement of The Hand, and tender your attention to the strict adherence of custom." Stefan nodded circumspectly and accepted the envelope from his brother. "Mother, this one's for you," her prince declared, striding forward to place it in her hand. Helena felt her mouth stiffen, her lips drawing down in disgust. "Stavros," she hissed vexatiously, recoiling from the loathsome gift. "We have yet to arrive at a decision in this matter. You cannot respond impulsively. You must think the business through. Weigh your every option." "Your every option, you mean." His shoulders knocked back imperiously, his features growing dark, his words riding low with menace. "Your resistance intrigues me," he offered as he moved to block her view of the room, the people in it, the light itself. "Has your knee grown so soft, Madame Cassadine, that you find you can no longer bend it to your prince? Or perhaps your ambitions have been overfed at the board of Stefan's regency? What bleary eye meets mine this day to mistake me for my son? For surely, surely, you cannot be of a mind to dispute the authority of your lord?" And suddenly his lips were at her ear, his voice cold with command. "Yield to me, Madame, and quickly too, ere I be forced to break that knee myself." Helena snatched the missive from his hand and took a step back, her glance sliding from the fury of his face; her head dropping down, somewhat reluctantly, in an aspect of submission. By the time her eye lifted he had already returned to the desk. She saw him select the longer of the two remaining envelopes and tip it in her direction. "Here is the list of those I've summoned. The call was dispatched late last night. They've been directed to respond to you. They have some fifty hours left. Keep your tally, then pass it on to Stefan," he instructed, laying the packet back on the desk. "Oh, and before I forget, second cousin Alfred may be scratched at your convenience. He laughed and was made an example of." "Stavros," his brother interrupted, raising his head from the reading of his card. "You signed the ones you sent, yes? Made a mark? Scrawled a name? Because mine bears only your title, The Cassadine Prince." "Yours is identical to the rest, Stefan." "But they will think…" "Yes," his brother acceded knowingly. "They will think they come to face my son. And Nikolas will be left untouched in the interim. The ruse has its benefits." Stefan arched an assessing brow. "More for you than he, I believe." "Be that as it may…" Stavros stabbed a finger to the last of the envelopes and slid it off the edge of the desk, catching it as it fell. "And now to the matter of my wife. Laura," he taunted softly, moving to where she idled on the couch. Helena watched the simpleton perceive her danger and launch to seek refuge behind Stefan's back. She turned from the coward sour with disdain. "Stavros, you can't be serious. She's not fit to be presented to the kin. Not as your wife. Not even as our poorest relation. Everyone can see she's defective." "Nikolas is her son," replied their prince, coming to face his brother and the wife he hid behind his back. Stavros offered the missive over the barrier of a shoulder and Stefan plucked it from the air. "Laura will stand for Nikolas," he declared, his stern gaze meeting her eye, then rising to the eye of her protector. Once convinced his message had been received, he turned to address his mother. "Be assured she will attend this event in whatever condition the night may find her. I will roll her about in a wheelchair if I must. Bend your imagining to that, ma mere. How would it look? And how might it look…better?" His gaze narrowed sharply. "No more damage to Laura. Are we clear?" Helena spent a grievous look on the woman standing quiet against the wall. So she'd shared the character of the sword held over her head, had she? Penalties popped to the surface of her mind as those green eyes turned away. "And where is my invitation?" Stavros twisted his head in surprise and attempted to judge her meaning. "Regret, you do understand that, once summoned, you are subject to the dictates of the ritual? No concessions will be granted. You will be bound to Cassadine custom, the same as all the rest." Regret smiled softly. "It's not like you to belabor the obvious." Stavros broke into a weary grin. "Long night," he acknowledged, holding her eye with amusement. "Stefan," he called over his shoulder. "I do believe we've found you a date." And from a long, long distance away, deep in the bowels of the mansion, the phone began to ring.   The Sigh Of Things (30)   …my heart a lark in a zippered compartment chafing for the space of her wingspan… Sancia knew the day was coming. She could read it in their faces. These men, arriving as they had with a swagger in their step, a pride in their bearing, an assurance polished by years of success in divining the secret, the catch, the trick to the twist of every puzzle set before them. Fat they were with his money and merry with his mission; as if this were all some clever conceit designed to fill the time between one legitimate project and the next. Here on her wrist was a game of the kind found tucked into a stocking at Christmas. A mind-bender. A brain-teaser. A diversion to devour the hours until Mummy put their goose on the table. That was how they'd started, filled with insolence and presumption. It was never how they finished. She could tell when they gripped to the gravity of this by the way they held her hand; no longer as if it were flesh and blood but part of an elaborate equation. Gone was the cautious consideration given to her comfort, the ease of her position, the manifest distress brought on by every pinch and prod and poke. Damn it, girl, hold it straight! And there you could hear at last in their voices the tendril of their doubt. She marked the way it crept from their words to the proud stretch of their shoulders, snaking its weight across their backs to force that arrogant span to curl, to hunch, to bow beneath the burden of their own cursed confoundment. These large, lordly men grew small in the space before her, diminished not only in ego but in actual physical size. The perplexity of this bracelet crippled their self-importance like an invidious psychological plague. Sancia doubted, by the end, a single vanity would be spared. Yet always on an evening hour, as they pulled their instruments away and closed their files for the night, her puzzle - like a soft, silver lover - called them back. Each would bend to touch the metal fondly, draw a finger along its skin, and sink into the hope that one day, some day, she would consent to their fondest wish and come open on a whim. Lately, though, their eyes rose less and less in adoration and more with the petulant cast of a suitor scorned beyond his skill. Three had already departed, broken and resentful. Of the two still caught to its mystery, one would no longer meet her gaze. A dismal business, this, and not at all heartened by hope. "This has been explained to you? You understand the dilemma?" Not even Stefan Cassadine would spare a look for the creature his mother had condemned. Sancia couldn't blame him. So much easier to flip through the pages tacked to that laboratory clipboard; to view the problem objectively, as if it rested there in the paper and the ink and not here, wrapped around her arm. "Yes," she replied, slipping off the stool and sliding it back beneath the table. "Chen's trigger mechanism uses the band itself as a conductor. Cut the band and the charge is interrupted, activating the explosive. I had hope for the last attempt at re-routing but, as you can see, it's not an easy thing to tease that current down a different path." "And Regret's device has provided no insight at all?" "None. She didn't have a trigger, Stefan. Neither does Laura." Sancia tipped her head to the last assistant exiting the lab and waited for the door to close. "It may be time to call a halt to this. Really, they're lost. Apart from freezing the band, and in the process costing me my arm, they've exhausted every avenue of approach. They're out of ideas." She watched his brow arch to her suggestion as he continued with his reading, tossing back a page as he made his way to the desk. Once there, he pulled out the chair and sat, never once taking his eye from the report. Seconds turned into minutes and those minutes, she knew, would soon become an hour. An hour of his valuable time spent bent to the task of contriving her release. This still amazed her; that someone could care whether she lived or died. No one had. No one until this odd man on that odd day, a thousand years ago atop those dusty steps outside the Basilica in Rome. "A destra." This was all he'd said when he sensed her hand slipping silently into his left coat pocket. Her filthy urchin's hand reaching round to where he stood at the side of those great main doors. And in the instant of shock he'd provided by suggesting she rifle his right pocket instead of that left, he managed to turn, to see the little thief creeping up to ply her trade. Instead of bolting for The Arch of the Bells as any practiced borsaiolo would do, she had quite literally stiffened in awe. He was so young then. Seemed so strong, so rich, so terribly golden to her eye - like a precious charm, an icon or even an angel; someone come like a martyr or a saint from the very gates of heaven down to the portico of St. Peter's church. To this day that childish vision still colored the cast of her memory; enhanced, in large degree, by the manner in which he suddenly took charge of her life. What do you want to be? Such a silly question to ask a child! Deserving of the silly answer he got: I want to be the strongest of them all. He didn't ask why. He didn't need to be told about the big men, the bullies, the boys who hit her and took all the money she'd managed to steal. He didn't insist on a tearful recitation of those very few nights she hadn't been quite careful enough to find her sleep in a place no liquored lout with a taste for little girls might actually be able to find. No. No dark truths required for young Master Cassadine. And that one act of respect - for she knew, even at the age of ten, this was respect - gifted her the trust she needed to place her future in his hands. Japan first, because he knew she would want the strength to start. Those martial arts gave her weaponry that depended upon no circumstance, no accidental blessing, no lucky break to turn the tide of her battles. All she would ever need to defend herself could now be found within; a lion keeping its restless watch, forever alert for the moment to pounce. And with those skills, he knew, would come lessons in discipline, deliberation, detachment from the mercurial force of her temperamental nature. Her rage reduced to an anger channeled for the first time to a purpose. Her purpose. Which was somehow his purpose as well. This was the reason those years of schooling, first in England, then in Canada, had met with no resistance. How could they, when the choices he made were inevitably her own? It was the same with Milan. Of course she would come. Of course. Milan. London. This coastal compound. It was all of a piece in the end. And if she died here, in this last place, at the hand of his obstructer, so be it. The best thing, really, to die by the side of the man who gave you life. It was, in many ways, perfect for her. It was, in many ways, fine. Sancia smiled at the sight of his back inclined toward the surface of that desk, his attention pressed to the language of her dilemma. She thought she might be able to do it now. She might finally be able to pull this off. One step forward, then a second, silent as a shadow crossing over the moon. A measured reach, two fingers and a thumb curling to sink through the lip of that tempting left pocket. Down. Down to the seam they sank, fishing for his treasure. "A destra," he murmured softly, without looking up from the page. "You've proven quite useless, my dear." The fine gold netting of the bulb on the atomizer puckered as she misted the perfume to her neck. Regret followed the flight of the flacon as Helena brought it down to the vanity table. She watched the misshapen bubble struggle to work its way back from the pinch, to distend once again with a measure of the scent it would hold at the ready for its mistress. Even the tools of her beauty were trained to be prepared to submit to her desire. But what of the day that bulb came empty? What of the day there remained no perfume to be drawn? Was the whole device discarded, or would she reserve what could be put to a future use? Oddly-appropriate questions for the newest implement in Madame Cassadine's employ. Regret wouldn't bend to the babble of excuses; the sycophantic ooze of a wheedling defense for the reason she'd failed to turn Stavros from his course. She had not done what she could not do. And it made her happy in a strange sort of way to know she couldn't have succeeded even if she'd tried. His Summoning went issued long before he came to her on that beach. This Deciding, his darkly-ritualed bird of prey, had already lifted from its branch, had already spread it dangerous wings. So she held her silence as she stood, caught in the background of the vanity mirror; like an artist's ambivalent afterthought in the reflective portrait of a great grande dame. Helena spied her through the glass, her newly-powdered features chilled with contempt. "A simple maneuvering buttressed by every benefit I could provide and what have we to show for it? Evidence only of your tactical inabilities, it seems. That body should have served," she remarked, running a ruthless eye over the younger woman's figure. "To whose advantage was it used, Regret? Yours or mine?" "Placed before Prince Stavros Cassadine? You can be sure the advantage was his." Helena's expression contorted unbecomingly as she absorbed the sting of this truth. "You have no way around him, then? How unfortunate for you." "And you," Regret added bluntly. "He's not a man to your mind anymore, is he? Just a mutable force. An enticement at times, at times a means you would put to an end. Or as he is now, as he must so often be, an insurmountable obstruction. One wonders that you ever win against him. Or do you?" She took the opportunity presented by a startled moment of silence to cross to the hassock of a dressing room chair and lower herself to its seat, beyond Helena's view through the glass. The older woman stilled but did not turn. "You presume to comment on a bond you cannot possibly comprehend. I would advise you to concern yourself more with the manner in which Regret Derniere comes envisioned in my mind. Or fades from it, as the circumstance warrants. Incompetence is such an insubstantial gift. Why, you dim to my perception as we speak." Helena drew a small satin box forward and thumbed its square lid back, revealing two delicately-filigreed shells dull with the tone of beaten gold. Her head bent first to the left, then the right, as she clipped each charm to its ear and brought them to balance in the mirror before her. The tips of her fingers came to adjust the pale hair at her brow, sorting its sensuous curve to her taste. "I imagine he is steeled to this. Confident. Resolute. Fearless to the core." "A comforting thought," Regret responded. "I can see its perceptive appeal." This provoked a sharp twist in her direction and an angered ice-blue glare. "Play with me at your peril, little one. I've asked you a question. You will answer it or pay the price." Regret cocked her head curiously. "You want an answer? Which answer should I choose? You will forgive me, I'm sure, for remarking on the fact that the truth is rarely welcome at your door. How, for instance, might the news that your son is conflicted be received? Not well, I think. Nor the report of the appreciable effort he exerts to maintain the strength of his conviction." "Lies," snapped Helena, her hand wrapping round the corner of the table, its joints going stiff with rage. The younger woman nodded reflectively. "As I said, which answer should I choose? It would be much more in line with my own best interests, and Stavros' I suspect, to agree you are in every way correct. Very well. He is confident," she pronounced carefully. "He is resolute," she asserted, her eye going narrow with the word. "He is fearless to the core." And with this last declaration she assured his mother her son was anything but. Helena appeared to absorb this information effortlessly, an eyebrow arched sharp in judgment as the words sunk fast into the depths of her soul. The hand so tightly gripped to the table relaxed and removed to join its partner in her lap. Every feature seemed to soften, every arrogant angle ease. When her voice came, it was calm and coy with its intent. "Such a brave girl you are, to have mustered up the courage to attend our event. Our banchetto velenoso. Our poisonous banquet. The original rite - the Russian rite - was more primitive in nature. As I've come to understand it, theirs was an evening of tainted blades. Someday you must ask Stavros about his ancestor Vladimir, the Grand Prince of Kiev. Two brothers had he to stand in the way of his succession. They did not stand for long." She turned then, back to the mirror, to inspect the quality of her reflection. The spear of a long-tailed comb was brought to adjust the height of her hair. "They traveled abroad as the years went by and their powers grew to match their wealth. Those early princes, Cassadines all, were feted at every court in Europe. But it wasn't until they met The Wolf and The Lady of Ferrara that the custom of the Deciding came into its own. Cesare and his sister Lucretia, legend has it, gave them the secrets of the green and the white. La polverina. The powder." "The Cassadine alchemist, Fontraire, can trace his lineage side by side with our own. Generation after generation, his loyal forebears have mixed our powder, the same powder their descendant, Renardo, prepares for us today. Part cantarella, part arsenic, and part a mystery they will not share." Regret thought she saw the shadow of a pout beneath those full pink lips, but the aspect faded like a dream. "It is this mystery, of course, that prevents anyone from working to build a resistance. Had I that knowledge…but no. Not yet. We still come common to the vote, I'm afraid. As will you, my dear." Helena's eye slanted sideways to meet that of her captive, a sly smile playing at the corner of her mouth. "I wonder, do you realize you will have your packet of poison too? You've thought this through, haven't you? This demand to be a part of our Deciding? We summon no observers, Regret. Only participants. All are provided the means to make their choice and are bound by Cassadine custom to do so. You may choose any guest you like. And, naturally, any guest may choose you." Her smile curled with mirth as she added, "Am I speaking too quickly, dear? You do look a bit confused." Regret attempted to adjust her expression as she replied, "I was given to understand the choice lay between Stavros and Argos." "Ah," the older woman exclaimed, nodding as she returned to the mirror. "You have been with a Cassadine for how long, Regret? A year? And when, in all that time, were you left with the impression that the contour of our craft was so unswervingly straight? Those who have a stake in the fortunes of the prince will no doubt deliver their powders accordingly. But what of those whose interests are less…invested?" Helena allowed herself an elegant giggle. "The secondary game can be most amusing. I've often found it half the fun." "And all are expected to do this…to poison," Regret mused, almost to herself. "Not expected. Commanded, my dear. Commanded. The penalty is stiff for those who waver. You heard Stavros refer to the placement of his Hand? They stand as guarantors of the Cassadine compact. A sentinel in every shadow, marking off the cowards, the pretenders, the false. Dispose of your dose in a plant, beneath a carpet or even to your very own glass and they will take you. Few are killed for this, though. More for attempting to avoid the drink. Some endeavor to pour out their wine and others to switch their glasses. Several have been caught in the act of regurgitation itself. These will be the guests who vanish. Those few fickle friends one will never see again. Well, Louis. You are late. I fear this is becoming a habit." The sudden shift in subject caused Regret to blink and cast a darting eye around the room. There, standing just inside the door, still and silent as a great dark cloud, was Louis. Louis, whom she suspected was not Mrs. Garber's nephew at all. In fact, given his demeanor and the sensual greed of his glance, she judged him part of a much more significant relationship within the Cassadine household. A demanding position, to be sure, and not without its own inherent dangers. Helena held the man's gaze through the mirror, refusing to release it even as she spoke. "Regret, you will write a note to Stavros, inviting him to dine with us at his convenience. I will see for myself how conflicted he is. Until that time you will remain in your room. You may go." As she slipped between the pair on her way to the door, Helena added, "Do not forget your fittings begin in the morning. The gowns of a Cassadine consort and the wife of The Empire's prince. Prepare Laura as you must. I will have no awkward outbursts while my designers are in residence." Regret pulled the door shut quickly, yet not quite quickly enough to avoid the heated thrust of his mistress' groan as Louis took her to the floor.