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Rose and Thorn - part 4 (PG)

Posted: Tue Jan 20, 2009 10:54 am
by Shadow
Disclaimer: Moonlight is not mine and no copyright infringement is intended.






ROSE AND THORN
part four





Mick hadn’t seen Beth move, but she was standing closer to him now. She reached out a hand as if to touch his arm, and it was so like Rosie’s gesture, it was unbearable. If he’d still had vampire reflexes he would have been gone. Instead he stumbled back, almost falling against the window, and Beth, looking dismayed, dropped her hand to her side.

“Mick . . .”

He leaned against the window. It was cold, very cold.

“Mick, you can tell me,” Beth said gently. “What happened then?”

She needed to know all of it. “I called an ambulance,” he said at last. “I stayed with Rosie, and held her. I shouldn’t have, it was reckless, it was dangerous - but I just couldn’t leave her alone like that. I waited till the ambulance came, and by then she was starting to wake up.”

Beth looked cautiously hopeful. “Then – was she okay?”

“She had a concussion. A bad one, she was in the hospital for days. But she recovered.”

Mick had checked on her compulsively, those first few weeks, using Coraline’s connections. Coraline had been fond of Rosie, and had willingly helped Mick with his obsession. She’d hired a private investigator she knew, a quiet bookish human called Jared Finney. His sources included police and hospital workers, and later, Rosie’s friends, her parents, and even Rosie herself: the P.I. had pretended to be investigating the break-in, and everyone had talked to him. Time went by, as Finney brought the reports to Mick and Coraline.

Rosie was in the hospital, she was very ill, but they thought she would recover. She was still in the hospital but she was better; she was supposed to go home the next day. She was home, her injuries healed, teaching piano lessons by day and sleeping, peacefully enough, in her own room at night. She didn’t know what had happened. She’d never seen what hit her. She’d had a wonderful dream, just before the ambulance came, a dream that her lost brother Mick had been holding her in his arms, whispering her name. She wondered if he’d come to her like an angel, to call her back from death. Or maybe Mick really had come to her rescue, driving off her attacker and saving her life. Someone had called the ambulance, after all. Of course she knew the rescue fantasy was only wishful thinking, of course Mick hadn’t actually been there. But he’d only been missing for six months. He might still be alive somewhere, even though no one her family had hired for the search had ever found a trace of him. Even though she knew that if Mick was alive, he would have found a way to contact her.

Finney had raised his eyebrows as he’d told Mick that last part, but he hadn’t asked any questions.

Beth sighed in relief. “She recovered,” she said. “And she never saw you.”

Mick could see the change in her expression, Beth’s eternal optimism - she was starting to think that all was well, because it had ended well. He reached out abruptly to take the picture from her hand. “She never saw me. She never knew I was the one who attacked her, and she recovered completely. So maybe it wasn’t all so bad, right?” He held up the picture in front of Beth. “Rosie had this in her hand, and she was crying. She was thinking of me, missing me, mourning for me, at the very moment I broke into her room and tried to kill her. How was I supposed to live with that? I tried to run away from it, to escape it, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know how.” He couldn’t bear to hold the picture any longer. He put it down on the windowsill, and stepped away.

Beth had gone pale. “How to do what?”

“How to die.”

There was a long silence, and Beth stood very still. “You tried to kill yourself?”

“Threw myself off a roof that night, thirty stories up, just in case it might work.” He shook his head. “Coraline didn’t want me to know how to end it. She claimed that nothing could kill a vampire, and I never did stumble onto what would.”

“Never?” Beth said faintly. “How many times did you try?”

He hadn’t been counting. But he’d stopped trying, mostly, when he’d realized that recovering from his attempts only made his body need more blood.

“Beth,” he said, “I wanted to die. It was unbearable, and I didn’t know it was going to get better. Coraline said it would, but how could I trust anything she said? I came within a heartbeat of killing my own sister.”

“But you didn’t,” Beth said. “You didn’t kill her.”

“No.” Mick looked down at the floor. “But there were others. Some were as young and as innocent as she was.”

His hands clenched together, and he twisted the ring on his finger. It was colder than ever, and Beth was utterly silent. All he could hear was the quiet crackle of the fire, which was giving off no heat at all. The tears on his face would freeze there, and he would never be able to forget.

When Beth walked up to him and touched his face he flinched, and pulled away. But she reached out again and he stayed still this time, shivering, as she traced the path of his tears with her fingers and brushed a strand of hair away from his eyes. Her touch was warm and gentle, and in some way it was healing him. How could she come to him like this, with such compassion, after all that he had told her? How could she understand, and forgive? She had done the same that morning on the roof, the day she found out he’d been watching over her for all of her life. He had thought she’d be angry, that she’d feel violated, but she had understood exactly why he’d done it. This was so much deeper, so much darker, and he had never meant to tell her, but somehow she still understood.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, taking his hands in hers. “No one should ever have to go through anything like that. I should never have asked you – oh God, I didn’t know; I didn’t know what I was asking for . . .”

“How could you have known? I never told you. You needed to know, from the beginning, and I never told you.”

“But the things I said to you . . .” Her eyes were too bright, with unshed tears.

“Beth. It’s okay.”

Beth looked at him searchingly, then finally nodded, looking down at their entwined hands. Her hands were warm and soft in his cold grip, and he felt that warmth slowly stealing into him, easing the chill that held his body. She was silent again, for a long time. Then she asked, “How long did it take? Before it got better?”

“I’m not really sure. It was hard to keep track of time. I guess it was about a year, before the instincts started to fade. They were still there, but they weren’t as strong, and I was beginning to learn how to control them. They kept fading, over the years, but it was a long time before I was completely in control. Before I was safe.” He managed a faint smile. “It helped a lot, when I met Josef.”

They hadn’t exactly hit it off at first, but Josef had still given Mick the information he needed. He’d told Mick how a vampire could die – but he’d also shown him how to go on living in a way that he could endure. Josef had learned to live without killing out of practicality – he’d made some comment about torch-bearing mobs – and not out of guilt, and he was thoroughly bemused by Mick’s attitude.

“Coraline must have been seriously out of her mind when she turned you. If I’ve ever seen anyone less cut out to be a vampire . . .” Josef had rolled his eyes. “Hell, St. John, it wasn’t even you doing the killing. It was vampire instinct, and a newbie can’t fight it.”

“You make it sound like a war,” Mick had answered. He hadn’t really believed Josef. Who was the enemy, when he was fighting himself?

But being a vampire was like being at war, Mick thought now. A vampire’s life was as full of contradictions as any war, wondrous abilities mingled inextricably with bloodlust and horror. Vampire senses and strengths had helped Mick save many lives, including Beth’s, and he’d learned to love his speed and grace, but being a vampire was still darkness and blood and loneliness without end, and something vital was missing; it wasn’t really life. In the war Mick had seen courage and ingenuity and comradeship beyond belief, but war was still a monster that existed only to kill – Sam had died there, and Jimmy, and all those innocents as well, the ordinary people who’d been trying to live their daily lives in cities like London and Hamburg.

A German bombardier, some young soldier trying to do his duty, had flown over London and had seen only enemies there; he’d dropped his bombs, unaware of what his actions would do to a little girl named Mary. Mick, a newborn vampire, had looked through a window in Los Angeles and had seen only prey there; he hadn’t known, till it was over, that he’d attacked his own sister.

And how had he stopped himself? It shouldn’t have been possible. He let go of Beth’s hands, went back to the picture he’d left on the windowsill, and picked it up.

“When it was better – when you were safe - did you ever see Rosie again?” Beth asked.

“No.”

“What happened to her?”

“She lived her life.”

Carrying the picture, Mick went back to the couch, and Beth sat beside him. Mick took the rest of the photographs out of the album and slowly turned through them. Rosie walked alone on the beach in a summer dress, took a shy bow after giving a piano concert, danced with her fiancé at her engagement party, and stood beside her husband at her wedding, radiant in a froth of white lace.

“You watched her from a distance,” Beth murmured. “The way you did with me.”

Mick shook his head. “I hired people to watch her. I didn’t ever dare go close enough to see her.”

In the photographs Rosie slowly grew older; lines appeared on her face and her hair began to turn white. She sat at the piano with a student, guiding his hands; she held her husband’s arm as they walked a winding path up a sunlit hill. She pushed her husband’s wheelchair down a sidewalk lined with dandelions, wept at his funeral among wreaths of dying flowers, and walked alone on the beach in a winter coat, her white hair blowing loose in the wind.

Beth turned the last photograph over and looked at the date on the back: March 12, 2007.

“She’s still alive, isn’t she?” Beth said.

“Yes.”

“Where is she now?”

“San Francisco.”

“Will you ever go to see her?”

“No.”

Mick put the pictures back in the album and leaned over to lay it on the table. His pendant fell free from his shirt, and he touched it lightly, brushing his finger along its chain.

After a moment Beth said, “But you want to.”

“Of course I do.” His hand tightened around the pendant.

“I understand why you won’t,” she said. “There are so many reasons, even apart from the way you feel. I don’t know how you’d explain things, and maybe it would be too much for her. But . . .” Her voice caught. She rubbed at her face and pushed back her hair, looking impossibly tired. “I know now, I would have rejected Josh’s proposal, and it would have been over between us. But I’d still give anything to be able to see him again.”

Mick stayed silent.

“You’ve lost so much, Mick. Your parents. Your brother. So many others. You must feel as if you’ve lost Rosie too. But she’s still there.”

“She’s still there. But so is that image in my mind. What I did to her. I swore . . .” Mick put his hands to his head. “I can’t,” he whispered. “Beth, I can’t.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said it. It’s just – I’ve never lost anyone before, anyone I was close to. I never knew my grandparents, my parents are alive and well, I’m an only child. I never even had a pet. I thought I knew what it would be like to lose someone but I didn’t, not at all; it’s the worst feeling I’ve ever known, and you’ve been through it so many times. I don’t want you to lose anyone else, not if you don’t have to. I’m sorry.”

Mick reached out to touch her hand. “I don’t want to lose you.”

She stared at him, silent.

“I thought . . . maybe I had.”

“No,” she whispered. “Oh God, Mick. No.”

Her hands moved to the back of his neck, brushing through his hair, and she pulled him to her. He put his arms around her and let his head fall against her shoulder, and when she stroked his hair he shivered, but it wasn’t really cold, not any more. She drew him closer, and he could hear her heartbeat, feel her warmth. He hadn’t lost her. They had always been connected, and they still were. Whatever happened between them in the future, he would never lose her.

Dawn light came through the windows, and it was warm.










The railyard would have been ugly and utilitarian on any other day, but it looked beautiful to Mick; it meant that he was finally coming home. The train slowed, rattling through the yard and pulling into the station, and Mick stared hopefully through the dirty window. So many people were waiting - how would he ever find his family? But as soon as he set foot on the platform they were there, his parents and Rosie, and Rosie had grown so much he hardly knew her. The pictures she’d sent had only hinted at the change. He’d left behind a little girl and come home to a young woman. She turned her head and saw him, then gasped and ran to him, flinging herself into his arms. “Mick!” she cried. “You’re home, you’re really home!” He spun her around and laughed through tears, calling her name over and over again. Rosie, Rosie. Oh, Rose.

The room was not quite dark; the glow from the city lights slipped through the curtains and cast shadows across the floor. Mick sat up in bed, his head in his hands, and another shadow moved hesitantly into the doorway. Rosie came to sit on the bed beside him, and through the haze of the receding nightmare he heard her soft murmur, asking if he’d dreamed about the war, and if he wanted to talk to her about it. He recoiled at the thought. He couldn’t fit the two worlds together, couldn’t speak of the horrors of war in this safe and normal place. Not to anyone, and especially not to his innocent fifteen-year-old sister. But Rosie’s very presence was pulling him free of the nightmare. He took her hand, and leaned over to rest his forehead against hers. “You can tell me, you know,” Rosie said softly. “I’ve read a lot, and Susie Whitman’s brother talks about the war all the time. I know more about it than you think. Whatever it is, I can handle it.” Something in her voice made him realize that young as she was, she was telling him the truth. If he told her what he’d dreamed, she would listen, and understand, and not be harmed by it. But I still can’t bear to speak of it.

It was dusk on the eve of Mick’s wedding, and the light was fading outside. Mick sat beside Rosie on his threadbare couch, and opened the little box she’d given him. He touched the silver fleur-de-lis cross inside, awed, only half hearing her tell him that it was not actually silver, but gold. How had she found something that so perfectly reflected Coraline? “Gold because it’s a wedding, but white gold because silver’s your color,” Rosie said. “It’s so you’ll think of Coraline, even when she’s not with you.” Mick took the pendant into his hand and held it tight. Rosie was the only one who truly seemed glad for him – his friends didn’t think Coraline was the sort of girl one ought to marry, and his parents were thoroughly dismayed by his whirlwind courtship. But his relationship with his parents had been strained ever since he’d gotten home; every conversation had turned into an argument, and he’d had to move out almost at once. The war had changed him, and he hadn’t fit into his old world any more. It was Rosie who’d been there for him through the dark times, through his anger and confusion; she’d all too often patched him up after he’d gotten into fights, and had put him to bed when he’d come home drunk. And it was Rosie who was here for him now, delighted to see him finally happy and in love. Mick put the chain around his neck. I’ll wear this always.










The dreams of Rose faded gently as Mick woke. He sat up on the bed, pushing back his hair. The blinds were open, and late afternoon sunlight streamed in through the windows, glinting in prisms off the glassware in the kitchen. He reached for the fleury cross, which lay hidden beneath his shirt. It had never made him think of Coraline. Instead it brought him memories of Rose, a sweet and terrible mix of heartache, love, and guilt. He’d worn it every day for all these years, never sure if it was for penance or for remembrance. Rosie would laugh, if she ever found out how he’d twisted her simple gift into something so complex.

He picked up the blue album from the table, and slid out Rosie’s last photograph. He gazed at it, thinking how lost and lonely she looked. What must it be like for her, left abruptly alone after over fifty years of marriage? She had no children. Her husband, her parents, and her brother Sam were all dead, and she must certainly believe that Mick was dead as well.

Even though I’m still here.

He hadn’t just lost Rosie. She had lost him as well. He’d always known that, but Beth had made him truly see it. All these years he had told himself it was too late: Rose had finally given him up for dead, mourned for him, and gone on with her life. It would be cruel to turn up on her doorstep, inexplicably thirty years old, and disrupt the happiness she had found. It would be wrong for him to go to her as a vampire, to touch her life, again, with the darkness that had immersed him.

But he was human now. And she was alone. He could almost hear her voice, whispering to him in the night: Whatever it is, I can handle it.

Could Rose really handle knowing what Mick had become? He’d never thought that any normal human could, but Beth had accepted what he was so calmly and completely, it had left him shaken. Maybe it would be the same for Rosie. Or maybe it would only cause her pain. How could he possibly know what would be best for Rose? He could hardly hire someone to interview her, to find out the answer to a question like that.

But he could ask Beth to talk to her.

Beth.









He’d taken her home in the morning light, with the car’s top down and his sunglasses stowed in the glove box. The light and the open air had been intoxicating, and he hadn’t been able to stop smiling. In the passenger seat Beth was exhausted and rumpled, her hair blowing in a tangle around her face, but she was smiling too and she had never looked more beautiful.

When he pulled up in front of her apartment she turned to him, reaching out to touch, very gently, the bruises on his face. “You do understand that you’re mortal now, don’t you?” she said, raising her eyebrows just a fraction.

“Well, yeah.”

“Then will you do me a couple of favors?”

Mick looked at her warily, and she laughed.

“Just small ones,” she said. “Like - oh, I don’t know – maybe you could stop fighting with dangerous vampires in dark alleys?”

“Well. I could try.”

“And - will you remember that you can’t do that vampire jumping thing any more?”

“Oh, that hurts.” Mick grinned. “Just being human is so lame.”

“Yes. But you wear it well.” Beth smiled, and looked at him intently. “I can’t get over seeing you like this. It’s like you belong in the sun.”

“I grew up in it. Every Saturday Rosie would be after me, wanting me to take her to the beach.”

“Did you ever manage to say no to her?”

“Sure. I said no to her all the time.”

Beth raised a brow.

“But I ended up taking her anyway,” he confessed, and she laughed.

“In the summer, we practically lived on the beach,” Mick said. “We were always by the water, in the sun.” He could remember those days clearly now, he realized in astonishment. The bright memories had always been overshadowed, before, by what had come after them.

“Have you gone back there yet?” Beth asked curiously. “To the beach?”

“Not yet. But I will.” Mick gazed at Beth. He realized that he’d never seen her properly before, in the sunlight, without dark glasses, without the pain of day hurting his eyes. Even at Josh’s funeral he’d had one eye swollen shut. “There’s so many things I want to do, in whatever time I have.”

Beth reached out to take his hand, her expression suddenly serious. “Just be careful, okay? It scares me a little, knowing you’re mortal.”

He held her hand in both of his. “I’ll be careful.”

“Good,” she said softly. “Because I don’t want to lose you.”










Would Beth be willing to talk to Rose? Mick was certain that she would. She’s a crusader born, and she wants me to have Rose back in my life. Mick’s breath caught; could it really be so simple to have hope again? He thought that nothing would be better for Beth, in her grief, than a project that touched her heart. And Beth could find out, if anyone could, what the best choice would be for Rosie.

Whatever that choice turned out to be, he suddenly realized how very much he wanted Beth and Rose to meet.

Mick picked up his coat and dug his cell phone out of the pocket. He found Beth’s number and made the call, to ask her how she would feel about a trip to San Francisco.














THE END
(though the story continues, in a different way, in "The Other Side of the Mirror")











_

Re: Rose and Thorn - part four

Posted: Tue Jan 20, 2009 6:24 pm
by LynetteC
There's more, right? You're not going to leave us hanging NOW?

I just caught up with all four chapters and I'm hooked! Please post chapter five soon - REAL SOON! ;)

L. x

Re: Rose and Thorn - part four

Posted: Tue Jan 20, 2009 7:09 pm
by wpgrace
LynetteC wrote:There's more, right? You're not going to leave us hanging NOW?

I just caught up with all four chapters and I'm hooked! Please post chapter five soon - REAL SOON! ;)

L. x

What Lynette said, oh please oh please oh please oh please!!!!!!

This is a marvelous story.

Re: Rose and Thorn - part four

Posted: Tue Jan 20, 2009 8:13 pm
by coco
I'm chiming in with Lynette and Grace and asking, no pleading, for more of this.
Simply fantastic story :D

Re: Rose and Thorn - part four

Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 1:28 pm
by Shadow
I had always meant this to be the end of the story. And it is the end of this story. But I got interested in Rose and in what might have happened next, so I did write another one (just finished it!) and will start posting it as soon as I get a spare minute..... It's a sequel chronologically, but it's also something of a mirror story to this one.

Thank you for asking for more! That's the best compliment ever.

Re: Rose and Thorn - part four

Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 1:35 pm
by coco
Shadow wrote:I had always meant this to be the end of the story. And it is the end of this story. But I got interested in Rose and in what might have happened next, so I did write another one (just finished it!) and will start posting it as soon as I get a spare minute..... It's a sequel chronologically, but it's also something of a mirror story to this one.

Thank you for asking for more! That's the best compliment ever.
Looking forward to the sequel Shadow :)

Re: Rose and Thorn - part four

Posted: Wed Jan 21, 2009 4:50 pm
by lorig
I just finished reading this. This was amazing. So heart breaking yet hopeful.. I am so glad you decided to write more. I can't wait for it.

Re: Rose and Thorn - part four

Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 1:31 am
by mitzie
What an excellent story!! Heart-breaking, yet full of hope. I loved it!!!! I am really looking forward to the sequel to this!!
Bravo!!!! Excellent writing.

mitzie :mrgreen:

Re: Rose and Thorn - part 4

Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2009 7:31 am
by Shadow
Thank you, lorig and mitzie! Glad you want to see more because I'm off now to post the first chapter of the next one. It will probably take me longer to post this next story but I'll get all the chapters up as soon as I can.

Re: Rose and Thorn - part 4

Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2009 9:05 am
by lila
Wow. Shadow, this fic is incredible. Just when I thought we had hit the climax, the highest of the high, you give us just a little more pot to smoke ;) .

Sorry for the humongous quote, but...
Shadow wrote: Mick reached out to touch her hand. “I don’t want to lose you.”

She stared at him, silent.

“I thought . . . maybe I had.”

“No,” she whispered. “Oh God, Mick. No.”

Her hands moved to the back of his neck, brushing through his hair, and she pulled him to her. He put his arms around her and let his head fall against her shoulder, and when she stroked his hair he shivered, but it wasn’t really cold, not any more. She drew him closer, and he could hear her heartbeat, feel her warmth. He hadn’t lost her. They had always been connected, and they still were. Whatever happened between them in the future, he would never lose her.

Dawn light came through the windows, and it was warm.
This part here is delectable. I adore the transition and the duality of hot and cold, how one reflects mortality and the other vampirism and guilt. I especially love Beth's reactions: she is warm and supple and so caring that it makes my heart ache.

I'm so glad there's a continuation to this!

Re: Rose and Thorn - part 4

Posted: Sun Jan 25, 2009 11:22 pm
by Shadow
What an amazing comment, lila. I loved your insights and was especially glad that Beth came across for you (I'm never quite sure if I've got hold of her character!) Thank you.

Re: Rose and Thorn - part 4

Posted: Wed Jan 28, 2009 10:09 pm
by francis
So this was Mick’s first impression of the P.I. job. It explains why he wanted to become one, too. Helping people who are distraught with worry, like he was back then. Then again, it also explains the stalking, he did it before he met Beth, with Rosie.
I love that this, Mick telling Beth, is bringing her closer to understanding Mick, to loving him. And she needs to know about the hard time a fledgling has. She is sugarcoating so much, in the show and in fanon.
And then, bam, this blows me away:
“You make it sound like a war,” Mick had answered. He hadn’t really believed Josef. Who was the enemy, when he was fighting himself?
So true, so deep. And chilling how this ties in with his war memories.
In light of your story, the misconception of Coraline becomes clearer. Had she known how much Mick’s war experience had shaped the man, and how it would make his life as a vampire miserable, and if she had known about war, she might have chosen differently. But I guess she has never been on the battlefields, as a woman of her ranks.
“I know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said it. It’s just – I’ve never lost anyone before, anyone I was close to. I never knew my grandparents, my parents are alive and well, I’m an only child. I never even had a pet. I thought I knew what it would be like to lose someone but I didn’t, not at all; it’s the worst feeling I’ve ever known, and you’ve been through it so many times. I don’t want you to lose anyone else, not if you don’t have to. I’m sorry.”
Did I say that I love your Beth?

I love how you take the image of cold and warm to explain how Mick feels.

And Rosie gave him the pendant to think of Coraline – wow. The sister he loved and Coraline he later hated in one pendant. Of course he will never be able to shed the pendant, or the memories.
Wonderful!!!
I love that Beth brings out the happy memories of his childhood.
And now Beth might talk to Rosie. That will be worth to read.

Thank you for this wonderful journey.

Re: Rose and Thorn - part 4

Posted: Fri Jan 30, 2009 8:12 am
by Shadow
Wow. francis, thank you so much for this comment - which let me know that everything I wanted this story to say, came across for you! Especially the vampire/war analogy - and it was so intriguing what you mentioned about Coraline, that she might have made a different decision if she had known war in that way. I would never have thought of that .....
So glad you mentioned the pendant too. I wanted to come up with a reason why Mick doesn't go a day without a fleur-de-lis - which is so very Coraline - when his feelings about her are so mixed. Lovely to know that you liked that bit. Thank you!

Re: Rose and Thorn - part 4 (PG)

Posted: Thu Feb 19, 2009 12:19 am
by redwinter101
This is such a beautiful ending, Shadow. I love how you've woven this story, bringing in Mick's past, the events of the present and then using them to build a picture of the future for Mick and Beth. Together.
Shadow wrote:When Beth walked up to him and touched his face he flinched, and pulled away. But she reached out again and he stayed still this time, shivering, as she traced the path of his tears with her fingers and brushed a strand of hair away from his eyes. Her touch was warm and gentle, and in some way it was healing him. How could she come to him like this, with such compassion, after all that he had told her? How could she understand, and forgive?
This is just so touching - Mick's wonder at her love for him when he sees himself as so unworthy. It squeezes my heart.
Shadow wrote:But being a vampire was like being at war, Mick thought now. A vampire’s life was as full of contradictions as any war, wondrous abilities mingled inextricably with bloodlust and horror. Vampire senses and strengths had helped Mick save many lives, including Beth’s, and he’d learned to love his speed and grace, but being a vampire was still darkness and blood and loneliness without end, and something vital was missing; it wasn’t really life.
And this is just about the best description of Mick's feelings about being a vampire that I've read. It's NOT all bad and hateful, but the overall package is still so loaded with sadness and regret. This is perfect.
Shadow wrote:He hadn’t lost her. They had always been connected, and they still were. Whatever happened between them in the future, he would never lose her.
The events that have brought them both to this point, and Beth's understanding of the forces beyond his control that led him to attack Rosie, have also, finally, led Mick to realise that she loves him. All of him.
Shadow wrote:Dawn light came through the windows, and it was warm.
This is such a simple sentence but it says so much. Really, really beautifully written - subtle and gorgeous.
Shadow wrote:Mick gazed at Beth. He realized that he’d never seen her properly before, in the sunlight, without dark glasses, without the pain of day hurting his eyes.
For me, this was the perfect way to finish. In all their flaws and glories, finally, they see each other.

I have adored this story from start to finish. Your writing is so warm and beautiful - you have captured Mick/Beth in a rare and stunning way and I am looking forward to reading the continuation.

Red

Re: Rose and Thorn - part 4 (PG)

Posted: Mon Feb 23, 2009 5:54 am
by Shadow
Thank you so much, Red. It's wonderful to hear what you thought, and to know how deeply you got into the story - you've definitely made my day! That's really high praise about Mick's thoughts on being a vampire. It did seem that for all that Mick longed to be human, there would still be some amazing things about the vampire that he would miss, and conflicting feelings on his part.

The next story's a bit different although it's a mirror to this one. I hope you'll enjoy it too!