(no subject)

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric's new room is up a floor from his old one and at the east end of the corridor. Inside they arefrankly ridiculous. Romanesque with vaulted ceilings with edges with frescos of animals, rich tiled floors that are warm underfoot.

The cross shaped layout and columns create discreet niches - one with a large bed; another lined with books and a map of the world as known in his time painted on the wall, a third holding several large couches circling his harpsichord.

The east side opens onto a glassed-in portico with a stunning view of the snow speckled garden.

A door off the bed chamber leads to a more modern but still Romanesque bathroom with a bath easily large enough for three.

Comments

[cook_the_rude]

"For me, it was old," Hannibal says. "Steeped in culture and traditions, with the finest old-fashioned and hand-made food, drink and other goods to enjoy."

[thewidewideworld]

"It sounds like a perfect place for you - full of art and culture and finery. We're you happy there?"

[cook_the_rude]

"Not as happy as I could have been," Hannibal admits. "I ultimately went with the wrong companion."

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric strokes his shoulder gently with a cloth, washing him softly.
"You would rather have been there with Will." It isn't quite a question. "Rather than Bedelia."

[cook_the_rude]

"Will, and Abigail," Hannibal says.

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric sets down the cloth to wrap his arms around Hannibal's shoulder, stroking the back of his neck lightly. "Your family." He looks into Hannibal's eyes with nothing but compassion.

[cook_the_rude]

"They would have been," Hannibal sighs.

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric looks him in the eye and kisses him softly on the corner of his lips. "I'm sorry."

[cook_the_rude]

"I sometimes wondered where I went wrong, turning our hope into despair and destruction," Hannibal says, sadly.

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric stokes Hannibal's cheek, holding his eye. Not that long again he would have offered to look, to tell Hannibal how things might have turned out different. But with his own experiences this evening and his time with Emcee has made him a little more wary.

"That which is broken can sometimes be mended, but they are never truly whole. Not as they were. All we can do is go from where we stand."

[cook_the_rude]

"Kintsukuroi," Hannibal says quietly.

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric cocks his head questioningly. The word didn't come into use some 700 years after his own time.

[cook_the_rude]

"Repaired with gold," Hannibal says. "A broken vessel of great value, made even more precious by not glueing it together not setting the pieces in precious metals."

[thewidewideworld]

"Is that how Abigail is for you? A memory bound in precious settings?"

[cook_the_rude]

"And suffused with regrets," Hannibal says, softly.

[thewidewideworld]

Sinric brushes a gentle hand through Hannibal's hair, kissing him softly. "For all I am coming to see future and past, I am learning too that regret is a waste of the heart. Once a thing is done, one can only learn from the outcome, and remember it the next time a similar path comes to us."

[cook_the_rude]

Hannibal just looks at him.

[thewidewideworld]

"We go from where we stand." Sinric goes on, tangling his fingers in Hannibal's, looking into his eyes. "And unlike that poor, sweet musician whose desire we share, we neither of us stand alone."

[cook_the_rude]

"You have the Vikings," Hannibal says, "the conqueror and his monk -- and I have Will."

Yes. He does.

[thewidewideworld]

"And we have each other. And all that we share." He adds.

Part of him wonders how much he really has Athelstan anymore. Or Ragnar, as one pines for lose of the other.

[cook_the_rude]

"But only here, not in our worlds," Hannibal says. "All I might have of you back in my world would be your skeleton and grave goods in a museum."

[thewidewideworld]

"If I have a grave, marked with any worldly goods. More like my bones will be scattered some lonely place. It matters little, compare to the to the treads I have touched, or the ripples I have left on the weave." He smiles distantly, warmed by the thought.

"And as for you," he kisses Hannibal's knuckles, "in your mind is a great and beautiful palace. Look for me there, and you will always find me singing."

[cook_the_rude]

Hannibal runs his fingers through Sinric's wet hair.

"I would miss you if I couldn't come back here," he says softly.

[thewidewideworld]

"And I you, when the door and the years part us." He kisses Hannibal's cheek, resting their foreheads together. "But here and now, in this moment and in this bath, we have all of each other. Let us not say goodbye till it is time."

[cook_the_rude]

"We might not know when the time comes," Hannibal says. "Even you might be surprised by the turn of reality one day."