Casta browsed thourgh the dusty shelves of an old bookstore she had found. She wasn't excatly dressed like a bookworm, her jeans were low riding and faded with holes at the knees, a tank top that showed off her stomach and a short leather jacket. Her long orange hair was down, spreading down her back in waves and her blue eyes searched the shelves.

"What the bloody Hell are you even looking for, Casta?" She asked herself,reaching her hand up to brush against the books. " 'Poetry for the Heart',crap,'Look at Me',crap. Wait,what's this?" She stopped looking up at a tattered old cover, a shelf above where she was looking."Wonder what it is?'' Casta asked herself.

She looked around for a stool or something so she could grab it. Casta wasn't the tallest person around.Hell she wasn't even 5'5! "You'd think I was a drawf." Casta said aloud, angrily.

It isn't very often that you find a blind man in a book store. However, Emrys possibly frequints this store more often then most people of whom still had their eyes. This was, after all, one of the few book stores that carried brail. The bell tinkled softly when he entered the shop and walked straight into the shelves, his cane making soft tapping sounds against the wood bottoms of the book shelves.

He was short for a man really, but he was taller for a person that didn't stand even five foot five. He stood at five feet seven inches, his shoulders wide but the rest of him slim. He was in shape. Not fit or flabby, just in shape. He wore a black polo tee shirt, showing the scars that covered his hands and forarms like a shinny glove. Blue jeans fit comfortably loose, boots sticking out the bottom, just plain black hiking boots. His skin was darkly tanned, at least, what wasn't scared. The scars were white. Over his eyes was a strip of cloth like a blindfold. His hair hung nearly to his shoulders, wavy and coal black, covering his ears.

He moved with a sort of rolling gait that most sailors seemed to have. His cane tapped her ankle and he mumbled something low that may have been an apology and stepped to the side a little, one hand coming out to touch the shelves and feel his way around her without bumping into her. Which, in the narrow shelves, he didn't manage, and he bumped her again with his shoulder, hand, and cane. He stopped again.

"I'm sorry." His voice was raspy, like the vocal cords weren't properly working. Like a smoker's voice, or an old man. Burnt vocals.

Casta watched the man as he waked down the isle toward her. He wasn't drop dead gorgoues,but he had a face you could rember,that could haunt you for a few days until you dismissed it. She saw the tiny scars all over his hands and arms.Burned,perhaphs? The cane and blindfold around his eyes, made her reliaze he was blind.

He hit her ankle slighty with the cane and mumbled what she could only guess was an apology,before he passed her,holding his hand to shelves. Unfortunaly,he hit her again with his shoulder, hand,and cane. Casta listened to his voice,raspy,as he stopped and said"I'm sorry."

Casta shook her head,then relizaed he couldn't she her movement and opened her mouth instead."It's no problem. Shelves are pretty narrow here." she said softly."I'm Casta Joans." Why the Hell did she just tell a stranger her name?! True,he was blind,but Casta had never been the most trusting person.

Then Casta may have met her match. Em trusted no one. Well, except for Sin, his new found 'little brother figure.' And even then, he hadn't immediatly trusted the boy.

The scars on his hands and forarms were indeed exactly like you would find on a burn victum, one sold scar on each. Then the little scars that littered his body, some from Verkur, some from Logan.

When he bumped into her, he seemed to 'space out' for a breif moment. The reason would go unexplained to the woman but the author is going to tell the authoress that Emrys was haveing a 'sight'. Not a vision. Visions were bad. His 'sight' meant he was mentally seeing what Casta looked like somewhat. He could see her outline, her basic structure and appearance, as if he were looking at a fire with a person in it. He shook his head as she spoke, shaking away the image in his mind.

Emrys took several steps back with the aid of the bookshelf in order not to brush her again, bump into her again. And to get out of her reach. Paranoid.

"Em." No full name from him. He trusted no one with his full name save for his school and hospital records. Sin still called him Em, though, when he'd visited him in the hospital he was sure he'd found his real name.

"They are narrow." ... Nervous.

Casta watched curiously as he shook his head and then as he took several steps back,away from her and said,"Em'" then nervously."They are a narrow."
Now, Casta wasn't usually one to push things, but "Em" had caught her interset. And when you get Casta interseted, she doesn't give up."Em? No last name?" She asked,taking a few steps toward him.

She looked him up and down. She wasn't sure why he quite her interset. Peharps it was the tiny scars,she wanted to know how he got them. No, it was more then that. There just seemed this presence around him,that drew her to him.

He frowned. Shook his head quickly at her, to answer her. Usually, when he gave only a nickname, people didn't press or question. They must know he has his reasons for not wanting his name known, even if they only thought he was a little parnoid. They'd be right. It took him a moment to find words that would satisfy, though as they left his lips he was nearly positive that they would not quench curiosity.

"Last names are unimportant, overrated."

He could hear her foot falls towards him. To a person who could see, they would know she was curious, the would know she was just moving closer, just for that reason. Emrys can not see, and he's not trusting, and to him, her advancment after his retreat was threatening and maybe hostile.

He took several more backwards steps. "Not that it's a bad thing," he said, since she'd given her last name he didn't want to insult her, make her angry and more menacing. "I just don't like mine really."

Casta forwned, as he took yet another several steps away from her."It's your choiceif you don't like it and don't want to tell me." She said softly,though it didn't quench her curiosty. Casta was slightly hurt he kept moving away,though ofcourse she wouldn't ever show it. She wasn't the type of person to show if someone got to her,good or bad way.

"Why do you think their over rated and unimportant?" She stayed where she was so he wouldn't move farther then he already had.

When her footsteps stopped, he stopped retreating. It was a simple process.

In fact, he seemed to look a milimeter more comfortable now that she'd stopped advancing on her. He set the end of his cane down on the ground and leaned both hands on it. He was faceing a point just above her face, almost directly facing her. Just a little too high.

"Because, now with just a last name anyone can find anyone. Anyone can look up your entire life span, everything about you. All of you credits and you social security, your insurance. Everything." His voice didn't change at all with the more he spoke. It was simply a rasping hint to every word. Definatly a vocal problem. It's called too much smoke. "That concept doesn't frighten you?" He inquired softly, so not to seem accusatory.

Casta smiled at his explantion,then tilted her head to the side slightly,thinking over his question. His voice was raspy,somker perhaps,and his tone held no accusation,it was just a question."Truthfully? No. Rather it'd make me angry,thinking that someone just decided they could just try and control everything of mine. Or try to become me. I'd fight."

Casta spoke the truth. She just wan't the type to lay back and allow someone to take everything from her. She thanked her past for giving her that. To Casta the worst thing that could happen was that she would be overpowered,helpless.She hated that. It made Casta feel like a caged animal.

He listened, his face growing less frightful and more gaurded. Or at least...it looked so. People often found it hard, trying to determin by look what Morose was feeling. People don't realize how much emotion is in the eyes until they met someone whose eyes would never willingly be shown.

"The last time I fought," was a mere moth ago, "I was nearly killed." In fact, if you notic, he's leaning rather heavily on his cane. This is because one week ago his ankles had healed enough to walk a little. Now they were able to walk a block and not feel pain. He'd just walked four. "The time before I was beaten. And the time before that, and before that. And the first time I fought, i got this," he waved his hand in front of his blindfolded eyes.

"I'm done fighting." He'd just rather keep his name hidden. He hadn't sounded very sad, or remorful, about being 'beaten' or 'nearly killed' or the blinding. He seemed at peace with it. Because he's come to learn that it's his life and unless he ends it, it will probably continue that way.

Casta looked up at him,her eyes didn't hold pity. She didn't she how pity helped anyone,instead they held respect and prasie. "Why all the fighting?" She asked softly,respectfully,watching his face and noticing how he leaned on his cane.Casta wanted to step toward him,but she had learned he liked his space."I don't think I'll ever stop fighting." Casta whispered.

She wasn't speaking of physcial fights,more emtional. Fighting with her past and trying to ecscape it's clutches, and pushing against memories. An internal fight that affected everything about her on the outside. In a way she had scars,like Em. But instead of being visible on her skin,they were hidden in her mind,and sometimes shone thourgh her eyes.

He wouldn't have known pitty. He'd heard the sound in many peoples voices, felt the feeling through his visions, but he'd never really seen it. As a child, he was picked on because of his ears, the shape of his eyes. And his fostor mother, she showed no pitty, just protection and love. After he was blinded is when people began to pitty. So he'd never seen it. Never really known it.

But he knew the sound in her voice, respect. Was she a good actress? Or was she sincere? When he'd touched her she hadn't caused any visions. Perhapes she was not bad.

"You shouldn't ever stop fighting," he replied, because it was the right thing to say and he knew it. Why all the fighting? "Because...I seem to draw..." demons, mage children with evil personas, dark angels, even he himself was an enemy. But how could he know if she were initiate or uninitiate? He did not, just like with Sinister. "the less pleasent people to me. And when I lay still and let it happen, I seem to come out safer then when I fight."

Casta gazed at him in slience for a moment. "I don't think I could that. Just lie still and take it. My past won't let me." Her tone was bitter sweet matching the ghost of a bitter sweet smile on her lips,though he couldn't see it."But you're right,you can never stop fighting,even if you wanted to.'And so she contuines fighting. Fighting the past that has made who she is today.And in the back of her mind she wonders, Will the Fight Kill me in the end? Or will I end my Misery in the inky blackness of my mind?'" She whispered,forgetting for a moment that Em was standing before her.It was something she had wrote,just a little bit of rambling about her internal fight.

Emrys' hearing is exceptionally well. It is true, after all, what they say. Take one of your senses away and the others all become stronger. You become more aware. So he'd heard her whisper, soft as it was, and his face softened with it. She couldn't be terrible. Unless she was a really good actress.

"No one can ever answer that." He replied. He knew that his reply wasn't helpful or needed, but it seemed necissary. And as he stood there he wondered too, would the fight ever kill him? It seemed that something was fighting everything that happened to him, something was trying to keep him alive when his fighting should have killed him.

His legs, his ankles to be precise, were growing weak and his weight leaned more on the cane then before. He reached out a hand and touched the shelves, indicated back to the direction he'd been trying to walk before touching her. "I'm sorry I've disrupted you. I'll leave you be but I need to sit." And he hesitantly started forward, though something told him, with her curiosity, that she wasn't just going to drop the entire conversation.

And he wasn't sure if that was good or bad.

Casta jumped,she hadn't that he heard her,then again your senses sharpen after losing one. Though he couldn't see, Casta smiled warmly up at him.

Casta was stratled when he had said he needed to sit and had been sorry he had disurpted her. It was quite the opposite,she enjoyed Em's company even if he was closed off,then again who was she to talk about being closed off?

"Why? Is something wrong? Here let me help you. There should be a table and chairs just around the corner." Without a thought she walked up to him,planning to grasp his arm and help him.Casta had noticed that em had been a little weak in the ankles.Plus this gave her the chance to contuine their talk. For some reason,Casta just couldn't let Em walk away from her.

That's funny. Most people couldn't wait to get away from him. They found him oppressive. Depressing.

Why? Is something wrong?

"I was injured not too long ago and I should not be standing so long. There is a table at the end of this line," he knew as if he could see it. And he couldn't, but he'd seated himself at it so often that he knew it would be there this time, just as it always had been.

Here let me help you.

"No I..." And she stepped towards him and he stumbled back away from her. In his hurry to move backwards from her reaching hand that he knew must be there, he stumbled, bumped his shoulder against one of the shelves and jerked back from it, tumbling backwards onto his seat on the ground. His cane clattered loudly, as if hollow, across the floor.

He was trying to right himself already, before she could offer to help there as well, no sign of injury but ankles were throbing and landing on your butt on the hard floor was no fun thing. "I can manage. Really. Thank you." Don't touch me. And he was on his feet, sweeping his hand to find the shelf, moving his foot to try and find the cane.

Casta was surpised and shocked when he reacted so badly to her and landed on the floor.But before she could help him he was standing, one hand to the shelves to steady himself and his foot,searching for the cane. Even though he had said he could manage,Casta still reached down and grabbed up the cane that had fallen to her feet. Casta began to walk slowly toward him,stopping about 3 feet away from him,and held out his cane.


"Here" she said softly. Em was confusing her,which was a rare to Casta, she could usually tell what people were like,though how she didn't know. For the first time ever Casta found herself wanting more about someone to get close to them.


How Em just managed to intrance her she didn't know. A normal person would have just left Em to his own devices.

He stood and didn't even look embarassed in the least at his antics. And why should he? He doesn't want touched, he fears being touched. Because he doesn't want to risk a vision, those visions that cause him seizures and pain and fear and terror. And He can't even explain his reasons to her, because he did not know if she was Uninitiate or otherwise. It was tourment. Not that he had to explain. It would just be nice for once to speak to another person, more then just Sin and Hawthorn, and not be thought crazy.

He could hear her moving, knew what she was doing, and so planted his feet, determined not to flee again. He reached out with a scared hand, the light bounding off of the one solid, glove-like scar and making it smooth surface shine slightly. He took the cane, held it until his knuckles turned paler, frowned and loosened his grip.

"Thank you," he said softly and waited to her to move, to free his path or to lead the way. Just don't touch me.

Casta searched his face,the way he clutched his cane and then loosened his grip. Em was hiding something,but she had no right to ask unless he said he wanted to talk.Whatever it was,it had to do with her touching him.

Stepping carefully around him,so she wouldn't brush against she strated to walk down the isle."Come on,Em. You said you needed to sit right? Because of your injuries?" Even though she didn't think he would open up and slip all his sercets,she wasn't about to leave him. She waited for him to walk beside her,making sure their would be distance betwen them.

Come on Em.

He nodded his head. He indeed needed to sit, and soon. His last fight had been with a telekenetic he'd already encountered once before. That boy had cut his ankles to the bone only a month ago using his power. A normal man should not be standing at all. Emrys had healed them himself, but he was not powerful and it had taken long to do so, and even now, they were still not strong enough to suport all of his idiocy. Walking, stumbling away from her.

Shame.

He followed her and found the table without the use of his cane, and he pulled a chair, holding it out from the table and to the side for her. He may have grown up in a run down beach house but his 'mother' had at least taught him maners.

She watched him go ahead of her,finding the table and pulling out a chair for her. Casta smiled softly."Thankyou" she sat down and then watched as he seated himself. Her mind was spinning. This was the first time she found herself enjoying the company of a man,even if he seemed paranoid. Though she couldn't say she trusted him,Casta knew she had faith of a sort in him. Why? Casta didn't know.


All she knew was that it was confusing her. If there was something Casta learned from her past,was to NEVER be comfortable and trusting of someone,especially a man.Casta sighed to herself,willing the memories of her past and her confusing thoughts to the back of her mind, and anaylze them at a later,safer time.

NEVER be comfortable and trusting of someone,especially a man who was as uncomfortable and untrusting as yourself.

Emrys would be that man, though truthfully, she would come to more harm at the paws of a feisty kitten then she would through the hands of Emrys Damian. But still, he did not trust her which gave him no reason to expect her trust.

"Your welcome." He seated himself and lay his cane over the table so that no one would incidently trip over it. He'd learned that lesson when a man had tripped on it, grabbed on to him, and thrown him into a fit of visions, none of them pleasant.

"What is it you are looking for?" Maybe he should have been more specific with that question.

"An escape from my past. From the things that haunt my waking moments and from the mask that I put on everyday to hide from the world. And to know your secrets." Casta said,before she could even think.It had just rolled off her tounge. Startled, she began trying explain away what she said to Em."I-I. Just please- please earse that from your memory. I wa-I was lost in my thoughts and-" Casta stopped,she was just making things worse and she knew there was no way to explain her slip.sturtting,that was a first for Casta.


Whether she liked it or not, it was out in the open.Casta could only hope that Em wouldn't take it the wrong way. what the Hell was wrong with her today!?!

An escape from my past. From the things that haunt my waking moments and from the mask that I put on everyday to hide from the world. And to know your secrets.

"I'm sorry. I meant in..." in the book store. He stopped there and let his lips still for a moment. "Nevermind. Your past? It must have been hard to be speaking of it in such a way. To have a need to put on a mask." Says the man that wears a blindfold. Says the man that hides in his room unless necissary to leave, or, at least he had until he'd met Sinister.

"Do you realize what you ask?" he said once she ceased to stutter out a plead for him to forget that, "Once something has been said, no matter if a person says the forget it, it can't ever be forgotten or taken back." Of course she must realize this. It's common sense, though, it's not something most people will think about.

"My secrets," he mumbled. He'd had his head faced towards the table but now he turned as if to look at her, though he couldn't really. "I havn't got many. What is it your wanting to know? You might find it's not a secret at all." Emrys really has few secrets from an unnish person and no secrets from an Innish person. He simply has subjects he'd usually not freely discuss.

Casta sighed."You're right.I can't take it back and I can't expect you to forget it."
Of course he was right,but was she willing to tell him her past? The past she was trying so hard to be rid of?

On the matter of himself,well she felt that if he'd let her,she could go on and on.Instead Casta decided to take it slow."Your scars. Were you in an accident? Is that how you lost your eyesight? And why won't you let me touch you? Even if it's to help you up?" She wanted so badly to reach out and trace the scars on his hand,and Casta found her hand reaching out to his. But she stopped herself in time.

He'd not moved an inch, because, really, he didn't know she'd been reaching to touch him again. His hands both rested on the table top, his fingers spread flat over the surface, feeling every groove beneath the skin. Every knotch that a bump or ding put into the wooden surface.

"I was in an accident," he confirmed. "I caused it, a fire. I was burned and another killed." His voice sounded strained, hard, yet somehow the words flowed easily. "I hadn't meant for it to happen. A branch in the tree feel on a boy and trapped him. He died and I lost my sight." His hands turned over, palms up, letting the wood cool the back of his hands, then he curled his fingers. "It's my punishment for starting that fire. I deserved it, I've learned to live with it."

That's how he saw his blindness. A punishment. He left out much of that story, all of what he could not tell her. And some that he could but the information was unnecissary. The boy had been attacking his mother. He'd started the fire with him mind. He would not have been burned had he not gone into the fire to save the boy. That his blindness wasn't his only punishment. That he had visions of terrible things, murders, suffering. These she didn't need to know. And only some he could tell her without arousing suspicion.

"Why I can't touch you..." not 'why you can't touch me' but why I can't touch you. He sat in silence for a moment, trying to find a valid reason, a lie, and came up with none. "That I can not tell you. I just dislike touch. It hurts." Really, it does. It's the 'why' that he can't tell her.

Casta nodded,though he of corse couldn't see it."I understand. Wasn't to long ago when I hated people around me,just brought back to many memories." She didn't think that he disliked touching was the only reason,but she left it.

Casta took a moment before approaching the subject of the fire and it being his punishiment."I don't think your burns are your punishment,like you say. Things happen,no matter how much we want to change it. Like when I blurted out the whole hide from the world in a mask. It came out and I couldn't change it. Just like you can't change starting the fire and the fact that someone died because of it. Fate is Fate,and nothing can change it. The fire may have helped you become who you are today. That's what I like to think about my past.That if I hadn't gone thourgh what I did,I wouldn't be who I am." Casta looked down at his hands.


"I don't mean to be cruel or anything but I don't think it's your scars that are your punishment.I think it's your mind. You're scars are and blindness is just a rember of what happened in your past. It's your mind is what keeps that blame fresh in your mind,not letting you let go of your past. Then again I could be wrong and if that's the case,please tell me so. It might stop me from putting my nose where it doesn't belong." Casta laughed softly.

Fate is Fate,and nothing can change it.

"You're right. Fate is Fate. And just as the little boy steals his sisters cookie, it's fate to stand in the corner for his punishment. Just as I have killed a boy and it is my fate to live where he died. He could have had a life. But I stopped it." What he isn't say is that he had wanted that boy to die. Guilt had driven him into the flames to save him.

He actually twitched his lips into a grimace that might have been the faint show of a potential smile not quite bloomed yet. "Your nose belongs where ever you want it too, so long as I still have the option to disregaurd answering what I do not want to." It's your mind is what keeps that blame fresh in your mind,not letting you let go of your past. "It is the darkness that reminds me, yes, and thus, is my punishment. I am blind, and I will always be blind. And I will always remember the reason for which I am blind and that I am such because I caused it."

He'd made himself blind. Which was half true. He'd walked willingly into the fire to save someone he'd tried to kill.

"In a sense," he said, after a moment of reflecting on that, "you are most definatly right."

It seems that the last few sentances before the admitance that she was correct were said outloud but as if orgignizing the thoughts for himself.

Casta listened with her full attention. She watched as his lifted slighty in a grimace,but Casta guessed that it was the cloest thing to a smile for him and it made her smile."Of course you rightfully do have the option of telling me what you want me to know and to keep to yourself what you don't."


She was quite for a moment." You don't want to forget the reason for your blindness and burns. Even if you could,you wouldn't. Fate is Fate, and nothing can change." the saying had become like a way of life for her now. Casta shook her head slighty,shaking away her thoughts."So,as I have asked of your life,it's only right you ask me of mine,right? Though ofcourse I'll decied what to tell."

"Only if you wish." He replied. Truthfully, because she'd unknowinglly forwarned him that her life hadn't been good, he wasn't certin he wanted to hear of it. But then, that part of him that has always existed, the part that was curious and adventurous and willing, was still there. The part that was him before the fire.

"I do have curiosity, is this person, this Casta I'm meeting and speaking to, is this the mask you spoke of earlier? Or is this the true person?"

Casta was startled. She wasn't sure how to answer it. And then the more she thought on it the more she relizaed that she was letting the mask fall,slowly."Yes and no. For some reason Em,you're able to make me relaxed,not as gaurded as I always am. Truthfully,you put me in a trance. you make me look thourgh my past,detail thourgh detail,when in the past I've run. You make me smile and laugh. And that confuses me. You're a man,and in my experince men don't make me feel that way,no one does."


"I'm gaurded,I don't trust anyone and most of all I am NOt comfortable around men. Right now, I'm letting you see a side of me that no one has seen for a very long time. But I'm still gaurded,still part of the mask is on.To hide the whole me."

"What have men done in your past that causes so much distrust?"

Maybe it is because most men are tocuhy in these days, most men were raised without manner and become pigs. They grab where Emrys doesn't even want touched, let alone to touch. They are strong where Emrys is thin and weaker and bares weakness such as blindness. Some people feel safer, subconsciensly, when the other is handicapped.

"I am glad," he said after a moment, "that this is, if it really is, the real you. Your pleasent." He's rarely said such outloud and twice he's felt it, for Hawthorn and for Sinister. Comfort. Ease.

Casta smiled softly."Thank you. Your pleasant as well."


She licked her lips,trying to start on why she distrusted men so." In this time and age,it's no surpise to hear about rape and abuse, but when it's someone close to you,someone who loved you,someone who was related. A Father." Her voice broke slighty."And it only makes it worst when it's not only him."

He wanted now to reach out and touch her shoulder, that human guesture that was meant as comfort but did little to actually comfort someone. But on that note, he dared not touch her again. The first vision is always of the person's flaming appearance. The second is a rush of every bad experiance they had of great enough magnitude to linger in their heart. Or of everything terrible they did to cause a magnitude of pain.

Now he truely feared to touch her.

"It is why my company lets you relax," he said after a moment of letting the silence linger. He turned his hands back over, flat to the table again. "I would not touch you. I'm safe." He was safe. He made people think 'safe' or 'victum' depending on what sort of person you were.

"I'm sorry it happened to you."

Casta blinked trying to hold tears that were thearting to fall."It's not your fault about what happened to me." She gathered her thoughts together."It's not that you won't touch me that lets me relax.It's-well actually I don't know what it is about you. But I am relaxed around you.You make me happy to drop the mask,even for a moment." Casta sighed and shook her head."I've never felt that. I don't I ever have.Thank you." She wanted to reach out and hug him or at least pat his hand,but she didn't dare.And just the thought that she wanted to thank him by hugging him,confused her.Even though she was relaxed around him,physcail contact like hugging him surpised her.

Emrys sighed softly, just a light sound that slipped between barely parted lips. He turned his head to the direction of the table, bowed it slightly as if he were looking at his hands pressed flatly to the wood. He'd have freaked out for more then he had earlier if she were to touch him now. Because now he knew just how bad her past really was. And it frightened him, because her touch would let him see it, feel it, experiance it.

"Don't thank me." Because he'd not purposly tried to get her to drop her mask and be herself. If he'd tried he'd accept her thanks, but he hadn't tried. But something, the part of him that was before the fire, was glad that she was happy. He as he was now was simply woeful, dwelling on her sad past. "Please don't cry." He requested, hearing the strain of holding back tears in her voice.

Casta wiped her eyes with her hand."I'm sorry. I haven't been this emtional in a long while.I try to hide emtion." She took a deep breath to calm herself,closing her eyes."Well,what now?"She asked opening her eyes and smiling."Now that we know quite a bit about each,shall we go our sperate ways,or plan another meet here?" Casta would like for them to still be friends,meeting here every once in a while,but it was truly up to Em.

"I am not certin," he replied. "Much of my life is left to fate. I let things happen." And it was true, he let life flow around him. Most people don't even meet him. He goes to class and goes home. He goes to the bookstore and to herb stores randomly, and too the beach. But this is it. Hawthorn had met him in the herbs store, Sin on the college campus, and now Casta, here, in the book store. And like with Hawthorn and Sin. Now he doesn't mistrust her.

"But I frequent this book store weekly," he added. It means that 'maybe I would like to meet you again.' Maybe. Because with Emrys, nothing is certin.

Casta bit her lip."I'll take that as a maybe."She smiled slighty.She thought her shecdule of what she usually did. Mostly she did a bit of everything."Today's Tuesday. So I think I'll come here every Tuesday and maybe Thursday. And one of these days we might meet again." Hopefully Em would decide to come these days. He was the first person she at least partically trusted,and she liked his company. She didn't have many people she could call 'friend'.

"Then maybe eventually we'll meet again." Most likely, since Tuesday, Friday, and Saturday were his three days without class. She's not likely to ever see him on a Thursday, however. He had two classes. And he wasn't likely to go anywhere after two classes.

He shifted his face back towards her. "I hope," he admited finally.