The speaker's apartment was arranged exactly like the one that her group was staying in. Or, at least, it looked that way from the door. There were a few throw blankets in bold reds and blues thrown across the couch, but other than that it was the same. Zaria balanced herself with one hand on the wall as she removed her shoes, stopping as she noticed Yasuo's wide smile.

"Did I do something funny?" She asked, in her head substituting the word funny for wrong.

"No, no. Thank you for removing your shoes. Not many Americans would do that when entering another's home."

"Oh, not...American," she ducked her head down and lined her shoes up neatly where she would in her own home. "It became a habit in one of my earlier worlds, and I found I liked the idea of not dragging garbage through my home as I walked around. I didn't have a choice in the last world, I guess it is good it is still a habit..."

She could see the handsome man smiling as he walked away, toward the kitchen. "Please, have a seat on one of the couches, I will get the water ready for tea."

Zaria walked hesitantly across to the couches, the heels of her feet barely touching the ground. There were no warning bells going off, and the voice singing softly from the kitchen was relaxing muscles in her back that she did not realize were tense. She settled into the corner of the couch where the front wall met the side, passing the only window in the living room as she went. The filmy curtains were blue in this apartment, and with no light shining in from the sun behind them they appeared almost opaque. Not thinking about whether or not it could be considered rude, she brought her knees up to her chest and set her chin on them, her arms holding them close.

"Here we go!" Yasuo returned carrying a tray with a tea pot that looked to be an antique and two delicate cups. Before filling them, he picked up a throw blanket and held it out in front of her. "May I?"

Zaria blinked at him twice before nodding her head. Why was it so cold? The blanket went behind her back and wrapped around to cover her legs. The smell of honeysuckle filled her nose.

"Mmm, I love the smell of honeysuckle," she said,a smile flirting at the edges of her lips.

A loud clink of porcelain hitting the tray. "What did you say?"

"Oh, sorry," she apologized, sliding her arms out from beneath the covers. "I thought I smelled honeysuckle? I didn't mean anything bad by it." She watched as he stared into the cup before smiling and pouring steaming tea into it.

"No, I am sorry, I did not hear what you said clearly. That is the blanket I was using earlier."

"Oh. Oh! Oh that was rude of me, I wasn't trying to say you smelled!" Zaria took the cup of tea. Her hands were steady as she blew across the surface of the liquid. She couldn't tell when it happened, but she was no longer shaking, and the cup warmed her hands as much as the smells were warming her insides.

"You were not rude. I apologize, you are not from this world. Nobody has smelled honeysuckle off of me for hundreds of years. Not since my first wife. It is a funny little thing in our world. An evolutionary quirk that can help both the Lykos and the Sanguine, although in different ways. For the Lykos, they can't only turn humans, and only if there is a complimentary magic inert inside the human. Sometimes, if the magic that helps them to turn is too strong, they need a mate to help balance them. They know they have found the mate when they encounter that one smell that calls to them. Sanguine are not too different." He settled back on the couch opposite with his teacup cradled gently in his hands. "We have the ability to live forever, but our minds can't take the stress so most of us will choose to move on after a couple hundred years."

"Move on? You mean like die?"

"Ahh, the stories we have seen come from your world see the end of this life differently than we do. When a person passes from their mortal body their journey is over, or sometimes they go to an afterlife. It is very interesting, is that how things really are there?"

Zaria mutely nodded her head, confused by the talk of death not being death. She tested the temperature of the tea and hummed her approval.

"In our world, when you cease living in your mortal body you become part of the earth. And yes, it has been tested, it is not a superstition like our ancestors thought. The magic inside of us returns to the earth to nurture the next generations of all living things. They are the Ones Who Have Moved On"

"That's...wow, okay. That sounds amazing. The certainty that part of you will live on forever, I mean."

"It can be a torment for Sanguine. The only way that we can move on is if we consciously decide to, or if we are injured so badly that we can not repair naturally. I have not yet felt the need to move on. I need to be here for my son, now, but before then I don't know. I am glad that I am still here, it is not my time yet."

"But what does that have to do with honeysuckle?" The words spilled out before she thought them through, and the back of her neck grew warm. "Sorry, again."

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A laugh as bright and refreshing as the first breeze of a warm summer day wrapped around her and she closed her eyes to soak it in.

"I thought when I met you earlier that there was something special about you. I can sense something that is not quite magic about you. Some of your companions have no magic at all, which is interesting by itself. Your boyfriend has a type of magic I have never seen. But you, I could sense magic around you disappearing. And the small amounts put out by the Ones Who Have Moved On are hovering just out of reach. A few get close to you, and I can see you loosen up when they do. They trigger a chemical reaction in us that brings about joy and calm, depending on what emotions you are already feeling. But they are mostly staying away. I was not sure why until you said you could smell honeysuckle."

He readjusted himself on his seat. "For Sanguine, our mates help us to stem the madness that comes from everlasting life. They create a calm in our minds just with their presence. The reason I watched so many of my friends and contemporaries choose to move on while I stayed was because of her. She was taken from me a long time ago, but the peace stayed in my mind for a long time after. She is the only person who has ever smelled honeysuckle around me."

"Wait, are you saying I am your mate?"

"No, no. We will only ever have one. But I believe, and please tell me if I am close, that you can absorb magic."

Zaria rolled the tea across her tongue. There was a faint sweetness, something added in after, perhaps. Or maybe it was just the flower of this world, different from her own. The pressure in her head, the buzzing in her skin, even the ringing in her ears was gone, and she felt relaxed for the first time all day. When the words caught up to her, she inhaled sharply, knowing she should be panicking again and unsure why she wasn't.

"Maybe. But what would that have to do with smelling honeysuckle?"

The laugh again. Zaria felt her lips curving up in response. He took a sip and responded, "Tell me, do you smell anything strong around your boyfriend?"

She nodded, smiling a little as she recalled his mountain snow smell.

"I can tell you that your boyfriend smells like soap, but I know that you smell something else. You are smelling his magic, your brain's way of interpreting the magic it is absorbing. My wife could smell my magic because she was my mate. You smell it for another reason, but it is interesting still that you can smell it. You seem bothered, are you uncomfortable being here? I am sure if you send a message to your boyfriend that he would come back early."

"No..." It was not that she didn't want Gu Cheng around, she assured herself. It was not his fault that her memories were so aggressive suddenly.

"You are touching your neck, again. I can see very faint signs of bruising, almost completely gone now. Was he the one that did that to you?" The warm and kind voice was gone and Zaria looked up, her eyes wide. Yasuo cleared his throat and finished his cup, his knuckles white as he set it down on the tray. "I'm sorry. I did not mean to startle you. Are you in danger right now, Zaria Joseph?"

"No.No, I don't think so. It wasn't Gu Cheng who hurt me. Two worlds before this one I met someone who was the victim of a curse. My weird ability was able to lessen his curse, and I made the mistake of thinking I could help and leave whenever I wanted to. He showed me that I couldn't." A nervous smile slipped out, and she tried not to meet his eyes. "One of the times he hurt me it was after he tricked me by making himself look like someone I had met before. I know it wasn't really Gu Cheng, but sometimes my brain gets confused. I don't know why today was so bad."

"You said that you have never had anxiety before. From what little has been said about the last place you were, you were constantly afraid and in danger, and you may not have noticed it amidst the fear you were feeling at all times. Our world is safe, or as safe as I imagine it could be with a few exceptions. Now, you can feel it all the time, and it is obvious."

"Maybe." Her cup was empty, but she held onto it like it was life buoy in a turbulent sea. "But I don't feel it right now. I don't know how long it has been since I felt this calm."

"I would say that it was the Ones reacting with you, but I really don't know. They are not sentient, they can't stay away forever, it's just what they do. But when you absorb their magic it creates eddies that drive them away. It is quite an interesting experience!" He sighed and sat back on the couch, crossing one slender leg over the other and linking his fingers around his knee. "I do believe that we should talk about all of this more. If you would feel better, Mr Gu can be present. I do not think he will be happy about it, though. It seems as though he can sense that his own bond with you is somehow threatened, if his behavior when we first met is any indication. He worries about someone else being interested in you."

"Are you saying Gu Cheng is jealous? But I hadn't even spoken to you yet!"

"Emotions are powerful things, Miss Joseph, even when there is not magic guiding them. And he has great magic, but not anything I have ever seen. I can not guess to what he is thinking, but as for feeling, I could sense hostility from him directed at me all through dinner." He seemed to find this amusing, his smile growing until his cheeks pressed his lower lashes upward. He laughed, delighted. "I can not think of the last time someone was so outwardly hostile to me."

"I'm not sure what to do, then. I know that I am hurting him when I react the way that I do, but I can't control it. I can tell him what you have said to me, to make sure that he understands that you are not at all interested in me in that way. Maybe it will help. I don't know. "

"Then, might I suggest that you not worry about it right now? You are calm, and perhaps we could spend the rest of the time until the others arrive trying to come up with ways to help you stay calm. You do not have to tell me anything that you do not want to, but I am willing to listen."

They spoke for hours, and with a peace of mind that had been rare for quite some time, Zaria fell asleep wrapped up in the boldy colored blanket, her nose buried in its soft fabric. When the sound came of the door to the outside closing and footsteps walking up the stairs, Speaker Kimura opened his door and invited Gu Cheng over. He explained briefly about Zaria not being able to get in and wanting Gu Cheng to have some time to see the new world, and then led him to where she was peacefully sleeping on the couch. Gu Cheng nodded curtly and thanked him before lifting her up into his arms like she was precious and breakable and carrying her back to their bed. Zaria rubbed her cheek against his shoulder and murmured his name, and slept through the night without bad dreams for the first time in a long time.