There was already a layer of snow on the ground that January night by the time Eliot and Claire finally ran across a villager who was returning home at that late hour. They managed to start up a conversation with him, or rather, Eliot did. They were fortunately then made aware of a small cabin near the forest line that was no longer being lived in. The former resident had apparently made the move to the city some months ago. Upon hearing of the uninhabited cabin, the two decided that would be their shelter from the weather, at least for one night.

By midnight, the snow was even deeper outside, but they were now settled into the cabin, and had even managed to start a warm fire in what was essentially a very small one room home. Though it was still an improvement over the train car, even if there was only one bed. But they had already shared a bed on their alleged wedding night. Then again, that was before that kiss that neither of them had mentioned again since it had happened.

“It’s really coming down out there” Claire observed before closing the thick drapes and moving to take a seat on the large bed that nearly filled half of the entire room. The other half being a small kitchen area with a table and a pair of chairs.

Eliot had moved to search the cupboards, not really expecting anything to have been left behind from the prior residents, but figured he might as well check, at least. “I’m starving. Aren’t you starving?” he asked her as he closed the cupboard and looked back over his shoulder at her.

“I’m... ok” she managed, though she had been getting more than a little hungry, especially after the final part of her attempt to convince the emperor of the reality of their relationship.

“I haven’t seen you eat once in the two days we’ve known each other” he teased, then added, “given, you were asleep for most of those two days. No wonder your waist is so tiny.”

Claire simply looked down, now remembering yet another factor that was going to make it very hard to hide what she really was for much longer at this rate.

But Eliot’s voice soon continued, “I saw a garden out there. Might be something still alive in it. But we are definitely going to visit the village market first thing tomorrow.”

“That’s probably an easier task for you. I don’t really speak German and all” she offered the first excuse she could come up with. Eliot narrowed his eyes at her, though still offered a smile before heading out into the cold to check that garden he had mentioned.

When he returned with the few stubborn fruits and vegetables that had managed to survive the winter that had been thankfully mild so far that year, his eyes turned to where she now lay curled around a rather dusty pillow atop the equally dust-covered bed. But he still couldn’t help the smile as he saw her there.

“You seem to be getting comfortable in our fabulous new home I see” he smirked as he took a bite of fruit, offering another to her, which she again declined.

“I like it. It reminds me of a place I used to live...” her sentence trailed off there.

“Let me guess, a long time ago?” Eliot teased, which did cause her to turn her emerald eyes back to him as she remained wrapping her arms around the pillow.

“Pardon?”

“Just, almost every time you mention any part of your past, you always say ‘a long time ago.’ You’re beginning to make me feel acutely aware of our age difference..”

“Sorry” she murmured against the pillow, scolding herself once more for ever trying to believe that she could possibly manage to keep her true nature a secret from him for much longer at all.

He watched her for a few more moments as he finished his rather modest dinner. As she continued to stare into the fireplace, not saying much else, he had to break that silence once more. “So what did you mean, on the train?”

“Mean?” she asked as she let her eyes move back to him.

“When you said you should have prepared me?”

Claire let out a shaky sigh, somehow hoping that his shock as well as the station attendant’s interruption would have somehow made him forget that statement. Instead of answering, she instead let herself try to turn her own curiosity about his behavior that night back on him, “I’ve been wondering something too. What made you actually want to kiss me tonight?”

Eliot was then the one who broke eye contact with a slight blush, “like I said, you’ve made me question a lot of things. And when I thought I lost you, that would also mean losing the chance to try and find those answers. I realized how much I didn’t want that to happen.”

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“So, what happened then... when you kissed me?” she asked bravely as she moved to her knees atop the bed, while he still sat just a few feet away at the table.

Eliot let out a nervous chuckle, “you were there too, I believe.”

“But I’m trying to help you answer those questions now, Eliot. What happened when you kissed me? Did you feel anything?”

“Other than your lips, surprisingly moving against mine as well?” he made one more attempt to deflect, still avoiding direct eye contact with her.

“Why is that surprising? You already know that eighty percent of my lovers have been men. And you were the one who initiated that kiss. You’re the one who’s so surprising in this situation.”

After a moment, he quietly answered, “this is just very hard for me, Claire.”

She smiled back at him, “I know. That’s why I’m so willing to sit here now, trying to help you figure it all out.”

“Why though? Why are you so willing to help me?” he had to ask at last.

“Why shouldn’t I be?”

“Other than the fact that I’m a complete stranger to you, and I did practically kidnap you, and I’m still keeping you away from the actual reasons you even came here? Should I go on?” he asked with another sad smile.

“I guess I just think you’re still worth helping, despite any of that. Like passion, it doesn’t have to make sense” she reminded him again.

“But what are you even getting from this? You asked me what I felt during that kiss. But what about you? What did you feel?”

“You’re asking if I’m physically attracted to you, then?”

“Am I? I’m new at this, remember.”

“But you’re the mystery we’re here to solve, remember? I’ve known for...” she looked down with another smile as she caught herself, then reworded, “I already know and understand my desires, after all.”

“So how do we figure those out for me?”

“I’m pretty sure that’s something you have to decide how to do, Eliot” she smiled again.

He took another shaky breath as he looked around the small cabin, trying to buy himself the time and courage to reply. “I can only think of one way to even try to figure out what and who I actually want. And I’m pretty sure that way would be at least half your decision.”

She looked down again then, “so is that why you asked me what I felt when you kissed me? To try to figure out what my half of that decision would be?”

“See, I’m not a complete mystery after all” he teased once again, to cover his own nervousness.

“Like I said, I’m here to help you figure this out. So that’s what I’ll do.” But before Eliot could offer any response, Claire nearly flinched and exclaimed, “dammit!” just as Lemuel’s voice broke into her psyche once more.

“Damn what, exactly?” Eliot asked, more than a bit confused by that abrupt change in her tone and their current, rather important subject.

“I’ll just... be right back” she apologized as she got up from the bed and headed out the door into the still falling snow outside, leaving Eliot to look after her with even more confusion then.

Nearly fifteen minutes had passed while Claire apparently tended to something or other in the heavily falling snow and quickly dropping temperature outside. As she hadn’t even put on her long coat before heading out into the storm, Eliot was beginning to get quite concerned at that point. In order to try to calm his fears, he moved to the window nearest the front door and pulled the curtain slightly aside to try and determine what had been urgent enough to so suddenly draw her out into that weather at all, let alone in the middle of what he had thought was a very important conversation.

He found her standing not far outside the door, in the darkness and the falling snow, not looking like she was honestly doing anything in particular, other than just standing there, her back to the small cabin. And that somehow only confused him more. He watched her for a few more moments, only to realize that she didn’t seem to be affected by that weather at all. She showed no signs of even the slightest shiver, and more importantly, he could not even see her breath in front of her, which only made him that much more perplexed by every single thing he had discovered about this woman in only two days’ time.

She literally slept like the dead, even though he had originally thought that had only been a joke the first time he had accused her of it. She never seemed to eat. She was barely affected by any sort of weather. She had no problem cutting into her own flesh just to uphold his lie. She referred to everything in her life as if it were actually several lifetimes ago. She had assured him that she was in no way capable of ever bearing children.

Then there was her extremely odd take on love and passion, as if most human perceptions of such were foreign to her. She also most often appeared to be able to simply look at him and know all his thoughts and feelings with ease.

And no matter what he knew to be true, standing right in front of him then, he honestly thought she had well and truly been dead that morning. And now, here she was, showing not even one sign of breath escaping her pretty lips as she stood there in the middle of a winter storm. When they had walked through the village earlier in the evening, due to his own breath, Eliot barely had even noticed the absence of hers. Or perhaps he had just been reeling so much from forcing down his fears and giving in to finally kissing her lips at least that once, that he honestly just hadn’t noticed such a clear clue about how ‘less than normal’ she really was.

And there was that strange statement, about preparing him, which she still had yet to explain. There was something very, very strange about her indeed. On that thought, he tried to calm a million racing thoughts as he swallowed hard, continuing to watch her through that window.

He wanted to be angry and afraid of all those abnormalities once he had started to put them all together in his head. But for every one of those, there was an equal amount of sweetness, and gentleness, and a desire to help him, and an acceptance of the darkest secrets that he had; the ones no one else had ever accepted.

Perhaps her acceptance of him was because of whatever dark secret of her own she was apparently hiding. But whatever the cause, the effect was an extremely beautiful woman, there with him, offering to help him figure out who he was and what he truly wanted, after not allowing himself the chance to ever figure that out, once in his entire life. And that made her someone he found himself not wanting to push away, regardless of any of those secrets she may have been hiding.