bakerstreet | A protector for always

[So Flynn was made for this.

He will obviously be the knight, but he can be AU'd as a prince if you prefer.]

Thank you for a good spar, Flynn.

[Jeile gave a bright smile to his knight, drying some sweat from his forehead. It wasn't many people that gave him a challenge while training, but Flynn did, always keeping him motivated and trying to improve his skills further. It was nice having someone around that he could trust as much as he did. It might have taken awhile before Flynn came into his personal service, but during the year that had past a strong bond had formed between them.]

We should really get cleaned off.

It's my pleasure, your highness. You continue to improve at an incredible rate. Sooner or later it'll be me on my back.

[Flynn chuckled good naturedly, the innuendo of his comment completely escaping his notice. While it was true it had taken him much longer than he would have liked to enter into Jeile's service, his prince had proven to be a trusted friend. As a result, Flynn was always doing his best to make up for lost time with him.]

A good idea, your highness. You still have a few more duties to attend to today. We wouldn't want the aristocrats to greet their prince smelling like sweat and dirt. They may actually think you engage in hard work.

[Flynn chuckled again as he followed his prince into the changerooms/baths of the sparring area. The insult was intended for the aristocrats in question, not Jeile, who Flynn made no effort to hide his respect for.]

It is my aim to get you on your back.

[Jeile didn't notice the innuendo in his own or Flynn's sentence. He were just pleased at getting complimented for his skills. A few years ago he had not been much of a fighter, but he had improved at a rapid paced and it felt good to have his hard work acknowledged.]

Of course we can't have that. A prince working hard? The scandal!

[He gave a small laugh. Nobles could be so very silly at times. What was wrong with him working to be strong? To be able to protect his people? As future king he had a lot to live up to and he wanted to be a king the people would be able to trust and feel safe with.

Entering the changerooms, Jeile undid his hair to tie it up into a knot. He did not have time to let his hair dry if he get it wet in the baths. His hair really could be a mess to deal with at times.]

[ooc: Either / or.]

[he's your knight.

sorry about that.

open to gen, m/f for shipping.]

[ I'm good with either or! ]

[An actual knight and Crown Prince... although, definitely open to twists.]

[Could be either role... at least in a very general sense...]

[He's... a knight.]

[OOC: I have this one to offer if you'd like her.]

[ooc: Hello there. Yes, that would be great! Do you have any particular preferences?]

[ooc: I'm fine with either canon and if you want to follow that I'm caught up on all the English translated chapters, so up to 76 (not counting the peek at raws for 77 and things); or I would be content to AU her to have her be cured of Heaven's Ecstasy and human again, or even making her a Princess. I'm way too easy to please so lay it all on me. ~~I just need these two meeting again somehow because they got screwed in the anime okay.~~]

[ooc: I'm actually fine with any of these things! It's so hard to choose... But I'm excited to play with a Jeanne. I'm caught up with the manga as well. I am also easy to please. Or if you wanted to do something with them being both human, before Jeanne's death, we could do that, too. ~~And yes, I agree with you completely.~~]

[ooc: Let's go with something post canon. I might have a need of Jeanne with her sanity back meeting up with demon Gilles, okay. She wouldn't know what to make of him in that state. ~~FYI, I'm so totally ditching that magical girl look for her I just can't stand it.~~ I can start if you'd like.]

[ooc: Excellent. I would love this, too. ~~Please do ditch it. Not my favorite design at all.~~ And feel free to start! To let you know, I'm voicetesting Gilles, so I'm still a bit unsure of what I'm doing.]

[ooc: Oh good a kindred soul. Same. I haven't really played her before either so... We'll do it together.]

There's a rattling gasp from her as bright blue eyes drift open, she's panting as if she's surfacing from the depths of drowning. The first thing that registers to her senses is pain that radiates from her back and her head feels clear for the first time in a long time. She's actually inside of her body, in total control of it rather than feeling as if she was locked some place deep inside pushed into the back, where all she can do is helplessly watch. Dimly, she remembers she'd been sent here to collect that woman - her soul.

Someone stopped her and her host then she'd been yanked from the sky. Jeanne recalls her head had hurt horribly before she'd seen green light breaking throught something blingingly bright. Pulling in a shaky breath she's sitting up, leaving be hind feathers. She's alive but how exactly? Shouldn't she be dead?

The fire - No, Michael, the Archangel had come for her and blessed her? Was that a blessing? She's not entirely certain. There were demons, she'd been forced to fight them. Forced to fight. A frown mars her features and before she grits her teeth before forcing herself to find her feet. Where she stood looked like a wasted battle field, a crater - it's a crater and she's in the center of it. She looks exactly like she belongs there, exactly how she had in days begone; crimson cape around her shoulders, armor adorning her body, her hair short with it's simple braid.

[ooc: Her normal gear looks so much better that that outfit. And yes, let's!]

Gilles stood, staring. At first, he was motionless. Finally, after hundreds of years... that person was standing before him. He had been badly battered and was probably badly injured injured, but he didn't care. He didn't care about irrelevant things like his physical form and safety at times like this. This was everything, now.

The air was clearing, but there was still a distinctly angelic stink hanging on the breeze. Distasteful. He conjured a breeze of his own to push it away, but it was stubborn stuff, like heaven itself. Standing on the rim of the crater, his gaze was fixed on Jeanne. There was a difference in her manner. In her dress. And that maniacal, ridiculous gleam had faded from her eyes. How was that madness supposed to be holiness? She'd never looked like that when she was alive, when she was herself. How she'd looked when she was alive—was exactly how she looked now. He'd never forgotten a single inch of her. And she—had she forgotten him?

Gilles hopped up into the air—only to descend immediately, alighting on the floor of that crater where the heavenly smoke still lingered. He was a few paces closer to her. He could feel his heart shudder. "If I'd known you were coming, I'd have prepared a warmer welcome." He gestured with both hands, encompassing the ruined earth. "Will you just look, the carpet's a mess."

Someone was watching her from on high, above her and that did nothing for her nerves and uncertainty but she stood her ground as always. They aren't close enough for her to see too clearly just yet so her eyes are narrowed as she squints, her expression turning to one of concentration.

Losing sight of him even for that instant was enough to put her on alert and she he's suddenly landing in front of her she's taking a small half step back, backing herself for defense. But he makes no hostile or threatening move so the tension in her body eases away little by little.

His appearance might have changed - his clothing especially - but there was no changing those eyes, that voice. Soon she's regaining that step she'd taken backward, then another coming forward and another. Bright blue eyes are looking him over now as if they're picking him apart clearing away the changes of literal lifetimes. Yes, there he is - there he is.

There are scratches, a couple streaks of crimson on her cheek but she doesn't really notice it. Feathers are still falling from her back by the handful with every step towards him she takes, every gesture she makes. "The hard packed earth of mountains doesn't count as carpet. Carpet is something softer. Though I can think of no warmer welcome than truly seeing you again, battered as you are."

Shaking her head, she's reaching out to cup his cheek with her hand; thumb brushing against the strange marking under his eye. It's new, she certainly doesn't remember it from before. Then again her last clear memory wasn't exactly the most pleasant one. Jeanne shakes her head banishing the memory, she doesn't want to remember that at all if possible. Instead, she focuses on the moment in front of her - the man in front of her. By all rights, they should both be dead but here they are again centuries later.

"How did you come to this, Gilles?"

It's clear she means being a demon but... He is here, too. At what could only be a scene of battle and he does look a fright.

When she starts to move forward, Gilles—in spite of all of his thoughts and expectations about this moment—freezes. He hadn't expected this, to find her like her own, old self. He'd expected a shrieking drone from Michael's foul host. In the time he stands there, frozen, she's able to walk up to him and touch his face. If this were a trick of Heaven's, to show him the old Jeanne to confuse him, it would have worked. He wouldn't have defended himself in time.

Is it a trick? But the heavenly gleam doesn't reappear in her eyes. And she says that about him. Surely, Heaven isn't that clever, is it?

"Don't be so literal..." That's right, the plainspoken peasant, catching him off-guard with her honesty. He's already faltering before her. She's ruining his attempt to be sarcastic, but he rallies and tries it again. "I could have brought some plush velvet for your sainted feet. Or maybe roses to lay before you."

He knows she must realize what he is. But she doesn't react with revulsion or anger. Yet. That's not what he'd expected, either. She's already bewildering him with the sheer unexpectedness of herself. Like before. "I came about it in the usual way. I made a deal with a demon and became a nephilim. I'd think you'd know that, as an agent of Heaven." If he'd died a normal death, as a normal knight and nobleman, he might not have descended into Hell, but then he wouldn't have been able to stand before her again like this, in defiance of death itself.

"I don't play coy as well you know." She's following that mark on his face with her eyes, curious but not asking - yet anyway. "Velvet is a bit much for me, don't you think? Things that decadent are certainly not to my taste. Flowers would have been welcome. I've always had a fondness, after all."

Jeanne presses her lips together for a moment before tilting her head. "I'm well aware of that but how or perhaps more to the point it would be why ? Why would you make a pact with a devil to become one yourself?" She was very much aware how she had been taken, blessed and saintified. Being the foolish young woman she was she'd fallen for such lofty praises of herself and the cloying sweet words of manipulative angels.

But her eyes are clear, her thoughts, actions and words her own. If they hadn't been he would had been wide open to be slain. Some part of her knows this. Jeanne knows that had Michael still any control of her as his puppet she would have killed him and that doesn't set well with her. Nor does the fact that she's killed at all.

"I'm not certain that's true anymore. I can't hear his voice any longer." She's not sad about it but she does sound lost and more than a bit confused.

"I know." He's not used to being at a loss for words, but he hesitates. "Of course I know that. But in Heaven you're their precious saint, aren't you? Worthy of silks and gold." Wasn't Heaven decadent? As much as Hell was, in its own way. He'd never been there, but he could imagine. "And I'm afraid there are no flowers here. If there were, they're now a bit parched." Or charred, more like.

"Why?" He remembers very well the promise he'd been made, that if he made a contract, he would be able to see that person—this person again. If she would last through the centuries, then so would he, no matter the cost. But to say that to her, to her face... he hesitates again, before forcing a careless shrug. "Why not? Once I got a taste of sin, I found I enjoyed it." It shouldn't be difficult for a demon to lie, should it? Usually, he doesn't have any trouble whatsoever.

A smile brightens his face when she says that about Michael. The angel is gone from her? Did he have something to do with that? That was his goal, after all, but it's hard to tell exactly what happened in the midst of so much chaos. "Is that so? Then maybe he's abandoned you, or someone finally rid us of the bastard." Either would be fine with Gilles, although he would have preferred to wipe Michael out himself, to see the anguish and anger on his face as he was destroyed by a mere nephilim. That would have been a sweet victory.

"I've never had any interest in silks and gold. Or anything of that nature. Those kinds of things don't suit a farmer's daughter. Heaven was luxury upon luxury spotless white halls of marble, shimmering spires, silk robes..." She shakes her head her nose wrinkling slightly, clearly she disapproves.

"Yes, why.." Those blue eyes are staring up at him bright and clear then she's laughing. "You're a very poor liar. Fine, don't tell me. I suppose it's some kind of answer you assume I would disapprove of." Not that she didn't disapprove of him sinning on some scale grand enough to get the attention of a demon that could make him one of their kind. Jeanne isn't very happy about it but she can't judge.

"I wouldn't know at all. Perhaps he thought me lost and unworthy of recovery." She gave a shrug of her shoulders letting her hand fall to her side. "I just felt him leave and I could breathe again. Truly breathe." Her eyes dropped as her fingers twitched slightly.

Everything she's known for the past few centuries tells her she should attack or flee. This person is a demon. Gilles is a demon and she.. was a saint? Had wings and the scent of Heaven yet clung to her even if she'd regained most of her former self. She aches to embrace the sole spark of familiarity but would that be wise? "What do I do now?"

"Certainly they don't. They never should have cloaked you in such things. I always preferred you like this. But I was joking." His jokes aren't working. He's too shaken. Or maybe she simply doesn't think they're funny.

"I'm an excellent liar! I'm a demon!" He's generally seen as very good at it, but she sees through everything, doesn't she, with those clear eyes of hers? How ironic that being made a saint, and supposedly so wise and holy, only blinds humans. The real Jeanne is the wise one. The valuable one. Heaven didn't save her. If they were truly good and kind, they wouldn't have allowed her to come to any harm. What had happened must have been exactly what they wanted. He can never forgive them for that.

"If that's what he thought, then he's more the fool." She was the best they had, even stripped of her humanity. But perhaps there's some other reason Michael temporarily abandoned her. Maybe his influence will return. It could happen any minute, and he has to act before it does.

Then she asks him what she should do. Before he can think, he's reaching forward to seize her wrist. He's so unguarded, so weak! If this were a trick of Heaven's, he would surely have been slaughtered by now. He can't mount a cogent response, let alone an effective defense. Not when she's like this.

"Join me! Jeanne! Join me in Hell. We'll be together again, we'll be unstoppable." He's just ignoring the fact that he has other commitments, because he doesn't care. This is what he was promised, so he should be able to take it. He sinks to his knees before her. "Stay with me. Side by side, like before—!"

"They really shouldn't. Those clothes were ghastly." She makes a face before her fingers come to rest lightly on his chest. "These do suit me much more than the others." She might give a light laugh, she remembers very well how different she'd looked in those frills and ribbons.

"Of course, you are, Gilles. The best liar I've ever met." But she's clearly not buying and certainly unimpressed with his attempts to assure her of his prowess with lies. "I'm very aware you're a demon. So very aware of it, in fact, that it's like a warning humming through my body.."

She gives a little shrug of her shoulders. "I cannot assume what goes on in the minds of angels. But it is rather foolish of him considering I won't be so easily pulled back. Before I didn't know what was waiting and followed blindly. This time not so much so."

Letting out a soft exhale letting him have her hand, brows coming together as she stares at him. "Join you? In Hell?" Her expression is one of uncertainty. "Gilles, demons hate me. They will want nothing more than to rip me to shreds." He's on his knees before her and she isn't certain why that's making this harder than it already is.

Her fingers move brushing against his forehead soothingly. "I would not be safe. You would not be safe. What you're asking of me would put us both in danger. You know this."

"It was an insult to you." As were so many of the things Heaven had done to her. Making her kill, driving her mad. "Another crime to add to the list." Jeanne with her hair cut short, in her simple garb: it was a sight that had affected him deeply from the first moment he seen it. Not that she wasn't striking and affecting, no matter what she wore.

"So I am. A lord among liars. I knew you'd have the sense to recognize it. Always so wise." Although he can tell that she doesn't believe him. Still, he balks a little at the thought of plainly telling her the truth. "And aren't you going to scold me for it? For the things I've done?" Part of him wants that: her reprimands, her anger. Her punishment. So far, she's only been kind to him, speaking to him almost as if things are back to the way they were, when the two of them were human. But things aren't like that anymore. "Don't underestimate that monster."

Now that he has her hand in his, he keeps hold of it, leaning forward until his lips are almost touching it. He's sure the angels and the demons would laugh to see him like this—the touching story of Gilles de Rais, who wanted only to be reunited with Jeanne d'Arc! They're annoying. He doesn't care about them now. "Demons hate, you yes—so become a demon. You can do battle with them and gain power, until you become a great lord of Hell! So many of the demons here were angels, once. Why not a saint like you? Heaven warns you about me because it fears the thought of us together."

There might be a few things wrong with this plan, but Gilles' personal safety is not high on the list of his concerns. He'll challenge anyone, if it means getting what he wants.

"Truly it was. I have a strong aversion to being someone's doll and plaything." Not that she'd had any say in anything at all. Instead, she had been just that - a puppet and it grated on her nerves. She had been fine serving her Lord and country but this - what she had become after was a step too far from what she had been. She had loathed every minute.

Her expression softens slightly and she sighs. "It's no grand feat to determine that a demon is lying. The greater skill would be to know why and to what end." Her head tilted to the side. "Would it undo what you have done? If I were to admonish you would you regret it and repent? Would that make you want to change the choices you've made to bring you here? Are you wishing me to take the pound of flesh from you for your transgressions?"

Shaking her head Jeanne sighs before continuing her voice steady with just an edge of harshness. "I am angry with you, do not miss understand me. Because of your actions, innocent people suffered - I know this without knowing. I know they did because demons do not come to the innocent, to those without sin staining their skin nor do they offer them a place within their ranks. That I can't forgive now if ever." But can she truly stay angry with him is the question, without all that, this moment wouldn't be happening now.

"I think at the moment it is you who are underestimating me. I know exactly what he could do - how easily he could some swooping back for me and make me not myself again." her words are plain as she watches him, drawing her lower lip between her teeth. This might feel the tiniest bit nostalgic; Gilles before her, seeking to be at her side or perhaps keep her at his. Part of her wants that, desperately; he's the only one she knows that is alive now that doesn't seek to use her for his own purposes.

"More fighting and bloodshed? Is that what you think I want?" She doesn't but what choice does she have? She can't stay here or go back to Heaven, remaining on Earth wouldn't be wise - she wouldn't fit in at all. "What of your life there? The demon that made one of their own wouldn't be too thrilled with you bringing me home. I have a very keen feeling they would be furious at you for bringing in an enemy."

"You always were strong-minded." She was far too good for Heaven. She'd been wasted on them. They didn't know what they had. They'd ruined her, the best thing they'd ever had the honor of beholding.

"Do you think you have that skill? To read my lies?" He tilts his head to the side too, his movement echoing hers. He's sure that they're in some danger here, that they will have to do something soon, but at the same time, it feels like time has stopped, like there's only the two of them in the entire world. If only that were true.

"No. It wouldn't undo anything. Or make me repent. I only wanted to see what you'd say. Yes, I did such terrible things, did untold harm to countless innocents and soiled my soul thorougly, Jeanne." It's such a thrill to say her name. "How could I hide that from you? It's all right, I don't expect you to forgive me. Be as angry as you like."

He's still smiling, but the thought of Michael darkens his expression. "If he tried to do it, Jeanne, I would rip the wings from his back and the head from his body." He might not actually be a match for Michael, even in a weakened state, but Gilles believes he could do it, and he would try.

"I know it isn't. I know how you hate that. Yet you did lead an army into battle, when you lived. Those men died, even if you didn't kill them." How could you involve yourself in war and not accept some of the blame, some of the blood? It wasn't as if they'd defeated the English peacefully. "Baalberith?" Gilles waves a careless hand, once again dismissive of someone very powerful. "Don't worry about him, I can deal with him. I can deal with him. I'm not so sure he'd be that angry. Having the fallen Jeanne d'Arc in your household may not be such a bad thing." This is what he'd been promised, or that's how he's interpreting it.

"I've never come across an honest demon. It's really just a simple fact. There are some things I would just expect them to lie about." She gestures with her hands. "I can't claim accuracy to my assumptions but I'm fairly sure at least in this instance. I know you better.. - knew you better perhaps."

Those blue eyes are fixed on him. Some part of her wishes he hadn't done this. Hadn't let himself fall this far. It's so hard to wrap her mind around this being the Gilles from her past - that he had become this. She wishes she could be as furious with him about it as she should and yet... She's so very glad he's here. "So I see. Stained through and through, poor Gilles."

A shake of her head as she tugs at his hand. "Come up here, honestly you kneeling before me like I'm a royal. It's almost comforting you want to defend me but truly let's hope you needn't do so." Her expression falls, completely crumbles and she's staring at him before she nods. Of course, Jeanne knew this but having him say it a tone that was so matter-of-fact, gave her a chill; as if she could feel that blood spilling onto her skin, dying it crimson.

"They did. I did."

Fallen Jeanne d'Arc. Had there ever truly been any other kind? Bloodshed in the name of the Lord and for the greater good was still bloodshed, still death and destruction. Suddenly, she doesn't feel very saintly at all. Maybe she hadn't been sanctified as a blessing but as a punishment.

"That must be where I belong then..."

Edited 2016-07-06 04:35 (UTC)

"Oh, but I'm honest sometimes, Jeanne. Sometimes I'm very honest." Usually about something horrible, these days. Although he was just as frequently lying as he was telling the truth. There were so many people to lie to, for so many reasons, but in the end, for him, most of those reasons boiled down to the girl standing before him.

"You knew me better than anyone, once." Although he was changed, hundreds of years older, and he'd experienced countless things she could know nothing about. "But now my heart and soul are thoroughly debauched."

He rose to his feet when she asked him to, surprised at how easily he followed her order. "Oh, but I'd like to fight for you. I'd like to do a lot of things for you." He watched her expression fall, and it gave him a thrill as well as a chill to see her doubt herself. She'd always been so confident, so sure of herself and the heavenly voices that had instructed her. Did he like seeing her like this? Hadn't he wanted her to be debased?

"Yes! You belong with me. I won't make you fight, if you don't want to. Not like those horrid angels. Why should you have to, when you'll have others to do it for you? Hell has had an emperor for so long... perhaps it's in need of an empress." It was a reckless, outsized idea that was forming in his mind, but Gilles didn't enjoy thinking small.

"But not about why you became a demon." She's giving him a pointed look for that. "And to me no less. I hadn't thought you would do such a thing, to lie to me in such a fashion.."

Her lips press together. She's torn between yelling at him for being so foolish as to do that to himself and his soul but the other part of her is glad he hand and she's not sure which is the right way to feel. "You shouldn't have done this. Whatever the reason, you deserved more than this."

It does't sit well with her none of it does. As he gets carried away she clicks her tongue before pressing her fingers against his lips. She's finding her footing again, her calm assertive voice once more. "Stop. If I'm coming with you. If I'm going to Hell. I have rules and I expect you to follow them."

"When I go to Hell if there is any fighting it must only be in my defense. And I don't want a throne. Lofty titles don't suit me and weight me down like chains. I'm tired of such things. I want a simple, relatively peaceful existence or as close to one as can be achieved in Hell."

She's lowering her fingers from before is lips. "Now if you can agree to this we'll go if not I'm certain I can find some place in the mortal world to hide away until whatever is meant to happen, happens."

"What?" He feels genuinely chastised at her words, unlike when Baalberith reprimands him. It's an entirely different feeling, being scolded by Jeanne. Perhaps because he actually cares about it.. "It isn't a lie... I qualified to become a demon, and I was made an offer. I accepted." It's not technically a lie. By omission, maybe.

He shakes his head. It isn't as if he's surprised. He hadn't thought she'd approve of him becoming a demon. He knows her too well for that. "More than what? This way, I have power. I'll live many hundreds of years. What's wrong with that? Why don't I deserve it?" But his eyes widen, and he stops talking for a few moments when she touches his lips. He pauses, savoring that moment, the feel of her fingers on his mouth.

He doesn't speak again until she's finished talking. When he continues, he sounds a little more sedate, but he's not convinced. "But that isn't how Hell works... You have to fight. Hell isn't peaceful. Nor is the mortal world." He wonders if there's anywhere like that. Peaceful. "No matter where you go, they won't leave you alone. Not now."

"You heard me clearly enough or shall I say it in French?" Jeanne crossed her arms over her chest. "Yes, but you did many things to set you on that path to become qualified." She spits the word out sharply there's no way to hold back what she really thinks of such things. "How you came to cross that border between the Gilles I knew to the one before me now, the one that attracted the interest of a demon with the atrocities you committed is what I'm speaking about."

She exhaled. "More than being a demon. More than damnation. You were a good man, Gilles." And this pains her. This lust for power that seems to have been cultivated in him. He had never been one like this when she had known him; rode into battle with him. "Truly this can't have been your wish."

Jeanne is scowling. "I'm aware that it isn't but, I'm tired of fighting and blood on my hands. Demon, human... The manner of being doesn't matter. You loathe Heaven because they made me fight, that they used me as a puppet and mouthpiece that every word from me was anything but my own. Yet, you want to force me into a new world where I have to fight? Where I shall have no allies save for you that I could even begin to trust?"

It's true. They will never let her be free. Neither Heaven, nor Hell. Earth was no longer a familiar place. She frowns and rubs at her chin. "I don't have any choice, do I?" For a moment, she sounds lost. Completely lost.

Edited 2016-07-11 02:20 (UTC)

"Oh, that." He says it as if all the blood and suffering were meaningless. "I decided I didn't believe in God. I gave him the chance to prove He existed. He didn't." If God had been so worried about the behavior of Gilles de Rais, he should have appeared. He should have done something useful. "Do I disgust you now?"

Good. He has to scoff. "If I was a good man, would I have done all that?" He's laughing, but he isn't entirely sure of the answer to his own question.

"But If I didn't do it, Jeanne, how could I be here, now, to greet you and serve you, now that your time of slavery is done? I would have died an ordinary death. Heaven would never have sanctified the mere knight, Gilles de Rais, human and possibly good and unremarkable—but Hell took notice of the monster de Rais!"

He studies her face, sees the conflict there. The loneliness. He's both glad of it and hates it. "You have a choice. Choose to stay with me. What other ally do you need?" He smiles at her. He touches her face.

"And what made you come to that conclusion? That God didn't exist. Clearly, he does." Even if she'd never exactly met God but rather Michael and various other angels. "I didn't say that. Don't put words in my mouth."

"Good people do horrible things. They're called sinners Gilles. They can be done with noble intentions doing what they believed right and just. Others can be lead astray. People do not always know the path to take."

And there it is, like a raw wound exposed at last. This is the reason. There is the knife twisting violently in her heart. "You would have found peace in death. I would have wanted that for you. Why..." Her voice trails off for a moment then it's harsh and loud.

"Why should you suffer for centuries waiting for something that wasn't promised? Why stain your hands, your soul - your entire being for something that was never guaranteed? I don't care what some demon may have sworn to you with poisonous words laced with honeyed sweetness to make you become worthy of Hell. You couldn't have known it would be this way. Even I didn't know."

When had she moved? When had her hands taken hold of his shoulders? Either way, that's where they are, gripping at the fabric beneath them, firmly. Jeanne's voice had gone soft - the wind could steal the words if she hadn't been so close.

"Stay with you?" Her eyes are closing at that touch. Stay with me. It's an offer she can hear echoing in her head, resounding and quieting the confused and jumbled buzz of everything else.

"And if I did?"

"Why wouldn't I think it? After what happened?" He blurts the words suddenly, without forethought, but if God had existed, surely he would have saved her! But he didn't, so he couldn't exist. "I wasn't putting words in your mouth, I was asking you. I'd say most holy people would be disgusted with me." He leans in to study her carefully. "But not you?"

Her attitude about sin is not unexpected. Of course, there's supposed to be the chance for redemption, but angels tend to think that redeeming demons involves killing them. "Honeyed sweetness?" Gilles rolls his eyes at this description of Baalberith. "You don't know him very well. There was nothing honeyed about it. Besides, the demon only spoke to me after I'd been deemed worthy. I became worthy all on my own, without any help! Suffering—it's not so bad, in Hell. I don't know what they've been telling you up there about us. All those fire and brimstone stories?" He laughs a little, running his gloved thumb lightly over her face.

"No, I didn't know. I was offered the possibility. That was enough. You would have preferred that I died? Well, I didn't, so I'm here." Perhaps he'd have been better off, if he hadn't sinned, if he'd lived out the rest of his life naturally, but that wasn't what he'd done. He couldn't know what that would have been like. He couldn't imagine that fictional, virtuous Gilles—and he didn't much like him, for being so unmoved by Jeanne's death.

"Yes, that's right..." Gilles hasn't thought that far ahead. He hadn't thought he would be standing here, talking to her like this, although he'd bided his time, waiting for this day: all his plotting and planning, for this. It' doesn't feel quite real to be talking peacefully to her, as they used to do—although about very different subjects. He never would have foreseen this outcome, back in that time.

"I'm not an angel. I won't be telling you what to do. Why don't you do as you like, for once?"

"Because of the trial..? The fire?" She knows that is exactly what had lead to this. "Most holy people have never been human - they don't know what it is to be human." A shake of her head, "Not disgust. It saddens me, it angers me.."

A smile tugs at her lips, "I don't know him at all that I can recall but I didn't mean sweet talk. I meant he promised you something you wanted to get something he wanted. You." That smile faded as quickly as it came and she cleared her throat. "I didn't mean Hell itself - the waiting, the uncertainty, being alone; a personal hell of one. Though they did tell me such stories."

She turns her head into that touch, letting it soothe and smooth away the angry lines on her face with its warmth. "I would have preferred we both had different outcomes to our human lives, yes." A sigh before she opens her eyes.

"As I like?" No one has asked her what she would like in so long Jeanne isn't even sure what it is to want to do something. That's not true. it's a sudden realization that she does want something - desperately. the saint - former saint? - is moving forward to embrace him; arms sliding to wrap around his waist. Like this, she presses against his chest.

"I'll stay."

"The trial. The fire." He repeats the words slowly. He hates them. He hadn't recovered. When they'd burned her, he'd felt it was something in him that was being burned away. Maybe that had been selfish of him, to think of himself, but he was selfish. Human. Like her. Like she had been, and like she was now.

"I didn't care. The more I killed, the less I cared." The less compassion he'd felt, and the more the killing came to seem like an end in and of itself, although it hadn't brought him happiness. He keeps telling her these things. He doesn't know if it's to test her or because he wants her to turn away from him, but she doesn't turn away.

"What outcome would you have wanted? Jeanne." She's letting him touch her, so he doesn't stop. Why should he stop? Does he mean it, when he says she can do as she likes, or is he going to be the cowardly, cunning demon that he knows he is? It seems he doesn't have to be, yet, because she does what he wants. She puts her arms around him. "It's true that they'll come back for you. They won't leave you to me." He'll fight them. He won't hesitate to face Heaven's wrath, to go to war against them, but even he knows he can't defeat all of Heaven.

It pains her to think of it really. How horrible it all must have been for him. While she can't say that she would have dealt with it in such a way as he had, Jeanne could see all too easily what had happened. He had lost all sense of right and wrong in the face of such unjust actions. It made her heart ache.

Giving a little shake of her head, she sighs softly. "I don't believe you didn't care. I believe you just didn't care about them." She's certain that he still cared but her death seemed to have pushed him over the edge into the dark, onto a path of self-destruction which he pulled so many more unfortunate innocents down with him because of madness fueled by grief and anger.

"Before? As a human? A life that wasn't cut so short for a start. I had hoped after my task was done I would have a normal life. A simple one - a family, children..." Her voice had softened ad she spoke until it trailed off into silence. Jeanne had always been a simple girl who was easily made happy by common everyday things. She'd had no need or desire for fancy finery and luxuries.

"Right now? I-" Don't know what to what. Peace? To feel safe? To be herself and free? Judging by the state of things, she can't have all of that. "I don't want to go back. I don't want to be a puppet on Heaven's strings, Gilles." But she isn't sure how to do that without going to Hell and becoming something that is very much not what she really is.

At least there her choices would be her own - the freedom of choice to only fight, battle and kill as she must rather than being sent to do so.

[either or!]

[The knight.]

[She is both a princess and a soldier. ♥]

A protector for always

Flynn Scifo | Tales of Vesperia | OTA

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Rey | SW:TFA | OTA

John 'Reaper' Grimm | DOOM

Derek Hale | Teen Wolf

Trucy Wright | Ace Attorney | ota

Alric of House Caelegart | OC | M/F

Tetsuo Usuda | Akira OC / Original | M/F

Gilles de Rais | Makai Ouji | ota

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so sorry for the slow!

Shhh, no slow is okay.

Lance | Voltron Legendary Defender | OTA

Marius Titus | Ryse Son of Rome

Makoto Kino | Sailor Moon | OTA