Undecided

10.

All of her life Alice had always picked the wrong people to fall in love with. She didn't know if it was the result of lessons that she had failed to learn in her adolescence when she experienced her first love, or if it was just the cruel reality that was given to her, devoid of any meaning other than the inevitable, innate suffering that comes from existing. Perhaps it was simply the imitation of patterns she learned as a child from her parents who were the first models to show her what love was really meant to look like. The only issue is that Alice didn't think anyone truly knew what that was, for even God's love came with terms and conditions. To her, that wasn't real love. Real love was unraveling a person to their rawest form, exposed for all its beauty as well as its rot, and cherishing it like the life that ran through your own veins. Maybe it was unrealistic, just an idealistic hopeless romantic's pipe dream, but she knew if that's how she felt then there had to be someone out there who viewed it the same way. Unfortunately, as children, women are presented with the idea that love is what their lives are 'supposed' to be meant for, what they are intended to revolve their lives around seeking, while men fall victim to their biological disposition.

Lust.

Sexual desire in itself isn't inherently bad, after-all, its natural and simply a part of life. Everyone experiences it. However, when sex is obsessively being advertised to every person after the age of puberty to the point of a societal addiction, it becomes a problem. It loses its sacred aspect, becomes empty. It forms the mind into something perverted, and grotesque. Maybe it was bitterness, but she has witnessed this sickness be the death of many relationships, including her own.

Unfortunately, she had always been attracted to men who were broken like herself. It felt familiar, she was most comfortable with obviously broken people. She was practically a lighthouse guiding them to her. She wanted to mend them, show them they were deserving of love, like she wished someone would try to mend her, and that was her first mistake. All she could see was herself reflected back in them, and she gave her all to them each time, no matter how badly it hurt. She knew they needed it even if they took a piece of her each time. Alice truly saw them, but they never saw her. Their void could never truly be filled, they traded her for the next thing, or person, they thought would fill it. She was a sucker for the pretentious type. The brooding, lost "bad-boy" archetype, and she never learned.

Sadly, what you don't learn, you are bound to repeat. It was her heaven and her hell.

The way Samael looked at her was different. He pierced straight through her like an arrow, leaving her insides exposed and vulnerable. It made her so anxious it was almost unbearable because she had no control over it, there was nowhere for her to hide from him. To be seen, to be truly understood, was all she had ever desired in a person, but it also gripped her with a fear so paralyzing that it had to have followed her through multiple lives. To be seen for all you are is to be completely naked, and what if no one could love her once she was stripped down to bone.

All Samael could think of was obtaining her, it had become an obsession since he left her apartment. He knew the only way to gain information about his current circumstance was to visit the Moirai. If he was blinded by Alice then he would go to those above his own station. Visiting the Fates was a headache, but to have her, it was worth trying to decipher their cryptic nonsense. They never made it easy, gaining information from them was near to impossible from anyone that was not himself. Thankfully, he loved to solve puzzles.

Samael closed his eyes, feeling his material form fade from him as he visualized his destination. As the earthly prince, the human world was his dominion, and with that, all the humans. Therefore, the Moirai were more inclined to inform him of their affairs. He didn't come to them often. Little warranted him to seek their company unless it was absolutely necessary. They spoke in riddles and cared little for any beings other than themselves. The cave he manifested in resided in the in-between, the astral plane. Three women stood in the center, surrounded in webs. Threads of mortal lives encompassed the seemingly endless, damp cavern, shimmering faintly in the dim lighting. He stayed where he was, knowing they were more than capable of hearing him from his distanced position. More-so, they already knew why he was there.

"Greetings, young prince," They spoke together in unison, their movements spider-like as they maneuvered to face him. Their voices layered together, the brittle, cracking tone of the oldest Fate's contrasted with the youngest's bubbly pitch.

"Long time no see," He replied simply, a smirk lifting his features.

"We've been expecting you for awhile." The Moirai's eyes were glazed over as if they were peering far off into the distance, not all there. "You are here to inquire about the soul you pursue, no?"

He nodded.

"The answers you seek, you already know."

His eyes instantly narrowed, his facial expression altering in less than a second. He felt a guttural growl rip through his throat, "Do not equivocate."

The eldest Fate held up a hand to silence him. "What once was lost, now is found. Her soul was bound lifetimes ago."

They didn't need to say anything more for him to understand. This time there was no puzzle to solve. There was no cryptic riddle. He began to tremble, and he fell to his knees. A deep, choked sob left his quivering lips. Even Gods as composed as himself experienced these dreadful emotions: anguish, longing. Humans were merely a reflection of them, after all. He couldn't stop the tears that rolled down his face, the cold rock beneath his hands being the only thing that grounded him. Samael completely crumbled, millenniums of years of repressed feelings he thought he had long locked away crushed him with the weight of a thousand universes, but with it brought that cursed feeling. Hope.

The Moirai watched, silently observing.

"I thought she was gone," He whispered, barely able to muster the sentence. Everything made sense now. Samael understood why he had been drawn to her, why his abilities were repressed in regards to her, why he could not collect her soul.

It was because it was already his.