[b]Dylan Stroud[/b]

“You fancy me a skald, eh?” Now he was at her side and walking in lockstep. Rain fell, churning up smells of what the city once was. “I am afraid if I was to draw from personal experience then stories of heroics would be few and far between. I’m no Siegfried.”

Dylan looked up at the hidden heavens and heavy clouds, hanging there in seeming suspense with the threat of a torrential downpour. “At least the moon will not be jealous tonight.” He grinned.  

Wetted hair was beginning to cling to his scalp and nape and clavicle. Lamplight danced in the wide pools of his eyes, and sparkled in the tiny puddles they splashed through, and shimmered in the moisture on his skin. However, it cast his companion in a new light entirely, without her jacket now, much of her form was visible, a tracing of temptation, and in the unnatural orange light, her hair might indeed be flame. 

Rivulets ran through the crevices of the paving stones, splashing up as Dylan let his feet take him where they may, his destination a mystery. The silhouettes took a journey through the avenues of time, across the uneven cobblestone of memory. Hands cupped in front from his face and he struggled, but eventually succeeded, in lighting a cigarette. 

Trailing smoke as he waved his hands about, he went on, “I do have a few tales involving horses and nuns,” he shook his head, his smile was empty, and the wrinkles seeming more pronounced as he thought of days gone by, “but those are far too adventurous for present company.”

After a long drag, he let free a blue, withering cloud. “I was in a circus for a long time, if you would fancy that.” He seemed to smile at something very far towards the horizon, “Those years of my life were most delightful. The whole circus was a colossal family. They taught me to juggle and walk the tightrope, and all other manner of showman’s tricks. I was a fast learner, but I had an unfair advantage." He gave a fanged smile, "Everyone there was peculiar to some degree. Next to a bearded lady I seemed quite normal.”

 “It was a new kind of liberation. We were carefree in every way. Our time together was spent travelling or performing, or chasing farmer’s daughters, or carolling through the streets of Prague, or enjoying the Absinthe bars of Paris, or dreaming deeply in the silks of Istanbul, or skating upon the frozen Thames.” He looked at his muse, his own stolen star, a gift from the gods. She had the beauty of the night-time skies, and all that was best of dark and light, met in her aspect and her eyes. With the alcohol loosening his tongue, he told her all the wonders he saw with his troupe, of the close shaves with law, and of the nights in courtly manors - as well as those in wayside ditches, of ephemeral lovers and haunting performances. The nights spent running from women through cities, or looking for girls that hid from him. Stories of opium and alcohol, of food so fine it made his mouth water even then, and of the days when they had naught but gruel.

It was only a crossroad that stopped his rambling; not entirely sure where he was, even his feet stopped moving. He looked left, then right, and then straight ahead. “Say,” He began, offering the cigarette with a dainty hand, as well as an apologetic look, “You should have stopped me rambling, now my feet have gotten me lost.”