Title: Insequitur

Characters/Pairing: Renata/Demetri

Author's Note: A long, long time ago, hopeforastalemate asked me to write a Renata/Demetri one-shot. Here is my second attempt (finally), a bit darker than the first. The title translates to ' that which follows', which I think summarizes Demetri's gift quite nicely.

Renata's hands are lovely, unfurled in bony wings upon the rainwater weave of her freshly-acquired cloak.

The observation is a trifle, the sort of insignificant scrap that finds a fitful fingerhold only in the minds of the mad, but Demetri's head is eternally abuzz with dragonflies and details that accompany his flinty gift. He allows his fancy a brief, fluttering flight as he longs to touch the tangle of earth-coloured hair tumbling incautiously about soft features.

A heartbeat later, the feeble newcomer meets his gaze with ember-bright eyes, before turning away with inelegant alarm.

.-.

Demetri watches, from his precious position of slate-tinged loyalty, as Renata becomes an adored pet, a sweet, satin-clad doll that encompasses lost sisters and daughters upon porcelain-wrought features. A symbol and a cipher, she carries with her the whimsical sentiment of the coven, nothing more.

It must be achingly, jaggedly lonely, to be sought as a wraithlike replica of the long-deceased.

He waits for the shards of mourning to tear through Renata's flesh, leaving carved ribs and darkly empty wounds, but the ruffled wren of a girl is stitched together by grace and gratitude, even when Aro steals away her paltry secrets and the guards' merciless training leaves clawed striations upon her pretty, moon-shaped face.

Only then does Demetri wonder what demons she has fled, what hideous draught mortality had forced down her throat.

.-.

"What purpose do you foresee that child serving?" It is Caius who questions Renata's merit, but the inquiry has insinuated its shadowy self into the minds of most. A certain patina of strength is requisite for serving the Volturi; she cannot neither feign nor possess it.

From his inglorious alignment at his snow-haired master's side, Demetri senses the caustic tide of wrath and fear raising blisters upon his skin.

"Eleazar is quite certain that our little Renata bears a gift," Aro croons, marking expert contrast between his brother and himself.

"Of what variety?"

"A shield." The delight is palpable, as is the disbelief it welcomes upon Caius' stern features. "Surely, brother, you have come to expect that. The girl spent her life longing to fade away. What other talent could be reasonably expected?"

Aro's explanation, wonderfully, wilfully factual, twists into a chain within Demetri's thoughts; he recalls that Renata was blue with blossoming bruises and coughed blood when she was brought to the palazzo, already twisted by the throes of metamorphosis. A quiet vow is made to return with Renata to her family, offering them the same sort of coppery mercy they had granted her.

.-.

It is an impossibility to begin a friendship with a girl as elusive as fireflies, but Demetri attempts it. Little by little, he aims to coax her tale from her, seeking the ephemera in his habitual, neurotic way.

Weeks later, he realizes that the circumstances have reversed themselves. Renata can recite the novella of his life from birth to present, recalling names and fears with every semblance of tenderness, while he knows only that her skin smells of clover and shimmering spring.

His gift contorts itself, tangling like rough wool, until he can barely track upon his masters' orders, every step treacherously taking him closer to the still-eyed shield.

.-.

Demetri plans no grand declaration of affection, but it is revealed regardless, dramatically framed by a sweeping southern sunset upon scarred land. The Volturi stand triumphant, victors of a battle that should have been settled in favour of the opposition, choking upon sickly smoke and wind-strewn dust. Nonetheless, there is celebration, quick embraces and muffled encouragements.

He finds Renata standing at the edge of things, rocking upon her heels with misted eyes. Brutality troubles her, and the faint whispers of a meandering melody she hums indicate that she is lost, leagues from the plain and the blazing corpses.

For a single, silvered moment, he considers speaking to her, reassuring her that this, this is justice and mercy entwined, that there is nothing for her to fear. The words do not come.

Instead, he wraps his arms around her, shielding her with iron-edged ferocity and half-expecting her to raise slim palms and let the shelter of her gift push him away. She does not.

The embrace is returned and he hears her laughter for the first time, before feathery lips steal the memory.

"You—?" he attempts to inquire, before speech departs. It is a blow to his supreme arrogance that this slender little thing was drawn to him while feigning perfect incomprehension. He is, after all, Demetri which is synonymous with acquiring his wishes with no struggle.

"Must you disrupt the moment?"

It is then that he realizes how far and fast he has fallen.

.-.

There is something reluctantly lovely about finding himself mired in this sticky swamp of affection, tell-tale and chilly as old blood, Demetri finds, something akin to a story. The girl hides, from past and present behind a shield evanescent as summer, and the boy seeks with pitted precision.

It is a game, a complexity, a dichotomous love affair of the dead.

He does not wish to think in poetic terms.

Instead, he allows Renata to take his roughened palms between questing fingers, welcoming the shivering silence. She insists that their dalliance must be a shrouded thing, conducted amongst cobwebs and saffron-tinted lantern light; he is not accustomed to the decorum of masquerades.

Perhaps it is a lie sustained by fire and mothwings, a play of mirrors and smoke, a wrinkle within the ranks. The possibilities are weighted, recorded and cast aside when Renata's kisses pull him into dark water and let him drown.