Okay, then...

I have no idea what this is or where it is going. Any ideas will be appreciated.

Black painted nails chittered across the tabletop.

“We expected you before this.” She said.

The table was of a blond wood, scarred with years and use. Dark gouges were visible along the length and breadth of the surface, absorbing light into itself.

Her nails were smoothly manicured, but weirdly bent, as if from a vitamin deficiency; curving down on one side but not the other. A quarter inch of keratin gone badly wrong. I couldn’t stop looking at them, wanting to put them right.

“You knew your time was up, and yet you still delayed. You kept us waiting. Why?”

Her voice was like a silk shawl that had been dragged through burrs. Snags and skips that only emphasized the smoothness beneath. It echoed lightly in the gloom.

The room we sat in was full of smoky darkness, lit only by torches hung at intervals on the walls. It was a large space, long and high, with the table running the length of it. Old, moldy rushes lined the floor and dark, arched doorways led off at intervals along the open brick walls. Bright patches where tapestries had once hanged could be discerned against the smoke darkened masonry.

Sitting in a hard wood, high backed chair across the table, I raised my eyes to look into hers. This sounds like a simple thing, but you will never know the strength it cost me to look into that milky blue whiteness.

“What you want is not mine to give.” I said.

I couldn’t hold her gaze. My eyes dropped down to her bloody lips. Her mouth curved into a smile. My head swum and my eyes dropped further to her nails again, crawling along the wood of table, tracing scars carved in ancient times, feeling the damage as a lover caresses flesh.

“Then take it.”