Diane had been anxious.  Something waiting, holding its breath, hopeful and afraid, hidden.  What was it afraid of?  Not finding; finding.  Afraid of disappointment, afraid of consequences of fulfillment.  Too skitterish to pin down.

It had been frustrating, not being able to find him.  She'd tried to mindspeak to him, but though she did not feel that the attempt had failed, nor yet been rejected outright, the silence within was untainted.  She walked outside again, rose petals cupped in her hand.  And a vista opened behind her eyes.  Faint, but clear; oddly tinted.  She thought she recognized it, and began to walk uphill.  There was a mountain atop their cave home, one with many views like the one she could sense, but one of those was accessible yet isolated, and held a thoughful air within its bounds.

The expanse of woods lay both above and below the world.  Agememnon looked up to the sky with his milky, blind eyes.  A few birds, perhaps, wheeling, turning, rose and fell with the currents of air - the breath of gaia.  The late afternoon sun was at eye level at this height, slowly dipping behind the trees.  Down below, the pygmy ant farm of figures, almost meaningless in size, moving to their own rhythm.  He thought she was almost here.

Diane had to squint to make out the figure, as the overlay of visions disoriented her, she stopped looking into the mindlink; though it remained in place, she turned her attention fully to the external world.  She thought of a few different things to say, discarded them, and was left with a soft "Hi."

"Beautiful, isn't it?  Almost enough to bring forgetfulness."

"The best scenery."  She wondered how he knew so clearly what this place looked like; he was blind, how could he see it?  "What are you trying to forget about?"

Agememnon turned and smiled at Diane.  "Not I.  I have nothing to forget, but others have been here, in this spot, to forget."

"I don't have anything I'm trying to forget, either."  Not completely true, but true in the sense that Diane had not come here seeking to forget anything.  She should get to her reason, then, shouldn't she?  But she hadn't told him yet about the result of their trip into Dallas.  "Everything went okay, really.  We rescued the cub, and no one died..." She smiled, remembering what he'd said before she'd left for Dallas.

She reached for Agememnon's hand, and he sensed the movement, offering it to her.   "These are good things," he said.

Diane dropped the two rose petals into his hand, then closed his fingers around them gently, and let go.  "These are petals.  I brought roses."

He pulled his hand back to himself, touching the petals very softly.  "It's cool to the touch.  I didn't expect that."  His fingertips traced their outlines, memorizing the texture.  "You can see what I see.  Would you like to see as I see?"

"As you see?  I didn't know..." that you saw at all.  But she had not quite not known.  "Yes, I would like that."  She paused for a moment.  "After you show me, will you come with me, so I can show you the roses?   They're growing really well."

"Close your eyes for a moment," Agememnon said, answering her answer, not her questions.  She closed her eyes, and with the sense of rose petal texture both remembered and new, an inner space opened.  Into it came a vision unlike any she had ever seen.

He knows he is white, and tipped in black, and so, himself, looking down, he sees himself white, edged in black, with an unknown energy in his hands... turning this way and that, a clear flame.. a cool flame.  He looks up - and sees the sky, which he has never seen - gold and green, and the sun, which shines and warmes, not gold itself, but soft blues, and the grass and ground in lavenders and orange.

Diane gasped softly in wonderment.  "It's beautiful.  More than that - magic."

"Sometimes imagination is better than certainty."  He rose with a dancer's grace, or an artist's.  "I will follow, if you lead."

Diane kept her eyes closed for a long minute, awash in blue sunlight.  Finally when her eyes opened, everything looked fresher:  more radiant, even in its own colors.  "It isn't far."  She stood up slowly.  The brightness of the world around her must have extended to Agememnon, because he looked the same, but different too.  She couldn't understand why, but somehow, showing him the roses she'd brought from Dallas and planted was the most important thing in the world.  A mixture of confidence and unsurety at the rightness of this made the world seem to tremble around her.

As they set off, the extra vibrancy of the light faded swiftly, leaving only a fragment of itself in her memory.   Agememnon's fingertips were on Diane's shoulder as she led the way down the mountain and to the place Sho had found for her to plant the final rose.

--

When they reached their destination, Diane stopped, paused a moment to look at the results of her gift.  The dark crimson roses were still blooming, the original flower open wide, the second that she'd coaxed into existence still partly closed, and three new buds had added themselves already.  This was, to her knowledge, far past the natural rate of growth for roses, but she thought it would slow down once the spirit power of the gift she'd used on it had worn off a bit.

She took Agememnon's hand and pulled it gently down toward the flowers.  He hesitated, then carefully lowered himself to kneel by the plant.  He ran his fingers over the stems, carefully feeling the contours, from base to blooms, a faint smile on his face.  After a moment, he brought his fingers to his lips and traced his mouth, then sucked on one of his fingers.  "Beautiful."  He turned his face up to Diane, a questioning glance.  "Roses?"

"Yes, they are." She looked at him, her expression hopeful.  "Do you remember we were talking about them one time?  I thought you'd like them."  She looked at the largest blossom, then back to Agememnon's face.

His lips curved up more; continuing to look up at Diane, he spoke softly, reciting a poem.

somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
any experience, your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skillfully, mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the colour of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands

Diane thought she had read the poem before - it was by e. e. cummings - but never heard it.  The words rushed over her and took over her mind like a whirlwind, roses opening and closing in a vivid loop of imaginary film, echoes of emotions following in their wake.  She felt, somehow, that the poem was a return gift to her, in thanks for the flowers she had brought for him.  A circle turned, forming a figure 8, infinite yet fully present.  All to be unfolded in time.  "I'm," she stopped after one word, looked at him again, then the rest of the words rushed forth, "glad you like them."

Agememnon lowered his eyes, smiling more to himself this time.  "Yes.  They are wonderful.  Thank you for sharing them with me."

"It was the only thing I could think of."  Diane grinned, feeling a worry lift from her heart.

"I would like to paint them."

"You should, then."

"And you?" he added.

"You'd like to paint me?"  Diane asked, not sure that was what Agememnon had meant.

"If you wouldn't mind.  A picture is not complete without all the pieces which make it so - what is a gift without the giver?"

Diane smiled.  "I wouldn't mind.  I'd like it.  There's a little more of the gift, too, two more rose plants.  One by the caern, and one just outside the cave."

Agememnon smiled happily, looking at his fingers.  "You bring me beauty.  It would be very special to return it to you."

"I think so."  Diane felt an emotion she had no words for, somewhere in the intersection of satisfaction, happiness, and relief, but not really any of those.  "I can help bring your paint and so on out here, or to one of the other plants."

Agememnon reached out and touched the petals again.  "This one.  This one is ours.  The rest must be shared."  He looked up at the sky.  "No beauty may be hoarded, but some are best appreciated in silence."

Diane looked at him, then back to the flower.  "I planted them for everyone, and for Gaia - but I brought them back here for you.  So in that way, they're yours."

"Just this one."  He touched the petals that Diane had placed in his hand; he still held them.  "Just one is enough for me.  Gaia gives to those that give to others."  Diane nodded quiet agreement.  She did not think Sho would mention the location of this flower to anyone, so if Agememnon wished it to be kept between them, there it would stay.  Agememnon's fingers were still on the petals as he asked her, "The tears are from this rose?"

Diane had to think for a moment to figure out that tears meant the rose petals.  "Yes, from this one.  It grew for me... I sang to it.  It's a dark color, darker than blood, but the same shade."  The petals that lay on Agememnon's palm were even darker, losing the color of life and not yet faded with death, but matching.

"And so."  He rose and turned his milky eyes on Diane.  "Tears of the heart."  He smiled into her eyes.  Diane smiled back, her mouth forming the same curve as Agememnon's.  "Beyond war, there are fields of roses, as we are, holding their breath in silence.  It is good to have another to share the silence," he said softly.  "When the time is right, I will paint."

The sunlight gleamed on his white hair, turned it into strands of living light, transformed the black tips into glittering jet.  For a moment, Diane saw that sunlight again in shades of blue.  "When the time is right," she echoed, her words as soft as his, sharing the same harmony as their smiles.

In their living silence, the roses continued to grow.