Private Concerns

I woke up, and she was there, it was like the world before her had been in just black and white, and now, I was seeing in colour for the first time. I knew I loved her, then.

— Private Concerns describing meeting yet another love of his life for the first time.

I woke up, and they were there, it was like the world before her had been in just black and white, and now, I was seeing in colour for the first time. I knew I loved them, then.

— Private Concerns describing meeting yet another love of his life for the first time.

I woke up, and he was there, it was like the world before her had been in just black and white, and now, I was seeing in colour for the first time. I knew I loved him, then.

— Private Concerns describing meeting yet another love of his life for the first time.

"Oh, where was I? Oh, harnessing the power of love. Yes, right. Any of you students have any idea how to do that?" He asked the students of his class at The Spiral Academy. "Yes?"

"Make them fall in love with you, move away, repeat?" Ragara Sinu Lelland replied, the class tittered.

"Anyone want to take the first stab at this idea, before I finish him?" He said, a twinkle in his eye.

"Anyone with any sense will check if you've fallen with them first, idiot." That was Nellens Soliton, and their breakup had been epic. The tartness in her voice could have curdled a lemon tree at ten paces too.

"There's a kind of logic to her point, even if she's being... heavy handed. The true power of love isn't cultivated into such a shallow pot as you imply mister Ragara. Nor is its greater powers revealed until you gain mutual acceptance of its nature." The class groaned, this teacher was known to drone on and on about true love. But he didn't. This time.

"Teacher?"

"Yes, miss Iselsi?"

"Have you ever fallen in love?"

"Now, now, miss Iselsi, that's a rather personal question..."

"Well considering your class subject..."

"You're wondering if I have any experience with my topic?"

"Um, yeah..."

"Please don't worry about that, I won't recite my marital history for the sake of it, but suffice to say you'd be dead before I'd be halfway through, since you're a mortal, and I'm not..."

"Er?"

"I am a Chosen of Venus, I exalted under the star sign of the constellation of the lovers. Barring an accident of fate, I should see at least a score and a half centuries of life. T he eldest of my kind fall out at fifty centuries."

"Why are you here though? Aren't there places you could be teaching, in Yu-Shan?"

"You really do like to probe to see if you can get a reaction, don't you?"

"Err, well, guilty, at least a little, but I didn't mean to offend, I'm just so used to everyone doing what I want, that your reticence..."

"There's a lesson you should learn early, not late, or you'll end up like I did, banished from where you wished to teach the children of the gods, and end up teaching mortals... And that is to know who you're up against? He quirked his eyebrow at her."

"Err, what am I missing?"

"I'm sure you've not taken your second breath yet, miss Iselsi..."

"Err, no. I guess you have?"

"I've taken my second breath long ago, I met your ancestor, the Scarlet Empress, before she became empress, if that tells you anything..."

"Err no, how long ago was that?"

"I met her seven hundred and sixty-two years ago, to the day."

"Great-grand-nana? The red one?" The girl's eyes could only be properly described as agog.

"The Red Lady herself, she was a Scale Commander then. I was just a pup."