[DROP] It'll take your breath away

BASTIEN Soon everybody, everywhere will be The envy of the gods above Bastien saw several people he recognised enter. He didn't see Lily drop in, but as she came close and asked her question, he nodded and tried to smile comfortingly. "It would appear so. But I'm afraid I cannot say what specific kind of magic..." He was about to put forward some theories, ideas of potential divine causes when the woman appeared before them. For just a second his heart leapt, thinking Safrin was about to materialise. But no, it was just....a woman. A magical woman though, definitely. The question was surprising. He wondered how she expected to hear everyone's answers at once - were they to form an orderly queue? But other people simply began to speak, and he supposed the way of magic was to just go with it. "My biggest regret...back in the refuge, in Venice. There was a man. About three years younger than me...he had had the hardest time in life. But my God, his paintings. They changed my life, allowed me to see the canvas as a place where things could happen instead of just a picture before me. I had to have not just his art but his mind, his body. And I did." "Until..." Bastien sighed and looked down at the ground with a frown. He had not spoken about this in a long time. "I found him in bed with another from the refuge. We had always had a policy of free love and we had never made any promises, so he was in his rights, but...I still lashed out. Jealousy got the better of me. I gave and gave so much to those people and I just wanted...that one thing to myself. He left the next day. I never saw him again."