Work Text:
Mad, they called him: mad, bad and dangerous to know. Well, he was a mere amateur compared to her. His vices were mere toys when set next to hers, his intrigues but nursery games. He had known love? not as she, whose letters burned with passion beyond his imagining. How could he, in this chilly after age, compare in magnificence to her bright life? He kept her burnished hair close to his heart, thinking it pity beyond measure that she lay so long dead: if he could but touch her soul as well, his very being might burst into flames.