Logs:If She Had a Choice
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| RL Date: 19 January, 2008 |
| Who: Satiet, N'thei |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| Where: Post flight. |
| When: Day 28, Month 12, Turn 14 (Interval 10) |
| Satiet's Weyr(#4031RDIJM) N'thei has not slept. He hasn't even nodded off, the very idea of sleeping in Satiet's weyr too far-fetched. The night has begun to drain, Wyaeth and Teonath returned to the weyr-- the bronze asleep on a new ledge with no tender cuddling for the frosty queen, just a heavy snore. There are only so many ways to violate a person in one night, so the bronzerider has settled at the end of the cot with his back against the wall and a safe distance between himself and the weyrwoman, his breath ragged, his arms and chest and forehead slick with sweat. After a tenderness-free evening, his eyes have finally unclouded and he looks wordlessly at the woman. What does one say in the end? This was not how it was supposed to go, that much is clear from the dragon pair's return, Teonath maintaining a breadth of distance from snoring Wyaeth -- her disapproval, her wakeful watchfulness of this new mate of hers. Highly aware that the man beside her does not sleep, Satiet does the opposite and makes the pretense of sleep, if not the act itself. Her rhythmic breathing isn't quite peaceful enough, and the constant shift of lashes would betray so much if she were turned towards N'thei rather than the open space of her weyr. And then there's a shift, arms stretching down to bring the sheet more closely about her body, that elicits a pained sound that gets muffled behind quickly clenched teeth and the ruse is up; she turns awkwardly on the makeshift cot. For her, though there's plenty to say, reflected in the pale face and pale eyes lifting to try and meet his downward gaze, there's only one thing actually spoken. A cool, slowly elongated word: "Congratulations." N'thei kens the sound even before it's muffled, tired eyes watching all the things Satiet leaves unsaid. Watch is really the only word for it, as there is no registration in response to her look, his expression slackly unaffected. That cool word is all it takes to break a well-cast spell, the enchantment of weariness unraveling with a long sigh when he slides to the edge of the cot. He's not looking at her now, but casting a look about the floor for strewn garments, and it's from the midst of this preoccupation that he answers; "Thank you." The white-faced weyrwoman, the pale pallor of her cheeks and forehead visibly sticky from dried perspiration, slides herself with painful slowness up along the wall as N'thei turns away. The sheet comes up with her, held loosely at her chest with one hand, and while he surveys for shed clothing, she observes the weyr as a whole, pinpointing with a drop of her chin, the remains of a dropped and shattered wine bottle and the puddle of red around it; their starting point. Satiet's, "You weren't supposed to win," falls flat, lacking mocking or emotion, and is quickly followed with a lift of her delicate face out of the shadows of her dark hair to place an aloof look on the new Weyrleader. "Will you be better than him?" "Yes." N'thei leaves Satiet to her sheeted dignity, removes his weight from the covering by leaving the cot. He's found pants, and there's a certain security for a man with his pants on that gives him courage to face her again. "You doubt?" With his tunic wadded in his hand, he rakes a look over the slight woman that lands with a challenge to meet her eyes. He finds what she seems to have lost, the mockery of a smile, the stupid self-confidence to wear victory with squared shoulders. Her blue eyes scrutinize, darting away from his challenging eyes to the mocking smile down the mantle of victory on his shoulders, then to the pants. It's view of the pants that returns life to the goldrider in a faint flush on her cheeks. For a brief moment, she looks pleased. "I doubt," returns Satiet, scornful gaze lifting to meet his challenge, however late. "You wanted to win. To best them. But to be Weyrleader?" A silent beat is followed by a deliberate emphasis of askance on the possession coupled with a slow, sly smirk, "My Weyrleader? I doubt." N'thei takes slow steps back to the cot, speaks with drawled certainty. "Yes, I wanted to win. And A'son didn't want to." The last two words breathe quietly across the apples of Satiet's cheek when he leans down, the bruised right bracing himself against the wall over her shoulder, the left pressing his weight against sheets and mattress beside her thigh. Close, close enough to get hurt again based on the history of his proximity with the goldrider, he smiles cold confidence right into her eyes. "Then doubt. I don't care. It's done." "The best leaders are those that don't want it," opines the raven-haired weyrwoman, a cursory glance cast N'thei's slow approach. The sense she speaks is negated in the next breath, spoken into his skin as he breathes into hers. "But R'hin didn't want it, but didn't want to lose it, either." And look how that turned out. Two hands lift, releasing the sheet from around her body, then fall to drape over his shoulders, interlocking fingers loosely and her body leans forward into his chest so her teeth draw to his earlobe. "You weren't supposed to win," Satiet repeats, the hold of her arms strengthening to stay the new Weyrleader's weight on this cot. "So what are you still doing here, you stupid, stupid man?" N'thei mocks, "Would you have had A'son here? Someone to command and despise?" He allows only a moment to enjoy the little teeth on his ear, the glaze back over his eyes, the sigh caught in his throat before he draws his head away from Satiet to see her again. His answer is light, breezy, supremely out of place in the odd warmth of their proximity; "Doing? Getting dressed." The hand slips from the wall, draws her to him intently, the film of the sheet just breaking the contact of skin-to-skin. "Enough with what I wasn't supposed to do. I did. Now /we/ do." Her arms lock for his movement backwards, intertwined fingers catching along the back of his neck, to keep him close or hold onto what little she has control of still. But his continued mocking drives her self-confidence underground once more and brings defensive words to fly hurriedly off her lips, "Someone who would naively do what must be done because he believes it's the right and only thing to do without thought of consequence if only because he's too stupid to realize consequences. If I had choice-," Satiet thins her lips and fails to complete that thought as she's drawn in by N'thei's arm. Startled, the words she means to say catch in her throat and the arms that are already about his shoulders reflexively hold on tighter. "I should hate you." The second time he says it tonight. "Then hate me. I don't care." The arm around her, the elbow at her waist, the hand at her shoulder blade renders any tightening of Satiet's arms useless, N'thei does not need help to secure her against his chest. "If you had a choice? You would have a good man, a better man than I am, but not the right man." His lips taste the apples of her cheeks then rest close to her own, forehead-to-forehead for a moment, only a man and not a confident fool; "I lied. I do care. But I'm leaving anyway, so you may hate me while I'm gone." From start to finish, nothing's been in her control and losing control for this long doesn't sit well with a woman like Satiet. But the lips against her cheek and the press of sweat-sticky foreheads to each other undoes what willpower she can muster, fists falling lax by her side to bury in the gathered fabric of her yellow sheets, and she lets his arm support her dead weight. "The right man," she begins, alto twisting sardonically, "Couldn't be a good man. Go away, before I ask you to stay, so I can hate you alone." "Ask me to stay." N'thei kisses her again, briefly, more a smudge of his lips across hers; the breath he sighs against her chin afterward is considerably longer than the kiss itself. "So I can tell you no." The arm bracing his weight bends, leans him lower and her with him, until the hand on her back slides away and leaves Satiet against the pillow. "Stay here and hate me. It's the only way we'll be able to live with each other, work with each other." What he can't see when he bends in for that brief kiss are the eyes that shut to savor the moment and the fists that drive further into the mattress to clutch at the fleeing strands of willpower. "You cruel, foolish, stupid man," which, rather than insulting, sounds on the verge of endearing or what passes as such for her. "/Go/ /away/," Satiet repeats in lieu of asking him to stay, sinking back against the wall with the sheets pooled about her waist. Deliberately, her face turns away from N'thei, studious on the opposite wall. All that's left is the sound of N'thei finding his clothes, a sock here, a boot there, the pad of bare feet across cold floors. He spends little time at this even, leaves before he's dressed. At least he shows Teonath the courtesy of a nod, of a mumble of apology for employing her ledge to put on his clothes. Wyaeth snores. Teonath is as frosty in her reception of N'thei on her ledge, as she is of Wyaeth's presence there. But that breadth distance is imperceptible from the ground and while she is awake while her mate sleeps, there's the semblance of solidarity in the massive golden frame. |
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