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 Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 4:36 pm
She lowered her eyes before giving her head a single shake. No, she knew no more about the mysteries of growth than he. In truth, it had never occurred to her to question it! She'd had her trials, painful as they were, and emerged more whole than she'd been. Aki had always said…if it doesn't kill you, it will make you stronger. Rivener had made her stronger.
Pasha watched him turn the berry over and over, like a coin he was about to flip. She had been caught in her own thoughts, but his rich voice pulled her attention back as it always did. The Muse listened, eyes searching his face as she tried to put her version of events aside and see it as the Stag saw it. It was an old pain, familiar to her. Somewhere between regret and survivor's guilt…it was a place Melisande had known for many years.
"I forgive you." He'd asked, but it had been in rhetoric. That didn't stop the Muse from offering her grace. It wasn't his ignorance she was forgiving.
"I hadn't put those pieces together either. You and I. How we fit." Pasha reached past the strawberry basket, settling her hand in the space between them. There was something warm in her expression, nothing of pity or deprecation. "But perhaps, just perhaps, if I'd been with you, I wouldn't have been able to protect Cruz. Or help Anita. I used to think of all I could have done for Zavier."
Pasha didn't speak his name often. Her hand withdrew, fingers curling gracefully around the ring at her neck like a flower closing. "But what if I'd also faced that storm, and fallen beside him? Or in his stead? Would that have comforted him?"
She stated it simply, but the meter and weight of her sweet voice gave life to a much more poignant story. In the end, Melisande's pain had kindled faith. "You're right. It is the immoveable past. But we can make a pact, going forward." Pasha pushed away from the table, smiling suddenly as she offered a hand to the Frei.
"I will show you all I am, and all I can do! If you do the same for me, surely there is nothing we can't accomplish. We will leave no room for 'what if' and no room for regret."
Her hand waited for his. Pasha's eyes were bright behind her fall of bangs, resolute.
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Posted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 9:47 pm
It was true, when Cesc thought of it. The startling simplicity of her logic had never occurred to him before she'd uttered it. What if their being together in the jungle would have exposed someone else? He knew that he'd failed to protect his own group. But Melisande, she had not failed with her own. As he remembered it, they arrived the least battered of any of them. Cruz was harmed only by his survivor's guilt. Anita did not seem at all unwell. The man with the gun, him, either. Only Melisande, her wing...
He inclined his head, respectful, and listened to her as she continued. It was not the words so much as the emotions behind them that let him in -- the pieces began to fit together. The ring, the heavy feeling of loss that had so tormented her -- so tormented him -- at the beginning of their acquaintance. The way she said that name, Zavier. There was love in her voice. She said the name both carefully and with a depth of both sadness and joy that only that love and that loss could bring. It was her name to say. His ring on her neck like a promise.
She'd lost him to a storm, then.
A sorrow entered Cesc's eyes as he looked at her. She had not deserved such a loss. Anyone worthy of being loved by her deserved more than one life to devote to rejoicing in it.
He rose and took her hand, all warmth and gentleness. He closed his fingers around hers.
"Of course," said Cesc. "I am willing to do all I can."
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