milliways_bar | (no subject)

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She doesn't look innocent when she sleeps. Far from in fact, she's curled far more akin to a hound than a human, cheek cradled on her towel. Her wet hair is spread in the grass like blood, her scarred back turned towards a small fire that leaps and jumps tiredly in the growing night.

There's a plate with lunch on it as well, a sandwich with a few bites taken, a bit of fruit...it seems that the call to sleep was too great after her swim though...so, Rachel is asleep by the lake, there's room enough at the fire for more though.

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Because he has no right to shed them. He has no right to want this that he cannot have. Hasn't he been given so much? So many extra chances, so very many blessings. It is so close to life, this. So very close, except for the living part. His hand tightens in hers.

"Please don't. It isn't worth it."

And oh, how ashamed is he that all this, and still he wants more. Isn't it enough for him to have this? To have his love?

It is human nature to want, and the nature of love as well.

Does she have the right to withhold what she could do? To let him keep that pain and fear and loathing? "You're my brother" she offered, as if that explained everything.

He wouldn't ask. He couldn't, he doesn't know how. He reaches ofer to touch his fingertips to her cheek.

"And what man would want his dear sister weeping because he is being foolish?"

"With me it isn't foolish, but it in't my place is it?" she almost begging to have that decision taken from her entire. If one cannot share life with those closest, what is the point?

"It isn't my place to tell you not to, I suppose."

He is speaking only of weeping. He doesn't truly understand what she is offering. He's no idea that such a thing is within her power. He sighs softly.

"I've had my chance, it seems..."

She knows he doesn't understand. She's not sure she wants him to...afraid of what that knowledge would do to this...this closeness.

"No, never say that Archie..."

He would be startled, yes. But he cannot now even fathom ever being afraid of her. She is already far and away more powerful than he can imagine. What is a little more?

"I've had more than others. I have more than many others. I haven't the right to ask for more."

"You don't ask" she pointed out, simple and true. "You never have, you live in a Bar that holds more magic in a single room and you never asked..."

"It is normal to desire, to want, to bleed for what you do not have...but you have nothing to be ashamed of!"

"But I have asked. I asked Arithon..."

He turns his face away. It obviously didn't go well. One more reason they've not spoken in months. One more reason that he and Svava never speak either. He should have known better than to ask.

"Arithon is bound by more rules and holds than I care to count. He couldn't...but you have asked no others" she admitted.

She hugged him tightly, shifting her head to his chest comfortably "If you need forgiveness, then I forgive, Ari forgives, but forgive Yourself"

"He forgives, he can't not, and I knew that. He doesn't forget though, and he would hate me if he could. He's said as much. There is no hope there."

He sighs again, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"It is an exercise in futility. There's nothing to be done, so why dwell on it?"

Sometimes....Rachel understands people better than Arithon, and sometimes, vice versa. She has little real life experience, ah, but she is the heart that beats in the universe. And the mind walker.

"Because, Archie, you're human. You have to poke at wounds and sores to prove they're real and they still hurt. Wouldn't have you any other way brother-mine"

He smiles a little at that.

"Aye, well there's some that would call that accursed stubbornness, and some that would call it dull and childish."

He stares back up at the sky.

"I'm glad you find it charming though."

"Ask those "some" if they still do it, and honestly they'll have to say yes. People don't let things rest, especially in their own minds. They remember unless they're forced not to"

"Well, one of us had to be the charming one, and well, I vote for you"

He sighs again.

"I wish I could."

What he wants is not to want. Especially this. Why can't he simply be grateful for what he has? He gives her a little sideways glance.

"You are quite charming, dear heart. I assure you, you charm me considerably."

She can't help that, or she won't. There ae greater things out there for him, than to foolishly wish to change what he is...

"That is because you're weird. Or because I'm bright and shiny." she chuckled.

"A bit of both, most like. I've never claimed to be anything but strange, I expect it's why I like it here so much. And you are certainly bright and shiny."

He hugs her a little, petting her hair again, absently.

"Normal is far overrated" she pronounced solemnly before breaking the moment with a dazzling grin and a returned hug "I could give a ferret seizures"

And he laughs, and laughs at the sheer absurdity of it.

"Oh... poor ferret..."

But she's never given him seizures, that dubious honor belonged to Simpson alone.

It's good to hear him laugh, she actually revels in the sound, going quiet and still just to let it continue rolling...but eventually...

"Well, not my fault I fit the bill for every button the poor things have...bright, shiny. distracting..."

Another soft chuckle.

"And you wonder why I came over to talk to you that day you were working on that puzzle... You might as well call me a ferret as well, since bright and shiny tend to distract me as well."

"Luckily for me, you've a higher constitution and will than any plain ferret" she chuckled easily. "Else I'd feel very, very bad about giving you seizures"

"You don't seem to mind the distracting though"

"I haven't had fits in a long time, thank God. And you wouldn't be the one to cause them in any rate."

He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly.

"But yes, distractions are most often very welcome."

No, she'd hunt down the cause of the fits and kill them, harm them, or if necessary, bring them back to kill...

"And that means we get along"

Archie would insist that she not kill him. That's his job. His revenge. BUt that's a story for a different day.

"So it does, my dear, so it does."