(no subject)

[inthetapestry]

It was quiet, in the Temple, but not like this. That was a quiet of reverence, of hushed tones and quiet steps, the quiet of a large building full of people making an effort to be quiet. This is a quiet of stillness, of soft breeze and water and birds.

It's good, she thinks, to be out of the city today. Away from the hundreds of questions, of decisions, of details, of things. She needs the stillness. The time to adjust to the new way of thinking. Or at least to begin to adjust. Everything is changing. Some things are trivial, like the fact that it's still surprising to look down to her hands and see that the her sleeves are blue or green. Others are very serious, as it's even more surprising to wake up in the middle of the night and realize that Paul is there, is sleeping beside her, is staying.

The city is not a good place for reflection. This cottage is.

Jaelle stands in the doorway, her head against the frame, and watches the sunlight on the water, eyes half-closed against the brightness.

Comments

[first_of_dana]

"Yes," she says. "But I had not really ever thought you would tell me.

"At times, I wondered if you knew yourself, which is probably unfair to you."

[pwyll_twiceborn]

A wry twist of his mouth. "Probably."

His gaze rests steadily on her. "The reason is simple enough. There was a woman named Rachel, whom I loved.

"She died the summer before we came to Fionavar. She died in a crash, in a car I was driving."

Jaelle won't know the word 'car'. It doesn't matter.

"That is as much of the story as Kevin, or anyone else, knew when I went to the tree."

[first_of_dana]

No, it doesn't. What matters is the statement of responsiblity.

"And am I to know more?"

[pwyll_twiceborn]

"Yes."

He wants to beg for a moment to compose himself, or think how to phrase it - but old habits, as always, die hard, and a moment is a moment of weakness.

So he goes straight on, abruptly: "Do you remember the night you told me that control mattered too much to me?

"I told you I had done that one to myself, and I had - Rachel told me very much the same thing on the night she died, when she said she had accepted someone else's proposal."

What was it he'd said? Something about a Niobe number - he can't remember the exact words. Which is, he suspects, a good thing.

"The irony, of course, is that just a few seconds later I lost control of the car in a way that led to her death.

"It was . . . difficult to accept that control had not, in fact, been in my hands; that I hadn't chosen, just for a moment, not to turn the car aside. The responsibility was mine, and that is why I went to the Tree."

[first_of_dana]

She lays one hand against his cheek -- the same cheek she struck the morning she took hom down from that Tree.

"And did you wish to die, or just to control the means by which you did so?"

[pwyll_twiceborn]

He remembers.

Blood drawn for the Goddess. He doesn't begrudge it; the life was for Mornir. Dana he has always owed a debt.

"The Tree is a poor choice," he murmurs, "for those who wish for control in dying."

[first_of_dana]

"It is," she agrees.

"But did you know that, when you chose it?"

[pwyll_twiceborn]

"No. I knew -"

A small headshake. "I would like to say that I was thinking mostly that at least some good could come of it."

And that was part of it, he knows.

The other part is that it was simply the most painful and direct way available to him.

[first_of_dana]

Jaelle is silent for a moment, then gets up, comes over, and takes his hands, pulling them just enough to make the gesture an invitation to stand.

[pwyll_twiceborn]

Paul rises obligingly, looking down at her, though not far down - he's not a tall man.

[first_of_dana]

"I think," she says slowly, keeping hold of his hands, "that it has to be safe here, for either -- for both of us to give up control sometimes. I don't think it will be easy, for either of us, even now. Difficult or not, it has to be safe to."

[pwyll_twiceborn]

Paul looks down at her for another long moment, and then raises one of her hands up to his lips and kisses it, in a gesture devoid of irony.

"You are very wise, my lady," he says, quietly. "Yes. You're right. And it's a thing we will both have to learn to do."

[first_of_dana]

"Fortunately, love, we're neither of us too old to learn new things."

[pwyll_twiceborn]

"Very fortunate," Paul agrees, with the beginning of a laugh in his voice.

"As I have a feeling it will be many, many years before either of us stops having to."

[first_of_dana]

"And possibly," she says, starting to laugh as well, as she reaches up to kiss him, "even longer than that."