Closer is Good (2/2)

Writers: Danielle, Eimi
Date Posted: 11th June 2006

Characters: E'dian, Gilsha
Description: E'dain tells Gilsha about his lost love and she gives him a practical response
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 12, day 2 of Turn 3

It was light again by the time it was over. Slowly his breathing calmed, but his heart still raced. Then, that too slowed to its normal rhythm. He lay there, eyes closed, reveling in the aftermath of a much needed release. A rite of passage, something to be held dear. And he did, he held it as close to his shattered heart as he dared.

He wasn't even aware of the tear that fell from his closed eyes, leaving the mark of its passage on his cheek.

"Well, I've moved my lovers in powerful ways, but I don't remember making them _cry_," she teased lightly, still a bit breathlessly, as she wiped the tear with her finger. "What's the matter. Did I hurt you?"

"No...no. You haven't hurt me." How much did he want to say? How well did he even _know_ this woman? "Old memories. I'm sorry." But he didn't move away. He might have, once. He might have run from the room, once. Not now. E'dian didn't know what had changed, but something had.

"Nothing to be sorry about," she replied as she rolled onto her back.
"I'm not the one crying."

He shifted, rolled onto his side towards her. With care, he took her hand raised it to his lips and kissed the back of it. "Thank you, Gilsha. For a most...memorable flight. This was the first one Shandarath and I have had in at least a turn."

"Poor Shandarath," the greenrider said with lifted eyebrows. "No wonder he was so determined."

"That, and after making him stare at you and Palialohath for the past sevenday, well. I suppose he finally felt able to chase." Which meant...he was....healing. It seemed impossible.

"Well, perhaps you should adopt that tactic with all the pretty greens,"
she teased lightly. "Seemed to work this time."

He smiled. "Shan's rather picky, you know. He doesn't just chase _anyone_."

"And are you so picky?"

And there it was. He took a breath, let it out slowly. "Like rider, like dragon. I suppose I am."

"Well, at least you are not the type to settle for just anything," she said with a shrug. Nothing wrong with being picky.

"I'm not. But when I do...when I finally make up my mind...it's very hard to change it." He smiled, sadly.

"And someone else changed your mind for you and so you've been pining away for a turn and this is the first time your dragon chased. It's all becoming clearer now."

He felt himself tense. There it was. She came so close to the hard grain of truth that had become the very core of his existence. "She's dead." He closed his eyes, but he made himself open them. To look at her. "She died of the worst case of Threadscore I have ever seen a Turn ago. And yes, this is the first time Shan or I have been able to participate in a flight." It meant something. It had to mean something.

"Life goes on, E'dian. It has to, or you might as well end it," she said, not harshly but matter of factly.

"It does. I know that. I'm a Healer, by the first egg! I know this.
That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt. Especially knowing..._knowing_ that I might have been able to help, had I not been a DragonHealer." He said it, voiced aloud the guilt that was the core of the ongoing pain.

"Why? Are you some superbly skilled healer that knew more than everyone else in that infirmary? Was she just left in the care of innocent apprentices who had never seen Threadfall in their lives." Gilsha sighed as she snuggled down deeper into the pillows. "I think you are giving your fellow healers too little credit and yourself way too much.
What could you possibly have done that a whole team of healers hadn't thought of or tried?"

"There wasn't enough of them. We didn't have enough healers. They'd said so- they were too short handed to cope with the amount of casualties that come in that Fall. I could have been another set of hands at least..." He could have done _something_. "Not so many of the dragons were wounded. We had enough staff on hand..." He said it quietly, carefully avoiding raising his voice, trying to keep the emotion from breaking through. He could do that. He'd had enough practice, telling patients, the families of patients, terrible news that they didn't want to hear. He didn't want to hear the words he was saying. But he said them anyway- knowing that he needed to hear them spoken even more than he needed to explain to her.

"Yes, and if I could move the Red Star with my mind, _no one_ would have died, E'dian. It is how it is. You are _not_ a people healer. Even if you had been, a turn or two later her dragon could have been fatally scored and you would feel guilt over the same sharding thing."

She was right. She was right as Alixana was when his grandmother had spoken words so very similar a turn ago. He knew it in his heart and in his mind. He drew a shuddering breath. He simply had not wanted to accept it. Or accept, fully, that _she_ was gone. "I know."

"You can't live your life between times, E'dian. I doubt your lover would have wanted that for you. If she truly loved you, she would look and see that you've done your time pinning away for her, and now its time to be happy again." After all, if they grieved for turns for ever dead loved one in this Pass... Well, they just didn't have that luxury anymore.

"She would. She would want me to be happy. It's just...very hard to move past the thought that she is gone." But he was. Slowly moving past that point and away, into his own life. One without _her_, because she was never coming back.

Gilsha sighed as she stretched her arms over her head. "Well, how hard have you been trying to?"

He turned to watch her, then unexpectedly, he laughed. "In truth, not very."

"Well, between your dragon not rising for a turn and your crying the first time you bed a woman, I got that impression..."

"Perceptive of you."

She shrugged. "I'm just realistic."

"I've noticed. And very real." He smiled. He could do that now, it seemed. "I have something for you, by the way."

"Something for me?" she asked suspiciously. "Naked and in bed? I wonder what it could be..."

"Well...other than the obvious..." he said, then rose to cross the room to his desk. A moment later he returned, and offered her a plain, cloth-wrapped package, rectangular in shape.

"Should I open it now?" she asked curiously, feeling the weight and shaking it just a little.

"If you want to," E'dian said as he lay back down and slipped under the blankets.

She carefully unwrapped the cloth to reveal a beautifully polished wooden frame with a drawing of both her and Pali in a tender moment together. He had captured the sweetest smile on her face as her hand rested gently on her green's neck, and Pali's draconic features actually looked _loving_ as she gazed at her rider. "Shards... E'dian it's... I don't know what to say. It's perfect."

He let go of the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. "You like it then?"

"Very much," she nodded and turned to him with a broad smile. "It's fantastically done. Do I have to pay you for the frame?"

He shook his head. "It is a gift. Besides, I already owe you more than I can say, Gilsha," he said softly.

"You owe me nothing, E'dian," the greenrider replied as she lightly touched the picture of Pali. "I have done nothing for you a friend wouldn't do."

"Then I thank you, for being who and what you are," he reached out, touched her hand lightly, then lifted it and brought it to his lips.

Gilsha decided not to tell him that it was silly to thank her for things she had absolutely no control over, or that were not in place just for his benefit. Instead she just smiled and clutched the picture close.
"Thank you for this."

"You're welcome. I am glad you like it."

She smiled thoughtfully and leaned down to set the picture carefully on the floor. Turning back to him she wrapped an arm around his waist and kissed him softly. "Perhaps we can take a moment and express to each other our mutual appreciation?" she murmured against his lips.
Gilsha didn't usually linger after a flight long enough for a third time around, but it was a pretty picture, and after a turn of solitude, it sounded like E'dian could use the attention.

He was more than a little shocked, and more than a little pleased by her reaction. "I think..." he said, "A moment wouldn't be long enough..." E'dians arms came up around her again, and this time his thoughts were only of Gilsha, and no one else.

Last updated on the June 11th 2006

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Closer is Good (2/2)