Estella set her quill carefully back down in the inkwell, allowing her signature to dry on the letter. Ashton had left yesterday for Kirkwall once more, and Séverine the day before with Pike. She had no doubt they'd explain everything to Sophia between themselves, but since the Guard-Captain was undoubtedly not looking forward to that conversation, she'd thought it best to put down an account of events for Sophia herself, so that someone at least would know what to expect when Ashton arrived. It might be a bit of an overreach on her part, but... she hoped it would be received as it was meant, and not as her stepping over some line she didn't deserve to cross.
Once she'd sealed it with the saffron-colored wax and the Inquisition's official stamp, she stood. Fortunately, she hadn't been trapped in her office all day; Rilien had seen to that. She sometimes wondered if making her train was his way of making sure she didn't drown in paperwork. Either way, she appreciated it—and she certainly needed the extra practice.
Opening the door out to the hallway, she smiled at the stern-faced soldier who stood guard outside her door most afternoons. “Evelyn, would you mind running this up to Rilien? It's for the Viscountess of Kirkwall." At the woman's nod, she continued. “I'm going out for a while, so you're free to take a break or head back to the barracks after."
"As you wish, Lady Inquisitor."
Estella managed not to sigh at the formality, ducking back into the office just long enough to grab her cloak and gloves. She'd settled the hood in place by the time she made it to the keep door, and the cold wasn't too bad when it rushed to meet her as she opened it. Still, she kept her pace brisk until she reached the warmth of the tavern.
No one had taken the Fade particularly well, exactly, but it was not lost on her that Saraya had reacted especially poorly, and that the repercussions were nearly disastrous for Vesryn as well. Saraya's problems, she doubted she would ever be able to do much about, unfortunate as that was. But... she could check on Vesryn, at least, and perhaps there would also be something she could do for him. He hadn't been around as much of late, according to servants' gossip and the like. Mostly keeping to himself, which was very unusual. So perhaps her concern was justified.
Estella found him on the second floor of the tavern, but he wasn't as solitary as she'd been led to believe. There were other Inquisition soldiers with him, at least. Indecisively, she hovered at the top of the stairs for a moment. Perhaps there wasn't any need for her to be here at all. Without actually intending to, though, she made eye contact with him, smiling a trifle awkwardly and lifting one arm in a little wave.
Vesryn caught the wave and smiled back. It was thin, a bit forced, something he never usually had to do. The three soldiers at his table had yet to notice her, but Vesryn soon rectified that. "I hate to leave a story unfinished, friends, but I believe I'm required elsewhere." They followed his gaze and immediately understood, two of them immediately offering greetings of Lady Herald and Inquisitor respectively. "We'll return to this another time, of course. You know where to find me." He stood, grabbing a rather large tankard that he'd been working through and gesturing with his head of silver hair for her to follow.
He led the way back to a smaller, unoccupied table in a less noise filled section of the upper level, setting down the tankard and pulling back the chairs. "It's good to see you," he said as he took a seat, a rather more subdued greeting than he might've normally given. "My apologies for not making my way up to the Keep. I imagined you had your hands full after the battle."
“I did," Estella admitted, taking the seat he'd moved out for her and scooting in a little bit. She folded her hands into her lap; her shoulders hunched forward slightly, but she kept her spine straight. “But you would have been welcome there anyway, you know." She liked to think she was the kind of person who would always make time for a friend, even when it was difficult. Then again, it might not be much help in any case.
She tilted her head slightly, trying not to let her concern show too obviously. “How have you been, since then?"
"Well enough, I suppose," he said, exhaling a bit heavily. He was far from drunk, but it did appear as though he'd been drinking a fair amount for the evening thus far. "Physically I'm recovered, mentally no issues apart from what we discussed in the Approach. That nagging insistence that something was done to me. I suppose I've been staying here because... it's louder here, more often. Easier to not think too much. Thinking wasn't getting me anywhere, and it was just getting both of us frustrated." Naturally, he didn't need to specify whom he was referring to by saying "both of us."
"I... saw you and the other Argent Lions in here. And heard, I suppose. I confess I had no real idea what Nostariel meant to all of you. I'm sorry it turned out the way that it did. It shouldn't have been that way." He said it with a certainty, implying he felt he had some personal connection to the way things had gone. Which, since he was one of the six that fell from the bridge, was perhaps understandable.
Estella pushed a soft breath from her chest, shaking her head. “It shouldn't have, no. But that's..." It was still hard to think about, still hard to really acknowledge. She was used to being away from her friends and people she cared about for long stretches of time. But it was difficult to come to grips with the fact that she wouldn't ever see Nostariel again. It didn't get easier because it wasn't the first time, either.
She scrubbed her hands down her face, collecting herself for a moment before she ventured to glance up far enough to make eye contact with Vesryn again. “I keep thinking about what I could have done differently. I've... I've lost friends before, but... never like this." She'd never felt like so much of what happened was really within her control. She sniffled a bit, but her eyes remained dry. “But when it comes down to it, Nostariel chose. And the people to blame for the fact that she had to... that's not me. And it's not you."
"Even if you're right about that," he answered, drumming his fingers on the table, seeming to expect that sort of reply from her, "I don't think it changes the fact that I barely served a purpose in that fight. A Fear demon, maybe a powerful one, sure, but still just a Fear demon. Cyrus removed that behemoth from the picture, leaving us with the demon and its ilk, and all we needed to do was remove it before it slowed us too much. If I'd had Saraya with me, I know she could've dealt with anything it threw, she could've guided me there, we would've..." He broke eye contact, raising a hand halfway towards his head and nearly closing his eyes for a moment. He then shook the sudden reaction away, like cobwebs from the corner of an old attic. Pushing aside whatever feeling Saraya expressed at his words.
He found Estella's eyes again. "It shouldn't have been on you to keep me alive. It was a near miracle you managed to get there in time, and just as lucky that you survived the retaliation. It's... stop." The last word clearly wasn't intended for Estella, and Vesryn looked down towards the table when he said it, taking in a few breaths. "I've trained to be a champion on the battlefield. A protector, for you, for everyone that I fight with. What use am I if after all these years, I fall to pieces as soon as I lose my guide, and the ones I want to protect have to shed their blood to save me?"
“Plenty." Estella said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, but it occurred to her that this might seem strange. She couldn't even begin to fathom what it must be like to be so very accomplished at something that one error—even an important one—could by itself cause such doubt. But doubt, she understood very well indeed. She wasn't sure if anything she could say could reach someone whose experiences were so very different from hers, but she knew she wanted to try.
Estella squeezed her hands together in her lap, collecting her thoughts like threads and trying her best to weave them together the right way. “Nobody expects you to be perfect, Vesryn. Well, except maybe you." She tried for a smile, but it was thin and she knew it. Her eyes fell to the table between them for a moment, seeing but not really noticing the patterns in the grain of the wood. “Everyone has times when things don't go as expected, when new difficulties arise. And when those things happen... what's wrong with someone else bleeding to protect you? I mean, it's never what anyone wants to see happen, but that's what it means to be a team. To be friends."
Her eyes flickered back up, and she tilted her head. “I'm not... wrong in calling you that, am I?" She didn't think so, but that was the thing about gregarious people. It was easy to mistake general amiability for amity.
"What?" By his expression, Vesryn seemed to think the question was absurd. "Estella... no, of course you're not wrong. It's..." He leaned back, more falling into the back of his chair than anything, and the air seemed to flood out of him. Like he'd been punctured, and any anger he had began to dissipate, even if almost all of it had been aimed at himself. "It's why I've been so frustrated about this. I've had precious few real friends ever since all this began." He tapped his temple with his middle finger as he said it. "I don't think anything bothers me so much as seeing them hurt because of me, or things I fail to do. I've had to leave some behind because of it."
The waitress started to come by, having just finished checking in on the other Inquisition soldiers, but Vesryn waved her off, and she was quick to give them privacy again. "But leaving this Inquisition behind, leaving you behind... that's not an option for me. It's just... the Fade forced me to confront that Saraya and I are even less secure than I'd feared. And if a demon can manipulate my mind into such a weak state, it seems only a matter of time before it happens again." He swallowed, his expression as troubled as she'd ever seen it. "And then someone else might die. Another friend of ours, or maybe it'll be you next time. I know I'm not perfect. But I've never thought of myself as a liability before."
“You're not—" Estella stopped herself. Her automatic, knee-jerk reaction here was simply to reassure him that he wasn't a liability, but she paused there, letting herself consider it. She could understand so much of what he said, because they were thoughts she'd had about herself at one point or another. Or all the time, more like. She appreciated it when people tried to reassure her the way she'd almost moved to reassure him, but she didn't tend to believe them. She didn't want to project too much onto what he must be feeling, but all she could do was try and be as honest and forthright as possible, and hope that maybe he'd chosen to speak to her about this because there was something she could do.
So she took a deep breath, and tried to relax the reflex that made her hide things by habit, so it would be more obvious that she meant what she said. “I'm sure it feels like a step backwards," she said softly. “But I think the only way you'd ever become a liability is if you let that stop you from moving forward again." It was something she'd had to internalize in herself, over and over again, because she'd taken steps backward, over and over again. “Someone who wants as badly as you do to protect other people... well someone like that can always improve, right? Even if it's little by little. Even if sometimes the rest of us need to cover you, or bleed for you in the meantime." She set her forearms on the table, leaning forward against them and lacing her fingers together on the tabletop.
“I believe—I have to believe that moving forward again is always possible. And I don't know if it makes any difference to say, but I also have to believe that truly being a liability is giving up and being content to stand still. So I guess if you think you are one now... then I have two questions for you." She pursed her lips and found his eyes again, her own still gentle in their expression, but her tone a little firmer. “What are you going to do about it, and how can I help you?"
After maintaining a thoughtful silence for a long moment, Vesryn actually smiled a little, looking down and drawing his right arm back over the top of the chair. "I remember my first real fights. Wolves, giant spiders... sparring with the other young mercenaries in my company. I had ill-fitting, cobbled together armor. Axe that was too heavy for me. I had a way of fighting Saraya's every intention, my poor instincts guiding me into taking hits. It's a wonder I'm still alive to talk about it." The smile slowly faded, seriousness replacing it. "I wasn't born to fight. The Denerim Alienage probably remembers me as a peaceful, awkward boy at best, and a coward at worst. Saraya did what she could to fix all that, but... it's hard to change the essence of a person's mind."
He took up his tankard again, finishing what was left of it, and dabbing at his lips with a cloth. "I think to move forward, as you say, I'll need to go back. Back to those years, no matter how uncomfortable they were. I trust Saraya with my life, and I know my capabilities when we're together, but I don't think I can trust myself yet. I can't rely on myself. I don't know if I ever will, but if there's even the slightest chance I'll be without Saraya's help again, I need to." Her words seemed to have had an effect on him, as already there was a more familiar spark in his eye, that almost ever-present hint of a curl at the corner of his lips. He leaned away from the back of his chair slightly, studying Estella's eyes.
"As for how you can come in... if you can find the time once in a while, I'll need someone to spar with, preferably in private. Mostly I'll just need you to try to hit me repeatedly. I need to be quicker with the shield, I need to see better. And perhaps you could run this by Khari as well, discreetly if you could. I'm sure she'd be more than willing to take a few swings at me."
She smiled at that, a soft huff of air escaping her. “That sounds like an idea she'd like, yes," she agreed. “As for me, well... I'll help as much as I can. At the very least, I know the place for this. Rilien usually has me train away from watching eyes, too. It would probably be a little demoralizing to see just how often the Inquisitor gets knocked on her rear." Her tone was dry, but she managed to say it without too much of the usual dejection that accompanied the thought.
She hesitated a moment, then decided that if she was ever going to venture this, it might as well be now. “Could I ask you a small favor in return, though?"
"Name it," he answered quickly.
Estella cleared her throat a bit awkwardly. She'd sort of expected him to think it over a bit or something, first. “May I call you Ves? You're welcome to use Stel for me if you like; most of my friends do." In fact, all of them did eventually, but she didn't really mind either way. She'd never disliked her full name the way Khari did, for instance.
Whatever he'd been expecting, that wasn't it, but he smiled, letting his weight fall back into his chair again. "You're more than welcome to call me Ves, Lady Inquisitor Stel." His smile grew at the little tease, but he pulled it back quickly enough, to keep his expression sincere. "And I should apologize, I've been too wrapped up in my own problem lately. If my company would be welcome in the great hall, I'll do my best to share it more often. I can't imagine I'm your first choice to speak with, but... if you need someone to discuss anything with, I hope at least I can be a choice."
“Nothing to apologize for," she replied, lifting her shoulders. It wasn't like she could blame him for dwelling on this. A little smile touched the corners of her mouth. “And you never know. For what it's worth, I think you were exactly who I needed to talk to, after Haven." She managed to say that without choking up, perhaps more a product of the months since the events than any true sense of having moved on in the way people usually meant. She'd always carry that day with her, just as she'd always carry Adamant.
Carefully, she stood, moving the seat back into place by picking it up, so it wouldn't scrape against the floor. “And the next time you're inclined to spar... I usually find myself wishing for an excuse to stretch my legs by midafternoon."
Once she'd sealed it with the saffron-colored wax and the Inquisition's official stamp, she stood. Fortunately, she hadn't been trapped in her office all day; Rilien had seen to that. She sometimes wondered if making her train was his way of making sure she didn't drown in paperwork. Either way, she appreciated it—and she certainly needed the extra practice.
Opening the door out to the hallway, she smiled at the stern-faced soldier who stood guard outside her door most afternoons. “Evelyn, would you mind running this up to Rilien? It's for the Viscountess of Kirkwall." At the woman's nod, she continued. “I'm going out for a while, so you're free to take a break or head back to the barracks after."
"As you wish, Lady Inquisitor."
Estella managed not to sigh at the formality, ducking back into the office just long enough to grab her cloak and gloves. She'd settled the hood in place by the time she made it to the keep door, and the cold wasn't too bad when it rushed to meet her as she opened it. Still, she kept her pace brisk until she reached the warmth of the tavern.
No one had taken the Fade particularly well, exactly, but it was not lost on her that Saraya had reacted especially poorly, and that the repercussions were nearly disastrous for Vesryn as well. Saraya's problems, she doubted she would ever be able to do much about, unfortunate as that was. But... she could check on Vesryn, at least, and perhaps there would also be something she could do for him. He hadn't been around as much of late, according to servants' gossip and the like. Mostly keeping to himself, which was very unusual. So perhaps her concern was justified.
Estella found him on the second floor of the tavern, but he wasn't as solitary as she'd been led to believe. There were other Inquisition soldiers with him, at least. Indecisively, she hovered at the top of the stairs for a moment. Perhaps there wasn't any need for her to be here at all. Without actually intending to, though, she made eye contact with him, smiling a trifle awkwardly and lifting one arm in a little wave.
Vesryn caught the wave and smiled back. It was thin, a bit forced, something he never usually had to do. The three soldiers at his table had yet to notice her, but Vesryn soon rectified that. "I hate to leave a story unfinished, friends, but I believe I'm required elsewhere." They followed his gaze and immediately understood, two of them immediately offering greetings of Lady Herald and Inquisitor respectively. "We'll return to this another time, of course. You know where to find me." He stood, grabbing a rather large tankard that he'd been working through and gesturing with his head of silver hair for her to follow.
He led the way back to a smaller, unoccupied table in a less noise filled section of the upper level, setting down the tankard and pulling back the chairs. "It's good to see you," he said as he took a seat, a rather more subdued greeting than he might've normally given. "My apologies for not making my way up to the Keep. I imagined you had your hands full after the battle."
“I did," Estella admitted, taking the seat he'd moved out for her and scooting in a little bit. She folded her hands into her lap; her shoulders hunched forward slightly, but she kept her spine straight. “But you would have been welcome there anyway, you know." She liked to think she was the kind of person who would always make time for a friend, even when it was difficult. Then again, it might not be much help in any case.
She tilted her head slightly, trying not to let her concern show too obviously. “How have you been, since then?"
"Well enough, I suppose," he said, exhaling a bit heavily. He was far from drunk, but it did appear as though he'd been drinking a fair amount for the evening thus far. "Physically I'm recovered, mentally no issues apart from what we discussed in the Approach. That nagging insistence that something was done to me. I suppose I've been staying here because... it's louder here, more often. Easier to not think too much. Thinking wasn't getting me anywhere, and it was just getting both of us frustrated." Naturally, he didn't need to specify whom he was referring to by saying "both of us."
"I... saw you and the other Argent Lions in here. And heard, I suppose. I confess I had no real idea what Nostariel meant to all of you. I'm sorry it turned out the way that it did. It shouldn't have been that way." He said it with a certainty, implying he felt he had some personal connection to the way things had gone. Which, since he was one of the six that fell from the bridge, was perhaps understandable.
Estella pushed a soft breath from her chest, shaking her head. “It shouldn't have, no. But that's..." It was still hard to think about, still hard to really acknowledge. She was used to being away from her friends and people she cared about for long stretches of time. But it was difficult to come to grips with the fact that she wouldn't ever see Nostariel again. It didn't get easier because it wasn't the first time, either.
She scrubbed her hands down her face, collecting herself for a moment before she ventured to glance up far enough to make eye contact with Vesryn again. “I keep thinking about what I could have done differently. I've... I've lost friends before, but... never like this." She'd never felt like so much of what happened was really within her control. She sniffled a bit, but her eyes remained dry. “But when it comes down to it, Nostariel chose. And the people to blame for the fact that she had to... that's not me. And it's not you."
"Even if you're right about that," he answered, drumming his fingers on the table, seeming to expect that sort of reply from her, "I don't think it changes the fact that I barely served a purpose in that fight. A Fear demon, maybe a powerful one, sure, but still just a Fear demon. Cyrus removed that behemoth from the picture, leaving us with the demon and its ilk, and all we needed to do was remove it before it slowed us too much. If I'd had Saraya with me, I know she could've dealt with anything it threw, she could've guided me there, we would've..." He broke eye contact, raising a hand halfway towards his head and nearly closing his eyes for a moment. He then shook the sudden reaction away, like cobwebs from the corner of an old attic. Pushing aside whatever feeling Saraya expressed at his words.
He found Estella's eyes again. "It shouldn't have been on you to keep me alive. It was a near miracle you managed to get there in time, and just as lucky that you survived the retaliation. It's... stop." The last word clearly wasn't intended for Estella, and Vesryn looked down towards the table when he said it, taking in a few breaths. "I've trained to be a champion on the battlefield. A protector, for you, for everyone that I fight with. What use am I if after all these years, I fall to pieces as soon as I lose my guide, and the ones I want to protect have to shed their blood to save me?"
“Plenty." Estella said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, but it occurred to her that this might seem strange. She couldn't even begin to fathom what it must be like to be so very accomplished at something that one error—even an important one—could by itself cause such doubt. But doubt, she understood very well indeed. She wasn't sure if anything she could say could reach someone whose experiences were so very different from hers, but she knew she wanted to try.
Estella squeezed her hands together in her lap, collecting her thoughts like threads and trying her best to weave them together the right way. “Nobody expects you to be perfect, Vesryn. Well, except maybe you." She tried for a smile, but it was thin and she knew it. Her eyes fell to the table between them for a moment, seeing but not really noticing the patterns in the grain of the wood. “Everyone has times when things don't go as expected, when new difficulties arise. And when those things happen... what's wrong with someone else bleeding to protect you? I mean, it's never what anyone wants to see happen, but that's what it means to be a team. To be friends."
Her eyes flickered back up, and she tilted her head. “I'm not... wrong in calling you that, am I?" She didn't think so, but that was the thing about gregarious people. It was easy to mistake general amiability for amity.
"What?" By his expression, Vesryn seemed to think the question was absurd. "Estella... no, of course you're not wrong. It's..." He leaned back, more falling into the back of his chair than anything, and the air seemed to flood out of him. Like he'd been punctured, and any anger he had began to dissipate, even if almost all of it had been aimed at himself. "It's why I've been so frustrated about this. I've had precious few real friends ever since all this began." He tapped his temple with his middle finger as he said it. "I don't think anything bothers me so much as seeing them hurt because of me, or things I fail to do. I've had to leave some behind because of it."
The waitress started to come by, having just finished checking in on the other Inquisition soldiers, but Vesryn waved her off, and she was quick to give them privacy again. "But leaving this Inquisition behind, leaving you behind... that's not an option for me. It's just... the Fade forced me to confront that Saraya and I are even less secure than I'd feared. And if a demon can manipulate my mind into such a weak state, it seems only a matter of time before it happens again." He swallowed, his expression as troubled as she'd ever seen it. "And then someone else might die. Another friend of ours, or maybe it'll be you next time. I know I'm not perfect. But I've never thought of myself as a liability before."
“You're not—" Estella stopped herself. Her automatic, knee-jerk reaction here was simply to reassure him that he wasn't a liability, but she paused there, letting herself consider it. She could understand so much of what he said, because they were thoughts she'd had about herself at one point or another. Or all the time, more like. She appreciated it when people tried to reassure her the way she'd almost moved to reassure him, but she didn't tend to believe them. She didn't want to project too much onto what he must be feeling, but all she could do was try and be as honest and forthright as possible, and hope that maybe he'd chosen to speak to her about this because there was something she could do.
So she took a deep breath, and tried to relax the reflex that made her hide things by habit, so it would be more obvious that she meant what she said. “I'm sure it feels like a step backwards," she said softly. “But I think the only way you'd ever become a liability is if you let that stop you from moving forward again." It was something she'd had to internalize in herself, over and over again, because she'd taken steps backward, over and over again. “Someone who wants as badly as you do to protect other people... well someone like that can always improve, right? Even if it's little by little. Even if sometimes the rest of us need to cover you, or bleed for you in the meantime." She set her forearms on the table, leaning forward against them and lacing her fingers together on the tabletop.
“I believe—I have to believe that moving forward again is always possible. And I don't know if it makes any difference to say, but I also have to believe that truly being a liability is giving up and being content to stand still. So I guess if you think you are one now... then I have two questions for you." She pursed her lips and found his eyes again, her own still gentle in their expression, but her tone a little firmer. “What are you going to do about it, and how can I help you?"
After maintaining a thoughtful silence for a long moment, Vesryn actually smiled a little, looking down and drawing his right arm back over the top of the chair. "I remember my first real fights. Wolves, giant spiders... sparring with the other young mercenaries in my company. I had ill-fitting, cobbled together armor. Axe that was too heavy for me. I had a way of fighting Saraya's every intention, my poor instincts guiding me into taking hits. It's a wonder I'm still alive to talk about it." The smile slowly faded, seriousness replacing it. "I wasn't born to fight. The Denerim Alienage probably remembers me as a peaceful, awkward boy at best, and a coward at worst. Saraya did what she could to fix all that, but... it's hard to change the essence of a person's mind."
He took up his tankard again, finishing what was left of it, and dabbing at his lips with a cloth. "I think to move forward, as you say, I'll need to go back. Back to those years, no matter how uncomfortable they were. I trust Saraya with my life, and I know my capabilities when we're together, but I don't think I can trust myself yet. I can't rely on myself. I don't know if I ever will, but if there's even the slightest chance I'll be without Saraya's help again, I need to." Her words seemed to have had an effect on him, as already there was a more familiar spark in his eye, that almost ever-present hint of a curl at the corner of his lips. He leaned away from the back of his chair slightly, studying Estella's eyes.
"As for how you can come in... if you can find the time once in a while, I'll need someone to spar with, preferably in private. Mostly I'll just need you to try to hit me repeatedly. I need to be quicker with the shield, I need to see better. And perhaps you could run this by Khari as well, discreetly if you could. I'm sure she'd be more than willing to take a few swings at me."
She smiled at that, a soft huff of air escaping her. “That sounds like an idea she'd like, yes," she agreed. “As for me, well... I'll help as much as I can. At the very least, I know the place for this. Rilien usually has me train away from watching eyes, too. It would probably be a little demoralizing to see just how often the Inquisitor gets knocked on her rear." Her tone was dry, but she managed to say it without too much of the usual dejection that accompanied the thought.
She hesitated a moment, then decided that if she was ever going to venture this, it might as well be now. “Could I ask you a small favor in return, though?"
"Name it," he answered quickly.
Estella cleared her throat a bit awkwardly. She'd sort of expected him to think it over a bit or something, first. “May I call you Ves? You're welcome to use Stel for me if you like; most of my friends do." In fact, all of them did eventually, but she didn't really mind either way. She'd never disliked her full name the way Khari did, for instance.
Whatever he'd been expecting, that wasn't it, but he smiled, letting his weight fall back into his chair again. "You're more than welcome to call me Ves, Lady Inquisitor Stel." His smile grew at the little tease, but he pulled it back quickly enough, to keep his expression sincere. "And I should apologize, I've been too wrapped up in my own problem lately. If my company would be welcome in the great hall, I'll do my best to share it more often. I can't imagine I'm your first choice to speak with, but... if you need someone to discuss anything with, I hope at least I can be a choice."
“Nothing to apologize for," she replied, lifting her shoulders. It wasn't like she could blame him for dwelling on this. A little smile touched the corners of her mouth. “And you never know. For what it's worth, I think you were exactly who I needed to talk to, after Haven." She managed to say that without choking up, perhaps more a product of the months since the events than any true sense of having moved on in the way people usually meant. She'd always carry that day with her, just as she'd always carry Adamant.
Carefully, she stood, moving the seat back into place by picking it up, so it wouldn't scrape against the floor. “And the next time you're inclined to spar... I usually find myself wishing for an excuse to stretch my legs by midafternoon."