Until It's Proper

Witchofthepen

Disclaimer: I don't own anything to do with the Young Wizard Series. I really, really wish I did….

This is a scene on the mobile's world from Roshaun's point of view. None of the dialogue belongs to me.

Roshaun started as his mind conjured up an unbidden image. 'That's strange,' he thought, and then realized where the thought had come from.

"I have seen that too," he said without thinking towards Dairine. Immediately he mentally winced. 'Stupid!' he thought, careful to shield his thoughts from Dairine, who was now looking at him strangely. 'What if she's hearing my thoughts as well?'

"You've been hearing me think?" she asked. 'She's so cute when she's stating the obvious,' Roshaun thought before he could stop himself. 'Wait, bad thought! No thinking about Dairine that way. At least she can't hear me unless I let my guard down.' Turning back to her, he nodded in his way. She looked pensive.

"That doesn't bother you?" she asked. Bother him? He looked out past the horizon. Of course it bothered him! He had just been named king and here he was falling in love with a member of another species! And he was sharing thoughts with her no less. 'She's beautiful, though,' he reasoned. 'Why should I be upset? Is it really that wrong?' He knew the answer before he even thought it, soon becoming aware that Dairine was about to start speaking again.

"It can mean that wizards are getting—"

"Too close?" Roshaun interjected. Yes, he was probably becoming too attached to her. But too close? With that beautiful human? 'SHUT UP!' he thought, barely able to keep from shouting aloud. He really hoped she couldn't hear his thoughts. "How close is too close?" he asked, more to himself than her. He continued to speak as if she wasn't there. "Neither of us is thinking of doing anything… inappropriate." At least she wasn't. And he was trying not to even think about it. He was really, really trying.

"Huh," Dairine mused. She wasn't making it easier on him. She moved the lollipop around in her delicate mouth in a way that made him… 'Bad Roshaun! Bad!' Dairine raised her head a bit and began to speak again.

"I don't know how 'inappropriate' looks to your people." 'I really wish she hadn't said that!' Roshaun thought, images coming to his mind before he could suppress them. He opted for the easy way out rather than answer her incredibly cruel question. "You should read the manual more." 'Or maybe she shouldn't,' he reasoned. 'She might become so adverse to my culture that she'd never speak to me again.'

"Seemed simpler to ask you." Simpler? Simpler his ass.

"And probably more embarrassing." Embarrassing was right, especially since he had been thinking about said inappropriate actions since Dairine had arrived on Wellakh.

"Maybe I just like yanking your chain as much as you like yanking mine." Roshaun took a moment to decipher the strange idiom. It reminded him of the soul bond legends on his world. But they couldn't be… she was an alien. He covered his slight anxiety with a smile.

"The idiom is peculiar, except in so far as it implies we're linked."

Dairine said nothing. 'No,' Roshaun thought. 'She's angry. She doesn't want to be linked to me in any way shape or form. Not after how I treated her over the couple of weeks. Really, she should just plain out hate me in the nicest way possible. Especially after how father acted earlier today.' Maybe that was what she was so upset over. "My father's concerns about the two of us, I take as an indication of other things that were going on with him right then." But what if he were right? 'Dairine was so… No, back on topic, Roshaun,' he chided himself. "Wellakhit are not moved to seek union bond with another until at least a third of the way along in our lifespan." Kind of like Dairine's people, but not quite. "I am nowhere near that, and you, if I'm right, would be only about a sixth of the way along, as your people reckon time."

He knew that he was right. How could not be right? He had only developed an inexplicable obsession with Dairine! "Sounds about right." See! He was right! She was about the same as age as him. Noth that they could probably reprod—'Stop. Bad thoughts, boy.' "You do have the idea of being "just good friends?'"

The words were like a knife to Roshaun. "Just good friends," he repeated. No, not a knife. It was like someone had extracted his appendix with a spoon. "For so high and honorable an estate," he said, referring to being her friend rather than his, " 'just' seems a poor modifier to use." A dull, rusty spoon. 'Just' was horrible. That meant no liking Dairine in a way more than 'friends'. Because if he did, it could ruin his kingship. And just as bad in a different way, his relationship with her. Or would it? Roshaun groaned inwardly and bit down hard on his lollipop in frustration, something that Dairine hated.

On cue, she said, "I really wish you wouldn't do that."

Roshaun smiled slightly at her vehemence. "You are always hearing trouble before it happens." He wasn't referring to her comment. He knew that she was worried about the getting too close. As was he, and what he said was to reassure him as much as it was to reassure her. "Some might say it was a sign of lack of faith in the benevolence of the universe." He stopped for a moment, thinking of his current predicament. "Or of dysfunction." He could heel her glare. It was okay with him though. He had survived attempts on his life. He could deal with a couple glares.

"You keep this up, I'll give you a dysfunction where you'll have trouble finding it again!"

Roshaun was torn between wincing and laughing. "Now there you have it. All that aggressiveness! I wonder about you sometimes." Ha. More like all the time now. About her hopes, her dreams, what she had eaten for breakfast that morning. Everything.

'You wonder about me?' he felt her voice in his head.

'Yes,' he replied. Oh, did he ever. But she'd probably never knew. It just wasn't proper. But he was king of an entire planet, wasn't he? Couldn't he make it proper? Well, until it was, he'd have to suffer in silence.