Author's note: FYI, I guess this will be three chapters long instead of the predicted two.
That night the dream came again.
Once again she was walking the path of the garden and vividly aware of the sweet scent on the breeze lightly wafting over flower beds. Daniel, when prodded, had been surprisingly adept at identifying the plants with the brighter and showier blooms. The luxuriant bush before her had deep crimson blossoms and a sweet, heady aroma. Roses, Daniel called them roses.
She stopped to enjoy their lush fragrance. To bring the flower closer, she grasped the stem, but cried out in pain when something sharp pierced her thumb. Before she could react further, Daniel was at her side and reaching for her offended hand.
"Let me see." Using both hands to cradle hers, he gently examined her thumb.
"Daniel," she said, sounding mildly offended, "the plant bit me."
Daniel laughed softly and explained, "It was just a thorn."
Their heads were bowed closely together. One of his hands held hers as his thumb skimmed over her knuckles and the other gently circled her wrist, tracing light patterns on the sensitive skin he found. Vala shivered. "Is it poisonous?" She asked in an unsteady voice.
Daniel shook his head, "No, it's just a scratch," and lifting her hand to his lips, placed a tender kiss on the pad of her thumb.
Vala stared, mesmerized by his gentle ministrations. Something stirred deep inside, something more profound than lust, something that left her breathless and thoroughly disconcerted. She closed her eyes and swallowed. This is just a dream, she reminded herself and sought to mask the sound of her heavily beating heart by complaining aloud, "It's not fair that anything that beautiful should be so much trouble."
"I think you just might have a lot in common with rose bushes."
Each word he spoke sent little puffs of air to caress her cheeks and she felt the timbre of his voice resonating in her chest. Unable to look away from his eyes, she stammered, "Wha…what do you mean?"
Daniel continued to hold her hand in his. "I mean that you are beautiful, inside and out." He flattened her palm over his heart using one hand, while he traced the contour of her face with the other. He raised one eyebrow and smirked, "I also mean that you are well able to defend yourself."
Vala instantly thought of their first encounter and subsequent battle on board the Prometheus. She blushed and looked down and then felt the blush deepen due to her embarrassment because she was blushing. She couldn't remember the last occasion it had happened.
Daniel placed a finger beneath her chin and lifted her face so she was once more gazing directly into his eyes and whispered, "And finally, I mean that I find the blossom well worth the risk of thorns."
If her heart hadn't fallen all the way before, it willingly completed the journey now. With its descent, Vala gave a piece of her soul. She gasped, knowing never again could she live strictly for herself and knowing, dream or not, there was no way to get it back. Fear constricted her heart. How would she satisfy this longing for the same gift from Daniel? How would she survive the coming pain if she didn't get it?
Her whole life was based on hiding behind an image, shielding the most vulnerable core from the countless casual cruelties inflicted by those claiming to care. She felt exposed, out of control, and frightened by how deeply she needed what was offered in Daniel's warm gaze. He shifted his mouth closer to hers, her heart tripped and sped up, but she pushed back from his embrace, fighting her complete surrender.
"Wait, Daniel," she begged, her breath coming in broken gasps, holding a hand up to hold him at bay.
A furrow creased his brow and he looked confused. At his sides, his hands flexed repeatedly, like he was fighting the urge to reach for her again. He tilted his head and asked, "What's wrong?" He suddenly appeared as vulnerable as she felt.
Vala moistened her lips and swallowed, searching for an explanation for her unexpected rejection of his offered kiss. Remembered sensations from last night's and the previous night's dream flashed through her. Nothing compared to the power of those kisses that marked the ending of her dreams. She seized a hold of a notion. "Daniel, you must know how very much I want you, want to be in your arms this very moment, but we had so very little time together last night. And the night before, everything ended when we kissed. I'm afraid that the kiss somehow triggers an end to our time together." The more she spoke, the more she believed what she said.
Daniel looked away and squinted in a physical manifestation of his desire to see the situation more clearly. He ran a hand through his hair and raggedly exhaled before he looked back at Vala. His forehead smoothed and he nodded. "You might be right. Why don't we sit and just talk for awhile." He smiled and held out his hand. "There's so much I want to know."
A little fearful about his possible reaction to her checked past, Vala still could not refuse his invitation. She placed her palm to his and followed wordlessly when he led them past a stone bench, past the fiercely structured confines of the garden plots, and off of the garden path entirely. Had he been leading to the edge of the universe, she would still be willing to follow, but he settled them at the bottom a grassy slope along side of the clear stream snaking through the garden. They sat shoulder to shoulder and for a while just enjoyed the easy silence between them.
Daniel was the first to break the quiet. "So, were you telling me the truth?" He plucked a blade of grass and twirled it between his fingers. "That time when I found you in my bedroom on base."
Vala saucily raised an eyebrow. "You mean when you so rudely kicked me out?"
Daniel cheekily grinned and added, "Out on your cute little butt."
"So you noticed?"
"I noticed a lot of things." His grin faded. "I noticed I hurt your feelings that night. I'm sorry."
"What's that saying? Sometimes the truth hurts? That's one reason why I try to avoid it so much, just on principle." That statement earned Vala a raised eyebrow. She continued more seriously, "I will have you know that you weren't entirely correct."
"No?"
"I may in my colored past have used the promise of sex or the illusion of sex as a means to an end, a way to control the situation. And I'll admit I do terribly enjoy saying something outrageous just to knock you off your toes." At his smug smile, she wagged a finger at him and scolded, "There is such a thing as being too calm and too sure of yourself."
He caught her hand and laced his fingers through hers, but said nothing, just nodded for her to continue.
The heat radiating from his palm was distracting, but she continued. "But, I was not in your bed merely as a way to exercise control."
"Why were you there?"
"Do you really find it so hard to believe that a woman could find you desirable on your own merits?"
"That's why you snuck into my bed and ambushed me? Because you couldn't resist my merits?" Daniel teased.
"While they are numerous, darling," Vala purred and clucked him under his chin before plucking a small weed and examining it, "I will admit I rather doubted you would take up my offer."
"If you thought I'd kick you out, why were you there?"
Hesitantly Vala answered, "I was lonely and besides, usually you yelling at me is wildly entertaining on its own."
Genuinely curious, Daniel asked, "What If I had taken you up on your offer?" The heated look she flashed him was nearly more of an answer than he could take.
"Then we would have had a marvelous night and," Vala added, "I might have been able to walk away before you got quite so far under my skin. I could have labeled you just another man. Then again, maybe not," she muttered under her breath, "after all, I had already spent the better part of a year setting up a reason just to find you and your people."
Vala suddenly realized she was still speaking aloud and cringed. "Can we just pretend I didn't say that last part?" Mortified, she hid her face in her hands. "See, this is why I do not find confessions helpful. Not at all cleansing or whatever or other sort of nonsense the do-gooders are spouting on about. You don't want to know this."
"I don't want to know what? That you came halfway across the galaxy not for a lost treasure, but to see me?"
"Well, eighty percent you, twenty percent the treasure."
Daniel fell quiet. Vala sat on tenterhooks waiting for his reaction. Finally she could take the suspense no more. "Say something!" She pleaded.
Daniel tossed the blade of grass he was toying with to the ground. He shook his head ruefully. "I'll probably never admit this again, but I was glad to see you."
Tears sprang to her eyes. "Really? I thought I got it all wrong and you hated me."
A mischievous sparkle twinkled in the corner of Daniel's eyes. "Well eighty percent wanted to see you and twenty percent wanted to run the other way."
"Not the other way around?"
"It flip-flopped some." Daniel picked up her hand again. "You haven't answered my question yet. Were you telling me the truth that night? About your village trying to stone you? About the fiancé?"
Vala looked pained. "Mostly. I had been engaged, but I broke it off when I realized he never wanted to do anything but grow old in the village." She looked into his eyes, hoping to find understanding. "I wanted to see the world. I wanted him to come with, but he made his choice clear." Vala tilted her head back, stared at the heavens and sighed. "Just before I was to leave, I was offered up as a host by my village. Qe'tesh was agreeable."
Daniel was both confused and horrified. "What do you mean offered you up?"
Vala glanced at Daniel and could read the pity in his eyes. Pity is not what she wanted. "They came, the Goa'uld, every so often looking for workers or hosts. Usually they sent an envoy with their specifications to the town elders. Sometimes, the elders made it easier for the Jaffe to find what they were looking for. It doesn't matter anymore; it happened a long time ago."
"Doesn't matter how long ago it was, it's still despicable."
Daniel's dark scowl on her behalf made the past more bearable. "I'm inclined to agree with you darling. Still, once I was freed from Qe'tesh, I no longer had the same desire to travel the universe. The simple village life held great appeal." She frowned and something haunted flitted through her eyes, "The villagers didn't agree." She shrugged carelessly. "For the best though, I would have been dreadfully bored." She flashed Daniel a smile, but it didn't quite flush out the old ghosts in her eyes.
Daniel scooted closer and put his arm around her shoulder. Vala gratefully leaned into him and with a sigh, put her head on his shoulder. He brushed a kiss against her temple and whispered, "I'm sorry." Not a declaration of pity, but affirmation that she had not deserved such treatment. A long forgotten pinched place near her heart eased. In some bleak corner of her mind, Vala had harbored doubts, wondering if she was fundamentally lacking.
"Tell me about your wife."
Daniel was silent for a moment and then with warmth and his fond memories apparent in his voice, began telling her tales of Sha're. Vala found much of what he told her familiar but marveled how her mind mixed fact with unexpected bits from her fertile imagination. Given his wife as a gift? She still wasn't going to fall for that one. Once Daniel had revealed Sha're's existence, Vala started discreetly asking questions and reading reports. Several soilders tried telling her the old Sha're was a present routine. She wasn't going to fall for that line. Researching Dr Daniel Jackson had become a hobby of hers, but she enjoyed the conversation her dream generated too much to worry over tomorrow and the need to separate truth from fiction in the waking world.
And so the night continued with the two of them talking, laughing, and sharing history that shaped who they were today. The next morning, Vala woke feeling at peace, as if her constant companion, restlessness, had moved on. The day kept getting better. After the briefing, Daniel seemed more amiable and receptive to her thoughts and ideas and generally more relaxed in her presence. Vala figured not baiting him during briefing must have contributed to his mellow mood.
The pattern repeated the rest of the month. She went to sleep at night happy over a new friendlier relationship with Daniel during the day and then had wonderful dreams at night in which she often felt Daniel was courting her. Courting was a lovely old fashioned phrase that seemed appropriate since her dreams remained as chaste as a chaperoned spinster since any round of passionate kisses always induced a premature end to the dream. Rather than waste such a precious opportunity, they walked through the garden or sat by the waters edge holding hands, sharing secrets or just speaking of what was happening in the waking world.
A week had past since Daniel stopped smiling at her. Seven days of cold indifference and calculated avoidance. This was the first night she had dreamed since Daniel started seeing her as a stranger. Would she be able to find solace in her idyllic dream relationship with Daniel, or would the imitation be too bitter to take, now that reality had so miserably soured? She walked the garden path and waited to find out.
