Cassandra watched the tear silently, not knowing what to do or to say. How many things would she have liked to tell him, words of comfort, endearments, promises of her love and loyalty, but she was as tongue-tied as if she had been gagged. None of these things seemed appropriate any more, and she felt tears of regret burn in her eyes when she remembered as how there had been a time when words simply hadn't been necessary. Now, they were impossible.
They had never spoken about love. Never used the word.
Never had she told him she loved him, as there never had been a need to.
But now, when there was more need for words than ever, none would come. She couldn't even say his name. Couldn't move a finger. She just lay in her bed, propped up by pillows, and stared at him as he slowly sank down to his knees.

And she still could only watch in despair as he, the strongest man she had ever known, buried his face in the mattress beside her and swallowed a heavy sob. She watched with tears streaming down her face as he clutched her blanket in his fists, unable to stop himself despite the shame he must feel, his shoulders trembling under the strain.
She knew she should not let him cry like that, that she should say something, do something to make him stop, to comfort him, but she was still petrified, partly from the shock at finding out so suddenly that he was alive and partly because of what had just happened minutes ago. She didn't watch him cry out of a feeling of him having deserved it. She watched because she was completely helpless at that moment and had no idea what to say to him.

But then he lifted his head and looked up to face her. Cassandra swallowed hard, thinking that a man like him should be impossible to be pushed so far beyond his limits of what he could bear. But it was her doing, she realized. It was her doing, it was him loving her that made him so vulnerable in that part of his soul. And with her loving him, it would have been her duty to keep that part safe from pain and harm. But she still felt the abyss between them that their double betrayal had created, and had no idea how she would ever be able to bridge it, get across to him again.

"Forgive me", he finally rasped. "Forgive me." He dropped his head into his hands and violently wiped them across his face a few times, then looked up at her again. "Cassandra… please forgive me. Believe me, I do not wish for you to have been raped. Never. Please, believe me." He swallowed hard. "I just… I just could not have imagined… not on my life I would have…" He shook his head heavily. "It did not occur to me the child… could be mine… simply because it… it is impossible. Or so I thought. Everyone thought that. No one had thought about counting. I know that does not absolve me, but I… I could not think… I simply could not think of it." He fell silent and shook his head again. "No…" he went on after a moment of hesitation. "No, never should I have thought you capable of just leaving me behind and move on to the next man just like that. But that was why I was hanging on to the thought it had to be rape, simply because I could not imagine there was any other way." He looked at Cass again, jaws clenched tight in agony. "Cassy, what can I do? What can I do to make you forgive me?"

The use of her nickname, that simple, single, little reminder of the easy intimacy they once had shared, made Cassandra want to cry again, but it also enabled her to reach out for the hand he had extended across the abyss to her. She took it, and for a moment they both balanced precariously at the edge.
Swallowing heavily and with a deep breath to steady herself, Cass lifted her left hand and reached for his face. He closed his eye with a shudder as she cautiously, and with trembling fingers, touched the scars on his face and traced the lines from eyebrow to chin.

Then she jumped.

"I already have", she whispered, and realized at that moment that she had spoken nothing but the truth. She wanted nothing more than to put all this behind her and be in his arms again.

He caught her, and she landed safely.

"Thank you", he whispered and took her hand. Then he moved forward, and she sat up a little, and they leaned cautiously towards each other until their foreheads touched. Both of them had their eyes closed now.
They remained like that for a while, hands entwined and foreheads touching, until Cassandra couldn't stand it any longer. "Hold me", she whispered.
"I will", he replied in a low voice. "Give me a moment." Then he got up, and she watched as he slowly reached over his shoulders to activate the pressure pads clasping his armor shut. It was no ordinary armor, of course, it must have been custom made specifically for him to fit. Fawkes shrugged the armor off his shoulders, and she could see more white scars on his right arm and the right side of his chest, where they vanished under the tank top he was wearing.
As he sat down on the bed beside her, she traced the scars on his arm with her fingers and shuddered. "How?" she looked up at him and he met her eyes. "How did you survive that?"
"Almost not at all", he replied, looking away. "The ground was uneven. By sheer chance, I was pressed into a little hollow and not crushed. But there was a lot of shattered ferroconcrete all over the place, and in that little hollow, too. I was literally impaled by the armoring. I couldn't move, almost couldn't breathe, and had to spend two days trapped under the carcass until the Brotherhood found me, covered in blood and gore, my wounds gone septic. I was in fever for weeks." He paused, and Cassandra shyly took his hand. He squeezed it and went on, still not looking at her. "The medics in the Brotherhood did what they could for me, but could not restore my eye. Then Lyons offered me a place in their ranks, and how could I have refused? They made me an honored member, and after all that time alone, I am a part of something bigger again. No longer a despised outcast on both sides. No longer a monster." He cast his eyes at the door. "I owe them my life, and they gave me a place in their ranks. But now… I don't know how I shall divide my loyalty between…" He paused, and finally looked at her again.
Cass tilted her head. "Between them and me?"
He nodded.

Feeling a tiny smile spread on her lips, Cass took his hand in both of hers. "Why? I am a knight, too."
"But you left…"
"Not completely true." She sighed, but did not look away. "I ran away. I never left the Brotherhood. I just ran away, because I was a coward. I didn't want to look at your body, didn't want to watch them put you in a grave. Had I only stayed, to make a proper farewell and help them bury you as I well should have, all this wouldn't have happened. I'll gladly join the ranks again, to protect the people in the Lyon's name, if they will only have me back."
"I think right now your duties lie elsewhere but to fight for the Lyon's Pride", he gave back slowly.
She lowered her eyes. "I know. But at some point…"
Fawkes nodded slowly. "At some point. But until then, you have to trust in us to protect you."
Cass looked up again. "Us?"
"Well, yes." He cleared his throat. "Us. The Brotherhood. And… me…"
"You would?" Feeling suddenly shy again, Cass avoided his eyes.
"Protect you? I would." His voice was a little hoarse.
"Keep me safe?"
"Yes."
"Forever?"
He frowned. "As long as I live, Cassy. If you want to have me back, after what I said and did to you."
"Want you back?" She leaned back and stared at him with wide eyes, but now it was his turn avoiding eye contact. "Want you back? God… Fawkes… I went through several hells of pain to survive giving birth, because the child was the only thing that was left of you; I crept back from death's door leaving a trail of blood behind, because I owed it to you to live for him, and you ask me do I want you back?" She would have liked to laugh at this, but she could only cry. "Want you back…", she said, swallowing her tears. "I've wanted nothing in my whole life more than I wanted you. Would you want me back, after I abandoned you like that?"
"Yes."
"Just like that? Yes?"
He nodded. "You are not the only one able to forgive, Cassy."

They looked at each other again, and finally, Cassandra felt that she would shatter into a thousand pieces without him.

"Hold me", she whispered again.
And this time, with the armor already gone, he did so, closing his arms around her, pulling her close, holding her tight as she wept, until at least all her tears of loneliness, pain, grief and regret were spent once and for all. She calmed down, her face pressed against the skin of his shoulder.
At this point she remembered their very first night, and her sudden hunger for him almost overwhelmed her. She pressed her face into the grove of his neck, breathing heavily, and heard him chuckle. "Not here", he whispered. "Not now. But I have a small cell to my own down in the Citadel."
She smiled against his skin. "And I guess we have to wait until we get there."
"I would advise it."
"You ask a lot of me, Fawkes."
This time it was him who chuckled, both of them feeling the relief that the strain was ebbing off and some of the easiness of earlier times was beginning to come back. "You think this is any easier for me? I have to use all my self control not just to… devour you."
Cass leaned back to look at him. "You'd have to find a side dish", she said with a glint in her eye. "I'm not precisely well fed right now."
"No, surely not." He held her a little closer. "Just by holding you I can feel every bone in your body. We need you to get your strength back soon."
She didn't reply; just closed her eyes and rested her head on his shoulder. Tired, she was so tired, she needed a bit of a rest. She thought about asking him to lay her down, but, her head still on his shoulder, was already slipping away before she could open her mouth.

As he sat there and held her, it took Fawkes a while to realize she had fallen asleep.