Title: Not Yet by Lightning
Chapter:
Author: Jade Sabre
Notes: First of all, sorry about the delay. First there was the Avatar: The Last Airbender finale, and then I went on vacation, and then I read Artemis Fowl: The Time Paradox, and so my brain has been a little fried, fandom-wise. But now I'm back in action, yay.
Secondly…so, there's supposed to be a Casavir chapter here. And I tried to write it. I swear that I tried to write it. It's not really important to the plot (what plot?), but I thought Casavir deserved his own chapter because I'm trying to be as…realistic? Balanced? as possible, and it's not fair to badmouth one character from another's POV without giving that character a chance to defend himself. Unfortunately, as I tried writing this chapter, I discovered a horrible truth: I suck at writing Casavir from Casavir's POV. I can't sustain it for any long period of time. I don't know where this block came from, but…there it is.
So instead, a compromise. I'll post snippets from my (several) failed attempts to write from Casavir's POV, and then I'll post the actual chapter that comes next. It could also be seen as an extra-long segment to make up for the delay. I apologize to all the Casavettes out there for the inconvenience. :-b
Part of chapter 17 contains a teeny-tiny homage to RiikiTikiTavi, whose fanfic is awesome.
Disclaimer: I don't own Neverwinter Nights, or any of its sequels or expansions, or any of the characters contained herein, aside from my PC, who was created on a Bioware engine and thus probably therefore partially belongs to them too.
16.5
The door opened, finally, and out stepped the young Knight Captain, her eyes downcast and then closed as she rubbed the heels of her hands in them. She closed the door and leaned against it, blowing out her breath in a long sigh, and immediately all thoughts of prayer fled Casavir's mind. He very rarely saw the Knight Captain give any indication that the her office was any strain upon her, and seeing her so wearied made that part in him that he didn't wish to name reach out, wanting to take the burden from her shoulders.
"My lady?"
Of course, that part in him always spoke before the rest of him had a chance to consider what he was saying, leaving him to blunder helplessly along in the conversation. She looked up at his addressed, startled, before her face smoothed into its usual neutral expression, as if whatever bothered her wasn't so pressing after all, as if his half-planned offer to help wasn't as necessary as it had seemed. Part of him sounded a half-retreat, backing away but unwilling to relinquish the battle quite yet.
"I hope I have not delayed you from your own prayers," she said.
"Oh, no," he said, afraid he was speaking too quickly. She nodded a little, and didn't seem inclined to speak further, so he said, "I trust you are…well?"
"As well as ever, Casavir," and she said his name again, gods help him. "And you?"
"I am well," he said. Very well, so long as she would stand there, exuding peace of mind into his soul.
She glanced down the hallway—a servant was lighting torches as the sun set and the stone hall grew dark. She looked back at him, and he must have been looking at her a little too hard, because she said, "Is something wrong?"
"No," he said, again too quickly, and so he tried to school his voice as he said, "I simply…have not had a chance to speak with you, lately, and I…"
She nodded a little, and said, "I was planning on going to dinner, and the perhaps heading down to the Tail, if you would like to join me."
She was too kind, he thought, as he fell into step next to her. She walked with purpose, a crisp stride that wasn't quite a militaristic march, the stride of someone not carried by destiny, but calmly walking out to face it. He admired this courage, as he admired her quiet leadership and overwhelming sense of compassion, and her brown eyes in her pretty face. This observation, made as he glanced at her, was not particularly professional or honorable, but it preyed at the edge of his consciousness and arose in his mind without bidding.
o-o-o
"You think there will be a battle, then?"
"Oh yes," she said, quietly. "He will bring the battle to us before we are able to take it to him."
"He will be hard-pressed to defeat us."
"Yes," she said, a grim smile touching her lips before disappearing again. "But yes, the troops are coming along nicely. Bishop—"
"You have put him in charge of their training?" he said, alarmed at this unknown possibility.
"No," she said. "I would prefer not to have them killed for failing. But I have sent him out to supervise patrols, just as I have sent you, and Katriona, and Bevil, and Khelgar."
Casavir couldn't help narrowing his eyes. "And you think this a wise proposition?"
"It's wiser than keeping him here," she said. "He needs employment, and he might as well be busy doing something that will be productive now as doing something that might be counter-productive later."
"You suspect him, then." That, at least, was a relief. He couldn't help but think, sometimes, that his lady was a little too lenient towards the ranger's comments and actions.
A muscle in her cheek twitched, whether trying to grimace or smile, he couldn't tell. "I know he has ulterior motives, Casavir. I don't know what they are, or what he wants, but I know that at the very least he wants something to do, even if he hates doing it."
"He hates the patrols?"
"Of course he does. He hates being—" She stopped, and shook her head, and said, "I am not trying to analyze him or understand him."
"You are better off for it," Casavir said. "It would not be worth probing his motives, only to be tainted by the consideration."
"Do you hate him so much?" She sounded curious, and when he looked down at her she was looking up at him, the question taking shape in her expression.
The honesty and strength of her question made him pause. "While I do not use the term lightly, despite what others might think of those of my order, I find his actions and his words to be intolerable to the point of endangering the goodness of those around him." That was a start. "And furthermore, as he takes such pleasure in tormenting others, especially those I have sworn to protect, I consider myself justified in hating him. It is the hatred the good has for evil."
"He's too lazy to be evil," she said, but he couldn't tell if she was joking.
o-o-o
And that's that. Hopefully you get the idea that Casavir is, in fact, a very nice guy, but that his sense of Laura, versus who Laura actually is, is a little…well, different. Maybe one day I'll go back and write this chapter, but for now, let's continue with the next part.
17
They had dinner down at the Phoenix Tail, like she did once a week, gathering all her companions and inviting her other acquaintances to come (though they never did), relaxing over a glass of wine while watching Khelgar down tankard after tankard, challenging anyone who looked at him crossways. The regulars were used to both his threats and the odd assortment of people gathering on these nights, and either chose to stay away or take a seat in the back and watch the show.
Tonight's installment promised to be particularly entertaining, because their Knight Captain spent the majority of it with her head bowed, speaking in low tones with the paladin. The entire Keep (never mind the surrounding lands; hell, even the people of Port Llast) was more or less aware of the paladin's feelings for his leader, and of her other companions' penchant for teasing him about his inaction on the subject. But tonight was different; tonight the cleric and the paladin sat together cozily by the fire, deep in conversation to the exclusion of all the others. Not that they were particularly missed; her curious choices in companionship meant the others were more than capable of amusing themselves through mutual antagonism. But it was different for her to seclude herself so utterly. Even if she usually merely sat back and watched all the others, she was alone, or surrounded by them all. She had shown no favoritism—until tonight.
Someone else had decided to take upon themselves the mantle of the loner, though—Bishop sat at the bar, scowling into his own tankard. This wasn't unusual, as he tended to keep to himself anyway (especially since Shandra's death, and the sudden dearth in easy targets who weren't capable of setting him on fire with mere words), but Sal, who had served him for years, thought he was scowling a little more than normal tonight, and happily passed this news onto his gossiping customers. Anything to keep them coming back another night.
Finally Laura took Casavir's hand and squeezed it, saying something (which no one aside from Sand or Elanee would have been able to hear over Khelgar's drunken shouts; the latter gave her captain privacy, while had the former not been busy controlling Qara's magical talents, he would have almost certainly been keeping a mental record) that made him smile. She released his hand and stood up, stretching up and shaking her head from side to side with a yawn.
"I'm going to bed," she announced, prompting the inn's patrons to toast to her health. She received their gesture with a slight smile and a nod and slipped out the front door. Casavir stayed by the fire, staring into it with a thoughtful look on his solemn face (but then again, he always looked like that, like he was contemplating the mysteries of the universe—or perhaps just the depths of whatever soul-crushingly depressing memory had stirred in his mind). But he seemed…content, or more than he'd ever seemed before, anyway. Sal chuckled at this, and returned to the bar to give Bishop his inevitable refill—but the ranger no longer sat there or was, in fact, anywhere to be found in the inn's common room.
Sal frowned, but it wasn't really any of his business, so he set himself to cleaning his tankards with the first clean rag he found, surrounded by the sounds of his bustling pub.
o-o-o
o-o-o
Laura knew she had left before him, and yet somehow Bishop had beat her to her rooms and was waiting for her when she arrived, standing in front of the decorative screen in the corner, arms crossed. She shook her head as she closed the door behind herself. "One day…"
He snorted, fingers tapping restlessly on his arm. She observed this, and flicked her gaze up to his face. He was…distracted, she thought, though she couldn't think of why. "Well…"
"Oh, I don't know," he said, "you look a bit tired. Dragging information out of him is exhausting, I know, so maybe you should just get some rest."
She worked very, very hard to avoid rolling her eyes. "What?"
"Nothing," he said. "Just that you seemed very cozy and comfortable by the fire—"
"I don't know where you plan on going with this," she interrupted. "Ultimately—"
"—and I would hate to disturb you from that sense of rest and—"
"You're in here, and he's not."
"Isn't he?" There was a gleam she didn't like in his eyes. Granted, that could mean any number of things, given the situation; but now, tonight, there was an edge to him that she didn't recognize, and that made the gleam harder to define. "It's hard to put him out of your mind, isn't it?"
"Not really," she said, though that was a little bit of a lie. "I mean, if you keep talking about him—"
"You're a woman. Of course it is."
"What is it?" she asked, impatient now, desire slowly draining away to be replaced with annoyance.
His fingers twitched nervously, and suddenly he dropped his arms and started pacing. She leaned back against the door, watching him, until he finally stopped and crossed his arms again, still twitching. He said, "You do nothing but agree with him all day long. First it's about how we should approach the lizardfolk alliance—despite the fact that both the druid and I have more experience with lizardfolk dealings than he does—then it's spending all your time with him at the inn—how you expect anyone to take you seriously—"
"I do not agree with him all the time," she said calmly, aware that she was speaking on the defensive and suddenly wary. "We have, in fact, several key core differences in doctrine that make it impossible—"
"Like you're some kind of slave to doctrine," he snorted, which made her think maybe he didn't know how much she was, and how much she wasn't, how the simple act of letting him in her room went against and with everything she believed, all at once. "But gods, it's sickening to watch, the way you throw yourself—"
"You're delusional," she said, which was an attack itself.
"Maybe I am," he said, still pacing. "I know I am, and yet you're still there, always smiling at him, listening to every damn thing he says and then going along with it—"
"I have to," she said. "I don't always go along with him, but I have to listen. He needs me to listen. And I need you here—"
"He needs you?" He laughed. "Oh, he needs you, all right. Needs you in his bed so he can siphon off that damn tension of his—"
"I would no sooner fuck Casavir than he would ask me, and believe me when I tell you that's never going to happen."
"Give it time," he said. "Keep wearing down his defenses with your sympathetic ear and smiles—"
"I have to give him that. It's the only way to handle him."
"So this is your way of handling me?"
She shut her eyes, unable to watch him restlessly shifting positions. Quietly, she said, "I can't handle you, and we both know it. You're here because you want to be here and because I want—"
"You don't even know what you want."
This was truer, truer than he realized, truer than either of them knew; she opened her eyes to glare at him and said coolly, "Why do you care?"
"I care because you're giving the paladin ideas and that—"
"Gods!" she said, throwing her arms in the air. "You're in here, he's out freezing in some lonely room in the Inn. I don't know how to make this any simpler for you."
He uncrossed and recrossed his arms, trying to hide the way his fists were convulsively clenching. "It's not that simple if he's involved."
"He isn't—"
"But he thinks he is, and gods know all he does all day is think, and he thinks about you—"
"He doesn't—"
"He's a godsdamned man with a godsdamned dick, and you're a pretty woman with a pretty smile—"
She shrugged, and he hated it. "Thanks," she said in a sarcastic tone he hadn't heard from her often, if ever.
"—of course he's thinking about you. Don't even give me that bullshit—"
"Why does it matter?" she demanded. Then she seemed to deflate, a little, as her voice took a weary turn and she said, "He's out there, you're in here, so why are we even arguing about this? What does it matter?"
He couldn't immediately answer her, because he didn't know why it was so suddenly and immediately important that he convince her of his point of view. It was just—he was a man, she was a woman, and they didn't need any godsdamned paladins coming in and fucking things up with talk of—of devotion and duty or whatever the hell it was he talked about. And he was a man, and she was a woman, and he didn't want any other men getting their hands dirty with her in mind. And they were fucking (or weren't at the moment, and it wasn't something they should have been arguing over) and that was all there was to it and there was no way he was going to let anyone screw that up.
In the space it took him to try to make up an explanation, he unfolded and crossed to her, shoving her into the door as he grabbed her shoulders and shook her. "It matters," he said, "because—because—"
And then, like he hadn't been able to say whatever he had planned outside of the Inn when he'd kissed her, so long (weeks, even) ago, he covered up the inadequacy of words with a kiss. She was glaring at him before he pressed his lips against hers, as hard and forceful and—and—he broke it off, still holding her shoulders, and looked at her for a moment. In the space of a moment he saw her lips, parted and wet, her nose, her hair all tightly bound, and then her big dark eyes with their butterfly-wing lashes, and they made the mistake of letting their gazes meet for the space of another moment, and then he escaped by kissing her again.
By the third kiss her hands had come up to his face, her palms rasping against his stubbled cheeks as she kissed back just as hungrily, meeting, matching—exceeding?—his need with her own. When they broke for air he reached up and unpinned her hair—she shook it free, letting it fall out of its coil, and in the moment she looked up at him she was so beautiful he went hot and cold all at once and masked it by tangling his hands in her hair and kissing her until he forgot everything else.
o-o-o
o-o-o
Laura awoke exhausted, a peculiar feeling she had come to associate with the perils of staying up too late with paperwork. Or Bishop. Or both. Lately, though, it had tended to be the ranger's fault, a blame that could be overlooked due to the whole, satisfied feeling that accompanied him.
She was in that awake-but-not-up stage she rarely encountered—consciousness, but not quite to the point of opening her eyes. She felt tired, the kind of tired that came from strenuous but non-life-threatening activity, but also warm. She felt warm from head to toe, a sort of deep, muscle-relaxant warmth that was delicious but also out-of-place in her normally chilly bedroom. Enjoy it while it lasts, she chided herself, still not quite willing to wake up completely and face another day of whatever it was they were doing—reforging a sword? Old alliances? Waiting for death to come to their gates so they could see if Veedle was as good as his word? She didn't know, and thinking of Veedle while enjoying her warm blankets made everything less…less…
There was someone in her bed.
Her eyes snapped open and she was already moving before she recognized the arm around her waist. "You're awake," he said. "Took you long enough."
She was warm, so warm, but paralyzed as well. To distract herself, she shifted her head on her pillow, turning to look at him. It was different, seeing him in the light of day. The sunlight came in through curtains, yes, but she could actually see him, make out the lines near his eyes, the ones that were starting to trail from his perpetually downturned mouth. At the moment it was quirked in a strange sort of smile, which didn't quite reach his eyes—eyes that looked almost as disbelieving as she felt.
Bishop was in her bed.
It was morning, and yet he was in her bed, with his arm around her waist.
Which meant he hadn't left in the predawn hours before she woke.
Which meant he had slept the entire night (or what little of it they had slept) by her side.
Which meant he hadn't left.
Which meant he was in her bed.
It was morning, and he was in her bed, his other arm propping up his head as he looked at her.
They stared at each other, trying to figure out why, exactly, this seemed so enormous, neither saying anything but both feeling—uncomfortable? No, she thought, putting her hand to his chest, curling her fingers against it. It was too late to start feeling uncomfortable or awkward. This was—just strange. But not altogether unwelcome, and certainly not unpleasant. Different, that was all. Nothing had changed, things were simply different.
Part of her screamed—commented politely—that she didn't need or particularly want different, not this late in the game, not when the threat of attack was so imminent and if anyone was going to make a move it was rapidly going to be sooner rather than later that they would make it, and definitely not different with him. Daisy-chain Laura was decidedly unhappy.
Daisy-chain Laura was also trapped in the burning ruins of the Starling house in doomed West Harbor, and Knight Captain Laura—
No, not Knight Captain Laura either. Knight Captain Laura was a proper officer who ran a keep and reported all her activities to her superiors and spoke sweetly to the paladin in her employ. Knight Captain Laura was bound by walls and stone and duty, and if there was anything in this world Bishop hated (more than himself, she sometimes thought), it was the Knight Captain. It was as much a part of her as the daisy chains, but it had not—would not—encompass her whole being. And here, in this moment, that was who she was—Laura; nothing more, nothing less.
She suspected he was staring at her with much simpler thoughts running through his head, but the sudden rush of freedom she felt made her smile anyway. His queer little smile twitched, a little, and finally he said, "Morning."
"Good morning," she answered.
"No," he said, "just morning." He bent his head, his nose bumping into hers as he kissed her, once, and quickly. "Now it has the possibility of getting better."
"I can't," she said, realizing she had even less of an idea of the etiquette in this situation (especially considering the fact that she almost wanted to lie in bed all day). He gave her an incredulous look, and she said, "The Keep. And I have meetings, and—"
Her breath hitched as he ran his hand down, curving from her waist to her hip, slipping over her leg to run down the inside of her thigh, and she couldn't control her shaky sigh. "What were you saying?" he asked, his voice low and rumbling as he pressed his lips to her shoulder, sending vibrations across her skin.
Her mouth moved soundlessly, eyes half-closed. "I—I…"
"It's not all about you," he said, now working his way across her collarbone, slowly coming atop her.
"I have lost all powers of voluntary motion," she said, breathlessly, and he laughed a laugh that was almost real, a sound that nearly broke her heart, and so she kissed him.
Some time later—the light still seemed to be morning light, anyway—they lay with the blankets tangled around themselves, not talking, just breathing and keeping each other warm. It was even more nerve-wracking than lying in bed at midnight, she was discovering, because at least at midnight she had the guarantee that she could fall asleep and he would be gone when she awoke. Now—now there were no boundaries keeping him here or there, and the thought was almost terrifying.
The knock at the door, however, startled them both. "Knight Captain?" came the concerned voice of her valet.
"Oh," she said, in a surprised voice, having forgotten that perhaps someone might notice her absence and think to check on her (which was a silly thing to have forgotten—he was doing a number on her thinking skills, that was for sure). She clambered out of bed and wrapped the first thing she grabbed—his Cloak of Elvenkind, carelessly draped across all her papers on her desk and probably knocking everything out of its nice, neat pile (how like him, she thought)—around herself as she went over to the door.
He gave her a look (are you seriously going to open the door?) and she returned it (of course not) as she leaned against the door and said, "Nori?"
"Knight Captain!" came the voice a second time, relieved now. "Kana was asking after you—she was worried when you missed the sergeants' meeting this morning—"
Laura, in the middle of another wordless conversation (then why the cloak?). let slip a "damn" and tried to recover (because I don't walk around naked?) her thoughts. "Um. I—" (that's a shame, a look made infinitely irresistible when delivered by a half-naked man with her blankets tangled near his waist) "—tell Kana I'm sorry. I over—" (stop it) "—slept and I'm running a little behind this morning."
"Do you need any—" (I-don't-take-orders, a look she was entirely familiar with, though never in the context of another that's-a-shame) "—assistance, my lady?"
"Oh, no, Nori," she said (please stop it). "I will be ready soon. I just have a few—things—" (this time she glared at him before he was able to arrange his features into a comeback) "—to clean up before—I come out. Could you please go find Kana and…and…ask her to find Grobnar and get an update on how the Construct's coming along?"
"Certainly, my lady. Are you sure you won't need me?"
Bishop was smirking now, and she longed to wipe it off his face through any means available. "No," she said. "Thank you, Nori. That will be all."
She strained her ears and was almost certain she heard footsteps trailing off, so she allowed herself to lean against the door and relax for a moment. He seemed to take this as permission to start snickering, which only got louder when she glared at him again.
"Sending Kana to check on Grobnar? You, my lady," he said, mimicking Nori's crisp, polite words to devastating effect, "are a sadist."
"Maybe," she said. "But you, my lord—" she threw his cloak at him as she went hunting for her underclothes "—have to leave."
He sighed. "A shame."
She snorted, pulling on her trousers and binding her chest before turning around. He was already fully dressed, of course, and had come around to her side of the bed and leaned against the wall, watching her. Trying not to blush—it was so different, in the daylight, when he could see her too—she opened her wardrobe and started hunting for a tunic. The task actually wasn't that difficult—she had more clothes than she knew what to do with at this point—but it allowed her to busy her hands, rather than having them busy doing…other things.
She gestured with an armful of clothes. "The door is that way."
"I know," he said, pushing off the wall and ambling over towards her, instead. She looked up just in time to see him coming, and then he had kissed her, once, twice, and the third time (always the third time—he was so quick with his kisses that sometimes it was almost like she had imagined them, or as if he had pulled back at the very last second, leaving the warmth of his lips lingering in the air right before hers) she regained her wits enough to kiss him back.
They parted, and suddenly she wasn't able to look at him and he wasn't able to look at her, either. "Come find me when you know what we're doing," he said, "and I will see you then, milady." He sketched a mocking bow and slipped soundlessly out her door.
Laura dropped the tunics she was holding in a heap on the floor and sat down heavily on her bed. Aimlessly she reached over and grabbed the first tunic she laid hands on, pulling it over her head. She felt warm and wonderful and satisfied and tired and confused and her room smelled of him many times over, and she liked his scent. Next thing she knew she'd be stealing his clothes so she could keep him with her.
They had two boundaries, the length of the night and their desire for secrecy, and he had broken one. She doubted he would touch the other—they both knew Casavir (for starters, first but certainly not last) would jump at the chance to defend her honor, and she didn't want a fight and Bishop was too lazy to deal with it. But the time allotted to them was a more mutable, shifting thing, imposed more for—for the sake of having a boundary, of having space and time to recover, of being separated because…well, after this morning, she was having a hard time thinking why they imposed this restriction, and she knew that in and of itself was dangerous. She hadn't forgotten the night before, or the way he had kissed her, like he needed to have her and to know that he had her (and how she had kissed back, wanting to be his because it meant he was completely under her power), and it worried her.
But there were other things, such as the end of the physical world as she knew it, and her potentially imminent death, and the inevitable death of her stronghold's guardians, things that required her attention more than did the attentions of a wayward soul who was a liability to everything else, including her own ability to sacrifice herself. She closed her eyes and took a long, deep breath, prayed that the servants who cleaned her room would be oblivious to the mess, and firmly shoved him as far away as her mind would allow. It wasn't much, but it was enough to function, and at this point, she was grateful for that much.
He had stayed the night, and she'd woken in his arms.
She tried not to think about what a nice feeling that was, and knew that she was farther lost than she could have ever imagined.