Title: Not Yet by Lightning

Chapter: Nineteen

Author: Jade Sabre

Notes: So, I'm late again, but I've been wrestling with the end of this chapter ever since I wrote it, and I finally made myself quit tweaking it and send it out for the world to see, so, be gentle but do tell me what you think.

Also, I'm heading out of the country; hopefully I will still be able to update on a regular basis, but this is just a warning ahead of time in case that doesn't happen.

Thirdly, I'm pleased to announce that I've gotten my other NWN 2 fic back from my beta, and that once I'm done posting this one, I'll be able to start posting that one.

On a fourth note, there's only three chapters left! And I know the timing in this one is a little off, maybe, from what the game's timing is, but I wrote it without the game on hand to reference, so…hooray for artistic license.

Finally, I love reviews, and I really do appreciate every single one I've gotten. Thanks for sticking with me this far; the end is in sight!

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.

19

"We should have a calm night," Kana said at the debriefing. "Their troops are too far away, and they won't risk moving in the daylight—even if they do, it will be tomorrow night before they reach the Keep."

"Thank the gods," Bevil said, running a hand over his jaw. "The men could use this night off."

"We all could," Laura said, feeling her fatigue pressing in at the edges of her vision. "Tell as many soldiers as possible to stand down, and make the sentry shifts as short as possible. Keep the gates open so the patrols can come in and out as much as needed; I want everyone to get as much rest as they can tonight."

"Of course, Knight Captain," Kana said. Laura was almost too tired to restrain a grimace at the title, and settled for a wince instead. "Is there anything else?"

"Not unless you have anything," she said. Kana shook her head. "Well, then. Goodnight, everyone."

The chairs creaked as they were pushed back against the stone floors; her companions stretched, starting to murmur among themselves as they slowly got to their feet. The exhaustion in the room was palatable, and Laura just wanted to get out and crawl into her bed and sleep until tomorrow came. Or perhaps the tomorrow after that. Things were quickly spiraling out of control; she couldn't dictate when they brought the war to her, or how quickly Aldanon would be able to crack the ancient scripts that would give them access into the Mere, and she longed for some semblance of order to her life.

"My lady?"

Casavir, of course, standing at her shoulder. She straightened and glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. He'd had a long, hard battle today, and he'd constantly held her back when she'd felt her guard starting to slip. She couldn't quite see his face, but there was a new kind of tension in the way he held himself near her—close, but not too close.

"Yes, Casavir?" she said, trying to sound simultaneously interested and weary.

"Might I have a word with you?"

"Yes?"

There was a pause; she didn't move, though she really wanted to rub her temples, and he finally said, "Perhaps…in private?"

She couldn't keep her mouth from dropping open, though she held it from being too obvious, and let her breath out in one quick whoosh. "Of course," she said, her voice steady.

"Perhaps on the walls," came his voice, once again calm and quiet. "It is a lovely evening."

She caught sight of Bishop, then, lurking in his corner with an ugly look on his face. When he saw her looking he replaced it with one of the worst smiles she'd ever seen, and she was almost too tired to keep the despair from her face. She looked away, swallowed, and said, "Lead on."

She followed him out of the war council room and down the stone hallways, past men hurrying to and fro with messages and orders and the other necessary essentials of running a keep; she wanted to stop them and shake them and tell them to go to bed. Instead, she followed the tall, broad-shouldered paladin with grey streaks in his black hair out to the outer walls of her keep. He chose the eastern wall, away from the majority of the sentries, and she followed him without a word.

He spent some time looking up at the sky, so she leaned against the wall and stared out across the lands that, legally, belonged to her. There were woods and hills in the landscape before her eyes, and she felt no kinship to them; her blood was in the swamps and the ocean. She'd never really thought about it before—she prided herself on her ability to be detached, on the fact that she could examine any situation objectively because the only thing she relied on was her faith. Yet here she was, indifferent to woods simply because they were not swamps.

"There is death," he said, "in the air, tonight."

She glanced over at him, the moonlight glinting off the grey in his hair, smoothing the harsher lines in his face. He was still looking up, and so she finally said, "Yes."

He glanced at her, and seemed almost unnerved by the fact that she stared back so calmly, but he took a breath and regained his composure. He looked…gentle, as he did when he was reassuring someone, offering them faith even when his was shaky. She admired his devotion in the face of his doubts; there was something to be said for a man who believed in the principle of goodness so firmly that even his theological difficulties could not sway him from doing what was right.

She almost wished she shared his conviction.

"My lady…" He took another breath, and then faced her and said, "I need to thank you."

"My name is Laura," she said, "and you're welcome."

"Laura." He said her name, and she shivered. "Laura, I…I don't know how to say this. I had been…you have…you have been an example for me."

Her brow furrowed and she made some noncommittal noise to show that she was still paying attention. He looked away again, and continued, "You have reminded me of what it is to have faith, in one's god and in other people. What it is to…to care, for another person. I…I was lost, for a long time, before I met you. And you have since…helped me find my way again. And for that I am grateful."

She shrugged, shifting so that she faced him as well. "You have always had your faith, Casavir. You may have had difficulties finding it, but you have always had it."

A small smile crossed his face, and he looked ten years younger. "Perhaps, but I thank you nonetheless." His smile changed, growing a little more nervous, as he said, "But that's not—there is more I wished to say. Laura…"

He reached out then, with one bare hand, and brushed her cheek; she froze and tried to remember how to breathe. "There is darkness in everyone," he murmured, coming closer to her, "but you evoke such a wonderful light."

"I really don't," she breathed, trying to lean away without being too obvious. He was a good man; he was an upright man; and he thought better of her than she did of herself. No, not better of—he thought differently of her. He had a picture of her that was different from her picture of herself, and it was…too polished, too pretty. She didn't want to be a pretty creature of light; she was a creature of the earth, of flesh and blood, and despite his words she was grounded in her reality. "Casavir," she said, his fingers still lingering on her cheek, "I do…I…I am not who you think I am," she said, "and you know that as well as I."

He paused, looking down a few scant inches at her, and said, "Perhaps you are not," he said. "But I would still be willing to—"

She turned away, and his hand dropped. "I am honored," she said, though she felt betrayed, "but I do not return your feelings."

There was silence, then; the moonlight shone upon the stones and the unfamiliar land, but the air was still with anticipation and thick with silence. She breathed, in and out, closing her eyes and searching for the peace that came with silence—but everything was tense; destiny stretching her entire being taut, everything she had worked for all rushing to a head, denying her the chance to rest until it came to pass.

"It does not matter," he said at last, his voice slightly hitched, as though it did matter. "I feel for you, and those feelings are pure." Pure as snow, she thought. As light. "And that is enough to fight for."

He waited, but she went on staring at the black horizon, and she heard him turn to go.

"I never asked anyone to fight for me," she said, dully.

His footsteps paused. "Perhaps you never said the words," he said, "but the thought has drawn us all together."

She shivered again and crossed her arms, leaning against the wall as his footsteps faded behind her. The stone was cool, bleeding through the thin material of her sleeves, so that when she shifted she could feel the grooves in the rock scraping against her. She closed her eyes again, wanting to go to sleep but too tired to try to go to bed just yet. She wished for a brisk night breeze to wake her.

A hot breath scorched the back of her neck. "Done with your happy playtime?"

She wanted to lean back, to fall back against him, so badly; she wanted to know she could fall and he would gladly catch her; she wanted to let go and know he wouldn't tell a soul.

Instead, she said, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"So you and the paladin came up here for shits and giggles?"

She rolled her eyes beneath her lids and said, "Are we having that discussion again?"

"I wasn't aware it was a discussion."

"So what is it, an interrogation?" She opened her eyes but didn't pay any attention to the horizon before her. "If so, I'd kindly ask you to notice that, once again, you're here and he's not."

"But you're thinking about him."

"I wasn't until you brought him up."

He snorted, and she couldn't suppress another shiver. "So you just followed him away from everyone else because you thought it'd be fun?"

"I followed him because he asked to speak with me," she said. "I did not know he was—"

"Bullshit."

"You're making me angry."

"Good," he said, which didn't really surprise her, but she was too tired to be properly angry with him, and it was worse with his voice curling right in her ear, sending all the blood from her head to her heart.

She sighed and shrugged, and suddenly he had grabbed her shoulders and was shaking her. She twisted under his grip and turned to face him only to be pressed up against the wall. "What?" she asked, pulling her head back to try to read his expression.

"Stop that," he said.

"Stop what?" she said, trying to play cool against his heated rage.

He shook her again. "That," he said, and then he kissed her, his lips hard and forceful, pressing into her as his hands came up to cradle her face, holding her in place while he pushed himself into her mouth. Her knees buckled and she slipped, bringing him over her as her feet sought purchase on the floor, her hands torn between supporting her and flailing helplessly. He was warm and a single thoughtful probe of his tongue was enough to reawaken her senses as his thumbs brushed against her cheeks and she had to grab his arms to hold herself up.

He pulled away and buried his face in her shoulder; she shook, taking unsteady breaths while she tried to deal with supporting both of them. "Stop—what?" she asked, turning her head to brush her cheek against his hair.

He mumbled something against her neck, his lips rough against her skin, and she had to steady herself all over again. This became increasingly more difficult as his lips stopped moving from words and started working their way up her neck, down her jaw, light little brushes of kisses that overwhelmed her tired brain. He found her ear and flicked his tongue against it and her breath left her in a quick gasp; her hand reached up to pull on his hair as she tried to get her uneven breathing under some semblance of order.

"You have no idea," he said, one arm going around her waist, the other hand reaching up to pull her hair out of its twist, gently combing it out, his fingers tangling in it as he buried his face against it. "No idea," he said. "And you don't deserve to."

"Tell me anyway," she said, turning her head to kiss his ear, her hand coming up to stroke his cheek, the rough stubble not unlike the coarse rock against her back. She dropped her forehead to his shoulder and whispered, "Please tell me."

He pulled away, his eyes darting to look at her face; she stared back at him, not knowing what she looked like, probably exhausted and confused and hopefully not desperate or—or anything else. He looked at her, and then stepped away from her, his arm sliding around her back and reaching out to tug at her hand. She allowed him to pull her to her feet, following her wiry brown-haired ranger down stairs and across courtyards, hugging the shadow of the wall, slipping out of the gates and past the sentries. She stumbled after him and he didn't complain; he set a pace she could follow and she kept to it, her fingers locked with his as her only guide across the land.

He finally stopped in a patch of woods off the road, and at first she didn't notice and bumped into him; he caught her and steadied her as she blinked, trying to focus her eyes on him. "What?" she asked.

His hands rested on her shoulders, and he cocked his head, looking at her. "I wanted to see what you looked like," he said. "Out here, alone."

Her eyebrows went up even as her brow furrowed. "But—"

"Not alone," he said, and for a moment she thought he was going to leave, and she froze. He shook her, just a little, and said, "You always look so beautiful and I wondered if it was because the walls kept you contained and safe and you belonged there so of course you looked as if you fit."

"And?"

He blew out his breath in a sigh but didn't speak; instead he cupped her cheek in one hand, tracing his thumb over the bone below her eye, and running his fingers back into her hair, the look in his eyes—blank, as if he was focused on nothing more than the soft, delicate caress.

Something was terribly, terribly wrong if he was being tender. Sure, he'd sometimes stroke her gently, but she figured that was what happened in the heat of the moment, and he never took the time just to touch her, and certainly not her face. She tilted her head, her hair falling in her eyes, and said, "What?"

He said, "I don't know," and leaned forward and kissed her, softly this time, slowly, heat pouring into her mouth and traveling leisurely down to her toes, giving her time to acclimate to it, to slip her arms around him and bring him closer. He kissed her again, a little more insistently, and each kiss made her more and more like putty in his arms until she had to break away.

It gave him an opening, and the next thing she knew they were both shirtless and stumbling, kissing haphazardly; her mouth found his ear, the crown of his head as he dropped his head to her breasts, planting kisses on her bare skin, hard and taut in the brisk air. She operated on pure sensation, exhaustion shoving any other considerations to the side, but she didn't know where to touch or kiss or caress, didn't know how to soothe his increasingly frantic kisses. Her back hit a tree and she felt the bark scraping her flesh; she tangled her fingers in his hair and tugged his face back up to hers, kissing him, pulling at his lips as her palms held him in place, and he kissed her back with a softness at odds with his harsh breath, with the way his fingers dug into her thighs as he pulled her up, pushing her into the tree. Everything—from the cold night air to their utter exposure under the moonlight—felt new, somehow, from the way the muscles in his back shifted under her hands, to the near-violent desperation with which he drove himself, to—

"Laura?" he whispered in her ear, and she nearly lost it; the sound of her name in his deep, ragged drawl was so utterly strange and yet utterly welcome that she could barely manage an "uh-huh?" to answer him.

He paused, and pulled away from her; the look in his eyes made her desperate to kiss him, to hold him, to do something to reassure him, but he closed his eyes and rested his forehead on her shoulder and simply said, "Laura," again, and then she was unaware of anything she couldn't touch (stubble against her neck) or taste (sweat off his shoulder) or hear (was that her voice, screaming?) or see (darkness, all around) or feel (oh gods oh gods oh gods).

They slipped down to a tangled mass of arms and legs on the ground, he sprawled half-atop her, both breathing heavily. Her fingers curled into the ground as he shifted once more, and the dirt beneath her fingertips was cool, and soft, and she took a deep breath and relished feeling alive.She relished the feeling of being underneath him, of feeling his chest heave and his heartbeat gradually slow; her fingers danced over his skin, sliding into his slick hair and drawing him more comfortably atop her. She was fully satisfied, and fully terrified.

"Bishop?" she whispered as he pillowed his head on her shoulder.

"Mm?" he said, burying his nose against her chest and inhaling.

She paused, still running her fingers through his hair, and finally said, "You said my name."

"Laura?"

Even in her doubled exhaustion, somewhere inside her she somehow managed to conjure up a shiver, a spark that combusted in her gut. "Yes."

He was quiet, one armed draped across her waist, his fingers absentmindedly tracing the curve of her hip. Her eyes fluttered closed and she instinctively pulled him closer; his other arm groped around and finally found a cloak to draw over them.

"'s a nice name," he said, so quietly she wasn't sure she heard him, and then he said, "Go to sleep, Laura."

Her name—in his voice—but she couldn't keep herself awake any longer to contemplate it, and slipped into a bone-weary sleep.