Moira stared at his back as he left. The old her would have fallen onto the bed and wept. She would have planned speech after speech to get him back. But now, with the sting of Auron's words she simply stood there staring at the door.

She was beyond upset. Not that Auron had had sex with another woman, or a dozen other women for that matter; it was beyond obvious that he was experienced. She was upset at his apparent need to keep this secret from her. She had held nothing back from him; even her most embarrassing and painful secrets. Even with their strange connection, she had still admitted these truths.

The connection – why couldn't she see this part of him until he became enraged? Why was he so angry? It seemed to her that every memory the man had was shown to her at one time or another. So why was he able to hide the 'encounter' with Lulu? What else was he hiding? Was he hiding how he truly felt about her?

She shook her head. Why was she so desperate to know what happened? It wasn't jealousy, it wasn't curiosity. She couldn't understand the compulsion. But she knew she couldn't rest until she understood what happened and understood where his anger came from.

"Are you alright?" a voice asked. Moira looked up to see that she had wandered out of her bedroom.

Lulu stood in front of her looking miserable. "I am so sorry!"

Moira blanched thinking Lulu had overheard the argument but she quickly realized the apology was for the stop spell.

"I'm fine. These memories will come back from time to time. But I'm learning to deal with them."

"We can stop the lessons for now." Lulu offered.

Moira considered it for a fleeting moment. It was the easy way out. It was...wrong. For better or worse, the universe decided to trap her in Spira. She had no clue if she would ever set foot in her world again. It would be the smart thing to do to become more than useless.

"Useless?" Lulu asked. Moira blanched. She had no idea she had been muttering to herself.

"Just something with Auron."

Lulu smiled wryly.

"What did he do now?"

"Oh nothing now, we've had an argument. It's something from his past that he wouldn't tell me about and I pushed him too far about it. I've never seen him so angry and ruthless." Moira snuck a glance at the mage realizing two things at once. One, it made her sound like a nosy busybody and two, could she keep from Lulu that the secret was about her and failed liaison?

Lulu paused, realizing thing 2 for herself. She looked at her feet and asked,

"Doesn't your strange connection with Auron show you what you need to know?"

"I don't need to know. I guess he's allowed some secrets. I just couldn't understand why I didn't already know. And I can't fathom why he was being so secretive about it. I can't say there isn't much he doesn't know about my past."

"I'm sure he's content with your present. And your presence. Moira, do you know how much you have changed him? He has purpose and hope for a future that was always going to be denied him."

Moira tried to smile at the praise. She tried to push Auron's voice out of her head for the moment. "Are you jealous? At least she was a challenge!"

It was too difficult to reconcile Lulu's version of their relationship with the way it had just spectacularly imploded.

Up until her less than graceful entrance into Spira, her life consisted of drifting from one mistake to another. Catching feelings that could not and would not be reciprocated.

Every. Single. Time.

No matter the man in question.

Then there were those that she didn't act on. A simple dream about a man she knew turned into days of fantasizing about someone who never was interested in her, whose situation in life made their pairing impossible or just someone who turned out to be a complete disappointment.

Having Auron in her life was a complete anomaly in itself and she couldn't help but think that she had destroyed it all by being too nosy.

"The secret involves you." She blurted out.

"Oh," was all the mage replied.

"But I don't need to know!" Moira cried. "Just forget I ever said anything."

Lulu chuckled to herself. For a brief moment she allowed herself to return to that stormy night, to remember how the warrior had made her feel so alive in that fleeting moment before bringing her crashing back down with his blunt refusal. Even now, she summoned the memory of his surprisingly soft lips on her breasts, the gentle scrape of his unshaven face rubbing up against her, the feel of his adept fingers tracing her skin and exploring her wet folds. She sighed softly and pushed the thoughts away. She opened her eyes to meet Moira's knowing stare.

"I imagine you can guess what the secret is," Lulu said.

"I didn't have to guess. When Auron grabbed me..."

"He what?!"

"He just grabbed my arms to make a point."

"Did he hurt you?" Lulu asked.

"Not physically," Moira said sadly.

"And what happened when he grabbed you?"

"Our connection showed me. Everything." Moira said quietly, wishing she could spare the mage any embarrassment over the memory.

"I see. So you know it all now."

"Yes but why did he refuse you? You are absolutely beautiful!" Moira replied.

"He just stopped. He simply said he couldn't continue, apologized and walked away. To this day I can't understand it."

Moria just shook her head sadly.

"I've been there."

"He did it to you too?" Lulu asked shocked.

"No. In the past. But that guy went one step further and didn't just walk away; he left me on the side of a road and drove off."

"Moira! I'm so sorry!"

"Thank you but it was so long ago now. I'm over it and I've experienced much worse since then."

Lulu remembered hearing that Moira had been raped by Seymour and his flunkies. She shuddered at the memory the poor woman trying to scrub her skin off. She remembered how Moira became so enraged at Lulu trying to intervene that she attacked her. That was when she struck her with a stop spell and why Moira reacted the way she did during the lesson involving that particular spell.

"You are so strong to have recovered from that brutal attack. I'm proud of you Moira."

"Oh the rape. Well sadly that wasn't the first time." Moira turned away.

"WHAT?!"

Moira saw that the mage was truly shocked and chastised herself for even bringing it up.

"It was years ago. I was barely a teenager. 14 years old. I didn't even piece together what had happened to me until a couple years ago." Moira sat down, pressing her head against the wall.

"What happened?"

Moira sighed and closed her eyes.

"I was at a friend's house and her brother and one of his friends were there. To this day I can't tell you why I was there or why I was alone with them. They offered me a drink which I took and my next memory was waking up in one of the bedrooms. I was so sore and my nighthgown was on backwards and twisted around me. My legs were soaking wet. I had thought that it was just sweat from the summer heat. The two men were nowhere to be found. All I remember was gathering my things and going home."

"You don't remember anything that happened?"

"No. One minute I was on the couch drinking a beer and the next, I woke up like I described."

"Any they gave no indication that they wanted to..." Lulu paused trying to find a delicate way to say it.

"No." Moira sighed. "But I do remember sitting there wishing that one of them would make a move. That one of them would find me attractive. I remember being so desperate for affection, longing for someone, anyone to find me desirable. I asked for it."

"I don't believe you at age 14 asked to be violated like that!"

"But looking back, did I do anything to dissuade them of the idea?"

"It still does not excuse what they did!" Lulu cried. "If they had any honour at all, they would not have done that. You are not to blame for being violated!"

"Who's been violated?" Yuna asked shocked. Neither Lulu nor Moira had heard the summoner come down the hall with Rikku in tow.

"Let's take this to my room," Lulu said. Her maternal instinct took over and she put a comforting arm around Moira. It was this tableau that Auron saw from the doorway. He took it as they were protecting and comforting her from their latest argument. Rage and despair battled within him as he went back into their room, picked up his sword and went looking for something to kill.

Wakka was stretched out on the bed when the four women arrived. He was snoring lightly and without hesitation, Lulu walked over and shook him awake.

"Hey! What's the big idea, ya?" he yelled.

"We need the room. You were just leaving." Lulu said plainly.

"I was just sleeping," Wakka replied meeting the gaze of his girlfriend/mage. The mage was in control he quickly realized and he jumped from the bed and grabbed his blitzball. "Sorry Lu." He called as he made his escape and went looking for something to eat.

Yuna, Rikku and Lulu sat listening to Moira re-tell her story of rape as well as any other embarrassing and humiliating things that had happened to her in her short adult life. As she named her secret shames, Moira felt lighter but still, her issues with Auron came back to the forefront.

"What will he think of me now?" she asked with a defeated sigh.

Lulu looked at Yuna and Rikku. None of the three could understand this kind of worry and despair. They, for the most part, had been very lucky in the love and relationship department. None of them had to recover from anything close to what Moira had been through.

They'd never had to deal with being raped, not once but several times. Being the butt of so many jokes and humiliations. They had never had to find their own way home after being left on the side of the road. They had never had to swallow their pride and try to hold their heads high as they found out that their so-called best friend who had been encouraging her to "go for" a certain guy had in fact been secretly dating him all along. They had never had to deal with the unbelievable shame of finding out that other "friends" had one time bought her a date for the night. Imagine the shame upon learning that a man wouldn't go near you unless financially compensated!

Moira sighed again and swallowed her tears.

"I don't think Auron and I should continue. From now on, we are just two Guardians on the same pilgrimage."

"Moira, that's not the right solution. Talk to Auron."

"And say what? Try to explain that despite my actions I'm not completely insane? That I had a good reason for demanding to know every little thing about his past? There is no scenario that makes what we said to each other ok." Moira squeezed her eyes shut, willing herself not to cry.

"He loves you," Yuna said. "It was truly love at first sight!"

"I remember his first sight of me," Moira said flatly. "I only saw contempt mixed with anger."

"Ok, not at first sight but very soon afterwards," Yuna replied.

"That's my point. I'm surprised we've lasted as long as we have given how quickly we rushed into things. How many days was it from the time I dropped into Spira and your summoner battle at the ruined temple?'

"I'm not sure," Yuna said. "Maybe four or five days?"

"Not long enough for two people to become so attracted to each other that we were making out in the bushes after I ran from the temple."

"I always KNEW I'd interrupted something more interesting than him comforting you!" Rikku cried.

"Well you did," Moira said flatly. "But I see now that it along with everything that came after should never have happened."

Lulu turned her scarlet gaze to Moira.

"If you truly think that way, you could not be more wrong."

Moira scoffed, completely dedicated to feeling sorry for herself.

"What you and Auron have is true and amazing. Where is it written that it is diminished in any way because it came within days of meeting each other?" Lulu asked.

"Look at it any way you want, but if you weren't so wrapped up in this pity party, you and he would have already made up," Rikku said.

"I'll need my own room from now on," Moira said without looking up from the floor. Rikku sighed and shrugged her shoulders.

"You can stay with me for now. Until you come to your senses."