Should Have

Writers: Devin, Dana
Date Posted: 21st September 2009

Characters: N'vanik, Traelyn
Description: The Weyrleaders' discussion is a little more civil in the morning.
Location: Dolphin Cove Weyr
Date: month 4, day 13 of Turn 5

N'vanik

N'vanik shifted, half awake, and wrapped an arm around the woman next to him. But something was off, and as his mind woke a little more to wonder what it was, he realized he felt awful. It felt like a dragon was sitting on his head, and his mouth tasted like a wherry had relieved itself in it. Why did he feel so ...

Then he remembered. **Loseth--**

The bronze's response was sleepy, but quick. }:She's asleep, in our weyr.:{

N'vanik sat up and immediately regretted it. He groaned, wishing he'd done that _slower_.

One gray eye slit open and Traelyn looked blearily up at him. "Well, you did have a lot to drink last night," she murmured.

Oh, great. "And made fool out of myself." He moved to the edge of the bed, mindful of the pounding in his skull.

She sleepily propped herself up on her elbows, watching him, not really impressed by his change of attitude. "If that's how you want to look at it."

"Well, thanks for sharing the bed." He stood up slowly, one hand on his head. "You can go back to ignoring me now."

She felt as though she'd been slapped--hard. The blood drained from her face, and she was too hurt and too angry to do anything but stare numbly, silently, up at him.

"Don't look at me like that. You'd much rather have me leave you alone so you can focus all your attention on that brownrider of yours." He hadn't slept off his bitterness and anger with the alcohol. He was just thinking more clearly now, and the hangover wasn't helping his mood.

It was as if everything that had happened last night had been wiped away. Everything she'd done and said to him..... Her eyes flashed with dark fire. He hadn't listened. And by Faranth's Egg, she was not going to repeat herself! "If this is how you're going to treat me, I want you out of my sight."

"Well, now you know how I feel." He probably should go, but now that he wasn't a babbling, crying drunk, there were things he wanted to say. "Except for the part where I went halfway across the South and changed my whole life just for the chance to share a Flight with you."

"And we did share it." She wearily scrubbed a hand over her brow. "You didn't have to participate, but you did. You came when _he_ wouldn't--I haven't forgotten. And you won." Her eyes flickered to his. "Frankly, I don't quite know what you had in mind for us when you did win. I seem to remember your first thought being about Talryne when we woke up together in the sharding flight cot. I always knew she came first with you, N'vanik, and those moments after the flight reinforced the fact. Things weren't going to change there, and I honestly didn't expect them to. You had her, and I had B'ram. You weren't going to drop her, and I certainly wasn't going to drop him."

"I didn't say anything about dropping anybody. Yes, Tal comes first." He rubbed his temple. "But I thought it would be like it was before I won the Flight. We made time for each other then, only now we wouldn't be timezones away."

"So what you're saying is that our relationship is too platonic for you."

He sighed. They didn't _have_ a relationship. "What happened, Trae? What did I do to make you shut me out?"

"Did you ever consider that any tension that has been between us is due to the fact that every time I've tried to talk to you about it, we've ended up fighting?" She sat up. "After a while I stopped trying, N'vanik. I avoided the issue because I'm sick to death of fighting with you."

"You started shutting me out before we were fighting. You shut me out at the Hatching Feast. You made it clear that I was so far down your list that you hadn't even thought of me. It was our Hatching, Trae." He'd kept fighting with her because it was easier to fight than to talk about it. Talking about it hurt too much. "Not mine and Tal's. Not yours and B'ram's. _Ours_. You have no idea how much that meant to me."

"I was with you for nearly the whole Feast. I was on your arm. I dined with you. I danced with you. The only thing I _didn't_ do was invite you back to my weyr because I thought you were going to spend the night with Talryne." But she'd also known that she and B'ram would be together that night since he wouldn't be with her during the Feast. And she'd wanted to be with him--needed to be--because of what U'kaiah had done to her.

"Yes, you did all the things a Weyrwoman is supposed to do with a Weyrleader. But you never thought about _me_. You didn't think that for one night, being with you might come first? I wanted to show you how much it all meant to me." He swallowed, and turned away. Quietly, he said, "How much _you_ meant to me."

"No, it didn't occur to me," she replied just as quietly. "You should have talked to me."

"I should have--" He bit down on the anger. It wasn't going to help, and it only made his headache worse. "I didn't think I needed to." That was the problem. It was clear that it had been just another Hatching to her, nothing special. And he was just another bronzerider that happened to win her Flight. No matter what she said, it was her actions that mattered. He was such a fool, such a sharding fool.

And there it was. They were both guilty of assuming too much about the other. They had been living separate lives at two different Weyrs for so long, but not anymore. Not since Nyith had let Loseth catch her in flight. Their separate lives were mingling, and each of them were trying to make it work. So far, the results had been quite lacking. "I think," she began, "that we both need to start over again. We've been assuming too much about each other. We need to communicate better, or this...or it won't work, N'vanik."

Traelyn ... Talryne. He choked up. "I could use some starting over today." He saw his boots on the floor and bent to pick them up.

When he straightened, she was standing in front of him. "I want to make the effort. I want to try. For you." Her dark eyes searched his. "Do you?"

He traced a thumb along her cheek. "Of course I do." He was playing the fool again, but he wanted to believe. Hope was all he had right now.

She gave him a smile.

N'vanik kissed her forehead, aching for more but afraid of rejection. "Now I have to go see if Tal can forgive me."

And if he could forgive her? "If you need to talk," she told him softly, "you know where to find me."

"Yeah." For a moment, fear was clear in his eyes, then he turned away.

Last updated on the September 23rd 2009

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Should Have