Of Sprained Brains & Ankles

[Tolleson]

((A small recap))
[Genny] “Mister Bromn,” there is a polite nod as he heads away, but her tone is entirely different, cordial. They were more or less strangers, acquaintances at best. A strange nod to a strange stranger and she is left to herself. Zilliah comes back to her aid and she gives a sidelong look after Altias. “You… I will be all right, you… should go after Altias,” not that she necessarily wanted to be left alone and a mess in the middle of the road, in the middle of the night half way to the Dagger – but it wouldn’t be the first time and likely not the last. Still she would close the distance to Zilliah and let him hand her what books he had gathered, the two or three she hadn’t found herself. “Thank you,” for both his help and for his kindness, there was subtlety in her voice, something that would have come across in waves had their minds been one. But a slight emotion he might have to learn to read in people without the familiar landscapes of their mind at his disposal.
 
[Zilliah] Clayton and Bromn both leave, fed by each others egos and the fae, in his shame, stays by Genny's side. "You never have to thank me, Genny." Not after the things he has done to this poor girl. He wraps his arm around her shoulders once he is sure she has a good grip on her books and helps her back towards the inn for the talk in question.

------

"And I always will," she smiled sort of meekly, it wasn't the first time he had saved her and she was thankful to have a friend, no matter how flawed. With Zilliah at her side the trip would be much easier, it was the conversation and not her sprained ankle that might prove tedious. Shifting the weight of the books into one hand and under her arm her fingers touched the gem he had secured, now around her neck. "What is it?"

With any luck they would soon arrive at the Dagger, where her plan was for a nice cup of tea and a warm spot before the fire where she might set her leg up and rest. The stairs could wait for another day, after all, she had fallen asleep on the kitchen bench or nestled in an armchair in the common room plenty of times.

[Pantha]

The's fae's cheeks flush red when Genny reminds him that she always will thank him, no matter how minor the thing in question. Nothing is broken and he helps her to a chair near the hearth, taking her books from her so that he can begin to clean away the mud and filth from their tumble in the sloppy ground outside. He takes a seat on the floor near her feet, not really caring if he gets any muddier than he already is. His lovely face, free of scars and embedded gems, turns up to gaze at her wearing his pendant. “That is my eye. I gave it to Lord Bromn but he does not want it or need it. I think you should protect it for me.” He is back to calling Altias by that name, though Genny wouldn't have ever known the fae was calling him anything different while he was upset with the man. The idea of his eye being worn around Genny's neck instead of sitting forgotten inside Bromn's desk drawer has him blushing deeper and he has to look away at the maid coming to them with hot tea, brandy, and a few warm, wet towels that he begins to use to clean the splatters of grime from his face and hands.

[Tolleson]

An eye. His eye. How peculiar, but in fairness Myrken had a great abundance of oddities. “I … shall do my best,” but surely there were safer necks around which something so precious might be worn. Then again, while her palms and knees, shins and arms were always sporting some fresh wound or bruise, her neck was remarkably unscathed.

Zilliah might not care how much more dirty he gets but Genny is not one sit idly by, tending to her own mess with diligence. “Though… I… why give it to him in the first place,” it was a precious thing, a little unorthodox but wasn’t that what love was – giving something to someone, trusting them with a piece of you whether that was physical or not. Wasn’t love entrusting one’s heart to another?

Ruminating on these thoughts left her silent as she gave a nod of thanks to the maid and wiped her face. Then down her arms and unlaced her boots, she wiped the mud splatters from her legs. The tea would be left to cool, it could wait until she was more presentable.

[Pantha]

The unspoken silence between their two minds has his staring up at here, trying to figure out how badly this will go before he speaks. “I gave it to him because I harmed him with it. Because...” He frowns deeply and looks away. “I do not want it. I do not like the person I have become. Maybe without it I can be the man I once was.” Before Snowy, before his self-imposed exile. He had once been a very stable, functioning member of society, surely Genny would have seen that in his “file.” A business, paid taxes, no run-ins with the law, and no one ever really complained about him. Deeper down, he knew something was fundamentally wrong with the humans now, something having changed in the decade he had sequestered himself to the woods, but even so, he felt the darkness inside him as well. He looks up at her then and tries to smile as he cleans his own boots of filth.

[Tolleson]

There is silence from her, the flame hair visage gone from his mind and only re-appearing a short while later, once she is done and sets her hand gently at his elbow. Not to stop him from cleaning the mud from his boots but to reassure him the connection has not been lost. She simply wasn’t strong enough to maintain the mental connection now without a path from each side, without touch. For her it was not a natural gift, reaching out the minds of those around her was navigating unfamiliar roads in total darkness. However, as it had been with Rhaena, the proximity seemed to help; it illuminated the road and allowed her to complete the crossing from within herself to another, to connect.

Here in the firelight of the Dagger, Genny would appear far more tired. A ghostly pallor and thin even for her lean frame, a dwindling thread of her former self; still she melted down at Zilliah side with a content smile, resting her shoulder upon his with some trust that she would be welcome there. Hope at the very least, “I… So long as you are willing, I see.. well, I see no reason why not.”

But the thoughts that formed soft words in her mind would roll through her, a warm summer breeze and carried on it like a sweet scent the memories and feelings of all the times he had been so kind to her.

'You are already a good man, you will be so much better with effort.'

[Pantha]

Even without his own mind to help illuminate those paths, she has walks them many times and they can be found if one knows how to look for them. The touch at his elbow has him pausing, even if that was not her intention and he looks to her, following her every movement as she moves from the chair to the floor with him. She would feel from his a flash of pain at having her so close and knowing that she is not his, not the way he would have her anyway. The words in his mind, the reassurance that he is making the right decision fills him with warmth and he drops the filthy towel so that he can sit up better and bring his arm around her to hold her against him. “I am trying, but others are making it so hard for me. I do not want to be someone that children fear.”

[Tolleson]

A flash of pain and she nearly recoils, not as much physically as mentally. At least for now. The confusion and fear that it might be her is shared as willingly with him as if he was an extension of herself either because she hasn’t learned to hone the skills to help it, or because she is unafraid of the openness with him. “Am I… is this making it difficult?”

Fear, the fear there was not the fear of darkness, pain, the very real things in the world that go bump in the night and gobbled up children. It was the sort of fear one holds closer to themselves. It chipped away at confidence, drew away ambition, dissipated dreams and aggrandized insecurities. Like most every other human, there was something, someone, within herself that she feared. A fear of realizing dreams, of trying, of choosing, or failure, or of being loved.

In her mind the touch as he wraps his arm around her is barely noticed as a physical thing. The presence is there, the reassurance, all of the positive and confused feelings of affinity and trust. Instead the feeling radiates within her and back, resonating like visible waves that touch the corners of her mind, bounce and return. Some of them do not, there are still dark corners where these things are lost; dark paths leading into her and labyrinths if taken.

[Pantha]

His arms fully encircle her, hugging her tightly against him. When he closes his eyes, he sees her then, as Catch does with her wild, flickering mane of red and he smiles. Not everything in Catch's mind is so terrible. "No, you are not. I would tell you if you were." He laughs softly at her and turns her face up to meet his, so that he can see how unfocused her eyes are as she maintains that tenuous link between their minds. "You are making my decision easier, if you must know. I am glad you did not let my decision stop you from trying." He continues to meet her eyes, never blinking as he strokes her freckled cheek with his thumb. "Rheana has taught you well. I am sorry that I could not show you how to do it instead." And if he had known a way, he would have shown her. "I have been curious. When you and James become married, will you be linked like he and Lamai? Or will you be like Rheana and Glenn?" She would feel a very deep and burning fear for her, a concern about what would become of the bond she enjoys so much with him when that time comes.

[Tolleson]

Just as before, every touch on her physical body radiates waves upon the surface of her mind, a pool of water carrying the ripple of sensations which fortunately or not, bounce and return through the link. It wasn’t just a decision because she enjoyed his company but in this state she was vulnerable, unable to restrict all that was felt or sent. It wasn’t the power of projection or of talk between minds that lacked, certainly in the days since she’d discovered she could reply of her own accord her mind’s potency has increased. Where she was a novice was in control and balance.

He lifted her chin and in her face he would find nothing. Her eyes vacant, her muscles lax and body a husk as if the two states were entirely separate from one another. While keenly aware of what was happening to her outside, she remained within.

‘I had to try, you’re the only one who knew me as I was… you’re the only one I am certain would not arbitrate me for who I am.’

The love she felt for James and her need to impress him, to be a woman and not a child; the confused affection she held for Glenn, Catch, and even the friends like Rhaena that she had to guard and never fully let all of herself be exposed. It was a great trust she held in Zilliah, this much was transparent. Perhaps it was the uncertainty she carried in herself that allowed her own mind to be so easily overcome. Even now as the words slipped into thought and through the link, a tide of self doubt, internal strife and uncertainty, surged. And with it the other voices in her mind, the ones that could only gain a foothold because she listened to them more than she listened to herself.

Even the flickering flames of red that curled and swirled so unnaturally for both hair and fire, Catch’s vision of her was hardly how she saw herself. But so many minds had now influenced her own, she carried in herself more than one person. Zilliah, Catch, Rhaena, James, Lamai, their presence had given her these abilities; but pieces of them, the paths they had come, the voices and memories they left – they did not simply fade away. And it had begun to get crowded, loud, confusing; even Catch’s dreams had overshadowed her own and Zilliah had witnessed firsthand.
It all swells in a second and is instantly gone, like hot tears rising and quickly wiped away, at the mention of James.

There were a myriad of questions now propagating her mind, whispers of thoughts but the loudest of them, ‘do you think he will ask me?’

[Pantha]

Her answer is not the one he wanted but the one he gets is expected so he does not become unduly agitated like he does with others when he thinks they are not listening to him. Genny has heard him and the emotions that well up inside her fill him just as easily as they do her. His heart jumps, pulse quickening as she shows him such boundless trust. This was Genny, and though there are dark places in her mind that she does not share, even with him, she gives so much more to him than any other person ever has. When she looks into his mind, she sees and feels -him-, not his smart mouth, not his pretty face, not the fear of his powers. Him, as he wishes to be, a friend, a lover, a person who only wants to use his power to be one with someone, to make them happy. But that is not what the others see in him; they only see his potential for abuse. Had Glenn ever found a single account of the fae hurting someone before? In the many centuries that the fae has lived here, has he ever tried to do all those things that people fear he might? This is who Genny knows, the fae who does not want to hurt, only love and understand. And he cannot even love Genny, though she would know that he would always have chosen her if it had been his own choice.

The look on her face, or the lack of one, now is the answer he was looking for. She will be like Rheana, only so much more. He pulls her face to his chest and he holds her as close as her can, hands running down her back and arms, craving as much physical contact as he can get from her right now, as if it might keep their link from ever being severed if he never lets the physical contact be broken. There is guilt then, guilt that -he- had been the one to do this too her. In his mind, he still hears her scream, from the first night he had gone into her mind. He had done it for Atlias of all people. Did she even know that before? Did she know that he had invaded her mind, had spoken the request for a drink for Glenn so that Glenn would know the power the fae has, so that he would know the fae would protect Bromn from a man like Glenn. What good had it done? It had frightened Genny, terrified her even at that time, and still Altias had gone to Glenn and sold himself to him.

She speaks of James and he feels the flood of emotions so powerfully that the tears actually well in his eyes and slip down his smooth cheeks. The answer is not spoken, and there is a great heaviness to his heart as he admits that yes, he does think James will marry her. He wants so badly to -lie- to her, to tell her no and to take her from him, to run with her to his home and keep her there selfishly like he had Snowy.

[Tolleson]

Perhaps it is selfish that she doesn’t say to him how much she enjoys their conversations, how thankful she was to have him. But somewhere beneath the undulating layers of more pressing emotions made tangible, it is solidified in the sediment of their conversations. A simple and fundamental truth she hoped he knew as well as she did. So, it was not the answer he’d wanted – but there were unspoken answers all the same, because he was her teacher, because she did not want him to be alone, because she loved him in a way that was entirely unique.

Aloud, Zilliah said nothing, but she was within him now and might hear the emotions he felt as clearly as if they were spoken. After all, the thing she did now, the thing she had been learning to do for months was not merely conversing, it was feeling. A power she had begun to wield with extraordinary versatility but at a cost that meant being consumed in the thoughts and cares of others, sometimes with little ability to know where she ended and another person began.

Though proximity made little difference now, Zilliah held her closer and the guilt, the fear, the desire to lie and the reasons for it rushed into her. Her mind however, did not brace against the storm, nor did she bend and let it rush past her. The whole of her mind became elastic, a sponge that took it all in and felt it, swallowed it whole. Let all that he let out become a part of her.

Mentally her presence waned, but only slightly, feeling and absorbing whatever lingered. Physically her eyes refocused and weakly her arms encircled Zilliah enough to give a small squeeze. A moment more and she was completely back within herself. She would attempt to pull away some, just for comfort, for the fact that she wasn’t a limp rag doll anymore, her hand on his, if he allowed.

She did love him, could he see it? Surely he could feel it, his emotions turgid in the membrane of her mind and her own awash though him. But what good would it do to say them aloud. Her love was not a lover's love, it was not the sweeping romance that provided thrill and glee. It was a fortified love at its base, a friendship. Her closest, at that.

“I... am not certain what I shall say,” it was not an invitation by any means, but it was uncertainty where something ought to be certain.

"But it is no matter... What of Mister Bromn? How are you?" Eager to ease his hurt, suspecting that in some ways she might well be the cause.

[Pantha]

She doesn't have to say that she enjoys them; he knows she does and he enjoys time spent with her. He never had to worry that she might abuse his gift, and that she actually sees it as such now. She doesn't fear his mind, she embraces it and it fills his mind and heart with such happiness and joy, even when they speak and share thoughts that are not always so happy.

That was the beauty of it though, that she accepted his shame and his admitted feelings without trying to run from it or tell him it was wrong. She even makes the effort to gain control of her body, to hug him back and it causes his face to flush. She pulled away enough so that she can speak with him, with her voice instead of her confusing emotions and he doesn't protest as she pulls away mentally and physically a little. He felt her love but did not understand it for what it is. He only knew two sorts; the innocent whirlwind of first love that he had with his Snowy for so many years, and the one he currently held for Bromn which was fraught with uncertainties and so much pain and disappointment.

It is not really his place to tell her what she ought to do about James. He knows it is selfish of him to wish the man would go away, would just find himself a woman in his homeland and never come back, but he also wants nothing more than happiness for Genny. She is not the first to be his friend like this and in the past when faced with such a thing, he would have eagerly pushed her into the other man's arms so that she would know love and happiness and more than that, so that she would have someone to grow old with, to have a family with. That is, after all, what humans are meant to do.

Bromn's name on her lips has him tensing a little, his eyes turning away to look at anything else besides her as the wave of emotions flood through him. If any part of her were still holding onto his mind, she would feel a wave of emotion so painful and powerful at the same time that there is no way she could mistake it as anything but love when he thinks of Bromn. “My Lord and I have made amends.” For now. One never knew with Altias how this might play out. “I have spoken to Glenn about purchasing a house in town.”