Dragon (S)Layers Ch. 54

It wouldn't have been the first time.

"Posh," she whispered to herself. The logical answer would've probably been to sit back and integrate herself into the group once more. Catch up on the goings on of things- find out where they were. It'd been too long, though. In Sarah's mind, still full of numbers and vectors, she couldn't solve for social grace.

So she observed.

While the others were laying down the sleeping arrangements– including one for Sarah, she noticed– Caldion went about stringing up their cookware in a wide perimeter around the camp site. Once they were finished they gathered close and drew straws. Caldion drew short.

Keiter and Tess crawled into their bags leaving Sarah stuck with the damned paladin. For his part in it, he moved his chair over on the opposite side of the fire as though she'd lash out and strike him or something. When he was suitably comfortable, he drew a blade and quietly began sharpening it.

The silence lingered between them.

Sarah was content to let it.

So was Caldion.

And so it did.

It wasn't her fault he'd gotten himself involved, she'd tried to keep him out of it. What the hell did he have to be so sullen about? He was invading her life and now he had the gall to just play it off in silence?

The nerve. Two could play this game.

Sarah huffed and leaned forward. He looked towards her. She opened her mouth to speak. Caldion didn't. Why didn't he? Wasn't he going to explain where they were going or how come he'd chosen her life to ruin with his shenanigans?

He sat looking at her cooly, answering her without a word.

That stung. Sarah spread her hands as if to say 'well?'

Caldion still kept quiet, honing the edge on his dagger.

Sarah huffed again. "Ok-"

"I win."

She stared.

"You," The boy cleaned his blade off on his trousers and sat forward. "Were trying to get me to say something."

"I was trying to understand why you thought to stare at me in such a manner as to suggest I was responsible for whatever contrived inconvenience you were going through."

"You mean why I haven't run off yet."

Sarah cocked her head. "A very paladinly sense of self worth. In certain circles, I think that would be rather quaint– now had you not tried repeatedly to rob me of my freedom and by extension my very life, I would likely be in one of those circles."

Caldion produced a little bag of nuts, kicked one foot over the other and sat back. He stared at her as though he expected her to continue while he ate. When she didn't, he kept on eating anyway. At her flat expression he merely smiled.

A thin kind of smile that said he thought he had her figured out.

Was that so? Sarah launched into fluent Sphinx with a cocky churn to her dictation that made her sound as though she was delivering a lecture. "In the Free States when an orphanage child reaches an age of awareness, they're given a test of gears. A simple puzzle in which parts are stacked," she mimed holding a small box. "If the puzzle is too hard for the child, their future is set in the mines. Very uncouth. Very unfair. . . .for many, very short. Those who can finish the puzzle get to go to the gear pits." She smiled as his self-assured expression began to waver. Then she pointed at him and said in a more common tongue. "I bet you'd have loved it."

The boy at least had the good grace to look faintly admonished. Once crisis out of the way, Sarah massaged her eyes and took stock of the camp site such as she could– for all she knew about camping and protecting oneself from the wilds, it looked pretty secure. They'd at least have warning if something came along trying to eat their food.

Of course, that was only because Caldion knew what he was doing.

Sarah looked over. She was just about to ask him where he'd learned his skills when he got up to relieve himself. Under normal circumstances she'd have followed through but– no. Sleep was more important. They were going to be spending a lot of time together whether they'd wanted to or not, they could stretch it out.

The gear pits had taught her how to be patient.

#

The trend of keeping silent company followed for the next few days. Sarah made a concerted effort to conscript the others into her work by having them take measurements of the ship several times, building temporary furniture into the hold and with a little elbow grease they made something of a home out of the ugly tub.

It wasn't big on privacy but no one seemed too bothered, Tessarie was comfortable with a little corner and a blanket strung up and if Keiter had ever shown an interest in privacy in all the time Sarah had known him, she'd missed it. It made their living situation about as communal as one could get.

All the while Sarah churned out designs on her makeshift blackboard with every calculation drudged up from the deepest parts of her memory. It was hard, slow and agonizing; she was working old muscles that had atrophied under a tidal wave of booze, sex and time and she'd be damned if she was going to trust them to lift the ship.

But then again, they had a couch that worked as intended, didn't they? It was little more than four legs and a platform with a backing, but it was technically a couch. She still checked on it every few dozen leagues to make sure it hadn't loosened up somewhere along the way. She was in the middle of one of those investigations when Keiter's presence drew her attention.

Ass up, crouched down checking the nails in the floor was probably not the first time- nor worst- way in which he'd found her. "And how is my favorite friend?"

Keiter was quiet for a moment, maybe watching. Eventually he said, "I wonder what plans you have, I wonder why you haven't told me about them." When she didn't respond immediately, he added. "I wonder where my friend has been in this, too. I haven't seen you like this since The Village."

At that Sarah looked back. Keiter was perched on one of the ship's ribs with his claws dug into the wood for balance against the rattling. Reluctantly she turned away from her work and spread her arms to invite him into her lap. He didn't come. Where did she even begin? How much did she even believe herself? Sarah frowned as she glanced to the side.

"The truth?" Keiter said softly as his little shoulders slumped. "Isira tells me things, She knows you lie–"

"Don't." Sarah said flatly. A little too cold. "She has no right to preach truth."

Keiter clicked his tongue sharply. Irritation? At Sarah? Since when? "She cares for both of us, she looks over me–"

"So do I!"

"I'm not human," he said simply. "I don't know when you're lying. And I don't want to. . . .I love you for who you are, not what you say or do. If you tell me this is for the best, I believe you because I know. But you aren't you." His hands spread consciously. A deferential gesture. "It pains me to see my friend this way."

Sarah massaged her eyes a few times wondering what she'd tell him to placate him. She aimed for the truth. "I'm not entirely sure. I. . ." hesitation? Her? The cold truth, then. "I've been running for so long I don't know where to go any more. There's nowhere left to go. If I can be found from coast to coast, the only chance we have is off the ground. But! But. . ."

"But?"

She swept her hair back and exhaled through clenched teeth. "I can't trust myself to build so much as a fucking spice rack without calipers, a t-square and blueprints." She planted her feet a distance apart with her arms on her knees and her chin on her hands looking to her oldest friend. "I am a terrible priest and an even worse engineer." She smiled ruefully.

That admission felt a hell of a lot heavier than it should have. Even without the sudden assault on her mental defenses that Sarah felt her Cherub launch into. Pushing, probing. Clawing for a weakness. Sarah wasn't about to give it one. She clamped down even harder.

Keiter inhaled deeply and sighed. "This is why you fuss with that bench?"

"Couch," Sarah corrected. "It has upholstery!" Insofar as burlap could be considered upholstery anyway.

"Couch." He drawled the word, then clicked his tongue again. "I've known you a long time, but never to be terrible at anything. You chose to excel even with things beneath you. You take pride in it. . . .I've seen your eyes light when you finish scrubbing floors and when you finish convincing someone to give you their time. Any job done well–"

"It's different." Sarah hefted herself up and eased herself down on the couch warily, waiting- feeling for any flex, any give. "I can't present it in any better a fashion than to say that were you in my shoes, I feel you might well feel the same! Or, failing that, perhaps you would become more keenly attuned to how positively monumental what you're asking of me actually is."

"I'm not asking anything." Keiter rocked back when the boat jostled. "I'm your friend as you are mine, but you never tell me what's wrong so I can help."

Sarah eyed him for a moment. It hadn't been long since Sorash and the slaughter of his congregation, the loss of the temple and even his visit Isira. The three most powerful moments of any cleric's life, Sarah imagined. She hadn't taken even a moment to ask how he was doing and to see after his health, yet here he was. . .

A deep sense of shame rolled through her as she looked on and wondered what should have come out of her mouth. If nothing else, didn't she owe her best- and only- friend someone worthy of the title? Sarah rested her fore arms on her knees and leaned forward. "I may chose to excel in the technical competencies I undertake, but you my friend? You excel where I fall short time and again. Gods, were it possible for me to put into words my feelings. . ."

"You can if you chose to," he said simply.

She could, of course. Well, why not? "It's often the goal of an Engineer to create something worthy of being considered something more than they themselves are, hm? Some would say this should be the goal of parents, too."

He looked vaguely confused for a moment before eventually trotting over to her and resting a hand on her knee. "That would mean you've excelled once again."

"In the end, I've surely excelled." Sarah gave him a side hug. "But let's not pretend you haven't had other teachers, shall we?"

"I would never." He patted her knee again. "You deserve to smile, if I can help you do that I'm being a good cleric and a good friend. What you need I can't give you-" he motioned around "but I can ask you to teach me. We can learn together."

"She teach you that, did She?"

"Yip!" He said with obvious theatrically.

Sarah laughed, squeezed him and sighed. "I'm sorry, Keiter." She murmured. "I've been a terrible friend."

"For a long time. But you're still more a friend than I deserve."

"Forgive me?"

"For now." He ran his claws through her hair. "I'll forgive you, but right now we need a direction. You always told me to know where you were heading and who was coming with you."

Sarah mumbled. "Never forget the order."

"Yip."

For the first time in a long time, Sarah actually felt grounded– there was a lot of work to do, but she could handle it if she had someone beside her. And in that moment she did.

She wasn't alone.

It had been so long. . .