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[noburden]

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[noburden]

Again, she agrees. It comes with a little nod of her head.

"It was miserable the first time and worse yet now."

She can't lose both her friendship with Dion and her relationship with Clive. These past weeks have been horrifically lonely in a way that surprised her.

[rosarianoath]

"I had to rebuild your trust in me, than," he says. "And now we must rebuild our trust in each other."

[noburden]

She's quiet for a long moment. She thinks she might know the answer, but there shouldn't be any room for doubt.

"Do you trust me less, now?"

She was quick to banish him from the bedroom. Quick to worry about Dion rather than Clive himself.

[rosarianoath]

Clive's gaze drops to her wounds again, shame surging in him for the mere idea of admitting it directly.

"I know I hurt you on that terrible night," he says. "But to be driven out so swiftly... I have not known what to think."

He shakes his head and gently runs the cloth down her side.

[noburden]

"I didn't know what to do. I was overwhelmed." So much happened that night. Joshua's confrontation, Dion's face, the way he yelled at her. There's much she wishes she handled differently.

"I'm sorry I was so quick to act."

When she's upset with him for being so quick to seek out Dion and hurt him, she knows she did the same, in her own way. A hurt for a hurt fixes nothing.

"It was cruel to tell you this bed was yours only just to send you away."

She knows.

[rosarianoath]

Clive nods, feeling a swell of hurt in his chest; it's odd to feel when he's being apologized to, but to have the pain acknowledged for being what it is, itself, a new sort of pain.

"It was overwhelming in many ways."

Joshua was upset. He'd struck Clive. Jill had defended him. Clive had left. Then Jill hadn't defended him.

Clive continues to stroke her skin clean of blood and gravel.

"You did what you could with the situation."

[noburden]

If it were anyone else but Dion, it wouldn't be so difficult.

"I know you have no fondness for Dion, but I do. And will continue to, regardless of what happened. Will that damage your trust in me further?"

She sucks in a breath as he touches a particularly tender area.

[rosarianoath]

He pauses in his cleaning, momentarily dipping his head like he might kiss her chest to soothe her, but he doesn't. Finally, he looks back up to her.

"I could live with it," he says. "As long as I am never made to endure his company again, or expected to hear about him."

[noburden]

She meets his eyes with something distant in hers.

"I don't want you near him again," she says quietly, but sure. She doubts she will have little to say about Dion moving forward, but she'll cross that bridge once she finds the courage to seek him out.

Dion may be less understanding than Clive.

"You made a mistake. It doesn't undo all we've shared."

[rosarianoath]

"I'm glad it won't undo us."

He could defer further comment, but in the spirit of being honest, he gives her a serious look.

"But what he did that night was the grain that tipped the scale between us. Perhaps we can talk about what that means sometime, when you are well, but I do not feel I acted out of line."

[noburden]

"I'm well," she tells him. Scraped and sore and sad, but some of that won't improve for some time. "I walked into Dion's cottage to find him laying in a mix of his own blood and beer. I'd like to hear how that wasn't out of line."

She's already tired. But she'll hear him out. She owes him that much.

[rosarianoath]

"He's dogged me for the better part of a year with what I should do and when, and all the ways I have been an inadequate saviour for Valisthea –– for his own redemption."

That should be enough, but it isn't all of it.

Clive has to tense his jaw for a moment to find the strength to confess:

"He beat me with steel gauntlets when I left you."

[noburden]

It's clear by the look of surprise in Jill's eyes that this is new information. She remembers sitting on Dion's bed when he returned from seeing Clive. She can't remember if he had his gauntlets. Her memories of that time are blurry at best. The two things she remembers are how discarded she felt, and how Dion kept her from letting the despair take her.

"I wasn't aware," she says. "So you beat him with beer cans."

Tit for tat. Miserable.

[rosarianoath]

"I had it in my head that I'd spent enough time trying to be respectful to a man who beat me, who made my cause a vessel for his own redemption, and who lived high and mighty on the enslaved until the moment he was cast aside," he murmurs. "What was one more drink together?"

[noburden]

Jill lets out a slow sigh.

"I know Dion is far from innocent. We all have blood on our hands," she says, and yet she felt so sick with Dion's on hers. She'd grown protective of him this past year, seeing his pain and understanding much of it. Her empathy is proving to be a problem--she loves them both and understands them both and yet Dion and Clive are doomed to clash. She's not enough to bring them together.

So be it.

"You were both wrong. He should have never put hands on you to begin with."

[rosarianoath]

Clive finds himself looking at her wounds, endlessly frustrated that these conversations feel like a deeper knife twist when they should feel like immediate relief. He exhales slowly. We all have blood on our hands. You were both wrong.

“So are we then all excused from our actions against each other? Wound for wound, blow for blow?”

[noburden]

"It's not my place to excuse you or forgive either of you. I'm upset and disappointed, but what can I do about it?" Neither seem to regret their actions. "I can only strive to keep you apart."

[rosarianoath]

“But where does that leave us?” Talking about Dion, he’s realized, leaves his frustration building. “Even if I never see him again, trust has been broken between us.”

[noburden]

Jill sighs. She feels more defeated than frustrated. She doesn't have the fight in her to be upset. Vaguely, that worries her.

"Broken doesn't mean ruined forever, does it?"

[rosarianoath]

“Of course not,” he says. “But it needs mending.”

[noburden]

"It does. Whatever that looks like... I think we deserve to try again."

When they're good, they're great. And when they're not, it's hell. That must mean something.

[rosarianoath]

“I do too,” he says. There’s a pit of anger in his belly, but he wants her, too. “Perhaps… we take our time with it. Avoid distracting ourselves with lovemaking and put our focus on our hearts.”

[noburden]

Jill holds his gaze for a few heartbeats, then nods.

"We've made that mistake before," she recalls, slow in the way she reaches out to rest a hand over his heart, eyes dropping to his chest. "I love you in ways I can't describe, Clive. I never want you to feel used by me. Not again."

He was cruel to Dion, but she can't be cruel to him.

[rosarianoath]

That she brings it up at all makes him feel the slightest bit heartened, but kneeling before her now, he finds himself unsettled anyway. He gets to his feet just to sit next to her on the bed, instead.

"I appreciate that," he says. "I think it is for the best that I remain in the basement for now. But for the rest... we should continue to talk, and spend time together. Family dinners, not just for Joshua but for us, too."

[noburden]

As much as it hurts to hear, he's right. Some space will stop them from falling into one another too quickly.

"I agree. I miss what we had, even if it was brief."

Sitting at a table together, happy. It was like a dream.