Private The Lie of Omission

[Aerik Lechner]

Wearing: This | Weapons: Lightsaber | Knife
TAG: Skadi Lightbane​

The storm never stopped on Dromund Kaas. Rain dragged across the transparisteel in long sheets, blurring the jungle below into shifting shadow. Thunder rolled through the citadel, low and constant. Aerik moved through the corridor without slowing, and those who noticed him coming stepped aside without being told. It was not rank or title that made them move. There was something in the way the pup carried himself that made hesitation feel like a mistake. What happened on Brosi had not stayed there, whether he remembered it or not.

Time had passed since then, enough for the edges of it to dull, and the celebration had come and gone with its weight buried under something easier to carry. He had stood beside her through it, close enough to believe nothing between them had shifted, and he had let her take hold of the wolf without hesitation because there had been no reason to doubt her. Not then, not after everything that had settled between them while he was recovering, when she had stayed and had not pulled away. What had formed between them had felt steady enough to trust.

He had asked her what happened, and she had known.

He reached her door and triggered it without slowing. The panel slid open with a sharp hiss, striking its stop hard enough to echo down the corridor before it cycled shut behind him. The room sealed itself off, leaving only the low hum of the structure and the storm beyond the glass. He did not pace or hesitate. His attention fixed where it needed to, and when he spoke, the word landed flat and direct.

“Why!?”

He did not move after that, and when he continued, his voice stayed level.

“I asked you what happened on Brosi, and you chose not to tell me. You knew I lost control and hurt her, and when I asked you, you said nothing.”

He stepped further into the room, not to crowd her, but because stopping at the door felt like distance he was not interested in keeping.

“You stood there with me after, through that night and everything else that followed, and you still chose not to say anything. That was not your decision to make. I don’t remember doing it. I remember before, and I remember after, but not that, and when I asked you what happened, you said nothing.”

His gaze held onto Skadi, steady and unmoving as the storm rolled beyond the glass. His eyes were aflame with a fire which had never been directed toward Skadi before. She knew what it was, but this was the first time the inferno had been leveled at her.

“You don’t get to stand there with me and decide I don’t need to know, not after everything that has already been put between us. You don’t get to decide what I can carry. If I’m going to answer for something, I will answer for it knowing what it was that I did. I don’t get to choose the consequences that come with the weight of my actions, and neither do you.”

He let the silence sit for a moment before finishing. His voice was quiet now. Sadness hung on the edges of the words which followed.

“Why didn’t you tell me I lost control and hurt her?”

 

[Skadi Lightbane]

Aerik Lechner ​

It had been a long day for Skadi - a day full of training, of tests and studies and more tests, and she was tired and drained emotionally and mentally. Now, she was relaxing in her own apartment, scanning her personal holodevice as she lounged on the small couch in just a simple night shirt and shorts. Outside her window, the storms that raged across the surface of Dromund Kaas, pelted the transparasteel window with rain that blocked her view of the city beyond.

Sitting on the small table in front of her couch, was a steaming mug of tea. She would have preferred ale or mead, but she couldn’t source any of that at the moment - so she made do with what was on offer.

Skadi had just started to zone out, almost ready to fall asleep, when her device chirped with an incoming message. She frowned when she opened it, seeing that it was from none other than Irina. The message was simple, but it filled Skadi with an icy cold sensation of dread.

He knows.​

“Shit.”

Tension coiled in Skadi’s belly, when she felt the Force shift and move around the building she resided in. This wasn’t all that strange or uncommon, as she was surrounded by powerful Force users - apprentices and Sith Lords alike. But this sensation that brushed against her awareness, felt familiar.

She didn’t even have time to throw a robe on over herself to hide the fact that her night clothes left little to the imagination, before the door to her apartment slid open with a hiss and the familiar body and presence of Aerik Lechner barged in.

Skadi did not move from her place on the couch, even when he entered with fire in his eyes and darkness flowing through his presence. She did not rise up on her feet, though her golden eyes settled upon him as she quietly set her device down on the table beside her mug of tea that she hadn’t even drank from yet. Behind Aerik, the door sealed itself shut - shutting him inside her apartment and away from curious, prying eyes.

It was just the two of them now.

She did not greet Aerik, she knew that any such greeting would fall on deaf ears at the moment. So - she waited, with the patient stillness of a hunter for its prey to make its move.

“Why?!” was the first word out of Aerik’s mouth, landing flat and direct. Skadi didn’t answer him, not immediately. She knew he had more to say, more to vent, more to throw at her. So she waited and watched as he stepped further into her domicile.

“You stood there with me after, through that night and everything else that followed, and you still chose not to say anything. That was not your decision to make. I don’t remember doing it. I remember before, and I remember after, but not that, and when I asked you what happened, you said nothing.”

He didn’t have to tell her what he was going on about, she already knew. Irina’s warning message had clued her in. She knew why he was here, and what this was about. She was not going to run from this, but face it like the shieldmaiden she’d been trained to be.

Aerik’s eyes held her own, and she did not look away from him, she wouldn’t. In the silence that fell between them, a loud roar of thunder rattled the window, its red light flickering through her sanctuary. Still, she waited for the young Wolf to continue, and he obliged as the fire in his eyes burned brighter.

“You don’t get to stand there with me and decide I don’t need to know, not after everything that has already been put between us. You don’t get to decide what I can carry. If I’m going to answer for something, I will answer for it knowing what it was that I did. I don’t get to choose the consequences that come with the weight of my actions, and neither do you.”

He fell silent for a moment as his words settled, before he added with a sadder lilt to his voice: “Why didn’t you tell me I lost control and hurt her?”

The Valkyri was silent for several longer moments, simply watching Aerik. The idle thought that this was his first him being in her apartment surfaced in her mind, and she was a bit miffed that he had come because of this, but she pushed that thought aside and shut it away.

Finally, she stirred. She reached out and picked up her mug of tea and sipped it, enjoying the bitter tang of it on her tongue for a moment, before she set it down.

“I did not tell you, Aerik, because I was not the one who you injured. Irina was. And while you can stand there and tell me what I can or cannot decide to tell you, I still stand by my decision on the matter. I could have told you, yes. But it was not my place to do so, not at the time. This was something that occurred between you and Irina, and I respect both of you enough to not take away an opportunity from either of you, to discuss such a matter.” Skadi fell silent for a moment and searched Aerik’s face - but she continued before he would have the chance to cut her off.

“When I was with you, when you were healing, I was operating under the assumption that Irina had not told you about what had happened already. I kept my silence when you asked and shifted the conversation, because I felt that it would be better for you to hear what happened from her, before you heard it from me. Now that I know that you know, I can tell you what happened. But it sounds to me like you already do.”

She shifted on the couch, carefully unfolding her bare legs and swinging them over the edge of the couch so she was in a sitting position. She gestured to a single chair at a table nearby and said, “Sit with me, if you wish. I have a feeling you have much more to say on this matter, ja?”

 

[Aerik Lechner]

Wearing: This | Weapons: Lightsaber | Knife
TAG: Skadi Lightbane​

“Yet you were the one who stopped me. You were the one who kept her alive.”

His words still carried an edge, even as the anger behind them settled. The sharpness remained. Skadi had given him an answer, and it had been a reasonable one. That irritated him more than it should have. She should not have been so calm, and there should have been something in her response that pushed back against him. Instead she met him evenly, and that took some of the fight out of him in a way he did not like.

Even without bringing a chill into the room, she still knew how to settle him.

Aerik sat and ran his hand through his hair before looking up again. His attention caught on the state of her attire, or what little of it there was, and the reaction came and went quickly, a brief flush crossing his face before he forced it away. The thoughts that followed were not appropriate for the moment, and he shut them down as soon as they surfaced. It was subtle, but she had not taken her eyes off him, and he knew she would notice.

He allowed a faint smile, more to steady himself than anything else.

“She warned you, didn’t she?”

The question carried less force than the others, but it did not lose its weight. He should have been more upset than he was, but the fact they were standing here speaking at all, considering what happened when Irina found Skadi in his apartment, was not something he dismissed. It left room for something to be repaired, and he held onto that more than he expected.

His frustration remained, but it had shifted. It was no longer about what happened. It was about what had been decided for him. He had been recovering, but that had never meant the truth was not his to carry.

Aerik’s gaze moved through her quarters, taking in the details. It was what he expected, though there were small touches that surprised him. He did not linger on them, but he noticed.

“I don’t understand why either of you thought I couldn’t handle the truth. When she finally showed me, when I pressed for it, I almost left.”

He let that stand.

There was more he could have said. The memory of that night came back in pieces, blurred by drink and dulled by everything that followed, but enough remained. Irina had told him why she left and what led to it. Some of it had not been meant for him, but he knew it anyway.

He looked back at Skadi.

“Rin told me everything. Even what the two of you were talking about while Torvald was getting me drunk.”

His gaze moved over her, this time without distraction, taking her in as he had not allowed himself to before.

Skadi was beautiful.

“Was it bad, the injury?”

 

[Skadi Lightbane]

Aerik Lechner ​

Skadi did not deny his edged words because it was true. She still sometimes dreamt of that awful day, when Irina’s blood stained her hands. But they were all alive, and in the greater scheme of things - that was all that mattered.

She watched as Aerik took her offer of a seat and ran a hand through his hair. She saw the moment he looked back at her, and the flush of red that crept into his face. Her eyes flickered briefly to the cloak that was hanging up by the door he had burst through only moments prior, but made no move to get up and grab it.

Aerik gave her a faint smile, the heat to the fire behind his eyes dimming - though it wasn’t completely gone.

“She warned you, didn’t she?”

Skadi had no reason to lie to him, and she really didn’t want to. “I received a message only moments before you came through the door. All she said was, ‘he knows’.” A small smile played at the edges of her lips for a moment, before she leaned forward a little bit to pick up her tea mug from the small table that stood between them. She gave him time and space to say whatever else he wanted or needed to say, choosing not to fill the space with empty words - or things she would regret saying, again.

She had learned that lesson by now, from her last interaction with Irina - the same night she hand danced with a very drunk Aerik, and even had the honor of riding astride his back in his wolf form.

She could understand why her omission of the truth would hurt him so. He had let her in, and when he asked for the truth, she had withheld it.

Skadi watched how his eyes roamed over her quarters; it was sparsely decorated, but the layout was reminiscent of a longhouse - as close as she could make it be like one, in the urban sprawl that was Dromund Kaas. She even had wooden statues that she had carved to represent the major deities of her family’s faith. A taste of home, a small act of defiance against the orders their shared Master had given her.

The Young Wolf’s eyes returned to her, and she met them with the same bold fearlessness she had always carried in his presence. She was unapologetically herself before Aerik - and no amount of heat or anger towards her would change that.

“I don’t understand why either of you thought I couldn’t handle the truth. When she finally showed me, when I pressed for it, I almost left.”

Skadi blinked, hoping that he might catch on to the words he had just said to her. He didn’t understand why…and yet, he answered his own question in the next breath as to the ‘why’. She had things to say about that, but before she could, Aerik had shifted his gaze back to her once more.

“Rin told me everything. Even what the two of you were talking about while Torvald was getting me drunk.”

Truthfully, she wasn't surprised to hear this. She expected Irina to say something to him about what she had said. Skadi still had not heard back from Irina about that particular discussion, and she wondered if she ever would. She was pulled from her thoughts when she watched as his gaze dip from her own and then drift over the rest of her. The notion that he was looking over her didn’t disturb or bother her and she didn’t say or do anything to stop him.

“Was it bad, the injury?”

Skadi crossed one leg over the other, a decidedly lady-like posture that had been ingrained in her since she was a very little girl, when seated beside her mother in the Great Hall before the Clan. At first, she didn’t answer Aerik’s question - she was remembering that fateful day, the battle that had been raging all around them.

“Yes. She lost a lot of blood, but I and a field medic from her own team were able to stop the bleeding in time, and save her arm. I would have continued to render her aid, but she pushed me away and told me that I needed to stop you. And I did as she asked me to. The White Wolf and I both did.”

The Valkyri took another drink of her tea, and finally tore her eyes away from Aerik's face. She appeared contemplative, thoughtful. She licked her lips absentmindedly, as her eyes stared into the steaming contents of her mug. After a moment, she returned her gaze to him.

“I do want to address your earlier question - why you don’t understand why either myself or Irina thought you could not handle the truth. You already have your answer, Aerik. Did it not occur to you that perhaps, the reason why neither of us were willing to tell you, is because we were afraid you would leave us?” She paused, letting that settle, before she continued.

“When you learned the truth - that you had hurt one of your packmates in a fit of primal rage - Aerik, I know you. Not as well as she does, perhaps…but I know that had you learned of the truth sooner than what you had…you would be gone. You would have cut us out, put distance between us and yourself…in an attempt to protect us.” Her eyes sharpened then, like flint.

“I withheld the truth from you, because I knew that had you come by it before the gods willed it - you would have hurt us more by walking away than your ulf’s fangs ever could. I do not regret holding it back from you.”

She took another drink of her hot tea, and her eyes glittered with some sort of inner fire, a challenge. “You wanted the truth, now you have it. If it angers you, then let it be so. Your wrath will not chase me away. And if you try to walk away to protect me from your inner beast, I will chase you down.” Her smile returned, mirroring the challenge that danced in her eyes.

"And let me guess...Irina said the same thing to you as well?"
​

 

[Aerik Lechner]

Wearing: This | Weapons: Lightsaber | Knife
TAG: Skadi Lightbane​

All the pup could do was nod in response to Skadi’s answer. He had seen the bite mark that permanently marred Rin’s flesh. Bacta had done what it could and had repaired much of the damage to her shoulder, but the wound had been too deep to heal without leaving its mark. Aerik did not need to see it happen to understand how bad it had been. What remained told him enough. The scar would fade with time, but it would not disappear.

The fact that Torvald had helped stop him was not lost on the young pup. That was a conversation he would have to have as well, and he already knew how it would go. There would be some remark about respecting older wolves, something about how the White Wolf could still drink him under the table, and then the offer of mead. There would be no real discussion, only tankards set in front of him until resistance stopped mattering.

Torvald would not press him for answers. He would simply wait him out.

Skadi pressed in a different way, but it was no less direct. Her words carried the same truth Irina had given him, even if her tone and cadence were her own. She had been blunt about it, just as Irina had, and about the resolve he already knew he carried. There was nothing in it he could argue with, so he did not try.

“You would all be alive,” he said, the rebuttal weaker than he intended.

All of them knew he would try to put distance between them until he found some measure of control, and all of them had already decided they would not allow it. Skadi said as much, and she had been right to assume Irina had said the same.

“Yes, she did.”

His voice lowered, quieter now, as though the admission had cost him something small but real. That was how it worked between them. They knew each other too well to pretend otherwise. Irina would always meet the fire head on because it was what she understood. Skadi would remain steady and clear in how she saw things. Aerik would try to hold himself in check and fail when it came to those he cared about. He had done it since he was young, and his siblings had known it long before he did.

“It seems that the wisest thing for me to do is to shut up and listen.”

Aerik let out a quiet chuckle, and something lighter surfaced in his expression. A hint of challenge flickered behind his eyes as he met her gaze, as though part of him wanted to see if she would follow through on what she had implied. His attention shifted briefly toward the door before returning to her. The thought crossed his mind to make a run for it and see if she would catch him, but he let it pass.

There were other things between them that had not been settled.

What they were to each other still had no clear answer. She was his partner, his fellow student, his packmate, but the question of whether she was more than that remained. Irina had not let that go, and neither could he. It was not fair to any of them if he continued to ignore it. The silence stretched just a moment too long before he broke it.

“Skadi.”

Her name settled between them, quieter than before, but it did not ease the tension. His gaze held on her.

“Rin asked about other things. What were the two of you trying to figure out before I interrupted you. She told me her side of it. I want to hear yours.”

It was a simple request, but he meant it.

 

[Skadi Lightbane]

Aerik Lechner​

Aerik nodded quietly as she spoke, a silent agreement or at least an understanding that she was not wrong in what she had to say. He did give a rebuttal of sorts, the argument that they would all be alive, but came out weaker than perhaps he had intended it to be. He also confirmed that yes, Irina had said something similar to him as well.

Skadi huffed a soft laugh. “I had a feeling she did.” she replied lightly, noticing how his voice had dropped lower, quieter. She was tempted to argue his prior point - that they would all be alive, but she decided against it. Yes, they would - but at what cost? Skadi felt, truly, that she would rather her loved ones kill her body, than kill her heart.

“It seems that the wisest thing for me to do is to shut up and listen.”

Skadi smirked playfully, an attempt to help further lighten the atmosphere from how it had been when he had barged into her living quarters. “Sometimes, yes. The wise listen, and are slow to speak.”

She noticed the glint of challenge rise up in his eyes, responding to her own challenge leveled against him just moments prior. His eyes flickered to the door, and her body subtly tensed. She almost hoped he would make a run for it; she relished the idea of being able to put action into her words. But, he remained seated where he was, and the moment passed by.

Alas, maybe another time…

For several moments longer, Aerik was quiet. He seemed contemplative, as if he had something on his mind that he hadn’t quite committed to speaking about yet. That changed, however, when he softly called her name, and Skadi’s full attention settled upon him, sharp and intent. His eyes held hers, as he finally spoke what was on his mind.

“Rin asked about other things. What were the two of you trying to figure out before I interrupted you. She told me her side of it. I want to hear yours.”

For the space of several heartbeats, Skadi was silent on the matter. She thought back to that conversation she had had with Irina on Brosi, during the celebration - just before a very drunk Aerik had stumbled upon them. She still regretted saying the words she had said to Irina, but there was no taking them back now.

And now Aerik was asking her about it too. She would not run from it, even though she shifted almost uncomfortably in her spot on the couch.

“I...had said some things that I probably should not have. Not at the time anyway. But I will try to answer your question to the best of my ability. When you came upon us, I had just told her that I knew we both felt strongly for you, and that neither of us were going anywhere…and I felt it would be wise for her and I to figure out to best way to move forward with that knowledge so we can operate as a unit, a pack. She …did not take it very well. It confused and upset her.”

Skadi looked away from Aerik and down at her hands, idly playing with a loose thread at the hem of her silken night shirt.

“You want honesty, and truth. And I will give it to you. I know that Irina feels strongly for you. She wants you. Her jealousy comes from that place where she wants you all to herself, and I do not blame her.” Skadi paused and inhaled a deep breath, before lifting her eyes back to Aerik’s.

“I also feel strongly for you, Aerik. Not just as my partner, my packmate. More than that. I foresaw the issues that would come from this, that is why I offered to step away. To…kill the desire I have for you. I did not want to do that, but I also did not want to come between you and Irina. You told me that you did not want me to step away, that you needed me, though I believe you meant that in a different way than how a man needs a woman - though I am not so sure about that."

"You have not turned down my flirtations, have not shut me down or outright rejected me, so I have moved forward with the idea that perhaps you do feel something for me in return. So that was what I was trying to figure out with Irina that night on Brosi, at the celebration. I was trying to find a middle ground, where all of us were on the same page, there was no mystery, no ‘what ifs’.”

Skadi sighed heavily and fell silent, allowing her words to settle between them, and giving Aerik time to process them, and ask whatever questions he needed to. She hoped he would ask questions, or perhaps shed some light on the matter at hand. Anything to help her move forward, to navigate this situation that had vexed her since the moment she had laid eyes on him, and the moment she learned that Irina shared a place in his heart too.

 

[Aerik Lechner]

Wearing: This | Weapons: Lightsaber | Knife
TAG: Skadi Lightbane​

The truth was often a hard thing to hear. Aerik had learned that when Quinn Varanin told him their relationship needed distance. He had become too close, or Quinn had allowed it. When she told him she was dangerous, Aerik had not wanted to accept it, and yet the truth did not change simply because he wanted it to be different.

In many ways, Skadi and Rin wanted the truth of the situation between them to be different. It would have been easier, far less complicated, if Aerik had not been in their lives, and yet both of them had made it clear they would not let him walk away. The way Skadi said it stayed with him.

His distance would hurt them more than his fangs ever could.

Rain dragged across the transparisteel in long, uneven sheets, the sound steady and constant as it pressed against the structure.

Aerik listened intently. Skadi’s honesty explained why Irina had left the celebration. It would be a conversation she might never be ready for, or one that would push her to embrace the fire jealousy could stoke. That path would be easier. It would also be the one most familiar to her.

The pup shifted slightly, restless. He was being forced to face things he would rather hide behind discipline and control. It would be easier to choose, to draw a line and hold it. Perhaps the simplest path would be to tell Skadi to stop, to make it clear her advances were not wanted.

It would be a lie.

Just because the pup struggled to name what he needed from Skadi did not mean his desires were unclear. If anything, they had only become more obvious. Seeing her now, with less distance between them than ever before, made that impossible to ignore. The attraction was undeniable. That had never been the question. Irina had not asked if it existed. She had already assumed it did. That certainty unsettled him more than he expected.

Why did it feel like a betrayal?

Thunder rolled through the citadel, low at first, then closer, the sound carrying through the walls before settling.

Aerik and Irina had not made any promise to each other. Skadi had not asked for anything beyond honesty. Still, everything felt uncertain, and what he knew with clarity was that he needed his pack. He needed them both. Whether that need was the same for each of them did not seem to matter to him.

It did to them.

“When I talked with Rin, she kept saying she knew she would have to share me, but she didn’t know how much of me that meant. She is jealous of the proximity you have, the fact that you see me nearly every day. I know she is afraid of losing me, even though I have made it clear I have no intention of letting that happen again.”

He was speaking about Irina, but the promise extended further than that. Maybe he was trying to give shape to what Skadi had already said. There was a need to be honest, even if he could not define what he felt with the same certainty he had with Irina. He knew enough to understand that he loved the one he had injured. Yet as he looked at Skadi, he knew he had injured her as well.

Her heart was in pain.

Rain struck harder against the glass for a moment, the rhythm shifting before settling again.

It had not been easy for her to stop him. It had not been easy to stand between him and Rin. What mattered was that they were all still alive, and Irina had made one thing clear. He would learn control because he was too determined to hurt those he cared about. Whether it was love or something else, Aerik knew he cared for Skadi. That truth did not need refinement.

They belonged to him.

“I don’t just need you, Skadi. You’re right. I haven’t pulled away from you, even knowing what it is you want. I care for you. You know I’m not good at naming my feelings…”

Aerik fell quiet for a moment. Outside, the storm pressed closer, the rain intensifying as it dragged across the transparisteel.

“…but I do know what desire is. I know what I want when I look at you. I also know it is not fair to you or to Rin…”

Thunder followed, louder now, the sound carrying through the walls and settling into the space between them. The storm did not break, but it shifted, the downpour easing just enough to trade force for persistence as it continued across the glass.

Whatever the consequences, he said it. It was the same truth Irina already knew. Skadi likely knew it too. It seemed they both understood him better than he understood himself.

 

[Skadi Lightbane]

Aerik Lechner ​

Aerik was quiet as she spoke, listening to her every word. Outside, the storm battered the city, the Citadel, her windows - but she had grown accustomed to it by this point. Sheets of rain splattered against the window, momentarily taking her focus away from Aerik and to the storm that raged outside. She watched the flicker of red lightning for a moment, heard the distant roar of thunder, before she returned her focus back to Aerik.

The young man shifted in his seat, restless. She knew that such frank discussions about feelings and similar things were uncomfortable for him, and though she didn’t outright show it to him, it was uncomfortable for her too. Not because she didn’t want to talk about these things, but because she was new to it all.

Aerik was the first man she had ever felt attraction for, and where she came from - attraction was not what built relationships, not at first anyway. It was often the last thing considered between matches. But such was the way of her culture, her people.

When she had finished saying her side to the story that he had asked for, there was a moment of silence while he digested it. Then it was his turn to speak on the matter, and Skadi listened to what he had to say - though if she was being honest with herself, she felt both eagerness and dread to hear it.

Her heart could either be broken in these next few moments, or given the confirmation she’d been longing to know, to hear.

“When I talked with Rin, she kept saying she knew she would have to share me, but she didn’t know how much of me that meant. She is jealous of the proximity you have, the fact that you see me nearly every day. I know she is afraid of losing me, even though I have made it clear I have no intention of letting that happen again.”

Skadi felt a ripple of relief trickle through her; it appeared that Aerik was choosing to face this head on and discuss it, instead of brushing it under the rug again. To hear that he and Rin had discussed this did not come as a surprise, she had hoped they would, and for now Aerik was the bridge between her and Irina - even though Skadi despised that it was so. It would just take time for the two girls to get on the same page with one another, and in the meantime that meant that Aerik would have to be the one between them. If Skadi could have things her way, she would eliminate the need for him to be the bridge. She had always been one to face challenges and struggles head on, but with Irina…she couldn’t do that. The fire that burned inside the other woman was too powerful, her anger too easy for her to grasp.

A useful tool for a Sith, for certain. Not so useful when matters of the heart were needing to be discussed.

“I don’t just need you, Skadi. You’re right. I haven’t pulled away from you, even knowing what it is you want. I care for you. You know I’m not good at naming my feelings…”

Aerik fell silent for a moment, and Skadi did not fill the silence with words as she could tell he had more to say. She waited, though her heart was now hammering faster in her chest.

“…but I do know what desire is. I know what I want when I look at you. I also know it is not fair to you or to Rin…”

Skadi lifted her golden eyes back to Aerik’s, searching them and his face as his words settled over her. So he did want her in the way she wanted him… The admission should have made her leap for joy, but she remained subdued. Not because she was unhappy - far from it - but because the last part he had said fell over her like a ton of rocks.

Not fair to her or Rin.

…where did she go from here? Where would they go from here?

The only thing she could do…was be blunt and honest.

The temptation to destroy whatever attachment had been growing between her and Aerik rose up fiercely - it would hurt, but it would solve this…problem of fairness. That war waged in Skadi’s eyes, upon her face. The struggle between bridging the gap further, fighting through all of this in hopes of a better outcome in the future…or saying those words that she knew would destroy not only herself, but Aerik too.

But she couldn’t do that…not to him. She was willing to shatter her own heart, she would in a heartbeat…but she could not do that to him. She knew then that the only way for that to happen, Aerik choosing a side - would be if he drew a line in the sand.

She tore her eyes away from him once more and down at her hands. She was silent for longer than she really wanted to be, as she tried to find a way forward in this.

“...The easiest way out of this would be for me to just…step away, to kill that which I feel for you and bury it so deep that it can never be found again.” Skadi paused for a heartbeat, her voice lower and now edged with pain as she lifted her hands to rub her temples, as if trying to chase away a growing headache. “But I do not want to do that. I do not want to let you go. You are the first man I have ever been able to have feelings towards - the first man that I pursued for myself, because I wanted to.”

When she lowered her hands back into her lap, Skadi’s expression was hollowed, her eyes distant. For a moment, she stopped existing inside her apartment, and was transported back to the cold and snowy world of Toola, to her Father's Hall...to the smoke and the mead and the rumble of voices that made decisions on her behalf, as if she was but an item to be traded around.

“I ran away from home because my Father was going to force me to marry a man I did not want. A cruel man...all for the sake of an alliance to end a blood feud. I thought that if I fled…and found someone that I wanted, that I chose for myself…that I would be spared from that. And I could become something that I chose for myself...not something that was decided for me.” she confessed quietly to nothing in particular, the truth spilling out before she truly realized what she had just said. And when she realized it, it was too late to take her words back. Her face paled as the truth settled in the space between them, and she found that she could not even bring herself to look at Aerik - afraid of what she might see, now that he knew the truth. ​