Feeling like a ghost

He might have been retreating, but he wasn't running. She caught him easily, and he didn't fight back as her fingers locked around his wrist. He stopped, but it was the stillness of marble. He stood with his jaw locked and eyes on the trail they had made coming out, not looking back even at the sorrow in Cordelia's voice.

If there were tears in his voice they had frozen in his throat, and now came out like chips of ice.

"No," he said, words clipped and as precise as the courier ever got. "I didn't tell you why. Didn't get the chance. An' you didn't ask before goin' off on me and tellin' me my 'place' in all this." He swallowed hard, finally turning his head to glare at her, wounded but burying it deep, afraid now to share the pain. "You were more interested in lecturin' me than hearin' me out. Of course I'm upset. I thought... I thought y'thought better of me than that." He looked away again, jaw firming against her tears - and his own. "That's what family is, least for a Seawright. Y'give family a chance before you go castin' judgments on 'em. But you got your opinions an' I got mine. Y'don't need to apologize. It's my own fault for thinkin'..." He paused, the words catching in his throat. Choking. There was blood on the ice but Boreal was the only one who could see it and she stayed high above, distancing from her companion's pain. "Well, never mind. Thank you for bein' honest, Miss Limore. It's good to know where I stand with you."

He pulled his hand away and started walking again, feet crunching lightly over the snow now that he was no longer trying to hide his presence. "The gods ain't fair. Life ain't fair. Y'weren't fair t'me, either. So why am I the only one that has t'be?"

Cordelia

"I do! Tal, I do think better of you. I- I didn't mean to snap. I'm sorry. Please... Just- just don't go like this." Oh how rushed and desperate her words are. Barely restrained, wavering and wobbling as her tears freeze on her lashes, cheeks burned red from the cold. Caido was on the brink of war and the idea of leaving things like this makes her sick. Fear turning her stomach and freezing her blood in her veins.

Still, he withdraws from her and she feels her knees buckle, collapsing into the snow, a sob caught in her throat. "I don't want to lose you, Tal. I didn't think before I said anything and I'm sorry." There are those words again. Sorry, sorry, sorry. It's all she can manage to say. The Shrike was known for many things. Her silence and quiet contemplation being one of them, but she was also steadfast and passionate, quick to jump in and defend those she cared about. Being stuck between two people she considered family tore at her and she struggled, clearly she did, given where she's found herself now.

Say something, something like you love me
Less you want to move away from the noise of this place

He'd steeled himself against their pain - his and hers alike - and set himself to walk away, leaving it behind on the ice. A quick, clean cut, excising the hurt and everything that had caused it: trust, friendship, affection. All the things that made the wound go so much deeper than any stranger could reach.

He took one step and heard her fall. Heard the tears in her voice, and clenched his jaw tight against it--

Deimos, gaze black and hard, face stone, turning and walking away from him.

The memory flashed across his vision and the courier's step faltered.

Stopped.

"I..." He didn't know what to say. Hurt, angry because of it, too proud to turn around but not wanting to inflict on Delia what he had gone through with Deimos. He was a mess of conflicting emotions and he ducked his head, wrapping his arms around himself as he stared down at the snow at his feet, seeking answers it could not give him.

"You stuck the knife in when I was already hurtin' an' I... I don't know what else I can do but go away so it'll stop." He squeezed his eyes shut for a few breaths, then opened them again and inhaled shakily, forcing himself to speak slowly and calmly in spite of the emotions that sent shivers of anxiety and tension through him. "An'... you're not sorry for what you said, are you? Just... just that I didn't react the way y'wanted me to. That I got mad an' hurt instead o' rollin' over an' showin' you my belly." Except... she said she hadn't thought before she'd spoken.

Something he was guilty of more often than not. Most of the time he opened his mouth, really.

His scowl deepened, but it wasn't aimed at Delia as he hunched his shoulders against his own shadow on the snow.

Cordelia

He stops. Thank the gods he stops. Cordelia moves forward on her knees, grasping at his hand as she presses her forehead to his hip, sniffling as she attempts to stifle her tears. The Shrike isn’t sure how to answer him. Of what to say. His question making her draw in a sharp breath because a part of her wasn’t sorry for what she said. She was defending Deimos and Evie, but she didn’t regret that. She did, however, regret not giving him a chance to speak. To explain.

”No, I’m not upset that you didn’t react how I expected. I don’t want you to just roll over and take it.” Cordelia starts, voice still trembling and thick with tears. ”I regret not hearing you out before I spoke. I- I shouldn’t have done that. It wasn’t fair to you.” And she means it. Every word. The Shrike should have waited. She should have let him speak.

She lifts her head, imploring him to turn around with a squeeze of her hand on his, ”I meant what I said about Deimos and his happiness. I’m sorry that it hurt you, but it needed to be said, but more than that, I’m sorry I didn’t give you a chance to explain your side.”

Say something, something like you love me
Less you want to move away from the noise of this place

He finally looked back, starting a little as she grabbed his hand--

And realized only then that she was on her knees. Shit. Even more than her tears her position made him instinctively flinch away from her, though he stopped himself from jerking his hand away again.

He couldn't deal with tears. Now that he could see them he scowled harder, feeling his stomach twist painfully at how distraught Delia was. There was no pretending otherwise now and he clenched his hands into fists against the realization that as much as she'd hurt him, he'd hurt her right back.

He hadn't intended that-!!

But here they were.

Slowly his fingers relaxed as she kept talking, but he wasn't fully paying attention. He sighed, a heavy sound that was almost a groan as he slowly sank to his knees beside her. "Alright, I get it. I'm sorry, too. Just... fuck. I'm still mad but... I don't want you feelin' like this, either." He reached up to rub the back of his neck with his free hand, glowering at a tree past her as he simmered awkwardly in a confusing swirl of unhappiness and uncertainty.

Cordelia

He finally turned around to look at her and Cordelia couldn't help the relief that ran through her when he did. He wasn't leaving. The Shrike sniffled, eyes red and gritty, brows knitted together as she looked up at him. He sank to his knees with a sigh that was more pained than anything, not even hesitating to throw her arms around his neck, squeezing tightly even as he glared past her shoulder at something in the distance. "Can we just... try again? Not even today. Just- just don't want things to be like this."

Cordelia mumbled against his shoulder, holding onto him with a vice grip, not daring to let him go. There was a war around the corner and Halo was going to be left vulnerable. The idea that they might lose each other at any moment once things started made her sick.

All she wanted was for things to be okay.

Just for a moment.

Say something, something like you love me
Less you want to move away from the noise of this place

He hadn't expected her to relinquish his hand only to grab onto the whole rest of him, and Tal wasn't prepared to defend himself.

He wasn't sure he wanted to, either.

He didn't know what he wanted any more.

For the pain to stop. But not to hurt Delia, either. For space and the safety of solitude. But also for the warmth of family and a feeling of belonging. Conflicting wants and needs swirled in his gut and he finally squeezed his eyes closed and brought a tentative arm up to rest against Delia's back.

"I... I don't know. But... I don't want t'fight with you, either," he admitted through another heavy sigh. "I shouldn't have brought it up." A lesson he wouldn't forget anytime soon, at least. "Couldn't care less what most people think. But you..." Caring about Delia and what she thought of him meant that she could wound him in a way few others could, as he had learned today. The words caught again in his throat and he shook his head, swallowing them back down.

"Just... let it go, Delia. I'll figure it out myself," he finally said, letting his cheek rest against her hair as he stopped trying to resist both her apologies and her embrace. "'m sorry, too. For makin' you cry."