Storm Warning - Mercedes Lackey [61]
“Is there somewhere up here we can go to sit for a while?” she asked quietly, as the tears began again. He waved vaguely to the right, and she supported him as she steered him away from the staircase and into the sitting room with its view from among the tree branches. She helped him down onto a cushion and sat beside him, still holding him, until his shaking stopped.
“Let’s start over,” she said quietly as the sun set somewhere beyond the trees, and thick, blue dusk gathered about them. “You were obviously tired, out-of-sorts, and we thoughtlessly came trampling in to destroy what little peace and quiet you had. That put you further out-of-sorts, right?”
He nodded, his stomach churning, only half of his mind on what she was saying. How could any of this matter now?
“Then, already unhappy and angry with us, you thought that Firesong was trying to seduce Darkwind. What you really saw was just Firesong teasing someone who is a good enough friend to tease back.” He heard a definite tone of wry amusement in her voice. “I was told by a-a Shin’a’in friend that Hawkbrother teasing usually involves a lot of innuendo and flirtation. She told me that I might as well get used to it, since it’s as stupid to get upset over something they grow up with as it would be to become upset because birds fly. So—I got used to it, and I’ve been known to give as good as I get.”
“S-s-so I’ve got no choice but to get used to it, too?” he said, with a touch of anger getting past the tears, momentarily distracted from his deeper and weightier fears.
He felt her shrug. “If you don‘t, you’re only setting yourself up for more pain,” she replied logically. “An’desha, I don’t know if you’ve ever felt strongly about anyone before, but there is one thing you had better get into your head right now. You don’t go into a pairing intending to try and change someone to suit you. They were themselves long before you came along. You do go into a pairing ready to compromise.”
He shook his head numbly, his entire soul rebelling at the idea that she thought his troubles were no more serious than simple hurt feelings, and once again she divined what he meant though he could not say it.
“Huh ... it’s not that?”
He nodded, then shook his head helplessly.
“It’s not that, and it’s more than that?”
He sniffed, and nodded.
She paused for a moment, and thought, her brows creased. “All right. I’ll start with what’s simplest. Now, listen to me and believe me. Darkwind and I are lovers, partners, and friends; there isn’t much that is going to come between us, and Firesong knows that. He also knows that I am not Tayledras, and that I would be very, very hurt if what you saw and heard was anything other than friendly teasing. So does Darkwind. That’s one of the compromises we’ve made.” Then she laughed dryly. “More than that, he knows that there is a very real possibility that he would be very, very hurt as well—physically! I have quite a few faults, An’desha, and I have a very bad temper. I do not care to share Darkwind with anyone, and I will not be humiliated, especially in front of others. If I thought that was going to happen, well, someone would need a bandage or splint.”
“Oh,” was all he could say.
“So—for the answer to the situation that made you angry in the first place and triggered all this, if I don’t have a reason to feel jealous or humiliated, and I’m the most jealous wench in Valdemar, certainly you don’t!”
Uncertainly, he rubbed at his burning eyes with the back of his hand and coughed. A certain Shin’a’in proverb sprang immediately to mind. Not a flattering one, either. “But they say that the—”
“The lady is always the last to know.” She snorted, a most unladylike sound. “Yes, but ‘they’ don’t reckon on bondbirds and Companions, both of whom would tell tales, I promise you. Vree doesn’t much care for Firesong’s bird Aya, and he likes me and Gwena both; he’d babble like a scarlet jay either to me or to her if Darkwind got up to something with Firesong that I didn’t know about.”
An’desha wiped his eyes again. It certainly sounded logical. “But—”