Let Myself Fall (1/2)

[lady_ragnell]

Title: Let Myself Fall
Wordcount: ~20,000
Summary: Nimueh meets an old friend, Ygraine, at the hospital where she's doing her foundation year, and finds herself wrapped up in her life and trying not to fall in love with her when she's already married to someone else.
Content Notices: So much fluff, language, pregnancy, mentions of infidelity, even more fluff.
A/N: So, this happened? I've had the idea for a while, it was meant to be for non_island 's birthday, but now it is several months later. It can be hers anyway, though. Anyway, I hope you will give this a chance even though it isn't A/M, I am quite fond of it. And if you know of anywhere I should be pimping it, let me know!
Disclaimer: I do not own Merlin.

Nimueh leaves the break room five minutes early, mostly for the pleasure of not having to run through the hospital for once, glaring at Balinor for good measure while she goes out, because he gets to leave two hours before she does, the bastard.

The fastest way to the Pediatric Ward is through the prenatal clinic, she’s learned since she started rotation there and one of the long-time volunteers told her, so she walks down the hall, already missing her coffee mug (she’s only had three cups and she has three hours left in a twelve-hour shift. She might not survive). There’s the usual amount of women waiting in the clinic, ready to talk to midwives or nurses or have an ultrasound, everything serene despite the fact that one of the women has a squalling toddler on her lap.

Everything is completely normal, down to the nod and smile from one of the passing midwives, until Nimueh rounds into the corridor that will connect her to the pedes ward and nearly runs down a blonde woman reading over a particularly gory chart on the stages of pregnancy. “So sorry,” she says, mostly on autopilot. “Didn’t expect to see anyone outside the waiting room, are you all right?”

“Yes, fine, no harm done,” says the woman, and when Nimueh gives her an awkward smile and turns away to head on her way, grabs her arm. “Wait, are you-Nim?”

Nimueh blinks at her, because there is a very short list of people allowed to call her that and there hasn’t been a blonde on it since … she stares some more. Eight years, but now that she’s looking, it’s got to be. “Ygraine?” Ygraine’s face lights up in answer, and she’s hugging Nimueh before she can quite process what’s going on.

“Oh my God,” says Ygraine, releasing her a few seconds later and staring just as hard as Nimueh still is. “Look at you!”

Nimueh looks her up and down, eyes catching on the flashy wedding ring and the beginnings of her belly swelling with pregnancy. Of course Ygraine is married. It would be impossible for her not to be. “Look at me?” she says belatedly. “Look at you! Have you been coming to Camelot for your prenatals all along? How have I missed you?”

“No, we just moved to London this week from the north, he got promoted, and so I’m here to meet the staff and schedule an ultrasound.” She smiles and presses her hands over her stomach, and reaches out and grabs Nimueh’s hand. “And you’re a doctor. Just like you always said.”

“Doing my second foundation year, and several years of training to go. I’m run off my feet, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“No, I imagine you wouldn’t.” Ygraine takes her other hand as well. Nimueh had forgotten how easy she could be with touch, and can’t quite get used to it. “I know this is too little, far too late, but I was so sorry to hear about your mother. I didn’t hear about the announcement until too late, and then it didn’t have any contact information for you and since you always used your mum’s e-mail I didn’t know if you would get the message I sent …”

Nimueh shakes her head. “By the time I could make enough sense of everything to realize I didn’t have your e-mail stored they’d deleted her address. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. I’m just so glad to see you!” Ygraine squeezes her hands. “I was here thinking I wouldn’t know anyone in London, since all my school friends are still near Oxford and Tristan is mostly in Paris these days and God only knows what Agravain gets up to, I never dreamed that you would be here.”

The alarm on Nimueh’s watch picks that moment to start its shrill beeping, warning her that she’s due to start rounds in two minutes. “Oh, shit,” she says. “Give me your mobile? Mine’s in my locker, but I’ll give you my number and you can text me yours and we’ll do coffee or something.”

Ygraine releases her at last and pulls out her mobile, which is a great deal newer and less beat up than Nimueh’s. Nimueh just lists her number off, as she has no idea how to do anything with a phone that could probably do more than her laptop can. “I’m not working right now, so really, call me whenever you’re free and I’ll try to arrange to see you. I want to hear everything,” Ygraine says, and kisses her on the cheek before pushing her gently off down the corridor.

Nimueh gives an awkward little wave and trots off down the hall, barely in time to the ward to escape a bollocking.

She denies for the rest of her shift that she’s still thinking about Ygraine squeezing her hands, not to mention kissing her on the cheek. Ygraine, who is married. And pregnant. And still just as gorgeous as she was when they were seventeen and Nimueh was madly in love with her.

*

That night, Nimueh turns up on Balinor’s doorstep with a full bottle of cheap vodka in a paper bag. “I will get you drunk if you listen to me moan and promise not to laugh at me too much,” she says when he opens the door.

“With a proposition like that,” he says, and lets her into his nightmare of a bedsit. His commute to the hospital is a great deal shorter than the one from her neat little one-bedroom flat, but he makes up for the better location with a flat about the size of a postage stamp, with books stacked three deep everywhere and more takeaway containers than should be strictly legal.

“You are going to get some sort of horrible food-related disease and die,” she says, because saying things like that when she visits him has become tradition.

“Have you eaten?”

“Yes. I can’t have liquid supper when I worked twelve hours today. Tomorrow’s my day off, so we get to drink.”

“You’re lucky it’s my late shift tomorrow.” Balinor escorts her to the couch, kicking a stack of books out of his way as they go. Nimueh tries hard not to look at the stained and ripped upholstery as she sits down, and when he’s sat down she hands him the vodka so he can have the first swig. He eyes her sideways. “We’re drinking it straight tonight?”

“Shut up, I had a traumatic moment today. I ran into my old best friend. In the prenatal ward.”

Balinor stares blankly at her for a second, and then his mouth twitches. She glares and points at him, reminding him that drinking her booze was tacit agreement to try not to laugh at her. “Your old best friend who helped you realize you’re gay? She who gave you the penchant for blondes?”

“I hate you, why do I drink shots around you.” Balinor raises his eyebrows and the vodka bottle. “Yes, yes, whatever. The point is that I’m traumatized. Because she is still gorgeous, and she was very glad to see me, but she is also married. And pregnant.”

He pats her knee awkwardly and hands her the bottle, which is the closest he gets to showing affection. She takes a healthy gulp and tries not to cough or think about her liver while he works on his answer. “Well, you knew she was straight, right?”

“We never really got the chance to talk about it. We only saw each other a few times a year, when our parents were presenting papers or at conferences or something, mostly we e-mailed. But yes, I always figured she was straight.”

“Then why is this traumatic?”

“You are rubbish at sympathy. I should have called Alice.” She takes another swig. It doesn’t make the vodka taste noticeably better. “It isn’t traumatic because I’m in--was in love with her, not really. Especially because she didn’t know. It’s more that we were seventeen the last time we saw each other and now she’s married and starting a family and I’m not sure where to begin. I mean, with coffee or something, obviously, but--do you know what I mean?”

He takes the bottle back. “Did you start drinking before you came over?”

“No. Bastard.” She puts a hand over her eyes. “I’m just sort of in shock, I think. I’ve wondered how she’s been doing, since we fell out of contact, but it’s weird seeing it up close. And then there are all these leftover teenage feelings to deal with.”

“I don’t want to hear about your awkward teenage hormones, Nim.”

“You suck at being a straight man, you never listen to me objectify women.”

“That’s because you suck at objectifying them.” He rolls his eyes and takes another gulp of vodka. “And this one is married and pregnant, so you’ll excuse me if I don’t get excited. Besides, blondes aren’t my type.”

“Are you a eunuch? Because I sometimes wonder what your type is.” Anything to avoid the subject of Ygraine for a little while, because the longer she sits there the stupider she feels for getting upset about it. Her best friend is in town, and it shouldn’t matter that she’s married and pregnant. Balinor, thank God, fidgets at that and takes an even longer swig. Nimueh pounces on the opportunity. “There’s a story there, isn’t there? Come on, spill. We may as well be each other’s agony aunts.”

“Misery loves company?” Nimueh takes the bottle back in answer. Another shot or so’s worth and she might raid is refrigerator on the off chance he has some orange juice that hasn’t gone bad. “No, I don’t think I’ll tell you until you tell me what the real problem is.”

Since she doesn’t know quite why meeting Ygraine again is driving her to drink other than the first-proper-crush-being-married thing and Balinor knows it, that’s as effective as a “mind your own business.” Nimueh goes to get them glasses so they can both drink at the same time.

*

Three days later, Nimueh is fidgeting over a cup of horrible hospital caf coffee, on a break unless her pager goes off, when Ygraine plops into the chair across from her ten minutes late, practically glowing with happiness. “I’m sorry,” she says immediately, “they got behind in the ultrasound room and then I had to say goodbye to Uther as he’s going back to work.”

Nimueh picks out the one word from that sentence that she can focus on. “Uther?” Ygraine starts going red. “No, really, Uther? That’s your husband’s name? You’re named Ygraine, your father is an Arthurian scholar, and you married a man named Uther? Tell me that’s your horrible idea of a cute nickname.”

And just like that, Ygraine is laughing and they’re seventeen again. “I know, I know, it’s awful. If it helps, he introduced himself as John, that’s his middle name, and I almost broke up with him so Tristan wouldn’t laugh me to death and my father wouldn’t expire of happiness when I found out. It’s a family name.”

Nimueh crosses her arms. “Ygraine, what are you going to name that child?”

Ygraine is going redder by the second. “Well, we just found out the sex today. If it had been a girl, she would have been Charlotte. But it’s a boy.”

“Oh, no.” Nimueh bites down on a laugh. “No, you aren’t.”

“It’s a nice name!” says Ygraine, somewhere between defensive and grinning.

“And it’s your own fault when all his friends start calling him Wart the second they start watching The Sword in the Stone.” Nimueh reaches across the table and touches Ygraine’s wrist while she laughs. “Congratulations, by the way. On your son. How many people know?”

“The doctor, Uther, me, you. I imagine Uther will tell his business partner when he gets back to the office, and I’ll call Father and my brothers later. If Agravain answers his phone for once.”

“I’m honored.”

“Well, I wasn’t about to miss our coffee date, I know how busy you are.” As if that reminds her, Ygraine takes a sip from her own cup and makes a face. “Is this meant to taste like tar?”

Nimueh considers that, since given the quality of the food that doesn’t go to the patients she sometimes wonders if they’re trying to make it shit. “Um, possibly. I’m immune to it by now, it’s possible I have no taste buds anymore, I should get an examination while I’m here.”

“Really, this is horrible, how often do you drink this?”

“Several times a day, but it keeps me awake so I can’t complain. Too much.” Although she may or may not be the one who started the Facebook group about it. To be fair, though, the entirety of the staff joined it within 48 hours. Including the Chief of Medicine. “Anyway, we’re here to talk about our lives, not about the coffee. For instance, you are married to a man named Uther whose last name I don’t know yet and are about to give birth to the Once and Future King in about four months?”

“Penn, I’m Ygraine Penn now, I should have said that before, sorry. And yes, about four months, how did you know?” Nimueh raises her eyebrows. “Right, trainee doctor, of course.”

“And you said you aren’t working while you’re pregnant the other day, but what will you be doing after he’s old enough? I know you always wanted to be a primary school teacher.”

Ygraine shrugs and takes another sip of her coffee, and she makes a spectacular face. “I don’t know. Uther makes plenty of money. I don’t have to work.”

The eight years of absence rear their ugly head. Nimueh still knows Ygraine’s expressions, and she knows that Ygraine isn’t very happy at the prospect of not working by how blatantly false her smile is, but after so long she has no right to interrogate her about it. “More time with Arthur, then.”

“Yes, precisely.” Her smile goes real again. “And what about you? I imagine you’re busy as anything, working here, but I’ve got my Uther. Are there any Merlins on your horizon?”

Nimueh winces. “Um, no. Not any Merlins. Not likely to be any Merlins.” Ygraine’s look melts into sympathy that Nimueh forestalls with a raise of her hand. “Actually, more likely to be Morgans. If you get my meaning.”

Ygraine’s eyes go wide. “Oh. Oh! That was horribly awkward, wasn’t it? I’m so sorry, should I have known? I don’t think you ever--”

“I wasn’t out, then. It’s fine, really. I just thought I should mention now.”

“I’m glad you did. Otherwise I would have embarrassed myself inviting Tristan to London so I could have you as a sister-in-law and you would be unlikely to disappear again. His girlfriend is perfectly nice but I like you better.” Ygraine pauses. “I suppose I ought to be asking if you have a girlfriend, then.”

“No, not one of those either. I’m at the hospital far too much for all that. And when I’m not in the hospital I am either sleeping or keeping Balinor from drowning in a sea of takeaway containers.”

“Balinor?” Ygraine asks, and they actually get around to catching up properly, Nimueh talking about her time at school and all the mad but lovely people she knows at the hospital and Ygraine talking about meeting Uther in her second year of university when he was in Oxford visiting some former professors and getting married two weeks after graduation, as well as Uther’s business partner (“no, I swear, his last name really is Gorlois and he’s from Cornwall”) and his daughters, the younger of whom is just shy of a year old.

By the time her break is over, Nimueh feels like she’s properly friends with Ygraine again, and she’s somehow agreed to come to a dinner party at her house next week to meet her friends and see Tristan again, since it’s in honor of him coming back to London.

*

“Remind me again why I agreed to do this,” says Balinor, loosening his tie as Nimueh rings the doorbell at the Penns’ horribly posh townhouse.

“I would be all alone in a sea of posh people without you.”

“No you wouldn’t, you’ve got Ygraine. And what’s-his-name, her brother, Tristan.”

“Tristan is lovely, but he is also posh. And Ygraine is lovely, and also posh, and I am a bit afraid that she’s going to turn into some Stepford Wife when she’s around her husband.”

“You owe me so much cleaning,” he says, and Ygraine opens the door.

She’s wearing some sort of sparkly golden cocktail dress that probably cost more than Nimueh makes in months, and Nimueh spares one glance for the red dress she’s been wearing to every nice party she’s been to since her second year at university before being swept inside. Stepford, she has time to mouth to Balinor before both of them are being fussed out of their coats as Ygraine introduces herself to Balinor, reels off the current guest list, and discusses the menu all in one fell swoop.

Nimueh and Balinor are the last to arrive, which isn’t unexpected, as they definitely live the farthest away. Ygraine takes Nimueh’s arm and Nimueh grabs on to Balinor so she doesn’t lose him, and they’re introduced around. Uther is first, of course. He’s a few years older than them, maybe thirty, and a lot more reserved than anyone Nimueh would have expected Ygraine of all people to marry. Tristan shakes hands with Balinor and then pulls Nimueh away from his sister to give her a long hug, smack her upside the head, and tell her that she isn’t to disappear again. Edward Gorlois and his wife Viv are next, and he seems pleasant enough. Viv would probably be pleasant enough as well if she hadn’t started the introduction off with a long stare at Nimueh’s dress, but she talks fondly about her daughters--Morgause, who’s going to be five soon, and little Morgana--so Nimueh can’t hate her entirely. The last guest is Tristan’s girlfriend, Helen, a voice teacher living in Paris but in London to audition for the Opera, thus prompting his visit.

They all sit down around the table after exchanging pleasantries, and Nimueh is relieved to discover that Ygraine and Uther don’t actually have an army of servants for their unreasonably large house, or at least that if they do they aren’t serving dinner. Instead, Ygraine encourages everyone to dish up their meals from the dishes spread across the table and there’s a comforting a clamor of everyone asking for the steamed beans at once and needing the salt or asking for a missing serving spoon. Nimueh is equal parts uncomfortable because she’s been eating standing over her stove or curled up on her couch ninety percent of the time for the last few years and comforted because if she closed her eyes and ignored Uther and Gorlois talking about the stock market, it would almost feel like the family dinners they had before her mother died.

The conversation, thankfully, centers around Tristan and Helen and what they get up to in Paris more than on anything else, because whenever the subject changes from that it changes to business, or occasionally Viv asking Helen something about fashion. Nimueh and Balinor spend those times sitting and fidgeting uncomfortably, which Ygraine seems to notice, judging by her frequent apologetic looks. Nimueh does her best to smile back and elbows Balinor so he stops looking like he’s being martyred.

Five minutes after everyone finishes dessert, when Uther and Edward and Viv put their heads together to talk business and Ygraine and Tristan and Helen start talking about all the places they’ve been in Paris, Nimueh makes up a blatant lie about switched shifts at the hospital and being on call in the morning. Balinor looks grateful, and Nimueh clings to that when Ygraine’s face falls and insists that they really do have to go, she’ll call Ygraine in the week and maybe she and Tristan can do coffee sometime.

“That was a rousing success,” says Balinor when they finally escape and are on their way to the Tube.

“I’m sorry,” says Nimueh, because there isn’t much to say to that.

He pats her on the shoulder. “Your Ygraine seems nice enough, and the brother and his girlfriend aren’t half bad. Just her husband’s a bit of a git, is all.”

“I am cleaning your entire hellhole,” she says, because he won’t accept thanks for restraining himself from going off on a rant about entitled blue-bloods and blatant capitalism, so that’s the closest she can get to it. This time, he squeezes her shoulder, and she knows that means he gets it.

Ygraine calls the next morning while Nimueh is eating breakfast, and interrupts her before she can get more than three words into her polite, practiced speech about how nice dinner was. “That was a bit shit, and I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have let Uther invite Edward and Viv, I imagine you would have been more comfortable without them. I’m usually more comfortable without them, come to that.”

“Balinor has already informed me that he will not be coming next time and I need another beard,” Nimueh says instead of saying that it was quite all right.

For a second, there’s silence, and Nimueh wonders in a sudden panic if Ygraine is offended or not ready to hear jokes about her being gay yet. Before she can backtrack, though, there’s a startled laugh. “He didn’t seem very happy, no. But he did seem nice. Tristan liked him, I think. Fellow Lord of the Rings fan and all.”

“It was good to see Tristan after so long. And Helen seems nice.” She spends a few seconds trying desperately to think of something nice to say about Uther. “And Uther obviously cares for you a great deal, being so excited about Arthur coming,” she settles on at last, because Uther’s a cold fish and unbearably posh but he did bring up the baby at every opportunity.

“It’s all right that you didn’t like him,” says Ygraine, and Nimueh almost inhales a bite of toast. “I didn’t either, when I first met him. Thought he was a stuffed shirt. I do hope you’ll give him another chance, he grows on a person.”

“I will.”

“Good, because you’ve no idea how nice it is to have a sane person around. Tristan and Helen aren’t here for long, and I have every intention of sneaking you on the guest list of every business event I have to go to until Arthur is born, at which point I’ll have an excuse to get out of them.”

“And what do I get out of going?”

Ygraine laughs. “The pleasure of my company, I suppose. Now, when do I get to arrange a less horribly awkward occasion?”

*

Balinor is acting shifty, and has been since a bit before their night of inadvisable vodka, and a week after the dinner party Nimueh figures out why.

It’s been a miserable shift, she’s been at the hospital for more hours than she actually cares to count and has only caught a few short naps in the on-call room and exchanged a few harried texts with Ygraine in between the series of completely shit events that has been her day. She wants nothing more than to go home and sleep for twelve hours straight, but when she clocked out, Hunith, a sweet girl who’s volunteering in the ward for her last summer before uni, was crying on the back staircase after helping with a boy who’d had to be told that his parents had died when their flat burnt down. She figures they might as well be miserable together for a bit, and after she’s changed out of her scrubs and grabbed her purse, she climbs the staircase, only to stop a landing from her goal when she hears voices up above her.

“He was just sobbing,” Hunith is saying through her tears, and Nimueh winces at the memory. It never gets easier, working with children in such awful positions, and Hunith is still new at it.

“He’s got an aunt and uncle who barely left his bedside in intensive care,” comes the soothing answer, and Nimueh almost drops her purse because that’s Balinor. Being soothing. She didn’t think he knew how to be soothing, he’s always being berated for his horrible bedside manner. “They aren’t his parents, but he’ll be taken care of, at least.”

There’s a silence long enough that Nimueh begins to wonder if she should make some noise or announce herself in case they’re about to leave, and then Hunith speaks again around her sniffles. “Thank you. You always help.”

That sounds like the beginning of the end of the conversation, and Nimueh doubts her ability to get out of the stairwell entirely without making noise, so she creeps down half a staircase and then comes up again, louder. Balinor is the one who calls down. “Who’s there?”

“It’s Nimueh.” She climbs up until she can see them, Hunith wiping her eyes and edging away from Balinor, who is trying and failing to look nonchalant. Nimueh gives him her best you-are-not-getting-away-with-this look. It’s hard to intimidate Balinor, as he practices three different sorts of martial arts (she sometimes wonders if he actually sleeps), but she can sometimes manage it. “I thought I’d come and see how you were doing, Hunith, but Balinor seems to have everything under control.”

“You’re lovely for wanting to help, though,” says Hunith, and pats the step above her. “Do you want to sit down? You were there for it too, we can have a pity party.”

Part of her wants to drag Balinor away and ask exactly what he thinks he’s doing, flirting with an eighteen-year-old, but most of her is miserable enough after her shift not to care, so Nimueh climbs up the rest of the way and joins them on the stairs, prodding Balinor on her way so he knows he won’t get away without having some sort of conversation about whatever’s going on. “You handled it well,” she says to Hunith. “The nurses were impressed.”

Hunith just nods, and they spend the next fifteen minutes talking about everything but little Edwin peering out from his mess of bandages and asking why his mum wouldn’t come. “I’ve got to go,” says Hunith at last. “I’m signed up to be here until three, and I don’t want to let anyone down.”

“I should buy some semblance of food before I go home and get some sleep,” says Nimueh, standing up and brushing the dust off her pants. “Balinor?”

“I’m on my long break. I’ll walk you to the door, Nim. It was good to talk to you, Hunith, I hope the rest of your afternoon goes better.”

Hunith smiles at him, so starry-eyed it’s almost painful, and gives them both a wave before climbing the stairs towards the ward. Nimueh waits until she’s out of earshot before turning to Balinor and smacking him on the arm. “She’s eighteen!”

Balinor crosses his arms. “Nothing’s going on. I’m not being a creep, and I won’t break her heart, Nim, I do understand how young she is. She hasn’t even been to university.”

She recognizes the expression on his face, even though she wishes she didn’t. It’s the same one she remembers from the beginning of last year, when he talked about his long-term girlfriend, who then proceeded to shatter his heart into a million pieces when Balinor spent more time at the hospital than with her and she slept with someone else. Hunith certainly isn’t mean-spirited, but she is young. “I’m more worried about you getting your heart broken,” she says.

“Hunith isn’t Karen.”

“I know. I like her a lot better than I liked Karen, too. But she’s eight years younger than you are, and she’s probably not going to want to start a family quite yet. You’re getting there.”

“If it comes to that, we’ll deal with it.”

“It’s hard to stay in love with someone you fall in love with when you’re eighteen,” says Nimueh, and winces because that was crueler than she meant to be.

“You’ve managed it,” he replies, and both of them freeze. She can’t really tell him that was uncalled-for, because she’s overstepping just as much, but she won’t forgive him instantly either. Ygraine is her friend, and she’s keeping it that way; if that means ignoring any feelings she has to the contrary, so be it.

It takes a few seconds to get her voice back. “Right. I’m going home now. Hope the rest of your shift is uneventful.”

Balinor just gives her the hint of a nod and they walk down a few flights of steps in silence before he splits off to go back to his floor and she continues down to go out the side entrance of the hospital.

*

Somehow, Nimueh manages to get herself talked into going to a business party that one of the PenGor Industries investors (and really, that’s a horrible name for a company) is throwing a few days later, after another long shift and no significant contact with Balinor. She gives in to her pride and spends more than she cares to think about from her savings on a dress that she can actually wear to these sorts of parties, since Ygraine seems to have her heart set on having Nimueh around, and doesn’t bother asking Balinor or anyone else to come along to protect her.

That turns out to be a good thing, since Ygraine grabs her arm the second Nimueh makes it into the coat check, exclaiming over her dress and smiling at the bouncer who almost hadn’t let her in. “I’m so glad you’ve arrived. Uther is already off talking to absolutely everyone and I don’t really feel like talking about the new line from Versace tonight.”

“Why do you go to these things, if your date abandons you the second you get here?”

Ygraine shrugs. “It’s expected, I suppose. And besides, you’re my date. Unless you pull, in which case I’ll go back to my husband and listen to him go on about how soon Arthur will be the heir to a business empire.”

Nimueh looks around the party. There are plenty of women, and plenty of them are gorgeous, but most of them are attached to men who are having very serious conversations with each other, and the women who are actually taking part in the conversations look very serious and are wearing conservative, sharp-lined dresses and certainly don’t look like they’re looking for company, even if they are gay. “Probably won’t be pulling, so you’re stuck with me. And is Uther really saying that? Is he going to make the poor boy pull a folder of stocks out of a stone when he comes of age?”

Ygraine bursts out laughing. “God, I hope not. Can you imagine?” She bites her lip. “My father is going to constantly give the poor boy swords and round tables and I don’t even know what else for every holiday even if he turns out to hate sport or business or anything else the Once and Future King ought to be interested in.”

“It’s your own fault, but it’s not too late to change his name. What about Henry, if you’re insisting on his being named after a king? Or Edward, even, Uther seems the sort to name his child after his business partner.”

Hand on her stomach, Ygraine wrinkles her nose. “Henry? Who is named Henry these days? And certainly not, on Edward. I want him to be his own person.”

“And with a name like Arthur considering his parents’ names, being his own person will be terribly easy.”

“I’ll make sure he is, though. Even if he doesn’t want to be part of his father’s company.” She lowers her voice. “Though don’t spread it around, that’s the basest of blasphemy if you ask most of these men.” Ygraine rubs her stomach with the same smile Nimueh saw a hundred times on her gynecology rotation. “He feels like an Arthur, though. I’ll bet he’ll kick like anything.”

“Arthur it is, then,” says Nimueh, because there’s no arguing with that.

Ygraine beams at her, and then takes her arm and starts introducing her around. Most of the men don’t bother to talk to them for very long, which annoys Nimueh more and more every time it happens, but a few are willing to converse for more than a few seconds--Olaf, whose wife can’t be more than nineteen but who coos over her as if he honestly does care for her, for instance, and Godwyn, whose wife actually makes sensible conversation. Nimueh realizes that she’s mentally referring to these women as “so-and-so’s wife” and has to have a glass of wine to console herself for being so incredibly anti-feminist.

It’s hard, she discovers as Ygraine looks pained and makes conversation with yet another woman about something going on in the House of Lords or a new line of shoes or, with the less awful ones, preparations for Arthur’s birth, to not be anti-feminist when the whole assembly makes it so easy. Really, the whole thing feels like a parody of a 50s film, and while Nimueh is sure most of the people really aren’t as vapid as they seem, they don’t act it in each other’s company. It also doesn’t escape her notice that well over half the women in the room are between twenty and thirty, and that well over half of those are blonde, and after that and another encounter with Olaf doting on his bride it doesn’t take long to think the words “trophy wife.” And then after that it takes uncomfortably little time for her to look at Ygraine and remember that she’s blonde, and lovely, and several years younger than her husband. Shit,, she thinks, and hauls Ygraine off to a corner of the room where they can have conversations like normal people.

Uther comes and gets them eventually, and Nimueh makes a point of being polite and friendly and very carefully not thinking the words “trophy wife” ever again while he shows them around and tells anyone who will listen about Arthur being the future king of PenGor Industries.

Even Ygraine looks pained at that.

*

“So, I was a bitch, and it absolutely sucks not talking to you,” says Nimueh as she sits down next to Balinor in the break room.

“You were,” Balinor agrees, because he holds grudges. She hands him the cup of fancy coffee from the café across the street even though she technically shouldn’t have left the hospital. He glowers at it before taking the peace offering. “I was out of line too,” he says at last, grudgingly.

She makes a noise that isn’t quite assent, because out of line he may have been, but he was also right. They let a few minutes pass in silence. “So. You and Hunith.”

“Maybe. Or maybe not. I am aware of her age, no matter what you think.”

“She … seems to want to. At least I got that impression when I saw the two of you.”

He elbows her. “So what the hell was all that about worrying about my heart the other day?”

She suspects that giving a proper answer is going to lead to him going off in a snit again, but there’s no use lying to him, either. She forgoes the long answer about people changing after they’re teenagers, since he’ll just bring up Ygraine again, and uses the short one. “You’re a forever kind of person, Balinor, and not everyone is so quickly, that’s all. Aren’t I allowed to worry?”

“You are. But the way I see it, I’m in a better position than you are right now.” Nimueh flinches, and waits for Balinor to remind her that being in love with a married, pregnant, straight woman is not a good choice and she might want to do something before it turns from a rekindling of teenage affection into something worse. Instead, he sighs and drinks more of his coffee. “How was that party the other night?”

“Fine, once we stopped talking to anyone but each other.” Nimueh takes a sip of her own coffee, which is from the break room coffee maker and doesn’t taste anywhere near as appetizing as Balinor’s smells. “She’s his trophy wife, isn’t she?”

Balinor’s never seen the sense in sugar-coating things. “Probably, yes.”

Nimueh leans back on the couch and moans. “I feel as though I ought to be doing something about it, but I really can’t. If they weren’t married, or even if she weren’t pregnant, I would mention it, but she really does love him and I think he loves her, and it’s really not any of my business anyway.”

“Do you think she doesn’t know?”

That brings Nimueh up short. Ygraine isn’t stupid, after all, and she must see the signs, especially with Uther not wanting her to work. However, she’d also like to think Ygraine isn’t stupid enough to stay if she really is a trophy wife. “I think she thinks he cares about her,” she manages eventually. Balinor just snorts. “Either way, like I said, it isn’t any of my business.”

“You want it to be.”

“Remember how five minutes ago we tacitly agreed to stop fighting? I like that agreement. It means I don’t have to go lurk in Alice’s office on my breaks any longer. Especially as she’s pretending not to flirt with Dr. Gaius from Cardiology and it’s really terribly difficult to stomach. They act more like teenagers in love than you and Hunith do.”

He just keeps drinking his coffee and ignores her brilliant conversational deflection because he’s like a dog with a bone about some things. “You’re going to have to deal with it sooner or later.”

“We’re just barely getting to be friends again, and seeing how much we’ve changed. Once I’ve gotten to know her again, chances are I’ll stop crushing on her. Easy.” Except for how it wasn’t even when they fell completely out of contact after Nimueh’s mother died, and how she always sympathizes a little bit too much with the idiots who sigh and say that you never quite forget your first love. But she’s ignoring that.

“You said the other day that I’m a forever kind of guy,” says Balinor, and she must look horribly miserable after that, because he actually stops. Neither of them attempts another sally for a few seconds, and then Balinor sighs. “So, your flat for an Eastenders marathon tonight? I could use some trash.”

Nimueh tries not to show her relief, though she suspects she fails at that. “Sure, sounds like a plan. Sure you don’t want to go to yours, though? Don’t want you having to get the Tube at two in the morning again.”

“If we go to my flat, we’ll end up cleaning again, so we’re going to yours. You’re cooking, because you’re a bitch and I’m going to get scurvy if I keep eating nothing but takeaway.”

“Then you get to do the dishes because you’re a bastard,” she returns, and leans into him a bit. “Our lives would be a whole lot simpler if I weren’t gay and we could just be in love, wouldn’t they?”

“Maybe. But we would also kill each other pretty quickly.” Nimueh considers that for a moment before conceding his point. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to go back on shift. I’ll come round to your place around seven. Thanks for the coffee, Nim.” And with that, he ruffles her hair and walks out of the break room.

*

For the next month, life falls into a pattern. Nimueh works absolutely horrendous hours at the hospital and reminds herself that she only has a few more months until her foundation years are over (she blatantly ignores the fact that after that she still has quite a lot of training to do before she can be a proper consultant. Balinor is lucky he only wants to be a GP). She and Balinor work their way steadily through his boxed set of Eastenders (she does not ask why he has a boxed set. She suspects she doesn’t want to know) while they very carefully don’t talk about Ygraine and Hunith. And, once or twice a week, Nimueh ends up at some business dinner or cocktail party at Ygraine’s side, trying not to hate everyone but Ygraine for being posh and sexist and talking about nothing but business.

It’s not all bad, though. She likes being Ygraine’s “plus two,” as Ygraine affectionately calls her, because it means she suddenly has her best friend back, and they spend more time talking to each other than to anyone else at the parties, except for the one circuit of the room Ygraine makes with Uther every time. They also tend to meet for coffee as often as they can, and with more of Balinor’s attention being taken up by the thing with Hunith that he’s not talking about, it’s good to have someone she can talk to about things besides the hospital. They make ridiculous plans for Arthur, about how he’s going to have a primary school teacher called Merlin who he’ll learn absolutely everything from, and how he’s going to sleep with Uther’s goddaughter Morgana someday and knock her up (“oh God,” says Ygraine when Nimueh brings that one up, “I’m supposed to have at least sixteen years before I start worrying about that, I’m sure of it”), and how he’ll be the PM someday, or marry into the royal family.

The problem is that Nimueh and Uther cordially hate each other. Most of the time, it doesn’t bother her, even though she knows it bothers Ygraine. Most good friends aren’t fond of each other’s significant others, and most significant others aren’t fond of said friends-they’re simply too jealous of the person’s time. (She ignores the fact that she adores Hunith, and is fond of both Alice and Dr. Gaius. She prefers not to have her points disproved.) Sometimes, though, she admits at least to herself that it goes a bit deeper than that, with her and Uther. When she’s around him and his associates, and sees the way he acts with Ygraine, she can’t stop thinking about that first party, and the words “trophy wife,” and she hates him for turning Ygraine into that when she’s so much better than it, when she doesn’t even realize that’s what she is. She doesn’t know for sure why Uther hates her beyond the usual, but she suspects it has something to do with the way she brings up possibilities for teaching and tutoring jobs for Ygraine whenever she can. And maybe he’s a bit more observant than his wife and has figured out that Nimueh has feelings for her.

“I don’t understand why you two can’t just get along,” Ygraine wails over coffee the morning after Nimueh and Uther spent a whole night trading barbs as sweetly as they could.

Nimueh just barely manages not to say Because he’s an arsehole and I try not to associate with arseholes. Especially as that’s a lie, because Balinor is frequently an arsehole. “We just rub each other the wrong way, that’s all.”

“Tristan doesn’t really like him either,” says Ygraine mournfully. “I know he’s hard to get to know, but he’s really not that bad, I promise.”

“Why do I have the feeling you spent breakfast asking him why he can’t get along with me when Tristan likes me just fine?”

“Lies.” Ygraine grins. “He left before breakfast this morning, so I’ll have to do it at dinner.”

Nimueh groans. “Please don’t. Really, it’s not the end of the world if we don’t like each other. I’m not going to like you any less if I spend time with you alone instead of with both of you.”

Ygraine looks down and rubs her stomach, a habit she’s developed over the past few weeks as Arthur is beginning to move a bit now. “If you say so. I just want so much for you to get on, and I know it’s foolish. Just-I want you in my life as much as possible, now that we’ve found each other again, and he’s my husband, so I wish I didn’t have to keep you separate. Especially with Arthur on the way. I fully expect you to spoil him rotten.”

“Just try and stop me. I am going to be an excellent honorary aunt.”

“Yes, I’ve been wanting to talk to you about that.” Nimueh nods encouragingly. “I know you aren’t religious in the least, but I’d love to have you as his godmother. Tristan’s the godfather. Uther’s a bit miffed that I didn’t pick Edward and Viv, but he’s happy enough about the baby coming that I talked him into it pretty easily.”

Nimueh blinks back an absolutely stupid set of tears. “Of course I will, especially as you don’t seem to expect me to catechize the poor thing. I’d be more likely to hang crystals in his window, at that.”

“I don’t really care, as long as you say yes.”

Nimueh reaches across the table and puts her hand over Ygraine’s. “Like I said. Of course I will. And it gives me an excuse to spoil Arthur rotten.”

*

Balinor decides, when some freak of scheduling gives them both two days off in a row, that they need to go clubbing. Since Balinor hates clubbing, Nimueh is confused by this until approximately thirty seconds after they walk through the doors of Isle of the Blessed, when Hunith bounces up to them in a sparkly top, already half-drunk. “You are going to the special hell,” Nimueh informs him.

“You can’t quote that at me, I introduced you to the show. Good evening, Hunith.”

“The special hell,” she reiterates darkly, and kisses Hunith on the cheek before going to the bar, as she suspects she’ll need to be drunk to spend a night being Balinor’s unwitting wingwoman.

Balinor and Hunith, it transpires, seem to have no plans for the evening besides staring deeply into one another’s eyes and occasionally ordering a drink, but both of them act horrified when Nimueh says she might go home, so she texts Ygraine in hopes of commiseration and goes to the dance floor. Everything on the floor is a haze of Lady Gaga and far too many men’s hands all over her, but it’s been a while since she was out dancing so she ignores that and moves to the beat.

At least until one man grabs her ass and gets pretty insistent about not letting go. She thinks about kicking up a fuss, but it isn’t exactly his fault she likes women, and she’s had a few too many cocktails in between dances, so she half-turns and shouts “Sorry, I’m a lesbian,” over the music.

That, as she might have predicted, brings titters, and the man who was trying to dance with her calls her a cocktease and goes to grind on some girl who looks barely legal. Nimueh shrugs, and is about to go get another drink so everyone will have a little time to remember what she looks like when there’s a throaty laugh from behind her. “Are you actually, or were you just trying to get him to fuck off?” a woman asks when Nimueh turns around.

“Not really any of your business, is it?”

The woman tosses her hair over her shoulder and smiles. “Possibly not, but I’ve been checking you out all night, and I sure wasn’t expecting to meet anyone gay in this club, so if you are, I thought you might want to dance.”

Nimueh eyes her up and down, since the woman is pretty blatantly checking her out as well and turnabout’s fair play. “Sure, let’s dance. I’m Nimueh.”

“Catrina.”

From there, the night gets much better. Nimueh dances with Catrina for the next five or six songs, and when Catrina leans in to suggest they get out to somewhere more private, Nimueh smiles and says her place is close before waving to Balinor and Hunith, who are still sitting at the bar staring soulfully at each other and not doing much else.

She has no illusions that she and Catrina are going to be anything at all, but it’s been a long time since Nimueh had so much as a date, so she’s perfectly happy to bring her up to her flat, which is a bit of a mess, and ignore the memory of Balinor’s raised eyebrows as she left the club to tumble Catrina into bed and do everything she’s been missing out on for months. When they’re both worn out, she manages to mumble something about Catrina staying the night, and takes Catrina’s responding grunt as assent before drifting off to sleep.

In the morning, she wakes to the suspicion that she must have swallowed roadkill at some point in the night and someone knocking on her door. She wiggles out from under Catrina, who apparently is a sleep cuddler and who also has absolutely awful morning breath. And snores. It doesn’t make her list of Top Five Regrettable Nights, at least, though perhaps the Top Twenty if she cared to count that far.

Nimueh staggers out of her bedroom, grabbing her bathrobe on the way, and catches a glimpse of herself in the hall mirror as she goes to open the door, smudged makeup and messy hair and a truly embarrassing love bite that absolutely everyone at the hospital is going to judge her for. She spends a second praying that it’s Balinor at the door, since she has ammo on him in the form of the cow eyes he keeps making at Hunith, before fumbling it open to find Ygraine on the other side with a wide smile and two cups of coffee. She blinks several times, but it’s still Ygraine. “Good morning,” she manages belatedly. “Have I missed a coffee date?”

Ygraine’s smile fades a bit. “I just thought, since you texted last night sounding unhappy, maybe I’d come over so you could complain about it. I suppose I should have waited a few hours, but I assumed you made an early night of it.”

“I was up late, sorry, I look horrible, I know. Please, come in, we’ll do coffee.” And she’ll figure out some way to explain Catrina.

“If you’re sure.”

Nimueh, in lieu of answer, takes Ygraine’s arm and leads her into her kitchen. She’s been to Ygraine’s house several times now, and it’s feeling a bit more natural, but this is only the second time Ygraine’s been to her flat. “It’s good to see you. I was afraid with Balinor abducting me I wouldn’t have time to see you.”

“Yet another reason I’m glad I came. I brought you coffee, by the way.”

“You are an angel,” declares Nimueh, and snatches it out of her hands to take a sip.

Catrina, because this is Nimueh’s life and nothing can be easy, of course, chooses that moment to wander out of the bathroom, in clubbing clothes that look garish and all wrong in the light of day. Ygraine’s mouth drops open and she chokes on her coffee, and Nimueh wishes the floor would open up and swallow her. “Morning, Nimueh,” says Catrina. “Morning, whoever you are. I’ll just be on my way, shall I? Thanks for a good night.”

“Oh, you don’t have to-I mean, if I was interrupting, I can just …” Ygraine trails off and looks at Nimueh helplessly.

“I’m just off on my walk of shame, love, no need to get worried,” says Catrina, waves at Nimueh, and walks out before Nimueh can come anywhere close to mustering an answer to that.

A long, awkward silence follows. “You could have warned me,” Ygraine says at last.

“Didn’t precisely have the time. Um, sorry. It had … been a while. Since I had a date or. Anything.”

“Ah. Right.” Ygraine is bright red, and Nimueh suspects she’s not any better. “So I suppose I won’t ask if the whole night was horrible, then?”

“It wasn’t anything, really. I doubt she even left her number.” Nimueh shrugs. “Not much to say about it. How are you this morning?”

Ygraine lets her change the subject, but Nimueh keeps catching her looking at her oddly during gaps in their conversation for the rest of the morning, before Balinor calls and she has to go off to mock him for mooning over Hunith and be mocked in return.

*

Ygraine is seven months pregnant when she calls Nimueh up one night full of good news. “Edward has a summer cottage in Cornwall, and Uther wants to take me there for a week. Says he knows I’ve been lonely with him working so much since we’ve come to London and wants to reconnect.”

“That sounds lovely,” says Nimueh, even though she suspects it means Ygraine is going to spend the week staring at the countryside miserably without much phone reception while Uther does business by e-mail and mostly ignores her. “When are you going?”

“The day after tomorrow. With me so far along, he doesn’t want to risk being away from London as I get closer to my date.”

“Quite smart. I’ll miss you, but I hope you have a lovely time.” Things are less awkward by the day, so she risks a little bit of honesty. “And I’m glad you’re having the chance to reconnect. You don’t always seem … happy. With the way things are.”

“This wasn’t really what I signed on for,” Ygraine says quietly. “Things have been different, especially since I got pregnant and we moved to London. I wouldn’t trade Arthur for anything, but I’m hoping that this week will get things back to how they were. I want to talk to Uther about working, if nothing else. You’ve inspired me there.”

Nimueh swallows. “I’m glad I have. But I hope you two can work things out this week. How was he before you came to London?”

“He still worked a lot, but when he wasn’t he spent more time with me. These days it seems like Viv and the girls see him more than I do. He’s so fond of little Morgana, and I can’t blame him, she’s sweet for all she can’t sleep a night through, but I hope he’ll stay home more once I have Arthur.”

“He probably will. And at least you know he’s good with children.”

“You’re a better person than I am,” says Ygraine, and Nimueh nearly chokes on her own spit because that is certainly not anything she ever thought she would hear. Ever. “If I were you and I disliked Uther so much I would be finding any excuse to break the two of you up, but you’re encouraging me to fix things.”

“It’s your life. But don’t worry, if you ever hate one of my girlfriends you have the right to say so.”

Ygraine’s tone is a little lighter when she answers. “Then you’ll forgive me for saying that I’m really glad you and Catrina aren’t dating? I only saw her for a few seconds but she didn’t look like the sort of woman I would expect you to date. Not that I’ve actually seen you date anyone.”

“Who has time to date? Not me. And I wouldn’t have dated Catrina. That just sort of happened.”

“Things always do,” says Ygraine. “Next time, you ought to tell me all about it. I’m an old married lady now, I have to live vicariously.”

“And you’ll have to tell me all about your time in Cornwall, as I am too busy at the hospital and have to live vicariously through you. Except don’t tell me about the sex, because I love you dearly but I don’t want to hear about Uther’s cock.” Ygraine chokes on a laugh. “Seriously. You may think I’m joking, but I’m not. I won’t talk about Catrina’s lady parts if you don’t talk about Uther in the same sentence as sex.”

“I really don’t mind if you want to.”

Nimueh snorts. “It’s great that you’re fine with me being gay, but you really don’t have to put yourself out that way. I’ve got Balinor to check women out with anyway.”

“No, I really don’t mind,” says Ygraine, but she changes the subject right after, to what she should pack and what sights she’ll see in Cornwall (Nimueh doubts that there are many sights there. Besides rocks and the ocean, that is), so Nimueh lets the subject drop and pretends to be happy that she’s going off to rekindle her marriage.

*

Nimueh and Balinor are having a movie marathon (consisting of two movies, because both of them have to be up in the morning) when her phone rings. She looks at it automatically, since the hospital might be calling her in for an emergency, and blinks when she sees Ygraine’s name, because she’s meant to be in Cornwall for three more days. “I’ll make it quick, just want to make sure that she and the baby are okay,” she says, and picks up the phone. “Hello, there. Couldn’t wait a few more days to tell me about all the fascinating scenery?”

She gets a sob in return. Then, wavery: “Nim?”

“Shit.” She sits up straight and makes an apologetic face at Balinor, who raises his eyebrows but puts the movie on pause. “What’s the matter? Are you okay?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Are you hurt? Is something wrong with the baby?”

“No. No, he’s kicking something fierce, but he’s all right.” Ygraine laughs, shakily, and it turns into another sob. “Can I-I’m sorry, I’ve no right to ask this and you’re probably working in the morning and it’s nearly midnight, but I’m on a train and I’ll be in Victoria Station in about half an hour. Could you come and get me?”

“Yes. Of course.” Sorry,, she mouths to Balinor, who’s already shrugging into his jacket. He doesn’t even roll his eyes, so apparently it sounds serious to him as well. “I’ll be there as soon as I can. Can you tell me what the matter is?”

“I’m calling you a taxi,” whispers Balinor, and takes out his phone.

“I-I don’t. I can’t get divorced, I’m having a baby in two months.”

Nimueh just barely manages not to screech her answer. “Divorced?” Balinor almost drops his phone while he waits for someone to answer him. “What the hell happened? Did he … did he hurt you, Ygraine?”

“No, he-Morgana.”

“What about Morgana? Is she hurt?”

“Morgana is his,” says Ygraine, and starts sobbing again.

Nimueh sits down hard and shakes her head when Balinor gives her a quizzical look. He holds up both his hands and then points at the phone. Ten minutes. She nods and mouths her thanks as he lets himself out the door. “His daughter? He slept with his business partner’s wife?” She mentally tallies how old Morgana is with how long he and Ygraine have been married. “Less than six months after his wedding?”

“A lot. He slept with her a lot, and I think he still is, except I didn’t ask.”

“He told you that? Is he drunk?” She gets up off her couch and finds a jacket, even though she should probably put on pants that aren’t printed with hippogriffs that she stole off a university girlfriend. She slips on her shoes and stuffs her keys in her pocket before starting down towards the street.

“No, he just … said it, after dinner in the cottage, like it was something I ought to have known already. God, I don’t even know how it came up, but then all of a sudden he was saying he’s very fond of me, like that was some sort of consolation.”

It takes a second for Nimueh to be able to get anything out around her building rage. “He didn’t even apologize?”

“I don’t know if he even realizes … Nim, why did he even marry me, if he doesn’t love me? Where’s the sense in marrying someone just to keep carrying on an affair with someone else?”

Nimueh hates him, and it’s everything she can do not to go off into a spitting rage. The only thing that stops her is the fact that Ygraine needs her, and she doesn’t need to be told he only married her because she’s pretty and a duke’s great-granddaughter, she needs crisis response. “I don’t know. Does he know where you’ve gone?”

“Maybe by now, I’m not sure. I left when he fell asleep, but he might have woken up any time.”

“What do you think he’ll do?”

Ygraine laughs, but it sounds horrible and off across the line. “Probably nothing. Maybe call me and tell me to come home so we can discuss it like adults. He won’t want to make a scene.”

Nimueh fidgets on the street, waiting for her taxi to come in view and trying not to think about how expensive it’s going to be to get across London and back in one. “You’ll stay with me until you figure out what you want to do, and I won’t let him across my threshold unless you say you want him there. Although in that case I reserve the right to break his nose first.”

“Didn’t you take the Hippocratic Oath?” Ygraine probably doesn’t mean her to hear her blowing her nose, so Nimueh pretends it didn’t happen. “And I can’t impose like that, your flat is the size of a postage stamp. You don’t even have an extra bed.”

“So we’ll share a bed. Or if you’re uncomfortable with that, I’ll sleep on my sofa for a while, until we figure something else out.”

“I’m not uncomfortable with it in the least, but I still can’t let you do that. You work so much, you don’t need to be sharing sleeping quarters with a pregnant woman who can’t make it through the night without having to get up three or four times.”

“We’ll figure it out. You’re staying tonight, at least, and I won’t hear any argument against that.” As if by magic, a taxi pulls up the curb and she nearly dives into it, telling the driver to take her to the station of Ygraine trying to object and say something polite. “No arguing. We’ll talk about it tomorrow, but I really don’t mind. It’s not like I have a lot of guests over or anything. You can stay as long as you want, as long as you don’t mind Balinor coming over and throwing popcorn at my television on occasion.”

Ygraine sounds just a bit calmer when she answers. “I suppose it would be silly to say no.”

“Right, exactly. Are you going to be okay if we hang up for a bit? I’ll see you at the station.”

“I’ll be fine. You do whatever you need. And thank you.”

*

Part Two