Apologies

[roughforkisses]

It is hard to sleep when one feels guilty. After the encounter with Marian, Silence had gone home and prayed, and thought, and prayed some more, and slashed at some perfectly innocent branches, gone for a ride, and finally killed a small dinosaur out of sheer frustration. As there are no Crusades to run off to, on the island, nor foreign kings to

Comments

[rebellious_lady]

In the same vein, Marian had not slept much either. She had spent hours with her rosary, whispering to herself, trying to avoid her thoughts. It was only so successful and she kept thinking back to when he had pulled away from her, the look he had given.

When he came upon her that day she was training. She had her sword wrapped in material and was lobbing it against the pell in a vicious but calculated manner. the tunic and skit she was wearing did not impede her movement much, though she had considered putting on her Nightwatchman's garb that day.

His words pulled her out of the place she was, but the look she gave him was cold. "My Lord," the same words she had said a day ago, and yet an age in the difference of their meaning. "How can I assist you?"

[roughforkisses]

It disappoints him, that look, but does not surprise him. After all, most of his experience with women has been so, that they might one moment want a kiss, and the next want your head if you refuse them. He had not expected it of Marian; he supposes he should have.

"I came to apologise to thee," he says stiffly.

[rebellious_lady]

"You have no need to apologise. It was I that overstepped the bounds of what is proper. I should not have treated you as such, and for that I'm sorry." Marian looked away, unwrapping her sword to put it away. "It is nothing to do with you."

[roughforkisses]

"It is," Silence counters, softly but firmly. "And I would not lose our friendship over such a thing. I am afraid I have treated thee ill, but if thou wouldst consent to hear a short tale, I might explain."

[rebellious_lady]

It is the flower that he is still holding that makes her pause and meet his eyes. "I would not either," she admits finally, motioning to the benches outside of her hut. "Would you sit?"

[roughforkisses]

He does, sinking onto one of the benches and holding the white flower out to her wordlessly.

After a moment he begins to speak, haltingly, as if he is not certain he knows what to say--which is true, really, for he promised years ago he would never reveal this to any soul.

"I told thee once," he begins, "of the war, in my England, between the men who married twins. And how the king decreed from that point forward that daughters could not inherit their father's lands."

[rebellious_lady]

Taking the flower, she nods to show she is listening, her sword laid carefully on the ground at her feet. Though, even though she knows she should not she is too aware of her fingers as they brush his, that they are sitting so close on this bench. "You told me of this, yes." Marian wonders where this story is going.

[roughforkisses]

Silence rubs awkwardly at the back of his neck, trying to choose his words carefully and still certain they are the wrong ones. "The Count of Cornwall and his lady wife were to have a child. They feared it would be a girl and not a boy, and when Cador died, that his line would die out with him and the family would lose all their lands." He knows this, at least, is something Marian will be familiar with. "So before the babe was even yet born, they had worked out a plan."

[rebellious_lady]

"Was he ill that they could not have another child?" She asks curiously, knowing too well what it was like to be an only child and a female child at that. Her hand brushes against his knee as she leans towards him, wanting to hear more of his story.

[roughforkisses]

"No. Perhaps they worried he would be killed in battle, or that his lady wife would die in childbed. He loved her, he would not take another wife, and while she was known as a healer, who can perform such art upon one's self?" He shrugs, more conscious than he lets on of her hand against his leg. "Truly I do not know. But they thought if their babe was girl, they would not reveal it, but would raise her as a boy."

The truth was, these plotting parents had intended to out their daughter again as female should they later have a son, but Silence had never been told that part.

[rebellious_lady]

"There is nothing wrong with that, is there? Of giving a girl more leeway than she would normally have. Of allowing her to do some of the things a boy would do?" She was not purposefully misunderstanding, but she was perhaps not taking in as much as she should of what he said either.

[roughforkisses]

"Not some of the things." Silence lets out a short huff of breath, gathering courage, his body very tense. "It was not merely teaching a girl to ride and shoot and swing a sword. It was baptising her as a boy, with boy's name. Having her raised in the forest where no one would see her till she was old enough to understand this secret that she must not tell anyone, ever. It was a lifetime of hiding, disguising, denying--but also of being true to Reason and Nurture, even if Nature were defied."

He leans forward, his elbows on his knees, looking at her at last, meeting her eyes. "Canst thou not see? It is not an act anymore, but the true person I have become. But Nurture cannot change the body beneath. Had I kissed thee back, however well I play this part...I would still not be a man, in the end."

[rebellious_lady]

It took her a few moments, staring at him blankly as his words sunk in. "You are saying that you..."

Marian stood, unable to take it all in at once. "You are a Knight, Sir, how can you not be a man?"

More than that, the feelings he aroused in her, how could he do such? "Djaq," she spoke quietly as she paced back and forth. "Her twin, he died, she took his place. She lived her life as a man, it... Robin's band, they knew, I knew before they, but with you, I did not know."

[roughforkisses]

"Nor has anyone," Silence says simply, "for I have never told them. Thou art the first." And he does not feel better for having shared the secret, he finds, but rather heavy and worried. "Three other people know in this life, and two are my parents. One is on the island, she spent some time in my body once, it was impossible to hide." He is babbling and knows it, and catches his breath. "I hope--I hope thou wilt keep my secret as well," he finishes, and it is almost a plea.

[rebellious_lady]

Her words are rushed, she doesn't know what she's saying. "I will keep your secret, of course."

She knows what he has said, for he cannot see him as she, not at all. Sinking back down onto the bench beside him she looks at him, the confusion plain on her features. "If I had been told this before this place I do not know what I would have thought. I still do not know, not truly." Marian finds herself rambling, her hands reaching for his, her stomach tight. "I do not know. I... It changes what has happened between us, but in some ways, it does not. I..." She cannot say more, but she knows that this does not change the fact that she wants to be near him, that she wants to touch him.

[roughforkisses]

And if there were not a significant part of him--for he stopped thinking of himself as 'she' long ago--that did not want the same, he would not be telling her all of this now.

"And so," Silence says, turning his hand a little in hers, "that is why I ran away."