Abject misery loves company. Even Milani's.
RL Date: 3/23/09
IC Date: 4/13/19 --Some language, not so much.
N'thei's Weyr, High Reaches Weyr(#412RJs)
Rank certainly has its privileges; among them are amply appointed apartments. Two chambers connect to form a large weyr, the outer cavern larger and better decorated. Here are impersonal furnishings: a seating arrangement of sofa and chairs in front of a large, tiled fireplace with a blue-and-black rug before it; an antique-looking desk, dinged and dented in a few places but polished and well-kept for its obvious age; a tall cupboard with tack-hooks beside it, gear for dragonriding neatly arranged inside. Two tapestries hung from the high walls depict overdone splendor for High Reaches Weyr, one a long view of the snow-covered bowl and the other a hazy impressionist piece of dragons flaming over a springtime countryside.
The inner weyr, a sleeping cavern and a bathtub, is smaller and cozier and less ostentatious. The furniture is sturdy but plain, bed and wardrobe and nightstand. A folding screen half-shields the sunken bathtub, usually with a towel slung over it and soap and wash rags within reach. The relics of a man's life are found here and there, large boots often kicked off carelessly in front of the smaller inner hearth, a rumpled tunic left where it fell, shaving kit by a washbasin.
The keening has stopped at least, though there's an odd stillness in the air around the Weyr, even as Rukbat's rising starts to eat away at the chill that still lingers in early spring. Milani's footsteps echo a little as she crosses the Bowl, arms wrapped around her mid-section. She's missed Tiriana, gone back to bed, and she mounts the stairs quietly, comes to a halt in front of Satiet's vacant weyr. Swallowing hard, she steps inside, takes in the emptiness of the weyr and nods once, eyes squeezed shut. She's really gone. One of her hands lifts to her forehead rubs like the headwoman is feeling a headache about to start. That moment passes and she goes on, pausing in the entrance to N'thei's quarters. She takes a deep breath before pushing onward and clears her throat to speak his name: "N'thei?"
The outer weyr is largely unchanged, minus a daisy, a scarf, and a letter. The 'Reaches falls apart, but the Weyrleader's weyr-- the part that belongs to the Weyrleader perpetually and not the man that wears the knot specifically-- looks exactly the same as it has these four Turns, four months, and thirteen days. Wyaeth, grayer, lingers on the ledge still, but all else seems quiet. Both F'rint and A'son have been wise enough not to impose on a man's grief, and no one else would have the brass to come calling... except Milani, of course. Time enough to pick himself up, to return to the inner weyr, hopefully to make himself decent. "He doesn't live here any more," answers someone who certainly sounds like N'thei, only not the angry-and-hateful N'thei to which Milani should be accustomed by now.
Milani slows her steps a little, just shy of the actual inner weyr, arms still folded across her middle and looks around. Throat tight, she has to swallow a few times before speaking again. "Where should I go to find him?" she asks finally, voice a little unsteady, leaning against the wall just outside the entryway, head tilted back against the stone.
There hasn't been enough time yet for the lack of industry to hit him particularly hard, but it looks like N'thei made an attempt to pack some things, emptied a few drawers into a canvas bag, collected a few odds-and-ends into a crate, but he hasn't gotten very far. Lethargy has the better of him, and now he sits again on the floor, his back against a bedpost, his legs extended, his bare feet toward the neglected fire; dressed as far as a pair of pants and a shirt whose buttons proved frustrating and thus neglected, unshaved, he looks exactly like a man who's had a bad, bad morning. "Don't know, but I'll tell him you were looking for him if I run across him." On the floor beside him, there's a deck of cards, and he's feeding them to the fire in a listless occupation, picking them up one at a time and tossing them onto the embers. It might have passed for some symbolic gesture were it not so obviously mindless, if he was even looking at them before he flicked them toward the low flames. "Come in," says the spider to the fly.
Milani swallows again, invisible, gossamer wings buzzing as she steps inside. The headwoman's eyes skip around the room, take note of the signs of leave-taking, the unbuttoned shirt. A card hits the flames and sizzles and her gaze rests there for a moment, returns to the Weyrleader. Silently she comes closer still, stupidly close. Without saying a word, she kneels down, reaches for those neglected buttons, apparently intending to start doing them up. "I've seen to the caverns," is what she says next, her voice low, though she's avoiding his eyes. She has to know he doesn't give a fuck. But she says it anyway. "I'll make sure of Tiriana and Lujayn. We'll take care of -- things." Left deliberately vague as she pauses takes another breath and looks up at him finally. "Would you like me to get you something?"
N'thei brushes at her hands with a careless, "Don't." There's no venom, just a daddy-long-legs after all. She talks of the caverns, and he looks at her blankly to inform what she already knows; "I don't care about the caverns, Millie. I never cared." Something-- her question, meeting her eyes, it makes him chuckle emptily for a moment before he leans his head back to rest against the bedframe, chin toward the ceiling. "That's a brave question, but no. Nothing you can actually produce." He takes one of those breaths that fill a person's lungs entirely, one often called steadying, but it leaves him in exactly the same state. "You're all right?"
Milani leaves off with just the one button hooked into a buttonhole and sits back on her heels, watching him. "I know," is pretty much all she can say about that. "That's always been the problem hasn't it?" she says slowly, and smooths out his collar just a little then drops her hands into her lap. "I've got the good brandy. Just in case you change your mind." It's a weak joke maybe, but sincerely intended. His question makes her blink in surprise and she echoes that intake of breath, nods once. "I will be. There's a lot to figure out, but it'll be fine. I --" She fidgets a little with a loose thread in the hem of her shirt. "I can see to whatever you need seeing to." Her gaze slips sideways, taking in some of that packing mess, returns to him. "You're leaving ..." she trails off and sighs a little. "Where will you go?"
"Not far." Especially not at the pace he's going now. In contrast to Milani's fidgeting, N'thei settles into relative stillness, not even tossing cards any more, just slouching and slowly lowering his head from his ceiling-watch to look at her straightening collars and picking at threads. "Do you ever sit still." He tries the same little laugh again, gets his eyebrows raised over the question, drops his eyes to her busy fingers.
Milani nods again, accepting that answer and tries to make her hands be still. "I know you probably don't want it but ... if you need help with," she gestures around and blows out a little puff of air, "any of it. Just let me know." His question draws her first smile, a wry little thing as her head shakes slowly. "No. Never have been able to. Fingers flex atop her thighs and her head ducks, ruefully. She's quiet for a little while, fingers pressing and releasing into the fabric of her trousers. "I'm -- sorry, N'thei," she murmurs after a moment or two and looks back up at him, eyes steady on his this time.
A head-shake answers the offer, that and a look around the state of the room to assess how much work N'thei still has ahead of him. At least he hasn't got a wealth of personal property to cart out of here, so that's promising. His attention comes back around to her at the rueful response, and he starts like he has something to say in turn, then stops and lapses into the same quiet. He might have been content with that silence indefinitely, but her apology closes his eyes resolutely, presses his mouth into a hard line that swallows the threat of tears. Then, nodding, eyes still closed, "Let's don't have apologies, you and me. Let's just..."
That hard line to his mouth makes her teeth catch at her lower lip and her head bows. Until he speaks again. She listens. She's silent again. When she looks up this time, she dares to reach out for his hand, like she did once a long time before. "Let it go and leave it be," she fills in the blank, voice a little unsteady, just a lilt of question in it.
N'thei's fingers tighten around hers-- what would have been cruelty not so long ago. Forefinger and thumb of his other hand wipe beneath his eyes before they open, unembarrassed by his tears but perhaps a little mystified by them. Focusing beyond his own hand, sympathy putting a furrow in his forehead; "Better you do it in here than out there, Millie." With a bend in his fingers to indicate her own presently dry eyes. "And I won't hold it against you much."
Milani's fingers curl around his much bigger hand in turn. She's surprised again by that offer and her mouth opens, closes. The headwoman looks over towards the fire and her gaze remains there for a moment or two. He might miss it, when the light glints off of the slow trail of tears that starts down her cheeks. Her free hand swipes at her nose, not her eyes. Millie shifts then, moving to sit alongside him and aims to slip an arm around his shoulders. "Okay ..." she says in a small voice and leaves it at that. Comfort offered for comfort.
He might miss it. But he doesn't. Misery loves company, and there's no misery like the abject kind. N'thei's furrowed brows relax, draw smooth, and he shifts only enough so there's some space against the bedframe to fit Milani alongside him, to draw an arm half around her in turn, to lean his head and close his eyes-- and say with a light tone that has no business in this grave moment, "At least now you'll all finally realize how bad you didn't really have it. Tiriana'll make me look like a prize by comparison."
Milani leans a little, hand doing that comforting-rub thing along his shoulder. "You were never that bad, and trust me, I know," the headwoman answers with a quiet snort. "It's going to be babes in the woods around here for a while." She swallows hard and tilts her head towards his a little. "It's a little scary."
A little derision, forgive him, but, "Four Turns of questioning every move I made, and I was never that bad?" Really. But N'thei has to concede a nod to her babes-in-woods remark; "Mind you, she'd be an easy one to disappear, and not too many people to go looking for her." His words lack conviction though, and his eyes stay closed in a mixture of weariness and dampness. Fingers tighten, loosen, moving on-- "I told A'son you were a whore. Best you hear it here first." There's a fair amount of laundry to air...
"Did you really think it was /every/ move?" Milani puffs out a long breath and shakes her head a little. "It wasn't," she says softly. "Just ... one stupid, stupid, stupid mistake." That interjection draws a hollow laugh. "Not my style. Maybe not even yours either. I've kind of got some ideas about her anyway, since I got her to trade that pink fleece for me." That, maybe, Millie /does/ sound just a little smug about. Her lips purse faintly at that admission and she clears her throat. "Slut. Not whore. I don't get paid for it." She's owning the word by the sound of her voice. "I told Leova I wished you weren't Weyrleader." Wry irony lines those words.
N'thei, quietly, amused; "Would respect you more if you did." A sidelong admission, still in that no-business-in-this-moment tone. "If I could tolerate Leova long enough to say that many words to her at once, I'd probably tell her the same thing," is his way of forgiving Milani for her ill wishes. On the subject of confessions, far easier than the subject that's going to come up for the rest of the day, he adds, "I never skimmed off the top, not so much as a sixteenth. But I have been investing." A careful word, that one. "The money from the Snowasis. I'll give you what's on hand and collect the rest as soon as it's-- available." This might be the oddest coping mechanism ever.
"I'm not that good," Milani admits about her N'thei-watching skills. "Not now anyway. Maybe someday." His admission though tilts her head back a little to take in his face. "I liked you better when you weren't," which is an awful lot like something else she's said before. The rest of what he says brings a flash of guilt to her face and she exhales slowly then puts her head down on his shoulder. "/N'thei/," she murmurs his name and there's a lot that's meant by that single word that's not actually fully stated. Something like a protest, gratitude, shame and regret for what she did in fact, think of him. She doesn't ask the obvious question that she might have a few turns ago. There's no petulant 'why didn't you tell me', only her arm squeezing around his shoulders a bit.
N'thei points out, to the defense of who he is as Weyrleader and who he was as bronzerider, "If you were about to see your best friend," a loose term, "fuck the love of your life..." The unfinished portion probably leans toward "you'd have done no differently." When she asked, all he did was refuse; when she doesn't, he turns his face into Milani's hair and explains, "You don't want to know where that money goes, Millie. Plus, you stopped trusting me, so I stopped trusting you." Or the other way around, the chicken and the egg. Quiet, fond, "She was the only one that never asked questions."
Milani inhales sharply at that and kind of, sort of laughs. "Right. I -- don't think in the end, that that would've worked out either," the headwoman says slowly. "Hindsight's a funny thing though," she swallows shifts her hand a little to run through his hair, down the side of his head. "I'm not asking," Millie answers promptly and stares off across the room, nodding faintly in agreement. She has no arguments against what happened. "I -- made the wrong decision," is what she concedes to, then slants a look back over at him, one corner of her mouth pulling upward faintly. "She didn't need to," the headwoman answers quietly. "A person could do a lot worse than watch and learn from her."
She made the wrong decision. "You were a little girl, I shouldn't have held a lapse in judgment against you." Hindsight, revisionist history, much the same. There's not much hair for running through, and what there is could stand to be trimmed, but N'thei returns the favor a little less graciously, a bit of blond around his finger, tugged experimentally, uncurled absently. "And now you get to watch and learn from Tiriana. You people are so fucked," with sudden, hard delight at the misfortunes in store for the High Reaches.
She sighs as he says that and some residual tension finally fades from her shoulders. Milani already apologized earlier, she only bobs her head a couple of times, changes the angle of her fingers so what little of badly-in-need-of-a-trim hair he has is vaguely smoothed down. That tug draws her eyes back to his and she opens her mouth to say something, then gives a short gasping laugh. "It's going to be hard, watching her back, making sure she doesn't fuck up. But I'm going to try," she answers with determination. "You people ..." she echoes. "So you're not one of us anymore? Or did you never think it of yourself?"
Almost like he's sorry to be the bearer of bad news, N'thei says with quiet certainty, "You will fail." But he's had a bad morning, so maybe his opinion is a little grim; evidence, "Quit fucking with my hair." Despite the warning tone, a smile pulls at his mouth promptly afterward, and he scoots just a little away to scoop up Milani's chin, to impress his next words looking square at her. "I'd have died for her, killed for her, begged, borrowed, and /stolen/ for her. But she's dead. And you people? This place? Have had enough from me already." Earnest; "You're on your own."
"Have to try anyway," Milani says stubbornly. The profane request is simply obeyed (for once). Her hand drops down to his shoulder just as he shifts. She doesn't fight the claiming of her chin, though there's a touch of wide-eyed startlement for it. Her far hand lifts, presses against his cheek. "Come back if you need anything," is offered just as earnestly. "Even if it's just a good laugh." Slightly self-deprecating. Milani leans forward then, meaning to brush lips to cheek gently. "I should go make sure that people aren't drinking themselves into a stupor and see if Tiriana's awake. She won't know what to do. I'll have to tell her."
"I'm not leaving, I'm just..." Done. Not living in this particular space any more. Not being the Weyrleader. N'thei makes the distinction with a brush of his hand to indicate the scattered packing he's accomplished, follows the gesture by just briefly covering Milani's hand against his cheek. "Send her my best regards, won't you. Tell her... tell her no one would weep like this for her passing. Should at least get her started on the right, indignant foot." The squeeze of his fingers, the last run of his hand down her hair-- after chastising her for the same damn thing-- is his version of thanks.
Milani takes a deep breath and smiles a little. "All right then," she says simply about not leaving, maybe understanding what he means and not pushing about it. For once. "Mm. I'll think about it. See if I want to get her that riled right off the bat, or if we should try to aim for a little more low key for day one on our own." Oh there's the smart aleck back again. Milani doesn't mind him playing with her hair apparently, she only smiles one more time, fingers trailing away as she shifts, scoots over and finally stands up, bracing her hands behind her on the bedframe. "Don't forget to do up your buttons, N'thei," she tells him as she steps away. At the doorway she faces forward, takes a deep breath, sets her shoulders and marches back out into the fray of trying to run a Weyr without a head.
"So fucked." Another card sizzles, N'thei shakes his head.
IC Date: 4/13/19 --Some language, not so much.
N'thei's Weyr, High Reaches Weyr(#412RJs)
Rank certainly has its privileges; among them are amply appointed apartments. Two chambers connect to form a large weyr, the outer cavern larger and better decorated. Here are impersonal furnishings: a seating arrangement of sofa and chairs in front of a large, tiled fireplace with a blue-and-black rug before it; an antique-looking desk, dinged and dented in a few places but polished and well-kept for its obvious age; a tall cupboard with tack-hooks beside it, gear for dragonriding neatly arranged inside. Two tapestries hung from the high walls depict overdone splendor for High Reaches Weyr, one a long view of the snow-covered bowl and the other a hazy impressionist piece of dragons flaming over a springtime countryside.
The inner weyr, a sleeping cavern and a bathtub, is smaller and cozier and less ostentatious. The furniture is sturdy but plain, bed and wardrobe and nightstand. A folding screen half-shields the sunken bathtub, usually with a towel slung over it and soap and wash rags within reach. The relics of a man's life are found here and there, large boots often kicked off carelessly in front of the smaller inner hearth, a rumpled tunic left where it fell, shaving kit by a washbasin.
The keening has stopped at least, though there's an odd stillness in the air around the Weyr, even as Rukbat's rising starts to eat away at the chill that still lingers in early spring. Milani's footsteps echo a little as she crosses the Bowl, arms wrapped around her mid-section. She's missed Tiriana, gone back to bed, and she mounts the stairs quietly, comes to a halt in front of Satiet's vacant weyr. Swallowing hard, she steps inside, takes in the emptiness of the weyr and nods once, eyes squeezed shut. She's really gone. One of her hands lifts to her forehead rubs like the headwoman is feeling a headache about to start. That moment passes and she goes on, pausing in the entrance to N'thei's quarters. She takes a deep breath before pushing onward and clears her throat to speak his name: "N'thei?"
The outer weyr is largely unchanged, minus a daisy, a scarf, and a letter. The 'Reaches falls apart, but the Weyrleader's weyr-- the part that belongs to the Weyrleader perpetually and not the man that wears the knot specifically-- looks exactly the same as it has these four Turns, four months, and thirteen days. Wyaeth, grayer, lingers on the ledge still, but all else seems quiet. Both F'rint and A'son have been wise enough not to impose on a man's grief, and no one else would have the brass to come calling... except Milani, of course. Time enough to pick himself up, to return to the inner weyr, hopefully to make himself decent. "He doesn't live here any more," answers someone who certainly sounds like N'thei, only not the angry-and-hateful N'thei to which Milani should be accustomed by now.
Milani slows her steps a little, just shy of the actual inner weyr, arms still folded across her middle and looks around. Throat tight, she has to swallow a few times before speaking again. "Where should I go to find him?" she asks finally, voice a little unsteady, leaning against the wall just outside the entryway, head tilted back against the stone.
There hasn't been enough time yet for the lack of industry to hit him particularly hard, but it looks like N'thei made an attempt to pack some things, emptied a few drawers into a canvas bag, collected a few odds-and-ends into a crate, but he hasn't gotten very far. Lethargy has the better of him, and now he sits again on the floor, his back against a bedpost, his legs extended, his bare feet toward the neglected fire; dressed as far as a pair of pants and a shirt whose buttons proved frustrating and thus neglected, unshaved, he looks exactly like a man who's had a bad, bad morning. "Don't know, but I'll tell him you were looking for him if I run across him." On the floor beside him, there's a deck of cards, and he's feeding them to the fire in a listless occupation, picking them up one at a time and tossing them onto the embers. It might have passed for some symbolic gesture were it not so obviously mindless, if he was even looking at them before he flicked them toward the low flames. "Come in," says the spider to the fly.
Milani swallows again, invisible, gossamer wings buzzing as she steps inside. The headwoman's eyes skip around the room, take note of the signs of leave-taking, the unbuttoned shirt. A card hits the flames and sizzles and her gaze rests there for a moment, returns to the Weyrleader. Silently she comes closer still, stupidly close. Without saying a word, she kneels down, reaches for those neglected buttons, apparently intending to start doing them up. "I've seen to the caverns," is what she says next, her voice low, though she's avoiding his eyes. She has to know he doesn't give a fuck. But she says it anyway. "I'll make sure of Tiriana and Lujayn. We'll take care of -- things." Left deliberately vague as she pauses takes another breath and looks up at him finally. "Would you like me to get you something?"
N'thei brushes at her hands with a careless, "Don't." There's no venom, just a daddy-long-legs after all. She talks of the caverns, and he looks at her blankly to inform what she already knows; "I don't care about the caverns, Millie. I never cared." Something-- her question, meeting her eyes, it makes him chuckle emptily for a moment before he leans his head back to rest against the bedframe, chin toward the ceiling. "That's a brave question, but no. Nothing you can actually produce." He takes one of those breaths that fill a person's lungs entirely, one often called steadying, but it leaves him in exactly the same state. "You're all right?"
Milani leaves off with just the one button hooked into a buttonhole and sits back on her heels, watching him. "I know," is pretty much all she can say about that. "That's always been the problem hasn't it?" she says slowly, and smooths out his collar just a little then drops her hands into her lap. "I've got the good brandy. Just in case you change your mind." It's a weak joke maybe, but sincerely intended. His question makes her blink in surprise and she echoes that intake of breath, nods once. "I will be. There's a lot to figure out, but it'll be fine. I --" She fidgets a little with a loose thread in the hem of her shirt. "I can see to whatever you need seeing to." Her gaze slips sideways, taking in some of that packing mess, returns to him. "You're leaving ..." she trails off and sighs a little. "Where will you go?"
"Not far." Especially not at the pace he's going now. In contrast to Milani's fidgeting, N'thei settles into relative stillness, not even tossing cards any more, just slouching and slowly lowering his head from his ceiling-watch to look at her straightening collars and picking at threads. "Do you ever sit still." He tries the same little laugh again, gets his eyebrows raised over the question, drops his eyes to her busy fingers.
Milani nods again, accepting that answer and tries to make her hands be still. "I know you probably don't want it but ... if you need help with," she gestures around and blows out a little puff of air, "any of it. Just let me know." His question draws her first smile, a wry little thing as her head shakes slowly. "No. Never have been able to. Fingers flex atop her thighs and her head ducks, ruefully. She's quiet for a little while, fingers pressing and releasing into the fabric of her trousers. "I'm -- sorry, N'thei," she murmurs after a moment or two and looks back up at him, eyes steady on his this time.
A head-shake answers the offer, that and a look around the state of the room to assess how much work N'thei still has ahead of him. At least he hasn't got a wealth of personal property to cart out of here, so that's promising. His attention comes back around to her at the rueful response, and he starts like he has something to say in turn, then stops and lapses into the same quiet. He might have been content with that silence indefinitely, but her apology closes his eyes resolutely, presses his mouth into a hard line that swallows the threat of tears. Then, nodding, eyes still closed, "Let's don't have apologies, you and me. Let's just..."
That hard line to his mouth makes her teeth catch at her lower lip and her head bows. Until he speaks again. She listens. She's silent again. When she looks up this time, she dares to reach out for his hand, like she did once a long time before. "Let it go and leave it be," she fills in the blank, voice a little unsteady, just a lilt of question in it.
N'thei's fingers tighten around hers-- what would have been cruelty not so long ago. Forefinger and thumb of his other hand wipe beneath his eyes before they open, unembarrassed by his tears but perhaps a little mystified by them. Focusing beyond his own hand, sympathy putting a furrow in his forehead; "Better you do it in here than out there, Millie." With a bend in his fingers to indicate her own presently dry eyes. "And I won't hold it against you much."
Milani's fingers curl around his much bigger hand in turn. She's surprised again by that offer and her mouth opens, closes. The headwoman looks over towards the fire and her gaze remains there for a moment or two. He might miss it, when the light glints off of the slow trail of tears that starts down her cheeks. Her free hand swipes at her nose, not her eyes. Millie shifts then, moving to sit alongside him and aims to slip an arm around his shoulders. "Okay ..." she says in a small voice and leaves it at that. Comfort offered for comfort.
He might miss it. But he doesn't. Misery loves company, and there's no misery like the abject kind. N'thei's furrowed brows relax, draw smooth, and he shifts only enough so there's some space against the bedframe to fit Milani alongside him, to draw an arm half around her in turn, to lean his head and close his eyes-- and say with a light tone that has no business in this grave moment, "At least now you'll all finally realize how bad you didn't really have it. Tiriana'll make me look like a prize by comparison."
Milani leans a little, hand doing that comforting-rub thing along his shoulder. "You were never that bad, and trust me, I know," the headwoman answers with a quiet snort. "It's going to be babes in the woods around here for a while." She swallows hard and tilts her head towards his a little. "It's a little scary."
A little derision, forgive him, but, "Four Turns of questioning every move I made, and I was never that bad?" Really. But N'thei has to concede a nod to her babes-in-woods remark; "Mind you, she'd be an easy one to disappear, and not too many people to go looking for her." His words lack conviction though, and his eyes stay closed in a mixture of weariness and dampness. Fingers tighten, loosen, moving on-- "I told A'son you were a whore. Best you hear it here first." There's a fair amount of laundry to air...
"Did you really think it was /every/ move?" Milani puffs out a long breath and shakes her head a little. "It wasn't," she says softly. "Just ... one stupid, stupid, stupid mistake." That interjection draws a hollow laugh. "Not my style. Maybe not even yours either. I've kind of got some ideas about her anyway, since I got her to trade that pink fleece for me." That, maybe, Millie /does/ sound just a little smug about. Her lips purse faintly at that admission and she clears her throat. "Slut. Not whore. I don't get paid for it." She's owning the word by the sound of her voice. "I told Leova I wished you weren't Weyrleader." Wry irony lines those words.
N'thei, quietly, amused; "Would respect you more if you did." A sidelong admission, still in that no-business-in-this-moment tone. "If I could tolerate Leova long enough to say that many words to her at once, I'd probably tell her the same thing," is his way of forgiving Milani for her ill wishes. On the subject of confessions, far easier than the subject that's going to come up for the rest of the day, he adds, "I never skimmed off the top, not so much as a sixteenth. But I have been investing." A careful word, that one. "The money from the Snowasis. I'll give you what's on hand and collect the rest as soon as it's-- available." This might be the oddest coping mechanism ever.
"I'm not that good," Milani admits about her N'thei-watching skills. "Not now anyway. Maybe someday." His admission though tilts her head back a little to take in his face. "I liked you better when you weren't," which is an awful lot like something else she's said before. The rest of what he says brings a flash of guilt to her face and she exhales slowly then puts her head down on his shoulder. "/N'thei/," she murmurs his name and there's a lot that's meant by that single word that's not actually fully stated. Something like a protest, gratitude, shame and regret for what she did in fact, think of him. She doesn't ask the obvious question that she might have a few turns ago. There's no petulant 'why didn't you tell me', only her arm squeezing around his shoulders a bit.
N'thei points out, to the defense of who he is as Weyrleader and who he was as bronzerider, "If you were about to see your best friend," a loose term, "fuck the love of your life..." The unfinished portion probably leans toward "you'd have done no differently." When she asked, all he did was refuse; when she doesn't, he turns his face into Milani's hair and explains, "You don't want to know where that money goes, Millie. Plus, you stopped trusting me, so I stopped trusting you." Or the other way around, the chicken and the egg. Quiet, fond, "She was the only one that never asked questions."
Milani inhales sharply at that and kind of, sort of laughs. "Right. I -- don't think in the end, that that would've worked out either," the headwoman says slowly. "Hindsight's a funny thing though," she swallows shifts her hand a little to run through his hair, down the side of his head. "I'm not asking," Millie answers promptly and stares off across the room, nodding faintly in agreement. She has no arguments against what happened. "I -- made the wrong decision," is what she concedes to, then slants a look back over at him, one corner of her mouth pulling upward faintly. "She didn't need to," the headwoman answers quietly. "A person could do a lot worse than watch and learn from her."
She made the wrong decision. "You were a little girl, I shouldn't have held a lapse in judgment against you." Hindsight, revisionist history, much the same. There's not much hair for running through, and what there is could stand to be trimmed, but N'thei returns the favor a little less graciously, a bit of blond around his finger, tugged experimentally, uncurled absently. "And now you get to watch and learn from Tiriana. You people are so fucked," with sudden, hard delight at the misfortunes in store for the High Reaches.
She sighs as he says that and some residual tension finally fades from her shoulders. Milani already apologized earlier, she only bobs her head a couple of times, changes the angle of her fingers so what little of badly-in-need-of-a-trim hair he has is vaguely smoothed down. That tug draws her eyes back to his and she opens her mouth to say something, then gives a short gasping laugh. "It's going to be hard, watching her back, making sure she doesn't fuck up. But I'm going to try," she answers with determination. "You people ..." she echoes. "So you're not one of us anymore? Or did you never think it of yourself?"
Almost like he's sorry to be the bearer of bad news, N'thei says with quiet certainty, "You will fail." But he's had a bad morning, so maybe his opinion is a little grim; evidence, "Quit fucking with my hair." Despite the warning tone, a smile pulls at his mouth promptly afterward, and he scoots just a little away to scoop up Milani's chin, to impress his next words looking square at her. "I'd have died for her, killed for her, begged, borrowed, and /stolen/ for her. But she's dead. And you people? This place? Have had enough from me already." Earnest; "You're on your own."
"Have to try anyway," Milani says stubbornly. The profane request is simply obeyed (for once). Her hand drops down to his shoulder just as he shifts. She doesn't fight the claiming of her chin, though there's a touch of wide-eyed startlement for it. Her far hand lifts, presses against his cheek. "Come back if you need anything," is offered just as earnestly. "Even if it's just a good laugh." Slightly self-deprecating. Milani leans forward then, meaning to brush lips to cheek gently. "I should go make sure that people aren't drinking themselves into a stupor and see if Tiriana's awake. She won't know what to do. I'll have to tell her."
"I'm not leaving, I'm just..." Done. Not living in this particular space any more. Not being the Weyrleader. N'thei makes the distinction with a brush of his hand to indicate the scattered packing he's accomplished, follows the gesture by just briefly covering Milani's hand against his cheek. "Send her my best regards, won't you. Tell her... tell her no one would weep like this for her passing. Should at least get her started on the right, indignant foot." The squeeze of his fingers, the last run of his hand down her hair-- after chastising her for the same damn thing-- is his version of thanks.
Milani takes a deep breath and smiles a little. "All right then," she says simply about not leaving, maybe understanding what he means and not pushing about it. For once. "Mm. I'll think about it. See if I want to get her that riled right off the bat, or if we should try to aim for a little more low key for day one on our own." Oh there's the smart aleck back again. Milani doesn't mind him playing with her hair apparently, she only smiles one more time, fingers trailing away as she shifts, scoots over and finally stands up, bracing her hands behind her on the bedframe. "Don't forget to do up your buttons, N'thei," she tells him as she steps away. At the doorway she faces forward, takes a deep breath, sets her shoulders and marches back out into the fray of trying to run a Weyr without a head.
"So fucked." Another card sizzles, N'thei shakes his head.