"I'm sure..." She offered a tired smile, pushing the food on her plate around with her fork. "Someday it'll be funny. If I ever figure out who did it, though, someone's gonna die." It was a spark of the old Ali, her old fire, but it was still so subdued, so withdrawn... Even the smile seemed distracted, or perhaps it was the mask she wore... Perhaps it was the things she tried to hide behind claims of exhaustion and a busy schedule.

Would it have been so hard to say, when she first realized it was a problem? Would it have been so hard to tell him what he obviously needed to know, before it went this far? Because she could see the pain in his eyes. Pain she'd caused with her secrets and her lies, and now, her apparent inability to just tell the truth and get it over with. He trusted her... She'd already broken that trust, she couldn't break it more by telling him. It would be selfish, and there was no promise in her mind that telling him would make him any less angry than just withdrawing now before it went too far...

Lies. She was lying to herself now. Where did it all end?

His hand grabbed her wrist as she went to leave, her eyes darting to look down, avoiding his gaze, staring at the way his fingers wrapped so desperately around her wrist, begging her silently to stay, to explain... She couldn't. She couldn't...

Even when she met his gaze, she was closed off, defensive... His gentle touch, brushing her hair behind her ear, was no longer as comforting as it once was. Flashes of memory, far too vivid, rushed through her mind, and she had to fight the urge to flinch for the first time in months as he touched her face. If she told him, he would be angry. He would be more hurt than he already was... If she told him, she'd be making a mistake.

But the problem was, and she knew it was, that she was making a bigger mistake by not telling him...

Her already shaky smile faltered further when he spoke... Saying how much he loved her. How he wanted to do the right thing...

"Aladar... You didn't do anything. I promise... I'm just tired, okay?"

She crossed her arms unconsciously in front of her as he let her go, stepping back.

"I'll come," she promised. "See you tomorrow."

And with that, she was gone. She left the tent without another word. She didn't tell him that she loved him, too... She loved him, she loved him so much it hurt, but she didn't deserve to love him. Not with what she'd done. She had no right to tell him that she loved him.

Her dreams that night were exactly what one would expect, with that being her last interaction of the night, anxiety mingling with the accusations screaming at her. It was a lot of fighting, a lot of yelling... Sometimes it was Aladar, sometimes it was Darren. Sometimes, she couldn't tell which it was anymore.

The next morning was fairly uneventful. She did join the dawn patrol, despite knowing she wasn't supposed to, simply because she didn't want the weight of another lie on her conscience. Breakfast, she sat with the others, at a crowded table. Immediately after breakfast, she moved to the medical tent to help Orym. She kept herself busy and surrounded by people, trying to keep moving for her own sake.

The man did not sleep well that night, the dinner replaying in his over and over as he laid in his bed, staring at the top of his tent. His mind raced to try and make sense of it all as he prayed his way in the darkness. For wisdom. For answers. To know what to do and say. Aladar wanted to make whatever was wrong better, and she had promised him it was not his fault. So what then? What haunted her so? He drifted off into fitful rest with those questions and the begging cries to God that it be sorted out.

By morning, he was awake early, immediately finding his way to his bible and his knees. He prayed for hours, well into breakfast. It was near the end that he finally stood, taking a breath and making his way to the tent. It was habit now to stop at the entrance, brown eyes scanning the faces to find Ali. And he did. He found her back as she ducked out of the tent, his gaze softening and filling with a tired sorrow. The man stood there for a moment longer than necessary, just staring at the area she had disappeared from.

Finally, his head swiveled to find Tendral, Aladar striding over to his friend. “Tendral, I need you for a moment.” With the simple statement, he turned and started back for his tent, the younger man immediately shoving one more forkful of food in his mouth before getting up to follow, chewing as he watched the Captain and ducked into the tent behind him. He could tell something was off, though he had known over the last few days.

“What do you need?”

“Advice.” Brown eyes met green eyes as Aladar motioned for one of the chairs, sitting down in his usual spot and waiting for Tendral to follow suit.

The lanky man did as told, stretching his long legs out in front of him, though he said nothing, instead waiting patiently. He knew Aladar would speak when he was ready, and he already had a faint notion of where this was going.

“I’m not sure what to do about Ali. She’s been distant since I returned. At first, she seemed really thrilled I was back and then suddenly, it turned. You know her as a friend, perhaps you know something I don’t.” He was straight to the point, watching Tendral closely. “That and you’ve had more experience with women than I have on the front of a relationship.”

“I don’t know Aladar. I’d say it varies from woman to woman really, so I can’t say for certain. She hasn’t exactly been talking to me either. What was the last thing you guys did before she started doing this?” It seemed like an obvious question, but he asked nonetheless, mostly curious himself what on earth Aladar could have done to make the woman who was utterly enamored with him to avoid him so much.

The Captain thought for a moment, replaying the events through his mind again as he had been doing every day since it had started. It always came back to the bible reading. “She likes it when I read my bible to her. I did a few days ago, a passage on how a man should treat his wife and she had me read the whole passage with the part about how a wife should treat her husband as well. After that, she began to pull away.”

Tendral glanced at the book mentioned, familiar with the cover but nothing more about it. It belonged to Aladar’s religion, not his. But based on what the man had said about what he read, it made perfect sense to Tendral. Because Tendral knew. “It makes perfect sense. I’m surprised you didn’t put two and two together. I’m sure it reminded her of her husband’s abuse, and she’s just struggling with that. Not everyone...”

“Husband?”

No words can even begin to describe that moment. The hoarseness in Aladar’s voice, the way the ‘a’ cracked without proper inflection. Green eyes widening, flashing with horror as they met brown ones that begged for clarification and some kind of misunderstanding. The wrong word. The wrong person.

“By the gods, she didn’t tell you, did she?” Tendral’s throat went dry, his thoughts beginning to mix as he was panicking, the pressure and stress muddling his mind in ways that made everything unclear. Made him unable to know what to say and where to stop.

“She’s... married? You mean she was married...” Aladar pushed his chair back and stood.

Tendral shook his head, slowly rising. “No... she... she still is. She said she would tell you. She told me months ago she would tell you...”

“Months? You’ve known about this for months?” Aladar took a step back, his eyes darkening as he blinked, taking a breath as he reached out to steady himself against on the crates. The news about his diagnosis had been painful and life-altering. But this? This shattered his heart into a million fragments, tore apart the very fabric of reality he had extended, and created for this woman to fit into his life. It brought his world caving in... because suddenly there was a gaping hole where he had made a place for her in his heart but he couldn’t... he couldn’t love a woman who already was bound to another man.

“Aladar... I....”

“Get out.”

“Aladar listen. Let me...”

“OUT TENDRAL!”

Tendral didn’t try again, making a quick exit and leaving Aladar staring at the table, looking around the tent as he let out a breath, one hand finding his hair.

He had kissed her. He had professed his love to her. He had thought of her often, wanted her, looked after her. Aladar had thought of a future with her. And she was married. Another man had already kissed her. Had already professed his love to her, bound his soul to hers, and by law and body, she was his. And Aladar... he had been willing, looking toward a future. Preparing to discover more about her and woo her and one day make her his. And she couldn’t be. She could never be...

Ali had lied to him. Lied to him and made him break everything he believed in.

“Oh God... God why?” He choked out the plea as he stumbled over to the table, palms pressing to the wood as he bent over it, head hanging. He felt so empty. So numb. And yet he was in so much pain he could hardly contain it. He could hardly contain the burning in his eyes as his fists balled up. How could she? She KNEW what he believed. She KNEW he trusted her. She knew this.... she knew this and she betrayed him.

He could not love her. It was wrong. So he would not. He would force himself not. And it hurt but at that moment, he ripped that emotional tie in his heart. He blocked her out. Because he had to. For his faith, for his career, for his men... he had risked it all for her and he had been stabbed in the back for it. He had loved for the very first time and... and... he blinked a few times, despising the moisture that sat in the corners of his eyes. He despised everything.

It’s a funny thing that happens when a heart is torn from the chest, when a person’s world crumbles on every foundation it is made. Everything so beautiful suddenly becomes terribly ugly, and even the most hopeful heart grows black for a little while. And it all felt torn away. Why hadn’t she just told him? If she had told him... instead of leading him on like this...

Aladar straightened, throwing the flap of his tent open. Dark angry eyes, anger that lingered to hide the gut-wrenching pain, landed on the nearest soldier. “You! Go find Alyana and send her to my tent now. Tell her it’s important and I expect her immediately.”

The soldier nodded, eyes wide at the unfamiliar character of his Captain as he made a dash for the medic tent, leaving Aladar to return inside, back to the opening as he stared at the empty firepit, left with nothing but ash. Like his heart.... cold and dark.

“Ali!” The soldier poked his head into the medic's tent, finding the woman. He approached somewhat nervously. “Ali, Aladar says to go to his tent. He said it was important and to come immediately. Something’s not right... he seems really upset.”

Ali worked slower than usual today. Always seeming to have something on her mind, eyes occasionally moving around the tent as she helped to cut linen cloth into thin strips for bandages. When she wasn't trying to build up the courage to say what needed to be said, she was wondering how she'd ended up as the healers' assistant... She was a footsoldier, not a medic, but so be it.

Even Orym knew something was up, though he didn't particularly care enough to ask or make note of it, except for the few times when someone walked through the tent flaps and she wasn't paying attention to what she was doing with the sharp knife in her hands. "Someone's jumpy today," the old healer commented as he hardly looked up from crushing dried herbs into powder.

She didn't respond, focusing on keeping her hands steady now and not thinking of how she had ended her conversation with Aladar the night before...

How she had practically fled the tent, how he had begged for her to tell him what was going on...

How she hadn't told him. God, if she could just tell him... Why couldn't she just tell him? It would be different, if he knew... She wouldn't live in constant fear of him discovering what she hid so carefully. She wouldn't feel so dirty inside, keeping such a... As he would have put it, "life-shattering" secret from him. She couldn't even justify it. She couldn't even try to make excuses...

The only excuse that she had was that she didn't want him to be angry. And she didn't want to hurt him, though that one didn't exactly make much sense... Considering she was hurting him by avoiding him, by not telling him what was going on. He still thought it was his fault... And it was her own selfishness.

The sound of someone calling her name pulled her out of her thoughts and disrupted the rhythm of her tedious task, actually causing her hand to jerk and cut across the fabric for a few inches before barely nicking the side of her left index finger. Hissing, she wiped the drop of blood on her pants before looking up at the soldier, brow furrowed at his words.

To say that her heart sank would be the understatment of the century, as she set the knife and fabric aside to rise to her feet. Brow furrowed in silent question, she wondered what on earth had happened, what he would be so upset about... Maybe he was finally angry at her for avoiding him all this time...? Because there was no way he could know, about the things she kept from him. Right? No one else knew, right? The conversation with Tendral all those months ago was far from her mind now, as she hesitantly made her way to Aladar's tent, pausing outside for a moment to mentally prepare herself.

She could never fully prepare herself for what was about to happen, because she still told herself there was no way he could know. She still had time to make things right, eventually.

She had time...

Slowly, she stepped into the tent, offering a nervous smile as the silent fury radiating off of him in waves seemed to crash into her as soon as she opened the tent flaps. He stood rigid with his back to her, so visibly angry that she stopped only a half-step inside.

"Aladar?" she asked hesitantly. "What's wrong?"

But in that instant, her hesitant smile faltering, without even meeting his gaze...

She knew.

Yes, he was angry. Angry in the coldest way possible that sent shooting cold shards of ice through his veins as he stood there. He was a man who had suffered much emotional pain in the past, lost his men to battle, lost his friends, carried the weight of a company on his shoulders. But this was different. This was his heart and soul torn out and shattered. It took every ounce of self-control not to clench his fists as he stood there waiting, every moment given to let it all sink in tearing him further down.

He loved her. He loved her so deeply it was painful.

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t love her because she was not his to love. And she KNEW that and still led him on. She let him kiss her. Let his feelings for her grow. Encouraged his attentions. And she knew...

Ali knew he was a man of faith. They all knew his morals. And despite this...

Brown eyes clenched shut as his chest heaved, teeth gritting. He loved her and now it was suffocating him.

Her voice caused him to stiffen even more, if that was possible. What was wrong? What was wrong?! Where could he even start? HOW could he even start? He was a man in both physical and emotional pain. He was a man that was so angry it burned in his chest, and yet so broken that it tore through him. And beyond that, still, somehow, he was thinking of her, fighting to keep his cool so he did not yell at her. Which left him standing with his back to her for over a minute, the tense silence cutting between them.

Finally, he dared to speak, his voice rough and strained, and strangely dark for him. “I have prided myself on being a man of good judgment.” There was a pause, his back still to her. “They say pride comes before the fall. I was too proud of that little fact. I thought I had good enough judgment to know if people felt safe around me. I guess I was wrong in your case. I believed I had made it clear you could trust me, come to me... and somehow, in the past six months I failed to do that. I failed you Alyana. I clearly left it so you felt you couldn’t be honest with me.”

In the midst of his betrayal, his nature won over and he laid the blame on his shoulders once more. He was still angry with her, yes, a million times over. But perhaps had he tried harder... perhaps had he done something differently.

“I loved you. I tried to offer everything I could.” He stopped there, his words growing thick before his jaw clenched, his words becoming strained. “I worked hard to make room for you in my faith and my life. And I only asked one thing. One thing Alyana. I asked you to be honest with me.” He blinked before finally turning, his hands shifting behind his back as he finally dared to look at her.

“I failed you in that I did not make you feel safe enough to share that with me. I failed you in that I never dove deeper into your background. And I failed myself.”

There was another stop, his chin lifting as his jaw twitched. But his eyes gave away everything. The anger, the betrayal, the heartbreak. They were swirling and muddy with emotion.

“I’m going to ask you one more time. Is there anything I should know?”

No matter what she said, it was already over. But he wanted to hear her say it with her own mouth. He wanted her to tell him that she was still married. That she knew this was against everything he believed. He wanted to hear the words come from her own mouth that she had deliberately not told him.

He wanted to hear her betrayal from her.

The long silence brought with it more than enough time for her to connect the dots to what was going on. Yet, she couldn't comprehend it fully, mostly because it felt so very surreal. He... knew? How could he know? It was only a few seconds after this that the memory of her conversation with Tendral finally came to mind. So long ago now, months and months and yet... It could only have been Tendral, no one else would have ever known...

Her own thoughts were so deafening she couldn't even make sense of them. He was angry... He was furious, just what she had hoped to avoid with her stupid lies and secrets. This life she lived, so stubbornly pretending the other had never happened... And yet, everything caught up with her eventually. Eventually, even the things she kept buried under a pile of excuses and secrets would come to light...

Wasn't there a verse in Aladar's stupid book about that?

She dared to break the silence, her voice soft and even more hesitant than before.

"Aladar?"

He spoke, finally, his voice harsh and cold, a tone she had never heard him use before and with words that cut deeper than she even expected. Still, he refused to look at her, refused to even face her, as her expression softened and her brow furrowed... Almost in denial of what was clearly happening right in front of her.

No, no, this didn't feel real. He couldn't really be saying those words... He couldn't really be doing what she knew he was... She was expecting anger, she was expecting betrayal. She was! But even in her mind, it felt like something they could work through together, that they could figure out together, like they figured everything else out... Like they always did...

But there was something about the way he spoke her name. Her full name. The cold sort of anger in his voice as he finally turned to face her.

The finality in his tone...

In that moment, as their eyes met, the panic in her eyes wasn't because her lies had been uncovered and her secrets exposed... No, there was some part of her that knew he would find out eventually, whether he told her or not.

The panic in her eyes was because the moment he turned to face her, the moment his cold, hurt, betrayed brown eyes met her ice blue, she knew it was over.

"I loved you."

"Loved."

There was nothing she could say. The damage was done. She'd said more with her silence, her unwillingness to tell him that one stupid detail about her life that she so desperately wanted to forget herself, than a thousand "I love you"'s would ever erase. She'd proven, with one selfish decision, a mere attempt to avoid his anger, that she really did not deserve Aladar... The man who had trusted her.

The man she still loved so desperately...

The man who no longer loved her.

There was nothing she could say but empty, fruitless words. There was nothing she could do. It was over...

"Aladar, I-" Even the empty words wouldn't come, her voice breaking as she bit her lip to stop the tears from welling up in her eyes, her hand moving to cover her mouth as she took a shuddering breath, trying to gather her thoughts. "I'm sorry..." What would an apology do? Nothing. "I tried to... To run away from that life, to forget it ever happened, I never th-... Never thought it would catch up to me..."

"I wanted to tell you... I tried, I tried to... The timing, I..."

Her voice wavered, then cut off as she moved both hands to cover her face in silent shame, taking another shaky breath.

"I'm so sorry... I never thought it would go this far," she whispered. And yet she felt her own world shattering.

She really thought that Aladar was the one... She really thought there was a such thing as a good man, one who would love her, one who would see her as his world. And she was right about that part; there was a such thing as that, and he stood in front of her now.

The only thing she was wrong about was assuming she could ever deserve someone like that.

He wanted her to just tell him. Aladar’s hands finally clenched behind his back as he stood there, waiting for her broken words to form an admission. For her to find it in her to just tell him. The damage was already done, the man having his heart torn out and closing his heart off from her. It could have gone so differently, if she had just told him. They could have figured it out. He wanted to figure it out but... how long would she have led him on?

“But you had a life. A life beyond me.” His words were to the point as his gaze began to slowly harden over, those brown lively eyes darkening and closing off the hurt and pain. Because she kept talking, as if she was trying to justify it, and still not just telling him.

How could she have led him on like this? How could she... How could he have allowed himself to be distracted?

“Enough...” Somewhere along the way, his gaze had fallen to the ground, but now they snapped up at her as she threw out another apology.

I never thought it would go this far.

“It went this far. And whether or not you thought it would, it did.” The thoughtfulness for her emotions began to slip away as the pain assaulted him yet again as he looked her over. It hurt him to see her hurt, and that was angering. Because she had done this... she had led him one. She had hurt him. And still, he loved that red hair that was too long for army standards. Loved those swimming eyes that pleaded with him. Loved everything about her.

He could NOT love her anymore. He could NOT stand here and love those things because they were not his to love.

And she stood here as if it could all be wiped away?

“I gave you all of me. I put you above my company. I almost put you above my faith. I asked ONE thing of you Ali! ONE!” He wasn’t yelling but his voice broke, the emotion coming from the depths of his chest and rumbling through his words. His tone was thick, bleeding out, “Why couldn’t you just tell me? You know... you know I can’t... we can’t...” He was struggling with the fluctuation of emotions, one moment angry, the next the pain and hurt suffocating and drowning the darkness of anger.

He took a step towards her now, a hand finally reaching out to take her chin as he so often used to, but it quickly fell away before he even touched her, the man drawing back again. His face turned sharply away. He had no right to touch her.

“Get out Alyana. You are no longer welcome in this tent as more than a soldier. You are to abide by all the decorum and all the rules. You are to address me as your Captain and you are to report to your commanding officer, not me directly. I expect you to start conditioning to return to active duty again as I can no longer be held responsible beyond the actions of your Captain for what happens.”

His words hurt even him as he turned his back to her again. “Dismissed.” It was barked out, in the tone of an annoyed Captain, but the moment she left, he looked back. And he blinked, fighting the pain in his chest before staggering over to his table. His head sank into his hands as he shook, though no sound came from him. No tears. But his heart bled out.

If his wounds could be seen, the room would be painted in blood.

Because he loved her still.

She had no answer for him.

She could say anything at this point, and it wouldn't matter. It was over now, nothing she could say would fix it, nothing she could say would make him love her again through the anger he felt, through the anger he saw. There was no way to make it work. If... If she'd told him... But she was afraid of this, this reaction, she hadn't told him for fear of his anger, for fear of the rejection she now felt slamming into her in waves with every word he spoke. This was her nightmare, the reason she never could find the strength and courage to tell him. This was what she was so afraid of, when she avoided his gaze, when she came so close to telling him so many times... Now, she saw her worst nightmares playing out in front of her, the anger in Aladar's voice reminding her far too much of Darren... Except it was real now.

"I tried..." Her defense was a feeble whisper. "I tried to tell you... I was afraid..."

She did not flinch away as he began to reach for her, to take her chin in his hands... In that moment, for a split-second, the faintest spark of hope dared to appear, that maybe... No. It was snuffed out instantly by the brisk manner in which he turned away. She saw the way his eyes finally grew cold towards her. She saw the moment he fully closed off from her, the walls he built up, the forced separation building until she was just a soldier to him.

The shock surely showed in her eyes as she silently processed it all, tears finally allowed to well up. She was no longer welcome... In his tent, in his life. She was no longer wanted here, she was no longer loved...

Her voice broke as she forced herself to respond, as the soldier she was, and nothing more. There was nothing more. There would never be anything more.

"Yes, sir."

Why couldn't she have just told him?

"I'm sorry."

She took another shuddering breath, lingering a few seconds too long, before she silently turned to leave the tent. The flaps closed silently behind her... And when she stepped out into the clearing, it was over.

The walk back to her tent took too long. She felt their eyes on her, their judgement, their questions. Each footstep was deafening, echoing in her skull along with the accusations and every word Aladar had said. She could barely breathe as she finally made it to her own tent, fleeing to the comfort of privacy to make sense of it all. Even as she sank onto the edge of her cot, her breath coming in shuddering gasps as she finally released the tears that had been threatening to flow since the moment she realized, nothing made sense through the pain she felt... It didn't take long for her to revert to her old ways as well, trying to drown it all out, trying to somehow numb the agony she felt, to somehow fill the void she suddenly found inside of herself...

She never would, but maybe, maybe for just a little while, she could forget... She didn't want to forget. But forgetting would be easier than the pain...

Not that she was ever able to forget. It was too raw, too painful, everything reminded her. The empty chair where he'd sat with her when she was injured... The extra blankets he'd brought her that one time that she just never gave back... The small wooden lioness he'd carved for her. It all hurt, it all reminded her of someone she'd once had, someone who had once loved her. Someone she'd lied to for far too long. Someone she hurt. Someone she didn't deserve.

She stayed in her tent for the rest of the day, not venturing out for dinner. The next day, too, she never left, spending most of her time sleeping or just staring at the walls of the tent with a flask in her hand. Breakfast on the third day was the first time she dared to leave, still not quite sober but finally too hungry to ignore life any longer. She knew she had to try to return to normal... somehow. She didn't know how she was supposed to do that when Aladar was her normal and now he wouldn't even look at her... Because of what she'd done... And because his morals and his religion meant that what they had was wrong. Meant that she was wrong...

There were rumors, she tuned them out. She took her plate and sat alone, avoiding the people she would have usually made an attempt to speak to, but not willing to return to her tent.

Aladar immediately threw himself into his work. It had taken him a few hours to rally his spirits enough to even try, but he did. His solution to his pain was to drown himself in paperwork, plans, and the conditioning of his men. But the issue was that they knew. They knew something was wrong. They knew he had been the one to be irritated, that she had come out of his tent and not returned. It was obvious enough that he had done something and it made the whole camp tense. But that did not stop the Captain from doing his duties and then some.

It was not only Ali and Aladar who suffered but Tendral as well. He had chosen to spend that day in isolation, having heard what had happened as much as anyone else knew. He had made an attempt to talk to Aladar but had been turned out. Which turned him to default hermit mode for two days, only socializing when necessary for sparring and the usual camp duties. Though even his fighting was rather bad, the usually skilled man losing every session. He had lost heart by hurting two of his closest friends.

Beyond sleeping, he managed to write a letter to Eunoia with his plight, pouring his sorrows and regrets for his slip of words to her. It brought some comfort knowing she would read about his regret, hold the paper he had held, sympathize, and hurt with him. That she would write him a letter back, scented with her perfume and words of encouragement... but he burned the letter. This was his mistake. This was his problem and it was not fair for him to reach out to his love when he had destroyed the most perfect pair. He did not deserve what he had just broken.

By the third day, he too finally ventured out, quietly taking his breakfast before his eyes landed on Ali. It was the first time he had seen her since the unfortunate day and he moved towards her, slowly and unsure but he did. He had not talked to Aladar either but the man knew he had to at least try and make amends. Try being key.

“Morning.” He couldn’t say good morning because that was simply not true. And one look at her told him that she wasn’t fully there, not to mention the scent of alcohol was clear evidence that she had delved back into her demons in Aladar’s absence. Tendral eased to sit down across from her, dull eyes glancing around her face, looking for something to say in the awkward silence he had created. In theory, this had been much easier, though even his theory hadn’t been easy in the slightest. He had words in mind when he had walked over but now they were gone. He was sick and tired of this war. Sick and tired of these situations. He wanted it to be over.

“I’m sorry, Ali. I didn’t know.” It was a pitiful start but at least it was one. And a start was all he needed for the floodgates of his mouth to fall open, as was usual when he had reached the end of his stress rope. “I thought he knew and he was worried about you. I assumed you were upset because his bible reminded you of your life so I mentioned it. I didn’t realize you hadn’t told him and I am so so sorry.”

He took a breath to get himself somewhat reined in. “I am sorry he has shunned you. I didn’t know he would ever do that. Just, if you need anything, I’m here.” His regret was so deep that for once he did not hold his brusque sarcastic nature. Only sorrow.

“Please.”

She hardly looked up from her meal, even when Tendral spoke. Still poking at the unappetizing food with her fork, without eating any satisfactory amount of it, because she wasn't as hungry as she thought she was and now she regretted coming out here at all... Just because she had finally left the solitude of her tent didn't mean she wanted to talk to anyone... And especially not Tendral.

It wasn't that she blamed the man. He thought Aladar had known. And Aladar should have known... She should have told him. She knew that, even now when she couldn't bring herself to care about much else.

"Hey."

Her voice lacked life, cracked from misuse and hours and hours of pitiful tears she didn't even bother trying to hide. She was, in a word, a mess. Her hair was tangled, still longer than the rules allowed, but she would cut it again. She was to abide by all of the rules... She was nothing more than a soldier... Her eyes, their pale blue now dark and dull, were still slightly glazed as she barely looked up at Tendral before once again poking at her food while he talked, raising a small bite to her mouth before setting it down again and pushing the bowl a few inches to the side. Nothing more than a miserable soldier.

"It's not your fault." A shuddering sigh escaped her, her elbows resting on the table as she clenched her teeth in silent frustration. "I... I should have told him... a long time ago." She didn't think it would be this hard to hold herself together in front of Tendral... Closing her eyes for a moment, her hands moved to run her fingers through her hair, attempting to detangle what strands she could.

"I thought..." A pause to shake her head, unsure of even how to begin wording her thoughts, the alcohol in her system not helping her attempts to gather her emotions into intelligible words. "I thought he'd be mad... But I thought we could make it work... Thought we could figure it out like we always did..." A shaky breath, once again struggling to not break down again. Damnit, why was this all so hard? Why?

Because you deserve this and you're too proud to admit it...

"But he didn't want to figure it out... He just told me to get out... And to never talk to him again..."

He didn't want you anymore...

She stopped herself before she went any further, just shaking her head slightly and resting her chin on her hands, elbows propped on the table again. This was ridiculous, Tendral didn't need to be burdened with the punishment for her own lies. She wanted to just disappear into her tent for a few more days, just a few more days and she'd sort everything out... But no, she had to return to her duties... She couldn't avoid them forever. She couldn't avoid the rumors forever... Because avoiding things is what got her into this mess to begin with.

Well, that and Aladar...

Glancing at Tendral out of the corner of her eye as he spoke again, her shoulders slumped in defeat, she gritted her teeth but nodded. Another lie... She didn't plan on going to him for anything. This was something she could handle on her own, just like everything else in her life.

She wished that Aladar had never found out about her. She wished that she could have lived the rest of her life as Allen. She wished she'd died in the last battle. Anything to avoid the wretched sort of pain she felt now, gnawing at her...

"It's over now," she muttered, slowly moving to rise to her feet. "It's done. Nothing else to be said."

There was a lot left to be said, but it would have to be confined to her own mind. It was time for her to pretend nothing had happened, to go back to the way things were before...

"I loved you..."

It was hard for him to process what she was telling him. It was already hard enough to see the woman struggling to hold it together, Ali being a complete mess. There was no doubting she was taking it all very hard, struggling to process what had happened, and not handling it all it seemed. But Tendral would never be able to not blame himself for it all. Had he only kept his mouth shut... had he not mentioned the truth, and used his brain to think that perhaps Aladar didn’t know.

But it didn’t help that according to the woman, the captain had told her to no longer speak to him. It didn’t sound like Aladar and yet... what if it was true? “You have to give him time to Ali... maybe he still will be willing to work it out. He just has to process it like you do...” he offered in the hope that maybe he was right. “I’m sure he did not mean some of the things he said. He’s told me to get out many times. It’s something he does when he is upset, you know that.”

He wanted to salvage this somehow.

But she was already getting up and slowly moving away. “Ali...” Tendral quickly rose after her, moving to take her plate for her and start to follow her. “Ali, I’m sure it’s not over. Please.”

He dropped off their still mostly full plates to trail her towards her tent and away from the prying eyes and ears. “Give him a few more days. Give him a few more days and I’m sure he will talk. If you told him everything, I can’t imagine he really meant anything bad he said.”

It was not Tendral’s job to fix the brokenness between the two people but he wanted to make up for his slip-up. He wanted to try.

Green eyes tried to search for her duller pale blue orbs as he gingerly reached out. “His faith is funny. Maybe in his book he has something against your position, but I also know he has a certain creed on how to treat people. Maybe you just need to try again, now that he’s had time to think about it. He’s stubborn, yes, but he means the best. Surely he meant the best.”

At this point, he didn’t know what he was talking about and finally dropped the subject with a sigh. What more could he do? Aladar had yet to let him get close, and he wasn’t entirely sure Ali was processing anything either. But he decided he would at least try and keep an eye on the woman.