contact part deux

[bouchonne]

if this were modern times byerly would probably make you listen to total eclipse of the heart before you were able to leave a message

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[archademode]

Yet he must take them. [The heat that rises along the back of his neck— tightening his posture— is some tangled mix of scolding for his own misstep in falling back on dated compulsions despite having already been warned away from them, and the desperate certainty in this: he has lived that life.

He feels that anguish no less, even now. And it does not diminish.]

He is a boy no longer. Time seeks him out with increasing fervor, and if he is not yet strong enough he will buckle beneath the strain when it lays waste to his protection.

[What use are wards when they wear thin? What use is armor if it holds no strength? A cub sheltered will only ever remain so, and the world is far too cruel to abide its presence for long.]

I swear to you, on my life, I will let no harm befall him.

[bouchonne]

Come now, Judge Magister.

[ Byerly's smile is crooked. A brief foray into cynicism - or, more accurately, a return to his usual form in the midst of all this earnestness. ]

You know that you can't make that oath. Harm befalls others no matter how passionately we promise their protection.

[archademode]

[What is he to say? 'I know better than you?' Here, in this world, where he’s so fresh in his footfalls and Byerly is not, between the two of them he can think well enough to know which of them makes the better advisor.

Yet his heart aches for it all the same.

His eyeline lowers, drawing away from tension into something thready and unreadable, lashes fitted over his eyes and maybe it is fortunate indeed that Byerly’s privileged enough to see his face, as it shows enough in tangent with that weary hum of a voice to promise his concession is not made lightly.]

Not in my experience.

[But few can say they’ve died for the guarantees of another, and fewer still can promise it would work again. He'd spent the whole of his breath and his luck on Lord Larsa already; Benedict might indeed fare poorer for it under similar circumstances. And so:]

But I’ve overstepped once more, it seems. You know the man better, and you’ve kept him in your shadow throughout, and I’ve no right to question either motive or means when the end result speaks for itself.

I disagree because I cannot help my own nature. I hope you’ll think no less of me for it.

[A pause, and then, righting his posture to harden back into its usual, iron-cast poise.]

I formally withdraw my protestation. Keep only my commendation for Lord Artemaeus’ work, and do with that knowledge what you will.

[Much as he knows Byerly dislikes the formality of lordship, he has to endure one last bow before that helmet is fitted in its rightful place.]

I bid you a fair evening, Byerly Rutyer.

...and thank you, for safeguarding him.

[bouchonne]

Hold on.

[ By lifts his hand, a gesture to bid him halt. His eyes are narrowed - not in disapproval, just in evaluation. ]

Argue with me.

[archademode]

[He's already turned to take his leave, one foot poised before the other, halting at an awkward spacing— before that helm tilts just slightly over the rise of his own shoulder.]

...what?


[???Byerly? ?

Is this a trap??]

[bouchonne]

I'm a fool. [ He says that easily and without shame. ]

So it's useful when an intelligent fellow with convictions argues with me. He can correct my lack of knowledge. So argue with me. If you have the truth of it, I'll learn.

[archademode]

[He’d anticipated spending the whole of his afternoon as sullen as spent ash. This— as so much of what Byerly seems to manage effortlessly— utterly displaces those designs. And for it he needs a moment longer to regain whatever mindset he’d lost.]

He wishes to change. It pulls at him like a thread laid bare.

[Benedict forgive him for speaking so plainly of his private pains.]

He lacks momentum, guidance, clarity— the means to understand where he falls short, and a deepset fear of that failure. It is a rot, that. It will not heal if he continues on as he does, for the man nearly shattered before me in confession this morning.

He will break, in time. This much I believe.

[bouchonne]

What makes you think he hasn't already broken?

[ By's head tilts to the side. ]

He betrayed us, then betrayed his country to rejoin us. If that pressure wouldn't grind a fine young bough into splinters, I don't know what would.

[archademode]

Consider the break unclean, if so.

For he did try. And he did succeed, however brief, in putting right his own missteps. [To feel guilt is one thing, after all. But to risk life and limb for those that matter, to want to make amends, and thus denied that opportunity to embrace the sting of that moment rather than burying it in indolence— these are hints of something worth grasping, he thinks.]

There was no need for him to fight that dragon, regardless of my own designs in bringing him. Fear froze him, urged him to flee for his own sake, and yet despite opportunity he chose action.

And do not think it was a matter of my influence, for before the battle we'd argued, and cut short our acquaintances.

[bouchonne]

[ Hm. ]

Unless the dragon took the form of an woman with an astonishing rear end who's draining the blood of her slaves to do magic, I don't know if that displays the sort of courage he's been lacking in the past.

[archademode]

[Well it’s not the description of the Magister he’d expected, but...filed away all the same.]

When one learns to walk, it is not by way of making running leaps.

More opportunities to prove his worth would likely strengthen his resolve. He would not lack for a safety net throughout, for all those who he's so won over.

[bouchonne]

Tell me about the opportunities you imagine.

[archademode]

[He's a blunt instrument, a man who would prefer the simplicity of direction and given orders, rather than any amount of deeper thought. It isn't as if he hadn't needed to devise strategies or discern deeper plots while serving at the Emperor's side— or that of his son's— but that it pulls more from him, those efforts. He's hardly peregrine, only a man with a keen nose and sharper intuition.

Still. He does his best.]

Less talking. Less wine and finery involved in his given assignments, and more grit. His strengths would not be wasted on joint missions where the rest of those gathered make their way by blade, and need only one clever tongue amongst them.

There is merit in it, the absence of thought under press of action at times. It builds instincts, those more inclined to be selfless than selfish.

[The more protective Benedict is of his companions, the better the odds he'll choose in favor of their shared benefit, rather than dreading his own footing. Or so Gabranth thinks, judging by the lesser experiences he'd had in Archades.]

With your permission, I would take him with me for some of my own endeavors.

[bouchonne]

[ He's quiet a moment. Taps his finger lightly against his desk. Finally: ]

My hesitation comes from the fact that the fear that I've seen from the boy is fear of people, not of mortal peril. He flinches away from scolding, from condemnation. I'll grant you true enough that I've not often seen him in life-or-death situations, but my personal thought is - has been - that he ought to build strength against people. That he ought to be exposed to people, and that he ought to learn to resist or to repudiate them.

[ And then, wryly: ] Wine and finery can require grit, as well, you know.

[archademode]

[There's a scoff for that comment, somewhere in the helmet. Were it still off, there'd be a great deal more to unpack.

As it is, he continues on:]

I was harsher on him than any for his slights against me. He bore them, though as you so accurately stated, he did flinch— only just.

And he has moved on.

For all of it I remain at his side. [This, without saying so, isn't something Gabranth does lightly.]

[bouchonne]

Hm.

[ He rubs his chin thoughtfully at that. That's good. ]

Then he's gaining a bit of mettle, it seems. When he first came to me, he vacillated widely between defiance and fear. What were the slights in question?

[archademode]

[Oh Byerly, you had to ask. For a long moment, Gabranth is silent. For longer still, in fact, as he exhales thinly through his nose in steeling preparation to deliver his own recount of events in the most distant and unfeeling way possible.]

He disrespectfully dismissed me before the Orlesian nobility when I came to collect him in order to prepare him for the battle ahead. [Slight one.] He then insulted me in private, disregarding my attempts at reinforcing the gravity of what we had been sent to do. [Slight two.

The last takes a beat longer to dislodge:]

...He then struck me in the eye, when I proposed that he dissolve our association if it was so undesired.

[bouchonne]

[ A beat - and then a honk of laughter. ]

He what!

[archademode]

[You had to laugh. You just had to. If his voice could sound any more thinned out and struck through with irritation, well— it'd be a miracle.]

This is hardly a laughing matter, Byerly.

[bouchonne]

It's completely a laughing matter. Him, punching!

[ hee hee hee ]

Were you even able to feel it? I've eaten pease porridge with more bite than the boy.

[archademode]

[If he sounds as though he's dying inside right now, trust that he is.]

...it was not a punch.

[bouchonne]

No? A little slap?

[ He mimes a tiny little slap. Then he crooks his hand into claws and makes a kittenish little scratching gesture. ]

[archademode]

[B Y E R L Y.]

When you typically aim to blind someone, think about the movement you would employ.

[bouchonne]

[ He thinks a moment, lips pursed - and then does an experimental thumb jab. Is this right? ]

[archademode]

[Lifting an index finger, Gabranth offers his own adjustment to that guess.

But yes.]