Ulla studies him for a moment, debating whether to answer.
"And if graduating might require stripping away the only thing left that I
want?" She isn't sure she believes it's possible without giving up her
revenge. "Lark thinks it's possible to graduate without losing that. I'm
not certain I believe him."
"I was always ambitious." Ulla knows how to want, but only out of anger
these days. "Everything else I've wanted went badly wrong. What was left
in the end was vengeance."
That's what she doesn't know whether she'll be allowed to hang onto
if she wants to graduate.
“Yeah,” he says as he reaches over for another piece of fruit, “That’s how I died too.”
He waves it lightly towards her.
“The vengeance. The… nothing else.” He considers it for a moment. “And yeah, I guess the crash and burn of my dreams. That happened… a little before then. I didn’t think of it. There was a month or so between.”
"It was a matter of moments, for me." The two are intrinsically linked
because they were bound up in the same awful night. She lost her goals,
her people, and the single person who mattered most to her in one fell
swoop. "Between losing everything else and choosing vengeance."
The choice was quick. She was still waiting to achieve it.
He tosses the bite into his mouth, chews and swallows and considers it for a moment. Thinks about it. Shakes his head.
"I think a part of me still hoped. That I could salvage something. Get my vengeance and make something out of it."
He reaches over for another piece of fruit.
"But there was definitely a point where I decided the revenge? More important than that chance. That after everything that happened, it was just a delusion I was using to stay alive."
He almost reaches for a fruit, changes his mind, and let his hands settle in his lap. It takes him a minute or so, and there's a lot that goes through his mind. When he speaks, it starts slow. And slowly gets back to a normal speed for him.
"I think... the person I was? It was the truth for him. I think... he was doomed. Because what happened, the problems? They started before I knew they were problems. And I couldn't see them before they exploded."
Ulla is quiet for a moment too, considering that. Eventually, she says, "I
knew I was swimming into problems. But I did it anyway. I just didn't
realize how big the problems would be. I was in the way of someone else's
ambition, and I underestimated the lengths to which he would go."
None of this touches the real reason she chose vengeance. It was never
Roffe's betrayal that was the tipping point. It was Signy's.
He nods to that and he looks out, away. He can bare himself this way, share these things, but he needs a little distance. His practical side knows it isn’t as effective, that there’s something to looking at someone when you say things like this. But his heart is too full and heavy and hot even thinking about it now to venture it.
“There aren’t many things that are just… true. There’s always exceptions. Always factors. Always… possibilities. And most of the time? That’s? A great thing. But. There was someone who. It was. An impossibility that he would turn on me. That he’d ever be disloyal. And in the moment where he did, I almost felt.
“Broken. Like the world was moving forward but I? I was stuck in place. Unwilling to move on. Being torn apart by the force. Because what I was seeing? Couldn’t be true. It couldn’t be reality. I didn’t want it to be reality. Because no matter how rough things got, no matter how dire. Dangerous. No matter what we were asked to do? We’d always done it together. And I didn’t even know how to… be different from that.”
His shoulders buck just the once before he swallows and reaches for a piece of fruit again.
“Surprises like that are a sonofabitch. I’m sorry.”
Oh. If she were in human form right now, Ulla thinks she might
cry. It's too familiar. It tears at a wound that never healed over in the
first place. She's grateful he isn't looking at her, so she has a chance
to compose herself a little.
Her voice is raw when she answers, full of old pain and quiet anger. "I
had someone like that too. Her ambition was intertwined with mine.
Sildroher magic works through music, and we were a perfect match for
duets. For years, it was the two of us. Then our performance caught the
attention of the prince, and it was the three of us. When he turned
on me and left me for dead, she chose him."
She isn't looking at Kepler any more than he looked at her, Ulla's gaze
firmly on the sand in front of her. "She came first for me, always. I
realized too late that what I was to her was a refuge. She left me
when she found another safe rock to cling to."
Ulla would have done anything for Signy. She did do anything for
Signy; that boy's death would weigh more on her conscience if she hadn't
discarded most of her scruples when she swore revenge.
He hasn’t found many people who get that. Who let themselves go that deep, so far, that the way you see the world is through a filter of ‘us’ instead of ‘me’.
He listens to the story and his heart aches for her. It aches for him, again. It makes him want to wrap around Jacobi and shake him. It makes him think of a moment on a space ship so different from this one and saying goodbye and knowing-
Knowing he has one thing he wants and nothing else mattered.
“Do you think she understood? How you loved her?”
And so she doesn’t feel alone-
“That’s the part that killed me, really. In… the figurative sense, here. Maybe in the literal sense. Hearts are funny like that.”
"I don't think she did." Ulla wonders sometimes if Signy was capable of
understanding how much Ulla loved her. Then she wonders how she could
possibly not know, when they were so closely entwined, sharing
secrets and wrapped around each other.
"Roffe, the prince. He saw that she'd fallen in love with him. He
threatened to lead her on, promise to marry her, and then break her heart.
That's how he convinced me to do what he wanted. And yet he still stole my
knife to use as leverage, in case I didn't love Signy enough"
Neither of them realized just how much Ulla loved Signy, not even when
Roffe was using it against Ulla.
In the first betrayal, the one that preceded the night Ulla lost
everything, "Signy helped him steal it."
He's keeping his eyes elsewhere. He thinks? It's probably best for both of them this way. They're connecting on one level, the important one. More of it than that might actually start to hurt. Something beyond the ache that this discussion was.
There's a dozen things he wants to say to that. But none of the words come. He's angry. And he feels this welling up of sympathy. And he's heartbroken. And he wants to rip both of them to pieces. And he wants to do something for her.
"Which one do you want revenge on?"
Obviously, the answer could be both. But for him, there'd be one.
Ulla could have moved past any number of things that Signy did to her. But
one instant that served as the tipping point. They've come far enough now
that she teeters on the edge of telling him. After an excruciating moment
of indecision, she does.
"When I was lying there in agony, I asked for my knife back to end my
suffering. And she looked to him for permission." If Roffe had
asked it, would Signy really have left her to die slowly and painfully,
without even the mercy of a swift death? Ulla supposes she'll never know
for certain. Signy turned to Roffe, and Ulla turned to rage rather than
oblivion.
“Cruelty on that level-“ and now that anger is out again, and yes, it’s for her. He hopes she can see that. Can recognize it. He shakes his head. Tried to settle.
“I’m sorry.” Just that, nothing more, a deep breath in. A deep one out.
“I don’t think ‘I understand’ is… true. But. I empathize. And I want… I want to help you get back there.”
“I do,” he agrees, and considers it. “I don’t mean to insult your choice to share it. I just… I know so much can be in the details. The small moments that loom large inside your chest. So I don’t want to presume either. Telling me about that,” he dips his head to her, “it’s not nothing.”
He won’t say thank you. But he hopes she understands.
It's not nothing. It's the first time Ulla has ever described that
moment aloud. She just tore old wounds open, and she isn't sure whether
she feels better for it.
But music is an easy lifeline to grasp, and she's grateful for the change
of subject. The reprieve. "Yes. I still want to learn."
He nods... and he slings the instrument back to his front, pulling the strap off of him and offering it to her.
He doesn't want her to go too deep on the first meeting, doesn't want her to regret talking to him, or sharing with him. Wounds like that can flow like a torrent when you take the pressure off for an instant. And he knows, for himself? He'd regret letting out too much. And if he wasn't feeling generous?
He might even resent someone for not stopping him. Better to end with something to shared like this.
"You use the knobs at the top to adjust the tension on the strings. Then you use your fingers to press here," he points to the neck, "between the raised sections to change the length of the string, changing the note."
Ulla plucks each string experimentally, strums once, then presses her
fingers to the frets and tries it again to see how the sound changes. A
welcome distraction. "And the notes are different depending on where you
press. So there's a range of notes you can play on each string."
It makes sense, though it might not come quite as easily to her as
piano did.
"Show me how to hold it for a few chords?" She could try to feel out some
fingerings for herself, and probably will later, in the music room. But
she'll take instruction while she can get it.
Ulla is now averse to emotional connections, but she's never minded touch.
Not even from people she dislikes, who have never had anything but
contempt for her. He's an improvement over her fellow sildroher.
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no subject
Ulla studies him for a moment, debating whether to answer.
"And if graduating might require stripping away the only thing left that I want?" She isn't sure she believes it's possible without giving up her revenge. "Lark thinks it's possible to graduate without losing that. I'm not certain I believe him."
no subject
“If what you want is that important, I’d have to agree. But I think… graduation? For you? Might be about finding something else you want too.”
no subject
"I was always ambitious." Ulla knows how to want, but only out of anger these days. "Everything else I've wanted went badly wrong. What was left in the end was vengeance."
That's what she doesn't know whether she'll be allowed to hang onto if she wants to graduate.
no subject
He waves it lightly towards her.
“The vengeance. The… nothing else.” He considers it for a moment. “And yeah, I guess the crash and burn of my dreams. That happened… a little before then. I didn’t think of it. There was a month or so between.”
no subject
It's more understanding than she was expecting..
"It was a matter of moments, for me." The two are intrinsically linked because they were bound up in the same awful night. She lost her goals, her people, and the single person who mattered most to her in one fell swoop. "Between losing everything else and choosing vengeance."
The choice was quick. She was still waiting to achieve it.
no subject
"I think a part of me still hoped. That I could salvage something. Get my vengeance and make something out of it."
He reaches over for another piece of fruit.
"But there was definitely a point where I decided the revenge? More important than that chance. That after everything that happened, it was just a delusion I was using to stay alive."
no subject
"What do you think now?" Ulla wonders. Now that he's been on the Barge all this time. Now that he's graduated.
no subject
"I think... the person I was? It was the truth for him. I think... he was doomed. Because what happened, the problems? They started before I knew they were problems. And I couldn't see them before they exploded."
no subject
Ulla is quiet for a moment too, considering that. Eventually, she says, "I knew I was swimming into problems. But I did it anyway. I just didn't realize how big the problems would be. I was in the way of someone else's ambition, and I underestimated the lengths to which he would go."
None of this touches the real reason she chose vengeance. It was never Roffe's betrayal that was the tipping point. It was Signy's.
no subject
“There aren’t many things that are just… true. There’s always exceptions. Always factors. Always… possibilities. And most of the time? That’s? A great thing. But. There was someone who. It was. An impossibility that he would turn on me. That he’d ever be disloyal. And in the moment where he did, I almost felt.
“Broken. Like the world was moving forward but I? I was stuck in place. Unwilling to move on. Being torn apart by the force. Because what I was seeing? Couldn’t be true. It couldn’t be reality. I didn’t want it to be reality. Because no matter how rough things got, no matter how dire. Dangerous. No matter what we were asked to do? We’d always done it together. And I didn’t even know how to… be different from that.”
His shoulders buck just the once before he swallows and reaches for a piece of fruit again.
“Surprises like that are a sonofabitch. I’m sorry.”
no subject
Oh. If she were in human form right now, Ulla thinks she might cry. It's too familiar. It tears at a wound that never healed over in the first place. She's grateful he isn't looking at her, so she has a chance to compose herself a little.
Her voice is raw when she answers, full of old pain and quiet anger. "I had someone like that too. Her ambition was intertwined with mine. Sildroher magic works through music, and we were a perfect match for duets. For years, it was the two of us. Then our performance caught the attention of the prince, and it was the three of us. When he turned on me and left me for dead, she chose him."
She isn't looking at Kepler any more than he looked at her, Ulla's gaze firmly on the sand in front of her. "She came first for me, always. I realized too late that what I was to her was a refuge. She left me when she found another safe rock to cling to."
Ulla would have done anything for Signy. She did do anything for Signy; that boy's death would weigh more on her conscience if she hadn't discarded most of her scruples when she swore revenge.
no subject
He listens to the story and his heart aches for her. It aches for him, again. It makes him want to wrap around Jacobi and shake him. It makes him think of a moment on a space ship so different from this one and saying goodbye and knowing-
Knowing he has one thing he wants and nothing else mattered.
“Do you think she understood? How you loved her?”
And so she doesn’t feel alone-
“That’s the part that killed me, really. In… the figurative sense, here. Maybe in the literal sense. Hearts are funny like that.”
no subject
"I don't think she did." Ulla wonders sometimes if Signy was capable of understanding how much Ulla loved her. Then she wonders how she could possibly not know, when they were so closely entwined, sharing secrets and wrapped around each other.
"Roffe, the prince. He saw that she'd fallen in love with him. He threatened to lead her on, promise to marry her, and then break her heart. That's how he convinced me to do what he wanted. And yet he still stole my knife to use as leverage, in case I didn't love Signy enough" Neither of them realized just how much Ulla loved Signy, not even when Roffe was using it against Ulla.
In the first betrayal, the one that preceded the night Ulla lost everything, "Signy helped him steal it."
no subject
He's keeping his eyes elsewhere. He thinks? It's probably best for both of them this way. They're connecting on one level, the important one. More of it than that might actually start to hurt. Something beyond the ache that this discussion was.
There's a dozen things he wants to say to that. But none of the words come. He's angry. And he feels this welling up of sympathy. And he's heartbroken. And he wants to rip both of them to pieces. And he wants to do something for her.
"Which one do you want revenge on?"
Obviously, the answer could be both. But for him, there'd be one.
no subject
"Both," although as always, "Roffe matters less."
Ulla could have moved past any number of things that Signy did to her. But one instant that served as the tipping point. They've come far enough now that she teeters on the edge of telling him. After an excruciating moment of indecision, she does.
"When I was lying there in agony, I asked for my knife back to end my suffering. And she looked to him for permission." If Roffe had asked it, would Signy really have left her to die slowly and painfully, without even the mercy of a swift death? Ulla supposes she'll never know for certain. Signy turned to Roffe, and Ulla turned to rage rather than oblivion.
no subject
“I’m sorry.” Just that, nothing more, a deep breath in. A deep one out.
“I don’t think ‘I understand’ is… true. But. I empathize. And I want… I want to help you get back there.”
no subject
Ulla glances up at him again, finally. "You understand more than most, I think." Or they wouldn't have had this conversation at all.
She reaches for another piece of fish, swallowing down some of her anger along with it.
no subject
He won’t say thank you. But he hopes she understands.
“Were you still up for guitar lessons?”
no subject
It's not nothing. It's the first time Ulla has ever described that moment aloud. She just tore old wounds open, and she isn't sure whether she feels better for it.
But music is an easy lifeline to grasp, and she's grateful for the change of subject. The reprieve. "Yes. I still want to learn."
no subject
He doesn't want her to go too deep on the first meeting, doesn't want her to regret talking to him, or sharing with him. Wounds like that can flow like a torrent when you take the pressure off for an instant. And he knows, for himself? He'd regret letting out too much. And if he wasn't feeling generous?
He might even resent someone for not stopping him. Better to end with something to shared like this.
"You use the knobs at the top to adjust the tension on the strings. Then you use your fingers to press here," he points to the neck, "between the raised sections to change the length of the string, changing the note."
no subject
Ulla plucks each string experimentally, strums once, then presses her fingers to the frets and tries it again to see how the sound changes. A welcome distraction. "And the notes are different depending on where you press. So there's a range of notes you can play on each string."
It makes sense, though it might not come quite as easily to her as piano did.
no subject
"You can play individual notes," he gestures to the strings with a plucking notion, "and chords" and a strumming motion.
"And of course, you can mix the two."
no subject
"Show me how to hold it for a few chords?" She could try to feel out some fingerings for herself, and probably will later, in the music room. But she'll take instruction while she can get it.
no subject
"May I touch you?"
It would be easier that way, but it wouldn't be impossible to manage it without.
no subject
Ulla is now averse to emotional connections, but she's never minded touch. Not even from people she dislikes, who have never had anything but contempt for her. He's an improvement over her fellow sildroher.
She nods. "I don't mind."
(no subject)