Я вернулся в деревню

[balancedlight]

Who: Svetlana and Open + a prompt for Fraser
What: Venturing forth and also dealing with April shenanigans!
When: April catch-all!
Where: Milton, then the path up to and including Lakeside. See prompts in post!

Content Warnings: Nothing as of yet; will update!

Comments

[bestsir]

Goodsir feels a lump in his throat and swallows. What she says—he knows it all too well.

Mr. Morfin is unwell.

After a moment, he says quietly, "I am one of a handful of men here who came from the same time and place—an expedition into the Arctic. Crozier, Hickey, Gibson, Little, Jopson—they are the others. Our ships were trapped in the ice, all our tinned provisions were rotten or poisoned, there was dissent from within and danger from without, and there was nothing I could do."

A pause, a deep breath. He thinks of Silna beside him, her hand on his shoulder, and hesitantly, he reaches out to put a hand on Sveta's shoulder. He doesn't dare do more.

"There is little worse for someone who's been trained to help others when there is nothing to be done. I know."

[balancedlight]

She sniffs, her cheeks damp with tears that she can't seem to stop. It all seems so silly - they're all trapped here and she's the only one who is sitting and crying about it. But she is also cut off from the Twilight, from the very part of her that makes her - her.

That hand on her shoulder is the anchor she's been looking for and she gratefully reaches up and places her hand lightly over his.

"Thank you," she says and means it. "I know you understand. And I will be alright. I will stand up in a moment and go about my day. But for now...for now I think I need to sit and cry."

[bestsir]

There's a little prickle at the back of his neck when she touches his hand, which he only glancingly notices and wouldn't know what to do with anyway.

"Sometimes that is all one can do," he says. "Would you prefer to be alone? Or—or I can stay, if you like."

[balancedlight]

"Will you stay?" she asks before she actually thinks about it. It's an automatic want, a desire to not be alone with her feelings. "Tell me - tell me what we talked about of the nervous system?" she finally decides, reaching up to wipe the tears from her cheeks.

She knows there's a lot of information, a lot of things she's discussed with him, but this neutral topic is easy. And she's more than willing to add to it.

She doesn't move her hand.

[bestsir]

He can appreciate the desire to talk about something simple and neutral, and he's happy to oblige. If he slips into a mode that's not unlike that of a student being quizzed by Dr. Knox, he can't quite help it. But it's nice, talking to her. and he even half-forgets the contact of their hands—it's as comfortable, really, as the conversation.