"So?"
"So."
"Are they?"
Jairus listened as Thea's breath labored. She soldiered on behind him at a steady clip, and he occasionally caught glimpses of condensing air out of the corner of his eye. She was out of eyesight, but near enough for him to feel the persistent shadow of her presence against his back, making his skin prickle in response. Jairus cast a glance back over his shoulder and cocked an eyebrow in her general direction. "Are who, what?" He intoned dryly.
He caught the disgruntled look she shot at him before he turned away and was forced to quash a smile. She sighed heavily and responded in a soft voice, vexation silvering her tone.
"You know what I mean." She was too on edge for his teasing, so he relented.
"Yes. They are."
"Oh." She paused and he waited with amused patience for the question he knew was coming. "Would it be an insult to ask if we're safe?"
"Yes." She let out something between a sigh and a soft but frustrated growl. He couldn't quite hold back the smirk which such a sound produced. It amused him, and was...endearing.
She was still behind him, barely visible in the periphery of his vision, but he could feel the heavy weight that settled over her shoulders as if it had been laid over his own. He didn't need to see her expression to know what it was. That fact sobered him.
"I will take care of it."
She made another un-interpretable sound and he cast one more glance back toward her. She was watching the road, her brow furrowed. Whether in concentration or irritation, he couldn't quite tell. Her eyes seemed darker than usual, more so when set against her pale skin. The natural tan warmth which usually graced her cheeks had been drained from her, leaving her wan and tired. The only color left was the unnatural pink flush in her lips and in the hollows of her cheeks, put there by the winter's chill. It made her look doll-like...fragile. He looked back to the road, ignoring the twisting sensation in his gut and sighed. If poppet she was, then it was not of the porcelain variety. She was not so easily broken...and for that he could be grateful.
He smiled again, faintly, remembering having called her that once. What had he said? Ah yes, she'd asked him to cut her down... that was it, and her word choice had amused him, as much as he could have been amused in that particular situation. She'd felt like a rag-doll in his arms then, fragile, weakened...needing him. He felt another strange stirring...he was proud of her strength, approved of it...yet....
She stumbled behind him, cursing softly, and pulling him out of his meandering thoughts. He blinked once and found himself again in the present.
They were making their way along the river road, and he took in the dark swirl of crows lifting like a black mist from the trees ahead of them. A murder of crows. His lips twitched, though this time without humor. He watched their westward flight and surveyed the wide scar of uneven snow and ice which marked out the width of the river's path, and allowed the vacant whiteness of it to blanket his troubled thoughts, clearing his mind.
The road they took was the same road Jairus had been tailed along before, and it was painfully slow work; the rutted and slush covered roads made the effort less than pleasant. He could just as easily have bundled her into his arms and made the journey less arduous, or dull, but he was more than sure they were being followed, and had no intentions of letting that fact go unpunished. 'Indeed, that is what my mind should be on,' he chided himself halfheartedly.
At this point avoidance was preposterous. They would find his home, it was only a matter of time. Unless he took care of the issue himself...which he had every intention of doing, and very soon at that. Thus it was that they found themselves trudging along the road's edge, cold and damp.
She fell in further behind him until once again he felt more than saw her hovering at his shoulder.
They had once again receded back into the silence which had thus far accompanied them on their wearying journey home. Thea chewed her lip and tugged her cloak tighter around her, trying and failing to block out the damp chill. She'd spent most of the trip watching his back, in the literal sense, and using his foot prints to ease her own. The snow hadn't had a chance to build up much on the road proper, though the banks rose up high on either side. She felt as if they were being funneled along a narrow channel. The thought made her nervous. She felt trapped, more so because she knew they were hemmed in from behind by those who were following. The dark wall of Jairus's cloak blocking the view before her wasn't easing her mind much either.
Her rational mind acknowledged she was safe. Jairus at least would not be hampered by a few snow drifts or the miserable slushy mess beneath their feet. Yet this knowledge did little to keep her insides from knotting with worry. She dared a glance behind her, the first in a long, long while....and still nothing. Just the grey-white of old snow and the black of night and of the naked branches tangling in the woods around them.
Where were the men? How could he tell they were being followed?
Not human.
She smiled to herself. That's what he would say if she asked, she knew. Thea watched his dark, broad shoulders. His hood had slid back and she noted the way the short hairs on his neck sloped inward in a sharp V. She smiled at a freckle just to the left of the V. The freckle struck her as somehow too human for him, too odd and imperfect. How 'not human' was he? she wondered. She also wondered how much he'd been changed, or if he had at all. What had he been like as a human? How much would it change her if....if...well, it wouldn't matter. She probably couldn't bring herself to do such a thing as it was...if such a thing he actually thought to do.
Thea continued to worry her lower lip absently. Who could say what he meant, or how much her own strange fancies had befuddled her mind and made her hear and see what she thought she wanted to.
She shook her head to clear it--trying and failing-- of the unnerving and titillating thoughts flitting through her mind.
"What will you do with them?" Her voice was soft, and she wondered if he could have even heard her, but he turned his head slightly to the side.
"Discourage them."
She pursed her lips at his unrepentant vagueness, even if it had been expected. And she knew with certainty that it was unrepentant....he was unrepentant. She had the strange feeling that he had always been that way...human or not. She couldn't resist the smile that pulled at her lips again at the realization. She decided she secretly liked that about him, though she'd probably never admit to it. But her smile was brief and she let out an undignified 'erp' as her heel slipped on a bit of wet ice causing her legs to buckle beneath her.
She blinked owlishly up at him before turning her gaze to the arm that held her steady.
"Thank you," she murmured. He nodded and released her, letting her wobbled back onto her feet. As much as he wanted to, it wouldn't do to let his hands linger, or treat her any more gently than he already had. There were enough eyes trained on them, he didn't need more.
He smirked down at her as she caught herself and straightened with an embarrassed grimace. Had she been an actual apprentice he'd probably have let her fall, both for his own amusement and her education. A lesson in watching where the hell you were going.
Not that he'd have faulted her either way. If she was distracted, then she had every right to be. She had passed through some very difficult moments these last few nights. Yet she'd handled herself admirably, better than many would have. He'd seen youths barely younger than her lose the contents of their stomachs, or even consciousness when faced with death. He also knew it wouldn't do to tell her that. She'd made it clear that this was not something she had any desire to hear, and he had no opinion on the matter to make an issue of it one way or another. If she had no desire to continue putting herself in harm's way, then so much the better.
She cleared her throat. "Sorry." She added with a shrug. His eyes caught a spot of red where her chapped lower lip had split, and he watched riveted as her tongue darted out to erase the mark. He felt a different sort of stirring, one which sent a shiver along his spine and made his finger twitch to touch her again.
"You've nothing to be sorry for." She shifted restlessly, her large doe eyes gazing up into his.
It took a moment for him to realize that he had been staring. He broke her gaze and turned away, continuing along the half frozen, half sodden road. He grimaced. He really would prefer to travel more quickly, but then he'd lose his quarry, a quarry who thought they were being ever so clever as they trailed behind in the trees along the side of the road.
She was silent again for a good while before he heard her clear her throat behind him. He smiled at the expanse of gray before him as he waited for her to unburden herself of the worries he knew were still plaguing her.
"Erm..."
"Yes?"
"Why...ah, how come Darius and his men were gone?" He'd accuse her of fretting...but the fact that Darius had left the city concerned him somewhat as well. Not too very much, as Jairus had what the man was looking for stumbling along behind him, but he'd been curious about that when Marcus had informed him before his meeting.
"Who's to say. We can only hope they've tired of the hunt, done the intelligent thing, and gone home to prepare for the next step in this silly game."
"Game?"
