More Than A Broken Hand?(Althesia, Rivaly)

[dragon]

J'rad's usual scowl stayed on his face as he listened to what he had done to his hand. Oh he did a fine job this time. Smashes, fractures, sprains and all in one hand. If he'd actually thought about it, he wouldn't have hit that wall. But J'rad really wasn't thinking. Well. Clearly, anyway.

"I can't make that a promise", J'rad spoke blunt, plain and cold, like a round boulder. Well, it was the truth. He couldn't promise not to punch another wall. He did irrational things, at times. Especially when angered, upset, or frustrated.

That caught his attention. Now he was really ready to think on what needed to be done between the two of them. It's not really that he'd been mad with Althesia. He was upset, true. But anger was punching that wall last night. He couldn't really look at her without thinking what to do, thus he avoided eye contact until he was ready to do so. Now, he was. And he looked over her so that he could ascertain just how he'd go about it and how he felt.

For some reason he was drawn to Althesia. If he wasn't, then he wouldn't have been upset. He really wouldn't be satisfied, no, he wouldn't be happy if she weren't around. But what was to stop her from sleeping around? Sharing a bed with other men? He was already confused as to the nature of their relationship to begin with or what to even call themselves. So this certainly didn't clear any air.

Ah. He'd have to talk to her. He'd have to straighten things out. He'd have to know where the solid ground was in this...relationship. He shot her a glance as though he'd say something but eyes quickly darted to Rivaly. Probably best not spoken infront of her. So he looked back over to Althesia, as if his look alone said that he indeed did have something to say but now was not the time. However, should she have no desire to talk then J'rad was quick with an answer to that as well. However, that wasn't as pleasing. But, if this were the case then he'd get over it. Eventually.

Mind now made up on what to do, thoughts drifted to a different subject. How would he perform wingsecond duties with an injured hand? Oh sure, it was his own fault but he wasn't really going to dwell on that part. Likely S'lyn would want to know exactly what happened. He'd deal with that when the time came. Any other curious dragonrider, fellow wingmate or not, would simply not get an answer. J'rad was use to giving others the cold shoulder. It was all apart of the image that was given off. A stone gargoyle, really.

[anhydrous]

Considering that Althesia was being treated as an extension of J’rad, she took it upon herself to correct his bitter answer. “He will not punch any more walls,” she assured the healer, eyes narrowed on her bronzer’s bruised knuckles as she lowered the glowbasket to her side. Her tone might have suggested many things, although Althesia wasn’t exactly sure which of them she was intending. Possessive? Reproachful? Determined? Was she trying to tell him that she would be there to prevent such a thing, or that she wouldn’t give him cause to?

Honestly, she had no idea.

Instead of trying to sort out her own emotions she watched his gaze flick up to meet hers and something surged in her chest. The sensation was almost pleasurable, a comfortable heat, but it didn’t last very long. Soon it shifted into a tightening; constricting her airway as he quickly glanced away. As much as she hated to be ignored, acknowledgement was bittersweet at best.

J’rad’s calculating stare cut through her as she attempted to read the words written in his expression, his heavy scowl still preventing any sort of hope of breaking through her brooding irritation. She matched his gaze, determined but unhappy. As much as she hated to admit it, there was something irresistible about this sullen bronzerider. He might not have the weyrleader’s prefect face or finesse with words, but Althesia could never see herself wrapped in J’fel’s arms at the end of a difficult day, reveling in the comfortable silence that so often permeated her time with J’rad.

It was no contest who she would rather spend time with, but her bronzer chose to ignore such things. He could not understand the separation of emotion and action, and it was doubtful that he would ever be able to come to terms with her various unhealthy habits. Just thinking of the fact that he might reestablish the wall between them was making her sick, but she didn’t let those thoughts show on her face. He would have to work to earn another show of how she truly felt. This crying business did not suit her at all.

[blueaid]

Where J'rad wouldn't promise, Rivaly accepted Althesia's word as law. "Wonderful," she answered back, casting a smile at the pair of them in the same collective-unit way that she had decided to lump them. It hardly took a mindhealer to see a relationship-on-the-rocks between them, to put together a broken hand and an unbroken silence. She spent more time than necessary collecting her bandages, her splint, her back turned while they shared their looks.

She was right there, guys. Right there. Someone who would be only too happy to help them put together all these broken little pieces of pseudo-relationship into some semblance of order-- and she stood apart from them, looking with sympathetic eyes over the top of her spectacles, willing one of them to say something so she could act on their collective behalf.

But a sigh steeled her for the less interesting work of splinting a busted hand, of binding and bandaging, the dull aspects of Healerdom that Rivaly could do with competence. But with very little interest. She approached them again quietly, green eyes cast back-and-forth with that invitation still open. She tried to bite her tongue, tried to keep it to herself, but... "Do you want to talk about it?" Either of them.

[dragon]

J'rad simply glared at Althesia in silence. How dare she tell the healer what he'd do. She had no authority, no right. How dare she try and command him. J'rad snorted in response. However, the healer accepted her answer? This would not do. He was not some pet that Althesia could make promises for him and trust it to be kept.

"What I said is sufficiant", he spoke up, holding his scowl. "You needn't correct me and propose such a guarantee that may or may not be able to be kept", he added. He wanted to be sure his answer was taken. Hers wasn't made of any sense or logic. If J'rad couldn't predict if his fist would meet a wall or not, how could she? The promise would be worthless and have no founding.

Now his mood set differently from just prior, he cast his glance at the healer as she posed her question. It was a stare as if daring her, no challenging her, to try her hand at healing this. Whatever it was, she thought needed to be discussed. No words offered, no movement of lips or posture just a simple enough stare to get his point across. Her question had been answered with a yes and now she had placed herself in perhaps a bigger mess than she'd intend to be. However, if the subject was going to take place then one of them would have to start the talking. Whatever response, he felt prepared and confident as always.

[anhydrous]

Whatever good that could have been gleaned from her words was lost on J’rad. “Stop being such an ass,” she snapped in exasperation. “She’s trying to help you and you’re behaving intolerably.” It was clear enough by the fire in her eyes that Althesia found the logic that her bronzer was struggling for irrelevant. The healer wasn’t asking for some impossible feat. It was plainly clear that she simply did not want J’rad back in her infirmary with a hand that had been injured without reason, which was an understandable request.

Althesia had been too preoccupied to notice Rivaly’s questioning glances, too distracted to realize what she had been fighting the urge to ask. Surprised that the healer had voiced something so timidly, Althesia joined J’rad in his impolite stare.

Being new to the weyr, Althesia was unaware of Rivaly’s true calling. She knew her only as a Journeywoman healer, as her knots specified. Under those circumstances, being asked to discuss personal problems with a complete stranger was an odd request. “Why would you want to listen?” She questioned with a frown, more curious than irritated. Both emotions read plain as day across her face, but for now her tone was devoid of hostility.

[blueaid]

"Because it's what I do." Rivaly said it without pretense or apology, just a little shrug while she dragged over a stool and her supplies and laid everything out on the rolling bed-side tray. "Listen to people, talk to people, it's what I do."

She beckoned with her fingers for J'rad to put his hand across the tray, all set to begin the work of splinting and bandaging his fractured digits. Likely, this was going to cause a fair bit of pain as well, but there was no sign of numbweed; perhaps this was a Healer's revenge? Stubborn, troublesome-- then suffer. Everything looked so innocuous though, a few flat pieces of wood to serve as a splint, a roll of gauze, nothing sharp or poky or slicey.

Mildly, she explained, "The two of you are having some sort of problem big enough to lead to a broken hand, new enough that you barely look at each other and only speak to argue. Sometimes, just having a third party can help paint things in a different light." Accusation-free, she left the offer out there for them to accept or decline.

[dragon]

J'rad growled at her reply. He was going to have say over his actions, not her. If that labeled him an ass, then so be it. He gave no other audible response than that as he laid his hand across the tray as the healer wanted.

J'rad's attention turned from Althesia to Rivaly as she spoke of their problem. She got the general basis of it, but it was obvious. "And you offer to be this third party?", J'rad asked with a grunt. Sure. Why not? He would let her have this. "Then who should start?", J'rad asked her, making it all too clear he'd accepted her offer and was willing to see where this would take him.

[anhydrous]

While the healer had insisted that she merely took a professional interest, Althesia didn’t quite know if she felt comfortable enough to share anything with this unfamiliar woman. What could Rivaly do to help them? Judge them? That’s the only logical result that she could come to, and it wasn’t exactly desirable.

J’rad’s growling didn’t help to coerce her thoughts into order, either. How would you explain such a thing? No matter how she worded it, Althesia would be in the wrong.

Unsure, the harper watched silently as Rivaly began to set J’rad’s hand. She sure as hell wasn’t going to begin this awkward conversation. What would she say? I slept with the weyleader? That would go over well.

Wordlessly she returned any stares sent in her direction, offering no parting of her lips, but at the same time, no real refusal to do so. After a moment she cast her eyes downward, “I don’t want to start,” she said softly, returning the glowbasket to its place to occupy herself.

[blueaid]

"Yes, I'm offering to be this third party. So let's work backward," suggested Rivaly helpfully, looking from one to the other for their obvious reticence. That she landed her look on J'rad had less to do with tying splits to his hand than with the fact that he seemed the one more willing to work-things-through-- which may not be such a good thing, depending on his perspective?

She had to lower her eyes after a moment, to get the splints lined up; his pinky would have to stay extended for the healing process, with a brace along the inside of it that crossed his palm toward his wrist, holding his finger outstretched. "Tell me what happened right before you punched the wall."

[dragon]

J'rad squinted a bit and gritted his teeth as she began her work. Oh how sensitive his hand was. Sensitivity really didn't suit J'rad, in any form. It would be considered, to some, an odd sight.

"Right", J'rad began, agreeing to start relating the events. "We were laying by the ledge of my weyr, talking. She told me something...", J'rad paused mid sentence to find just the right word to finish it. "...unpleasant", he finally finished, finding the right word. Yes, it was unpleasant indeed. The relationship and feelings were complicated enough. But to sleep with the weyrleader? That just threw everything off.

"She told me she had slept with someone", J'rad was straight to the point. He told the healer how it had felt. Unpleasant. Now he told her the general point of it all. Oh how those words stung him. It seemed to do more damage, more pain, than fixing his broken hand. "That's when I got up and punched the wall", J'rad finally ended it all with the point she asked events prior of.

Now it was on the table. But not all of it. For some reason he gave her some dignity by not telling who it was exactly. Perhaps it wouldn't have made much sense? Was it unnecessary to say such a thing? Surely it was necessary. J'rad would have thought so? Why hold back? For Althesia? Maybe. J'rad found he couldn't explain much when it came to her. Maybe he wanted her to admit it herself though? Who knew?

[anhydrous]

Retuning to the bedside as Rivaly began to bind her bronzer’s broken hand, Althesia did her best to ignore the hisses and winces. It was almost painful to watch, so she couldn’t image what he must have been feeling. The healer didn’t seem too concerned, numbweed absent in her spread of supplies.

The real fun began as J’rad picked past the night’s events, omitting the pride-slashing details in his usual blunt manner. As much as Althesia would have preferred not to meet Rivaly’s eyes, as the tale unfolded, she couldn’t help to be curious as to what the healer would say. Would she ask who it had been? J’rad hadn’t dropped the name, and she certainly wasn’t going to without prompting. Did it matter who it had been? Would he have been angry regardless? It suddenly struck her that she didn’t know him quite well enough to be sure.

Keeping her thoughts in order was proving to be impossible, but she kept some conscious part of her mind on the proceedings. As soon as J’rad’s words stopped, Althesia levelly interjected. “Which would be worthy of anger if he had asked me not to do such a thing,” glancing towards her wincing bronzer, some semblance of guilt clutched at her chest. “But he had not.” Her punctuated words would never suggest that she were capable of such an emotion, terse and formal. Surprisingly enough, it wasn’t as much of an accusation as it could have been.

With a careful tone Althesia elaborated, choosing her words guardedly. “In fact, the last time we spoke of that,” here the harper assumed that Rivaly would understand what she was implying, “He had mentioned that he could not ask me to stop such a habit. If I remember correctly, there was talk of goldriders…” She trailed off, a haze smothering the details of that night. Oh, alcohol.

[blueaid]

After J'rad's explanation, Rivaly's guess was pretty obvious; "And that made you jealous, and that made you punch the wall?" She said it while clipping the ends of the gauze in place, having made a mitt to surround the man's hand and hold all his fingers and palm just so while the healing had a chance to set all the little bones back to rights. But that was secondary, and her fingers stilled on the tray with her tools, no indication given that she was actually done with the bare necessity of their visit.

Then Althesia elaborated and she turned on her stool, slight enough gesture but it really brought home the fact that the Harper was now her focus. "Did you know when you told him that it would make him jealous?" she inquired without accusation; she wouldn't presume that the woman would attempt to raise J'rad's ire like that-- or, at least, she wouldn't let on that she had presumed. Practice practice.

[dragon]

J'rad seemed to growl as Althesia spoke up. "I can't help dragonlust", a more intent scowl was now playing his features. He paused for a moment, awkward silence would set in it seemed before he continued. "I love no one", J'rad finally broke out with. "Infact I can barely tolerate most, much less enjoy the company of another", J'rad responded with her. Oh, but there was a difference. What she did willingly, he would have to be forced into by his own dragon. And how true his words were! J'rad could barely stomach the company of another human being. Infact, it was a wonder how he stomached Althesia. But for some reason, she was the only one he accepted willingly and beyond the ties of dragonrider duty. After he had his say, he became quiet. No need to say anymore. He said what he needed to, or so he felt.

[anhydrous]

Speaking in front of J’rad was making her uncomfortable, both of them talking like the other wasn’t there. For the most part she was trying to ignore him and his testy comments, but each agitated quip stung like a sunburn.

With a sigh to brush past his latest scowl, Althesia cleared her throat. “Of course, but I didn’t tell him to make him jealous,” she said irritably. And she didn’t do it to make him jealous, either.

That, however, wasn’t said aloud. If she divulged that fact, she would undoubtedly be asked why, which, in turn, would lead down an awkward path. Instead she attempted to validate herself. “I told him so that he wouldn’t hear it from someone else.” It seemed to make sense enough, and for once, it was actually the truth.

Any attempts to ignore J’rad were broken by his latest admission, and she drew back as if someone had slapped her. To ask him to love her probably wasn’t realistic, but she had thought that there was something more than tolerance brewing between them. Certainly she felt more than lukewarmly towards him..

Suddenly she felt naked standing there; awkward and ugly like she had been as a child. That discomfort roiled momentarily in her stomach, endowing itself with silent fury as she stared heavily at the floor. She couldn’t take much more of this.

[blueaid]

Calmly but not without the certainty of practice and training, Rivaly said, "J'rad, you need to be quiet for a moment. I don't think you realize the things you're saying could be hurtful, so I want you to think for a moment before you say anything more." She kept admonition out of her voice, only the soft seriousness of a woman attuned to the feelings of others.

So, with a breath, she turned toward Althesia-- Althesia who stared at the floor, who drew back physically from the man's words. "Both of you are trying so hard to pretend you don't care as much as you do care. Why?" She asked the Harper, because asking J'rad? Seemed like adding fuel to the fire.