AU for _deadlydance_, set immediately after "The Price"

[birthrightgreen]

She wasn't nervous. She had nothing to be nervous about. It wasn't like it was a romantic evening. They'd just worked so hard on the case, working to catch the rabid witch who'd been slaughtering innocent males. And they had, with Jaenelle's help. Now Jaenelle and Daemon were back on their honeymoon and she...

She was here in Amdarh, back how she had been, nursing the bruises Falonar had left. So, why, exactly was she changing her dress? The one she had on was perfectly acceptable. She was going out dancing with a friend. She could use a friend right now. What she couldn't use was a male thinking he was just going to sweep in and carry her off.

Not that he was probably thinking that, but she was suspicious.

He was a male, and years of seeing them abused by her own sex still hadn't made her trust them as a gender. Then again, she didn't trust most people.

With a growl at herself, she finally settled on a black dress with enough slink to impress and a enough swirl to make a statement on the dance floor, no matter how elegant and formal. Hair pinned half up, the rest left down. If people stared at her ears, so be it.

She was ready. It was going to be fun. She kept repeating that. Fun. With a friend.

Just a friend. He wasn't expecting anything. He wouldn't be that foolish.

She just wished she knew what he wanted.

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"She certainly fought well."

Rainier played with the stem of his glass, now focusing in on the rest of Rainier's words.

"I had wondered about that."

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

"About what? Where I learned to fight?" She tilted her head at him.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"Yes. About how you learned to fight. About how you knew Daemon."

He had watched them, from the bench.

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

"His mother...Tersa?" She didn't know if he'd met Tersa, for all she lived on the grounds now. "She brought him to see Titian and me. She'd found us. Saw I was Blood. She wanted him to see to it that I was trained in Craft, to wear the Jewels if I was strong enough. He gave us one of his homes to live in and arranged for tutors for me, and for my Birthright Ceremony a couple of years later."

Her eyes darkened slightly, then she forced a smile. "When he found me again after Titian died, he took me to a Red Moon house to apprentice with and arranged for my education to resume, adding fight masters to the cycle of tutors. They built on what Titian had already taught me." And honed the killing instincts she'd developed on the street.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

Rainier knew enough to see that it hadn't been easy for Surreal after Titian had died. What worried him was that it was most likely worse than he imagined.

Fingers tightened on the wine glass.

"I knew you were close. I just didn't know how."

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

Close. A flicker of pain in her eyes.

"He was the only family I had for over 350 years. The only friend, really." Voice utterly calm, she moved to scoop up a little more of the dessert she didn't really want, but it was something to do with her hands.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"No wonder then, he is so protective of you."

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

When he didn't want to kill her.

"We've spent a lot of time looking out for each other through the years."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

There was a wry smile.

"He seems to have perfected the skill."

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

She chuckled. "He's had a lot of practice."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

Rainier nodded.

"It seems like he is your compass?"

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

Her smile was just a tiny bit forced. "Something like that."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"All I know is we walked ten times round this city, in every direction it could be walked, for three whole days. Then he showed up and you knew exactly what to do."

Daemon also had seemingly eased whatever had been upsetting Surreal for all of those days, setting Rainier on edge because he simply had no idea how to sooth it.

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

"It was his idea to use the boy. I wasn't thinking in terms of bait and hunting. I got distracted." By her own fears, truthfully. By what she feared to find, holding her back from finding it.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"And whatever it was that distracted you, he eased that too."

Rainier's eyes challanged her to deny it.

Not that he was jealous.

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

She nodded slightly. "Yes."

He'd known, without her saying anything.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"I'm glad he could help," Rainier finally admitted grudgingly. "I don't like to think about how many more men would have died."

Or how taunt, and drawn, she would have stayed.

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

"Nor do I." She was mildly disgruntled that she'd needed him to put it together. Extra 1300 years doing it or not.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

Maybe he should warn her, Rainier decided.

"Well, you can expect to have won the appreciation of a great many men in the city."

Was she prepared for that?

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

She looked up at him and paled a little bit.

"Oh, shit."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"They'll pet," he pointed out, almost as an afterthought.

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

She groaned slightly, closing her eyes. "Forget the theatre. I'm not leaving the townhouse for the next month until they forget."

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"It's a private box Surreal."

[birthrightgreen.livejournal.com]

"There's a lobby," she said grimly, remembering her last trip to the theatre.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_deadlydance_/]

"You doubt my abilty to safely escort you through a lobby?"