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Kahlan, struggling almost painfully into wakefulness, sat up slowly in bed and blinked into the darkness of the early morning. “Cara?” she mumbled, rubbing at her eyes as she reached blindly towards the other side of the bed only to find it empty, the sheets having long since gone cold.
Frowning into the darkness, she stood – sleep forgotten – and moved towards the balcony whose doors were thrown wide, as they surely had not been the night before. With her fingers tight around the hilt of her dagger, she stepped forward only to gasp as the cold wind rushed her. “…Cara?” she asked incredulously, almost dropping her blade in surprise.
The blonde grunted out something like greeting but her eyes remained on the inscrutable darkness of the night.
Thanks to the moon and stars Kahlan could, after a moment of adjustment, at least see her, a dark backdrop against the inky night sky. “Spirits, what are you doing out here? It’s freezing,” she said, abandoning her dagger inside as she stepped up beside her Mord’Sith.
“I didn’t notice,” she said and the brunette couldn’t help the way her frown deepened at her tone. So…not desolate really, no, that would have required emotion, however negative. No, it was more like she felt nothing at all.
Concerned, she reached out, resting an open hand on her arm. “Are you alright?” she asked.
Her arm tensed beneath her fingers and, though she braced for it, Cara made no move to pull away; the first good sign of the night. “I’m fine,” she said gruffly, “I’m just not tired,”
Fighting the urge to roll her eyes even as she continued to frown (it was just like the Mord’Sith not to admit when she was having trouble sleeping), she appraised her, eyes lingering on the tenseness of her jaw, highlighted as it was by the moons pale, but unforgiving, light. “Something on your mind?” she tried again.
Cara grunted, raising her hand to rub at her forehead. “You should go back to sleep,” she said as she lowered her arm, “There’s no sense in us both being awake,”
“There’s no sense in either of us being awake,” she corrected diligently, “But, alas, we will both continue to be so until you decide to discuss whatever it is that has you frozen here,” she shivered, almost pointedly, at the unintended double entendre.
“You are not dressed for the cold, Confessor,” she said and the blankness in her expression had not been as obvious as it was then, when her eyes ran appraisingly over the brunettes form and yet the familiar gaze held no hint of lascivious intent.
:Neither are you,” she said, eying her leathers pointedly. “And yet, here we are, here you’ve been,” she shook her head, “How long have you been standing here?”
Cara tensed briefly and Kahlan knew she wouldn’t like her answer even before she gave it. “I never slept,”
She flinched slightly, from equal parts cold and shame. How had she failed to notice the stiffness in the blonde’s frame as she’d drifted off, content with thoughts of the holiday celebrations that would, undoubtedly, begin in full force as soon as the sun rose?
Clearly reading her expression, Cara said, “It is no fault of yours,”
“Then why won’t you tell me what’s on your mind?” she asked, blinking down at her.
The Mord’Sith groaned, running a hand through her hair. “If I do, will you go inside and warm yourself?” she snapped and, after the lack of emotion, the sudden burst of anger took the Confessor by surprise, “Your people hate me enough without your missing the Solstice celebrations because of illness you gained on my behalf,”
“They’d get over it,” she said, not bothering to correct her. She knew, just as Cara did, that many people disapproved of the Mord’Siths presence in the White City. But just as her own mistrust had faded, theirs would as well, of this she was certain. Despite her protests to the contrary, one couldn’t help but see the truth in Cara now. “But, if it will urge you towards admittance, then yes; I promise to go inside afterwards,” she decided not to mention that she had no intention of returning to their bed alone.
The blonde offered her a stilted nod that matched her suddenly sharp breathing perfectly. “I am concerned that my presence here will…will make the celebrations less enjoyable. For you,” she began haltingly, “So I have decided to leave,”
“Decided to…” Kahlan’s eyes went wide. “What? You’re…you’re what?!” she looked at her, horrorstricken, “You can’t leave, I…” she swallowed, “You can’t. You just…you can’t,”
“I don’t mean forever, Confessor,” she said, her own eyes dark and painfully unreadable. “Just until the Solstice passes. A week, at most,”
“You would…you’d leave me?” she asked and Cara’s face twisted painfully, into a visage so full of hurt and shame that it scarcely looked like the one she’d come to know.
“You will have my promise to return,” she assured her, brow furrowed.
“That isn’t the point!” she exploded, “It’s not that I don’t trust you to come back; it’s that I don’t want you to go in the first place!”
“But I don’t belong here, Kahlan,” she said and the simple, all-encompassing belief in her words all but broke her heart, “These people don’t accept me and they shouldn’t. I am Mord’Sith,” she said, as she’d said so many times before. Had they always sounded so hollow? “But my presence here…it taints them, taints you, and I…” she looked away, “You deserve happiness,”
The words she didn’t say, the ‘You deserve better’, danced in the silence between them until Kahlan’s chest ached with it and her blue eyes clouded with tears.
“In what world,” she began, reaching to cradle the blonde’s cheek against her palm, “Could I be happy without you?”
“You don’t understand-”
“I do,” she interrupted smoothly, “I do understand, Cara. Every word you’ve said…and every one you didn’t,” she let that sink in for a moment before she continued, “And my answer remains the same, will always remain the same,”
“I love you,” she said, the words catching slightly in her throat as the tears that had been threatening finally slipped free of her hold, “And that is not affected by the feelings of Aydindril or anyone else except the two of us.” Her hand fell to Cara’s chin and she gently raised it so their eyes met once more, “Do you love me?” she asked, her voice scarcely louder than the wind.
She swallowed and, though she would deny it, Kahlan could see the shine of unshed tears in her shadowed gaze, “Yes,” she gasped out and the Confessor couldn’t help the smile that formed on her lips any more than she could stop herself from breathing.
“Then put this from your mind,” she said quietly, “And come back to bed,”
Cara looked at her then, deeper than perhaps anyone ever had, before she offered a nod more tentative than Kahlan had ever seen.
Not breaking eye contact, she walked them back into the room, pausing only long enough for Cara to latch the balcony doors, and to the bed which she urged the blonde into. Once she’d settled, Kahlan inched across the mattress until she was beside her, pressing her lips to the hollow of her throat before nestling into her side. “Goodnight, Cara,”
“Goodnight, Kahlan,” she mumbled into her hair and, this time, the brunette waited until her breathing was deep and steady before she allowed sleep to take her, offering up a silent vow that she would never again allow the blonde to suffer a problem alone when they could so easily fix it together.