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A twitch of the ear; she hears him before she properly senses him, idling just outside the double doors. One leg folded primly over the other, her hand cradling a teacup—the contents lukewarm, unfortunately, as she’d been lost in thought until his presence had suddenly, abruptly invaded the open space in her mind.
He could have at least waited until Y’shtola had made herself more presentable. While she can’t see herself, others can, and she was terribly, terribly vain at times. Though it’s more for herself than anyone else. Thancred has a way of showing up at the most inopportune moments, completely unannounced. No warning through a linkshell, no letter, nothing.
She frowns.
It’s been weeks, and he’d run off to one of the other city-states in search of an Ala Mhigan contact that had reached out to them with information they deemed vital. But Thancred, frustratingly enough, never deigned to give her any proper updates during his absence.
So, as much as she’s loath to admit it, she did worry. Horribly. Each mission he takes could always end in a trap, he could disappear without a trace, he could end up presented dead at their doorstep. So many possibilities, each one enough to make her knuckles turn white with tension.
A steady knock on the door finally makes her rise to her feet.
“You needn’t knock. This is just as much your home as it is mine,” she states as she makes her way to the door. Even without sight, she knows the layout of this room like the back of her hand. Maybe even better than when she could see. Y’shtola pushes the door open, and she sees Thancred’s presence in front of her—a swirl of disrupted aether.
He breathes in and her lips curl into a smile. Y’shtola steps back, the ends of her skirt brushing along the floor as she moves.
“Is all well?” She finally asks.
“Well enough,” Thancred replies as he steps inside, the door shutting with a heavy thud behind him. He sounds troubled, but that is commonplace by now—there is always something weighing heavily on his mind. Y’shtola gazes past him, towards the window. The sun shines in and warms her face. There is the shuffle of fabric, Thancred shedding his coat and undoing the straps of his armor. There is nothing to hide between them, and it isn’t as if Y’shtola can see him anyway. So she lets him.
Her footsteps are light as she walks to the window, the tip of her tail twitching. The window clicks when she pushes it open, allowing a rush of winter air to rush into the room. It chills her to the bone, but she hardly reacts. The air smells fresh and crisp, and she catches the scent of someone baking pastries nearby.
Something about it reminds her of when they were young, when she would hold his hand as they walked through the snow, in the shadow of buildings that had seemed impossibly large then, among men and women that, once upon a time, they two thought must have known everything. How that expectation came crashing down when they came to realize they knew as much about the world as anyone else did—which is to say, not very much at all.
It is strange to think of those times now that they’re older. They had been so young then. Thancred had gripped both her hands so tightly beneath the shade of a snow-cloaked tree; his palms were sweaty. He was nervous. He couldn’t look her in the eye and he couldn’t speak. So unlike the man that tried to charm every person who ever crossed his path.
So she did what he couldn’t, by rising up on her toes and kissing him.
It was just a fleeting thing. Never meant to be spoken of again, really. It’d just make things confusing… for him, at least. Y’shtola is quite secure in where her feelings lie, and she is a woman of action, she enjoys poking and prodding him to see what he’ll do. But if he has no interest in pursuing what they had nearly begun, she will not force him.
He fumbles enough with his own emotions as is. She’d rather he not tangle her up in it until he’s ready.
But then she hears him approach her and her ears swivel back, her tail flicks, and there is a hand settling on her shoulder. It’s warm and heavy, the palm weathered and fingers callused. Y’shtola cocks her head, staring sightlessly out of the window.
“If you’ve something to say, I would rather you say it,” she says, her words sharp and tone firm. Her hand finds the one on her shoulder, her nails lightly scraping over his knuckles. “You have kept me waiting long enough.”
“I was only going to say that, after the few weeks I’ve had, it’s good to see your face again.”
“Now you try to flatter me?”
“What, am I not allowed to be overjoyed at the sight of my dear friend?” He scoffs, and he removes his hand, but she catches his wrist in a vise grip.
“Is that what it is, then?” She comments, still keeping her clouded gaze pointed towards the window. “Simply happy to see your friend. Well, I do hope you were not under the impression I sat here yearning for your return.”
Thancred lets out a laugh. His arm twists in her grip and she feels his fingers run over the inside of her wrist, right against her pulse. It doesn’t change, it remains steady as ever. “You? Never. I’m sure you were far too preoccupied to spare me a single thought.”
Her brows twitch, furrow. “Perhaps.” And she thinks again when they were younger, and he had sometimes worried her so much that it disrupted the peace she had been so carefully trying to cultivate for herself. Nothing she would ever admit. Yet… “That isn’t to say your absence was not… felt.”
“Are you saying you missed me?”
She doesn’t respond, but it’s enough of an answer. She feels his hand take hold of hers, their fingers slotting together, and she lets it happen.
Finally, she turns her eyes towards him. She can feel him looking at her. Part of her wonders what expression he wears now, and what emotions swirl in the depths of his eyes. Mayhap it is for the best that she cannot see it, that she doesn’t know. It makes things a little easier… or a little harder. She isn’t quite sure.
“My tea has gotten cold,” she comments. “I shall make another pot, for the both of us.”
On the street below she hears a gaggle of teenagers walk past, laughing. She thinks again of the past and allows herself to smile.
“‘Tis good to have you back by the holidays. Now, sit and tell me all that you have learned.”