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| Details |
| Author: | inkie |
| Summary: | Siamus Fallon returns from Vashj'ir for good -- or something like it -- with a present for his wife. She has some news that throws his world off-kilter. He takes comfort in making personnel decisions for his own superior officers, and Avrenne offers additional solace by making a personnel decision of her own. |
| Rating: | M for Mature 17+ |
Chain: Siarenne
On the 10th of October, Avrenne is where she often is when she isn't actively maneuvering around wards, or socially smoothing out Lieutenants, or meeting with friends, and in between business meetings and political steering: her room, at her desk, preparing for the next thing. Either she isn't expecting company, or she will dress for it accordingly later, because she is in one of her simple house dresses, a rich clinging burnt umber velvet dress with a relatively low-cut neckline, with the usual long sleeves and long length, and a necessarily high bustline to accommodate her ever-increasing pregnancy bump. She has neither earrings or a necklace on, just the seastalk case on its gold chain around her neck. Her hair is a straight fall down her back, the sides tucked behind her ears in a girlish habit, and her cosmetics are faint, only just enough to hide the darker circles under her eyes to make her seem better rested than she really is.
The door to her room is three-quarters ajar, the suggestion of being very interruptible, although she is at work and not play, and therefore should not be invited to a social game at present, in the little Language In Between of her door.
There is the sound — possibly too distant or carpet-muffled for her to register it — of someone taking the stairs an undignified two at a time, and then her door is abruptly one hundred percent ajar as her husband arrives breathlessly in the doorway.
"Anamchara." He smiles at her. "I'm home."
Avrenne doesn't startle at the sudden entrance of someone through her door — she has lived too long with Isla to ever not be at least vaguely expecting it — but the exact who that person is (not Isla) is a surprise. Judging from the way her face lights up like a full high powered lighthouse beam, it's a very welcome surprise.
"Siamus!" She moves her chair back as she rises quickly to a stand (although this author is compelled to mention that it's still not really that quick of a stand, she's a slow moving boat these days), reaching out both arms to him for an embrace, which is still something of a difficult task to achieve no matter what angle she tries, but she seems mostly just eager for something that involves touching him. "Welcome home."
He moves to meet her immediately, angling himself to one side of her so that he can embrace her without her belly directly in the way, and bends to kiss her. "Tides, I'm glad to be home. I know I saw ye last week, but look at ye, pet. A little goddess."
He straightens but doesn't release her from his arms, smiling down at her. "All's been well? Yourself and the boys? Ralaea's not gone tearing off after Deathwing yet?"
"Only in her mind thus far," Avrenne reports, gazing up at him with a lambent glow to her, leaning into his embrace, one hand holding back onto him and the other roving along his torso and traveling south, maybe to check to see if he has anything in his pockets or he's happy to see her, but probably it's just that she's happy to see and touch him.
"We are all well. It's been a quiet week, all told. Ralaea has her new swords, and another set of armor on its way. She picked out her horse and a gryphon. I had Lieutenant Hazan over for tea to speak with him, and he and Ralaea had a visit as well. Priscilla came over for her regular visit, and Avrilla and Prenne have been updated, though nothing out of the ordinary occurred in the doing of such." Her smile is sweet and mischievous. "Except only in our minds thus far," she teases playfully.
Siamus's smile cannot be described as 'sweet.' "Nothing out of the ordinary? Well, I tell ye again, the ordinary's interesting enough. I trust the imaginary ladies are in fine form?" He lifts a hand to slide her hair back behind her ear again on one side; it had not fallen out from behind her ear, so either the measure is precautionary or, you know. He just likes playing with her hair.
The way she leans into his hand like an eager pet seeking additional petting, either she wants to keep her hair back, or she enjoys him playing with her. "Avrilla and Prenne are pleased and dismayed by their statistically significant increases respectively. I also did the math of using myself as the sole data for the overall increase relative to my starting point to chart it in a graph and then apply Priscilla's current measurements to the same ratio of the range of increase she could expect if she followed my own," Avrenne reports, and then helpfully demonstrates this with one hand, drawing first Priscilla's starting point, and then increasing it again. Priscilla is going to need so much bigger everythings.
"Tides ha'mercy on the lady," says Siamus. To judge by his smile and the quirk of his eyebrow, he is not actually that dismayed. "Here, will ye come and sit with me?" He releases her to take hold of her hand instead, drawing her toward the bed with him. It seems likely that if he does intend to sit with her in that particular location, they may not be sitting for long.
"Of course." Avrenne comes along willingly, some habit asserting itself as she gets closer to the bed to reach up to take off the seastalk case, and set it lightly down on its usual resting place by her bedside, which she does while keeping her eyes on Siamus as a compass points north, taking a seat on the edge of bed to begin with.
Siamus himself pauses to remove his coat before sitting. He sets it aside at the foot of the bed; beneath it he was wearing not his naval uniform but the plain linen shirt he wears when sailing without ceremony. The shirt is open at the neck, the bronze anchor and the kraken medallion resting there on their cords, and below them both, just at the left edge where the open collar ends, the end of a black ink-line is visible.
Siamus settles beside Avrenne on the bed's edge and takes her hand. He lifts it and lays it over his heart. "My homeward star," he tells her. "Her worth beyond beauty."
Avrenne's eyes make a necessary stop at the flash of open skin for a respectful perusal, and then hold there for a moment. As he takes her hand, her eyes flick up from his open collar to his eyes, leaning closer to him and pressing with her hand over his heart not in a pushing away but closing of small gaps, while the other reaches over with unerring precision without looking to touch on the inky line the same way she has touched a new scar, tracing the line of it with a light touch.
Siamus smiles down at her. "Careful," he says. "It's not yet a week old. Not as lovely as it will be when healed."
He draws back and leans away from her to pull his shirt over his head. On his left pectoral, over his heart, is newly tattooed a black-inked nautical star — the sailor's symbol for finding his way safely — set over a wreath of alyssum flowers.
It's Avrenne, with that sentimental soul of hers that has her mouth parting on a softly exhaled, "Oh." It's still Avrenne for what drives her to reach out as if to touch it again, that impulsive reaching he's seen before of hers (admittedly usually in the context of a ledger or naval plans), and the way she halts it just before, touching the air just above it, close enough to feel the light, gossamer touch of the natural heat of her hands. It's Avrenne as an admirer of Languages In Between that says, "Siamus, how lovely."
It is, however, probably the pregnancy that has her burst into tears, an overwhelm of feeling making its way out in salt and water to relieve the pressure around her heart too full to contain.
Siamus's expression as she takes in the tattoo is, despite his smile, a little uncertain, almost shy. He watches her expression carefully; his own is just beginning to warm with relief when she bursts into tears, and he immediately looks stricken. "My star?" he asks, reaching for her.
Avrenne reaches back for him, a helpless falling into him, her arms thrown about his neck. "Yes," she says, as if he'd asked her if she was and now she's answering. "Oh, Siamus. It's lovely. It's so — you had me inked onto your skin." (He knows this. He was there for it.) "I'm so happy, I don't… know what to say or how to say it. I don't think I ever imagined that anyone would ever — that someone would want to do so. It's one of loveliest gifts you've ever given me," she attempts to explain, her voice quavering with high emotion.
He exhales, his posture loosening with relief — super awkward to get a tattoo for a lady and find out she hates it — and puts his face in her hair. "I have ye with me wherever I go," he says. "Alyssum, my homeward star. I just set ye where ye can be seen." (I mean, some of the time. Presumably he does not spend all of his shipboard time shirtless. It's not that kind of ship.) "And so ye know for certain that I carry ye."
Avrenne's odd weeping intensifies for a moment before she sniffles and exhales a sound of mixed emotions. "I don't know why I'm crying," she tells him. "It must be the pregnancy." When in doubt, blame the pregnancy. She raises a hand up to brush at her eyes, those deeper exhales as if now she's trying to expel the emotion in her through wind rather than water. "It's wonderful, and I'm honored by it. I would do the same for you, if I could."
I mean. What's stopping her? Who would even know?
Siamus does not ask that question, whether he wonders it or not. "I didn't mean to make ye cry," he tells her gently, earnestly. "But I'm glad that ye like it, as it’s to honor you." He strokes her hair.
Then he adds, dryly, "I had a devil of a time trying to explain to Beecham what alyssum looks like. Fortunately, it came out that Farleigh knew it well enough to draw."
"It turned out very fine," Avrenne says, hovering a hand over the wreath, tracing the shape of it with that innate pleasure of hers in finding shapes and therefore inherent math on him. "I have dried pressings of the flowers, not that it would help with how they look properly in bloom. I always take some now when they do bloom, to have petals to send to you."
He smiles at her, kisses the top of her head, draws his fingers through her hair. "I'm always glad of anything ye send me. And I'm glad you're pleased wi'this. There are only so many sapphires a man can give a lady before she's bored of them."
Avrenne looks up at him in that way of hers that makes it seem as if the rest of the world has gone soft focus on her, and he's the only thing she's really seeing, as she smiles back at him. "It will never be the sapphires themselves that hold any interest in their own merit, but what they mean because they are from you. I will always find the brightest delight in a sapphire in my bathtub than I would have any desire for one no matter how precious the gem in a store window. Something like this is…" She flicks her gaze to the tattoo again. "It's like when you bought the motorcycle, only even more. I can't even tell you how cherished it makes me feel."
He lifts his hands to cradle her face, his dark gaze serious. "You are the most cherished of ladies, and I hope ye know it always. I'll be so glad to spend the next months at home with ye, waiting to greet our sons."
"I do know it. It's enough to make a lady consider if she might not hope for the pregnancy to go longer again no matter how uncomfortable, to sneak a little more time with her husband," she says teasingly, tempting the fates atrociously. "Hopefully this shore time will be more enjoyable than the last with the trial, of visits and interesting people. I should mention, Ralaea is ready for a visit of any number of your 'friends,' as she will be calling them. She took the news well, even more than I thought she might, and is considering a similar arrangement with herself and Mr. Morningdew, in fact, to account for his nature being what it is." There's something though in this mentioning that sends a dark cloud passing over her face, sobering her and causing that telltale start of a squaring of her shoulders.
"Oh, aye? That would be a bloody relief. The lass ought to have… something… beyond that. Will Morningdew countenance it, d' ye think?" Siamus’s hand moves slow circles on her back, and he's watching her face intently now, searching for the source of that cloud.
"I couldn't say one way or another. Mr. Morningdew and I never spoke of any such things when we spoke, and even then, you could tell that he really only had eyes for one person, so he may be the type to want the same in return," Avrenne allows.
Meanwhile, elsewhere, Harvey continues to stalk men around Redridge and Elwynn looking for one to present to Ralaea as the chosen one to tell her that they're getting a third, a man, for her. Ralaea does not yet know this.
Avrenne's gaze drops for a moment to somewhere around his chin before she looks back up at him, not only with her eyes, but that lift of her chin, the pleased glow replaced by a serious solemnity. "Ralaea mentioned something to me that I need to tell you about, some news that was revealed while we spoke to each other about the matter. The news of it will be… painful and distressing. And shocking, very shocking. It's nothing that has any urgency, and there will be nothing to do with the knowledge except having it, really. You must have it, at some point, but it can keep until tonight if you would rather not spoil your day with it." She sighs and admits, "It will spoil your day when you hear of it. It does me no harm to hold onto it a little longer for you." Information presented for him to make a decision on what course he would prefer.
Some of the warm light in him fades as Siamus studies her again. He nods somberly and draws back. "If it's what's casting that shadow over you, pet, then I'd better hear it, so as not to leave ye standing alone with it." He reaches for his shirt. This seems like it might not be shirtless-appropriate news.
Avrenne doesn't attempt to stop him, exactly, although she does set a hand against his chest, over the other not so recently tattooed side. "If you wanted, you don't have to put it back on," she suggests. Not quite asking, but you know. Unlike Ralaea and taking her shirt off in this conversation topic, Avrenne is very fine with Siamus keeping his off.
Siamus hesitates, a crease in his brow. He lowers the shirt to his lap and holds on to it. Perhaps it is comforting to Avrenne in the face of dire news if he does not wear his shirt. Perhaps he will want to put the shirt on once he's had the news.
It certainly improves the view for her at least. Perhaps he will want her to take her dress off for his own improved view when he's had the news.
She settles herself there next to him, as she takes his hand, but there's an extra lightness to her touch, like she is expecting any moment soon that he will rip himself from her grasp and she is planning accordingly with her balance and the placement of her grip.
"I could not think of any better way to break the news except to follow a similar path in which I heard it, and I must warn you that the the greater news, as terrible as it seems, is not the worst of it, and that it, of course, as with all terrible news these days, involves that woman," she says. There can only be one That Woman that sets those strange lights going in Avrenne's eyes.
"First you should know that all of this was concealed by decree of Highlord Tirion Fordring, who felt that he had both the right to do so, and that it was the best decision. Ralaea reported to me in confidence, with full awareness that I would speak with you about it, that during the assault on Icecrown Citadel, there came a point where… that woman evoked, somehow, the ghost of Uther Lightbringer from an unguarded Frostmourne, who informed the assembled that without a Lich King, the Scourge would destroy everything. It's unclear how much truth there is in any of it, but it's impossible to verify here and now. Ralaea then explained that after they slayed the Lich King that was once Arthas Menethil, a new Lich King had to be chosen, according to this logic. Sir Fording had intended to do it himself, but another stepped forward, and did, indeed take the crown, and there is, in fact, another Lich King as we speak."
Siamus stops breathing for a moment.
When he remembers to start breathing again, he takes the shirt very carefully from his lap and sets it gently aside on the bed, as though he is afraid he might inadvertently injure it. It seems to take him a little time to remember how to speak. "Another — there’s another Lich King? And Fordring —"
Okay, deep breaths. We are doing deep breaths. Siamus takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. Tightly, he asks, "Does His Majesty know it?"
"I have no idea," Avrenne admits. Her voice is low, gentle, that motherly caring tone of hers. "I can only assume someone must have, he's the king for Tides' sake — but I don't know. I don't know who might know, from who was there, who witnessed it directly and from those who had someone, like Ralaea, who ultimately broke the silence she was bade to keep." A pause, a pregnant one and not only because of the delicate condition she's in. "The person who took up the crown was someone who must have been in some… state of life and death, one assumes from what we knew of what allowed Arthas Menethil to take it himself. That person who took up the crown and now holds it, a Lich King who holds the Scourge at bay, is Highlord Bolvar Fordragon."
Siamus loses all color, goes to ash beneath the sun-bronze. He stares at her. "Fordra– Avrenne. Mo ghrá. That isn't — How?"
She shakes her head helplessly, reaching out to him to set her hand against his cheek in some attempt at a steadying touch. "I don't know. If I had to guess, I would consider what sort of magic might occur with a combination of the plague at Wrathgate with the Light, with what happened after," you know, when the red dragons came, "but I don't know. Ralaea is no expert on such matters to be questioned thoroughly with the how. But, she was not the only person there who might have some insight into the answers, if you need them."
He's shaking his head: at first a vehement, angry gesture, and now a dull, helpless one as though he's forgotten how to stop.
"Avrenne. I saw — I was there. I saw him fall. All of them." He struggles for a moment to speak, as though the memory has choked him. "He can't be… Bolvar? The Lich King? A new — how could they not — Bolvar?"
He hunches to put his elbows on his knees, his face in his hands. "It can't be," he says, muffled. "I'll speak — I'll speak to Ralaea myself. She's… confused."
"I'm so sorry, Siamus. I wish it wasn't true. Especially after everything we did to unseat the Lich King — " Avrenne sets her hand on his hair, stroking her fingers through it, slow and calm. "Ralaea would only repeat what she told me, and that will be the same data point. You would want to speak with someone else who was there, who could confirm it. There were many people present of the strike force that made it to the top, from 7th Legion to Argent Crusade to Ebon Blade to Cobalt Company. And if I recall correctly, one of those people was Miss Coit." Who is, unlike some of the others mentioned, just down the hall.
Siamus lifts his face from his hands and sits up as though electrified. "Miss Coit," he says, staring. "Of course. Miss Coit. She'll —" He draws away from Avrenne to stand and takes two urgent strides toward the door. He seems to have forgotten the whole shirt thing. The shirt. He seems to have forgotten his shirt.
"Siamus," Avrenne says, as she rises to a much less elegant stand, reaching out to him to attempt, if not a halt, at least a pause. "She's only just returned home as well, and she may not be in her room or alone where she can speak of this sort of information freely, until you can ask her into privacy. And I don't want the other children to know just yet about this, about another Lich King." And they will definitely know something is up if Siamus is running through the house shirtless in search of Lena. It's only information, rather than telling him what to do, but there it is laid out.
He does halt, and looks down at Avrenne blankly for a moment before the sense of what she's saying sinks in. "Oh. Aye, yes. Of course. I'll ask for her later. I'll ask —" He looks around the room again helplessly.
Avrenne reaches up, brushing the hair off his forehead, before she turns back to the bed, leaning against it with her hip and then heave-ho-ing herself the other direction to release his shirt back into his custody in offering if he wants it. "I know it's shocking," she said. She did say that it would be. "When I heard I thought I might faint with it. I spilled tea all over myself and could hardly hear Ralaea speaking. There will be other people who were there who will also know more. It's only a matter of also speaking with those willing to who will give the information up, against Sir Fordring's orders, not," she points out, "that he had any given right to order the full withholding of it. He is a commander in the Argent Crusade, and as they often insist they are neutral, and while his order's expertise on the undead must be respected, they do not have claim to such full authority over all there. Though I understand why many would have kept the silence all the same. Ralaea said that Highlord Fordragon insisted that it be known that he died at the Wrathgate, and nothing more."
Siamus takes his shirt and pulls it back on like he's angry with it. When his head emerges from the collar, though, his expression is bleak. He scrubs a hand through his hair. "Aszera," he says. "She's Argent Crusade, and was at Icecrown. I can see that she'd obey an order from Fordring, but I know she also won't keep a thing from me if I ask her. She might be able to add to what Miss Coit knows, when she's here."
Avrenne steps towards him, smoothing his shirt of him in a way that could be to adjust the fall of it around him, but it seems more likely with the way she touches him, light strokes, slowly petting along his lean torso and over the muscles of his arms, and then back up to his collar to drag her fingers through his hair at the base of his neck, that she's really just touching to settle the man as much as she can.
He drops his gaze to her, and the bleak look softens into a kind of tired sorrow. "Bolvar," he says. "How did I not realize he was — tides ha'mercy on me, I thought the news for Taelia was bitter enough before. The poor lass."
Avrenne leaves her hands where they are, brushing her fingers through the curls, leaning against him. There's a matching sorrow in her face. "I don't know if it will be better or worse for her to know someday that the father she knew is gone, but something of him still remains, if anything does. To know what this means for the Highlord, or to even know if we shouldn't be preparing for another war someday, or if we can trust that no power could corrupt Sir Fordragon where it easily corrupted Arthas Menethil. All of this is too far beyond my scope of knowledge to even start to guess at what all this is, and what it will mean."
"I would say," says Siamus, "that if we could trust in any man, it would be Bolvar. But I also know there's no man ever lived who was immune to corruption."
"I agree." Avrenne moves in closer to fit herself into the shelter of Siamus, resting her head against his shoulder as she angles herself. "With paladins, one can never be entirely certain which way they will go, but Sir Fordragon served with such honor, and held out against the corruption of Onyxia. If we have to trust in a mortal man to bear such a weight, he has the will to test against it. It's only the tragedy that befalls such men as him to be asked to bear it." She presses a little closer, tightens her grip on Siamus further, as if fearing that some wind might start to gust up and sweep Siamus off into some similar fate.
Siamus wraps his arms around her with a sort of silent, full-body sigh that makes clear how much comfort the action brings him. "Aye," he says at last, roughly. "I only wish I'd known — if I'd known the man wasn't dead, somehow, mo chroí…."
"Ralaea said that Sir Fordragon was there at the keeping of Arthas Menethil," she says. She does not elaborate in detail as to why and what purpose a Lich King might have done so. "That suggests that Sir Fordragon was taken from the battlefield of the Wrathgate to Icecrown Citadel, to the throne. And we fought to get there as soon as we possibly could have, at great cost. Even knowing that Sir Fordragon was there could not have forced us to go any faster, to mount a rescue with the drive to end Arthas Menethil's rule. Even if you had known, all it would have meant is the pain of having another reason to fight for what was already being fought for with full strength and conscience. You did everything you could."
"Tides," Siamus whispers unevenly. "The keeping of… Avrenne, the Lich King had him for… months, ha'mercy on the man." He stoops a little, turning his head to bury his face in her hair.
It also puts his head closer to her reach, and she takes advantage of it to draw a hand through his hair. "I know, dearest. I'm so sorry." Her voice is a low soothe. "We didn't know, and even if we had known, there was nothing more we could have done to end that keeping but exactly as we did. The way Ralaea told it, Sir Fordragon made the choice himself to take up the place. It was not forced upon him except by circumstances and what he must have felt bound to do by his conscience and honor." The phrase sends a brief shudder through her that she calms deliberately. "Will you come lie down with me for a little time, while we let Miss Coit settle back in before you speak to her? I should probably take some rest myself." It's for the Ladies, Siamus.
He is silent for a moment, unmoving, breathing the scent of her hair. At length, though, he nods and straightens; he will be strong, for the Ladies.
Avrenne leads him back towards the bed, an enticing siren song of the promise of resting there with his wife for her own well being, being a lady in delicate condition. "I missed the comfort of you holding me," she tells him, as she first sits, kicking off her house shoes, and then slides further into the center of the bed, her arms open for him to follow. "Especially since the shadow of this news."
Siamus settles on the bed's edge to remove his boots, and then slides over beside her. He fits his arms around her and settles back against the pillows. "I'm sorry, mo ghrá," he says quietly. "That ye were alone with it."
Avrenne presses in closer, a smaller form than her usual glamour, although the pregnancy adds at least width if not height. "It's only the thought of feeling as if wondering what it was all for. I took great comfort in knowing the Lich King was at last gone forever, so I thought, and that if such a high cost was paid at least it did that. There would never be another rise of the army of the Scourge. What happened to Lordaeron would not happen again. Only to be told now, if such a thing is to be believed, there will never be an end to it until every single part of the Scourge is eradicated fully, a task so monumental that it may truly be impossible. So there will always be a Lich King, and we may have to repeat this cycle again and again." She sounds tired, a defeated weariness, as she settles herself to stroke a light hand up and down Siamus' chest. "But I have been even more sorry for knowing who bears the cost now, and those who cared for him personally who must now go on knowing what his fate is."
"It's Taelia," Siamus says roughly after a time. "I don't know… what they must have told her already, or how. And I suppose they won't know this to tell her, but when she learns it…."
He exhales and turns his face to kiss the top of her head, then just remains there. He seems quite certain that Taelia Fordragon will learn it, somehow, someday.
"Sir Fordragon may have expressed his general preference to have it be known that he died at the Wrathgate, but I don't think he would have ever mentioned his daughter then and there among so many. She deserves to know, and someday she must know of it," Avrenne agrees. "But, keeping the knowledge that she exists, and that Sir Fordragon is her father and the Lich King both is now a matter of worldwide security. If something were to happen to her, it may be what breaks Sir Fordragon into action. Someone or some cult looking to force that tidal wave to rise would have a singular point of her safety or life to threaten to achieve it. And because Kul Tiras has closed themselves off, they refuse the diplomatic channels, and we can't get the information to them, Kul Tiras won't know to guard against it, until either we can get through or until it comes out, and she's in active danger."
Siamus is silent; he has tensed again beneath her touch.
"Aye," he says at last. "I can't think… who else knows about the girl. Myself, Sintha, His Majesty. Himself. There must be others."
"And thus the Venn diagram of those who know about her, and those who know about who sits on the Frozen Throne is still very small, and she is as safe with our knowledge as she would be with our ignorance," Avrenne says. "But it may be that the best way to keep her safe, from what we can do here, is to keep the secret of who the Lich King is for as long as possible to avoid anyone going looking for a weakness or vulnerability that might push him over the edge, or allow them to use him to their own purpose. The fewer people who know of the Lich King, and who he is, the greater chance we have of preventing anyone who does know of the child, and who would not keep her safe, to also know of the connection she shares with him. We will find a way to keep her safe, as best we can with the tools that we have available to us." Mathematical reduction of probability of intersecting knowledge and therefore harm, the Avrenne Esprit Fallon toolbox.
Siamus sighs and nods. He, too, finds comfort in a Venn diagram.
He is also a surface for drawing it, as Avrenne makes two near-perfect circles on his abdomen, with only the smallest intersection between them, a sliver of connecting loops. "If we do find out who it was that sent the map, and some form of communication is possible, we might at least be able to send something of a general warning, but I fear that any hint that she might be in danger would be taken as a threat with the political atmosphere as tense as it is. Our hands may be tied until relations improve."
"Aye." Siamus turns his head to gaze up at the bed's canopy, and rests a hand over her forearm as she draws on him. Perhaps having a Venn diagram drawn on him is even more soothing, who can say? "I've heard nothing on it — the map, that is — from Miss Curran yet."
And then he frowns. "I've also heard nothing on Jes-Tereth's confirmation as Grand Admiral yet. D'ye know if there's a date on that? She's not answered me in her letters. I think she's still cross wi' me."
Avrenne changes her Venn diagram doodle to what might seem like… a bell curve? Or, perhaps, the curved shape of an admiral's hat. "The last I heard is that it's to be held in November, on the 22nd, before the holiday week of Pilgrim's Bounty. I think the possibility of it landing on the holidays spurred the final effort of the wheels of the political machine." She pats his chest lightly, little taps of her fingers. "Admiral Jes-Tereth will not stay cross with you," she says, which isn't the same thing as saying that the Admiral isn't now. "She knows how indispensable and immeasurably valuable you are to the Admiralty, one of her most loyal and dedicated commanders, and that you always have the best interests in the Admiralty and the Alliance in mind." She is also very aware of Siamus' at home dedicated and loyal PR spin team who has all the time to work such things while Siamus gets things done.
"Well, I should hope she knows I'm bloody loyal,” says Siamus, sounding maybe an eense cross himself. "I think she's still cross wi'me because I put her forward in the House for Grand Admiral." Without, you know, mentioning it to or discussing it with her.
He frowns thoughtfully. Or could it be something else…? Given that this is Siamus, there could be an entire catalog of Something Elses.
"It may have taken her by surprise, but she will realize it was the best course, and that you were simply doing what you do best, being bold and willing to take the first necessary steps as a man of action," Avrenne says. Her attention is partially on Siamus' chest now, woefully covered by a shirt, as she drifts her fingers up and down along the center, avoiding the still healing tattoo.
Siamus nods firmly. That is correct, he is a bold Man of Action and not an inconsiderate know-it-all who sometimes Just Does Things. Someday the world will understand. (Thanks to Avrenne.)
"I think Taylor ought to have Dvorek's place," he says, continuing to make personnel decisions for his own superior officers. "He's only a Captain now, but the man's more than capable, and he's seen to the training of the SEALF and gone above and beyond as Dvorek's successor in Vashj'ir.
"And if it doesn't go to him, it might go to a man like Keller instead."
Ah, there we have the crux of it.
"I agree entirely, even, or perhaps especially, for the push above of two ranks at once, because I think it would be a popular, easy choice while the matter is still fresh, and it can be seen as a way of honoring his dedication to the late Admiral Dvorek, a timely, strategic fitting into what will soon be two open positions. And you are entirely correct — if Captain Taylor were only promoted to Vice Admiral, it would leave one of the positions of Admiral open to Keller or his like. A great advantage is that Keller has none of Captain Taylor's popularity, so we have the greatest opportunity to strike now, and block one of those seats immediately.
"And, of course, with Admiral Jes-Tereth's current rank also needing to be properly filled, it is obvious who the correct choice is: her most natural successor, one of her greatest supporters, who has served as her Vice Admiral with such dedication, loyalty, and skill, who holds the best interests of the Admiralty and Alliance at his heart always. You," Avrenne says, looking at his face as she taps her hand lightly to press into the center of his chest, her face shining with full faith and earnest belief in her words. Ah, the PR campaign of linking Siamus as the Natural Successor to Jes-Tereth has already begun then, likely months ago already, the moment Avrenne first learned of it.
Siamus smiles up at the canopy the way he might smile at a naked Avrenne. An Admiral (and not just in the bedroom). An Admiral before 35. He draws his fingers dreamily through Avrenne's hair.
"The reason I didn't suggest it," he says quietly, "is that I've long held a navy man shouldn't earn his rank ashore. And I mean to be. Ashore."
He angles his head to look at her. "Not all the time, mind. But a great deal more. I've the House seat now, and when it comes down to it, I've done more for the Alliance navy in a year and a half on the House than I did in seven years' active duty since Theramore before it. I don't believe there's another man in the kingdom could oversee the directives for shipbuilding and recruiting and training as I can, and I'll serve where I can be of best service to my navy, even when that's in Stormwind Keep rather than walking a deck." His sober gaze searches hers. "And I've a family now and time with growing children to consider, and what they know and see of their father.
"Not that I mean to leave active duty, mind, when it's needful, or to stop sailing altogether. But… less. For other duties, to the kingdom and my family."
It's impossible to miss the vulnerability in her expression, that look of someone being given something she could not ask for, even if she wanted it, a tremble around her eyes and mouth, the catch of breath in her chest, and the melting of her against him, a glow of such obvious love and devotion that she might as well just speak it as she rewards him with one of those smiles of hers, so bright and shining that it calls into question how anyone ever believes this woman to be cold.
She moves her hand up to his face, brushing her fingertips along his jaw, the back of her knuckles across his cheekbone, a touch of something precious and beloved. "I remember speaking to Sintha when you began your campaign for the House of Nobles of how I wished there were two of you, to serve each House and Navy in full, each place needing you. I always knew it would be a difficult line to walk, to hold a foot in each and remain in between, but on knowing you, it was obvious that if any man could do it well, it was you. I think it both still, and even more than I did then. There is no man more capable and driven that I have ever met.
"Of all of the commanders in the Admiralty, Siamus, you have earned the position of Admiral at sea more than any other up for such promotion, even if we were to look at worthy officers more than a rank below. This position belongs to you, already earned. And so long as you are in active duty and service, it should be yours, not only to speak of what you deserve, but of what the navy deserves as well, of a man such as yourself at the head and forefront. Because wherever you serve, whether ashore or asea, you will always be serving the Navy as best as you can, always thinking of the best possible course for the Alliance. The Admiralty needs you, and needs you high enough rank to keep it on course where another would steer it wrong.
"So I think you should take the promotion, as the worthiest man who can. And I also will support your decision to shift the balance of your focus more to the shore, for what can be done by such a man in two spheres, an Admiral on the House of Nobles," she tells him, and there's a softness to her smile. "And, of course, I will admit that it makes me happy to know I will have more of you at home, and it pleases me to think of you here more often with me, of you staying longer."
He puts his hand over her wrist on his chest. "It pleases me as well. I never thought to be as content ashore as I've been the last year when I've been home. I never thought I'd look forward to being ashore as I do now. I won't leave the sea, but she can have… less of me, at least for a time. Because I've got another lady now, who takes precedence." He smiles wryly. "And when that lady finds me too much underfoot, there's always the sea waiting for me."
"If you wait for me to tire of you here, you'll find yourself waiting until the last breath I take," she says. "That's not to say I won't ever encourage you to leave the shore for the sea, because I will, but that will be because I'll be going with you, to be much under you there." Under…foot? No, no, she definitely just said under him. That's a different image.
"Oh," he says, "well now ye do make a man want to go back to sea."
She laughs, a warm touch of sound, as she pushes up onto her arm to be able to look down into his face, the golden silk of her hair falling across her shoulder. "When a man talks like that, a lady can only conclude that in the formula for his happiness, that the coefficient that alters the outcome is not sea or shore, but where she is. And by the same principle of symmetry, a man might look at her own formula, and see it for the same, that it's the man himself that is the same coefficient to the constants of place."
Well, when a lady starts talking like that, in front of a man like this, there are certain results of that equation.