A Beautiful Mess (open)

At some point her arms had wrapped themselves around her abdomen, and Dana was quite unhappy with this visceral reaction to emotional pain she'd developed. With some effort she managed to stop hugging herself and put her hands by her sides.

She wasn't entirely certain Amir was completely right on this point, but she'd had enough of this particular brick wall that she was quite willing to leave it be. She was responsible for her own person, and maybe Lady Erin could have encouraged her to spread her wings sooner, but she's been perfectly happy until she'd basically become bored. Boredom, not some act of bravery had put her feet out the door, but she wasn't going to argue. She would sit down with herself and think it all through.

She had so much else to contemplate why not this as well? "It is not as clear in my mind as it is in yours. This too is another lesson I must learn."

A small smile curled the corners of her mouth. "I am not sure if you should praise me all that much Amir. I hid, because I was scared. Fear froze me in place and I could do little more than shiver and hover in the shadows."

She looked up at him, with some of that fear in her eyes. "No one should be asked to watch their lover, their friend, their teacher, get eaten by a wolf." Dana made a small dismissive gesture with her hand. "I know he was going for your throat, but from where I stood, he was eating you. I am not certain I can ever sit on the sidelines and watch something like that again Amir.

"I am not strong enough to defeat one of those things, but I do not wish to sit and watch you or anyone else do it. I will, if it is alright with you, cling to the shadows and learn everything I can. I will even stalk and take one down in its human form, with the element of surprise, but please, don't ask me to ever watch that again."

This was getting ridiculous and Amir was in a bad enough mood to have, perhaps, less patience than he normally would.

"Fear is a natural instinct," he said bluntly. "You're stupid to ignore it. If you're afraid of something, you've probably got good reason to be. And you didn't have the tools or skills to fight, so you remained hidden. It was exactly what you should have done."

His dark eyes flashed at her next words though. "I didn't ask you to watch anything," he snapped. "I'm trying to make the best of a situation that shouldn't have happened in the first place, but the next time the full moon is out, Dana, stay the hell inside!"

He dropped his hands from where they were on Dana's shoulders, temper too high to handle her gently, and turned away, pacing to the other side of the small garden they were in.

What the hell was wrong, anyway? It wasn't Dana getting her face gnawed on by a werewolf last night. Yet she had issues? Come on! And he hadn't ever asked her to watch anything of that nature. That she implied he'd somehow wanted her to see that bothered him greatly. Maybe Subira would have employed methods such as those in her training, but Amir didn't. He'd intended Dana to stay out of the way. He'd asked her to stay out of the way when she'd expressed interest in joining them.

Was this what came of mixing business with pleasure? At that moment Amir would gladly have taken a do-over and kept Dana neatly compartmentalized into "pleasure" where she'd began. No more of this mixing roles. It wasn't healthy for anyone.

She blinked, flinching slightly at the insult. "I didn't ignore it. But I am not about to take praise for something that I see as weakness and not some grand wise choice Amir. There has to be a line, or you begin to believe that your actions are all good and wise and necessary, even those done in cowardly self-preservation."

She blew her breath out between her lips, as she watched him walk away from her. She was angry, an emotion she'd much rather have than fear or worry. "The smart thing, the wise thing, would have been remaining at the car, like Bao asked me to. I was too damned worried about you to do that. I'm not sorry about that. I had only a vague idea of what we were running toward, but even if my ignorance had been complete the idea of you in danger would have made me make the same choices."

Her hands went to her hips, and she chose to stay where she was, but she did not raise her voice, Amir would hear her clipped words just fine from where he was. "You didn't expect me to tag along, that was my mistake and one I will not make again. I am scared, I have never felt this kind of fear, even when the Manor Lord tried to drown me in the lake to keep his wife from finding me, not when Lady Erin took my human life and gave me this one, not even when bombs were falling from the skies. I don't know what to do with this sick knot in my stomach or the dreams that haunted my sleep, and that seems to make the fear worse."

Dana had no real desire for this confrontation, it was not a happy place for her, but she would not back down. She would share her vulnerabilities with Amir, open herself to him, and she would be angry with him, and something in the back of her mind let her know that they would still be just fine on the other side of this.

"I don't understand everything about what you do, and that frightens me too. I want to help, I know I can, but not the way Bao and Mara can and I'm simply asking that you not put me in a position where I have to choose between waiting at the car on the edges of the forest listening to the noises, and watching those monsters rip and tear at the people I love."

She closed some of the distance between them, but stopped short of closing the gap completely. It seemed important that she not be the one to end this, even though she very much wanted to just curl up in his arms and never think about it again.

"And," Her voice had dropped its anger in those few steps she took, and she was surprised at the slight tremble in it as she stood looking at him in the bright moonlight of the garden. "If it means you ask nothing else of me, that is alright as well. I do not wish this to come between us in a way that is insurmountable."

Amir listened to Dana, his back still turned, arms crossed over his chest. Convinced she couldn't see him, he rolled his eyes skyward as she spoke. He waited for her to finish before spinning around.

"Fine," he said icily. "Would you prefer me to label you a coward and a fool? I never said that one decision made you a wise, brave paragon of virtue. You were scared, and somehow you fumbled around and managed to find an option that didn't get you killed."

He extended his hands and gave her a sarcastic little golf clap before continuing. "You lack confidence, and my 'praise' was meant to help bolster what little you do have. For whatever the reason, Dana, the actions you took were sensible, given the situation and your abilities. That was the limit and the extent of my observation."

His eyes narrowed and Amir found himself hissing, "And for the last time, I didn't place you in that situation. I didn't put you in any position whatsoever. The only thing I did was send you to someone who could actually help you learn, and arm you with information that would have been helpful to me for her to know. I didn't put you in a car, I didn't ask you to make any choices, and if it had been entirely up to me, I'd have kept you out of it entirely."

Dana's final offer had him staring at her with raised brows. Did she really think it was that easy? That they could drop the entire issue and just go back to playing games?

"And when I come home chewed up, missing bits and pieces, and covered in wolf spit," he asked ironically, "you're just fine with that, huh? No questions asked? it won't bother you in the least."

She stood feeling slightly dumbfounded and mote than a little attacked. Dana couldn't seem to take her eyes from Amir but he'd managed to take the fight out of her. As she stood there blinking a small little giggle bubbled up her chest and before she could stop it it escaped from her lips.

Fingers flew to those lips, and eyes rounded, and another giggle bubbled up and made it's way past her fingers. Before she knew what was happren laughter bright, full and child-like in its ring filled the little garden where they stood. Arms once wrapped around her in pain now held the same position trying to keep the laughter from breaking something. She heard the edge of hysteria in the bright bubbling sound, but couldn't seem to stem the tide.

Amir stared at Dana, completely thrown by her reaction. He'd never seen this sort of behavior from her and he wasn't sure what, exactly, he was even seeing. What was going through her mind? This far surpassed any ability of his to read her.

He waited, arms crossed, for her to laugh herself out, barely restraining his foot from tapping as he watched her. Amir said nothing, torn as he was between caution, concern, and irritation.

Her laughter didn't last too terribly long, but by the end of it she was working for breath and tears had gathered at the corners of her eyes. As she came back to herself she swiped the moisture away and cleared her throat several times.

Cough. Giggle. Throat clearing. Smile. Small giggle. Final throat clear. Blinking she gave her attention back to Amir.

"If you come home covered in wolf spit, I'm going to wonder why you let them lick you to death."

Another blink closed and opened her eyes. She really had no idea what to do. She'd laughed the fight right out of herself.

"Amir, I don't want to fight with you. I truly don't. I am a bit heartsick at what I saw, you are still a bit battered. I find that makes me a bit grumpy. I'd thought I'd worked it all out of my system but that does not seem to be the case."

With this, she did finally close the distance between them, placing her hand on his arm. "I love my Clan, and its people and I want to keep them safe. And I love you, in my own fashion, and I want you to be safe. In my head I know that the two may not always live in harmony, and that too makes me grumpy, because my heart doesn't agree."

She sighed softly, her head tilting. "I know I have a great deal to learn and I am willing to learn it, but I must be patient, something I am not accustomed to. And yes, that too makes me grumpy."

A grin curled her lips despite her best efforts to keep it away.

Amir was still wary of Dana, of her reactions, and not at all certain that anything between them had been even remotely resolved, but he was willing to call it a truce rather than risk further emotional bombardment in addition to all the residual crap from the previous night.

He didn't move immediately to return Dana's touch, instead continuing to watch her quietly, reactions hidden behind darkened eyes. When she finished her speech, which was pretty enough, he simply nodded.

"Fair enough."

Amir never apologized. Maybe something in the DNA. Whatever it was, that minor concession was about all Dana would get to signify that he, too, considered the current discussion closed. For now.

"What next, then?"

Apparently he was still grumpy enough to not feel very wordy, though. In another small concession he uncrossed his arms from where they formed a barricade over his chest, and stood looking down at Dana.

Dana sighed, and rested her forhead on Amir's shoulder. She needed to touch him. she almost always did when he was near. It was something that surprised her often as she was not a particularly touchy feely kind of person outside of this relationship, what ever it was, with Amir.

"You wished for a peaceful, quiet evening, and I've given you neither. I think we should continue our walk, and then head home."

A small shrug lifted her shoulders. "Beyond that, I do not know."

As Dana leaned close, Amir continued to stand still. After a few moments of standing on his own pride he gave a short sigh of concession and wrapped his arm around her waist, fingers spreading over her back. He pulled her close briefly and then released her so they could continue their walk as she suggested.

Dana's observation about their evening was met with a philosophical "hmm" of neutrality and a shrug. Amir's wishes were irrelevant. Things would happen as they happened and he wasn't going to hold a grudge just because he didn't get his way. He could hold grudges for lots of other things instead... he was adaptable.

He looked down at Dana, wondering briefly at her words. She didn't know? He assumed she didn't mean about their physical relationship. Why else would she have come close? She had a lot on her mind, too, now, however. She would have to think on it all and decide what she wanted.

"You know you can't go back," he finally said softly, remembering her initial reaction when things got to be too much for her. "You won't forget what you saw, and ignoring it won't make the reality any less grim."

It was said gently, Amir having recovered his patience once more. He didn't want to hurt her.

Something tight loosened a little inside her, when he hugged her. The tightness didn't go away, but she could leave it be for now. With her arm tucked around him, she silently walked beside him. Her eyes didn't really see the flora around them, as they were too busy looking through the tangled mess in her head.

Amir's words didn't make her feel any better, and she was certain he hadn't meant to do so. "I know, Amir. I know." Her own words were quiet and slightly sad. "I do not like having those pictures in my head, but if i could go back and not see it, I would not choose that either. The ignorance is far easier, but not nearly as safe or interesting."

A small smile curled her lips. "But, I am still not certain what is next. I need some time to sort through it all."

Amir nodded, as much to himself as to Dana. Part of him had feared she would ask him to try and Command her memory again, and he knew again what his answer would have been. He would have disliked alienating Dana, or losing her friendship, but if that was the cost he would have had no choice. He wasn't going to take something away from her, even if it were possible, just because she couldn't handle it. She would learn to handle it.

Perhaps someone else would have handled her in a kinder manner, or would have broken her in slowly to the realities of the world, but Amir did things one way, his way, and very rarely did he deviate. It was the personality trait that had set him apart from many of his own clanmates. Narrowmindedness, stubbornness, whatever the name, he had plenty of it.

He turned his eyes pointedly up to the skies and said, "Well, I imagine you've got at least twenty-eight days, give or take."

His voice had gone back to its usual silken tone now that he wasn't antagonizing or being antagonized, cultured but mellow at the same time, and thus his words were delivered, not as a warning, but a simple factual observation as if he had just mentioned that the sun would rise in the morning.

Dana looked askance at the moon and chuckled softly. "So it would seem. I would think it would behoove me to know much sooner than that."

They walked along the garden path in a silence that was both companionable and contemplative, at least on Dana's part. Her mind swirled with all that had happened to her in the last seventy-two hours. She was very much in need of her most recent journal and perhaps a very long conversation with Lady Erin.

She needed to ask some rather hard questions and she was sure she would not like most of the answers. It was not going to be a fun conversation and she had a distinct feeling she was going to be very angry when all was said and done.

They came to a large fountain, it's water bubbling happily among the stone figures. She moved away from Amir, to the side of the fountain and looked down into the rippling water of the pool.

Amir tilted his head and looked down at Dana. She wanted all this knowledge, and then when it was given to her she flipped out. It was a vicious cycle. But maybe that was how she dealt with it. Or maybe it was just that they needed some kind of filter... a way to say enough was enough, and to slow down the flow of information.

He said nothing else though, leaving her with her thoughts while she stared into the water of the fountain. She knew his knowledge was hers for the asking; if she wanted him to tell her she would do so.

Circling to the other side of the fountain Amir waited for Dana to be ready to walk again. He sat on the fountain's edge and then after a few seconds lay back, lifting one foot and bending his knee. He rested his right arm over his stomach to keep it from dangling into the water. His left leg remained planted on the ground and his left arm he folded under his head. In that position he looked up while she looked down, and he waited, letting his thoughts meander while his eyes tracked the course of the stars overhead.

Dana listened to Amir shift and move on the other side of the fountain. When he grew quiet again she looked up to see him laying along the fountain's edge. He looked so calm and at peace, and she guessed that if anyone were to observe her she'd look the same. Her eyes went back to the water and she stood watching the ripples and curls for a little while longer.

When she finally felt calm with in her own mind she walked in the soft silent way that was simply a part of her, around to where Amir lay, to stand at his feet. Looking down at him, a small smile softened her face. "Amir?"

Her voice was its usual soft lilt. "Why is it that I seem to go along happily enough, learning new things, being productive in a way that is useful and needed, and then something comes along that is life altering to the point that my first reaction is to simply shut down? I don't like that my first instinct is to run away."

Dana perched on the edge of the fountain. "I think in a perfect world I would obtain this information, these revelations, in small easy to swallow pieces. But this is not a perfect world and I must find a better way to assimilate information with out loosing my senses in the processes."

A small shrug moved her shoulders. "I have spent my life aquiring knowledge, I seek out new things, research and delve and experiment, but it is over long periods of time with trial and error as my guide. I don't know how to take these huge chunks of information and break them down quickly. And it seems to me trial and error is a much too dangerous form of learning here."

Turning she pulled her feet up on to the edge of the fountain, hugging her knees to her chest. "How do you do it?"

Amir heard Dana come closer but maintained his position as if he were also a part of the stone of the fountain, staring upwards while she spoke, listening quietly and deciding how best to answer. He didn't want to start an argument again, but immediately his thoughts flew to the catalyst that had sparked that flame to begin with, Dana's questionably sheltered upbringing.

Instead of answering Dana's question directly, Amir waited for some time and then began to speak.

"When I was much younger I thought I was invincible," he said. "I had been turned some seventy or eighty years before. I was strong. Nothing could hurt me. Those were trying times. Everything was trading and with trading came warfare. No area was completely safe. We had to defend our business, defend our goods. It was a constant power struggle.

During the course of a trading journey we were ambushed several times. Once was by a boat of rival traders. They managed to sink our ship and in the chaos I was forced underwater. The ship was burning above me; boxes, crates, and barrels were coming down all around me, and I was only a passable swimmer. My clothing was tangled and I couldn't reach the surface at all."

Amir's voice was measured and steady, but tight. These were memories that preyed on his fears and he hated the helplessness of that point in his life.

"I kept trying to speak, to breathe, and instead I sucked in water. I panicked instead of staying calm and untangling myself. I didn't know how long I could stay under without air." Amir smiled ruefully. "I did more damage to myself trying to swim to the surface while weighted down with wreckage than the attackers did to me."

He shook his head at himself and said, "It was a lesson to learn; I was not invincible, and a vampire cannot go indefinitely without air, especially when they're trying to suck in half the Nile to compensate. I think I was close to passing out when Subira figured out my problem and dove down to find me."

The memory was both embarrassing and amusing. Subira had grabbed him by the hair and simply hauled him out of the water, leaving him to cough up his half of the Nile while simultaneously tearing himself free.

He looked at Dana and lifted his shoulders. "From then on it was sink or swim. Literally. Subira would dump me in the water whenever possible. Usually while I was carrying something heavy. Sometimes while I was asleep. She got very creative."

As a result, Amir retained a profound fear of deep water, but he could swim just fine now.

"Anyway, sometimes it's not just a matter of learning it beforehand. I could swim fine before, but that didn't mean I could deal with something intense. It took once or twice for me to straighten everything out but I finally learned to stop overthinking, to stop worrying, and just to deal with the situation as it happened. It's not a natural behavior. And when you aren't exposed to anything but books, your reflexes or instincts just don't have a chance to grow."

Her arms hugged her legs closer as she listened. She'd been nearly drowned as a human, and it was a memory she held clear in her mind and while she loved to swim she was careful with whom and where she swam. Drowning was not an experience she ever wanted to experience again.

It seemed to her that Subria was an incredibly cruel woman and it was no wonder Amir had some of the issues he did. Granted Lady Erin wasn't much better, only she wasn't overtly cruel, just, as Dana was figuring out, cruel in her neglect of her child's education. How was Dana to know anything if she'd never been given the opportunity to learn it. She was for all intents and purposes a plaything. That made Dana incredibly angry. How had she not seen this before? Had she really thought that she was able to handle her self in this world because she had all this knowledge? It was an incredibly stupid way to look at things.

She narrowed her eyes at him, tilting her head a bit. "You're not going to start throwing me into water are you?"

It was a thoroughly inappropriate thing to say, but she needed a little levity in all this heaviness. "Over thinking and worrying are two things I do well, not doing that is going to be quite the challenge. I feel like I've started over and I must relearn how to walk by crawling through a mire of things that hurt and drag at me."

She sighed softly, and dropped her cheek to rest on her knee.

"No," Amir answered Dana shortly. He bit off anything else he was going to say. He and Subira had different ideas about how to teach someone. Amir wasn't about to coddle Dana, any more than he had his own children, but he wasn't about to teach them quite as harshly.

"Subira was a good teacher," he said, in defense of his creator. "She showed me what needed to be shown. I'm not unaware of my own faults." He lifted his head and looked at Dana so she could see his quick grin. "Sometimes, you just have to throw me in the water."

He gave a dry laugh of agreement at Dana's words. "In a way, you have started over," he said, no longer worried that the topic might start an argument. "Or at least, you're starting. Period. Books are fine, but you can't learn every lesson in the classroom."

Dana couldn't help the grin that curled her lips. "I'll keep that in mind."

With a deep breath, she let go of herself, putting her feet to the ground.

"It would hurt much less if I could."

Standing she offered him her hand with a smile. "I'd like to go home now."

"Just avoid the stakes in the heart please," Amir said in all seriousness. "I really don't like it. It just makes me angry."

He rolled himself upright when Dana expressed a desire to head back to Heolfor. "Sounds good," he said. He meant that, too... it had been a rough night in spite of their attempts to make it leisurely. Amir wanted his cave. He fully planned to check in with Subira, bury himself under his comforter, and sleep for the next twelve hours.

Amir wasn't certain if Dana would want to come back with him, or if she would want time alone. She'd been invited, however, and in Amir's opinion that invitation was open. He thought Dana would want some privacy though, and truth be told he wanted to be alone to sleep off his residual pains in private. At least that was what he told himself.

He offered Dana his arm and they made their way out of Vesper in relative peace, compared to how they'd mangled the quiet walk through it.

((ooc: Amir out pending response from Dana))