"You're safe with me. You will always be safe with me."
It's an effective appeal. Tuo does not relax, but he does not leap from his seat despite the tension in his limbs and the clearly visible whites of his eyes. Instead he stares back at his childhood friend, struggling to reconcile all the years of trust and affection that they carried together as children--a legacy inherited from their parents, no doubt--with the stridently diverging paths of their adolescence and adulthoods. For a moment Tuo feels acutely infuriated by his own naive stupidity, for having assumed that the man before him was the same gentle-hearted boy he had grown up alongside in Fiapori. And yet--
You will always be safe with me.
He closes his eyes and lifts both hands to cover his mouth and nose, then curls the fingers of one hand around the opposite wrist to still their trembling. His blood is awash with adrenaline with no outlet for the frantic energy. "Even if I were not," he admits, breaking the long silence, "there is precious little I could do about it now." His smile is thin, then. Resigned to whatever Dain chooses to do.
He reaches for the coat again, to take it and hang it up, if Dain will part with it. The simple, familiar courtesy will give him something to with himself, at least.
no subject
It's an effective appeal. Tuo does not relax, but he does not leap from his seat despite the tension in his limbs and the clearly visible whites of his eyes. Instead he stares back at his childhood friend, struggling to reconcile all the years of trust and affection that they carried together as children--a legacy inherited from their parents, no doubt--with the stridently diverging paths of their adolescence and adulthoods. For a moment Tuo feels acutely infuriated by his own naive stupidity, for having assumed that the man before him was the same gentle-hearted boy he had grown up alongside in Fiapori. And yet--
You will always be safe with me.
He closes his eyes and lifts both hands to cover his mouth and nose, then curls the fingers of one hand around the opposite wrist to still their trembling. His blood is awash with adrenaline with no outlet for the frantic energy. "Even if I were not," he admits, breaking the long silence, "there is precious little I could do about it now." His smile is thin, then. Resigned to whatever Dain chooses to do.
He reaches for the coat again, to take it and hang it up, if Dain will part with it. The simple, familiar courtesy will give him something to with himself, at least.