"Oh," said Merrin. Drawing her knees to her chest, she studied Adeila, and took a deep breath in preparation for stumbling through her next half-formed questions. She hardly knew what it was that she wanted to know. Everything, perhaps?

"What was it like?" she asked, feeling her cheeks grow warm even as the words left her lips. When she tried to clarify the vague, uncertain question, others intercepted it and tumbled out in a slew. "I mean - what did you do? What did he do? Did you ever have trouble...trouble knowing...understanding..."

She made a helpless gesture. "I don't know - what to do, or how - and it isn't that I don't like it" - gods, her cheeks must be flaming - "but I haven't...done this...before."

_________________

Adeila struggled for a suitable answer. This seemed the sort of question that Merrin should be asking her mother, not a recent acquaintance. Especially given how limited Adeila's own experience was. "I think," she said at length, "that it is impossible to compare any two relationships. Each is unique to itself."

She fingered the edge of the quilt absently, staring out at the village as she sorted through memories. There had been no epiphany, no grand declaration of undying devotion. They had simply known, from the start, that it was right. Certainly, there had been doubts, hesitations, even fights along the way, but it had always been clear that no other alternative would suffice. This was what was supposed to happen.

"He loves you, if that's what you are wondering. He all but worships the ground that you stand on - anyone can see that." Reassurance, that was was what Merrin was seeking. Advice, Adeila had very little of, but she could reassure. Smoothing out the quilt, she offered a thin smile. "Love is a learning experience. You are not expected to know everything."

Merrin nodded, then laughed suddenly and ducked her head, flushing. "I love him, too," she said, unable to stop the sudden warmth that swept through her - and unwilling, even had she known how. "But I don't...understand, all the time. I want to understand him."

Letting out a long sigh, she let her head drop back against the wall and closed her eyes briefly. It was good to be home. Even with the secrecy, and the way shadows had reached, in a very distant way, to sheltered little Riversmeet.

"It's not - wrong, is it?" she asked into the silence that followed. "With everything...with being Chosen, and having the Shard, and - everything - you don't think it's not wrong for me to - to love him, and forget about it all? Just for a little?" The questions were still coming. Merrin needed more to ask them than she could hope for an answer. "Mama and Da don't know. I don't know if I should tell them. Kendath isn't - he's not - what they would have wanted."

She offered Adeila a tentative smile. "I don't seem to know anything, anymore."

_________________

"I cannot speak for the gods," Adeila said slowly. "You are probably more qualified than I am to predict their will. But I cannot imagine that they would expect you to forsake all normal human interaction. They would not place people in your life if that were their intent."

"As for your parents....I only just met them, but they seem to be very reasonable individuals. I am sure that they respect your right as an adult to make your own decisions concerning romance. If they trust you to fly around on the back of a dragon, then they no doubt trust you to take care of yourself in other regards as well."

She moved over to the other bed and gave Merrin's shoulders a gentle squeeze. "Even if they do not completely understand, they will no doubt support any decision that you make."

Merrin nodded. "I just wish it could all be the same again," she said, unable to keep the wistful note out of her voice. "I hate it...keeping secrets from them."

She fell silent. It was impossible, with moonlight lancing down from the silvered mountaintops through the window, here where the people she loved were safe, to be unhappy. But she longed to be the hero the twins thought she was, and to be able to sink once more into little Merrin Tanner, without the secrets or the journeys into darkness.

A long sigh escaped her. Merrin looked up at Adeila. "I wouldn't go back, though," she said quietly.

They sat in silence for the space of a few moments, and a yawn escaped Merrin. Then another. She reached up to tuck a wandering tendril of hair behind her ear, and met Adeila's eyes with a smile. "I'll be all right."

And she would. When Merrin lay under the patchwork quilt, one arm behind her head, staring up at the sky while she waited for sleep, the warm flicker of the candle by her bedside drove away the shadows. Drowsy, she rolled over, and slumber was welcome.

---

When she woke, alert, at some sound just before sunrise, it took Merrin a moment to remember where she was. The faint scent of wildflowers, outside the window, reminded her, and she sat up already smiling. The glow of the sky outside promised day soon.

Adeila still slept, and there was no noise in the other room. Picking up her boots, Merrin stole out on tiptoe, pausing once to look at the sprawled foursome before the hearth, where last night there had been three.

The furthest, wrapped in a quilt and snoring gently, had a head of sandy brown hair that Merrin remembered very well. She resisted the urge to wake Jayen with her delight at seeing him again, and instead slipped out onto the front porch, where she sat down to pull on her boots and breathe the fresh, crisp air. Signs of life were already stirring in sleepy Riversmeet - a cat ambled across the road, and smoke curled from one of the chimneys - but all was very quiet still. The dew wet her boots, thin from wear, when Merrin crossed the little yard and swung herself up onto the fence in the shadow of a tree, whose very first changing fall leaves caught the pale predawn light.

She leaned against the broad bole, sitting on the fence with boots dangling over the long grass on the other side, and waited for the sun to glow over the hills.

_________________

Thump.

Kendath muttered something unintelligible and rolled over. A lump of a pillow poked into his side. He grabbed it and hugged it to his chest.

Thump. Thump. Thumpthumpthumpthump.

Pale sunlight filtered scarlet through his eyelids. He buried his face in the pillow.

THUMP.

Like thunder, right by his ear. His eyes flew open.

"Tag! You're it!"

"Am not! The rug's base!"

"Rug smug! You're it! You're it!"

Another thump, followed by the stampede of feet against floorboards. The rather earsplitting stampede of feet against floorboards, akin to a cavalry charge. Kendath, still muttering under his breath, climbed to his feet just in time to be smacked full in the chest by something blunt and vaguely resembling a club - something with a cowlick -

"You doorknob, Adasin, he's not even playing!"

"Is now!" Adasin bowled Kendath over, darted around, and barreled head-first into a sandy-haired figure Kendath could have sworn wasn't there last night. "Jayen's it!"

"Say, where's Rhie?"

A wail split the crisp morning air, followed by a crash that sounded suspiciously like smashed pottery. The wail, drifting from the opposite side of the room, shot up a few notches in both volume and pitch. The twins exchanged glances.

"Not my fault."

"Not mine."

"Jayen did it."

Kendath collapsed back onto his quilt with a groan.

_________________

In climbing, with groggy bad temper, to his feet, Jayen accidentally tripped over T'mor's blanket-swathed form. A yelp emanated from the blanket.

"Uhhh...tell the twins to take it outside..." T'mor groaned, and, unbelievably, rolled over and gave a large snore.

"Jayen, you're it." The giver of this helpful information was close enough for Jayen to make a grab at him. Adasin darted away. "Come on!"

"I bloody well will not!" roared the severely irritated oldest Tanner, swiveling to look at the source of the smashed pottery and ending by scooping up Rhie from amidst the debris of a flower pot.

The twins, having frozen in their respective headlong rushes, exchanged astonished looks.

"You cursed!"

"I'm going to tell Mama!"

"Mama! Know what Jayen did?" yelled Liand, despite his mother being - wisely - still closeted in her room.

Merrin, emerging from the back entrance and hastily depositing her pitchers of water on the table, clamped fingers over his mouth. "By all the gods, Liand, people are sleeping!"

"Merrin cursed too!" yelped Adasin, darting away -

- and smacking, for the second time that morning, headlong into Kendath. This gave Jayen an opportunity to nab him, which he did, and stood with a twin held firmly in one hand and a sniffling Rhie in the other. Merrin, opposite, shushed Liand's protestations. "I already got water, and that's one of your chores," she told him. "Outside! Now!"

Jayen gave a sullen Adasin a shove in the same direction, and then put Rhie down. "Someone should clean up that flower pot," he said, resigned.

"Yes, the twins should," responded Merrin.

They stared at each other for a moment. Then Jayen's face broke into a grin. He had a beard, Merrin noted with astonishment. "Surprise," she said, smiling herself.

He crossed the room to hug her in what seemed about two strides. When they separated, Merrin said, "You're getting married!"

"You're a dragonrider!"

"When did you grow a beard?"

"Don't you like it?" said Jayen anxiously.

Merrin collapsed into laughter. Jayen blinked at her. "What?"

When she shook her head, he raised his eyes to the heavens and turned to Kendath. "Jayen Tanner. You with her?"

_________________

The twins playing tag and running around the room, Jayen and Merrin exhanging words with one another and the rest of the household awakening all together, had forced Garthag to forfeit any attempts of further rest. In truth he had found it troublesome, no, if not nearly impossible to rest peacefully. The whole setting set his own thoughts astray, a small quaint village with a common family brought up too many pleasant yet unwanted memories.

One thought lead to another and in the end all he found was misery in those thoughts, the loss and grief these happless people could not comprehend was lodged deep within his head, ever painful and serving as a reminder that fortune was truly fickle. To distract himself, and to escape the tumbling twins, Garthag occupied a seat by the table and laid his spellbook wide open.

The chatter nor the sounds seemed to disrupt his thoughts as he went trough the intricate writing that spanned from one page to another. The book, wrapped in brown leather and it`s sides lined in grey, seemed rather neglected to Garthag as he had only occasionally returned to it during their journey, only when required. In the least the knowledge that only he could understand the text brought him little comfort as well as distraction from the bothersome thoughts.

But every once in a while one might have spotted a venomous, envious glare from the corner of Garthag`s eyes that disappeared as soon as it had appeared. He hated this place, it mocked him and poisoned his thoughts. Thus scorching this puny village would be considered as a merciful act towards himself and the residents as they would no doubt become only food for the monsters that the Meiltha were.

Yet then again he was not a monster himself nor desired to return to that path, one that he better than anyone knew would lead to becoming an abomination. Thus Garthag, quietly, spent his time flipping trough the spellbook and examining his old notes in order to bring back some well needed spells for the journey ahead.

_________________

Let him curse my name
On these blood stained pages of misery
Let him call me a tyrant so cruel
Let him curse my name, but remember the truth!

Kendath looked at Jayen.

Jayen looked at Kendath.

Kendath let his jaw hang slack for a second and a half before hastily snapping it shut. "No," he squeaked. Er. Said. "I mean yes. I mean - " He snapped his mouth shut again. An interesting pause. Then, "Nice to meet you." Yet another, less interesting pause. "I'm Kendath."

The silence, broken only by a disgruntled ruffle of pages courtesy of Garthag, was waxing too awkward even by Kendath's standards. Kendath cleared an imaginary irritation from the back of his throat and tried to remember what Merrin had told him about her brothers. He tried very, very hard not to glance at her.

He was saved, out of all people, by Rhie. The girl plucked at Jayen's shirt, smearing dirt across its hem. "I want Mama," she said.

Kendath, ever the opportunist, stole a pleading glance at Merrin.

_________________

"Go find Mama, then," said Jayen, shooing her off.

Merrin had a moment in between to recognize the glance Kendath cast in her direction as intimidation, and another afterward to take in Jayen's expectant look. The silence that fell, once again, made her look uncertainly from one to the other. How was she to introduce Kendath? This is Kendath, the former Meiltha I've been traveling with. Jayen, meet Kendath, he's been - helping me - helping her what?

There was no way to say it that did not require a long explanation, which Merrin would much rather have done in private. Instead, she moved to slip her fingers into Kendath's, and met Jayen's look with a hopeful smile. "Yes. Jayen - this is Kendath. Kendath, this is Jayen. He's the oldest."

She saw his eyes dart down to their intertwined fingers, and then his expression change subtly - for good or ill, Merrin couldn't tell. The silence stretched a moment longer.

"Oldest, yes," Jayen responded finally, seeming to suddenly come to himself again. He tried a grin that Merrin recognized as rather forced. "Responsible for these mischief-makers."

Merrin realized they were going to stand there forever. "Shall we - sit down, until breakfast is ready?" she said.

They made it to the cluster of chairs by the hearth. Merrin groped briefly for a topic of conversation, but was precluded by Jayen's addressing Kendath directly.

"So," he said, leaning forward. "Are you a Renegade dragonrider as well, then?

_________________

"Yes," Kendath answered, perhaps a tiny bit too quickly. He drew himself a chair, and sat as though the room were bristling with a contingent of hostile guards. The imaginary irritation in the back of his throat was annoying him yet again. He cleared it.

The single shaft of dim light, conspiring with the intensity of Jayen's stare, catapulted Kendath's nerves to some sort of interrogation room. Dungeon. Torture chambers. Fear. Kendath swallowed. Turn the question back on the interrogator... turn the question back on the interrogator...

"So. You're a... tanner?"

_________________

"Aye," was all Jayen said in response, leaning back.

Merrin judged it affable enough. "That's Garthag," she interjected, motioning to the reticent mage with his book, "and you'll meet Adeila a little later."

"No - Wyvern?" asked Jayen, turning so that his gaze, suddenly concerned, met hers.

Merrin swallowed. "No," she said, and when he looked likely to probe further, she dropped her eyes. "Later, Jayen."

A moment's pause, and then, carefully - "All right." To Merrin's relief, he flashed her a grin instead, and ruffled her hair, which was falling in disorder around her shoulders. The gesture was an old one, from when she was littler. She wondered at the sudden affection. "I missed you. Everyone missed you. How long are you home?"

"Not long," said Merrin, reluctant to think of leaving. Why did it seem impossible to talk of something else? "With - with Vryngard - Kendath and I need to go back."

"Returning heroes?" The joke did not quite fall flat, but Merrin saw his glance oscillate once more between the two of them. Me, maybe.

"You've been listening to the twins," she murmured in reply.

The umpteenth pregnant pause in the last ten minutes was cut off short by a very strange noise somewhere between a hiss and a yelp. In short order, a streak of brown and green shot through the back door, which was ajar, and an irate Svit leaped into Merrin's lap, bristling, followed by a likewise indignant Dragon, who began to bark at the top of his lungs.

"Twins!" Their mother could be heard from the kitchen. "Do something with the dog!"

Caire Tanner appeared, balancing a plate of toast in one hand and a platter in the other. "Jayen, if you'll check the snares this morning, I'll have T'mor go with your father," she said loudly over the noise. "Merrin might like to go with you, for company. Come and eat!"

"And Kendath," added Merrin, unsure what to do with the indignant reptile on her lap. "Ah - Adeila -?"

_________________

"Svit, honestly!" Adeila scolded, having come into the room to investigate the cause of the commotion. Svit immediately vacated Merrin's lap and darted up onto Adeila's shoulder, glaring venemously at Dragon. "No, I don't much care what he did first. You are a guest in this home; you might well start acting like it."

She smiled apologetically. "I am very sorry. Svit is a wonderful helper, and children adore him, but he's quite a selfish little thing at times. He can't stand anything that might detract attention from himself - chiefly, pets. We've been working on that for nearly twenty years now, to little avail. But I assure you, there will be no further problems. Am I right, Svit?"

Svit merely flicked out his tongue and hissed quietly in the direction of Dragon, who was being dragged out by the twins.

Sighing in exasperation, Adeila abruptly turned and extended a hand toward the only unfamiliar individual in the room. "You must be Jayen. My name is Adeila. I've been traveling with your sister recently."

"Gods, I would have slept better in the stable," moaned T'mor, rolling over and blinking at the ceiling. "Where're the twins? I'm going to kill one of them."

"Welcome home," said Jayen dryly, sympathy rather lacking. He rose to shake Adeila's hand. "Jayen Tanner. Pleasure to meet you. And...?"

"Svit," said Merrin.

"Kendath," T'mor interjected, "please tell me I am not the only one who feels as though the twins have run over his head."

"Stop complaining, you," said Jayen. "Some of us live here."

"Oh, I'm complaining, am I?" T'mor was waxing aggrieved. "I spend a bloody week dragging wagons through those mountains and then I come home to the floor, and a pair of iron-shod twins!"

"He's always like this," Merrin confided to Kendath.

"I heard that, Merrin!"

Leaving T'mor to bemoan his misfortunes on the floor, Merrin got up in response to a second call from her mother to come eat breakfast, aware that the sun was rapidly getting higher, bursting through their unshuttered windows, and like as not there was a good amount of work to be done. There always was.

As evidenced by the twins, seated and cramming bread and ham into their mouths, breakfast was much less of an affair than dinner. "Eat, then!" Caire was saying briskly. "I've washing to do, and your father has work. T'mor! Stop wailing!"

_________________

"If I can help..." Kendath began, glancing around at a scene that would have put a decamping army to shame. He took a step back and tripped over what could have been the dog or possibly... Rhie. The girl stood as though a slight breeze might knock her over. She took one look at him, stuck her thumb in her mouth, and began to cry.

"Merrin," Kendath hissed, panic mounting. He backed into the wall, all the while watching Rhie as one might watch an enraged dragon. "Merrin? Help - "

"Hey, mister. I made you a sandwich."

Kendath jumped.

Adasin or Liand proffered a slip of ham shoved between two chunks of bread. Adasin or Liand smiled sweetly.

"Oh. Thanks."

"See that little black dot? It's a cockroach."

Kendath froze midway through chewing. His eyes became quite round.

"Just kidding. It's a only a piece of lint. That's all T'mor's ever got in his pockets." Adasin or Liand turned to pluck at Merrin. "I made you a sandwich too. Wanna see?"

_________________

Merrin examined it, managing not to actually touch the haphazard creation. "You forgot what I like on my sandwiches," she said.

"You don't like anything on your sandwiches." Adasin - for it was he - was not convinced.

"Yes. No dog hair."

"Oops. Liand made that one." He gave it to Rhie instead, whom Jayen had scooped into a chair and distracted with toast and jam, and trotted after her when she went to get her own breakfast. "Merrin, can you show Liand and me swordfighting, today? Master Cuthare showed us some, but you're a dragonrider."

Merrin didn't answer, making a dive for ham and ducking around the platter of eggs that her mother placed on the table just as her father sat down. "Morning," she said, grinning across at him.

"Mornin', lass. Don't be a pest, Adasin."

"I'm not! Will you, Merrin?"

Merrin slowly buttered her bread. Why didn't she want to? "Maybe," she said. "We'll see, all right?"

Dissatisfied but resigned, Adasin tucked into his breakfast, and for lack of seating room, Merrin balanced precariously on top of the coal scuttle with her plate.

"Jayen's going to check the snares," Mistress Tanner was saying to her husband. "He'll be down in Threefell this afternoon, and T'mor has nothing to do at the smithy's, so he can help you -"

"Mama! Why? I was just home yesterday!"

"- you sound like a child, T'mor, stop it. And come home early, will you? Merrin can't stay very long."

Merrin received a motherly smile and gave one in return, and edged over to offer Kendath a sausage. He looked dazed. "We'll go out with Jayen after breakfast," she said. "The twins have their chores anyway, and they can be a little overwhelming."

_________________