But was that because he wanted me to be independent, or because I was strangling him? Hmm. Good question. Only Firesong knows the answer. Certainly being strangled is hardly comfortable, but he did wean me away as gently as possible, rather than simply shoving me away. But was that because he liked me dependent, but not too dependent? Another good question.
Now—well, the old proverb said, "Be careful what you ask for, because you might get it." Firesong had gotten an An'desha who knew who and what he was, and what he wanted to do with his life—and now Firesong was the one who was unhappy.
He wasn't exactly picking fights, but whenever An'desha said or did something Firesong didn't expect, he was visibly taken aback. Startled, even shocked, as if An'desha had turned into someone he didn't recognize. And when An'desha actually had a difference of opinion from him, Firesong would flash into a quiet and unobtrusive rage.
It never lasted more than a bare instant, and he never actually said or did anything except try to persuade An'desha that he was wrong—but that instant of rage was there. It was naked in his eyes and in the way he first flushed, then paled, then clenched his jaw hard and would not speak until the moment was over.
Firesong's solution, which An'desha had decided to emulate, was to avoid such situations by avoiding An'desha except at meals and at night.
At night, at least, they were still compatible, and it was a good tension reliever for both of them. But for how long would that last?
He shook himself out of his reverie; Master Levy was staring at him with curiosity, as if wondering what it was An'desha saw in the water-table. "Well, I'm not getting anything done here. Perhaps I ought to go take a walk and get some fresh air. Maybe I will intuit something that will help."
"I will go back to my angles and instruments, and see if I can't make something out of the result," Master Levy replied, but he sounded discouraged. "One of our problems is that the waves are coming from outside, yet our models rely upon waves generated from the center outward. We can extrapolate the results by formulas based on that, but it is still not an accurate enough representation."
On the whole, An'desha didn't blame him for being discouraged. What they needed was a new way of looking at this situation, a new approach. That was how they had come up with the breakwater, after all, a new approach—a mathematically-derived analysis of magical energies.
"Say... how about this," An'desha said quietly. "A hoop that can be dropped into the water model to create a circular wave from the outer edge inward?"
Master Levy examined his hands and reflexively cleaned under his fingernails for the twentieth time this conversation. "Mmm," he murmured finally. "That could help. I will put a student-artificer on the idea immediately. There are wave problems with the shortness of sampling time from the strike to edge reflection, but perhaps a large enough hoop could be made...."
Master Levy went on in the same vein for a while. They could come up with ideas, small ones that added up, but they never felt like a master solution. Now they needed another source of inspiration. The trouble was, they had run out of new cultural influences to provide such a source of new thinking.
We need a god to help us out this time. Unfortunately, since it is not likely that we will all be wiped off the face of the world when the breakwater fails, I doubt that She is going to be inclined to help us.
He shrugged and picked up his quilted Shin'a'in riding coat, pulled it on, and buttoned it up to his chin. He left the Palace workroom in a state of absorbed introspection, but he was not thinking about the mage-storms as he walked through the dead and deserted Palace gardens.
Odd. Not that long ago I would have been worried sick if Firesong had begun avoiding me. I would have been certain he was getting tired of me and was looking for someone else to replace me. I would have been in a panic at the thought of being alone. Now—
Now it simply didn't bother him, in part because such avoidance also avoided confrontations between them.
And frankly, it wouldn't matter to me if he did find a new lover.
That surprising realization stopped him, right in the middle of the path. He repeated it to himself, and it felt logical—right.
It would not matter to me if Firesong found a new lover. In fact, it would be something of a relief. I would stop feeling obligated to please him for fear of hurtful response. A feeling like that has no place in a love affair.
Yet there was no one else he was even remotely attracted to! So what was prompting this sentiment?
Do I want to be—alone?
That felt right too. Oh, he didn't want to be alone forever, but a third realization came to him, on the heels of the other two.
I'm starting to find things out about myself—not just all the things in the memories of Falconsbane-that-was, but things about me. I need time to think about them. And it has to be time alone.
Poor Firesong. He must be sensing that I want to be alone, and he's thinking it means that I don't want him around.
An'desha shook his head and started walking again, with his head down and his hands in his pockets. If only Firesong would find someone else, it would make things a great deal easier on everyone.
But the chances of that happening are not very good. There aren't a lot of she'chorne around for him to choose from, and most of them are involved with each other. And the others— He grimaced. I'll be charitable and say that the others are understandably warped by unfortunate early experiences. But that doesn't make them pleasant or healthy to be involved with.
She'chorne. When was the last time he'd heard, or even thought that word? Back with the Clan, before Falconsbane—I hadn't been making any attempts to court any girls in the Clan, so Grandmother started asking if I would at least consider courting one of the she'chorne boys. Such an alliance, though it obviously would not be possible to produce children of the blood, was still considered honorable. More than that, such couples could pursue the adoption of orphans from within the Clan. In fact, many Shin'a'in Clans encouraged such alliances so that there would be couples available to adopt parentless children. By Shin'a'in standards, a she'chorne couple, with no children of their own to support, always had the resources to support someone else, thus removing the burden from those with their own children to feed.
But that wasn't what I wanted either, and she started in on how I was as shiftless and rootless as my father...
There wasn't much to examine in his relatively short "real" lifetime, but he'd been going over his memories, trying to find hints of what he was in what he had been. He'd also been examining the less-disgusting memories left to him by Falconsbane and all his previous incarnations, trying to find a common denominator.