(no subject)

[lastgunslinger]

Spin. Parry. Thrust. Move the feet.

It's a deadly dance that Roland is performing by moonlight on the far side of the lake, where the door used to be. And dancing is what it looks like -- only it's a little too halting, a little too dangerous to be graceful.

He has not mastered the sword yet. Yet.

Comments

[locks_it_up]

She is there, because she is always there.

"You're pretty good with that thing."

[lastgunslinger]

Roland turns. He does not lower the sword.

Quietly, he says, "Lady. Prove to me who you are."

He remembers what happened to Joe, out by the lake. Remembers all too well.

[locks_it_up]

"Still have the stuffed chicken on my couch."

[lastgunslinger]

He won't smile, though he wants to.

Roland takes a few paces to the right, reaches for the scabbard, and slides the sword home.

"Anthy," he offers in explanation.

[locks_it_up]

"Figured. That girl..." she sighs, shakes her head.

[lastgunslinger]

"Tried to sound me out the other night. Wanted to know what I had planned."

Roland is still holding the scabbard. He looks down at it now, and smirks.

"I wouldn't tell her. She got -- angry, I wot. What passes for angry, with her."

And now his eyes shift to Death. "That was when she did it."

The look in his eyes is fixed, and mean, and wary.

[locks_it_up]

There's a spot of snow on the ground near her feet. She scuffs at it.

"If I didn't think it'd be too much of a mercy for her kind, I'd take her."

[lastgunslinger]

Roland looks at the ground for a moment. When he looks up, the meanness has left his face -- but the wariness is still there.

You are a dinh. For one of your tet. For Eddie.

Low: "I'd beg a boon, lady."

[locks_it_up]

She looks up.

She is older than age.

"Would you?"

[lastgunslinger]

"I would. For Eddie. I ask as dinh, and as one who loves him well."

He speaks softly. There is distance between them -- four feet or so.

Moonlight illuminates her. His face does not change.

[locks_it_up]

She is fair, yes. But she is fell.

"You may ask."

She may not answer.

[lastgunslinger]

"You know that he is dying, and not dead." Still quietly. "You arranged things -- or will arrange things -- so that Moiraine will return here, when it is her time to die."

The gunbelt is folded neatly, resting on a patch of grass nearby. It interferes with practice. And so now when he stands straight with his hands at his sides, there is no comforting touch of well-oiled leather under his left hand to steady him.

"Would you do the same for Eddie, lady?"

[locks_it_up]

"Moiraine is Family."

That's not an answer. Not really.

[lastgunslinger]

"I ask. I am yours. So is he. I am his dinh."

Roland has never felt comfortable playing the supplicant.

[locks_it_up]

"No one comes away from me unscathed, Roland. I could, but you wouldn't like the price."

[lastgunslinger]

His gaze never wavers.

"What is the price, lady?"

[locks_it_up]

"He would no longer be in my service."

[lastgunslinger]

The silver light makes Roland look like a statue -- a graven image.

"No longer a gunslinger." So soft. "Then what would he be, lady?"

[locks_it_up]

"Good question."

[lastgunslinger]

"Is it a question you'd answer?"

[locks_it_up]

"I don't want to hurt you more than I have to, Roland."

[lastgunslinger]

He looks away.

"All right."

Roland takes the few steps over to the clump of grass and picks up his gunbelt. He puts it on, and as he is fumbling with the rawhide string that holds the holster still against his thigh, he says, "I'll tell him, and give you his answer, if that does ya."

[locks_it_up]

"It does."

She is sorry.

It changes nothing.

[lastgunslinger]

Roland picks up his Hanzo sword with his right hand.

With his left hand, he makes a fist and raises it, outturned, to his forehead. "Thankee-sai, lady."

There is comfort in courtesy. A

(curtain)

screen to hide behind.

[locks_it_up]

"Anytime."

She manages a smile. It's sad.

"This'd be the part where I wish you long days and pleasant nights, wouldn't it?"

[lastgunslinger]

"If that is what you would do, lady."

The longer his days, the longer he must go without seeing her.

His face is stone.

[locks_it_up]

"If I must."

[lastgunslinger]

"I would not presume to give one of the Seven orders. Lady."

His left hand, the one without the sword in it, is still curled into a fist at his side. A tight fist.

[locks_it_up]

Silence.

Then, soft, so soft, her eyes downward.

"Long days and pleasant nights, Roland."

She thinks of rough-but-gentle hands and rib-pokes and shoulder-checks, and is comforted.

[lastgunslinger]

"Twice the number to you."

It's perfunctory.

He waits for her to leave.

[locks_it_up]

She sighs.

And is gone.

[lastgunslinger]

After she is gone, Roland bows his head. His face falls into shadow.

When he raises it and the light returns, there is no trace of anguish.

He goes to take his sword upstairs, and make ready for the evening.