In Which Tavrin Takes a Hint

January 1, 1171

Raia's friend and his woman had been arguing for a while now--a good angle of the sun, at least. She hadn't been lying when she'd said that things weren't going so well. Vaguely, Tavrin wondered how things had gotten so out of hand between them. He and Atala fought, his sister and her man fought, his grandparents fought... but never like this. This was more than a disagreement, more than a simple difference of opinion--much more.

"Oh, like hell you will, you spineless mass of vomit!"

"Don't think I won't!"

"As if I couldn't! You don't have the guts to walk out of here!"

"I'm at my breaking point, Ailede! Fourteen years of putting up with all of your shit, and what do I get in return? Nothing!"

Exalted Ancestors! How long could they go on like this? If there were any children, Tavrin hoped they were out of the house; he'd only ever known one parent, but if he'd had two, he didn't think he would have wanted to hear something like this. Well... unless they were both horrible like this crazy lady, maybe. That might have been amusing. Did the Dovans have a word for that? The Germans did, he was sure of it; he wondered if he might have been feeling that now if the man hadn't been Raia's friend.

Not to mention, if he hadn't felt pressed for time and wasn't sick of waiting for the man to leave already.

"What the hell are you talking about? Don't you realize how much I've done for you, you worthless ingrate?"

"What you've done for me? What you've done for me?" Through the window, Tavrin could see the man's fist hit the kitchen table, the resulting thud! audible in spite of the stone walls. "You treat the children like chopped liver, waste my money on things you never even use, can't be arsed to bring in any income or even take care of the God damn house, and fuck around with everyone but me! By God, when your sister went to the convent, I should have sent you right along with her!"

The man opened the door and stormed out, fire in his eyes and mouth and movement though the air was pure ice. The woman was an even sorrier sight; Tavrin couldn't help but recall the time he and Atala had once watched that one Dovan family's angry old sow give birth. "If you leave this house, don't think for one second that you'll be welcome back!"

"Fine by me!" He stepped outside and slammed the door behind him. His fury still burning, he let out a livid roar and strode up the path toward the road, overlooking Tavrin entirely; even if he had noticed him, the man was clearly in no mood to talk.

And yet, that was precisely why Tavrin was there. "Hey!"

The Dovan--what had Raia said his name was? Faldor?--froze. "Who's there?"

Tavrin hurried alongside the path and cut in front of him, stringing together a bit of the man's language in his mind before letting it fly from his mouth. "You is Faldor, yes?"

An eyebrow arched, the man gave a wary nod. "And, uh... what the hell are you supposed to be?"

He was asking who he was--as if that was important. "I am friend to Raia, but no matters. You go to castle now."

"I was just heading there." The man lunged as if to sidestep, but Tavrin was not to be out-maneuvered by a mere human. "Now, if you just--"

"Wait!" Annoyed, the man glared at him; he chose to ignore this. "You hurry to castle and warn father of Raia, yes? You hurry to castle and tell father of Raia--"

"Tell him what?" the man roared, clearly at the end of his rope.

Tavrin scowled; he could take a hint. "Know what? Forget it!"

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