Three words. It only took three words to tear the ground out beneath her, Themis' sense of what was solid and immutable in freefall. She didn't need to know that he missed her. But she did. Something small and uncertain in her, the part of her that questioned his devotion, that was afraid to be seen and known, needed to hear that he ached as she did. Because missing him seemed lightyears from the emptiness that consumed her now. To miss someone seemed easy, simple. This was a complicated web of their own making that made it hard to breathe or function. This was a loss; this was grieving for someone who sat inches away. He was here, but in minutes, he would leave her alone, cold as the stones in the courtyard. She cursed whatever adventure demanded his presence, the quest of his that was taking a physical toll on the man beside her. Samuel was the picture of decorum, always, but the sharp angle of his cheek seemed a bit too sharp, the hollow of his cheek making her question if he remembered to take meals as he was defying nature. She couldn't lecture him, if it were not for a very nosy house elf, Themis would have forgotten the purpose of food. It was difficult enough to force her mind to sleep, to turn off long enough for her to fall into some fitful slumber that woke her feeling drained and empty. And she could tell herself that all of this would be bearable if she knew he was alright. She could bear anything if she knew the outcome, but this waiting, the not knowing, hurt in ways she hadn't foreseen.

She almost gasped when his hand brushed hers, the contact sparking something to life that she had left to starve in his absence. Without a second (or first) thought on the matter, her hand entwined with his, her grip firm. How funny that she could almost breathe now that they were in contact, that she could feel the scar of his palm against her own skin. There was no one in sight, but she didn't move further or dare move any nearer to him. There was nothing to interest a passerby, and she would keep it that way. "I miss you. More than I can say." She could barely whisper it, the wind playing with her words in the cold air. But there was no more she could say.

---

The anguish in her voice unsettled him. It also pleased a part of him that sought to know his impact; he needed to know that this was important. It would justify him in his actions.

Her hand moved and took his, firmly. Samuel flinched at the contact, which seemed to send an electrical impulse through his body. He returned the pressure of her grip and their fingers entwined. He moved his thumb along her palm.
Suddenly he found himself bargaining. Did he really need to keep their separation as complete as he did? Would it endanger him or her to bend the rules, make it less absolute? He often dealt in absolutes. It instated order where else there would be fluid and pulsating chaos. The thought of chaos became more appealing. Samuel thought about being with her, somewhere alone. Perhaps not even at the school; lately the castle oppressed his spirits. Seeing her for the first time outside of its walls seemed to open another realm of possibilities.

A dizzying feeling spread in his chest and drew his throat shut. She would say yes, and he would be unable to go back on it. They would then not be able to keep seperate for long. His separate worlds would merge and flow together -- dissolution awaited him, and he could hardly bear it. It threatened him from all sides; at home with his family, with her, with whatever was happening to him since he met Don Juan, who would be waiting on his arrival soon. At the same time, he was desperate for the promise that was wrapped up in letting go of all that pulled him away from her.
"I find myself bargaining with myself," he said, and he noticed his voice sounding different, but could not place what was different about it.

---

She felt a tremor of tension as her body tried to relax and tense simultaneously. The firing of nerves and sensations were colliding through her body, and every cell seemingly called to the task of electrifying her. The small, rhythmic brushes of his thumb in her palm seemed to have an outsized reaction. Internally, she was now at war. He denied her offers of assistance before and she respected his decision as much as she loathed it. Whatever he was about was taking a visible toll and it unsettled every bit of her desire to protect and defend. It was who she was, fierce and unflinching in the defense of those she held dear. Samuel was more than dear to her. How could she walk away from him now and renew their separation? He insisted that this road was temporary, but so was human life. How long would she need to fret over his well-being? How much longer would she need to let her heart quake when he was missing in the Great Hall?

Seeing him beyond the castle made everything more real to her, both the danger she sensed and her need to interrupt it. Somehow, she felt less powerful here outside of her domain. She was merely a witch made victim to her own feelings. There was nothing exceptional about that, nothing grand. Here, she was ordinary, and that bothered her.

Samuel brought her back, his words mirroring her own struggle. Or at least, a part of Samuel she had heard before. This was not his voice, not the smooth confidence of her collaborator, or the warm assurances of her lover. This was a man caught in a web of his own thoughts, ones he deemed too dark for her to see. She vehemently disagreed. "Then bargain with me. There must be some way I can make this easier on you."

---

"Themis—" the vehemence caught him unprepared. "I really don't think you can." So far she had respectfully stayed away from reiterating her offer for help and he appreciated that. He appreciated it, because he knew what he was doing would not meet her approval. All the secrecy and separation, sure it was to protect her — he did believe that. But it had a dual purpose, in that it prevented her from discovering the truth about him.
It was, he had noticed, very hard for him to keep things hidden around her.
"You don't want to be involved with this; I don't want you involved. You would—"
He cut himself off. What did he even mean to say? That she would not like it? She would despise what he had done regarding his family and if she found out anything about the trouble with Don Juan and his history with that substance — well, that was a deeply uncomfortable thought. A veritable can of worms. He had outdone himself, once again.

"What I mean when I say I catch myself bargaining with myself is, that I try to make up justifications for seeing you and being with you, when I know it is unwise, right now," he said. Their hands were still entwined, but in his body held a different sort of tension now. I should leave, he thought. If she pushed him harder, there was a point where he might fold, he knew that. It was not worth the risk.

---

She felt his rebuke as if it was physical, a slight flinch at the warning he filled her name with. She had stepped too close to the fire and had reached just too far. And she had the sense and the grace to regret it. She was also in possession of shame, an emotion she avoided whenever it was possible. She had no right to his secrets or shadows, nothing beyond what he willingly gave her. That was their unspoken promise and she had come too close to violation. The pink in her cheeks had nothing to do with the cold.
"I apologize. It is most unfair of me to press you. You have been clear in your terms. I overstepped." She loathed being wrong, but she wasn't the sort to hide from it. She had erred and would make amends if he allowed it. That did not stop her listening for clues to his activities.
What in the name of all that was holy had he gotten into? The sinking feeling returned, the pendulum blade swinging just above her head. She could feel it, whatever it was that occupied him, forcing its way between them.She would what? He'd cut himself off, but the thought had been there. He'd given thought to her involvement already, puzzled his way to some conclusion that said she couldn't and shouldn't be involved. Nothing that came to mind could settle the unease knawing at her now.

She felt as much as she saw the tension in his frame, noticed his thumb had stopped caressing her hand. Oh, she had pushed him. His clarification adding a new, unpleasant emotion to the mix: guilt. Though this guilt was mixed with something more petty, base. A part of her wasn't the least bit sad that he struggled to separate from her. She was being selfish and for that, she would not apologize.
"I am more of a hindrance than a help to you now." She concluded, the words stinging as she said them, her chest clenching as she decided on the correct course of action. "I should leave you." She said the words, but her grip on his hand remained. "For your sake, I should go."

---

Her backing down did not give him a sliver of satisfaction; it pained him. "I see your intention; I do," he said. Leave him. Despite thinking something very similar a few moments ago, hearing it in her voice did not sit well with him at all. His other hand joined hers and he turned towards her. "I do not wish for that, I hope you understand that," he said. From the corner of his eyes, he saw the door from the library to the archway open. Someone was coming. He released her hand.
"I wish we could be alone with each other," he said.

Some time passed while he observed the person meandering down the path, infuriatingly slow.
"We need to go our separate ways now," he said finally. "There is no helping it."
He was right earlier; this had been an exercise in self-torment. If anything, he suspected that this run-in would heighten Themis' unease and worry. The look she had on her face now made something twist painfully inside of him. She looked paler and more fragile than she did the last time he saw her. He wished he could make her life easier, but could at the same time not bring himself to give her the closeness and love that would accomplish that -- he had it; he held it in his hands, not knowing what to do with it in her absence, and he was miserable about it. But it seemed impossible to veer off the course he had taken; it was too late to go back.

---

She believed him. It was a choice to honor the boundary he set and trust that he had matters under control. It took a faith she rarely placed on people, but now, it was all she could give him. She felt the emotional drop as soon as his hands pulled away, his rapid reorientation shocking her back to their surroundings. Of course they had company now, why not make this more difficult? His thoughts mirrored hers, what she wouldn't give to be back in her tower, where she could see to his safety. "And I will keep wishing for as long as you are away." It was a simple promise to make; he was never far from her thoughts.

Themis forced herself to make the right move, the tear at her own wounds and walk away from the man who held her heart. She waited, her frustration at the slow-strolling intruder growing as he meandered - finally - back inside. Now committed to her course, she stood, the action taking more strength that it should. She turned to him, deliberately putting herself between him and the door so she could reach for his hand one more time. "Tell me I may write to you. If I cannot see you, tell me I can support you this way. I," And she paused, the intent to speak and her words not connecting. There was too much to say to him, too many worries and ways she could make this more difficult for them both. The kind thing to do would be to walk away, to let matters rest. Still, she cautiously let her words venture forward. "The possibility of not seeing you again, or not knowing you are alright terrifies me." And it did, the fear evident in her voice, the possibility a deep warning in her bones. "Were that to be true, I would be most remiss for not telling you," A different warning sounded in her brain, the rational side that refused to make confessions out of fear. She warred with the warning and her words. She would never forgive herself if he walked away without knowing what he meant to her, but such things would only make this harder. "You..." Damn feelings and the knot in her throat. "Your heart carries mine, Samuel. Protect them both." It was as honest as she dared.

---

Samuel looked at her and thought that what he needed to do and say was obvious: Take her hand in a way that reassured her. Say: Don't worry about me, Themis. I will be fine and all of this will be over in two weeks' time. I'm coming back. Then he would smile at her and go. The wind was picking up again, miserably freezing, a teeth-shattering coldness that seemed to rise from below as much as it came down from the sky.
He thought about her words: The possibility of not seeing you again. Through all of his struggles along the twisting path of his life, Samuel had felt sure that nothing of consequence would happen to him -- could happen to him. Why, he could not explain. He would keep himself safe, that was all he knew.
Now this knowledge became hollow. His intuition told him something he could not bear to listen to. If he did not come back to her, he thought, and the night in the tower would have been the last time they saw each other, it would at least be an end he could be at peace with. That night he held in his heart as untouchable.
This run-in however, in this freezing courtyard, was a different story. He would leave her with a false promise of confidence and a big lie of omission. That was not enough. All that he wanted to give her and say to her, he could not, in this dreary place. She took his hand and he felt her fear and sorrow, as if she was pouring it into him by this touch. He held her hand and fought with himself, saying nothing.
"Listen," he said to her, suddenly and with finality. His other hand felt for something in the inside pocket of his coat and he pulled out a rectangular card, made from a dull metal, like darkened silver. It appeared empty, but as it changed hands from his to hers, it displayed his name and an address: "Keep this. It will remain empty most of the time, but it will display where I am, if I need you to know that information. Do with that what you please," he smiled wryly. He might come to regret this, but it seemed the extent of his restraint had passed him by.
"Of course you may write to me," he added.

---

It may have been the most frightening thing she had ever willingly disclosed, even if it didn't amount to the full truth. She waited, seeming to teeter on the edge of something when, thankfully, Samuel chose to catch her.

She held to his hand like a lifeline, his actions dictating her foreseeable future. When he handed here his card, Themis' brow furrowed, until he explained himself. This was illicit, absolutely not a respectable choice. She thanked him anyway, card clutched firmly in her hand. "I will." She promised without further explanation. She smiled, but it was perfunctory, her attention already lost to where she would be in the next half hour. She turned away from him then, with nothing else to say, and she walked purposefully back inside, fighting the urge to look over her shoulder.

There were choices to make. She could easily make the correct choice and stay at her home with her son, a normal night with no questions of her character. It wouldn't do. She paced in her room, fretted about her decision, and scribbled a message to her son. She would be missing dinner tonight.

---