The description works. Tris has never been anything like a soldier, but she's witnessed and fought in pirate battles. She knows the kind of defenses that work in a harbor, and she grasps that they wouldn't work on the open sea. "That make sense."
And that... is going to be a tough storm to control. Tris thinks back to the time she tried to stop the tides. At least she's learned something since then. "I'll need to know the area of the facility, then, and I'd like to practice with and without assistance from cold and warm fronts. Storms want to move, and to grow or shrink. Mages get killed when they try playing with forces of nature too big for them to handle."
Which absolutely does not mean that he's still short a weather witch. "I'll find a way. I won't risk all of their lives, and yours, and my own if I'm not relatively certain I can handle what you're asking."
"You've got some wiggle room. It can grow, of course. And you can just release it after - the whole place needs to be destroyed anyway. Anything we can do to stop them starting production again -"
Well. It'll save him a little ammunition.
He turns, for a moment, presses his face against her shoulder, takes slow breaths. If this works, if this works - that's one more ace in his hand, one more piece of the puzzle. One more step to getting the vod'ike safe. And he knows the sound of someone who will try everything possible.
"The danger in letting it grow is that it can't grow too much or it will pick up enough power that I'll have no hope of holding onto it. There's a careful balance." Fortunately, Tris is good at judging that, at least when it comes to weather.
Jedao's face against her, his deep breaths of incredulous relief, are enough to prompt one of her still rare gestures of affection. Tris raises a hand to pet the back of his head in slow, soothing strokes.
How could she say anything but yes? Softly, she tells him, "Fives and I have led very different lives, but I do know what it felt like to be a child who was treated as an object rather than being valued by any adult in my life. I can't leave them to that and worse."
Sure you could, he thinks, even though he knows it would be - petty, uncharitable to say. But of course she could. Everyone has their own lives. Everyone he ever knew, before the barge, survived by being inured, on a very basic level, to the suffering of others. Himself, for all that he turns it hard sideways, very much not excepted.
She could, if she didn't want to be able to live with herself afterward. She knows that. Tris got into her foster family's hands just in time to prevent her becoming inured. It takes a lot to shock Tris, when it comes to cruelty, but it doesn't take much to make her care. Her teacher, her mothers, and her siblings shoved her back into caring.
"Nonsense," she says gruffly, hand still in his hair. "Don't you know how satisfying it is to do something as opposed to just being impotently angry or worried?"
"Oh, it's all mixed up for me. I spend so much time waiting and planning - and planning plans that get tossed out the minute they start, war being being what it is. And I never got to see much of it work. But I'll take your word for it."
He takes her tone as a hint to straighten, slowly, despite how much he always relishes touch.
Tris leaves her arm around Jedao's shoulders as he straightens rather than
letting go completely. "Rosethorn had a point when she said I'm happiest
picking up strays. My favorite successes, now that I think about it, have
been measured in adoptions. All the animals, of course, and I raised a
little girl for several years after her mother and foster mother were
murdered."
She doesn't quite laugh, but there's wry amusement in her voice when she
continues. "I can't very well adopt a million children, but if I can do
anything to get them into the hands of someone kinder, I will. You'd have
a hard time picking a cause I care about more."
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And that... is going to be a tough storm to control. Tris thinks back to the time she tried to stop the tides. At least she's learned something since then. "I'll need to know the area of the facility, then, and I'd like to practice with and without assistance from cold and warm fronts. Storms want to move, and to grow or shrink. Mages get killed when they try playing with forces of nature too big for them to handle."
Which absolutely does not mean that he's still short a weather witch. "I'll find a way. I won't risk all of their lives, and yours, and my own if I'm not relatively certain I can handle what you're asking."
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Well. It'll save him a little ammunition.
He turns, for a moment, presses his face against her shoulder, takes slow breaths. If this works, if this works - that's one more ace in his hand, one more piece of the puzzle. One more step to getting the vod'ike safe. And he knows the sound of someone who will try everything possible.
He isn't used to yes.
"Thank you, Tris-ye."
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Jedao's face against her, his deep breaths of incredulous relief, are enough to prompt one of her still rare gestures of affection. Tris raises a hand to pet the back of his head in slow, soothing strokes.
How could she say anything but yes? Softly, she tells him, "Fives and I have led very different lives, but I do know what it felt like to be a child who was treated as an object rather than being valued by any adult in my life. I can't leave them to that and worse."
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"You're a good girl, Tris."
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"Nonsense," she says gruffly, hand still in his hair. "Don't you know how satisfying it is to do something as opposed to just being impotently angry or worried?"
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He takes her tone as a hint to straighten, slowly, despite how much he always relishes touch.
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Tris leaves her arm around Jedao's shoulders as he straightens rather than letting go completely. "Rosethorn had a point when she said I'm happiest picking up strays. My favorite successes, now that I think about it, have been measured in adoptions. All the animals, of course, and I raised a little girl for several years after her mother and foster mother were murdered."
She doesn't quite laugh, but there's wry amusement in her voice when she continues. "I can't very well adopt a million children, but if I can do anything to get them into the hands of someone kinder, I will. You'd have a hard time picking a cause I care about more."
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Tris nods. She still struggles to ask for help, even after a decade with her foster family and over a year on the Barge.
"I wasn't either, once upon a time. The instinct never goes away, but I hope you have the opportunity to get used to it."