TBTT later: Presented for consideration

[moonshadows]

 “…saw you at that formal event. Shameful. Women hanging all over you like dogs in heat.” Evie crosses her arms and scowls at him.

He scowls right back. “You think I want them throwing themselves at me?” Taloned hands clench. “Where I come from, girls are more demure.” Tyrande! his mind cries, longing and despair flooding him.

As he falls abruptly silent, the other four exchange worried glances. Tessa touches the back of his hand lightly, and in a heartbeat he has pulled her against his chest and is holding her tight, trembling in a way that says he would cry if he had eyes.

I’m sorry, he whispers silently to her, and then the flood of emotion is walled away with grim efficiency. She tries to think of something to distract him with, but her grandmother beats her to it.

“Well, you may be a world-conquering bully, but at least you won’t take any of those women to bed and be a degenerate lecher.” Hands on her hips, she sniffs disdainfully. “Got enough scandal with the killings, don’t need any from sleeping with a loosey goosey.”

His lips twist into a dry grin. “My Minister of State is quite capable of generating enough scandal in that area to make up for my lack.”

==================================

Once the door to her rooms has closed behind them, he grabs her wrist but does not pull her into his arms. She looks curiously over her shoulder at him, and he frowns.

“You never mentioned how Nathrezim conduct their affairs,” he says somewhat accusingly.

“I didn’t want you to think I was trying to make a move on you,” she replies calmly.

“But you wanted to.”

Her darkening cheeks are answer enough, but she raises her chin defiantly. “I am your Champion. Nothing else matters as long as you let me serve you. I was born to do that.” Her eyes drop. “I told you a year and a half ago that I’d do anything for you, and I meant that. I just want to serve you any way I can. I don’t want you to feel pressured by how I feel.”

In other words, he thinks, she’s as hopelessly lovesick as I am. Guilt and compassion batter him; he knows all too well what it’s like to have the one he loves be in love with another, and although they don’t talk often about his life before Outland, she knows how he feels towards Tyrande. He never could hide that. Grimly, he stalks to the couch with her in tow, sits, and pulls her down next to him. She sits demurely, hands in her lap, and he frowns. No, this will never do. Does she think things have somehow changed just because she knows that he knows how she feels? His arm goes around her and a forceful tug causes her to squeak and fall against him. After a moment, she nestles up against him as she has done for the last year and a half, and his frown relaxes.

“Tell me how the Nathrezim court,” he commands, tone reflecting his authority, using her obedience to overcome her reluctance.

“Nathrezim are very conscious of status,” she says crisply, but her fingers tight around his arm belie her calm tone. “A pairing will almost always be between two of different social rank.”

That surprises him. “Why?”

“The supplicant joins the benefactor’s household and rank if they are judged worthy,” she says. “The supplicant has everything to gain, every reason to be loyal and true. If a supplicant is too close to the benefactor’s rank, they are more likely to be spying than actually interested.”

“I see. And what was your rank?”

“I was my father’s heir. Still am, unless the courts decided otherwise. He was entrusted with the Lich King and the conquering of Azeroth – pretty high up. Enough that his useless half-breed child got into the best school, anyway.”

He frowns. “It sounds as if your family is dreadlord nobility.”

“Pretty much. All my father’s siblings are the benefactor in their pairings.”

The sting of being a lowborn orphan aches. “How would Nathrezim society rank a half-breed such as I am, with no dreadlord parent to inherit rank from?”

Her fingers tighten. “If you ever went to Nathrezene, you’d have half a dozen supplicants before you could walk ten feet.”

“What?” He looks at her in shock, unsurprised by the longing on her face.

“You’re famous, Kal’shan. You’re glorious and powerful and handsome and lots of girls fantasize about you.” The blush on her cheeks says she was one of those. “My family’s pretty high up, but you out-rank me.”

“Even though I’m a…”

She shakes her head. “You’re strong. You not only held Tichondrius’s position, but you carved out your own territory in Outland. I can’t even hold my father’s position against my cousins. The fact that I’m a half-breed just makes my weakness more pathetic, but it makes your strength more amazing.” Her eyes drop. “I can’t even hold my father’s position against my cousins. I only have rank because I ran away before I could be challenged, and lose. If I ever went back, one of my cousins would take my father’s position and then I’d be at the bottom of the social ladder, no position and no rank and no prospects for a benefactor, because who’d want a useless half-breed like me?”

“No,” he says harshly. “You will always have the position of being my Champion.” At her astonished, ecstatic gratitude, he gentles his voice. “Is that why you were so afraid that I would reject you?”

“You’re famous and amazing, and I’m nothing. If we were on Nathrezene, someone like you would never even look at someone like me.”

I doubt that, a corner of his mind whispers, and idly he strikes the whisper down.

“Serving you is more important to me than anything else,” she continues. “I don’t want to risk that for anything.”

She’s telling the truth. Not that he expected her to lie, but he didn’t think her devotion to him was that…total. “And so, you did not mention the courting rituals of your people because you did not want to seem…I see.” He strokes her horns lightly, soothing away her anxiety. “Your acts could have been construed as courting, and you did not intend them that way. Tell me how such things are done among the Nathrezim.”

He listens to her quiet explanation, coaxing the words from her with the motion of his fingers when she hesitates. The supplicant presenting his or herself for consideration, the benefactor accepting the supplicant. The long, slow process of serving the benefactor, growing closer over months and years through proving reliability, slowly gaining in trust and responsibility, orbiting closer and closer until one day, the benefactor decides that he or she does not wish to ever be without the services of a particular supplicant, and takes that one as his or her bonded mate. Yes, he can certainly see where her devotion could be mistaken for courtship. Guilt gnaws at him as he remembers a day in the gym, over a year and a half ago, when he realized that her survival was essential to his own. That he absolutely could not do without her at his side. She may not have meant to submit herself as a supplicant, but wasn’t that essentially what had happened anyway? When he allowed her to serve him even knowing how she felt, hadn’t he effectively accepted her for consideration? The battered blade of his honor twists uncomfortably inside him. He was using her, leading her on with no hope of reward. As much as he could tell himself that he was still unstable and had no way of knowing how he would feel once he was whole, the fact remained that he had been taking her loyal service and not giving her anything in return.

“Why did you not present yourself for my consideration?” he demands coldly, furious with himself and trying to keep that heat from burning her. “Since you are effectively serving as my supplicant, and Nathrezim courtship moves slowly enough to place no real pressure on me, and I am apparently so-“ he voice falters “-desirable a benefactor.”

“If I did, and you ever decided that another was worthy where I was not, I wouldn’t be able to serve you anymore,” she whispers.

Guilt at having taken advantage of her for so long stabs deeply, and he holds her tight. “Jentessa, my Champion, I swear to you that even if I should ever judge another worthy instead of you, you will always have a place at my side serving me.”

“Oh! Oh, Illidan…”

The words are hardly more than a breath against his chest, but the wonder in them makes his stomach flip-flop the way only Tyrande’s smile ever had. No, she did not miss his implication that she has been accepted as his supplicant. It doesn’t change anything – he doubts he will ever make a good husband for anyone, and Nathrezim courtship typically takes years anyway – except that he has promised her a position with him no matter what, and possibly…once she has freed him from his hate and pain…well, he has no desire to do without her now, so will he feel much differently about it when he is stable once again? Wasn’t her devotion the light that pulled him out of the dark vortex of despair that threatened to swallow him when he realized that Tyrande-

He shudders, the thought cut off before the pain can rip him open again. Yes – he made a silent promise that day, even if it was one that he cannot utter even to himself. Perhaps, when he is whole and she is not a child, if she still wants him…

As unworthy as he feels himself to be, the idea of his Champion smiling at another man – no. Unfair it most certainly is, but he is filled with the desire to ensure that he holds her heart in his monstrous, demonic hands even though he will not be acting on it in the foreseeable future. Before he can stop himself, he has her face gently between his palms and her lips are soft beneath his. The fire wakes, fury and burning need such as he hasn’t felt since he left the darkness of his prison, and he pulls himself away before he can inflict any of it on her undeserving flesh. She doesn’t notice his struggle for control over his dark impulses, dazed as she is, and he smiles in cruel satisfaction.

Oh yes, my Champion, I’m making a promise – I promise that you will never belong to anyone but me.