#runaan has been killing me softly since the day we met

[ask-ethari-anything]

How are you Ethari? I saw you running around with a lute yesterday and wonder...Who tought you how to play it? Did you made the imstrument yourself?..... And most important: Can you play a song for me? I'd be eager to hear you play!

I’m well, love! And so is my lute. My family loves music more than most. We’re an entire band, really. My father saw my interest in prettywork, which takes talented fingers especially if you’re only five, and started me on lute lessons. Now I can strum most anything from fine silver wire to lutes to the heartstrings of my favorite assassin. He has his dexterity and I have mine.

I’d be happy to play you a song! Let’s see... *fetches lute* How about this lovely tune? It’s called “Killing Me Softly,” and it’s hard to get more Moonshadow than that!

[ask-runaan-anything]

So…the cat is out of the bag!  A little shadowhawk has informed us that when you were first all smitten with Ethari, you were An Awkward Gay Disaster about it and just had SO MUCH TROUBLE with your weapons that resulted in you having to go back to him time and time again to get them “fixed.“  This is adorable and I need details.  What’s the most desperate move you pulled to end up back in his workshop?  Snap your own arrows?  Break your own bowstring?  Shatter your own knife?  Did anyone ever catch you?  Did anyone call you out because Ethari’s craftsmanship is so superb that it just made NO SENSE that his stuff “just kept happening” to break on you?  How did you end up finally confessing the truth and that you had a crush?  What’s your best story (stories?) about this?  We must know.  :)

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Little shadow, I have so many stories from this part of my life. And most of them are horribly embarrassing! Is it truly so amusing to ask me to relive those weeks of existential agony by retelling them? *sighs and smiles* It has been quite some time, though. And my affection was, in fact, returned. And I’ve been ridiculously happy with Ethari ever since. So, really, it’s just the first chapter in a long and beautiful story.

Very well. I will tell you some snippets from those days, if it truly pleases you to hear them. I do hope you’re comfortable, because this will take a while.

I hadn’t been living in the Silvergrove for very long before I realized that I’d caught feelings for Ethari. He was always so patient and capable, and the way he just hung on my every word, absorbing my very existence… it was intoxicating. I could barely think around him, and that was a new experience for me. I was absolutely a disaster. And I needed to be sure of him, sure that he felt like I did, and I do mean sure, before I said anything. Because some elves are just nice and helpful, and Ethari was definitely one of them, and I couldn’t just assume that he meant anything more by his attentiveness to me than to others, like Lain and Tiadrin. So the games, as they say, began.

I had to be very careful with my plan. I couldn’t be anywhere near as obvious as breaking arrows and bowstrings, no. I had to work my weapons into needing his help the hard way. And since I was new to the Silvergrove, it only made sense that I’d want to prove myself worthy to the other assassins. I trained so hard that I dulled and dented my swords on a wide variety of surfaces for which they were not intended. Rocks and other swords often, but not too many times in a row. I’d jam them into the ground at an angle and practice landing on the handle without falling off, which always bent them eventually. And I pushed everyone I sparred with, hoping for the odd bit of damage as well. It made all of us sharper, as it were. And it offered a far more legitimate sprinkling to my visits to my favorite craftsman.

It never hurt when I got to traipse into Ethari’s workshop with a bandaged arm or a cut on my cheek and explain that I’d just plain been sparring so hard because I was really good at what I was doing, very very dedicated and honorable, and now I desperately needed his help to continue my training, because my weapon had basically bent or chipped under the weight of my amazing prowess and could Ethari please very kindly take the tiniest moment to use his astonishingly accurate skills and set me right again, because I just can’t seem to be amazing without the work of his hands tenderly caring for my weapons.

Please understand, that was all subtext. What it really sounded like was this:

“Do you have a moment, Ethari?” I lingered at the doorway, waiting to be invited further in.

Ethari waved me closer with a welcoming hand. “Of course! How can I help you today?”

I approached him with my damaged sword held on my palms. “I… seem to have damaged my sword in practice today. An intense bout of sparring.” So he knew I didn’t do this every day, and that I had a perfectly logical reason for seeing him.

He kept his eyes on the sword. Very professional. “Oh yes? Let me take a look.”

His fingers always seemed to brush mine when he took my damaged weapon from me, and it always made me feel warm. But he never seemed to notice, even when his hands literally cupped mine and lifted the sword higher so he could study its damaged handle or blade more closely. Looking back, he knew exactly what he was doing to me when he’d touch me and pretend it was only for the job. I swear, I felt like a big, obvious, stammering mess most of the time. I can’t imagine how the whole village didn’t know how I felt about him. I really am a very good Moonshadow, though. All of my disaster chaos stayed on the inside. Most of the time.

At first, the repairs I needed would take some time, so I’d get to come back and see him the next day. But sometimes, the repair was quick, and he began to invite me to stay and watch. That let me hover over his shoulder, where I could admire him as he worked if I wanted to, without him catching me at it, and that opportunity nearly drove me to distraction. So I tried to damage my swords more lightly–dings and dents. And then he complimented me on improving! Ooh, he knew what he was doing there too. Ethari has such a light touch on me, in so many ways, and I’m shamelessly responsive to it, I admit.

Let me tell you, the day I finally caught him catching me staring at him nearly killed me. He has a little mirror that he uses to see customers come in behind him when he’s working. It sat on his work table the whole time I visited him. But I was so distracted by his shoulders, and his voice, and his hands, and did I mention those shoulders, that I didn’t really notice that he could see me staring at him instead of the work he was doing. He’d been fully aware of my gaze the whole time. Weeks and weeks. And he said nothing! He went still one day while he was retooling the pattern on my sword blade, and his sudden halt dragged me out of my admiring reverie. I jerked my eyes off his shoulders and they landed on the mirror, where our eyes met. And then there was no more hiding. He knew, and I knew he knew, and he knew I knew he knew. 

I nearly panicked. I’d been so careful, and everything we’d done had been perfectly professional and orderly, and no one could point to any one moment and call me out for it. I thought that my falling head over heels for this elf had happened in perfect solitude, with none the wiser. Except then Ethari noticed.

And he wasn’t even surprised. He already knew. I nearly left right then. I had an excuse on the tip of my tongue–something casual, something easy. Something I’d said a dozen times before for perfectly legitimate reasons. But somehow, I managed to understand that, yes, sure, he had known I was staring at him admiringly–and he had let me do it. He’d let me come round with my perfectly reasonable excuses again and again. He’d touched my hands and pretended he didn’t see how I liked it. He stood close and pretended it was just business. He’d invited me to stay with him for an hour or two as often as he could, and then he’d pretended that he didn’t notice any of my admiring looks after he stationed me right behind him, where he could keep an eye on me. Because he didn’t want me to know he knew. He wanted me to keep visiting him. 

Ethari’s all about eye contact. And when I stared into his sunset eyes that day in the mirror, I saw his heart. He smiled softly at me when he saw that I’d figured him out. He didn’t run, he wasn’t panicked. He knew his own heart and he accepted that for the truth it was. And that, that is what gave me the courage to reach out to him. Literally.

I rested a hand on his shoulder as I stood behind him at his work table, with my thumb pressing against his bare skin, and squeezed. hnggh so muscular And I told him, in a soft voice that was barely proclaimy at all, “Ethari, your work is beautiful.”

And he simply said, “You deserve my best, Runaan.” Then, very slowly, he reached back with his hand and took mine.

I couldn’t feel the floor. I could barely remember how to breathe. If you’ve ever had a deep love be requited, you vividly remember that first ethereal moment when you understand, believe, and truly trust that it’s being returned, that you are seen as more than just another ordinary person in your beloved’s life. We didn’t fall into each other’s arms and drown in passionate kisses–yet–but that moment in the mirror was the very first moment when we acknowledged each other’s hearts. 

He finished repairing my sword and handed it back with the same gentle precision he always used. And I thanked him for his dedication and skills, as I always did. And then we stood there, smiling at each other like a pair of total idiots. He reached up and tucked a stray wisp of hair behind my ear for me. And I nearly fainted. I blurted that we should talk soon, and when he asked me what about, I immediately decided that I needed a new and better weapon, and maybe he could help me with its design.

It was the best bullshitting I’ve ever done in my life, because I believed it myself. What I wouldn’t give for a weapon Ethari designed just for me! What a good way to have to spend lots of time with him! He was instantly excited by the idea, and we stammered our way through some plans to meet up outside the village and discuss it.

Those plans involved a picnic somehow. Ethari’s idea. He cooked everything himself. We rode together to a private glade with an ancient massive stump and a loud waterfall, which meant we had to sit close together to discuss this new weapon of mine. After a few hours of honest brainstorming, I called for a break and asked him if he wanted to see the understump ruins nearby. 

Understumps are like the basements of the Silvergrove. Large underground wooden rooms with several rooty hallways that connect them in a subterranean labyrinth, lined with glowing mushrooms for lighting. They’re usually for shadowy and secretive rites and meetings. But this one in the glade had been abandoned for centuries. And I wanted absolutely no prying eyes for this next part. Ethari readily agreed to join me, and we trekked down under the ground and deep beneath the ancient stump.

And there in that sacred silence, surrounded by soft glowing mushrooms and no one but the peaceful hush of Moonshadows long past, I took Ethari’s hands in mine and spoke one of the scariest truths I’ve ever uttered: “Ethari, I’m in love with you.”

When he replied, “I’m in love with you too, Runaan,” I nearly felt my soul ascend. I slid my fingers up along one of his arms, and he slid his up my other arm, and we pulled each other close and held each other. He smelled amazing, and he was soft and strong at the same time, and so very warm. That was the very first hug I got from Ethari. His arms were even more comforting than I thought they’d be. It took me several moments to get my breathing under control, I was so overwhelmed by this beautiful truth about this beautiful elf. 

You can be as certain as you wish about anything, but until you actually hear and feel the truth you believe in, there’s always that tiny doubt that you’re just completely wrong. And in that moment, I knew: I wasn’t wrong. Ethari loved me just as much as I loved him. Having his warm, strong arms around me, finally, after all that time, felt…

It felt like coming home.

When I finally lifted my head from his shoulder and met his eyes–and his eyes are glorious up close, you have no idea–I lost all my breath all over again. I’d never stood that close to him before. He filled every one of my senses with euphoria. Well. almost every one of them–

“Can I kiss you now?” he murmured. “I’ve been waiting so long to do it.”

I managed a rather delirious gasp before his lips claimed mine. Ethari’s kisses are just as soft, warm, and strong as the rest of him, and by the end of that first kiss–not my very first kiss, but my first kiss where anything meant anything–he had to hold on tight so I didn’t fall over. It’s a good thing he’s so strong.

We left the grove holding hands, we started dating, he gifted me my bowblade, we got married, and the rest, as they say, is history.