wrongkindofsith | Room 418, Wednesday Night After Radio

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Room 418, Wednesday Night After Radio

Instead of her usual post-radio bed-flop (talking that much was draining, all right?), Cara was pacing, fingers drumming restlessly against her thighs.

She mightn't have worn a hole in the carpet yet, but given the tension in her shoulders it was only a matter of time.

[Expecting one.]

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Okay, even Clark could admit that was weird. "So why do you hold it?"

"Because I'm Mord'Sith." It was as simple and complicated as that. "I've been trained to have the strength and endurance to wield it."

There was some thinking involved prior to Clark's response. "Then, you mean you don't feel the pain anymore? I'm sorry, Cara, I don't get what this has to do with you not thinking you're a good person."

It took all of Cara's self-control not to face-palm. Instead she moved to straddle his lap, hoping the proximity would help get the point across. "I feel the pain, every second of it. There's only one time I've only ever felt anything worse." And she was most definitely not going to talk to Clark about that. "Mord'Sith training enables us withstand the pain, embrace it, it makes us strong. Understanding pain enables us to serve the Lord Rahl the way we do."

Clark welcomed the closeness, if only because it meant she wasn't going to leave before he could understand what she was talking about. "Okay. So pain is not painful to you but it helps you do your job?"

That was close enough. "Yes. Knowing how to use it, to cause it."

"So you hurt people for a living?" This was the part where Clark started hoping he was understanding her wrong.

Cara licked her lips before continuing."The Mord'Sith serve the Lord Rahl in many ways." Any way the Lord Rahl wanted. "But amongst our duties, we're his torturers."

There, she'd said it.

Clark stared for a moment, not really believing what he was hearing. "And your friends, do they torture people, too?"

And it wasn't like Clark had even heard the worst of it. "No. Richard and Kahlan, they're not like me."

"Okay." Clark was processing.

Slowly.

"Have you tortured anyone here?"

"No." Though Cara didn't really see how where she'd tortured people was relevant. "There'd be no point to it, and Richard doesn't like the idea of torture."

"And Richard is the Lord Rahl, right?" Clark verified. If the man she served didn't like torture, Clark was failing to see the problem again.

"Richard is the true Lord Rahl." And any time he wanted to hurry up and actually claim his throne would be fine by Cara. "He has my loyalty. But he didn't know this until last year, and Darken Rahl... didn't share his views."

To put things lightly.

Okay, so she'd done a lot of bad things in the past. Clark reached out to try and take hold of her hand. "Cara, listen. No one's perfect. But I'm not going to judge you by what you did in the past. You get to decide who you are now." Johnathan would be so proud.

Cara gripped his hand hard enough her knuckles turned white. "I don't understand." She was not crying. Clearly there was some other reason her face was suddenly damp. "I'd understand if you never wanted anything to do with me, but not why any of you keep doing this."

The hand she wasn't trying in vain to break reached to wipe away the tears he'd never expected from her. "Your expectations for me are maybe too low," Clark suggested. "Sure, I've run from my problems before, but I learned from it."

That's because Cara was usually very good at repressing them, the same way she was very firmly pushing away the memory of the last time someone wiped her tears. "What could be so bad that you'd run from it?"

"You might not consider it so bad," Clark admitted, still ashamed of how he'd acted. Cara deserved to hear his little story, especially if it would help her understand why he wasn't running now. "You remember how I'm an alien? Well, the ship that brought me to Earth years ago started freaking out and sending me a message. I tried to resist, but my birth father burned this symbol into my chest and I thought the only way to make it all stop was to destroy the ship. Turns out, the explosion reached my parents and uh, my mom miscarried the baby they'd always wanted." He'd been able to tell the story pretty calmly until the last part when he had to look away. "It wasn't the first time some part of me had hurt them, so I ran off, thinking they were better without me around destroying their lives."

"But that sounds like it was an accident." Cara really had no idea what to say, especially without Kahlan or Richard around to prompt, but it was still easier than talking about herself. "You never hurt your family deliberately. Never chose to."

Jonathan probably would've pointed out how badly words can hurt beyond the physical pain. Clark was not so bright. "No, I guess not. Have you?"

Cara tensed and looked at a point just beyond Clark's shoulder. "Yes."

Clark didn't know if he should push or not, but if he was going to, now seemed to be the time. "What happened?"

"I killed my father." Considering the last time she'd told someone that it had been her sister, Cara thought it should have been easier this time.

If anything it was harder.

"On purpose?" Clark gulped, his eyes showing how much he didn't want to believe that.

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