In Passing

"Nothing... is worse than what I feel right now," I whispered, knowing there were tears in my eyes but not even trying to wipe them away.

I felt like an ass too. What kind of brother was I? "Come back to the tent with me and we'll try to rest."

I nodded and pushed myself up off the tree, wiping my mouth, then followed him. I knew there wasn't going to be any rest for me tonight though.

We got back to the tent, neither of us saying anything and started to bed down. What the fuck were we going to do about this?

I sat down on my sleeping bag and put my head in my hands. How the fuck was I ever going to tell Sem? But I couldn't keep it from her. I was going to lose her... I knew I was. There were no ifs, ands, or buts about it. She'd leave me as soon as I told her. 

We'd traveled for the rest of the day and were settling down for the night. We lined the carts up then started setting up the tents. I took my time. I knew exactly where I had to be as soon as I was done.



I reached out through the bars, barely able to reach Preston's face. "How are you doing?" I asked quietly. 

"Don't worry about me, how are you and the kids?"

"We're fine baby, I promise. They're sleeping. It took awhile, but I finally got Aiden to go down. He... he doesn't understand what's happening." 

"I imagine most of them don't. They've been treating you all good, right? You'd tell me if they weren't."

"We're in a cage Preston. But they're feeding us and letting us out to use the bathroom, if that's what you mean. What about you, how are they treating you?"

"I just wanted to make sure they weren't being total dicks to any of you. It's about the same for us but I don't know how long it'll last once we get back."

"I know. Neither do I," I said quietly. "They're not being mean or anything. They don't really talk to us at all, to be honest," I said as I saw movement from one of the tents and turned my head to see who it was.

I followed Katy's line of vision and saw Brendan leaving his tent and going into another one. "Do you know who's that is?" I asked.

"Some woman. She's always with Tywin during the day. I don't know who she is though." 

Well, there was only one reason I could think of as to why a guy would visit a woman in the middle of the night while everyone else was asleep. I didn't say what I was thinking but Katy isn't stupid. "Her name is Alexis."

I didn't say anything for the longest time. "He... he's married," I said quietly, stating the blatant obvious in my shock. What in the world could possess him...

"Yeah...and her brother is around here somewhere."

"Yeah he is. Right there actually," I said, watching Dom come out of the tent. "He has to know something's going on. They're sharing a tent." 

"I don't know, Katy. I mean, it really isn't like Brendan to do something like that."

"I know, but... why else would he be going in there?" 

"No idea. Maybe it's just work related since she's his commanding officer."

"If it's work related, I doubt he'd be the only one going in there."

"We don't know that, though. Just ask him the next time he comes to see you before jumping to conclusions too soon."

"I'm not jumping to conclusions. I'm definitely going to ask him about it though." 

"I can't blame you there, honestly."