There, and Back Again - Chapter 14

[schrodingers_time_lady]

Title: There, and Back Again - Chapter 14
Fandom: Doctor Who
Character(s): Rodageitmososa (OC), Perigraphaltas (OC), Rassilon (Pre-Canon)
Previous Chapter: Chapter 13
Next Chapter: Chapter 15
Synopsis: Growing into a Time Lady is hard enough, but growing up as the Lord President's ward is even harder. Especially when it seems as though all of Gallifrey and strangers alike want to tell you how to live your life and who you're going to become.
Cross-posts: AO3
A/N: In which the plan is finally revealed - not least of all to me, who had been dithering between two possible ideas and finally decided to go with the one that Roda would dislike the most ;) Hey, I have a reputation for annoying my characters to upkeep...

“I've always longed for adventure,
To do the things I've never dared.
Now here I'm facing adventure
Then why am I so scared?”
- “I Have Confidence”, The Sound of Music

---
 

Nine years later...

Roda had never been inside the Panopticon before.

She felt somehow… underdressed. Or improperly dressed. Or as though she wanted to be dressed as unlike the way that was expected of her inside the chamber as possible. It wasn’t a sensation she could put a finger on, and she couldn’t help but squirm as she paced around the room outside and tried to figure out why she had been told to meet Rassilon here.

He had summoned her to various meeting places before, of course. On occasion he had even asked her to meet him outside the building, to deliver some item or another from his chambers to him when his political duties ran longer than he expected. When she had been younger, Roda had wanted to see this deep inside the building - knowing full well that the more she asked, the less likely it was Raz would invite her inside - but since the ordeal years ago playing Eighth Man Bound… it didn’t make sense, really, but her mind had changed. After that day, whenever she had passed the council buildings she had just felt a sense of unease. Danger. As if something terrible had happened there, or would happen there, and that she could feel it in her gut. She had unconsciously changed her route home from the Academy, hoping to avoid getting too close by. It was only years later, grilled by a confused Peri, that she had even realized she was doing it. Some part of her clearly knew something that the rest of her did not, and so pressed for an answer she had been unable to give one. Stepping into the waiting room now - surrounded by statues of the Chapter founders - she simply couldn’t fight the feeling that she was not supposed to be there.

It was a stupid feeling. After all, it was where graduation ceremonies were held. She was as welcome inside as any other Time Lord or Lady was, and she had done nothing wrong. Really, she would have to get over her discomfort sooner rather than later, and she couldn’t help but chastise herself for being anxious about a building, in the grand scheme of things. There was much more to be stressed about.

She distracted herself by trying to remember the names of the statuesque faces surrounding her. After all, she thought to herself, they’re probably going to come up in Advanced Gallifreyan History. Each Chapter had been tasked with building one of the statues, she remembered, and the end result was a motley collection of designs that had all (naturally) tried to outdo one another. They towered far taller than any Gallifreyan, their faces shrouded in shadow. Quietly observing.

The easiest two to recognize were the Prydonian and Arcalian contributions; Rassilon and Omega respectively. Rassilon’s statue somehow managed to look just as much as though it had a staff up its arse as the real person did, albeit in fancier clothing. An older regeneration, too, but Roda could still tell it was him. It had that certain air of self-importance to it, not to mention his gauntlet and staff. Omega’s statue, on the other hand, gave Roda the unsettling suggestion that he was thinking about something. Like he was still alive, trapped inside the statue as opposed to having paid the ultimate sacrifice for the life that they lived. It was uncanny, and she wouldn't have been surprised to hear that there were others who felt the same way she did. As she walked, the eyes seemed to follow her, and she looked away with a guilt she couldn’t quite place.

Standing beside Omega was Pandak; the creator of the Oubliette of Eternity. Roda didn’t want to think too much about him, the Oubliette or the Neverpeople. Though the statue remained, it was a relief to know he was imprisoned. She didn’t quite remember what for but reading about the Oubliette gave her the creeps. She sped up as she passed him, and stopped in front of a statue she assumed was The Other. It had the least detail - nothing about her face stood out - but for a scroll clasped in one extended hand. They had been taught at school that she had inspired Rassilon to create the Protocols of the Great Houses, but Roda had always been more interested in the theory she’d once read that she'd had a hand in the creation of the first Type 1 TARDIS. She looked like a thoughtful person. Someone she would have loved to talk to. Someone who would give interesting advice.

The other two statues she could only guess at. The one with the boots that looked as though they could take an eye out was probably Apeiron, she decided. Which meant that the particularly ostentatious final statue was Eutenoyar. Despite her unease, Roda couldn’t help but smirk. The Scendelesions had almost bankrupted themselves building that one; and it was by far the ugliest. All gilded and drowning in ostentation.

“Aesthetic is in the eye of the beholder.”

Roda had honed the ability not to jump when Rassilon managed to come up behind her unannounced, but his invasion of her surface thoughts still made her twitch. Careful not to let him see the irritation on her face she turned to face him as he came down the stairs behind her, tapping his staff on each step. (She tried not to think too hard about the fact that it seemed he had started doing that after startling her, on purpose. To make a point that she wasn't paying attention, no doubt. How much of his behaviour was him being an arsehole and how much was just her being paranoid was - at times - difficult to decide.)

“Perhaps,” she replied, as calmly as she could manage. Semi-diplomatic. “But wouldn’t you say adding a couple extra inches and some decorative chiseled bits is just... overcompensating for something?”

A laugh almost, but not quite, graced Rassilon’s face. Roda relished that brief reminder of an easier relationship. When he had been glad of her questions, or at least encouraged them.

“I would not say so,” Rassilon announced. After a pause, his expression softened and he added: “It would be diplomatically miscalculated, to say the least.”

“Well I wouldn’t say it to a Scendelesion’s face,” Roda said, quietly, rolling her eyes. Rassilon gave a disapproving sigh, which Roda ignored as she dipped her head in a more polite greeting. “Anyway. You wanted to meet me here, Raz- Lord Rassilon?”

Damned stranger. She’d been slipping up and thinking of him as Raz ever since that first meeting; it was going to get her into trouble eventually. But he hadn’t seemed to have notice.

“I did.”

Rassilon stopped beside the statue of Omega for a second - just long enough for Roda to see him touch one hand to its arm - before making for the Panopticon doors. The gesture was oddly gentle, and for a moment her frustration melted away. She supposed they had been friends, once upon a time. It must have been hard to see his face every time he entered the building. The reaction made him seem less like a President in a way that Roda hadn’t seen in a very, very long time.

“Come, Rodageitmososa.” The moment passed quickly, but his tone was surprisingly casual despite the summons. Roda raised an eyebrow. “Tell me something about Eutenoyar other than the slant of his nose while we walk.”

With a sigh, Roda dutifully wracked her brain for some fact. Rassilon had been randomly quizzing her on what she had learned at the Academy for the past year; it might have been paternal, had every question not felt like a personal review of two hundred and ninety years of acquaintance. While the surprise quizzes from Peri were a kindness, Rassilon’s timing usually felt more like an imposition. But she spoke about the Founder while she followed Rassilon, ignoring how her discomfort only grew as she got closer to the heavy domed door. Nerves, she told herself. It’s probably just nerves. But if she was forced to admit it, the impromptu study sessions weren’t entirely unhelpful. Peri helped her with science; Rassilon focused on law and history; Bren and Odell knew plenty about the flora and fauna of the planet. The rest she didn’t have trouble with and she supposed she was at least lucky to have people almost more invested in her passing her exams than she was. And right now, it was taking her mind off things.

The stairs up to the Panopticon seemed to go on forever. Certainly too long for Roda to keep on talking about a founder about whom there was little more to know than ‘there have been some cults’ and ‘Rassilon has confirmed his nose really was that big’. (Not that she said that last piece of information in quite so candid words.) Her mouth felt dry, and she still didn’t understand why he wanted to meet with her here, and not just talk at their quarters. She didn’t think it was a day that the council was in session. Was there something he wanted to show her, a field trip of sorts to study for her exams? Or was she to meet someone? As usual, he was inconceivably vague.

Rassilon’s body shielded her view of what he did with the doors as she reached the top of the steps. He made a rough noise that might have been ‘very good’ in response to her thoughts on Eutenoyar, and then the doors went clunk and opened inwards. Rassilon shifted to face her, waving her into the Panopticon ahead of him with a sweep of his staff. Swallowing any sign of uncertainty, Roda lifted her head and did as she was bade, stepping into the kaleidoscope of teal light and looking around in astonishment.

She had known that the interior of the Panopticon was dimensionally transcendental, like TARDISes, but that knowledge had not prepared her for the sheer scale of the room she now stood in. The door thumped shut behind her, and Rassilon rested one hand on her shoulder.

“It is an impressive feat of architecture, is it not?” Roda could only nod silently. “The result of decades of work, and the seat of Time Lord power.” Patting her shoulder he stepped around Roda into the dark room, waving his hand at something that apparently turned up the lights. Roda craned her neck upwards, and found that she couldn’t even see the ceiling. We’re those… clouds? “Since the cessation of the Dark Ages it is here that our people have created laws, passed judgement and shaped the universe itself.”

It was a grand room. There was no denying that. The six-sided opening chamber was made of a translucent turquoise material that Roda didn’t recognize, and was beautifully catching the light of the sunny day outside. But for some reason, it felt like the kind of beauty you found on a toxic animal, warning her to stay away. The glow thrummed around her as though the room itself was passing judgement, and Roda felt her hearts race with a strange exhilaration. The walls and carvings  were all sharp angles that she would have sworn could draw blood if she accidentally touched them. They glinted as she passed, closing in on her despite the scale of the room.

“Why are we here?”

At first, Rassilon didn’t seem to have heard her. His mind was evidently elsewhere, and Roda noticed he was stroking his jaw thoughtfully as he studied the chamber. Her eyes narrowed with suspicion; that look usually meant that he was up to something. Or about to do something that he - if no one else (namely, Roda) - was convinced was a very wise idea. Or maybe the room was just making her nervous, again.

“Your dedication to your studies in the last decades has been commendable,” said Rassilon finally, clasping his staff with both hands as he faced her again. It clicked against the floor like the claws of an unseen beast. “Most of your Professors have reported an increase in your attentiveness as of late,” Roda took that to mean ‘except Borusa’, “and I am not unaware that Perigraphaltas has continued to be a good influence on your sense of discipline.”

“Uh…” Roda pulled an unsure face, caught between pride and confusion. “Thanks?”

“I also know that you have taken my advice to keep your temper in check to hearts, and there have been no more… incidents.”

No more fights with Selesion or trips to the badlands, he meant, and no more trips to the Library roof. That he knew of, anyway.

“I’ve been busy…”

“You have been focused,” Rassilon corrected her, with vigour. “As I said you could be, were you only to accept responsibility for your position and apply yourself.”

‘I still fail to see why I should prove that to you’ seemed like the wrong thing to say and so instead, Roda looked Rassilon in the eye, maintaining the shields on her mind as best she could. She clasped her hands behind her back, searching for the right answer to give.

“I intend to pass the remainder of my exams the first time around.”

“As I am sure you shall. Though I will admit, for a time I had my doubts.” Rassilon laughed, not sharing whatever his joke was with his ward. Roda resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “Regardless, you have proven me wrong and I am a man of my word. I have great plans for you, Rodageitmososa, and your drive to correct your… flaws,” Roda pursed her lips, “has shown me that you can be trusted to achieve them.”

Three thoughts came to Roda at once; none of them entirely reassuring. First, that Rassilon was still determined that she follow the path he had decided for her. There had been a time that she would have leapt at the chance to finally have it explained to her, and to live up to his expectations and do him proud. To feel important, and irreplaceable. That time had long since passed. All she wanted to be was the person she decided upon, and after their talk years ago she had assumed that he would never deem her worthy and she would get that wish.

Second, that there was nothing her guardian did just for the Skaro of it. And so his decision to finally let her in on his great, ineffable secret inside the Panopticon was probably relevant.

What that meant fed into the final illuminating realization; he wanted her to remain on Gallifrey. Perhaps for the rest of her lives.

“With respect, Lord Rassilon…” Roda began, choosing her words carefully. She saw his lips tighten, and concern briefly flash across his eyes. No, not concern; suspicion. He knew that she rarely called him Lord anymore, unless she wanted something or was hiding something. “Last time we spoke about…” she waved a hand, only faintly aware that she had mirrored his own gesture, “this, you told me that I was unsuitable. I don't think I've changed.”

“And yet as I challenged you to do so,” said Rassilon triumphantly, closing the distance between them with a flame in his eyes, “you have undone both of our expectations. Humility is noble, but taking pride in your achievements is also natural. Which is why I have decided to include you in my designs now, so that you may prepare yourself for them and be proud of who and what you are.” Before he continued Rassilon began to stride deeper into the Panopticon. Gathering her thoughts, Roda jogged to catch up with him. “You are aware, of course, that your mother held a position in the Council?”

She nodded, recognizing a lost cause when she saw one. There was no sense in trying to argue with him now. Later, if she was lucky. And foolish.

“You’ve mentioned it. My father did, too.” It seemed like a good idea not to bring up the fact that the last people who had told her about her mother had been Odell and Sax. She didn’t trust herself not to make life difficult for them if she mentioned them by name, and if Rassilon sensed there was something he hadn’t been told - or worked out that they weren’t Time Lords. “She reached her final regeneration before I was loomed, though, and died before... before my father did. I don’t remember her.”

“It was regretful that she was not able to raise you. And that she did not decide to have a child when she was younger. She was an inspired and disciplined Time Lady - even Lord Borusa respected her.”

Roda’s jaw dropped. “Borusa liked my mother?” Now that Rassilon brought it up, his digs were always at her father’s expense. For all that she was apparently liked and respected, people rarely spoke of her mother. Probably because I’m apparently nothing like her. “Huh.”

“Indeed. She was a shrewd diplomat, and pleasant to work with. Both capable of listening and obeying, and strong-willed enough to raise her voice when the need called for it.” He smirked. “Which is more than can be said for certain other Council members.”

Rassilon came to a halt in front of a pair of short, branching corridors; one, Roda knew, must lead to the courtroom while another presumably led to the chamber where the Council met. The Lord President gestured down the latter with his staff, bidding Roda to go ahead of him once again.

“Why are you telling me all this?” asked Roda, unsure if she wanted to know the answer.

“Is it not obvious yet, Rodageitmososa?”

Roda stopped in front of the chamber doors, raising an eyebrow as Rassilon keyed something into a panel on the wall once again. The door slid to the side with a pneumatic hiss, and the lights flickered on to illuminate a heavy, hexagonal table in the centre of a pristine room. Roda stepped over the threshold obediently, taking it in. Like the last room, it too was cool and teal, but without the high ceiling or the glass roof it seemed smaller, more claustrophobic. High-backed chairs sat around the table, with bleacher-like seats against the wall that the door was on, towering over them both. Opposite the door, on the far side of the table, was a larger chair that she immediately guessed had to be Rassilon’s. But as he stepped past her, smoothing back his hair and getting straight to business, it wasn’t his chair that he stopped at. Instead, he stood behind another, hands on the back of it, with a pleased look on his face. 

Roda knew what he was about to say a second before he said it. Clarity hit her like a brick to the face, and her blood ran cold. No. No way. She had studied as hard as she had - kept her mouth shut in the face of Selesion and Borusa and even Rassilon - on the promise that she would get to leave one day. See the universe, find Robin Hood, and live her own life. For years, she had begged for this guidance and a sense of purpose and now that she was being trusted with it it was stale in her mouth. This was not what she wanted. It hadn’t been what she wanted, not for a long time.

She froze up, reading the circular carving in the wood.

“Dahlesquintelias…”

Roda whispered the name under her breath, followed by a quiet, impassioned curse.

Rassilon was either oblivious, or did not care. With a broad smile, he drew back the chair and featured for Roda to sit.

“I intend for you to take her seat.”

***

“He did what?!”

Roda lifted her head from her hand to shoot Peri a withering glare, at a loss as to how he could possibly smile at the news. Tearing into a piece of fruit like a woman possessed, she shook her head in disbelief and did her best not to raise her voice. 

Much.

“He wants me to be on the Council?! Me!” Roda wiped the purple juice from her mouth with the back of her hand, still as shocked as Peri was excited. “Roda-‘wilful and disobedient and an endangerment to herself’-geitmososa? What is he thinking?!”

Peri stared across the table at Roda, disbelief evident on his face. Between them sat what would have been a mouthwatering platter of fruit and pastries and juice, under better circumstances. Roda was eating - and eating practically enough for both of them - half out of frustration and stress and half out of a desperate and unsuccessful attempt to have a normal day after the bomb that a Rassilon had dropped on her the afternoon before. She hadn’t wanted to miss the brunch with Peri - it was one of the few days he’d had off in a while, and though Bren had helped her work through her feelings, she still missed hanging out with him - but her mind was elsewhere. She had barely made it to the table before blurting out the news… but she hadn’t expected his response to be so positive.

“But this is…” Peri ran a hand through his hair, eyes still wide with astonishment. The food he had piled onto his plate was completely ignored, but he was still holding his fork, jabbing thoughtfully at the air. “Roda, don’t you realize how brilliant an opportunity this is? Think of what you could achieve with a seat on the Council - and straight out of the Academy! In your first life!”

Roda wrinkled her nose, a hundred arguments ready to go. She hadn’t been able to say any of them to Rassilon yesterday; instead she had stood numbly in the doorway until he had bade her to sit, and sat in silence as he had detailed his expectations for her. To Rassilon, the gift of a seat was a great honour, a favour that he was doing for her and Roda supposed that if pressed, she could see that it was. But how could he possibly have believed that it was the right path for her to follow? And how could he possibly believe that she would be happy about it? But the tafelshrew had got her tongue, and she hadn’t said any of that to him when she had the chance. And now, if she told him that she didn’t want any of it then she would just start a fight - one that they might not be able to recover from. 

Trapped. That’s what she was.

She had thought that Peri of all people - who knew her better than anyone else on Gallifrey - would understand. But she had forgotten that he was a better Time Lord than she could ever be. He relished the responsibilities that had been drilled into them since they were Tots, and when he had been told the path his life was to take he had nodded and smiled and been genuinely grateful. To him, it meant being accepted into and creating their society… but he hadn’t met the shobogans. He hadn’t been lied to. Instead, he had been raised by two mothers who had watched him grow and known his interests and ensured that the direction they turned him in was one that he could thrive in. Roda, on the other hand, was left wondering if any of Rassilon’s kindness had ever been genuine, or if it was all just a ploy to put his pawn in the Council from the day he had learned about her.

“I don’t want to achieve anything!” It wasn’t quite true, but Roda couldn’t quite think, either. She didn’t want to achieve those sorts of things. The Time Lady stuffed another piece of fruit in her mouth, chewing furiously while she searched for the right words. When had Peri stopped knowing what she said before she said it? “I mean, I do but the Council is out-dated and- and stifling. Selesion’s father has a seat, for Omega’s sake! I’ll have to deal with that rat-weasel. And Rassilon thinks I’ll sit and debate with the rest of them, and smile and nod and fall into line and he’s wrong. I’ll hate it. I already hate it. The system is broken, Peri, I can’t be a part of it.”

Once she started talking, the words didn’t stop. Years of built-up resentment poured out of her mouth like a raging waterfall. Sensing - at last - that she was beginning to properly lose her temper, Peri put down his fork and reached over the table to clasp the back of her hand. In a way that once upon a time had been soothing, he stroked it with his thumb, smiling cluelessly.

“Don’t you see, though?” It was the voice that he reserved for his patients. Calm, clinical, knowing. Roda narrowed her eyes, picking up on the same subtle ways that Rassilon would so often talk to her. As though he needed to speak slowly and clearly to keep her calm, or because she was stupid. She knew Peri didn’t mean it… not really. But was he just becoming another Time Lord, as opposed to her closest and oldest friend? “Your hearts are more than in the right place, Roda.” She wanted to be comforted, but instead Roda cast her eyes elsewhere. “You could make things better.”

“I’m just one Time Lady,” she argued, eyes flashing. “I can’t make those sorts of decisions without support. I’d be the youngest Time Lady there; no one will listen to me. You know as well as I do that Rassilon would expect me to back him on any policy.”

“Since when have you ever done what Lord Rassilon wants you to do?”

She pouted. “This is different.”

“But it’s not, Roda.” Peri lowered his voice, all matter of fact. “You have a chance here to change what you… what you hate about Gallifrey, and you want to throw it away?”

“He won’t let me say no,” Roda pointed out darkly, “and he certainly won’t let me break Prydonian lines.”

There weren’t politics on Gallifrey, not strictly speaking. So far as Roda could see throughout history, every member of the council tended to agree with whatever the President said. But there were times when the needs of one Chapter supplanted the needs of another, and that was when it got dicey. Roda, as a Prydonian, would be expected to do what was best for them whether she felt it was most important or not; especially since the head of her chapter was, well, also the President. And so far as she was concerned no one in the Citadel needed any sort of leg up with it without her vote. She didn’t need to pay attention in class to get that much.

“What Lord Rassilon wants, Lord Rassilon gets.” She sighed, pulling her hand away as Peri tried to argue. A frazzled sound followed, utterly wordless. “And besides, what if I don’t want to be a politician? You know I slept through half those lectures.”

“But I know you pay attention to what’s right.” Roda pulled a face; if only he knew whose company she kept, he might say otherwise. “You’ve been going on about that - that robbing dude since we were Tots.”

“Robin Hood,” she couldn’t help but laugh, but the response was strained. Bitter. He would not be in this position. There had been something in one of her books about him holding a corrupt King at the point of a sword, simply commanding him to sign a treaty to help the people of his planet. Or… Chapter? District? It hadn’t been entirely clear.

“Exactly!” Realizing that she wasn’t getting anywhere, Roda shoved fruit into her mouth and chewed it aggressively. More to stop herself from arguing with Peri, than anything else. She had by some miracle avoided an argument with her guardian; she would rather not have one with her ex boyfriend, instead. “Isn’t his whole thing righting wrongs?”

“Oh yeah,” snorted Roda, through a mouthful of berries. She felt as though she’d scarcely eaten so much in her life, and that her body was subconsciously trying to tell her to shut up. But her mouth wasn’t getting the memo. Peri looked at her as though she was barely coherent - which she probably wasn’t - or as though she had stopped speaking Gallifreyan. “Because stealing from the Council to feed the shobogans will go down so well. Let me just run that idea by Raz, see how he feels about welcoming the rebels in with open arms.”

“What are you - shobogans? What do they have to do with anything?”

Roda waved dismissively. “S’just an example,” she lied vaguely, “rich and poor. Better off and not. I know you think Gallifrey is just fine,” her tone became snippy, for a second, “but the whole point is helping people who aren’t immortal time-travelling aristocracy.”

“We’re not immortal,” pointed out Peri. Roda glared at him.

“Right, so that’s the bit you’re complaining about?”

“Just…” Peri pinched the bridge of his nose, as he tried to change the subject. “Forgot about shobogans, and Robin Rood-“

“Hood.”

“And listen to me. When have I steered you wrong?”

“If I hadn’t listened to you I’d be halfway to Sol-3 by now,” muttered Roda, sorely wishing (not for the first time) that she was.

“Who else in the universe could put on a brunch like this?”

“Is that really relev-?”

“That’s right. No one. Look, Roda.” Peri clasped both of her hands in hers, and gave her one of the smiles that would have melted her hearts once upon a time. “Anyone else would leap at this opportunity. Is it so crazy to think you are the one getting it for a reason?”

“I guess you’re right…”

Roda smiled, but her hearts weren’t in it. It was just that if she continued to argue, she knew she was going to raise her voice. And she didn’t want to shout.

There was no getting out of this - this mess. Peri was right; but if any other Time Lord would want the chance she was getting, then they could have it. She sure as Skaro didn’t want it. All it meant was it would tie her down. Perhaps it wasn’t a ball and chain, shackling her to the red grass of Gallifrey with no hope of reprieve, but it was a short leash. A sentence. Even if she did get to travel, she would have to attend meetings, sit in court, all of the sorry mess of being - and she suppressed a shudder - a politician. 

As she had walked to Peri’s quarters she had hoped that perhaps he would have some idea of how to get her out of it. But he was just as deluded as Rassilon was, and she supposed they had changed, both of them. They weren’t quite on the same wavelength anymore, even if they were still friends. And maybe they had never been. Entirely on the same wavelength, that was.

She shook her head, half paying attention as Peri talked about everything being on the Council meant, and then about his latest studies, and then about the weather. She interjected when she was supposed to, and ate at a more civilized speed, and it seemed to do the trick. She found random things to talk about and told him how good the brunch was, as usual, and forced herself to put up the usual joking disgruntlement when he brought up the upcoming exams. But her thoughts lingered on the inevitability of a hated future, and the meal became an act. Peri would be happy as a doctor, as a scientist. But she would never be happy in her role. She would have to join the Council, take her mother’s seat and be utterly useless. Either a pawn, or an embarrassment - worse, be branded a rebel if she spoke her mind. Even a renegade.

There was no use dwelling on it, and yet it was all she could do. The meal tasted like sand, and her future was slipping through her fingers like grains of the same. Peri excused himself to take a call from a colleague, and finally she let her head rest on the table and groaned. Maybe she could convince Rassilon to let her take some sort of time away, before he condemned her. Do something fun. Find Robin Hood, and get what was clearly some sort of pipe dream or misunderstanding out of her system while she could. Or maybe she should just run away, here and now. Only Rassilon would be put out.

On the other hand, he would be a very powerful enemy to make.

Sighing, Roda lifted her head from the table and wiped the dampness from her eyes and poured herself a tall glass of nothing in particular. She sipped at it anxiously, willing herself to manage a smile when Peri returned. After all, she was going to have to get very good at hiding her feelings. Might as well start now...