If he was anyone else. Anyone else! With every word he spoke she found comfort, but she knew she couldn't let it cause her to relax too much. She'd already let enough slip out. If he weren't as good a person as he was he could've had her bound in chains on suspicion alone at that point. But he trusted her, and that just caused her deceptions to hurt even more. But was it deception if she was giving half-truths and avoiding straight up lying? There was a time she might've answered yes to that, when she was a pirate and deception was part of the game, but that was a time past and now she knew the answer all too well.

But Sky gritted her teeth and held it all in. She had to deceive him, didn't she? He seemed so understanding, readily willing to hear her out, but the fact was she couldn't risk it. She'd already risked way too much saying what she had. Her best course of action there and now was to shut down and give him nothing else. It would just come back to bite her. If she told him then everything she had said thus far could be used to sentence her, to send her to the noose where pirates frequently met their end. It was a life she had left, but it would never leave her. She could only make amends, never get rid of her sins.

She turned her back to him for a moment, turning away from the eggs and staring off to the side. Then she paced to the side away from Eric, putting a gap between them, and let herself slide to the ground against a rock. It wasn't very good form, given that they were supposed to be guarding the eggs, but the entire thing was overwhelming and she just needed to sit down at that point. "Are redemption and forgiveness the same thing? One can be earned but the other one was must be given, and even then neither might be deserved," she commented grimly, pulling her knees to her chest as she let a blank expression wash over her face. Shut it out, shut it down, don't let her guard crack anymore, don't let the emotion make her vulnerable.

If some part of her had heard him she showed no sign of it. Legs were pulled to her chest and her forehead was resting against her knees, hiding her face behind the curtain that was created by her white hair. Truthfully she heard every word he was saying, but it was getting difficult to process them. There was so much else on her mind, it was so jumbled, so crazy. She'd heard of people comparing their thoughts to a storm but she'd navigated the seas during storms before, she'd much rather be doing that right now.

Or having a drink. A drink would be really nice.

But she had volunteered for this. She had sought him out and asked for the guard duty. She just hadn't expected to be so . . . revealed by the sight of the eggs. They had pierced a hole straight through her defenses, and now she was curled up in the sand doing everything she could to maintain herself, to keep the tears that wanted to break through from doing so. It was pretty much guaranteed that Eric would never do another guard shift with her, she was certain of that. Barely into the shift and she was already a broken down mess.

She had to steel her resolve, collect herself. Several painful swallows followed and she closed her eyes tight, refusing to let herself cry. That would just seal it. Teeth grit and her jaw set. Stupid girl! Get a hold of yourself! You were a fearsome pirate, goddammit! Fearsome might've been an exaggeration, but she was a damn good smuggler and well respected among the actual fearsome pirates. What would they think of you now? It didn't matter. That was a life she had left behind. She was trying to make a new life! She needed to put all that behind her.

Her knuckles were as white as her hair as she gripped her own legs, pushing up. In one awkward motion she climbed to her feet, after several long moments of being balled up, and put on a smile. "I do need to learn to accept the help, to accept that everyone is here for me if I need it. It's just hard. Could we . . . could we perhaps forget this ever happened and just continue watching the eggs?"

Sky looked up as Eric proceeded to cross over to sit down beside her. In a way it really helped to lift a weight off of her shoulders. He was being casual enough that she didn't feel a complete fool for collapsing like she had in the middle of a shift. She was supposed to be guarding the eggs, yet she had become a bundle of emotions. The only way she'd stop an intruder like that would be because they felt it was too awkward to interfere!

Yet the words that left his mouth caught her completely off guard. Her eyes widened and she felt her cheeks heat up in response, but Sky was not one to flinch away with bashfulness. Instead she set her grey eyes on the sand in front of her a shrugged her shoulders. She knew what he was doing, changing the topic so that she wasn't on the same train of thought that had ruined her. But then, perhaps it was worthwhile to entertain that idea. It would mean focusing on something other than her past. "No," she murmured in response, no one in particular coming to mind. She didn't look at others like that often enough to form such feelings, it seemed.

Yet the ridiculousness of the situation struck her suddenly and abruptly. Here she was sitting on guard duty with the Captain of the Dragon Knights talking about crushes now? On impulse, perhaps spurred by the ridiculousness, she let her head rest to the side, resting on his shoulder. "What about you?"

In such close proximity she could feel him tense up at the gentle contact of her head on his shoulder. She knew she was being extremely unprofessional, and she was probably tarnishing whatever respect he had left for her, but then you might as well go all in, right? It wasn't like a scrap of respect meant much when you broke down on duty in front of the captain himself. Besides, it just felt nice to be close to someone right now, even in the simplest of ways. It felt right for her.

His words, though, reflected his tension. She heard him out and lifted her head just enough to turn and look at him, stormy eyes sceptical and a single brow raised--a partially feigned, partially real incredulous expression. "And here just moments ago you were telling me I could talk to you, not just as my captain and teacher, but as a person. A response like that sounds like something a captain would say," she murmured, lowering her head back down. There was a part of her inside that liked the way he tensed up. Perhaps it was the pirate side of her scoffing at authority, or maybe it was merely a young lady enjoying having some power over a young man.

"Well perhaps you could find a nice woman who doesn't deserve much," she commented, then laughed aloud. "I understand you, though. I've too much already in my heart to consider such matters," she mused wearily, looking down at her hands. "You're a noble type, though, a real honourable person from a strong lineage. Wouldn't it also be your duty to continue your family line?" she wondered out loud, idly, not really expecting an answer from him.

When you spent enough time around pirates you grew a little desensitized to such topics. Especially if you were spending enough time around pirates as a young lady just finding her form. Sky had heard it all, both said to her and toward her, or at least she liked to believe she did. There was a lot she was naive to, but the basic idea of sex was by and large not foreign to her at all. Yet the way it made Eric react almost brought a smirk to her lips. It was a welcome distraction on her worn out emotions, so she continued to poke and prod at it.

Plus some part of her liked having this effect on the captain.

Her head remained in place this time--she didn't need to look up to speak to him. In fact she seemed only to make herself more comfortable, leaning the slightest amount of her weight against him. Not enough that it would be overbearing, but certainly enough to be noticeable. Partially it was to make him squirm a little more and partially it was for her own comfort. The neck wasn't meant to stay at an odd angle and by leaning closer to him she was at least able to rest her head properly on his shoulder.

"Woodkeep is a small place and the orphans, fortunately enough, are few. The chances that you'd luck into finding a young boy of vigor and honor as your father did are slim to none at best, yet your line needs to continue, at least in name, no? Besides, you're somewhere around my age, no? These are supposedly our prime years for that stuff, though I wouldn't know much on the topic," she murmured, half teasing and half musing herself. "What traits would you like in a girl, captain?" she added abruptly.

Maybe she shouldn't be poking and prodding at the man who was her superior like she was, but Sky was enjoying it. It kept her mind off of other topics, such as herself. Plus the more she talked with him the more she was genuinely interested in the answers to her questions. What did a young man at the top of the world want? She knew how to make a man squirm, like she was doing now, but admittedly she knew very little about their desires beyond the rather crude idea she'd gotten from pirates over the course of the past few years.

She really knew very little of the opposite sex, but that was perhaps par for the course given how young she was when she was swallowed by the world. The minds of males had never been a priority, and still wasn't, for the white-haired rider. However as he answered her question she found herself quite curious what he might say. And then disappointed as his answer wasn't very specific. Someone who could cook? He wanted less a woman and more a mother, it seemed!

Sky scoffed at the thought, but he tossed her question right back at her. She should've expected it to come, but it still caught her off guard. Fortunately she has a quicksilver tongue at times and her response was almost immediate. "Someone noble, honourable. To be honest if I could pick the man I'd marry he'd be too good for me, and I wouldn't deserve him. A just man, who does right by everyone. And can hold his booze . . ." she added the last part almost haphazardly. "And probably someone who's worth a laugh now and then. But mostly just a good heart." Or perhaps a strong heart to make up for my shattered one.