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Hungry from a hard days work, you stepped into the crowded mess tent and pushed your way past the lively, chattering inhabitants. You could tell, simply by how many people had gathered to eat, all at the same time, that it must have been Oscar's turn to cook. Though it took you some time to do so, you finally made your way to the front of the tent, and claimed your meal. As you began to search for a place to sit, you saw Soren, sitting completely alone, at the far end of the mess tent. It wasn't unusual for him to sit alone if Ike wasn't around, but you still hated to see him like that. Even if he did prefer to be in his own company. Since there was plenty of room at his table and little room anywhere else, you once again navigated through the crowd to join him. “Hey there Soren, fancy seeing you here. You don't mind if I sit with you, do you?” Smiling in the most friendly, upbeat way you knew how, you sat down beside him and lazily began munching at your dinner without first waiting for his answer. “You've been kind of hard to find lately you know. You're not hiding from me, are you?”

Obviously not all that pleased that you had decided to stay, Soren refused to so much as take his eyes off of his book. After a moment or two of you silently staring at him, he loosely closed his eyes and sighed. “I doubt it really matters to you anyway, but no, I don't mind if you sit next to me.” Pausing for a second, as if unsure whether or not he should say what was on his mind, Soren looked at you out of the corner of his eye. “You're not going to pester me about teaching you again, are you?”

“Hmm?” Swallowing down another bite of hot, delicious food, you lifted your finger to your lips and feigned a look of thought. “Well, I hadn't planned on it, but since you brought it up, why not?” Honestly hoping that he might actually be willing to help you now, you couldn't hide your excitement. “Have you changed your mind or something?”

Slowly shaking his head from side to side, Soren effortlessly extinguished your excitement simply by uttering a single word. “No.”

“Oh, that's too bad.” Slumping your shoulders forward, you dropped your fork to your plate and sighed. “You see, I thought that maybe one of the reasons you might not want to teach me is because you don't want me using, or messing up your tomes. So, I took it upon myself to buy a couple of them.” Digging around inside a small leather bag you kept at your side, you retrieved several large tomes, all varying in thickness and design, and placed them on the table. “I tried to read them, but I had no idea what I was doing.” Still not completely disheartened, you managed to laugh at your own failure. “You told me to expect as much, I guess I should have listened to you.”

Finally taking his eyes off of his own book, he glanced down at the tomes you had purchased and shook his head, obviously not approving of your actions. “You're right, you should have listened. All you've managed to do is waste your money on something you'll never use.” Curious, he opened the front cover of the top book and studied the unfamiliar symbols that filled the pages within. “Me not wanting to teach you has nothing to do with not wanting to share my tomes.”

“Oh, well, that's too bad.” Though inwardly disappointed, you shrugged off his refusal as if it was no big deal. “I guess if you're really not willing to teach me, even now, you can keep these.” Smiling again, you gently slid the heavy pile of books towards him. “It looks to me like I won't be needing them, so consider them my gift to you.” Placing your hands back on your lap, you looked down at the rather expensive tomes longingly. “I don't want them to go to waste, and I'm sure you can find some use for them.”

Your strange, unexpected actions confused Soren. And though he didn't want that fact to be overly obvious to you, he couldn't seem to stop himself from questioning you. “I take it that you're finally giving up then?”

“Nope, not hardly.” Amused, and surprised that he would even suggest such a thing, you started to laugh. “Actually, I think it's fair to say that I'm just getting started. You should know by now that you're not going to be able to get rid of me that easily.”

Soren's expression visibly dropped upon hearing this. He was actually so disappointed by this, that he secretly wished he hadn't asked you anything at all. “Oh?”

“Oh, indeed.” You nodded confidently. “I already told you that I wasn't going to give up on this, and I'm still not going to. I'm simply going to take another approach, since this one doesn't seem to be doing any good.” After finishing up the last bite of your food, you downed your drink and continued on speaking. “If I can't talk you into teaching me, and I can't annoy you into teaching me, I might be able to bribe you into teaching me. I'm not sure how I'm going to go about doing that just yet, but there's a pretty good chance it'll work. If I can figure out how to do it that is.”

Not even slightly worried, he shook his head. “I can promise you already that your plan's not going to work. Especially since you've just gone and told me you plan. You've failed before you even started.” Looking directly at you, Soren did something that you weren't sure you'd ever seen him do before. He smiled.

The sight of him smiling so openly caused you to blush and temporarily lose your nerve. In an attempt to buy yourself more time, you cleared your throat several times. When you finally did speak again, it took all of your focus and concentration not to stutter or jumble up your words. “We'll just have to see about that, won't we?”

“I suppose so.” Losing the little bit of interest he had in the repetitive conversation, Soren turned his eyes back to his book and nodded in an uninterested, apathetic way.

Even though you knew he'd probably prefer that you left at this point, you instead decided to scoot yourself a bit closer to him. “You know, Soren, I'm pretty sure I'm already off to a pretty good start with this whole bribing you thing.” Moving even closer, so that your hip was now pressed against his, you leaned in close and whispered in his ear. “I say that, because you haven't thrown any fireballs at me yet today. That's, in my opinion, is a huge sign of improvement.”

Unaffected by your unnecessary closeness, Soren didn't even try to move away from you. “I really do hate to disagree with you, but I think I should let you know just how wrong you are in assuming that.” Speaking in a tone laced with sarcasm, Soren continued. “You see, we're inside a highly flammable tent. Using any kind of magic indoors, especially fire magic, is an absolutely horrible idea.”

“Ah, I see.” Terribly embarrassed that you had not thought of that yourself, you slumped back down in your seat and hung your head in a poor attempt to hide the blush that was quickly taking over your upper half. “Never mind, then.”

Mocking your speech patterns, Soren finally agreed with something that you'd said. “Never mind, indeed.” Still not done with his own meal, he ladled a bit of his stew into his spoon and triumphantly lifted it to his lips. As he did this, however, he dripped one, small, hardly noticeable drop of stew onto his chin. This made his triumph comical to say the least, but you managed to keep your face straight. Feeling your eyes on him, Soren turned to you and scowled. “What are you staring at?”

“Oh, it's nothing really. Just a giant glob of meat hanging from your face.” Mimicking his own sarcastic attitude, you shrugged. “That's all. Nothing for you to worry about, I'm sure.”

“What?” Though he couldn't exactly tell if you were lying or not, Soren immediately grabbed his napkin and began wiping at his face. Somehow, no matter how much he attempted to clean himself, he missed the spot.

Though watching him frantically try to clean his face was funny, you couldn't let him continue to struggle with such a simple task. “Here, just let me do it.” Snatching the napkin from his hand, you placed your free hand on his shoulder and cleaned up the almost microscopic droplet of stew. “There, that's better. I guess I know now why you prefer to eat alone.” Chuckling to yourself, you placed the napkin back in his hand and stood up to leave. “You're a mess.”