Confidence: Is it quality or a quantity?
Caine acts as though I were a long lost cousin just come in out of the cold. In fact, that isn't far off. He offers hospitality and seemingly genuine welcome. This drained the flush of action out of my body. I forgot the trump of the great hall I had at the ready in an inside pocket. Kirena felt out of place in my hand.
As I stood before him, something else filled the spaces occupied by the eager 'ready juice'. Was it a different flavor of confidence, or real confidence? As if what I felt before was that of a fool with a plan.
It dawns on me that I've never really tired since coming back to Amber. Sure, I've been battered, sore and confused, but really really tired? Whenever I've needed to reach back for a little more, there was always something there. Adrenelane can give a person stamina beyond their normal range, but this was beyond that. This thought brings a calm. Is this 'confidence in spades'?
I moved Katherine to a couch; she would come back, perhaps with a start, in a few minutes. I sat aside, but away from Caine, noticing Seldon's Book of Hulls in his hands.
"Now that I've seen you again, I wanted to tell you", I began with my eyes and head tilted off to the right before looking at him directly, "I am sorry. For the ..."
"The ... ship?", he chuckled, "Ander you say some of the strangest things sometimes."
I didn't know if that was his way of accepting my apology or deflecting it just enough to deny me any satisfaction in the giving. Or perhaps, I realized ominously, it meant the things on his mind were much much heavier than a lost race.