As she lay in bed that night, she was painfully aware of the soft snoring beside her....and the presence of a four year old sleeping in her living room. She had tossed and turned for two hours already, unable to catch that ever fickle mistress, sleep. This overtired sleeplessness was familiar to her....but she hadn't experienced it in years. Its closeness wrapped around her, suffocating as the darkness seemed to practically squeeze the very air out of her throat.
It's always you....in my big dreams
Oh what she wouldn't give for just an hour....an hour of dreamless sleep would be a god-given gift! But there was just too much to think about, to mull over. Too many decisions to make and too much of the past bubbling up, unwelcome, to the front of her mind....It was a thick stew comprised of chunks of anger simmering in a thick broth of pain that threatened to boil over into her present predicament.
She lifted her hand in the darkness, staring at the platinum claddough ring on her left ring finger. In her mind, she pictured that same hand, smoothed over and unscarred with a diamond sparkling in the same place where the heart of her claddough ring sits. The memory is clear and sharp, the imagined brightness making her eyes water like a sort of placebo effect. The two visions, the scarred hand with the claddough ring and the smooth hand with the diamond, seemed to fade in and out between each other. Trying to ward off the bright crispness of that diamond vision with all her might left her feeling even more exhausted and still no closer to sleep. Finally giving in to the past, she fell into it with her whole mind, hardly able to brace herself for the sharp, gripping pain that these types of memories always bring back...
The sweet smell of fresh grass and soft heat of late spring sun fills her imagination. A fiddle plays somewhere in the distance....this is her old home, a small village just outside of Aroan. It is a modest, rural place that is comprised of an entirely run-of-the-mill human population. Farmers, a baker, a blacksmith, a tailor....average working families in a society without electricity, indoor plumbing, or other such modern luxuries. The feel of the grass beneath her bare feet and the warm sun on her face....grass and sun....at 16, her world was changing....
"What are you doing?" The voice snapping this young version of Lydia Braxlin out of her sun-and-grass filled reverie. She meets the curious emerald eyes of her pale-faced and yellow haired friend Vanessa. Distracted by the cute smattering of freckles across her equally young friend's nose, her answer is dreamy and wistful sounding.
"Just thinking....enjoying the beautiful day..."
"You're thinking about that ostentatious rock on your finger and that loser you were promised to." That was Vanessa....always able to hit the nail on the head with the worst words possible.
"He's not a loser. And I won't think about THAT....not just yet..."
The scene shifts to several weeks later. Another night of that horrible insomnia that had begun plaguing her the night after her brother Radix married that wretched Ronelle Kinala four years ago....They had too much power. Ronelle made the arrangements for Lydia's current pre-marital and slightly unwelcome state of engagement. The butterflies in her stomach are so strong she feels like she is about to vomit. This, what she has with Gex, is it really love" He has been sweet enough....going into the city itself to bring back a nice enough ring and giving her small gifts. He takes her on walks through the woods during pretty days and wraps her in his cloak on not-so-pretty ones. He tells her when she looks nice and pretends she is beautiful even after a long day of working and sweating. He told her he loved her recently and she repeated the phrase obediently, having been instructed to by Ronelle under threat of punishment. She likes him a lot but, as Azrin keeps telling her, she is still fairly young. She isn't supposed to have it figured out yet. ...And there is still something suspicious lying underneath all of this, if only she can put her finger on it.
All of these thoughts of what love is, her dysfunctional family, and the man she hardly knew but had uttered those sacred words to are jumbling around in her head, bouncing off her cranium like bullets being shot back and forth. She can tell a migraine is coming on as even the starlight outside her window causes her eyes to water. A soft shuffling of feet by her door causes her to pull the sheet up to her chin. Who could be up this late" The shuffling sounds continue back down the hall and a light tapping sound comes from her window. Lydia opens her eyes and sees her intended's face peering in.
"Go away!" she whispers harshly, a soft groan escaping her lips as she sits up with effort. The blood is pounding in her ears and she knows that by the time the sun shows its face, she will be in a whole world of hurt.
"Come out! I want to show you something!" The whisper that is returned is tinged with anxiousness....is it excitement' Nervousness" Something...
"I have a headache. I'm trying to sleep. Go Away!"
"I can get rid of your headache. Just come out!"
The exchange goes back and forth for a bit, but in the end he knows she will relent and open her window. She slips outside into the cool night air and climbs down the giant willow that allows them easy access to her second story room. The fresh air seems to do her some good, taking the edge off of the dull pain in her head and allowing a little clarity to her thoughts. They walk to the woods silently. Why isn't he saying anything" What does he want"
And then the whole world goes black...
Lydia, back in her bed in the cottage in Rhydin, snapped back to the present with a quiet gasp. Fingering the top of the long scar that starts at her left hip and runs the length of her thigh, eventually curving around the outside of her knee, she suppressed a soft sob. This was not the time to wake the one sleeping beside her. These secrets were something she had intended to lock inside of herself until it was safe enough to let them out again, and now was not safe. Her short journey back to Aroan after the mysterious appearance of Vanessa in Rhydin had proven as much and the letters....well....they certainly seemed to make things clear enough for the time being.
She turned over and stared at his face through the darkness that separated them on the bed. Her short time in this place had made it very clear to her what love was and what love wasn't....and this, what she had now, was it. But after 10 years of running to escape the events that transpired in her home town, it had become difficult to discern exactly what she was doing here. She had thought she had figured out who she was and what she was meant for....She was a rough-around-the-edges but kind individual who kept her nose down and did what she had to. She was a survivor. Sometimes getting into trouble and annoying the respectable folk, but never really doing too much damage and never getting in too deep....always making sure she could get out of whatever she got into without too much mess....But now" Now she WAS one of those respectable people. Intending to marry for love and to someone she actively chose....to someone who actually asked instead of being declared. It probably seemed like a no-brainer to anyone else but now there was a child involved. Now she had somehow found herself the replacement mother to a four-year-old when she had never even really thought about having her own kids. Yes....here she was....betrothed and a replacement mother, still wrapped up in old betrayals and heartache.
How could anyone, even someone like her love, ever entrust someone as selfish as she to care for a precious child. Had she not proven herself selfish when she hid behind the bar at the first sign of bloodshed" Had she not proven herself selfish at accepting coin for a room her first night in town with no promises of repayment' Had she not proven herself selfish with her ability to completely ignore everything of more importance going on around her in favor of ranting and discussing her own issues with anyone who would listen" How could someone as self-centered as she possibly be capable of raising a child well"
How could someone as self-centered as she possibly get the love of a man who is so completely selfless.
All trinkets and promises and good intentions aside, Lydia felt like she was walking on a glass floor suspended miles above the cold, hard ground. One wrong step and everything she had dreamed of would shatter, leaving her broken and bloody. Rhydin is always full of unexpected surprises, to be sure....She just hoped that maybe, just this once, she could actually live up to what someone she admired expected of her. His expectations were the only fuel driving her forward at this point. It was time to try a different tactic....To stop focusing on survival and easy escapes and start working to build something worth hanging around for.
This revelation did not come without its own little after-effects. Lydia finally curled up into a ball under her sheet and fell into the deep, dreamless sleep she had been praying for.
It's always you....in my big dreams
Oh what she wouldn't give for just an hour....an hour of dreamless sleep would be a god-given gift! But there was just too much to think about, to mull over. Too many decisions to make and too much of the past bubbling up, unwelcome, to the front of her mind....It was a thick stew comprised of chunks of anger simmering in a thick broth of pain that threatened to boil over into her present predicament.
She lifted her hand in the darkness, staring at the platinum claddough ring on her left ring finger. In her mind, she pictured that same hand, smoothed over and unscarred with a diamond sparkling in the same place where the heart of her claddough ring sits. The memory is clear and sharp, the imagined brightness making her eyes water like a sort of placebo effect. The two visions, the scarred hand with the claddough ring and the smooth hand with the diamond, seemed to fade in and out between each other. Trying to ward off the bright crispness of that diamond vision with all her might left her feeling even more exhausted and still no closer to sleep. Finally giving in to the past, she fell into it with her whole mind, hardly able to brace herself for the sharp, gripping pain that these types of memories always bring back...
The sweet smell of fresh grass and soft heat of late spring sun fills her imagination. A fiddle plays somewhere in the distance....this is her old home, a small village just outside of Aroan. It is a modest, rural place that is comprised of an entirely run-of-the-mill human population. Farmers, a baker, a blacksmith, a tailor....average working families in a society without electricity, indoor plumbing, or other such modern luxuries. The feel of the grass beneath her bare feet and the warm sun on her face....grass and sun....at 16, her world was changing....
"What are you doing?" The voice snapping this young version of Lydia Braxlin out of her sun-and-grass filled reverie. She meets the curious emerald eyes of her pale-faced and yellow haired friend Vanessa. Distracted by the cute smattering of freckles across her equally young friend's nose, her answer is dreamy and wistful sounding.
"Just thinking....enjoying the beautiful day..."
"You're thinking about that ostentatious rock on your finger and that loser you were promised to." That was Vanessa....always able to hit the nail on the head with the worst words possible.
"He's not a loser. And I won't think about THAT....not just yet..."
The scene shifts to several weeks later. Another night of that horrible insomnia that had begun plaguing her the night after her brother Radix married that wretched Ronelle Kinala four years ago....They had too much power. Ronelle made the arrangements for Lydia's current pre-marital and slightly unwelcome state of engagement. The butterflies in her stomach are so strong she feels like she is about to vomit. This, what she has with Gex, is it really love" He has been sweet enough....going into the city itself to bring back a nice enough ring and giving her small gifts. He takes her on walks through the woods during pretty days and wraps her in his cloak on not-so-pretty ones. He tells her when she looks nice and pretends she is beautiful even after a long day of working and sweating. He told her he loved her recently and she repeated the phrase obediently, having been instructed to by Ronelle under threat of punishment. She likes him a lot but, as Azrin keeps telling her, she is still fairly young. She isn't supposed to have it figured out yet. ...And there is still something suspicious lying underneath all of this, if only she can put her finger on it.
All of these thoughts of what love is, her dysfunctional family, and the man she hardly knew but had uttered those sacred words to are jumbling around in her head, bouncing off her cranium like bullets being shot back and forth. She can tell a migraine is coming on as even the starlight outside her window causes her eyes to water. A soft shuffling of feet by her door causes her to pull the sheet up to her chin. Who could be up this late" The shuffling sounds continue back down the hall and a light tapping sound comes from her window. Lydia opens her eyes and sees her intended's face peering in.
"Go away!" she whispers harshly, a soft groan escaping her lips as she sits up with effort. The blood is pounding in her ears and she knows that by the time the sun shows its face, she will be in a whole world of hurt.
"Come out! I want to show you something!" The whisper that is returned is tinged with anxiousness....is it excitement' Nervousness" Something...
"I have a headache. I'm trying to sleep. Go Away!"
"I can get rid of your headache. Just come out!"
The exchange goes back and forth for a bit, but in the end he knows she will relent and open her window. She slips outside into the cool night air and climbs down the giant willow that allows them easy access to her second story room. The fresh air seems to do her some good, taking the edge off of the dull pain in her head and allowing a little clarity to her thoughts. They walk to the woods silently. Why isn't he saying anything" What does he want"
And then the whole world goes black...
Lydia, back in her bed in the cottage in Rhydin, snapped back to the present with a quiet gasp. Fingering the top of the long scar that starts at her left hip and runs the length of her thigh, eventually curving around the outside of her knee, she suppressed a soft sob. This was not the time to wake the one sleeping beside her. These secrets were something she had intended to lock inside of herself until it was safe enough to let them out again, and now was not safe. Her short journey back to Aroan after the mysterious appearance of Vanessa in Rhydin had proven as much and the letters....well....they certainly seemed to make things clear enough for the time being.
She turned over and stared at his face through the darkness that separated them on the bed. Her short time in this place had made it very clear to her what love was and what love wasn't....and this, what she had now, was it. But after 10 years of running to escape the events that transpired in her home town, it had become difficult to discern exactly what she was doing here. She had thought she had figured out who she was and what she was meant for....She was a rough-around-the-edges but kind individual who kept her nose down and did what she had to. She was a survivor. Sometimes getting into trouble and annoying the respectable folk, but never really doing too much damage and never getting in too deep....always making sure she could get out of whatever she got into without too much mess....But now" Now she WAS one of those respectable people. Intending to marry for love and to someone she actively chose....to someone who actually asked instead of being declared. It probably seemed like a no-brainer to anyone else but now there was a child involved. Now she had somehow found herself the replacement mother to a four-year-old when she had never even really thought about having her own kids. Yes....here she was....betrothed and a replacement mother, still wrapped up in old betrayals and heartache.
How could anyone, even someone like her love, ever entrust someone as selfish as she to care for a precious child. Had she not proven herself selfish when she hid behind the bar at the first sign of bloodshed" Had she not proven herself selfish at accepting coin for a room her first night in town with no promises of repayment' Had she not proven herself selfish with her ability to completely ignore everything of more importance going on around her in favor of ranting and discussing her own issues with anyone who would listen" How could someone as self-centered as she possibly be capable of raising a child well"
How could someone as self-centered as she possibly get the love of a man who is so completely selfless.
All trinkets and promises and good intentions aside, Lydia felt like she was walking on a glass floor suspended miles above the cold, hard ground. One wrong step and everything she had dreamed of would shatter, leaving her broken and bloody. Rhydin is always full of unexpected surprises, to be sure....She just hoped that maybe, just this once, she could actually live up to what someone she admired expected of her. His expectations were the only fuel driving her forward at this point. It was time to try a different tactic....To stop focusing on survival and easy escapes and start working to build something worth hanging around for.
This revelation did not come without its own little after-effects. Lydia finally curled up into a ball under her sheet and fell into the deep, dreamless sleep she had been praying for.