Inspiration for piece:
All Good Things (Come To An End)
-Nelly Furtado
"Flames to dust
Lovers to friends
Why do all good things come to an end?"
The phrase 'all good things must come to an end' is attributed to Geoffrey Chaucer in the year 1374.
...we therefore commit his body to the ground, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in sure and certain hope of resurrection to eternal life-
The 1559 Book of Common Prayer
Standard disclaimer applies; not my characters or settings or backgrounds. But they are my words.
Flames to Dust
Delenn lay curled on one side on the bed. It was set near to horizontal, human fashion, and her head was supported by a long silk-covered pillow. A bolster was tucked up against her back. It provided support for a spine aching after many hours spent sitting on a hard bench in the front row of the chill temple; witnessing, meditating, wishing.
It had been a long day and her body complained of it, although she did not listen. The pain of stiffened joints and tendons tight with tension was easy to ignore. She'd had years of practice. The fire in her bedroom had been lit upon their arrival home, but in the time taken for a shared meal and preparation for sleep, it had died down to glowing embers.
"Shall I add more wood? This room is still cold. You should take the front room near the kitchen. It is easier to keep warm," Lennier half-rose from his chair next to her bed, preparing to add more fuel at her command.
"I prefer the light from the embers," declared Delenn. "Sometimes the flame moves across them and it looks almost like writing. Like someone is speaking through words of fire."
"A secret message perhaps," said Lennier. He rose anyway and re-arranged the embers with a long steel poker. Ash clung to the implement as he carefully replaced it in the rack. The mirror which hung over the mantel reflected his image as he moved around the room.
She watched in drowsy comfort as he worked, hanging her ritual robes carefully in the corner wardrobe, tidying away shoes she had kicked off upon their return, and finally twitching the curtains closed against the snow-filled night sky.
"Leave them open, Lennier," Delenn called from the bed. "We get snow so seldom these days. I like to watch it fall."
"You are watching the fire," he observed. "The window is the opposite direction."
"I can see the window in the mirror," she retorted. "Now stop fussing. I like the snowfall. I like the dying fire even though it does not provide enough warmth. Do you understand?"
"Understanding is not required," he said with a smile, as he took a seat in a chair next to the bed. "Only obedience."
She laughed, a hoarse low rasp that ended in a deep cough. In an instant he was beside her on the bed, holding her upright as she struggled for breath.
It took a few minutes for her to recover from the coughing fit. It was growing annoying; this illness clung like the pale ash on the grey slate hearth. When she was breathing easily again, Lennier lowered her head onto the pillow and smoothed her hair, like a mother soothing a sick child.
Turning to the low stand next to the bed, he picked up a tall glass bottle. "You didn't take your medicine," he scolded.
Delenn grimaced, watching him remove the cap and pour some of the golden liquid into a crystal cup, which was marked on the inside with fluid measurements in Minbari numerical notation. She slowly rose on one elbow, took the cup from his outstretched hand and swallowed the contents. "Only obedience," she said as she handed it back with a quirk of her lips.
Lennier regarded her impassively and returned to his chair. Looking up at the mirror which was perched on the mantel piece, leaning against the wall, he observed, "You can see the night sky."
"Did you doubt me?" asked Delenn, with one hand slipped under her cheek, and the other fiddling with the edge of the sheet.
"Never," replied Lennier. With one hand he pulled up the light blanket to cover her shoulders. "Delenn," he asked, "Does this day, does the remembering..." He hesitated as if searching for the exact word. "Does it cause you pain?"
"Pain and joy, light and dark. You cannot have one without the other." Delenn's voice blurred at the edges. She fought back the urge to sleep. "It is an anniversary, a date to remember. The wrong one perhaps, but the one the people have chosen." In a meditative tone, she noted, "I have now been without him longer than I was with him."
"Twenty years," remarked Lennier. "He accomplished a great deal in that time." He looked around the spare but comfortable room. It was quiet enough to hear the hiss of snow against the glass. "He, and you, laid the foundation for the peace we now enjoy."
Delenn nodded, her greying hair catching in the twisted fingers that cradled her wrinkled face. "He was like a sun," she mused, lost in recollection. "A blazing fire in the center of my sky."
"A shooting star, perhaps," mused Lennier, "Here, then gone." Hearing the sound of a latch, he glanced up at the mirror. His partner had gone out onto the terrace in the still night. Susan appeared to be watching the snow also. He noted that she was not wearing her cloak.
"No," argued Delenn. "Nothing so ephemeral as that." She watched Lennier's face, then glanced at the mirror. Susan was wandering about in the cold. Delenn smiled to herself. Lennier would be torn as to who he should be protecting.
"Of course not," Lennier replied. His brow furrowed. "There is too much dust on the fireplace. It aggravates your cough."
"Leave it, leave it," said Delenn. "I am almost asleep and sweeping will only stir it up in any case. Tomorrow is time enough." She considered the crawling orange glow of the coals. Flames turned to ash and dust, but the promise of fire remained in the embers of her heart.
Delenn pulled one hand out from under the coverlet and gestured to her old friend. "Stay with me a little while longer, Lennier." She smiled up at him. "Then you can rescue Susan from the cold."
He leaned forward and gently took her hand within his own. "I will stay," he said. "Always."