Inside My War
k.l.
Note: Apologies, this would have been up ages ago if I didn't suffer from this terminal affliction called procrastination. That and I watched Hua Mulan (highly recommended) and I could feel the inadequacy bubbling within. So I spend hours re-ironing and yet still... inadequate. Moral of the story: ignore this and watch Hua Mulan.
When Mulan returns the sun is at its peak.
Aurora waits, seated on the steps that lead to the cabin's door, Mulan's cloak wrapped loosely about her shoulders.
No words are spoken.
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Silence bleeds into the night and though it pains her to no end, Aurora knows it is not hers to break.
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It is on the third night when Mulan finally speaks. Her voice is distant and her gaze lost, but she speaks and Aurora listens.
"I was barely fourteen summers when my Father's summoning came. He was unfit for battle, his illness left him weak and his leg hindered movement to a laborious gait. But none could take his place, my brother of seven summers was far too young and women held no place. He would leave and he would die."
There is a pause and Aurora chances upon a pain so well kept. But it is only chance and before a second glance can be made Mulan's stoic facade returns.
"In the dead of night I stole the wooden marker with our family name emblazoned upon it, I stole our family horse and my Father's sword and armour. As I rode, never once did I look back. Never once did I stop."
"Twelve years I battled and breathed in the midst of men, none the wiser. I rose quickly in rank and by wars' end had achieved merit and stature most only reach in the world of dreams."
There is no pride, Aurora notes, in Mulan voice as she recounts a narration that many would share with great elation. Her father had. Philip had.
"Yet stature does not wash away the blood of brothers that stain my hands; merit does not quell the memories of children slaughtered, bodies defleshed and hung to walls nor the images of brothers tortured, branded and dismembered before you; and no amount of honour restores villages visible only by ash and bone."
The taste of bile overcomes Aurora's senses and tears threaten to fall. Aurora is not so naive to think war does not entail death, but war is a battle fought between soldiers. In her stories there are no villages erased from maps, no children massacred and the live are not dismembered or ill-treated. In her stories war is just; war is fair; war is noble.
Mulan repositions and her focus shifts from the open window to the wall opposite where Aurora is settled upon a mattress framed and supported by blackened steel, the rooms only furniture.
Aurora masks the emotions and thoughts that run frantic within her as Mulan allows their gaze to meet. It is the first in three nights and Aurora refuses to terminate it by show of faintness.
"When you woke me, I was not in Storybrooke, but in a village ravaged and pillaged by marauders. From my chest two arrows protruded, a third buried deep in my gut. My strength was fading and my vision near obsolete. All I could make out was the glint of a blade and the cry of a child. Blindly I lunged."
Unconsciously, Aurora traces the marred flesh at her throat. It is an action that does not go unnoticed.
Mulan reaches out ever so only to draw back. Her hands curl inward to form fists - nails angled as to cut deep into flesh. Shame and self-hatred consume her.
It takes all the strength Aurora possesses to hold herself at bay, to still her tongue, and to wait. To act now would be to lose a person Aurora never thought she could come to need so much.
"I would never in right body and mind harm you, you must know. But moments will exist when my grasp on this reality falters and I revert to the warrior who knows only battle; only death. This does not justify my actions, rather it paints the scene to which I add a path that divides and you must make a choice."
Aurora sees the picture as it paints in her mind's eye but the path does not part and there is no choice. But Mulan cannot - will not - see past her steadfast loyalty to protect. Aurora knows this and yet she cannot – will not – accept it.
"There is no choice to make for the path does not divide Mulan: our path does not divide." It is spoken with such conviction Mulan's gaze looks to waver. But Aurora won't have it and without hesitation she abandons the comforts of the bed, crosses the space that lies between them and holds Mulan's gaze with a palm to each cheek. "Once, you spoke of protection and I in response offered my life to protect you and yet you cast it aside, why Mulan?"
"I do not-" Mulan is flustered; confused. She tries to escape but the wall to her backside prevents it.
Aurora does not falter. "Mulan, why."
There is pause and the tension Mulan bears momentarily dissipates. "Because it would be not protection but torture."
"Yes, torture Mulan, it would be torture."
"There is no need to mock me Princess." Mulan recoils. "I will leave, all you need have done was ask."
The action pains Aurora. "Oh Mulan, can you not see?" The distress seeps into her words. "If the path should divide and you should take the other as means to protect me, it would not be protection Mulan. It would be torture. A torture I could not survive. You are that which binds and holds me together. You are the reason to which I can close my eyes at night and know, no matter the dream, that I am safe. You are the reason I draw breath." Aurora wavers. If Mulan should leave... Every uncertainty, every fear, falls upon her and for an instant Aurora no longer has the strength to stay afloat.
But the tumble Aurora awaits never arrives. Instead she is encompassed in warmth and for a moment she does not understand.
"Do you mean it?"
It is Mulan: Mulan who has prevented the fall, Mulan who whispers so brokenly. It is always Mulan.
Aurora smiles softly and without hesitation wraps her arms about Mulan. "I do." Aurora rests her head upon Mulan's chest and allows herself the chance to revel in a warmth Aurora thought forever lost. "Always."
As the arms about her tighten and chocked sob escapes, Aurora knows all is as it should be. The memories will never fade and a pain will always remain, but Aurora knows this is life's due process.
Aurora tilts her head upward and her lips press tenderly to the underside of Mulan's chin. Once, twice and a third. "Always Mulan, always."