Story disclaimer: I own none of the following. Many of the references in this story are owed to the writers and the rest of the team(s) involved in the creation and production of Torchwood and Doctor Who. Without them, this story would not be possible. My character Teya owns me. I am making no money from this or any of my other fics posted on this site.
Author's Note : I hate this chapter, it serves a purpose, but it doesn't flow properly... ah well...
Scene Seven – Cardiff, 1910
Teya lay in Jack's arms, all her hungers sated and wounds healed. Though she was still struggling to process all her knowledge of Jack, when he had made the usual advances, she had accepted. She saw no need to resist, understood his hunger for companionship now more than ever, and accepted that his need was so similar to her own. Her head was resting in the curve of his shoulder, and the only movement either of them made was Jack occasionally kissing her forehead tenderly. There was silence between them, other than their breathing which was gradually slowing. There were many thoughts running through Teya's mind. Her sense of fairness led her to feel guilty that she now knew so much about Jack, yet he knew virtually nothing about her, but where to begin? She sighed.
"What's wrong?"
"I was just wondering if my father is still alive." The words came out before she could stop them. Her thoughts had been on him, on his life. Later, when she was alone again, she would come to realise that it was a desire to share with him something of herself and her past. Giving up something that she has stolen from him...
"Your father?" Despite himself, Jack was intrigued. Teya was rarely forth coming about her life, and not wanting to give anything away about himself, he didn't care to ask too many questions of the subject. "Was he ill when you left?"
"No." There was a sadness in her tone that made Jack hold her tighter. She turned onto her side, momentarily burying her face in his chest. She looked up into Jack's eyes and made her decision. "He was being hunted by a rival clan. He'd already had three attempts on his life, my mother and brothers had already been killed, and he was so scared that I would be murdered as well… But I'm jumping into the middle of the story. If you want, I'll tell it from the beginning?
"I was born in darkness. There was a great storm, the night of my birth, and my mother was in terrible pain. The… shaman is probably the closest term you have… had already decreed that I would be born into a realm of darkness. My father, determined that I would be born into light, despite her claims, had fed my mother's room with torches and a great fire in the fireplace. My mother moaned about the heat and light, saying it was all too much, and eventually persuaded my father to decrease the number of torches in the room to two, one either side of the fireplace, and to let the great fire in the hearth burn to glowing coals. It was pure chance that moments before I was born, one of the serfs tending my mother spilt a bowlful of water as she tripped over the rug. The fire was out, and seconds later a great wind slammed the window open, dousing the torches. I was born before they could be relit, as the shaman predicted, in darkness. My name Aranteya Voranalagrect Celentura means Child Born Lost in a Century of Darkness.
"My people consider it terrible luck for a child to be named so, but the shaman was determined. My father threatened her, cursed her, and eventually turned her out of the castle when she refused to change the name. It was more fitting than my father knew, but for the first few years of my life no ill luck occurred. My mother was blessed again, with three boys. The castle was filled with the sounds of young children laughing and tussling. My brothers would wait for me to finish my lessons, and the moment I entered the great hall they would ambush me. I would be studying and they would run past, upsetting my inks and paints so that I would have to begin all over again. It made me so angry! But I loved my brothers, and could never stay angry for long. My father was preparing for me to rule our territory after him, and patience was one of the things he taught me well.
"One day, my father received a message from one of his commanders that an enemy was preparing to declare war. It was the family of the shaman who named me. It turns out she was a black sheep from a very rich and powerful family who were angered by her working in my father's territory. Once she crawled back to them with her story, they accepted her feud with my father… and prepared for war.
"My father had three attempts made on his life – one was an attack whilst he was out hunting, another was an attempt to slit his throat in his sleep. He survived both, thanks to some quick thinking by his guards, and a knife under his pillow. The third attempt was poisoning. An assassin dosed a stew with tarlafan leaf."
She paused in her story, once again burying his head in Jack's chest. He held her close, wondering why she was suddenly so open, but somehow glad that she was. Her story was obviously hard to tell, and he was prepared to wait to hear it all. When she spoke next, her voice was slightly muffled because she did not raise her head. He stroked her back gently, planting a kiss on the top of her head. "The stew killed many. My family, their guards and their serfs…. Nearly fifty people died… including my mother and brothers. My father had an upset that day, he ate a little and became sick, but his previous sickness prevented him ingesting much of the poison. I was lucky, I undergoing a fasting ritual with a few of the religious order. We emerged to a castle ravaged by sickness and death.
"My father had been intent on sending my brothers and I somewhere safe from the moment war had been threatened. A few days after the poisoning of our family, my father's remaining guards caught the assassin. My father tortured him terribly – the screams echoed from the dungeon up to the top of the tallest tower. Eventually, the man told of a rift, a rift that could send people far away, across space and time.
"According to the assassin, no one else knew of this rift. My father chose not to believe him, but he screamed the words, pitifully and pleading, right until the end. That was when my father decided that the only way to keep me safe was to send me through the rift."
"And you agreed?" Jack was incredulous.
"Of course not! I didn't want to leave my father. I wanted to stay and mourn my family, to fight our enemies alongside him. He was having none of it, of course, what did I expect? Our family was reduced to my father and I, plus a few serfs. He dosed me with a sleeping draught. It was the only way he could move me. I woke in Cardiff, alone and afraid. The rest, as you say, is history. I suppose I'll never know if my father lived or died."
A while later, Jack left Teya alone while he called into work. He was as clandestine as ever about his work, not that she expected anything more or less from him. Of everything she had learned about him, she still had no idea what Jack did for a living. In some way she wasn't sure she wanted to know, somehow she couldn't picture Jack in a nine to five office job. She wasn't sure what kind of job she could see Jack doing. She sat by the window, staring out over the city and thinking many thoughts.
More than anything she knew that she couldn't stay. She knew too much about a man who kept his life a secret from everyone he met. She sighed, glancing round the room with a sense of regret. She would have stayed with Jack forever, but they weren't destined for that; he kept himself too far apart from her. She didn't care to admit to him how much she knew, because she didn't know what his reaction would be. She knew, all too well, that Jack could be violent, she'd seen that in his memories, but more than that he was unpredictable. Teya had no way to tell how Jack would react to the knowledge she possessed. That was enough knowledge in itself.
Teya left, not without regret, and not without looking back.
