Pine-Brother
By: Eärillë
She yearned for him all her life. Was it so wrong to want to know about one's brother? What was so terrible about him that people never deigned to talk about Evanzadí, firstborn son of Evandar and Islanzadí?
Warning: Some elements on Brom's characterisation from here on might be construed as "character bashing." But I would prefer to think that he was human, just like any other person, and thus bound for many faults.
9.
All her family were angry.
No, beyond that, they were furious with her.
Arya was now thirty winters old, and considered herself mature enough to take on some responsibility. Brom seemed to be a caring person and an abled body with weapons and magic too, and he had promised to guide her through dealing with the other races that shared the same land as the elves. So one day in spring she approached the Queen about becoming the elven ambassador for the Varden, something Brom had been trying to establish in this latest visit of his to the Pinewood City. She considered it perfect from all angles, and told her mother so in their private meeting after Brom's latest – doomed – petition: Arya would gain necessary experience about the outside world and the other races, the elves would be well-represented by the heir-to-the-throne, the Varden would not be slighted by the continual refusal for elven ambassadorial appointee, and Brom needed not gain more wrinkles from trying to convince the Queen to appoint a representative for his pet organisation.
But Islanzadí had been just condescendingly amused, and treated her daughter like a whiny three-winter-old brat.
So Arya had approached the dragon-dancer twins Íduna and Neya to ask about magical tattoos, and if they could help her with putting one on her body. With all the guile and charm that she possessed, she tricked them into swearing that they would help her until the tattoo's completion no matter what before she told them what she had in mind.
She wanted the symbol of Yáwë imprinted on her shoulder, like the twins with their interlinked dragon tattoo, so that she could represent the elves without the trappings of being an heir-to-the-throne.
The twins were so angry, and she was scared because they were usually so quiet and placid, and partly she was fearful of the venomous, incredulous question they hissed at her: "Do you really wish to be a slave, little princess?" But an oath in the Ancient Language was unbreakable, no matter however much both parties wished otherwise.
And now, nobody in her extended family would speak to her, and there were all the signs that they would never speak to her, ever again, just after she had told them – and shown them, in some cases – the tattoo that had been freshly imprinted upon her flesh, upon her soul. Nobody gave her any reason to that too, just pulling a stricken-and-helpless-but-furious countenance that inwardly frightened her so much.
And at the same time, something that had beforehand never come across her mind happened. She was banished from her mother's presence.
Islanzadí of House Rílvenár was now just her queen, no longer her mother, and that hurt the most.
She departed Ellesméra as the newly-minted ambassadorial appointee without any fanfare, and with nobody of her extended family witnessing her leave her home for the first time ever, let alone blessing or praising her. It was far from what she had imagined when she had decided to take up the mantle of becoming an elven ambassador to the Varden.
And worse, though he was sympathic enough to her plight, Brom was much more focused on finally gaining what he had wanted for so long rather than her broken heart, life and future. He constantly talked about what he wanted to do in regard to the new alliance and what he wanted Arya to do in those schemes of his, all the way through Du Weldenvarden, and he never once noticed that Arya's semi-enthusiasm was faked.
And she had thought that she had at last made a friend…
