I am both very displeased with this chapter and very pleased. Hrm. Let me know your tots. And of course, enjoy.

Chapter 9 - Samn Schorme

Steady on… I think, holding my breath as I watch Briatte nock her bow. The stag nibbles at the green shoots that grow from the roots of the oak tree my squire is half-crouched behind. I'm on the other side of a small brook, also on a knee and just out of sight of both my squire and her prey. This hunting assessment hasn't exactly been going perfectly; her technique is fine and she's done anything I would have to track down game, but the forest isn't cooperating. This stag will be her first big catch today.

Fwoot.

The shot is nearly perfect, hitting the stag in the shoulder. It doesn't seem to realize it's been hit for a moment and tries to jump away into the forest, then stumbles and collapses. Briatte is on it in a heartbeat and I've barely spotted the dagger in her hands before she's pierced its heart. It falls still.

I stand, stretching my sore legs, then reveal myself. "Nice work."

"Lady Schorme!" Briatte jumps to her feet, hurriedly sheathing her dagger and wiping the blood off her hands. "I—thank you! I… I haven't caught much else, though."

"I know," I assure her. "It's not your fault. Sometimes it's just bad luck. But this more than makes up for it. Let's get it back to the castle. I can show you how to prepare it."

I help her lay the stag's body over Sunny's flank, then I go find Dune so we can return. As we ride, Briatte comments. "It's thanks to you, you know? I used that thing you told me about like, closing one eye and lining it up from your shoulder."

"Oh." I wind one rein around my finger, embarrassed by the praise. "Well, come on, I just told you. You were the one who took the shot."

"I'm serious!" Briatte's eyes shine. "I think you're the best with a bow at court."

"What, have you been secretly testing everyone?"

"No, but I mean…" She shrugs. "You have such good aim and you know so many, like, tricks."

Just take the compliment, Samn. "Well, thanks."

When we return to the castle, I help Briatte bring the stag around back and we lay it on the stone just outside the kitchen. There's a small pulley system to let us hang the animal up mounted in the bricks of the castle; some villager invention.

"Okay, start gutting it and I'll get us some carving knives," I direct. That's about as far as we got with fresh-kill preparation in past hunting sessions. So what? Thorrin doesn't know how to do it either. Not to knock Lady Fyrra, but… you know.

Briatte gulps as she looks at the body, then kneels and pulls her dagger back out. I return to the kitchen to fetch a couple of the slightly-curved, always-sharpened blades that are kept in a high-up cupboard. Sarola and her brothers have been causing enough chaos without wickedly sharp knives in their chubby little hands.

"Back already?"

I turn to see a very pregnant Lady Tiall hovering in the doorway of the throne room. She's taken to wrapping her arms around her belly and drifting from room to room to rub people's noses in her pregnancy. Now, she peels herself off the doorframe and takes a leisurely stroll toward me.

"Carving knives? Oh, is Briatte going to learn now?" Her smile's about as sharp as the blades in my hands.

"Yep," I say tightly and then quickly leave again, hoping she won't follow. Couldn't be that lucky, though, could I? Speikall trails me like a shadow pregnant with triplets. "Here, Briatte."

Briatte must hear something in my voice, because as she takes the knife from me, I see her stare at Lady Tiall. I guess we both grew up with her ruling the nursery with her iron fist, I think, noting the way Lady Tiall eyes Briatte. Briatte's her granddaughter, after all. Hm. Maybe that's the reason for all the pregnancy-showboating. Both Lady Fennen and Cindra are a little concerned about how the birth will go, since Speikall's around fifty, but she seems well enough to watch judgily as I quietly instruct Briatte on holding up the stag's leg, then incising around its ankle.

"Just slide your knife under the skin like that," I advise, guiding her hand with mine. Briatte makes a face, but her movement is smooth and unfaltering.

"Once you have the pelt you can make a cloak." If I didn't know any better, I'd think Speikall sounded sweet, but I've been around long enough to know a jab is coming. "Do you know how to sew, Briatte?"

There it is.

"Mom taught me." Briatte's tone is neutral, but her expression reflects my own irritation.

"And you and Samn have been practicing?" Speikall asks. Look, I don't even like being called Lady Schorme, but something about 'Samn' in that saccharine voice pisses me off.

"Nope, too busy battle training." I can't help mimicking her overly cheery tone. "Gut punches and choke-holds and that sort of thing."

Briatte is getting the hang of skinning, and sets down the knife to start pulling at the pelt with her hands. I turn to Lady Tiall.

"You'd think having two women in charge might allow the court to move in a more… family-oriented direction," she sighs. I grit my teeth. "But I suppose we'll all be learning to stab our enemies and the court will have to eat raw venison, skin and all."

I'm literally teaching her to remove the skin right now. "Your son's two years ahead of Briatte and he can't bake an un-scorched loaf of bread to save his life, you know."

Lady Tiall gives a little tittery laugh. "You know how men are."

Is she for real? I squint at her. I think she's just trying to wind me up. "Briatte's learning now, isn't that enough?"

She shrugs. "It takes practice, and she doesn't have it."

"Doesn't have it yet, everyone starts somewhere." Am I seriously arguing with a heavily pregnant woman? Just ignore her, Samn, and help Briatte before she cuts herself.

"And you've elected to let your squire start four years late?"
Alright, that's it. Pregnant or not, I'll deck her. I haven't done a bad job as a mentor, I'm just not doing it the way she wants me to, right? Briatte's doing fine. So what if she wasn't born knowing how to skin a deer? There are more important things in life. "Lady Tiall, all due respect, I'm not interested in your opinion on how I train my squire."

That actually evokes a non-cloying reaction from her. Her lips turn white and thin, and the usual spark in her gaze turns downright venomous. "Alright. Have it your way, but when she's—"

She cuts herself off with a sudden groan of pain, and wraps her arms even more tightly around her swollen midsection.

Oh shit, what did I do?

"Lady Tiall? What's wrong?"

"Nothing!" There's a nearly-triumphant look in her eye as she gazes at her belly. "I'm going into labour. Get the healer."

Healers. But there's no time to correct her. "Briatte—uh, leave the stag for a sec. Can you—um, can you help Lady Tiall into the healer's wing? I'll fetch Lady Fennen and Lady Plait."

Briatte has gone wide-eyed as if the babies are popping out of Lady Tiall as we speak, but snaps back to her senses at my order, and takes the woman by the arm. "Okay, I'll… I'll help you. C'mon. Um, remember to breathe."

"You don't need to help her through the delivery, just get her to the wing!" I toss over my shoulder as I run through the kitchen and out into the throne room. "Lady Fennen! Lady Plait!"

Cindra's just coming out of the dining hall with a bundle of paper under one arm. I don't know what she was doing in there, but now's not really an ideal time to catch up. "What—Samn, what's happening?"

"Lady Tiall just went into labour."

"What?" Cindra freezes and I have the weirdest feeling that she's about to run away. I grab her shoulder.

"Where's Lady Fennen?"

"Lady… she's—she was doing one of her big cleans, I wanted to stay out of the way—" Cindra explains, her gaze skittering around the throne room almost distractedly. I turn to see Briatte ushering a still-groaning Lady Tiall across to the healer's wing hallway. "And—oh, blessed Starlaxi, I'm…"

Oh. Silaverre. Her reaction clicks into place, and I tighten my hold on her shoulder, pulling her into a half-embrace. "Cindra. It's going to be okay. Goldanna was fine, remember? And Lady Fennen will be doing most of the work, won't she?"

"She's hardly a soothing presence!" I can't quite tell if she's making a joke. She swallows hard, looking faintly ill.

"Lady Tiall's tough as nails," I assure Cindra, and start herding her toward the healer's wing. "You'll both be fine, and you don't even have to take care of three screaming babies for the next two years." I'm relieved to see some of the almost-green cast of Cindra's face fade at the attempt at humour, and I finally let go of her. "Go get 'em, tiger."

"Please never say that again." Her straight face twitches though, and I grin.

"You'll be fine," I repeat, then give her a little shove toward the healer's wing. Lady Tiall's groaning is getting louder, and I can't help wincing too. But it's going to be fine. If she's strong enough to snipe at me all day, she's strong enough to get through this. She's at the castle, she has two healers with her… I swallow, remembering Fiyr's white face as he walked through the castle doors, clutching two children in his arms with tragedy hanging over him like a storm cloud… It's Speikall. The Blessing will save her.

Briatte appears in the doorway of the healer's wing and comes over to me, looking worried. "Lady Fennen told me to go. I would've helped, but…"

"It's okay, you're not expected to know how to deliver babies," I remind her, then add, "Just sew, skin a deer, and play a few instruments."

Briatte laughs, then shoots another anxious look at the healer's wing. "Is… do you think she'll be alright?"

"Of course," I assure her. "She's been through it before. Here, why don't we go finish with that stag and then we can prepare a nice meat pie for her when she's done?"

"How long will it take?" Briatte follows me into the kitchen, then back out into the cool spring air.

"The birth or the pie?"
"Uh… either?"

"I don't know, and probably around three hours if you include quartering the stag and preparing the meat." I bend and grab the carving knife that Briatte left on the stone. "Here, finish with the skin and I'll hook it up."

I'm grateful for the work. This kind of methodical, step-by-step process is great for keeping Briatte distracted, and honestly, I'm happy to have an excuse to focus on something other than the three-about-to-be-newborns in the castle. Briatte does a fine job with the pelt, and I haul the stag up onto the hanging system, grunting at the weight. Well, here's the fun part.

We spend an hour with the carcass, and I know that I'm kind of just making an excuse to not be in the castle, but hopefully Briatte's learning something. Sure enough, within the hour she's sliding her blade between muscle and bone like a pro. Take that, Speikall. My squire is doing fine.

As Briatte chops a couple of withered onions and potatoes, I grind the meat and spice it. It's an old recipe, and I have faint memories of Lady Fuor and Mom helping me and Duss measure out the spices, far away from the sizzling oven-top. Then Mom would herd us back into the nursery while we waited for it to cook and Duss and I would ask every two minutes if it was ready yet, emboldened by the smell. The memory makes me pause as I poise the bowl of ground venison over the oiled pan. I wonder what Duss is doing right now.

"Lady Schorme?" Briatte asks, noticing my hesitation.

I dump it in, pulling my hands away quick enough to avoid the splatter of oil on my hands. "Yeah?"

"Er, nevermind."

Lady Schorme. It gives me the familiar prick of annoyance. Even though I knew since I was like, six, that I wanted to tell everyone who I 'really was' at my knight's ceremony, the ceremony always seemed so… distant. And the rest of my life after that even less real. What was I, nineteen? And now I'm nearly thirty and I'm probably going to be around for at least another thirty years. It's a long time to be stuck as something I don't exactly want to be. And if the queen's predictions come true, which feels more and more certain these days… then I'll be Queen Samn-whatever Star. Any consideration of being in charge of the entire court is terrifying, of course, but that in particular makes my stomach drop. Aren't I a woman? I had thought so, and it's not like I recoil from simply considering myself female in that same way, but something about the title…

"I think it's burning?"

"Fuck!" I grab a wooden spoon from one of the pots on the counter and stir with a vengeance. The slightly-charred venison separates itself from the base of the hot metal. "Thanks, Briatte."

"What are you thinking about?" She sets down a water-filled pot on the burner next to me and lights the gas, then adds the potatoes to cook them.

I hesitate. This isn't a great time to spring it on her, is it? And besides, what if she starts calling me Sir Schorme and then everyone starts asking questions? "Uh… just about what Lady Tiall was talking about."

Briatte's brow crinkles. "I know she's probably having a hard time right now, but… she's so pushy."

That's one word for it. The synonyms my brain offers are not the sort I would voice in front of my squire. "Yeah. Hey, you don't feel like you're missing out on key information, or whatever, do you?"

"Like what?"

"I mean, you know how to cook, and hunt, and fight, but I guess I've only taught you how to skin and quarter a big animal just now," I muse. "And you don't know how to change a diaper or figure out why a baby is crying."

She raised an eyebrow. "Am I supposed to?"

I nibble on my lip, considering how to explain it. "Well, you've heard about my… unique situation, haven't you?"

"How your parents passed you off as a boy for twenty years?"

"Yeah."

"Did no one know?" I'm guessing from her tone that she's wondered for a while. She doesn't quite meet my eyes as she shrinks the flame beneath the pot of potatoes and twists up a timer. "I just… how did you do it? Didn't everyone know when you were born? And how did they not notice when you… when you… y'know."

I can't help laughing a bit at the colour in her cheeks. "I wasn't the one who planned it. My parents decided before I was born that however I was born, they'd raise me as a boy, and… well, when I was born, it was just my mom, my dad, and Lady Lief."

Briatte's eyes widen. "She knew, then."

"Yeah, and so did the queen and my grandmother, Lady Tali. But they knew my parents' reasons, and they respected their wishes." I stir the meat, judging how brown it's gotten. "And to answer your other question, we, uh… took certain measures. I wore tight-fitting bandages across my chest, kept my voice a little lower than normal, and…" I shrug. "The thing no one seems to realize is that it would literally never occur to you to wonder if someone is secretly another gender."

"But if they saw you… like, normally, wouldn't they realize something's weird?"

I shrug again. "There were a lot of things we couldn't control. I'm not as muscular as I would be if I'd been born a man, I grew slower and earlier than Duss, Fiyr, Graie, and Ravne. My voice deepened, sure, but it never properly dropped."

"And no one ever put two and two together?"

"Like I said. It's just not something you ever wonder about. How often do you consider that Faern might have been born a boy but that my mom and Sir Strommer swore everyone who knew to secrecy?" I suggest. Briatte lets out a bemused laugh.

"I've seen her naked," she answers. "She oversleeps a lot and eventually I just told her I didn't care if she washed at the same time as me."

I laugh too, remembering how I would sneak out to the washing rooms early in the morning and keep as many clothes on as possible as I washed. Usually, that meant training with damp under-clothes. "Okay, what about Clowd? He could be a girl."

"Well, he doesn't look like one," Briatte says, then tilts her head as she thinks. "I dunno."

"You only know what a boy looks like because you were told that Clowd, Sewif, and Thorrin were boys," I remind her. "Sir Peyelt, Sir Sterrip, and Sir Harte all grew up thinking that I was just another example of what a boy could look like. You aren't born knowing how to identify men and women."

"I—shoot!" The potatoes have begun boiling over. She turns down the gas further, waving to dissipate the steam. The stove sizzles as water leaks between the bars. "Why'd your parents do it, though?"

The question brings on a flood of memories, of each stage of my childhood as my parents explained more and more to me. I never questioned that they'd done the right thing, and especially after my father died… I'm silent for a moment, still holding the wooden spoon tight in my fist. Lady Flourer's gentle questioning comes back to me. "Because they wanted me to learn everything the boys would learn. And because they didn't want me to shuffled off into the nursery the moment I became a lady of the court."

Briatte's brows shoot up. "What?! That's not gonna happen to me, is it? What's Thorrin learning that I'm not?"

"No, it's not going to happen to you," I assure her. "Not if I or the queen have anything to do with it. But even just twenty years ago, things were different. There would've been certain expectations on me if I'd trained as a girl. Sir Strommer wouldn't have been my mentor, even for a short time, and the queen likely wouldn't have been either. Maybe your mother or Lady Peilte."

Briatte nods eventually. "Oh. And they would've taught you how to cook and prepare meat and raise kids and stuff."

"Instead of battle life-force and saving villagers-in-distress," I finish, nodding. "It's… I'm not saying cooking and raising kids aren't valuable skills, because it's the only reason any of us… you know, are alive, and aren't starving. But my mom…" I grimace. "She didn't have the life she wanted, and she wanted to give me the life I wanted. Or at least, the life she thought I would want."

And she wasn't exactly wrong, I think. Just the idea of losing all the times I raced Fiyr to a border, or knocked Duss on his ass in a spar, or executed a tricky move with Sandstorm… Blessed Starlaxi, no.

"She has the strongest life-force at court, did you know that?" I tell Briatte. "I mean, my demonstration was apparently really impressive, and I guess Brembal will give her a run for her coppers when he's older, but… of all the current knights and ladies, other than the queen, she's the strongest."

"Animal summoning, right?" Briatte shakes her head in wonder at the idea. "I flipped out when I summoned my first dog."

"I remember." I grin, thinking of how fourteen-year-old-Briatte gathered up the tiny, fluffy black dog in her arms and hugged it, practically bouncing with joy.

"Being able to summon all of them…" Her eyes almost glaze over, imagining. I study her face. I guess she'd be able to understand it even better than me. What would the equivalent be for elementalists? Mom can't summon anything any summoner could. She can't do any plants or trees, so… maybe like solid elementalism. Earth, wood, ice, sand, rock, metal, cloth, ash… I survey the kitchen, imagining how much a person could do with full control over nearly everything in their vicinity.

The timer goes off, snapping her out of her daydream. She carries the pot to the sink, and I cut off the gas that feeds the flame cooking my venison. We work on the crust together, and soon enough, a fat, yellow-crusted pie is cooking in the oven, crimped around the edges and glistening with brushed-egg. Briatte wipes sweat off her forehead with the back of one flour-y hand, then sighs.

"Whew. Okay, I'm ready to eat it," she says, grinning, then turns on the spray of cold water to clean her hands.

"Waiting's always the hardest part." As if the memory of our childhood summoned him, Duss appears in the doorway.

"Something smells good in here."

I smile, and, juxtaposing him with my memory, can't help cataloguing all the differences in him. He's still shorter than me, thank the Starlaxi, but neither of us are kids anymore. His jaw's not as round and pudgy as it used to be, and his hair lies… flatter, let's say, than it did before. I guess we've both changed a lot. When he looks me in the eye, his gaze is a little more distant. And that's new too...

"We made a meat pie out of the stag Briatte took down this morning." I should pack the other cuts into the icebox. Maybe we can smoke a few, I think the western forests' training packs are running low.

"Well done," he offers Briatte and she thanks him. The silence hangs awkwardly. "Well, uh, let me know when it's ready, I'll be first in line."

"We made it for Lady Tiall," Briatte informs him. "Are you going to cut in line in front of a pregnant woman?"

"Oh! No, of course I wouldn't! I—oh, you're joking, aren't you?"

I hide a grin as I rinse out the pan I used for the meat. That's probably why I was closer friends with him than Graie or Ravne… Birds of a feather, and all that. "You can have some when Lady Tiall's eaten her fill. Do you know how she's doing?"
"No, Lady Fennen isn't letting any in except Sir Peld," Duss answers. "Must be weird to be an elder and have kids."

Sir Peld's in his sixties, I think. How much longer will he live? It's morbid, estimating the probable number of years that other people at court have left, but… It wasn't easy for me to grow up without a dad. Maybe if Fiyr and I have kids soon… they could grow up with Lady Tiall's kids. We have time, though, don't we?

As our usual supper time rolls around, Lady Tiall is still in labour. Briatte and I are joined by Lady Fuor in fending off the rest of the court from the smell of the pie. She also whips a salad from winter chard and apples with the kind of absentminded deftness that I can only dream of. I guess a curriculum of almost entirely cooking and castlework results in a few talents.

Eventually, the hordes become too strong and it's obvious that if we try to stop anyone from eating before Lady Tiall, we might be here for a long, long time and will probably burn a few bridges in the process. Fiyr arrives to help divvy it up, and even after everyone's gotten their portion and settled down to eat, there's no sign of Lady Tiall, Sir Peld, or our healers.

"I hope she's alright," Fiyr murmurs as we sit. "And I hope Cindra's okay."

I nod. He starts on the food in front of him, and I watch him, unable to muster my own appetite.

"S'really good." His face is a little pinched, though, and I squint at him for a second. Is it bad? Did he get some of the burnt venison? He's probably worried about Cindra.

"Are you okay?" Can't really go wrong with that one.

He sighs and sets down his fork. Knew it. "It's Clowd again."

"Oh?" Okay, almost. I still knew something was wrong.

"He wasn't stealing from the training rations." Fiyr's lips purse. And that's bad news…? "He asked me if he could hunt alone, and I followed him to…" His cheeks redden a little. "I wasn't… I mean, I just wanted to make sure he was alright."

"You're his mentor," I remind him..

"Right. Well, I saw him go to the gods' manors. And… he wasn't there for his mother." Fiyr swallows. "This god, a really big one with white hair greeted him like they knew each other—he hugged him."

What?! Words fail for a moment. "I—you—he was… what?"

Fiyr looks sick and pushes his plate away from him. "I think the god was his father. I don't know how he found him, or how… but they went into the house together and I waited for nearly an hour, but Clowd didn't come back out until I was back at the castle. I have no idea what they were doing in there, but…"

I shake my head. Nothing good. "What are you going to do?"

"I don't know." His eyes cloud. "What do you think I should do?"

"Well, make sure he doesn't go back," I say, mind whirling. What can he do? Clowd already hardly listens to him. "You should confront him. He might think he's doing nothing wrong."

"He already thinks he's never done anything wrong in his life," Fiyr snorts.

"Exactly."

Fiyr's face is still creased with worry, but after seeming to think on it for a moment, he nods. "Yeah. You're right. Hey, Clowd!"

Shit. I didn't mean now! But Clowd's already breaking away from Sewif, Briatte, and Faern, and I don't have an excuse handy. Instead, I fix my gaze on my meat pie and get ready to tune out the argument. Fiyr isn't beating around the bush, at least.

"I saw you yesterday," he snaps as Clowd sets his food down.

"I saw you too." If I didn't already know that Clowd was guilty, I don't think I would've detected the edge in his voice.

Either he's a good liar or I'm terrible at reading people. Possibly both.

"After we trained," Fiyr grinds out.

"I went hunting," Clowd shrugs and puts a forkful of the meat pie in his mouth, "and I got unlucky."

"No, you went to the gods' manors." Fiyr's eyes flash.

"What are you talking about?"

"Clowd, I watched you hug the god and go inside with him for hours." I can tell Fiyr's reining in his temper. Time to stare at my salad. "Give it up."

Clowd shrugs again, careless as a summer day. "Dunno what you're talking about. I hunted in the southern forests."

"We both know that's not true."

It's genuinely destabilizing to hear Clowd lie so confidently. Fiyr literally followed him. How could he think there's a chance of him getting out of this with a good bluff?

"Whatever. Can I go?" He eyes his food with something approaching disgust and I feel defensive. Okay, maybe it burned a little! But the crust is good.

"Don't go back there," Fiyr orders, then his voice softens. "I know it's hard for you. But you—"

Clowd lets out a bitter laugh that makes my stomach turn. "No, you don't. You actually have no idea what it's like. Can I go?"

"Clowd…"

He stands, grabs his plate, and stomps off to the other side of the dining hall. As he passes the squires' table, Faern shoots him a concerned look that he ignores. Then he slams his plate onto a deserted table, slumps into his chair, and stares at the food moodily without touching it.

"I'm sorry, Fiyr," I offer.

Fiyr shakes his head and laughs, a sound uncannily similar to Clowd's. "What are you sorry for? Every time I try to… I just keep making things worse."

I cover his hand with mine, and he takes it with a little squeeze. I want to help him, but if I had to make a list of things I'm least suited to handling… "I don't know what you should do, but… I'm just sorry that he's doing this."

Fiyr nods, pursing his lips, then lets out a long, tired breath. The purplish tint to his under eyes makes me think Clowd's been on his mind a lot lately. I press on his palm with my thumb, rubbing slow circles almost unconsciously. His skin is so rough; had I not noticed before? I suppose we all have calluses.

Cindra takes a seat next to us. I didn't even notice her come in; she hasn't got any food. Her face is perfectly blank.

"Cindra…? How'd it go? Is it over?" Fiyr asks, worry rippling over his face as he takes in her empty expression.

"Yes, it's over," she rasps, and looks from Fiyr to me. "Lady Tiall's alright, and they have two sons."

"Two," I echo.

"There was a girl, but she wasn't breathing." Cindra folds her hands delicately, and I can see them trembling even as her face doesn't change.

No… I open my mouth, but the words snag in my throat.

Fiyr wraps an arm around her and she starts to cry.

"I knew something would happen," she says through the faltering breaths. Fat tears spill down her cheeks. "I knew. Because she's older, and Lady Fennen just—just told her to stay calm when Lady Tiall asked if she was going to be alright—and—"

I have no idea what I can say. I don't know if there's anything to say. Fiyr just gently rubs her back, and lets her cry. It's not fair, is as much as my brain can muster. It's just not fair. Why does it keep happening? And I know Lady Tiall and Sir Peld must be suffering immensely, but I can't help my heart breaking a little for Cindra too. How do you keep going, knowing it's your job to save people and still lose them? Then, remembering my train of thought from earlier… How can you get through your own pregnancy, knowing the risk? I imagine the terror of knowing that the life you carry might kill you. Or caring for it for nine months, and then losing them? Not to mention the risk of childhood illness… How do you suffer that much, and carry on afterward?

Looking at Cindra and Fiyr, though, and remember my father, there's really only one answer, though, isn't there? Because that's what we do. We keep going, because it's the only thing we can do. The world hurts us, and we heal ourselves.

I don't want to say it; it feels almost thoughtless. Disrespectful to Lady Tiall and Sir Peld, or like I don't understand the depths of their pain. I don't, it's true. I can't fathom it. But even as Cindra cries and Fiyr looks like he's breaking in two, I know it. We'll survive because we have to. I take Cindra's other hand and hold it tight.

Poor baby. Canon's a bitch. Review sir? *shakes can*

~Akila