Song to listen to : Celtic Dreams - Ready for the storm.
My roof is leaking. I mutter a curse under my breath as I push a self made shelf towards the roof and then star climbing up.
It seems i will have to change part of the straw and put some earth under it to avoid it leaking further. I'm calculating calculating under my breathe the portion of straw and earth I'll need when I hear the approaching of hooves.
I frown and wonder who it might be. Not really many people come this way.
The horse that approaches is the same as Tristan's, white with grey spots and grey manes. -" Can I help you?" I ask and turn, holding my weight onto the small shelf. Before I can completely turn, a sudden shadow perches on my roof.
It screeches and flaps it's wings so suddenly that I gasp and push myself backwards. I can feel myself falling and then there is darkness.
I wake in my hut, lain on my bed with a piece of wet cloth on my forehead, as well as a crudely made bandage on my hand.
-" Oww." I mumble and stroke my head. " what happened?"
-" You fell." his voice is so eerily familiar it nearly breaks my heart all over again. I don't dare to look but i can't help it anyway.
" Tr...Tristan?" Immediately I sit up, my head spinning when I try to get out of bed.
-" Down." his voice is absolute, stern and he pushes me down before I can say anything. He looks much the same, though he seems to have another scar or two on his arms.
I feel uneasy with him here, I must admit. -" What are you doing here, I ask?" Turning my face away. - " Should you not be with Ysolde?" At my question, Tristan arches a brow.
- "I could care less about Ysolde." I frown and whip my head back to him. For all her faults, I will not allow him to be this negative about her. - " Don't you dare speak about my cousin like that." His eyes seem to warm slightly at my outburst.
-"That's exactly like you, Yseult. Loyal to a fault." His hand hovers above my head but I scramble back.
-"What is this?!" I spit, angry. - "What game are you playing?!"
- "I'm not playing a game." Tristan says. I frown even deeper. - " You are. The Tristan I know would never be so kind or gentle. You were always with Ysolde? you never knew even my name. How should I believe you now? Surely you must be planning something. You cannot be like this, it's not possible." Don't give me hope after all these years.
Tristan's eyes turn cold. - " Don't judge a ook by it's cover only, Yseult."
I don' get it? I say, still upset. - " What are you talking about?" The samaritan lazily takes an aple that sits on my table and bites it before turning his gaze back to me. - " Ysodle.."
-"Ysolde? My cousin?" I mumble. - " I thought you were a couple?"
Tristan shakes his head. " We never were. Ysolde was beautiful yes, but she could never hold a candle to you, Yseult."
My heart throbs unexpectedly at his words. It's not possible what's he's saying, is it?I am quiet as I listen to him.
-"Ysolde was beautiful, but also what I expected of a typical highborn lady. You were different. Some might say you were plain, but there was something in you, when I first looked upon you. You were like a gentle sunrise to look at. And each time I looked at you, something else I discovered that I foudn beautiful? your hair, how it glimmered in the sun gently, unlike Ysolde's golden locks. Your greyish eyes, a normal colour at first, like a shell you in the sea.
The more times you look upon it, the more beauty you discover. And each time I looked at you, i thought your eyes more skin that reddened in the summer, showing you were often outdoors. Your practicality, how you worked hard, though you were noble born. Yout obvious love for your cousin. The smile on your lips when you felt the sun and breeze on your face.
Your smiling happy face when you stood in the rain. Your gentleness and kindness, the respect and friendlyness you showed to everyone, people oyu didn't know, disregarding their status and birth in life. Your sweet character, even your anger, all grew endearing to me over the years."
-"There was something about you that interested me from the very beginning when I first saw you, yet you wer always so busy, so quick to dissapear whenever you saw me I thought you hated me. And then, I understood soon enough you did not hate."
He continues. - " Because you always dissapeared whenever I came to you, I thought perhaps my reputation scared you. By then I had become friends with Ysolde, becausqe though spoiled, she was friendly and always respectful and appropiate distance when I was with her. Someone of her ladies must have discovered that I was interested in you in a way Ysolde could never compare to.
When she got wind of my interest in you; I didn't realize at first that the way she acted was to give you the impression that I was couple with her. Her arm around my arm? Her insistence that I always walk beside her? It made us look like a couple and though I stopped listenings to her demands immediately, making her clear her attention was unwaranted and unwanted, apparently the first seeds of doubts had already started to grow."
- "Still, the way you sometimes looked at me, it had me hope and so I sent you a dress and that evening Ysolde wore it. She said you hadn't wanted it when she heard from who it was because I was to little of you.
I was so angry that ndeed it must have looked like I hated you and I realized quickly it was so unlike you I started to suspect foul play. But before I could speak to you, you were already gone."
- "I confronted Ysolde about it and I heard she had told you it was a gift from me to her, I was going to tell you everything immediately. But Ysolde knew I would do anything to keep you from harm and so she threathened to tell lies about us. She would tell you that we were a couple and she told me that she would sent you away to be married at once."
Tristan sighs, his eyes clouded with a plethora of emotions as he recalls what happened.
- " I did not believe her at first but she kept saying it and I knew when she threw her childish tantrums she was capable of it. My years off scouting have made me pretty good at reading people anf I know she would, just to spite me. So I kept quiet of my feelings and intentions to you."
Now he sits down at my table, hands on his knees, yet his gaze searches mine. -" Soon after word reached me of her entanglement with the nobleman Marc. By then, I kept my distance from her because I was so angry with her. When she started to realize however that her entanglement with Marc would have her possibly marry him, she wrote a letter to him to propose you as I bride instead. Lady..,who has grown fond of you, told me and helped me find the letter. I topre it apart and burned it before it could be sent. We took her writing utensils and before that she could rewrite her letter, Marc came to Camelot and demande Ysolde as his bride.
Not wanting to marry him, she proposed you as his wife instead. Marc however was enraged and offended that after all her flirting and pretence of a courtship, she was not willing to marry him."
He continues on, voice still steady and gaze still on me. -"She fled and while Arthur settled the case, I came to look for you. And before I could reach for you I discovered you and Ysolde screaming at each other in the fields.
When I came up to you both, I helped ysolde up because she was closest and hugged me so suddenly I had not expected it. The way she was wrapped around me, made it look like I was hugging her. I pushed her off, but you were gone again before I could tell you the truth, the full truth, Yseult!" His voice rises in anger but I don't shrink back. This anger, it's due to the circumstances that we have been through. I step closer to him and then lean against the table as he unclenches his fist and continues his story, in a softer voice.
-" You had dissa peared and I had to escort ysolde back to her home. It was an order from Arthur, my king. He promised me he would seek you out in Camelot, but you had already left and when and when I returned, I learned you were gone. "
-" I felt I had hurt you and perhaps I had dreamed or hoped to much. Perhaps you didn't like me, were not interested in me and never had. And then I discovered you took the dress I had gifted you and I wondered if perhaps you felt the sam for me as I did for you. It was enough to make me look for you immediately, but you were hard to find. I've been the last year on the search for you."
Some of it clicks into place but still I cannot help but be doubtfull. And then I look at him and his eyes are so kind, so sad and there is something there and I have hope again. Tears are gathering in my eyes, for the lost time, for everything that happened.
My lower lip trembles as I hide my face in my hands. - " I thought..I was in lvoe with you Tristan and I thought you hated me. It was not the first time Ysolde had taken the fancy of a party I was interested in. But you, I could not give you up. But Ysolden she was my cousin, I could not..
Even if I loved you..Even if I still love you!" A loud sob leaves my throat as I start crying. The chair beside me scrapes and then I feel Tristan's hands on mine.
-" You loved your cousin, you were torn by your loyalty to her. But don't doubt me, Yseult. I fell in love with you somewhere between your smiles and hasty glances at me. I do love you, Yseult, and I suspect I always will. It was always you Yseult, no one else. And tp hear you feel the same, I could not have asked more."
His face is so close and I blink up at him and then he presses his head to mine. -* " I amnot leaving Yseult and this time I want to do it right. At least if you still want me."
I hiccup and shake my head fervently. - " don't say such awful things, of course I want you. I want to be with you, I want you to stay with me. Can we start over? Can we begin again to know each other all over again so that this time it wil go right before we go further?"
A rare smile comes to Tristan's face. - " I could not be happier, Yseult, for this second chance. Of course we can start over. We will go slow, at our own rhythm, no pressure. And only when we both are ready, will we take the next step in our relationship. First, let's get to know each other all over again."
I nod and smile. -" Now to bed with you, Yseult. You're still weak."I nod and climb back into bed. I hear Tristan move around and though I lie awake I hear eventually his breath deepen into sleep and a small smile lingers on my face before I close my eyes.
My sarmaritan doesn't leave that night, nor does he the next day or the following days. And when autumn has passed and winter announces itself, I find his sword now laying on a small chest near my table, his clothes and armor laying next to my small bag of clothes and always two sets of spoons, cutlery and plates on the table. We start out slowly, as friends, though tehre is no doubt of our feelings. We just want to learn to get to know each other even better and it is going well.
It is on a cold winterday, Tristan outside hunting, that I raffle through my pack and to my surprise a piece of paper seems to fall out.
When I recognize the handwriting of Ysolde, I realize it is a letter..adressed to me. The letter is dated two years ago, even a while before I left Camelot. I break the seal open and then unfold the letter to start reading.
As I read Ysolde's letter, she explains exactly what Tristan has told me. And I realize he never knew of it and Ysolde did not know he planned to tell me.
I did not doubt him, but seeing it black on white, still takes my breath away. The final words in the letter, in a trembling hand make me sad, so badly I feel my throat constrict.
"If I could take back everything I did, my sweet Yseult, I would. If i could say sorry to you and show you gratitude for all the years i have missused you and taken you for granted, I would. I would trade all of my riches just to see you again, in health and happy.
You are dear to me, my dear yseult, and I can't help but curse myself for being so selfish and spoiled.
You are more to me then you know...
All my love,
Ysolde."
- " You miss her." Tristan's voice comes from behind me. I nod. -" I do, so much." Tristan comes closer and bumps my shoulder, and for a moment we stand like that.
- " You will see her again, I promise, and I have a feeling you will both talk it out." I sigh and then smile despite my sadness over Ysolde. - " Thank you, Tristan. How about I cook us lunch?"
I walk over to the small pot hanging near the fire. Then Tristan is there, taking hold of my hands. - " How about I help you?"
I nod and look up at him before laying my head on his shoulder for a moment. He lays his head on mine and we stay like that for a moment.
-" Lunch it is!" I say. And as outside the winds howl and the snow falls, I grin to myself, soothed by the sounds of Tristan humming as he starts skinning the rabbit he has caught and I stir the water in the pot now boiling over the water.
And as I turn to look, Tristan is looking at me so tenderly that I smile and face him head on, looking just as tenderly at him and I know, we are off to an amazing new start.