Disclaimer: I'm only playing in Pat's beautiful playground.

Chapter 25: Different This Time

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"It was supposed to be me," she repeated. She was pacing the room now, back and forth. Wearing the shape of her anger into the age-old floor. And all I could do was sit numbly on the bed and stare. Just minutes ago, I had yearned for its softness. Now, the bedsheets stung my skin. Like rakes.

"I was promised," she continued, no longer able to stop her tirade. "My parents already paid the dowry. One hundred talents! But then you came along. You, with your pretty face and your perfect skin. And he decided he'd rather have you." Her face was now so hard I barely recognized her.

"I don't want him," I managed.

The words seemed woefully inadequate, but shock still numbed me. I had given Kvothe up to come here, to find them. Family. And if I couldn't have him, I wouldn't… No, this couldn't be.

Not again.

"You think that matters?" Dara spat, and her angry voice echoed through me. "He offered a bride price for you. How could they refuse?"

"This is a horrible prank, Dara." I said quietly, grasping at the last threads of my sanity. Not again. "Stop it."

"You think I'm joking?" She actually laughed. "Listen, Father's agreed. Do you understand? And Mother's already been stashing the coin. She's been bribing me with it for span to be a good girl and let this go."

I said nothing, my lips so numb they felt frozen.

"Lots of other husbands," Dara added, her voice mocking. "That's what she said. Lots of other men for you, Dara, sweetie. As if husbands with such reach and money come round every other span. They would've already benefited if he married me. They would have been in the family. I would have provided for them! But now they can reap the same rewards with you twice over. Don't even have to pay a penny for them! And you'll be Heldon's lady wife, and shit cares what happens to me! They'll probably sell me off to the first man that offers. Like some whore."

"That can't be true," I whispered. I felt the air draining from the room. My lungs strained to breathe.

"Of course it's true." She stopped abruptly, and her hands balled into fists at her side. "It's all they care about. Money."

Her eyes met mine, and I was shocked to see them shimmer in the candlelight. The anger was gone. And in its place stood nothing more than a broken girl.

"If you don't believe me," she added softly, "just have a look at your jewels."

"You went through my things?" I said, because the accusation was easier to voice than anything else in my heart.

"No, you fool." She shook her head, her expression pitying. "Mother did."

With a trembling hand, I reached beneath the bed, where I had tucked away my small parcel of money and jewels. My rainy day fund. All the things I'd painstakingly saved for months in case I needed coin when things turned sour. I didn't need to open it now to see the truth of Dara's words. It weighed like empty hope and broken trust. And nothing. Because everything I'd saved was gone.

They had betrayed me. Used me. Just like Father. It was more than I could stomach. I should have expected it. My life had been split into very clear lines. Before, and After. Before and after Denna had died. And everything after that had been seven kinds of horrible. I should have never allowed myself to think it could be different. But I'd let that foolish thing blind me. That thing called "hope." And when hope breaks, you feel that pain twice over. The edges are harsher, as if the hope has been sharpening them all the while. Like a knife pressed to the grindstone.

Of the confrontation that followed, I remember little. And I wish I remembered nothing, because their words had cut like steel.

"We're doing you a favor, girl. We're handing you a rich husband on a platter."

"A girl with no standing or family. How do you expect to find anyone who'll have you?"

"I don't want a rich husband," I had hissed. "I want a husband I love."

"Love?" Aunt Flora had actually laughed. "You think marriage is about love? Marriage is about money. And sacrifice."

A marriage I would never accept.

"I'm not doing this." My words were ice and steely resolve. Though still, they'd pushed.

"Of course you are. We've already agreed. He's been promised a wife."

"Who do you think you are? To sell me? To collect money for me?" The rage had consumed me then, hot and angry as a dozen hearthfires, until I could feel the shape of Dara's anger burning in my own chest. "You think you own me? I don't belong to you!"

"You're the one who came to us. With nothing. We took you in."

"Nothing? I see you helped yourselves to my things! Where is my money?"

There had been no shame on their faces. "It's payment for putting you up. You expect us to feed you and clothe you for nothing?"

"You may be my sister's daughter, but you're a strain on our family. We owe you nothing."

"We've done so much for you. Taken you in. Even arranged your future. You should be thanking us."

"Well don't worry," I snapped in cold anger. "I won't be troubling you any more. I'm leaving."

"Leaving? You can't leave."

"Watch me. Or are you going to tie me to a horse cart and drag me to Heldon's mansion with my legs spread open?" I'd hissed.

They looked shocked. As if they couldn't believe I could be so crass.

"We're helping you, you stupid girl! Can't you see that this is best?"

"How can you say such vile things?"

"Aren't they true?" I said softly, my anger simmering below the surface now. My voice controlled. "You were going to introduce me slowly. You planned to convince me. You were so sure that I would agree that you made the arrangements with him before even speaking to me. It didn't even cross your minds that I might not want this. You know nothing about me. Nothing."

I took a step toward them, and they backed away. My anger rose again until it reverberated through the tiny kitchen. "You're selling me to him, uncle. Like a pig at market. And now that I've said no… Now that I won't agree, if you could tie me down to do it, you would."

And they were silent. Aunt Flora's bony lips drawn into a thin line. Uncle Allard's face's a drunken fury.

There was nothing more to say. I had already collected what was left of my things. I couldn't stand another moment in this broken house. I pushed past them angrily, my eyes set on the door ahead.

"Where are you going?" Aunt Flora hissed.

"Anywhere," I said coldly. "Anywhere but here."

"How dare you?" she all but screamed. "You ungrateful girl. You show up out of nowhere. And then you leave us like this. What would you have us tell Heldon?"

"Tell him whatever you like."

"He will bring us before the court!" she cried. "He will demand retribution."

I ignored her, my eyes set on the door ahead. Another step closer.

I heard angry footfalls behind me and abruptly felt someone grab at my arm. I whirled. It was Uncle Allard, his face set in a horrendous grimace. His teeth bared. Cold stole through me, but I pushed it aside. I had faced worse, after all. And I was not afraid.

"Let go of me," I said quietly.

"You owe me." His voice was a drunken growl, his angry eyes locked on me. "I took you in. You owe me, girl."

With my other hand, I reached abruptly through the slit in my dress. For the knife laying flat against my hip. It glinted in my hand when I drew it between us, and his eyes widened. Behind him, Aunt Flora screamed.

"I don't owe you anything," I said quietly, and raised the knife higher, until it was pointed at his chest. "Let me go."

He did, his arm falling numbly to his side as he released my wrist.

"I'm leaving now. You will let me go. You won't follow me." My lips stretched into a horrible grimace. "Or I'll kill you."

"You wouldn't," Aunt Flora said. "You wouldn't dare. You horrible girl. She's bluffing, Allard!"

"Am I?" I smiled then. Cruelly. I hoped the honesty showed. "I've killed a man with this knife before."

The blade hovered in the air between us for a long moment, my hand steady on the worn metal handle. The kitchen fell silent and still, their eyes glued to the knife. I could hear the ragged sound of their breathing. The sputter of the lights. The frantic beat of my heart. I backed slowly toward the door, still staring them down. I wanted to turn. To flee. But if I had learned one thing on the streets of South Renere, it was when to keep your fear chained tight. And mine was.

I was nearly to the door.

"Leave the ring."

My eyes shot to Uncle Allard, who had thrown the words at me from across the kitchen.

"If you're going to run off on us, leave Althea's ring. It's worth a bloody fortune."

I squeezed my hand into a fist, locking Mother's ring firmly inside. "No."

"It belongs in the family," Uncle Allard protested. "We can trace it back to Yll through three generations."

"I'm Mother's family," I spat, my anger rising again. "And you will not take another thing from me." And with that I turned to the door and flung it open.

Out in the garden which encroached onto their stone path, I saw Dara. She was standing silently in the dark, her eyes swimming with the reflected lamplight that spilled from the windows.

"I'm leaving," I informed her as I strode past. "You're free to marry him. All yours."

I hoped she wouldn't. But what did it matter.

There was nothing in Anilin for me after that. I was no stranger to leaving cities in the dead of night. To letting the wind take me down another road, into another place.

It was far from easy. My so-called family had left me with little more than the clothes on my back. It was like starting over again with nothing but the benefit of experience. But as I told myself night after empty night, I'd made do with worse before. This was a familiar trail before me, leading through a forest I knew. With markers along the way, showing me where to place each step. I could live as I had before. Seeing men. Taking their money, their favors. Their food. I would do it… to survive.

But Tehlu, was life meant to be so empty?

I decided then, with this fresh layer of grief still settling around me, that this time it would be different. I couldn't keep going like this, with no end and no beginning. Just an endless stream of empty beds and time that didn't belong to me stretching on and on and on until it was nearly enough to choke on. As if my whole life was just surviving… and waiting to die.

And it wasn't enough.

I wanted to go back. To a half-remembered life where Denna and Mother were alive and Father was kind again, and the world was simpler. Where the thought of tomorrow didn't hurt quite so much. But that life was gone, I knew that. There was no going back — nothing to go back to. But I knew that sort of life could still exist. I knew it, because I had felt it just recently. Even if only for three days.

With Kvothe.

And he was gone too, I knew that. Off chasing his own little corner of the world. But for those three days with him, I had dared to dream of a future. One that I wanted. And if I was going to live, really live, I needed that again. Not Kvothe so much, but the dreaming. I had to find something for myself. To carve out a piece that was only and truly mine. And I already knew exactly what that was. It was Kvothe, really, who had reminded me that night in the firelight. And now my heart ached with the strum of it.

Music.

It had been years since I'd last touched Mother's rebec. But it was gone. Irreplaceable. And I didn't have the talents to buy any instrument, nor the skill to play it. But I still had my voice.

And there was already a place that pulled at me. A place where music lived in the halls and danced in the streets, until the cobblestones hummed with its energy. Within two span, I was in Imre. And if I found Kvothe while I was there… If I found Kvothe… Well, it would be a lie to not admit that I wanted him as well.

Music. And Kvothe. How odd, the way they both came together in the harmony of song.

It would also be a lie to say that when I got to Imre, I didn't spend a single evening with a gentleman. Music could support me, but it wouldn't happen overnight. I knew that. I still needed to live. To eat. I needed money as much as ever, if not more. Instruments cost more than I could easily make in span, and if my life had taught me one thing, it was to be honest with myself. And the truth was that I could never hope to afford it on my own. There were only two ways available to me to fund the sort of life I wished. A rich husband. Or a patron.

And I'd already made it clear that I didn't want the first.

A patron, however, proved harder to find than I imagined. I had a rough idea of how to start. I returned to Imre on a fine evening toward the beginning of summer and spent the next few span ingratiating with the inner circles of its upper echelons. As Diana, Dinael, Davena. I spent evenings with gentlemen who made wild promises of harps and flutes and pipes, but the thing they wanted in exchange was not my music. And every time they asked too much, I started over. In another bar, or music house, or tavern. There was an endless stream of them, in Imre and Tarbean both. I flitted between, blown about by the cruel and unrelenting wind.

The easiest way, perhaps, would have been to try for my pipes at the Eolian. I debated it. Even discussed it with Deoch on many evenings as I drank wine and watched while Imre's best played the most coveted stage in town. Any musician that had earned their pipes could perform on that stage whenever they pleased. And I could try too, if I were willing. It would have cost me a whole golden talent, though Deoch hinted he would be happy to lower the price. And even without his charity, I could scrape the coin together. If I was successful, not only would I earn the highest honor a musician could hope for this side of the Centhe Sea, but I would put myself on display before hundreds of potential patrons. I could find one there, even if I didn't earn my pipes. It would have been the simplest thing in the world.

But it wasn't.

For one, I had watched dozens take the stage with hope burning in their eyes. Many were fantastic, exuding raw talent thick enough to cut. But span later, only three had achieved that most coveted reward. The highest honor. Their pipes.

And nearly all of them had been better than me. All, really, if I discounted the ones who were simply horrible. And the ones who had received their pipes were untouchably good. With voices clear and rich as honey and fingers that danced across strings or keys to weave melodies so chilling that they left me shaken. And I knew, after watching them, that I might have a voice that left men spellbound, but I could never hope to earn my pipes without a musical accompaniment. I was untrained and out of practice. My gifts too small. I simply wasn't good enough.

It would have still been worth the talent. I would have paid it, since I refused to take Deoch's charity. But I had made too many rounds. Used too many names, then and now. Left too many bills at too many inns unpaid. The Eolian was Imre's greatest treasure, and everyone who was anyone within a hundred miles had been at least once, if not several times a month. A span. And if I stepped on that stage, I would light myself up at their mercy. I would risk recognition. Reciprocation. My names… my secrets revealed.

Perhaps I'd get a patron, but I'd just as likely be strung up by the constables as well.

So every time Deoch and even Stanchion asked me to step onto the stage, I shook my head.

"Not yet."

"They'd love to hear you," Deoch promised.

"I'm not ready." I doubted I would ever be ready. I had dug myself into far too deep a corner. There was no reconciling that with Stanchion's stage.

Still, without the Eolian I made little progress. Some days it was as if I'd never promised myself anything would change at all. Sure, I had dreams now. Aspirations. But my life was still an endless line of men who wanted to take more than they ever offered to give. And for all the praise and applause that potential patrons showered me with, for all the promises they made, not one came to fruition. If the entirety of my efforts could be summed up in one evening, it would be the dinner party at Duke Samerson's estate in Aetnia.

I traveled there towards the end of summer with a gentleman named Royen, who appeared, at least initially, to be quite interested in my music. He was closely acquainted with Duke Samerson, who — Royen claimed — was in search of a court performer. We spent two days on a coach traveling to the distant city, where Royen promised an enjoyable few days and an introduction to the duke. He was in need of someone urgently, at least according to Royen. Perhaps even to perform at the dinner, for all the singers and lutists and harpists in his retinue weren't fit to wipe the dirt from his shoes.

It was a ridiculous accusation, and I never should have believed it. I think I didn't, truly, but it was nice to flirt with hope again. It seemed to come back to me, no matter how many times I've tried to let it go.

Royen did introduce me to the duke, but there was no mention of my music. No talk of the dinner besides what dishes his esteemed cooks had prepared. And the night's entertainment was well accounted for. There was a string of performers, each outdoing the ones before. And the final act: a heart-wrenching rendition of The Lay of Sir Savien Traliard performed by an Aturan couple, which left the entire hall in tears so heavy the dessert tasted like salt. It left me in tears too, much like the last time I'd heard it. Even though I had watched them rehearse before the dinner began, too angry to spend the intervening hours with Royen who wished for nothing but to bring me to bed.

It was the most difficult of difficult songs. It drew tears straight from a person's heart. And the complexity of the vocals. The dance of the strings… Perhaps if I could master something of its sort, then a patron would be easier to come by. But still, I had nowhere to sing such a song. The Eolian was out. Royen was out too, after that lie-filled mess of an evening. I couldn't bear to spend another moment in his company. I returned to Imre, stealing away in the early morning hours. Shedding my name again. Denea was just another girl fading in the wind, her name already lost to time. And in her place stood someone else. Dianne. Another mask to wear, because that seemed easier than being myself. Whoever that even was anymore.

I met Sovoy the next evening. I liked him. He was a handsome dark-haired man, with a neatly trimmed beard and the characteristic high cheekbones that spoke to his Modegan ancestry. He was a little pompous, but I had yet to meet a gentleman who wasn't. And behind his elaborate demeanor, he was kind and perfectly polite. He was well educated. A student, in fact, at The University across the river. For a span, I tried to work up the courage to ask if he knew Kvothe. The University was huge — a sprawling complex of odd-shaped buildings scattered within a town overflowing with alcohol. A town that seemed to exist solely for the purpose of entertaining the hundreds of students who lived there. What were the chances that this fine Modegan gentleman with coin enough to entertain me for days on end would be acquainted with someone like Kvothe, who had little more than the clothes on his back? And even then, Kvothe had never met Dianne. And Sovoy had never met Denna.

On Mourning, Sovoy took me to the Eolian. I nodded at Deoch on our way in before following Sovoy up to the third circle — a small slice of a balcony with a distant view of the stage below and a smattering of widely spaced tables. We picked one near the railing and Sovoy ordered a bottle of fine Vintish wine.

The night stretched. I found his hand on my hip more often than not, but that was the price to pay for a warm meal and a soft place to rest my head. And I was used to paying it. I knew how much things could cost.

So we sat there for hours, indulging in wine and each other's company as the lights dimmed and music flowed up to us from the stage like the bursts of talk and laughter that followed. Twice, Stanchion slipped past our table in the wake of two unsuccessful trials. The second time, he asked me if I thought the Aturan girl below had played well enough to earn the highest honor.

"Her singing was exquisite," I told him honestly. "But her playing was not to your standards." Much like mine.

"She was wonderful, wasn't she?" Sovoy remarked after Stanchion walked away. "I do believe she'll get her pipes."

I smiled sadly. I wanted to believe it too, but I didn't. And I was not disappointed.

And then the lights dimmed again, and for the third time in my life, I heard the opening notes of that familiar song. The one that threatened to tear out my heart each time. But this time… this time, it merely set it ablaze. The tearing, I suspected, would come later.