At night, once the children were in bed, I'd sometimes talk to Duane and Kat, but not as often as we had during that year in the cave. We were all so busy during the day, and so tired at night. And they were young, and technically newlyweds; they liked some time to themselves as well. Once they disappeared into their room I'd start writing my letters, which were my best outlet for whatever I'd bottled up during the day. I tried not to acknowledge the trend to myself, but I did tend to confide most in Locke.
One bitterly cold November day, after delivering the mail through sleet, I burned my hand on the flatiron and shocked Duane deeply with my ability to curse. I followed that up with a storm of sobs. He really thought I'd lost my mind. I couldn't begin to explain that it was because I'd reflexively tried to heal myself, only to realize all over again that I'd lost that ability forever – it was a realization I kept facing, but that day, it was the last straw. I tried to explain all that, but while he knew, he didn't really understand. They'd noticed the color of my hair, they'd even seen me turn into an Esper, but there was no way to explain to a normal human what it was like to lose that part of yourself.
I mentioned it in my letter to Locke, both my overreaction and the odd loneliness of not being able to talk about it. To my surprise, I received a letter within two weeks, full of concern for my health and mental state. Clearly it was in reply to the letter I'd just sent. It should have taken two to three months for my letter to get from here to Nikeah, Nikeah to Figaro, Figaro to the excavation base camp, and for Locke's reply to retrace all those steps. I didn't understand, but I wrote back to assure him I was fine and demand to know what miraculous evolution had occurred in pigeon speed.
Very little, as it happened, though apparently Edgar's latest project was to breed a bird that could fly long distances over water. Locke was in Figaro, preparing with the rest of the team to address the Royal Society. He apologized for his "hysteria," as he called it, but insisted he couldn't help worrying. You were halfway magic after all, he wrote, a statement I instinctively felt wasn't accurate but couldn't refute with evidence. I'm still here, though. There must be a bit more solidity in me than that, I wrote back, and turned to other subjects. Tell Edgar to get back to work on my laundry invention, I added. He may think he's enough of a hero but he might actually impress some women if he'd work on that.
Three days after I sent my reply, I received another letter from him, this one dated a month and a half previously, somewhat weather-stained, and letting me know that the excavation was drawing to a close and that Locke would be wintering in Figaro. A week and a half after that arrived, I got another reply. I relayed your message, Locke wrote. Edgar has been spending much more time with laundresses lately. Perhaps there's a connection?
Our correspondence speeded up noticeably all through late autumn and winter. I began a letter, nervous, before a town meeting, and concluded jubilantly after it was over; they'd actually listened to me while we were drafting the new constitution, and I'd been nominated for the head of the council. While Martin Collier, one of the more popular of the young farmers, had been put up in opposition to me, he'd laughed and said running against me was a lost cause. When the neighbors had been friendly, before, I'd thought they were just being civil. I hadn't expected this sort of support.
All that winter we worked out the government. We hired Elisabeth Luther, the daughter of one of the few families to live in town, as the schoolteacher. (A decision that nearly led to mutiny in my own home – most of the kids had been old enough to attend school before the Fall and they didn't welcome its return.) We worked out the details of the legal system and taxation, and we drafted the letter to the government of Figaro petitioning for recognition as a sovereign nation. It was strange, and felt somewhat roundabout; it would have been simpler just to ask Edgar directly, after all. And while it was all very official, it somehow felt as though it wasn't. After all, I was just sitting there in the same dress I'd worn minding the store earlier that day, surrounded by people who bought plows and chamberpots from me.
But it was done, and eventually a rider in muddy royal livery delivered the official reply. I opened it that night at the council meeting, feeling nervous even though I knew what it would say. Edgar had sent me another of his scribbled notes to let me know I was now the head of a country, but it didn't really count until the seal had been broken and the letter read publicly. I feel as though I should have been wearing a powdered wig or robes of office for all this, I wrote Locke that night.
It was nearly the Solstice, and while they didn't do much to celebrate the holiday in Mobliz, it was still a holiday, to be marked with candles and a minor feast. And, for the kids, candy. More of a production was the planning for the next year's victory celebration. We'd begun the planning, in casual fashion, shortly after the harvest was finished, but it went into high gear once the solstice was past. We were so busy I almost didn't have time to notice that I wasn't hearing from Locke.
Almost. After a month and a half with no word, in the darkness and boredom of the tail end of winter, I guess the disappointment and irritation began to show on my face; Kat began giving me sympathetic looks when she helped me sort the mail. "Stop that!" I complained one day, half joking.
"I'm sure he has a very good reason not to write," she said.
I blinked. I didn't think she'd paid that much attention to my mail, to notice who it was whose absence from the stacks had upset me. I hadn't read that many snatches from his letters to her. A few, of course, but I didn't think I'd been a bother with them. "I'm sure he does," I replied stiffly. "He's bound to be busy, and he's probably... What?"
She was staring at me. "I was just teasing you," she said. "I mean, I figured something must have changed, since you always look so disappointed in the mail, but I didn't think I'd really drag a confession out of you. Who is it, then?"
"Oh shut up!" I wailed, and stomped off to do inventory in stubborn silence. Not the most mature reaction, or the course of action best calculated to convince her there was nothing wrong with me.
She left me alone for the rest of the day, and though I later apologized for snapping, she didn't start teasing me again. Or, for that matter, speaking to me. I tried groveling, that night, as we were washing the dishes.
"Well. All right," she agreed, grudgingly. "I suppose I understand. I mean, I didn't realize you were waiting for a specific letter, and I certainly didn't think you were in love—"
"I'm not!" I protested, a bit too heatedly to convince her. "He's just my friend, that's all!" She just gave me an infuriatingly knowing grin. It was probably deliberately infuriating, since she wasn't what you'd call quick to forgive.
Another week passed, still with no word from Locke. Kat dispatched the older kids, in rotation, to help me with the mail. They took full advantage of this opportunity to complain to me about school. Isabella, when pressed, grudgingly admitted that she liked being around other people her age, but Byram and Theo already had each other and saw no point to further learning. Both insisted that if they could read and do arithmetic, they were ready for the world. I didn't know if Kat was trying to be sensitive to my feelings by staying away, or trying to punish me with the boys, and when I asked, she just smiled sweetly and changed the subject. I was leaning towards the punishment theory, especially once she added Annie to the mix. Byram and Theo were stubborn, but Annie was relentless.
"I don't see why I'll EVER need to know the eights in multiplication," she was wheedling, when Martin Collier knocked on the window. I put a paperweight on the unsorted letters and came out onto the porch.
"There's a rider – should be stabling his bird at the inn now. Foreign accent, so he's probably business for you one way or the other." We were expecting another round of settlers, trying to move in just in time for spring, or we could have merchants or government messengers from any number of places.
"Figaran, Doman, or—" I broke off, staring at the wiry, bearded figure as it rounded the corner of the inn yard. He had a bandanna wrapped around his head, covering his hair. It wasn't a headband as he'd usually worn them, and the beard was new, but somehow I could tell anyway. It couldn't be anyone else.
"Terra!" he called, dispelling the last doubt – there was no mistaking the voice. I stood frozen for a long moment as he walked toward me, then I half ran down the steps and threw my arms around him. He staggered back a step, and I felt his arms tight around my waist. "Miss me?" he asked, teasing.
He smelled of sweat, woodsmoke, and chocobo. I pulled back, meaning to glare at him, but I couldn't keep myself from beaming. "You could have written," I said, trying to sound accusing but failing miserably.
"I just wanted to surprise you! It worked?"
I nodded. "I have to get really mad at you later," I said, grinning like a fool. "Remind me."
"Okay," he agreed, and pulled me close again.