Letter from Home
Tornac broke the wax seal with shaking hands. He had put off reading the letter as it was written in Tipper's handwriting. Now as he had nothing to occupy his time and he wished to no longer put it off.
My dearest brother, it read.
When we last spoke, I was of ill mind and I dearly wish that I could take back many of the words I had said to you. All I can do is ask for your forgiveness, though I do not deserve it and I cannot yet say that I have forgiven you for leaving me. However, I can say now that I understand some of the reasons as to why you had done so, and that I have forgiven you for the words you had said though they were harsher than mine. I wish I were writing with good news, instead of the bad that seems to encase this world as of late.
There is no easy way to write this and so I will be frank; Garnock, our brother, has passed into the Void a fortnight ago. I am so very sorry, my brother, as I know you two have become very close these past years, despite your differences. It was his illness that took him into a dark place, as I'm sure you know from the last letter his mind was failing him. Regina had found him in the gardens the next morning, it was quite a horrible way for her to discover her father's death. We can only assume that in his ill mind, he threw himself from the Old Tower the night before. I fear for our niece, as you had once feared for me.
Tornac sighed, no longer able to read it and skipped to the end.
Come home, my brother. I miss you dearly.
With all my heart, your sister,
Osanna
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Letter from Rose
Tornac-
You had once told me, ages ago now it seems, that time would calm my mind and lighten my heart, and yet I wonder if enough time has passed for this enlightenment to occur, for my mind is a maelstrom and I understand none of it. There are no words to express what it is that I feel.
It is unsafe, I know, and perhaps very foolish, overly so: my unexplainable desire to view the sights of Teirm. I can sit here no longer allowing myself to remain in this limbo. There are matters I believe I must try to execute, answers I much try to find. I am selflessly thinking of only myself, I know and I should not be and yet I am. Perhaps I am wrong in doing so, perhaps not. I hope very much that I am not wrong.
I write this in hopes that you shall not have to receive it in the means it's intended to be received- that I will be bold enough to tell you myself and to hear the dispute that I will surely receive, but I know I will not be. You also said that you believed me to have changed very little in this anarchy of a journey, now I believe your words to be unpleasantly true.
In hopes that you shall forgive me,
Rose
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A Dolly Down
"She goes up- up- up to drink outta ah cup for sup-a-lup, den she goes down- down- down with a big, huge frown. An' all sad 'cause she don't have a brown crowny- owny, frowny, lowny, cowny."
Selena looked up in confusion, moving aside the book in her hands. Muirgheal sat at the edge of her bed, her doll raised her head, and to the mother's shock, she was singing to it. Selena had never heard her daughter sing, and she couldn't hold back the laugh that escaped her. "Cricket," she said, "what are you doing?"
The girl started, dropping the doll which made a pitiful sound as it hit the floor, and turned to look at her. "Nothing," she said, looking away, at the doll she dropped. "Uh-oh."
"What's wrong?"
"It falled," the girl said pointing at the ground. She leaned forward and started to crawl down from the bed. The bed was far too high up for Muirgheal to get down from without hurting herself- Selena had had to pick her up and place her on the bed to get her up there. As the girl turned around and put her legs over the edge, Selena shot forward in panic and pulled her to the middle of the bed, so that she was laying on her tummy. "Mamma!"
Selena looked at her daughter innocently. "I'll get it," she said, swinging her feet over the edge, the tips of her toes far from the ground. "Stay put." Standing up, Selena looked at her daughter, who was now sitting, looking at her watchfully, and walked over to get the doll. She picked it up and looked it over, and upon seeing nothing wrong with it, she leaned forward and handed it Muirgheal. The girl took it eagerly and checked every inch of the doll before resuming her playing but now in silence.
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No Title
Two
Rose was looking at her with narrowed eyes, her hands on her hips. Had they been anywhere else Ailis would have laughed at her but instead she smiled and looked away, running the stick over the ground. The cat in front of them leaned down, as if to pounce, its whiskers arced forward, its tail swishing in the air. Ailis edged the switch towards the cat, and the cat swatted at it, its claws cutting into the dirt.
"This is a horrible use of time," said Rose, shifting from foot to foot, crushing the grass beneath her feet.
Ailis smiled, pulling the stick away from the cat. The cat rushed forward, its paws scattering ahead of it in a desperate try to get the stick. "You think so?" Rose said nothing. Ailis pulled the stick into the air, the cat rose up after it. "It's certainly better than riding all day."
"I'd prefer to ride," she heard Rose whisper. Rose took a step back, and Ailis flickered the stick close to her, the cat chasing after it. She scattered away from the cat with a surprised noise.
Ailis looked up at her for a moment, and sighed. How would she find the words for what needed to be said? She didn't know. Nothing had ever tested her so. Allowing the cat to catch the switch, at last, Ailis stood up. At least the cat was able to get what it was after.
No Title
Three
Lowenek looked down at her daughter, who was tugging impatiently on her sleeve in attempt to get her attention. Her daughter looked at her with brown eyes that gleamed in the candlelight, the tight curls of her hair fell into her face and around her head reaching the tips of her ears. She grinned at her showing off her tiny, growing teeth and tugged forcibly at her sleeve again.
"What is it, moon-drop?" Lowenek whispered in her ear, not wanting to interrupt the men as they talked.
Her daughter pointed to the door. "Mama," she breathed, "out."
Lowenek smiled sadly at her and shook her head. "Not now."
"Out," she repeated.
"Allow me to listen to your father," she tried to reason with the small child, "and then we'll go outside." The young child promptly began to pout; her bottom lip puckered out, partly covering her top lip. She looked up at her mother with her big eyes, and Lowenek felt herself waver for a moment, before she mastered herself. "No, Nasuada."
Huffing, the girl released her grip on her mother and tottered to the shimmering cloth that hung in front of the door. She pointed to the door again, and turned to look back at her mother.
"Out," she said in a louder voice. The three men around the table stopped in their debate, and looked towards the child. Nasuada jutted out her jaw and tugged at the cloth, pointing to the doorway behind it once more, making her message more than clear. "Out."
A strong hand squeezed her fingers and Lowenek started. She looked down at her hand then looked up at the luminous black eyes of her husband. He smiled slightly at her, and leaned his head in the child's direction. "Why don't you and Nasuada go on outside. It seems she won't be disagreeing with you if you do," he said. Then in a lower voice so that only she could hear, "If there is anything you need to hear, I'll tell you tonight."
"You will tell me everything tonight," she said in the same low tone. "Without a single detail left out. I mean it, Ajihad, these are things I should know also, both as your wife and as your partner in all of this." Lowenek gestured vaguely at room before she stood up, and withdrew her hand from his grip. "We won't go far," she said in a louder voice, as she walked across the small room of the chalet to the child by the door. Together they went outside, and Lowenek joined the child. They played in the grass and laughed, but her mind was elsewhere, because she knew that this joy would not last, that soon things would soon change.
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Safe
He was small, smaller than her daughter had been, his face creased and ruddy, a dusting of hair on his head. She held him close for a moment, listening to his breathing, his heart beating. It felt quite literary as if her heart were being torn from her chest, and she fought against the sudden urge to cry. She couldn't cry not here, not in front of her brother, not if she wished to convince him.
You'll be safe, she keep thinking to her son as if it were a prayer, convincing herself that the words were true. You won't grow up in danger. You'll be safe.
Her son would have to stay here with his uncle and aunt and cousin, live out his life as a farmer, for his own safety. She couldn't take him with her, it was far too dangerous. Protecting one child when she was hardly around was hard enough, she couldn't survive keeping two safe- it would kill her, and perhaps them. It was already too late to protect her daughter in the same way she was protecting her son. And she didn't know what else to do, where else to go. There was nowhere to go, no way to save herself and both her children. This was the safest thing to do. Perhaps this wasn't the best thing to do, but it was best thing she could do for him.
Farwell, Eragon.
