by Carnath-Emory » Sun May 15, 2005 2:51 am
Remembering nothing, her sleeping mind constructed its own recollection of the incident, something to fill the gap between Before and After.
The ride had been a long one, but not unpleasant. Born to the hostility of icy storms and biting winds, she'd relished the warmth that had left them sweating. Hours had passed, filled with the dull thud of hooves upon dusty earth, and she'd smiled at the beauty of sun-dappled forests. In time, they'd come to the village, and found horror in place of the Perfection they'd sought: the great iron gate was sealed with a living chain, savaged flesh that gibbered and moaned. Carving it open had granted them entry, at the Traitor's bidding, and he'd fled as the teeming horrors descended upon them --
No. Wrong. And: "Mason," she breathes in her restless sleep. It is a hissed curse, a fervent condemnation.
The ride had been a long one, but then they'd often ridden together in those early days, long and hard through fields that yielded little grain, across rocky earth that was dead beneath the winter ice. These journeys were the most Perfect pleasure she knew, dizzying with whispered promises, with the heady taste of freedom. There was no finer time, and when she woke that night it was to the taste of cotton, and with the life half-smothered from her. Breath grew stale in her desperate lungs, and his flawless face was bright in her mind: Vargan Chernevog, the Black Dog, the devil-prince who was the salvation of her family's fortunes --
No. She twists in her sleep, sharp pain flaring across her back, but there is a gentle touch to her cheek, a wordless whisper to soothe her before she can wake.
The ride had been a long one, but not unpleasant, and she'd relished the warmth that had left them sweating. Hours had passed, and days as well, for their destination was distant Orvere, her ambition was Jorn Lundstroem, the prince who would carve out his own kingdom, and see her dead as he did it, and masonry tumbled from the sky as the earth shuddered and groaned --
No.
There'd been no ride at all, that black night; there'd been only the dragon's call, and Beast Stealth to gather her up when she stepped from the tavern's safety. He'd spirited her away and done brutal, Perfect work on her flesh, and even through the worst of it, she'd chewed her lips to bloody ribbons rather than cry out --
No, as she twists and fights against gentle hands, an unfamiliar body's warmth that nonetheless urges calm upon her.
-- and they'd ridden but an hour through the Spring's gentle warmth, with a basket of food for their lunch, and lanterns against the coming darkness. They'd talked the night away, and she'd smiled often with the pleasure of his easy company, the benign warmth of this impossible third-born son.
No. Because all the wishing in the world cannot bring back those days. But still, this is a kinder recollection, however it might leave her aching; she wakes gently, with a lover's name on her lips, and her body warm in his embrace.
Almost. Burning eyes squint to resolve the man's features. Recognition is a slow, inexorable thing, but nose and eyes and the set of lips resolve gradually into the Governor's face. And his touch upon her cheek, and his hand at her hip, and she thrusts herself back in a confusion of shock.
"What?" As she clings to the edge of the narrow cot, pain flaring bright and sharp across her savaged back, the shirt a tattered ruin that she clutches to her chest. Memory falls on her like a hammer: her head aches because it was clubbed, her back burns because they'd carved at it with their delicate knives, and this damp chill is a trickle of blood down her spine from wounds that her struggles had re-opened. "What," again as she stills herself, on realising this. Won't wear their scars for them, no, not she -- and here is Bromn, with his cold words and quiet intent, Bromn who was supposed to have returned to the tavern, but has surely lain here the entire night instead.
There are worse ways to waken. But she's precisely the sort of fool who doesn't realise this.