The rain fell in a steady torrent, obscuring the world in shades of
gray. The chill air drove through cloak and garment, through skin and
bone to grip the very marrow within, leaving only discomfort in its
place.
She had never felt more alone - had never wanted to be so alone - in
all the long years of her not so long life.
She had climbed to the highest battlements surrounding the elven
Palace and stood now, her gaze unfocused as she looked out over
Shalonesti in all its drenched glory.
Black cloak pulled tight around her and the hood drawn far down over
her face, its ends snapped gently about her booted ankles in the ensuing
winds that gusted, the rain running in continuous rivulets down its
dark folds. She remained nothing more than a cold black statue, her
mind clinging to the thought that the weather was fitting in so many ways.
For brief seconds then, seconds that seemed to last an eternity, she
felt the remembered pulse of his heartbeat around the cold steel of
her blade..
'From whence he began, so has he ended.'
She closed her eyes slowly, her hand seeking out the hilt of her
sword. She gripped the worn leather hilt so hard, she felt her own
heartbeat thrum in her palm and along her fingers. The song lifted
then, as if in anticipation, and drove back the chill though again,
it had not the power to save her from the desolation within, nor the
haunting gray eyes that swam up within the depth of her to stare
lifelessly.
Gray eyes so like to her lost husband's..
The violence with which she thrust that from her brought on a flow of
painful anger that burned nearly out of control for mere moments,
before it banked and disappeared as if it had never been. The thought
- the comparison - was unwelcome and unnecessary at most.
A flash of lightning, sudden in its intensity, split the sky as she
opened her eyes and leaned her head back to let the rain wash over
her face. The torrent became a fully fledged downpour then that
soaked through her cloak, the sky darkening perceptibly as the
moments passed by...and yet she remained, knowing only that she
could not yet go home to her daughter.
She wondered then, fleetingly, if her best friend would forever judge
her. If one day, her daughter would look upon her with disgust, what
her royal ward would have to say when he found out and whether or not
the King would understand.
"Rest in the peace of Her graces, Lendach" she whispered into the
rolling creshendo of thunder and placed her doubts tentatively to the
side.
She had done her duty.
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