Western Druma

evening

I don’t even know what I’m supposed to put in this thing, so I asked Iskaryn, since this was her idea, and she answered, “The truth,” whatever that is supposed to mean. As that was not a helpful response, I followed it up with, “The truth about what?” and she gave me this funny look–and yes, I know she’s a bird, don’t ask me how I know it’s a funny look, I just know–and she said, “About how you feel. About your experiences.”

Except she knows I don’t want to talk about any of those things–I just want to forget most of it–so I said as much, and she just pointed out that this is how I got here. I didn’t have a response to that. Then it hit me: I was being lectured about the healing power of journaling by a magical bird that can’t even read or write.

And I must have said that out loud because she retorted, “I can do both,” and I just stared at her blankly, because what do you say to that? Which she took as a challenge, and proceeded to demonstrate it to me, promptly scratching out the Sylvan equivalent of “See? I told you so” in the dirt. Which is when I realized there was no escaping this trap she has set for me. And, yes, Iskaryn, I know you are reading over my shoulder as I’m writing this, and please stop it.

She objects to me characterizing it as a trap, and insists that this journal, or diary, or whatever I want to call it, was merely a suggestion.

Here’s what she means by “suggestion”: We’re at this trading post where the river–yes, that river–joins the Profit’s Flow, and I’m trying to buy food and water so I don’t starve over the next few days, and because I need a change from living hand to mouth in the wild. She lands on this book with an oil-skinned cover and starts shrieking at me. I try to shoo her away, and she comes back to it and does it again. This repeats a couple more times, and the shopkeeper, who apparently sees birds do this every day because he doesn’t even flinch, says, “I think they want you to buy that.”

Which, of course they would say that, because it’s expensive and they’d love nothing more than for me to give them money. And I’m looking at how many coins I have and realizing, sure, I could get this and a reed pen, or I could maybe eat for three weeks instead, and I try to explain this to Iskaryn–let’s not even go into what that must have looked like, me standing there, arguing with a bird who’s just shrieking back at me because, I don’t know, actually talking would draw too much attention somehow–and she is not having any of it.

I must look like I’m on the verge of a complete breakdown or something, because the shopkeeper takes pity on me–or maybe he just wants us to leave–and offers me a discounted price on it. And all I really want is for Iskaryn to just stop, so I agree to it, and now I’m going to run out of everything by the time I hit Petitioner’s Port. But at least I’ll be able to document it when it happens.

So, yeah. “Suggestion”.

I am supposed to record “the truth”? Okay, fine. Here’s some truth.

It hurts. It’s been almost four weeks and it hurts. Some days it feels like it just happened. Others, it feels like a lifetime ago. But that ache is always there. They’re gone, and there’s this enormous hole inside of me, and I don’t even know how to begin to fill it. And. It. Hurts.

It took me four days just to get out of the forest–four long days of one step ahead of the other, with Iskaryn flitting between branches above me. Then another day, along the road to here, slipping back into the trees whenever Iskaryn spotted someone approaching, because…I don’t know why. I just wasn’t ready to be seen yet. Or maybe I wasn’t prepared to see others. The walking helped, though. It kept me from replaying events. From wallowing in sorrow. It gave me something to do.

It would be so easy to just…give up. Go to Macridi–it’s not even half a day’s walk from here–and step back into that life. I could do it. It’s so tempting to do it. Only, I’m not that person anymore. She never even existed. She was just someone I made up, a role I could play based on half-truths because it didn’t require any difficult choices. So even though I could go back there, I just can’t. Someday, maybe, but not now.

This trading post has a shelter with small rooms that they let out to travelers. The norns didn’t deign to supply me with a schedule, but the way I figure it, they can see the strings of fate, right? So they’ve already seen all this, which means my time spent here is baked in. I’m just going to assume that however long it takes me to get to Breachill is how much time I have, and not fret over a couple of nights in a real bed for the first time in months. It is far from luxury–far from even a rundown inn–but it’s a bed nonetheless, and I’ll take it.

I’ll worry about the rest of it–how I’m going to get there and, more crucially, whether I’ll be recognized in Alabastrine–in the morning.