I met a woman the other day whilst I was brooding over Taala's letter and reflecting upon it, Contemplating what I should write in response but my mind draws a blank. I have not yet formally presented myself before the company. There are too many distractions, I was relieved for it at the time for the woman I got talking to was happy and oblivious and for a short while I could forget my troubles and laugh and joke and have fun. I never got a chance to do any of that growing up. I find myself harkening back to a simpler time when life had fewer hardships. A memory more distant than the moon and stars these days.
The child I have sired gurgles happily on my knee making persistent efforts to tug on my beard. In fact it is as though the little brat keeps trying to win my affection. Never have I seen a happier and more trusting little lad it certainly takes after it's Mother. Not like my boisterous little brother who will no doubt grow up to be a warrior. I have a feeling this boy will be soft and not at all a fighter unless he is raised in the correct manner. Not a bad thing. It would be a blessing rather than a curse if he did not know the life of hardship I have. Damn it, boy! Now is not the time for these paternal instincts to kick in. Kriea made me a pendant, a wooden carved horse on a string in the same manner as one of the boy's toys. Sigstæinn she calls him.
I have to once again come to a tough decision. I was informed that it was her ex that took her and presumably raped her. I have sown the seeds of doubt in her mind that the child was ever even mine at all. She cannot know, She must not know. That I left for Gondor knowing she was pregnant. At the back of my mind the thought of never returning. The temptation... Ah, to be constantly torn in two different directions not knowing which way to jump. I came back to honour my responsibility yes. I will ensure that this boy is well looked after, I will keep his mother safe. But as for romantic involvement? Well, Nay. That can never be the case can it. She never even has to know that the boy is mine. And the door is always open for me to express the truth in future but present it as a suspicion. If she ever knew that I specifically attempted to abandon her then I would never see my boy ever again. And I'm not sure I can bear that either.
These are the uncertainties of my mind dear reader, Sigstæinn will not be safe. There has been one constant theme throughout the whole of the last half decade. Daddy kills people. Little one. It feels so good to utter these words even though I know you can not possibly understand. Daddy kills people. And one day someone might try to get to you in order to hurt Daddy. He will not be safe, Just as Leofric wasn't safe, Rowena wasn't safe. And Calessan wasn't safe. She was the first lover I ever had. I built her funeral pyre and watched her burn. She lost her life, because of me. I am positive she died because of me. These terrible memories that I repress, they will never go away.
All these people, all these faces. Do I actually have even a flicker of warmth in my heart for any of them? They all seem to blur into one. It is hard to grow attached when every relationship, friend or otherwise a man has turns to ash. And now I'm shutting this book in order to resist the urge to burn it and all of it's contents. It's time to hunt the man who would bring harm to my boy and his mother. I have already a few ideas in mind for laying a trap, if the man dares to try and set foot in the house he stole her from originally. He is dead. As dead as dead can be.
