There was no tea to be had in the Mark. She'd asked for some simply out of habit, only to receive a confused and somewhat suspicious look from the tavern keep. It was a slightly jarring reminder of just how far she was from home. Though...she was just now coming "home", wasn't she? Was it possible to have two homes? What determined such a thing, after all? Was it the land where your blood-related kin resided, or was it the place where you were loved and welcomed? Sometimes those two things happened in the same place, and sometimes they didn't.
Her hand rubbed wearily over her pale brow. Her thoughts were disjointed and aimless these days. It was frustrating, wearying, and at times, frightening.
I remember when I wrote in my diary that I felt madness for you. Only then it was being madly in love. Is it madness now, too? Of a different and more terrible sort? For it is still you, and only you, my darling...that has brought this new and deadly madness upon me...
She pulled herself from her reverie with a sharp inhale, sitting up straighter in the chair before the small desk. After her embarrassing episode the day before, Aldwyn had encouraged her to try and put her thoughts to parchment. Her diary sat before her now, opened to a blank page. A quill pen lay near her right hand, waiting.
She picked it up, dipped it carefully into the inkwell, and then hovered the tip of the quill over the page. And there she sat. Her hand began to tremble. A moment later, it sank back to the desk, and a long sigh escaped her. She closed the diary with a gentle snap.
This wasn't home.
Home was his arms. His face, his smile, his voice. Sitting in the Prancing Pony, leaned against his broad chest, laughing and teasing each other, surrounded by friends.
But he was gone. Which meant...
...which meant what? That she no longer had a home?
No, it wasn't that. Hookworth was still home. It had been home before she met Conrob and it would always be home. The Mark was a different sort of home now, she supposed. Her blood came from this soil, these rolling plains, the stiff breeze that danced over the hillocks and rivers. This was where she was from. But it wasn't where she belonged.
Still, I'm here now, she thought, rubbing both hands over her face. How flat and sunken her cheeks felt! She'd not eaten a full meal in...she couldn't remember the last time. It wasn't that she was intent on self-harm. But there was a constant ache now, in the pit of her stomach, that wouldn't let her eat more than a bit of bread or soup here and there, and even then, a mouthful or two and she felt rather ill. I need to make the most of being here, somehow. I shouldn't repay all of Aldwyn's kindness with a slow suicide. I shouldn't, but...at times...I don't believe I can keep going. If I died, I'd be with him again. I could find him, find his spirit, I'd have all of eternity to search for him...
She shuddered lightly at the dark thoughts jumbling about inside her skull. Her breath was coming quick and short, and her fingers felt like ice. The room suddenly felt suffocating and oppressive. She pushed roughly to her feet and stumbled out into the corridor, hurrying along until she reached the front door of the inn, and she could escape into the early morning mist.
