It had been some time since Isulril had sent Lord Hathostaran on his way. She knew him to be gone, for her sources did not lie. It was a relief to have the man out of the town, out of the way and out of her life. For good, she hoped.
Things had been flat and dull since then. She kept little in touch with those around her, preferring her own solitude and the company of plants for a time. She had begun using the hothouse that her lord had set upon the property of house. She had researched what plants could be grown, what flowers, what fruits, and at what temperatures, and how to keep things moist but not too moist. It was growing into a passion for her to watch the flowers bud and watch the sprouts of fruits through the glass. Oranges. Nothing like she had known in Gondor, but something sweet with a hint of tart. She was proud of this, but felt sad that she had had no one to tell.
She thought, sometimes, of those with whom she had engaged. She thought sometimes of the woman she had begun to call friend, who had both helped and hurt her in turns, as suited her whim. She thought of the man who had been a good listener until she had thrown a bottle and her cares at him. She thought of the physician, and how much she wished to avoid him. She thought of the woman who tried to reap secrets as one might reap wheat from the field at harvest.
She had spoken to that woman and it chilled her, their conversation. She had expressed wanting sometimes to be invisible, to observe without being observed. And then the woman revealed her biggest insecurity. She felt, without her finery she was nothing. Indeed, she thought, without the fancy clothing, without the elaborate hairstyles, without all of that, the idea of being seen, being viewed, being observed--she was nothing.
She realized then and there at that moment that she was still living a sham, that she was still reluctant to show her true self to anyone, perhaps even to herself. She admitted to the woman that she was both attracted to and afraid of the physician, but that it was really just an echo of her feelings about herself. She still kept them in bottles. Thick, glass bottles not often prone to cracking. But, she realized, she could herself crack.
The quiet, the separation,it was all bringing back her former malaise, and the tedium of previous times. She longed for adventure, she longed for the inner turmoil that had been almost daily for her, that had overwhelmed her. She longed for the long intellectual conversations she had had with the physician...but she could not have them again, she reasoned.
If anything, the leaving of his lordship made her think more on the matter. It would be disastrous to bring herself close to the man once more, in the sense of proximity. She knew rationally that she would never be close to him in any other way than being in the same room as him,or possibly sitting on a chair near him. And she had come to accept it, at least she thought. She had come to accept that she would not share anything of mutuality with him. Her feelings, which had once been so intense, were beginning to fade a little. The man was becoming a memory to her, the more she avoided him, and it pleased her.
She kept to the garden,the lonely garden, speaking and singing to the plants when she knew that she was unobserved. It was solace to her, but it was a poor substitute for a person. She carried on her tasks with a sense of duty, but little of enthusiasm. In the evenings she often would translate a text, spending hours at her books. Then she would pull herself over to bed and try to stop the tears that would come.
She had come so far only to return to her former position. She felt the isolation keenly, but this time it was self-imposed. It was necessary. It was boring. It was unfortunate. But she accepted this as her own punishment, well deserved, as her own sentence to serve in a prison of her own making. It was necessary.
Isulril set all of this aside, and tucked herself in bed. Tonight, she reasoned, she would not cry. No, tonight she would plan for tomorrow. Surely, she thought, tomorrow would be more eventful than today.
