Radawen sat in an embrasure atop the summit of the ruin, staring at the clouds reflecting from the surface of the lake. She did not see the clouds nor the ripples in the surface of the water. Her mind had wandered back to what had happened two years ago.
Two years ago in Imloth Melui Delioron had used her and then saved her life. She had been fascinated by the man at first, then terrified when she had found out he was actually a spy who had used her just as cynically he would use anyone to get his hands on Romenstar’s diary. She still wondered what had possessed her to go look for him in his home at the Cape of Belfalas afterwards.
Radawen closed her eyes and remembered.
His first touch had been so clumsy and insecure, as if he had feared she was not real at all but an image evoked by his tormented mind.
”Don’t touch me like that”, she had said and pressed herself against him as they stood there in the doorstep of his house. She had embraced him with passion and he had realized she was real and not another fading shadow.
They had made love, but without words. When she had fallen asleep, he had stroked her hair and she had been aware of it, even though she had not woken up.
One time she had told him that she loved him, just to tell him the truth. He had not replied. He had had merely looked at her, and his marble gray eyes had been silent and a little sad, as if he was remembering some pleasant time in the past that would never again return. She had wanted to ask him if he loved her back, but she had not been able to say the words. She had been too afraid that he would respond only with silence or – which would have been even worse – a lie.
She was thinking about him now, about the life that had slowly transformed him into what he had become, an empty shell of a man, a fading shadow himself. She thought about all the betrayals and lies and secrets that had filled his soul for so many years until shadows had weaved themselves around his life, leaving him with nothing that was real or good; nothing but that tenuous grasp his existence depended upon.
Radawen blinked her eyes and noticed that they were filled with tears. Dammit, she thought and wiped them with her sleeve.
Suddenly she noticed some movement out of the corner of her eye. Had she seen some shadow moving below, down in the courtyard? Some animal, perhaps? Or was her mind playing tricks on her?
Suddenly Radawen was scared. She wanted to jump up and run down the stairs to her horse and flee this dismal, haunting ruin. Was this how Delioron felt all the time? Was this fear of unknown shadows the cause that had driven him to silence, isolation and coldness, to empty existence where the was no room for warmth or human emotions?
Radawen stared hard at the courtyard, feeling like a child again, a child who just wants the endless journey to be over.
