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Dec. 16th, 2007 11:53 pmThe blistering heat of summer night was there to meet Marian on the other side of the door.
As was the up keeping of Knighton, which she did more frequently than anyone on either side of the door knew. It was easier than thinking and took up her minds attention. It had started, originally, with knowing her fathers habits about his holdings and wanting to make things easier on him, especially in trying times. But it had been a long time now since she'd left it entirely to him.
It was simply a part of her routine now.
It was also a good portion of why Knighton’s' people didn't complain about their taxes as severely as other areas.
Not that they knew Marian was doing their taxes, but she requisitioned less by pulling more from one specific place--theirs.
And so this was where she was, editing the Millers accounts, when her father shuffled into the room. His feet stopped and the door never touched the wall, so she guessed he was watching her. Finishing the number, she looked over her shoulder to find her father's expressive mixture of pride and shame.
Looking back to the book before her, holding in a sigh that would never come even as the possible resigned lecture might.
Marian closed the book and laid the pen aside.
In the morning she worked on a piece of embroidery. Frustrated with the lack of a certain project in her house, she found herself embroidering little golden lions where they weren't quite expected to be. Which had led to a long strange, quiet moment sitting on the ledge of her bedroom window, looking out at the blue and white cloud sky.
She didn't think about God, deeply or frequently.
She went to church as often as was expected. She used prayer beads and confessed. She knew the words, the hymns, the steps.
The problem with faith, her faith, was that if she started thinking about it she would become too harsh, to hard. Too much all heart.
Nottingham hadn't needed to lose as many good men (and women and children) for whatever saving grace it might get one day. And since the moment she'd had that heart to heart with God around the age of seventeen, a small collection of months after she donned her mask the first time, they hadn't been talking as much.
Today she wondered why that could be.
God it was said was the only person who knew Marian's true soul. But today she wondered how she couldn't be talking to the only person who might know her life. No one knew every aspect, every emotion, but he might.
Even if he was unfair.
Even if he created a world that ended more than not.
Even if his world had somehow allowed all these turn of events.
Head leaning against the edge of her window, where the shutter met the hinges, she prayed.
A wordless, longing, prayer, without beads or men, or anything but the sky and that embroidery in her hand. To someone she couldn't allow herself to picture as man or deity or lion. To someone she hoped might hear her; even now.
She hadn't meant to yell at her father; but she meant what she said.
She just wanted to have a few days where she did hear their names.
His being her fiancé, and her ex-fiancé.
Whom her father had trounced being subtle about, when he mentioned his trip to Merton for lunch with its Lord.
She had looked at him angrily and asked, voice, too hard and sharp, why can't we just spend a night together and not talk about them?
And then she'd looked away. Not about to tear up, but furious at the wall between them.
She couldn't tell him what she really meant.
She couldn't tell him she'd come home from Milliways for him.
For the one man who never had, and never would, leave her. The one person who had accepted her for what she was, without that acceptance coming with a price she couldn't pay or struggled to survive with. The one who came from where she had, saw the choices she'd made, supported her for them, and thus, even in darkness, made her world brighter.
Instead, ignoring his look of surprised hurt and pity, she took his hand and apologized.
Allowed him to reach out and touch her cheek as he spoke.
And wished she was just his little girl again.
Wished this hell was a dream.
The next day Marian went riding through the forest, straying far from both the safe areas and Robin's. She didn’t want to be interrupted. She just wanted to ride. Wanted to hold on to Sorley's reign, leaning so she could feel him dodge the branches, jump the rises, and wear through the endless emerald blur the forest becomes.
It had been nearly an hour, just clinging to horse, not paying attention to their direction, just their speed, when Sorely began slowing. His gait became walking steps before she wanted it to, and she raised her head, about to make an annoyed sound even understanding he needed a rest, when she noticed the area.
The rookery, caught in the full of golden streamers of sun, where the birds were pressing around it still.
Sliding off, she let the reigns hang free. Reaching up, she stroked his long neck, pressing her face into the vaguely damp hair, before she turned and walked toward collective of wild birds all cawing and moving. It was like a river of black, shifting and shivering.
The center area, was still full of food, which she skimmed her fingers through. It was never empty. Her fingers moved to trace the words carved into the sides slowly. Loopy letters she could have spelled in this specific way, almost as well as her own name.
Ravenskeep.
They cawed at her as she moved toward their perched spots, but they did not stop her today any more than they did ever. They eyed her warily though, seeming jittery and louder than normal. She knew how they felt. Or perhaps it was they who knew how she felt? She never knew here. It was not a sensible place to those of Nottingham on both sides of the divide. Unholy, unknown, and haunted perhaps.
But it was comforting to her.
Leaning on it, she pulled bread, part of her supposed lunch, from the inside of a sack hanging across her. Breaking pieces off she started feeding them. Watching them cluster around her shoes and the hem of her pants. When the bread was gone, and she'd propped herself up to sit on an edge, she pulled out a chunk of cheese out. Crumbling sections she held it out to the braver ones who hopped over to her.
Soon, she whispered, to the one with the tuft of head feathers sticking up who was perched on her knee now.
And not sure what would happen, she did know it was soon.
She could feel it the way one felt a storm.
It, whatever it would be, was coming.
Closer and tighter and soon.
As was the up keeping of Knighton, which she did more frequently than anyone on either side of the door knew. It was easier than thinking and took up her minds attention. It had started, originally, with knowing her fathers habits about his holdings and wanting to make things easier on him, especially in trying times. But it had been a long time now since she'd left it entirely to him.
It was simply a part of her routine now.
It was also a good portion of why Knighton’s' people didn't complain about their taxes as severely as other areas.
Not that they knew Marian was doing their taxes, but she requisitioned less by pulling more from one specific place--theirs.
And so this was where she was, editing the Millers accounts, when her father shuffled into the room. His feet stopped and the door never touched the wall, so she guessed he was watching her. Finishing the number, she looked over her shoulder to find her father's expressive mixture of pride and shame.
Looking back to the book before her, holding in a sigh that would never come even as the possible resigned lecture might.
Marian closed the book and laid the pen aside.
In the morning she worked on a piece of embroidery. Frustrated with the lack of a certain project in her house, she found herself embroidering little golden lions where they weren't quite expected to be. Which had led to a long strange, quiet moment sitting on the ledge of her bedroom window, looking out at the blue and white cloud sky.
She didn't think about God, deeply or frequently.
She went to church as often as was expected. She used prayer beads and confessed. She knew the words, the hymns, the steps.
The problem with faith, her faith, was that if she started thinking about it she would become too harsh, to hard. Too much all heart.
Nottingham hadn't needed to lose as many good men (and women and children) for whatever saving grace it might get one day. And since the moment she'd had that heart to heart with God around the age of seventeen, a small collection of months after she donned her mask the first time, they hadn't been talking as much.
Today she wondered why that could be.
God it was said was the only person who knew Marian's true soul. But today she wondered how she couldn't be talking to the only person who might know her life. No one knew every aspect, every emotion, but he might.
Even if he was unfair.
Even if he created a world that ended more than not.
Even if his world had somehow allowed all these turn of events.
Head leaning against the edge of her window, where the shutter met the hinges, she prayed.
A wordless, longing, prayer, without beads or men, or anything but the sky and that embroidery in her hand. To someone she couldn't allow herself to picture as man or deity or lion. To someone she hoped might hear her; even now.
She hadn't meant to yell at her father; but she meant what she said.
She just wanted to have a few days where she did hear their names.
His being her fiancé, and her ex-fiancé.
Whom her father had trounced being subtle about, when he mentioned his trip to Merton for lunch with its Lord.
She had looked at him angrily and asked, voice, too hard and sharp, why can't we just spend a night together and not talk about them?
And then she'd looked away. Not about to tear up, but furious at the wall between them.
She couldn't tell him what she really meant.
She couldn't tell him she'd come home from Milliways for him.
For the one man who never had, and never would, leave her. The one person who had accepted her for what she was, without that acceptance coming with a price she couldn't pay or struggled to survive with. The one who came from where she had, saw the choices she'd made, supported her for them, and thus, even in darkness, made her world brighter.
Instead, ignoring his look of surprised hurt and pity, she took his hand and apologized.
Allowed him to reach out and touch her cheek as he spoke.
And wished she was just his little girl again.
Wished this hell was a dream.
The next day Marian went riding through the forest, straying far from both the safe areas and Robin's. She didn’t want to be interrupted. She just wanted to ride. Wanted to hold on to Sorley's reign, leaning so she could feel him dodge the branches, jump the rises, and wear through the endless emerald blur the forest becomes.
It had been nearly an hour, just clinging to horse, not paying attention to their direction, just their speed, when Sorely began slowing. His gait became walking steps before she wanted it to, and she raised her head, about to make an annoyed sound even understanding he needed a rest, when she noticed the area.
The rookery, caught in the full of golden streamers of sun, where the birds were pressing around it still.
Sliding off, she let the reigns hang free. Reaching up, she stroked his long neck, pressing her face into the vaguely damp hair, before she turned and walked toward collective of wild birds all cawing and moving. It was like a river of black, shifting and shivering.
The center area, was still full of food, which she skimmed her fingers through. It was never empty. Her fingers moved to trace the words carved into the sides slowly. Loopy letters she could have spelled in this specific way, almost as well as her own name.
Ravenskeep.
They cawed at her as she moved toward their perched spots, but they did not stop her today any more than they did ever. They eyed her warily though, seeming jittery and louder than normal. She knew how they felt. Or perhaps it was they who knew how she felt? She never knew here. It was not a sensible place to those of Nottingham on both sides of the divide. Unholy, unknown, and haunted perhaps.
But it was comforting to her.
Leaning on it, she pulled bread, part of her supposed lunch, from the inside of a sack hanging across her. Breaking pieces off she started feeding them. Watching them cluster around her shoes and the hem of her pants. When the bread was gone, and she'd propped herself up to sit on an edge, she pulled out a chunk of cheese out. Crumbling sections she held it out to the braver ones who hopped over to her.
Soon, she whispered, to the one with the tuft of head feathers sticking up who was perched on her knee now.
And not sure what would happen, she did know it was soon.
She could feel it the way one felt a storm.
It, whatever it would be, was coming.
Closer and tighter and soon.