Category: Journal Entry

I did not think it possible for a storm to settle inside a person, but here I am. My heart and stomach raging and howling inside of me, untempered and out of control.

The feast is long over. The candles have burned low. The plates were cleared, all but Tomaso’s. Nephele barked that it remained until he showed up. The other glasses were polished and returned to their place amongst our luggage. The tavern felt quiet though it was filled with the joy of new and old people from Runeheim alike.

Tomaso did not come.

Nephele arranged everything precisely. Ten settings, my good silver, the goblets I forged myself. I selected the wine carefully, one I had been saving, the bottle that deserved an occasion worthy of it, one such as my birthday of course. I had dusted it twice and realigned the label before packing it in our luggage to bring to town. I even rehearsed the moment I would hand it to him, some remark about his atrocious timing and my unparalleled generosity.

Still, he did not come.

At first, I told myself it was maybe the cold winter. The roads are treacherous and the winds are unkind. Perhaps he was delayed at his last crossing before coming to town. Maybe he would arrive late, breathless and apologetic, with some extravagant explanation and a gift too heavy to be practical.

I kept glancing at the door, but it remained closed. All I could see was Graham lingering in the window, sulking, as we awaited our food to be served. Good.

Nephele noticed, of course. She notices everything. She tried to distract me with conversation, with praise for the feastware, with gentle commentary about how beautiful the table looked adorned in my feastware, the meal I prepared “so delicious and satisfying”, I did not acknowledge it. She even tried to have everyone sing happy birthday to me, but my ears were too preoccupied trying to listen for the sound of my brother to hear everyone celebrate me.

Our crew tried to fill up the space that was missing, but all I could bear to feel was my blood boiling progressively hotter with each passing moment that Tomaso did not walk through the door.

They were nice.

They were not my brother.

I took a brief moment of pride shortly after our food was served and I heard that Graham was curled in a ball under a tree sobbing. I hope it was because he realized he is a traitorous little shit and felt bad after I revoked his invitation to my birthday feast. He deserves to cry. Maybe if he cries, I won’t need to.

I had saved Tomaso a seat on my right hand side. It remained empty.

I have always told myself that I am above sentimentality. That I am composed of finer materials than simple longing. I am Aurelia. I host, I dazzle, I command rooms, I craft masterful things at my forge, I am the embodiment of luxury and refinement.

And yet tonight, when I finally returned the unopened bottle to its shelf, I felt like something dangerously close to insignificant. Horrific. A nightmare that became true.

He has never missed my birthday. Ever.

Not when we were children and the cakes were uneven and the ribbons cheap. Not when we were older and the celebrations grew more elaborate. He has always appeared; sometimes late, sometimes smug, sometimes with an excuse already prepared, but he was always there no matter the distance it took him to travel to find me.

I do not know whether to be angry or afraid.

Anger is easier, it has edges, I can mold it, bend it like the steel at my forge. I can decide it was an insult, a lapse in judgment, a failure to prioritize the most important day of the year.

Fear is softer. It slips through my fingertips. What if he takes more after our mother than I had thought? What if, deep down, I’m not his favorite after all? What if he doesn’t love me?

I despise that my mind goes there. I reassure myself that he has no reason to have missed my day but that, when he arrives, it will be something stupid. It feels less impossible and painful to swallow.

Nephele tried to reassure me without saying too much. She placed a steady hand at my back as the guests departed. She did not offer false certainty, she simply said she would look into it.

That is how she loves; quietly, efficiently, without spectacle. Today I hate her for it. I am left here as a spectacle regardless and full of silent rage. I want her to scream and storm the room, publically shame Tomaso for insulting me on my birthday, I want her to make a scene because I have been so deeply and personally wronged. I want to feel justified in my anger. I want her to share my anger.

The feast was flawless. The wine, obviously exquisite – though the bottle intended specifically for Tomaso and myself sat untouched. The table was radiant and the laughter sincere. Yet the seat at my right hand felt like a sore in my mouth that I could not stop tonguing, each time I made contact with it only encouraged it to grow and sting more.

I tell myself he will appear tomorrow with apologies and some absurd story about a washed-out bridge or a stubborn horse. I tell myself I will scold him dramatically and then forgive him magnanimously. But tonight, the tavern feels too large. It feels empty, even while I’m surrounded by new friends.

Though the storm has passed outside, it festers and lingers within me. I am inconsolable.

A storm has rolled in, melodramatic and ill-timed, preventing safe travel for those who intended to attend market weekend. It is, I suspect, a jealous display. Not everyone handles my approaching birthday with maturity.

So I remain at my forge, shaping steel into submission while thunder grumbles overhead. Unlike the sky, I possess patience. Inside the house, however, discipline is a suggestion at best.

It was Nephele’s idea, and mine, brilliantly co-signed, that her wards; Dong Quixote, Damascus Steel, and Cass a’Nueva, might coexist harmoniously with my own formidable trio. A merging of households. The finest Hestralian exchange. A masterpiece of domestic ambition. What we have achieved instead is operatic.

Dong Quixote has appointed himself defender of righteousness in all forms, which currently includes guarding cooling bread from “tyranny.” His bravery is disproportionate to his size and I adore him for it. When he squared off against Abuela Pan Duro’s stern baking regime, I very nearly intervened; out of pride, of course. He recovered admirably after being corrected by a loaf. There is resilience in him. A slightly flour-dusted formidability.

Damascus Steel, ever earnest and methodical, attempted to bring order to Abuela del Ron’s generous distribution of “fortification.” He approached the matter like a scholar of liquids, which she interpreted as a challenge to her authority. The debate that followed was philosophical, emotional, and mildly intoxicating. I watched with great fondness. His seriousness against her exuberance is a thing of beauty.

Last, but not least, Cass a’Nueva; a radiant, poetic man, has become the focal point of Tía Besitos’ unstoppable belief in destiny. She circles him as if he were a tragic prince awaiting discovery. He attempts dignity. He tries to charm. He bravely takes a shot at out-flirting a woman who weaponizes affection. It is adorable. He does not stand a chance.

Nephele is in the center of it all, attempting to maintain peace with the expression of someone who regrets agreeing to this alliance. I can hear her issuing firm instructions, negotiating boundaries, perhaps reconsidering her life choices. It fills me with warmth because I’m so fond of her wards. Truly. They are chaotic in the most sincere ways; brave, earnest, dramatic, and sometimes clever. They bring life into every room they occupy. They clash and tumble, argue and aspire, and it makes this house feel less like stone and timber and more like something alive. Even when Dong Quixote declares a pastry uprising, when Damascus Steel insists on measurable rum allocations, or when Cass accidentally encourages matchmaking sermons, they are splendid. Nephele, after all, deserves the chaos of it all with how much she owes me. Sometimes I catch her clenching her teeth, and this miniscule detail brings me no end of delight.

Between hammer strikes, I step inside to check on them under the guise of inspecting my wine collection. I count each bottle, dust them lovingly, ensure the labels face forward in immaculate alignment. My birthday approaches, and I will choose one bottle worthy of the occasion, one bottle of perfection to share with Tomaso and the rest of this beautiful, exhausting household.

I glance at the feastware I forged myself, polished to a reverent gleam. Ten settings. Balanced and prepared to travel with us to the market as soon as the storm permits.

The storm may howl, and the house may shake with laughter and flour and loud affection. Nephele may sigh in theatrical defeat while throwing her exasperated hands in the air. The truth is this: our home is fuller for their presence, and when the candles are lit and the table is set, and every chaotic, beloved soul gathers beneath this roof to celebrate me, as they absolutely should, it will not just be a feast in my honor.

It will be a feast for all of us.

The frigid night air felt like needles on Reason’s cheeks, though their shivering was hardly from the cold.

The distant clamor of voices and steel made Reason’s hair stand on end in a way it hadn’t. Even at a safe distance from the fighting, a primal fear arose within them.

Still, they walked, trusting the night to cloak them and Eden’s uncanny intuition to steer them along a safe path. It didn’t help that she seemed to reappear on Reason’s other side between sentences, though perhaps that was just part of her assessment.

Her words landed upon the carpenter heavily, even if they knew she was right.

“Shed your name. Separate yourself. Completely.”

The stars blinked coldly down, as piercing as the frost itself. At one point, Reason knew their names, but no matter how hard they tried could not recall what they were.

***

Reason muddled over the plans, drafting and re-drafting the verbiage of their proposal. They fretted over every detail, flipping unhelpfully through some of the dense books Rhyme had without avail. A half-drunk tankard of ale sat abandoned by the candle burned almost all the way down.

Felix would have good feedback, as would Graham. They sighed, letting out a breath they hadn’t realized they were holding. Even though the thought of Court instilled a sense of dread, they had nothing to fear.

Resolving to settle matters in the morning, Reason set their papers aside, took a final swig of ale, and curled up in their bed. The weariness of their body and mind quickly overtook them.

They had just shut their eyes for a moment when the curtain haphazardly covering the bed was parted. Steel glinted, affectless words reaching their ears but hardly registering. It was only when the intruder vanished that the pain hit. No words could form, and with how deep the cut was they quickly felt faint from the loss of blood.

Minutes ticked as they felt themselves slowly slipping out of consciousness.

They heard Sygrun yell, then the searing pressure of hands and cloth over their neck, soothed shortly by the nervous but determined gaze of Sister Liora at their side. Her warm demeanor steadied them in their shock as they slowly came to. She fretted, but the care was enough. Two strangers, helpless in unique ways, comforted by the other’s gentility and understanding.

Through their delirium, they managed to rasp out what happened to the passerby attempting to interrogate them.

Rhyme ran into the room in a whirlwind, panic in their eyes as they clutched onto Reason, the threat of a fiery death on their lips to anyone who would dare hurt their other half, seething that they weren’t called over quicker.

Sir Jacquelin, having sprinted to their quarters, offered to sleep at the foot of their bed, but Reason hoarsely shooed them back to their House. Reason already knew Rhyme wouldn’t abide sleep that night, and they were unwilling to let any more of Runeheim’s best defenders lose sleep over them.

They shut their eyes.

Nothing to fear.

***

Their sleep was restless and fractured.

Everything seemed to close in, an inescapable swirl of dread that threatened to consume them. They woke up frequently, chest heaving as they reached to find Rhyme’s hand, gripping it weakly until they drifted back to fraught unconsciousness.

Darkness loomed in a way that made them feel small and helpless. Shadows crept taller than the trees, slithering out from every corner and threatening to take Reason with it.

Until it didn’t.

When Reason awoke, they felt strangely serene, more worried about Rhyme’s lack of sleep than the burning sensation of the raw wound every time they shifted.

They were alive, by miracle or by design. Either way, a show of fear was a show of weakness, and Reason had no interest in that. The last time there was a threat over their life, it was because they had done something right, and perhaps that was the case this time as well.

***

Even in the daylight, the threat of violence was no less frightening.

There was a fearlessness in the Dunnick culture that felt innate, yet it was something Reason had always struggled with. To fear was to be flawed in a way that was incompatible with who they thought they should be.

Yet Reason watched Blair put herself between nearly every threat and her companions so many times the night prior, and still they were surprised when they, frankly a stranger, suddenly found themselves behind the protection of her blade.

“Stick to Friar Ciaran, and run if you have to,” was later said with an understanding Reason thought they’d never hear.

Yet Callum, who seemed to share at least some of Reason’s reservations about fighting, was never once remarked on for their lack of skill on the field. Callum cared and provided for his people in other ways, and never once did he have to prove himself through means unrelated to his skillset or shows of physical strength. Bravery was not the solution to every problem, nor was its most banal, physical form what defined the culture.

There was no fear in the face of unconditional care.

***

“We need to do this — *I* need to do this,” Reason corrected, their voice gentle. “I think it’s the right decision.”

Rhyme’s brows bunched, perhaps uncertain, perhaps sad. There was hesitation, not the first time this market, in the mage’s demeanor. They kept their gaze down as they haplessly tied a clump of straw together.

“I know it’s terrifying. I’m scared too. I want to assure you that you don’t have to do this if you’re not ready, as it needs to be on your terms. You have enough on your plate,” Reason reached out to hold Rhyme’s hands, meeting the other’s exhausted gaze. “And when you’re ready, I’ll be there. It won’t change how much I care about you, now or later. It just means I get a chance to love the version of you that you were meant to be.”

The tavern was loud, yet Reason felt deaf to the noise, focused only on Rhyme.

The mage’s voice was soft when they spoke, “I want to. It’s time.”

Whatever fear remained in Reason’s heart was gone.

***

The fire burned strong as the Hearthwise tended to it, care taken in every turn of the logs.

The jesters spoke together, though remained separate in their intentions. Their little effigies were so different, in shape and design. Rhyme’s was mostly straw, dry kindling that threatened to catch fire from the stray embers caught in the wind, with orange peel and dried moss. Reason’s was of lichen and pine, the needles still green and spry, as well as sheltered by a rounded, cloak-like maple leaf.

Yet at each effigy’s core there was a prickly blackberry branch, an acknowledgement of their shared root and shared soul. O’shea was a man driven so crazed by his pursuits, so haunted by his mistakes, and so fundamentally *alone* that it drove him to split his very soul in half.

No longer would they be beholden to a dead man’s fears. Two shattered pieces could heal, each in their own way.

Reason and Rhyme — O’shea — was carefully placed by the tender hands of the Hearthwise into the flames.

There was no sadness as the effigies turned to ash, but a hope that a new leaf could be turned. So as ash fed the farmland, so too can their past be a gentle guide on their journey forward.

Cenn and Aodhán watched the hearth as they stood, embracing who they would become.

Friar Godfrey waved goodbye to the last wagon as it left the market grounds, shouting a blessing, “MELANDIEL GUIDE YOU HOME!” he watched as the wagon turned the corner on the muddy road. Godfrey then started feeling the aches and pains of market weekends. The soles of his feet felt like they had been pounded on a blacksmiths hammer. His hands sore from dishes and carrying others’ loads. His legs like a newborn deers from his many trips to help people. His back was screaming at him from carrying the Brody The Bold to his grave, and giving Good Sister Liora a piggy back ride up to the cursed chapel. His side slashed open from a bandit’s blade, his chest pierced from when a creature of darkness struck him, His shoulder looking like ground beef from where the vampire spawn chewed on him while the town was working on the pillars. He made it to a tree and collapsed, the weight of the weekend driving him into the ground.

he felt his chest and realized that it wasn’t sweat and rain making his chest moist it was the stitching burst open from his helping with the wagons. It must have been that very large and heavy chest. He had had worse injuries in the past and they had always healed up ok and would feel bad to bother people about it. He dabbed at it and drew his fingers into the light, his blood a deep red, the smell of the rain, the fresh mud, the smoke on the air

A memory flooded him.

His long axe on his back, a sack of stolen silver around his waist, and his hands drenched in the blood of the innocent, running away from a burning village laughing and singing with the rest of his band.

A wave of sorrow and sickness hit his mind and soul as a massive wave strikes a small ship

there he laid in the rain and mud completely alone and whispered the only thing he could think of when he suffered

“I walk the Penitent Path”
“I walk the Penitent Path”
“I walk the Penitent Path”

I have walked a tightrope before.

On the deck of a ship, with salt in my lungs and wind in my teeth, it was almost a comfort. The sea teaches you balance. It tells you plainly when you lean too far. The ropes creak. The mast groans. The world sways and you sway with it. I have always trusted that kind of uncertainty.

But on land, the rope does not move. It stretches taut between people and promises and pride. It is strung between ledgers and loyalties, between silver and gold, between what is right and what is survivable. And instead of waves beneath me, there are eyes.

I find myself hanging things. Weighing things. Measuring words before I let them leave my mouth. Deciding when silence is strength and when it is surrender. Parsing politics that feel more suffocating than any storm. Trying to understand a life built without freedom.

My blood burns at the sound of certain words.

“Slavery.”
“Dredges.”
“Forced.”
“Taxes.”

Each one tastes bitter. Each one a chain dressed up as necessity.

To sit at a table and consider them calmly, to calculate which injustice must be swallowed first so that another might be undone later, feels like betrayal of something sacred inside me. And yet I must. Because there are people who follow me. People I love. People who trust that when I step forward, I will not step blindly. My community needs me just as much as I need them. I need to protect them.

It is in moments like these I remember why recklessness should be a sin.

I needed to think quickly. I needed to speak with certainty. But all I could hear in my mind was a number.

Ninety silver is not twenty gold.

How could anyone call it close? Why ninety? Why not half? Were the tools, the labor, the planning, the risk not worth more? Did they see only the grain I laid at their feet and none of the hands that harvested it? Did they think the food appeared from air and goodwill alone? Did they want the yield but not the roots? I decided to just ask her, after everything was said and done.

And then, my contract. Someone save me from my own ignorance. What did it truly say beyond “tax exempt”? What promises were inked that I cannot read with my own eyes? In these moments I curse myself for never learning more than the single vulgar word Santiago once grinned and pressed into my vocabulary. Bless him. One word is better than none, I suppose.

It has been a year.

I watched it signed. I remember the scratch of pen. Her mark. Ragnar’s mark. I remember it spoke of work, of answering when called. Of serving when summoned. But no summons has come. No call to labor. We were to act as point of contact for trade from the Reich, to move excess goods outward.

The Reich has barely enough to sustain itself, let alone surplus to send across waters. And yet we have built. We have planned. The shipyards are not some indulgent dream. They are survival. They are promise. They are the means to fulfill what we agreed to do. Tomaso sees them not as vanity, but as lifeblood. With them, we reach distant shores. With them, distant shores reach us. Trade flows. Safety grows. Futures widen.

How dare anyone call that self-serving.

And then, salt in the wound. After brokering my deal with Lady Dragomir, after standing as shield and speaker for myself and my crew, whispers reached me. All I had hoped to do was release my crew to show that everyone else could soon follow. It was meant to be a stepping stone in providing an example to the city of what happens when your love, your aid, your time and more are freely given. Yet, the Valerians are plotting to kill me.

After I extended an olive branch with steady hands. After I paid them more than most merchants would have dared for their aid. After I surrendered coin and materials my weary hands bled to gather, because I believed in sharing burden and reward alike. It feels like betrayal carved with deliberate care.

Their resentment sears through me. I thought we would stand shoulder to shoulder. I thought we would divide the labor, the risk, the triumph. Instead I find myself alone on this unmoving rope, the ground very far below.

I am devastated.
I am afraid.
I do not want to die.

And for the first time in a long while, I do not feel like death would be a fair price for my choices. Of all the moments, this time I was not reckless. I was not cruel. I did not act for greed.

All I did was try to help.

And somehow, that feels like the most dangerous thing of all.

“Did you love him?”

The night was stilled, the spaces around her filled by the sounds of her frantically beating heart. Blair fumbled through cabinets that were once so familiar and warm. Her skin burned and ached, ruined beyond repair. The only bandage holding her deep set wounds together was the idea of freedom itself.

Her hands shaked as she searched, a nervousness of being found and retrieved chilled her. She didn’t want to be a part of their games anymore, she didn’t want him to see her like this and didn’t want to be tricked into staying. Fooled into a sensation of pretend protection, this could happen again and she just wanted to go home and have him believe her dead.

Only a small bag of supplies was truly needed to return to her own folks. A light bag and her familial right, which decorated the mantle of this false ‘home’. It was the final thing to grab and the gleam of the blade reflected her ugly self, causing her to lose herself in the shame that she had become. The sting of tears rolling down into her injuries only deepened the sensation of a growing eternal numbness.

Her hands wrapped around the hilt, and a budded seedling of spite sprouted.

“You will admit to everyone here what you did.”

The sound of blood from the blade and the spilled ink pooling off the table both dripped in an eerie unison. The note in his handwriting, legible and clear in its message. Accidents of life and death happened frequently in Roglia. Bastion Drake, now a ghost, will carry her shame into death and he wrote it clear as day, proving his ‘guilt’.

She had freed herself, the feeling of shame and horror felt foreign. Distant even. The Blade of Woes rightfully in her hands brought her to her senses. The person she was before tonight was who she was before she married and dragged down into weakness.

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

19 days. 5 days to lose hope. 9 days to lose faith. 12 days to lose your sense of self. 15 days to completely break- Who shall Conquer us?

He didn’t even bother to look for her. “Drakes don’t keep prisoners, Blair.”, he assumed they were the same.

There was no sorrow for what she had endured, and if there was she would not have needed to make a deal with the whispering wind to escape. She believed Bastion would have- should have saved her from the Rennetts, yet he was only sorry at the end when he himself dealt with the punishment of those 19 days by her hands.

“Look at us, Blair and Liam back at it! Fighting together again.”

I missed him, my brother. I missed my people. I missed fighting for the passion that burned deeply in me but was repressed by a Rogalian binding. I missed being me, Blair MacCraig.

So what if I killed my husband?

When heaven’s vault unbars its iron gate,
And rain descends with neither plea nor pause,
The road once known submits itself to fate,
Unmade by water’s unrelenting laws.

The ruts grow deep where wheels had traveled true,
The markers fade beneath a shifting skin;
What once was simple passage to pursue
Becomes a test of nerve and discipline.

The stream, now swollen past its modest claim,
Spreads wide to dare the measured step to fail;
It asks of man more judgment than of aim,
More steadied hand than favoring wind or sail.

No kindly veil, this curtain cast from sky—
But trial laid where comfort used to lie.

Yet in its surge a harder lesson stands:
The ground is earned by thought, not given land.