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November 8, 1203
Dora remembered having odd dreams. She was sure she'd forgotten having odd dreams. Neither thought had ever bothered her.
What did, however, was exactly what had happened upon waking this morning. She knew she'd dreamed--vividly. She knew it was an odd dream--very odd. But she couldn't remember a thing about it, other than that it had happened.
That had happened before, but never quite like this. She might have had... at least a flash of an image, even if it told her nothing about the dream as a whole. But this morning, there was nothing. Just an empty space in her mind, a gnawing reminder of something she'd forgotten, something that ought to have been unforgettable.
Something...
"Ah! Finally awake, I see."
Her husband, all smiles caught her as she cleared the last few steps and cleared her fog with a mid-morning kiss. Mid-morning. She'd always been an early riser, as Alina had long lamented since they'd been little girls stuck sharing a bedroom. A lucky thing, this rare occurrence striking on one of her free days!
"I was starting to worry. You're not ill, are you?"
"No. I just... slept strangely, I guess." Slept strangely, dreamed strangely, woken strangely. Adonis, at least, was his usual caring self. "I'll be fine so long as I've got you."
"And you'll always have me, my love--although alas, I won't have you to myself just yet today! Your father's waiting for you in the kitchen."
"My father?" She certainly hadn't gotten her usual sleeping habits from her father! Of course, her father had no sleep habits at all. She'd spent half her childhood convinced that he in fact didn't sleep, until she'd overheard the baron scolding him for napping at his desk. She'd since heard reports of him catching winks in trees, on the roof, at Master Altharaine's inn (probably not after having paid for a bed), and even in the Lady Rahileine's cellar--from the sounds of, any preceding presence on the property going unnoticed by the family.
Her mother thought sleep bored him. But if sleep bored him, then so did routine visits. Not that he didn't call, but rarely did she find him waiting politely in her kitchen.
"And he even knocked, if you believe it! I was so concerned, I asked if anyone had died. Of course, he told me to spend less time asking stupid questions and more time making my eyelashes look less girly."
"So... less cause for concern, then." Dora shook her head, not without that bizarre fondness only her father could inspire. "I'll go see him."
"And I'll be upstairs, making my eyelashes look less girly."
She chuckled as Adonis took to the steps, then made for the kitchen. Her father hated waiting even more than he did both sleep and visits.
"Oh, thank God. I need your help."
"Good morning to you too, Father." Whatever it was, she suspected he'd be better off seeking help from her five-year-old son than from her. "What do you need?"
"Your boss has a stash of books, right? Books that might say something about... I don't know, behavior and whatnot, whatever you did at the university? Or training? I'd ask Raia if I could use the university's, but it's tough to speak with someone after your nap in their cellar ends with them pelting potatoes at your naked ass as you run like hell."
"Wait, you were-- never mind." Dora sighed. "What do you need a book for?"
"I'm glad you asked. See, I'm curious as to what kind of bird would be best suited to a life spent stealing pastries off of windowsills. I don't know if a crow would be able to carry a pie, but I get the feeling that an owl would betray me..."
NEXT CHAPTER:
May 1, 1202
"Thank you for all your help this whole time." Adonis began about half a minute after Rina sat down. She'd been at the bank all morning, but she'd opted to use her lunch break to check in on Dora and her family. Dora's husband must have thought that to be a larger gesture than it actually was. "You and Severin and Thetis."
"It wasn't a problem. Friends do that." A lesson she'd learned later in life than one ought to have, which was perhaps why it stuck so fervently. She also knew what it was to be ill and bedridden, and how little help it was when the best of the people around resorted to avoidance. "Thetis said she was breathing better?"
"Yes. She's still asleep, but it's a peaceful, healthy sort of sleep. Your husband says she'll be well when she wakes, at least in body." Dora's own husband sighed at the incompleteness of that assessment. "I worry about what he might mean by that, though."
"Well... there's still the memory issue, isn't there? That, and I don't think it's unusual to be stressed and agitated after recovering from an illness; there's a feeling of needing to catch up with life after essentially rejoining it."
"Hmm. I suppose that makes sense." But Adonis just drummed his fingers against his leg, enlightened but not reassured. "I just... God. I just want her to be well, you know? Healthy, and happy. I'd pull the stars from the sky if that would make her better, and I hate knowing that there's nothing I can do to help and probably a thousand ways to make her feel worse."
A thousand ways to make her feel worse. Rina knew how that felt. But, she also knew that many of those ways were more about intent than anything else. "Just be there for her, Adonis. She knows that you care about her; as long as you give her no reason to doubt that, you'll help her more than you know. I know that loving isn't always enough, but sometimes it is."
"I should hope so. Sometimes it's all we have, isn't it? Like now." A scuff of his boot against the floor took that bitterly. "Do you think she'll be all right, in the end? More than in body, I mean?"
'Think' wasn't always the best word at times like these. It wasn't a question for the mind, or at least not for their minds. How would they even know, necessarily? If Dora cared to, she could hide her misery beneath a mask of content for fifty years yet, and no one would know the difference.
A genuine answer required a different verb. "I hope so."
NEXT CHAPTER:
April 29, 1202
"I... I just..." Dora broke up her own sob with a cough. She'd been ill the past few days, to the point where Thetis Tumekrin had taken it on herself to make bowl after bowl of soup, to keep an eye on Ceidrid when Adonis had to work, to fight for sleep on the uncomfortable spare bed just in case she was needed in the morning. She was with Ceidrid now, downstairs, greeting Adonis as if she'd half-expected him to return as early as he had. The walls weren't thick. She'd probably heard more than Dora thought she had.
The sickness wasn't the half of it. "I can't remember anything, Adonis! I don't know, maybe it's the fever, but I can't! It used to be that everything seemed wrong, or that pieces were missing, but now it's all--just--gone!"
Adonis wiped his wife's brow with the cuff of his sleeve before lacing his arm around her back. The fever was as strong as ever. He wished she'd lie back down, but then again it had been long enough that bedsores may have been a concern. Still, her brow... "Darling, let me get you a cold cloth, for your head. It might be easier to talk about this if you're a little more comfortable."
"I don't--I don't know." He couldn't quite be sure she'd spoken in answer. "I don't feel like I'm here, even. I don't feel real any more. I don't know if I ever did."
"You're very real. And you're here. I know because the world's been better, since you've been here." And how unbearable a thought it was, that she might not recover--that she might cease to be here, and the world would return to what it had been before. "I wish I could help you with your memories. Perhaps Orrick, or Severin--"
Dora shook her head. "Orrick is my boss; I can't tell him about this. And Severin wouldn't understand. He's not like me. He's never been like me. Even when we were kids..."
Her words collapsed into sniffles as Adonis fumbled with the last of them. "What do you mean? You didn't know Severin when you were kids."
"I--I don't know who I knew when I was a kid. At this point, how can I know I even was a kid?"
She'd forgotten, he knew from the earnest shudders, just what she had said. It might not have meant anything. It might have been a patchwork of words collected from scattered thoughts, in the form of a complete but nonsensical sentence. If it meant anything, Adonis couldn't say he cared what.
She was the love of his life. He just wanted her to get better. "Dora..."
He took her in his arms and she clung to him tightly, fist balled around the fabric of his tunic. The tension of her grip was a wildfire he could not contain.
But her sudden release was a pinch to a candle.
"Dora!"
NEXT CHAPTER:
June 12, 1196
"Thanks again for getting me this furniture. It's good to have some of this space filled up, at least."
"Oh, no trouble." Adonis gave Dora's hand a light squeeze. In truth, it had been about time he'd done some personal business with the kingdom's carpenters, and they'd all been sure to point that out. "I'm just relieved I managed to pick some patterns you like. I mean, I knew you liked yellow, but I wasn't sure about teal."
"I do like teal. It makes me think of you."
"Oh." She liked thinking of him! God, he hoped he wasn't blushing. Lucky Adwyn had inherited their mother's olive skin and hadn't even blushed at his own wedding banquet. Adonis had their father's not-so-forgiving run-of-the-mill peach. "Huh. That's... very flattering."
A touch of pink emerged on Dora's own face. That helped, he guessed. At least they matched? Shy and embarrassed together? "Oh. Well... it's very flattering that you helped me find all this furniture. I mean, you could have just easily gotten some for yourself first."
"For my room at the inn? I think Ilyda and Senwick like the current furnishings well enough."
"Wait--you don't have a house?"
Huh. Odd that that had taken so long to come up. "Well... I'm usually split between a bunch of different building sites. It just hasn't been convenient to settle somewhere permanent yet."
"Oh. Well, you're welcome to stay here any time." The touch of pink, to a wave of red. "Uh, in the spare room, I mean."
"That would be nice." He smiled. That seemed to ease her coloring somewhat.
"Thank you."
NEXT CHAPTER:
January 12, 1196
"How did you manage to nab a place like this?" Adonis asked as he sat down at Dora's kitchen table, oblivious to the fact that the flowers he'd brought himself constituted the only personal touch the room contained. Though, Dora did think they made for a pretty first. Yellow and white. Her favorites. "I know people who've lived here their whole lives and end up settling for less."
"Tiada's mother found it for me. I guess being lady's maid to Lady Veldora brings some connections." Dora's own mother back in Dovia had been a lady's maid before she'd passed, but she'd never had the sort of social circle needed to find such a lovely vacant cottage. Then again, she'd only been lady's maid to a knight's wife, not an actual lady of a shire.
"So you lived with them when you first came?"
"Yes, Orrick offered a temporary room when he hired me. Before that, I was staying at the inn with my savings."
"I see." Adonis's perma-smile flashed once more. They'd encountered each other at the market that morning, and that encounter had led to a conversation, which had led to a lunch invitation. Dora had seen him in with both excitement and nervousness--she'd never quite sparked such obvious attention from a man--but something about his manner did well to assuage the anxiety. "You know, I've got to admire such spirit, moving to a new kingdom on sheer faith that everything will fall into place."
"Well, I had nothing and no one keeping me in Dovia--and I just had this nagging feeling that Naroni was the place I was supposed to be." People back in Dovia had been right, it seemed, when they'd said there was something magical about Naroni. Though, they spoke of it as a sinister magic; Dora thought it rather the opposite. "I was right. I have a great job, good friends, and a lovely home--even if I've barely had the time to furnish it beyond the essentials."
Adonis chuckled. "Well, there are only so many hours in a day--but you know, I work in close proximity with several of the local carpenters, so I can probably get you some deals on furniture if you like."
"I won't say no to that, if I plan on staying here for a while."
"Smart move--and I must say, I hope you do."
Not sure what to say to that, Dora found her cheeks warming. She hoped the blush wasn't too visible. "Ah, well... it seems likely at this point."
"Great." Adonis grinned again--how did he keep his teeth so perfect?--then glanced over to the flowers on the table. "Look, I get that this might come across as a little forward, but I'm supposed to have dinner at my parents' place tonight; any chance you'd maybe want to come along as well?"
Dora blinked. That was a little forward. And more than a little quick.
But maybe she didn't mind as much she ought to have minded. "Where do they live?"
"Veldora, so it's a bit of a ride--but, I figure we can have a nice long chat on the way."
A nice long chat. She thought she liked the sound of that. "That would be nice."
"Great." Adonis reached across the table and took her by the hand. He was an architect, not one of the laborers who took his visions from the parchment, so there wasn't a callous upon them. "I'll rent some horses after lunch and stop back here for you."
NEXT CHAPTER:
October 14, 1194
"So... you're sure it's just stress?"
Rina had to give her husband some credit for not rolling his eyes. Adonis Wythleit came to the surgery every couple of months complaining of headaches, and not the sort of headaches no one else was prone to getting every now and then. There wasn't a thing else wrong with him--Severin had checked several times.
But, he was the only educated architect in the kingdom, and he was living in a shire that was still relatively new. His workload was, to say the least, demanding.
"Adonis, you work sixteen-hour days juggling about a dozen projects. Of course it's stress." Severin crossed his arms and sighed. "Just take a couple of days off and try to finish a few jobs before you take on anything new."
"Days off? What would I do with myself? You know I'd drive myself mad, just lounging around alone in my cramped little house."
"Then find yourself a wife."
"Bah, now you sound like my mother." But he looked over at Rina and winked. "Have you any single sisters, Rina?"
Rina snorted. "No, but I have a reasonably-aged brother if you're not too picky."
"Ah, a pity!" Adonis laughed as he made his way toward her seat on the bench, Severin trailing behind with a face that clearly read 'clinic hours are over'. "Stubble gives me rashes."
"Then why don't you shave?"
"Other people's stubble," he corrected himself with another wink. "Otherwise, I might have snatched up poor Severin before you had the chance."
Severin shuddered. "Don't flatter yourself."
"Hmph. As if he couldn't do much worse than me."
"Look, I hate to break it to you, but Roddie and I agreed once in a drunken stupor that if we were both homosexuals, we'd make quite the attractive couple."
Rina raised an eyebrow. That was... not the most unappealing of images. "All right, what all went on at Leo House and why was I not around to see it?"
"As far as I'm concerned, it's because you're lucky."
She and her husband and his patient looked to the door to see their neighbor enter, a woman following--a woman other than his wife.
"Orrick!" Adonis was the first to greet him verbally, while Severin merely nodded. Rina couldn't peel her eyes off the woman. There was something about her, something both familiar and... not. Maybe Severin would have a better sense of it? "Does Tiada know that you're running around with this lovely young lady?"
"Tiada would be showing her around herself if the boys weren't down with those pesky fall colds; this one managed to get herself a snug spot under that wing." Orrick--and Tiada, Rina guessed--sensed nothing strange about this newcomer, at least not that he'd let on. And he'd majored in sensing strangeness in people! Perhaps it was all in Rina's own head.
It could have been--if Severin hadn't taken to squinting as he looked her over.
"This is my new assistant, Dora Floren. She just arrived from Dovia last week."
"Hello," Severin managed, while Rina smiled politely in turn. Adonis took a bolder approach.
"Always a pleasure to greet a new neighbor." He'd taken her hand and kissed it before he'd finished the sentence. "Adonis Wythleit, at your service. My friends here are the Tumekrins: the lovely Rina, and the not-so-lovely Severin."
"Oh!" Dora blushed, apologetic eyes on Rina's husband--never mind that she hadn't been the one to say it. "Oh, no, I don't think there's anything much wrong with your looks, sir. In fact, you strike me as... oddly comforting. Somehow."
Severin frowned. "Not a sentiment I'm used to inspiring."
"Which is unfortunate, given that he's a doctor." Adonis chuckled. "You seem prone to familiarity yourself, miss. If I dare say so, it's rather charming."
The pink on the woman's cheeks grew darker. "My apologies. I'm... not much good at socializing, am I?"
"You're doing just fine." Adonis reassured her with a wink.
"Well, he seems thoroughly smitten, so perhaps we can all forget about Leo House," Severin ventured as an attempt at a joke. "How did you and Dora meet, Orrick?"
"What do you mean, how we met? I was looking for an assistant, she showed up for an interview, she got the job."
"I'd heard tell that there was a clinic here," Dora confirmed. "It was my own dumb luck that I showed up when Orrick happened to be hiring."
The newcomer cast another shy smile around the room. It hit Rina as she caught the focus of her face that Dora bore an uncanny resemblance to her sister-in-law Alyssin, never mind the fact that Alyssin had probably never smiled shyly in her life. Why was she only seeing that now?
And why--in spite of an apparent mystery solved--was there still such a peculiarity about her?
To her side, Severin struggled not to stare. He must have caught the resemblance too. Rina would have to take this one. "Very fortunate indeed."
NEXT CHAPTER:
March 8, 1191
"Teodrin!" Roddie clapped his hands together with that perpetual energy so many Kemorins seemed to have. If he was here to invite Teodrin to a night at the inn again--which of course he was--then chances were his two studying siblings would also be there. Falidor was quiet as far as that family went, but CeeCee was just as off-the-wall as Roddie if not moreso. Teodrin could barely handle one of them at a time, much less together. Plus, all of their friends and acquaintances and practically everyone else on campus.
All in the same inn at the same time. On a Friday night. With plenty of beer.
"Come and paint the town red tonight!"
It took a concentrated effort not to whimper. He got that Roddie meant well, but there wasn't much point in trying even if he did have an interest in that sort of loud gathering. Friends and fun weren't meant for broken people. "I have some work to do..."
"It can wait. I promised your big brother I'd keep an eye on you, you know--and you don't exactly make that job easy, cooping yourself up in your room all the time."
"We don't have to go to the inn if you'd rather not," offered Farilon from a few feet behind Roddie. "There are plenty of other things we could do. Roddie and I promised Alya and Nata a good night, and Adonis might like having another bachelor along rather than being a fifth carthorse."
The third member of their party grinned at him, though Teodrin's socially-induced lockjaw prevented him from returning it. He hadn't seen Adonis Wythleit around campus since he'd been here, but he remembered him from the old school. Of course, Teodrin probably hadn't been significant enough to merit most upperclassmen's notice. "I don't know if we've met. I graduated with your brother and sister."
"I know," he managed after a couple seconds, not so loudly as he'd somehow managed for Roddie.
"Oh, good, you know each other. I didn't know if Adonis would visit after he graduated, but here he is." Roddie smirked. "Probably here to look for a girlfriend."
"For the night, at least," Nythran added with a jerk of the head eastward. East was where the brothel was. There was no way in hell Teodrin was going there.
"I could use a wingman who doesn't have another date tonight," Adonis admitted. "I could return the favor if you like."
"There you have it!" Roddie clapped again. "Come on, it's either you or Searle, and... well, you know how he is."
Yes. As far as Teodrin knew, there was nothing out of the ordinary about Searle's anatomy. "I really should do my homework. I have a lot of it."
"That's a shame." Adonis sighed. "I think we would have had a good time."
NEXT CHAPTER:
