Post by Tallaith on Nov 15, 2009 16:34:15 GMT -5
"Pass me that pitcher, please?"
Ceallian smiled gently as her cousin scooted the jug of milk across the table to her. Leasung was learning to make bread, her clumsy attempts at kneading the dough still leaving the stout recipe edible even after several beatings like this. She furrowed her golden brows in concentration as she punched a perfectly acceptable loaf down again into a flat, lumpy mass.
"Here. Can I show you?" Ceallian stepped around the table and arched a brow as Leasung almost immediately brushed her back with a floury hand.
"I will never learn if I do not do this myself. Patience, please. I have not been doing this since I was in nappies like you have." Leasung's words were only barely barbed and softened around the edges with a girlish half-smile.
"As you wish, then." Ceallian went back to her work, whipping eggs and sweet milk together for a custard. "You are improving every day!"
Leasung made no answer but the older girl caught her slow grin of pleasure as she leaned over the dough. Leasung's hair seemed to never want to stay tied back, offering the lass a convenient shield for her expressions.
Ceallian took her mixing bowl to the hearth. She cautiously checked the temperature of the double boiler and started the meticulous work of boiling the custard mixture without scorching it. Her long wooden spoon moved with an unusual grace; since the baby was born, Ceallian was even more clumsy than normal as she regained the knowledge of her original body size.
It was a blessing, she mused as she began delicately adding drops of amber honey to the mix, that Leasung did improve so much and so quickly.
The previous morning, the cousins woke to face their first full day in the Shire. As Ceallian rolled from the huge bed and struggled to brush both the sleep and her wild mane of hair from her eyes, Leasung immediately stood, pulled her own long braid over her shoulder, and began straightening the covers.
Ceallian watched her with ravenous curiousity. This was the first time since they fetched the lass from Esteldin that she was moving under her own steam; if she wanted her cousin to do something, she had to prompt the girl before she seemed to understand what was expected from her. She could do any normal task she knew how to perform as long as someone put the required tool in her hand and started her moving. She was a doll most of the time, silently and mechanically moving, until her mouth opened, mostly with no reason, and she began talking.
Her mind was still sharp enough for Leasung to make sense and to express clear ideas and wants. But her thoughts were so muddled that she spoke in riddles, circles, fairytales that the listener had no way of picking apart from truths. It was nearly infuriating to talk to her about the simplest matters like carding wool or whether or not it would rain. She would pick up key words that were said aloud by others and begin a somehow-related rant using the same choice word over and over.
Today, however, Leasung proved herself to be a very different lass than both the one who left Bree-Town to ride to her horrible fate in Esteldin or the make-believe girl she presented as her true self. As Ceallian began the day's work, she watched, completely dumbfounded, as Leasung began to assist her in the never-ending chores. Her younger cousin clearly had no knowledge of housewifery, unskilled with every aspect of domestic life, but she gamely tried to help without hampering Ceallian's efficiency. She watched Ceallian stir a pot of porridge and took the spoon without question, mimicking the motions perfectly. Later, she knelt next to the young mother and helped her weed out the flower beds near the little round house's front
stoop. If she pulled up a "good" plant by mistake, Ceallian gently patted her hand to correct her.
Like this, the two girls passed the entire day in quiet work. Leasung didn't utter a word and Ceallian respected her silence by keeping her own chatter to herself, speaking only softly and sparely when neccessary.
Leasung was obedient and patient; she took the last of the late autumn apples from the tree in the dooryard in for Maggie, the wet-nurse, to pare for supper, she drew water from the well after a few clumsy failures and filled the urns and basins inside, she swept the common room of the house with slow preciseness.
Near dusk, Leasung was in the kitchen with Maggie, her fair head bent next to the nurse's dark wreath of braided hair over a pile of taters to be peeled on the long table, when the postman arrived. Ceallian was about to latch the door for the evening when she spotted the bent little figure making his way up the lane.
Ceallian stopped the Hobbit near the postbox, her heart flying in her chest suddenly with a passion that scared her. "What is wrong? What has happened?"
"Nothin', Lady." The wrinkled face was dubious, as if he questioned her sanity. "Nothin's wrong. Just have a late delivery here, somebody paid a nice bit o' coin ta have this delivered fast. Fer a 'Leasung Gyldenfeax' listed at this address."
Ceallian let out a lengthy sigh of relief. "My husband, he is a soldier, you see..."
"Ya don't hafta explain nothin' more ta me. I unnerstand now, Lady. Here, yer package. An' no bad news from me today!" The Hobbit bowed stiffly as he produced a small, leather-bound bundle from the pack at his side. "This 'un lives here?"
"Aye, my cousin. Many thanks." She slipped the postman a few silvers and darted up the path to the house, her curiousity nearly burning her.
Inside, she laid the bundle on the table before her cousin without a word of explanation besides, "For you." She met Maggie's dark eyes and the nurse followed her into the bedchamber to check on the baby.
Alone in the kitchen, Leasung stared at the sturdy leather wrappings of the small package. Aside from her name and address on a wooden tag attached with twine, there was nothing written on it. Her hands were steady as she finally untied the string and peeled back the leather; beneath, she found layers of parchment, also perfectly blank of any writing. She pulled the flimsy paper away, and froze. Her eyes were glass jewels set in ivory. She barely seemed to even draw breath.
A silver girdle, set with pearls and moonstones, was heaped carelessly in the bed of parchment. Her fingers were still sure as she lifted it up before her eyes in the firelight. The belt was made of the finest silver wire, woven together into a lace of glittering links. So many memories, feelings, overwhelming words and places and smells and sensations, washed over her, that all she could do was neatly roll the girdle back around itself and tuck it back into the wrappings.
A full minute passed. She pressed her eyes closed firmly, concentrating on only her breath. She counted as she inhaled, counted as she exhaled. Breathe. Breathe. She opened her eyes. The girdle was still there, glinting in the firelight. Her hands quivered as she carefully closed the supple leather around the package once more. She stood, mercifully her feet sure beneath her, and slipped the bundle onto the top of a cabinet of crockery
near the hearth. She had just settled back on the trestle bench at the table when Ceallian and Maggie joined her again in the kitchen.
Ceallian said nothing to her cousin to question the contents, or now the whereabouts, of the package. She sat down across from the girl, focused for only a moment on Leasung's stony expression of neutrality, and took up a tater to peel.
"Do you really think he is coming?"
Ceallian jerked her chin up at Leasung's soft, cultured words. So unlike the ranting tone everything she'd said rang of lately, her voice was now steady, gentle, musical.
"The Captain? Of course. He said he would be here.. As soon as he could. It has been near to three months now. He will see his son before I leave again." Ceallian struggled to keep her own voice level and pleasant, betraying none of the ache behind what she said aloud. "This house is all I might have dreamed of! Lovely, aye?"
"Why has he stayed away so long?" Leasung did not look to the other girls as she slowly, with huge amounts of concentration, took up a tater and began to unburden it from it's skin.
"He is a soldier, you know that. And I could not travel to see him. Likely, he is off chasing dragons somewhere in Angmar, and not weighed down with ledgers and the like. He hates that sort of work."
Leasung solemnly raised her eyes to meet her cousin's. "I hope he comes soon. I do not like you as you are now."
Ceallian opened her mouth to speak and was hushed almost instantly by Maggie's short shake of the head. She gave the nurse a ghost of a nod in return. Of course. The girl's voice was level, sane, and her actions were starting to betray a spark of life behind them. But that by no means meant the lass was mending. This could be merely another sort of a sickened mind.
"I want to meet him. And see who you are when he is around. If he is worthy of you."
Ceallian blinked. "O-o-of course. You will meet him. He should be here soon, I hope!" She looked to Maggie, hoping the girl would offer words to support her. The nurse only silently shrugged, refusing to raise her eyes from her own work at peeling.
Ceallian sighed. They had passed the rest of the night in edged silence.
This morning, Ceallian was barely hopeful that her cousin would continue to show improvement, but was surprised as the girl got up on her own, bathed in a bucket of cold water, and dressed herself and braided her hair. Leasung's movements were still a bit mechanical, like the actions of a clever Dwarvish toy, but she seemed to be aware fully of the world around her.
She even murmured a greeting to Maggie when she appeared to help with breakfast, and made a small fuss over the baby held to the nurse's breast. Ceallian smiled as she watched the younger lass cluck and coo at the baby for a moment before returning to her work.
Perhaps the simpler, brighter air and purer sun of the Shire was going help Leasung heal in ways no medicine could hope to improve her. Ceallian didn't know. She did know, however, as the day went on, that Leasung was not in any way the lass she thought she had grown to accept as her cousin.
She spoke freely, if shortly, today, and nothing she said betrayed any lack of reasoning. She didn't bring up her stay in either Esteldin or Bree-Town or the subject of her Kinsman, Brendur. Leasung asked and answered questions, made soft, well-bred comments, and all in all was delightfully understated company for the day.
As the afternoon wore on and Ceallian busied herself with cooking more and more dishes that she thought of as "festival food," she felt in her own belly something growing like uneasy madness. Everything in her instincts told her that Edan was coming today. She could be finally succumbing to her dearest wishes, but somehow she hoped she was right. So she took from the cabinets all the finest and rarest spices her husband had stocked for her; she sent out Maggie to the village market to buy the finest meat, cheese, and other ingredients to be found there.
As Ceallian deftly worked, she hoped. And hoped.
Ceallian smiled gently as her cousin scooted the jug of milk across the table to her. Leasung was learning to make bread, her clumsy attempts at kneading the dough still leaving the stout recipe edible even after several beatings like this. She furrowed her golden brows in concentration as she punched a perfectly acceptable loaf down again into a flat, lumpy mass.
"Here. Can I show you?" Ceallian stepped around the table and arched a brow as Leasung almost immediately brushed her back with a floury hand.
"I will never learn if I do not do this myself. Patience, please. I have not been doing this since I was in nappies like you have." Leasung's words were only barely barbed and softened around the edges with a girlish half-smile.
"As you wish, then." Ceallian went back to her work, whipping eggs and sweet milk together for a custard. "You are improving every day!"
Leasung made no answer but the older girl caught her slow grin of pleasure as she leaned over the dough. Leasung's hair seemed to never want to stay tied back, offering the lass a convenient shield for her expressions.
Ceallian took her mixing bowl to the hearth. She cautiously checked the temperature of the double boiler and started the meticulous work of boiling the custard mixture without scorching it. Her long wooden spoon moved with an unusual grace; since the baby was born, Ceallian was even more clumsy than normal as she regained the knowledge of her original body size.
It was a blessing, she mused as she began delicately adding drops of amber honey to the mix, that Leasung did improve so much and so quickly.
The previous morning, the cousins woke to face their first full day in the Shire. As Ceallian rolled from the huge bed and struggled to brush both the sleep and her wild mane of hair from her eyes, Leasung immediately stood, pulled her own long braid over her shoulder, and began straightening the covers.
Ceallian watched her with ravenous curiousity. This was the first time since they fetched the lass from Esteldin that she was moving under her own steam; if she wanted her cousin to do something, she had to prompt the girl before she seemed to understand what was expected from her. She could do any normal task she knew how to perform as long as someone put the required tool in her hand and started her moving. She was a doll most of the time, silently and mechanically moving, until her mouth opened, mostly with no reason, and she began talking.
Her mind was still sharp enough for Leasung to make sense and to express clear ideas and wants. But her thoughts were so muddled that she spoke in riddles, circles, fairytales that the listener had no way of picking apart from truths. It was nearly infuriating to talk to her about the simplest matters like carding wool or whether or not it would rain. She would pick up key words that were said aloud by others and begin a somehow-related rant using the same choice word over and over.
Today, however, Leasung proved herself to be a very different lass than both the one who left Bree-Town to ride to her horrible fate in Esteldin or the make-believe girl she presented as her true self. As Ceallian began the day's work, she watched, completely dumbfounded, as Leasung began to assist her in the never-ending chores. Her younger cousin clearly had no knowledge of housewifery, unskilled with every aspect of domestic life, but she gamely tried to help without hampering Ceallian's efficiency. She watched Ceallian stir a pot of porridge and took the spoon without question, mimicking the motions perfectly. Later, she knelt next to the young mother and helped her weed out the flower beds near the little round house's front
stoop. If she pulled up a "good" plant by mistake, Ceallian gently patted her hand to correct her.
Like this, the two girls passed the entire day in quiet work. Leasung didn't utter a word and Ceallian respected her silence by keeping her own chatter to herself, speaking only softly and sparely when neccessary.
Leasung was obedient and patient; she took the last of the late autumn apples from the tree in the dooryard in for Maggie, the wet-nurse, to pare for supper, she drew water from the well after a few clumsy failures and filled the urns and basins inside, she swept the common room of the house with slow preciseness.
Near dusk, Leasung was in the kitchen with Maggie, her fair head bent next to the nurse's dark wreath of braided hair over a pile of taters to be peeled on the long table, when the postman arrived. Ceallian was about to latch the door for the evening when she spotted the bent little figure making his way up the lane.
Ceallian stopped the Hobbit near the postbox, her heart flying in her chest suddenly with a passion that scared her. "What is wrong? What has happened?"
"Nothin', Lady." The wrinkled face was dubious, as if he questioned her sanity. "Nothin's wrong. Just have a late delivery here, somebody paid a nice bit o' coin ta have this delivered fast. Fer a 'Leasung Gyldenfeax' listed at this address."
Ceallian let out a lengthy sigh of relief. "My husband, he is a soldier, you see..."
"Ya don't hafta explain nothin' more ta me. I unnerstand now, Lady. Here, yer package. An' no bad news from me today!" The Hobbit bowed stiffly as he produced a small, leather-bound bundle from the pack at his side. "This 'un lives here?"
"Aye, my cousin. Many thanks." She slipped the postman a few silvers and darted up the path to the house, her curiousity nearly burning her.
Inside, she laid the bundle on the table before her cousin without a word of explanation besides, "For you." She met Maggie's dark eyes and the nurse followed her into the bedchamber to check on the baby.
Alone in the kitchen, Leasung stared at the sturdy leather wrappings of the small package. Aside from her name and address on a wooden tag attached with twine, there was nothing written on it. Her hands were steady as she finally untied the string and peeled back the leather; beneath, she found layers of parchment, also perfectly blank of any writing. She pulled the flimsy paper away, and froze. Her eyes were glass jewels set in ivory. She barely seemed to even draw breath.
A silver girdle, set with pearls and moonstones, was heaped carelessly in the bed of parchment. Her fingers were still sure as she lifted it up before her eyes in the firelight. The belt was made of the finest silver wire, woven together into a lace of glittering links. So many memories, feelings, overwhelming words and places and smells and sensations, washed over her, that all she could do was neatly roll the girdle back around itself and tuck it back into the wrappings.
A full minute passed. She pressed her eyes closed firmly, concentrating on only her breath. She counted as she inhaled, counted as she exhaled. Breathe. Breathe. She opened her eyes. The girdle was still there, glinting in the firelight. Her hands quivered as she carefully closed the supple leather around the package once more. She stood, mercifully her feet sure beneath her, and slipped the bundle onto the top of a cabinet of crockery
near the hearth. She had just settled back on the trestle bench at the table when Ceallian and Maggie joined her again in the kitchen.
Ceallian said nothing to her cousin to question the contents, or now the whereabouts, of the package. She sat down across from the girl, focused for only a moment on Leasung's stony expression of neutrality, and took up a tater to peel.
"Do you really think he is coming?"
Ceallian jerked her chin up at Leasung's soft, cultured words. So unlike the ranting tone everything she'd said rang of lately, her voice was now steady, gentle, musical.
"The Captain? Of course. He said he would be here.. As soon as he could. It has been near to three months now. He will see his son before I leave again." Ceallian struggled to keep her own voice level and pleasant, betraying none of the ache behind what she said aloud. "This house is all I might have dreamed of! Lovely, aye?"
"Why has he stayed away so long?" Leasung did not look to the other girls as she slowly, with huge amounts of concentration, took up a tater and began to unburden it from it's skin.
"He is a soldier, you know that. And I could not travel to see him. Likely, he is off chasing dragons somewhere in Angmar, and not weighed down with ledgers and the like. He hates that sort of work."
Leasung solemnly raised her eyes to meet her cousin's. "I hope he comes soon. I do not like you as you are now."
Ceallian opened her mouth to speak and was hushed almost instantly by Maggie's short shake of the head. She gave the nurse a ghost of a nod in return. Of course. The girl's voice was level, sane, and her actions were starting to betray a spark of life behind them. But that by no means meant the lass was mending. This could be merely another sort of a sickened mind.
"I want to meet him. And see who you are when he is around. If he is worthy of you."
Ceallian blinked. "O-o-of course. You will meet him. He should be here soon, I hope!" She looked to Maggie, hoping the girl would offer words to support her. The nurse only silently shrugged, refusing to raise her eyes from her own work at peeling.
Ceallian sighed. They had passed the rest of the night in edged silence.
This morning, Ceallian was barely hopeful that her cousin would continue to show improvement, but was surprised as the girl got up on her own, bathed in a bucket of cold water, and dressed herself and braided her hair. Leasung's movements were still a bit mechanical, like the actions of a clever Dwarvish toy, but she seemed to be aware fully of the world around her.
She even murmured a greeting to Maggie when she appeared to help with breakfast, and made a small fuss over the baby held to the nurse's breast. Ceallian smiled as she watched the younger lass cluck and coo at the baby for a moment before returning to her work.
Perhaps the simpler, brighter air and purer sun of the Shire was going help Leasung heal in ways no medicine could hope to improve her. Ceallian didn't know. She did know, however, as the day went on, that Leasung was not in any way the lass she thought she had grown to accept as her cousin.
She spoke freely, if shortly, today, and nothing she said betrayed any lack of reasoning. She didn't bring up her stay in either Esteldin or Bree-Town or the subject of her Kinsman, Brendur. Leasung asked and answered questions, made soft, well-bred comments, and all in all was delightfully understated company for the day.
As the afternoon wore on and Ceallian busied herself with cooking more and more dishes that she thought of as "festival food," she felt in her own belly something growing like uneasy madness. Everything in her instincts told her that Edan was coming today. She could be finally succumbing to her dearest wishes, but somehow she hoped she was right. So she took from the cabinets all the finest and rarest spices her husband had stocked for her; she sent out Maggie to the village market to buy the finest meat, cheese, and other ingredients to be found there.
As Ceallian deftly worked, she hoped. And hoped.