Part #2

I walked up the steps to my parent's manse wearing my best gown, one of three I had purchased off Kandice the turn of the queen's gathering. I wrapped myself in memories of that gathering now, one of my best. To be lighthearted and filled with hope when darkness gathers all around has always been a favorite sensation of mine, so rebellious. That was the night that Doyle had arrived in ceremonial robes matching those worn by the Iron Knights. The heady excitement that had coursed through me at that realization was only outdone by my jubilation at the queen's announcement of her and Hojo's upcoming bonding. I had a different bonding to attend to now, mine. Or rather the possibility of mine. Correction, the slim possibility of mine, a sliver of possibility, like a splinter...really.
Cedric answered my knock and informed me that my parents were out visiting an associate of theirs. I could pretend that this filled me with hurt and anger, but really I was relieved. Their absence allowed me to wrap Cedric up in an embrace. I giggled at his momentary surprise before stepping back to look at him. He was aged, but then he always had been. Once a guard, his demeanor still held a stiffness and formality that made him even more endearing to me. It was Cedric who had been given the task of escorting me out of this very house twelve cycles ago. It was Cedric who had put an arm around me as I stood there bawling and beaten, waiting for the ferry to arrive that would take me to my new life in Dundee. And it had been Cedric who placed my very first blade, his, into my hand as I stepped onto the ferry.
“Your rooms have been prepared for you upstairs.” he indicated the stairs with a nod as he spoke. It was not the warmest of greetings, but it sufficed. “Mistress Avantis has asked that you keep away from the servants quarters,” he added, pausing before continuing with a firm, “And the kitchen.” Ah, yes, really I could understand that request. As much as I chaffed at not being allowed into the place that held center in many of my favorite memories of home, it made sense. I had poisoned poor Conner the last time I had been in there. Seems this new start still carried lingering ghosts, they always do.
“Thank you, Cedric, I know the way.” I gave him a smile in parting before ascending the steps, anticipation filling me. My rooms, my little sanctuary. As I opened the heavy wooden door I noticed it had been cleaned. All signs of the former me wiped away. My dolls, no longer played with but still lined in honor along my window seat, were gone. Even my writing desk, in the little room attached to my bedchamber, was scrubbed clean. The dark stains, marking the many times I had ruined a parchment by tipping over the ink pot, had been sanded away. The piles and stacks of books that formed a barrier around my bed had been returned to their rightful place in the library.
Inanely, my thoughts turned to the half-read book I had left sitting in the Alliance Hall's basement. I wondered if anyone would think to look down there, in the little room that I so dearly loved. Deep sorrow hit me at the realization that it will most likely have been demolished by the time I return, the material used to build a new hall, for a new guild. This stone fortress in the mountains had been a second home to me, my love for it only outmatched by my love for RoK. I recalled seemingly endless marcs spent in the strategy office, learning of history, of trust. I sat down on my bed and formulated a wondrous plan to chain myself to the beams of the Last Resort. Surely they would not destroy it with me inside. I could gather others as well, we could all chain ourselves to something, we could save a part of history! A very noble cause indeed. But not my cause, not my place and not my business. Besides, it would cause a spectacle and the Gods know I have caused enough of those.
So instead I pulled out my maps, save for the one I left in Synvasti's keeping, and used lockpicks to pin them up over the wall behind my desk. Below these I lined up my collection: diagrams of what I remembered of the inside of the Dark Fortress, a hastily comprised time-line of anything and everything bronze, a rather intricate map of Branishor down to Fartown, over-layered with the tunnel systems and a funny little drawing of blood splotches on snow. That done I went into my bath chamber and retrieved my old journals, stacks of missives, and keepsakes from beneath the loose tile. I pulled Butterfly from her pouch and flopped down on my bed. I untied the bundle of missives, all from Conner and spanning almost our entire lives. I began to read them to Butterfly.