I'm Fine

Writers: Miriah, Suzee
Date Posted: 2nd March 2019

Characters: Yriadha, Sophque
Description: Yriadha finds some comfort from a valued friend
Location: Sunstone Seahold
Date: month 10, day 12 of Turn 9
Notes: Mentioned: Bryvin, Humari

Yriadha

Sophque

Humari had taken Yavin for the evening and Yriadha had answered few
questions before leaving to go to her quarters. She found her rooms
quiet and thankfully warm from the fire that had been laid for her.
With automatic motions, she'd prepared her bath, stripping herself of
the borrowed gown with a faint feeling of repugnance. She left it on
the floor, ignored. Her bath wasn't soothing, but was instead a
ritual of fierce scrubbing that reddened already tender skin.

As she tied her robe around her and carefully sat before the fire, she
took a comb to her long hair. The fine, damp strands fell about her
shoulders and as her hands blindly worked in the familiar activity,
Yriadha's eyes never left the fire. She felt...nothing.

Sophque scratched on Yriadha's door and then opened it a crack. "Hey,
I heard you were back," she called. "Can I come in?"

For a moment, Yriadha's hand paused, then began combing once again.
"Yes." Her gaze never wandered from the flickering flames. She heard
the door open, but she didn't move from her chair to greet her friend.

Sophque's smile faded as she came into the room. Her brow furrowed
"Are you alright?"

"I'm fine." The lifeless words sounded hollow to her. The comb moved
repeatedly through the same lock of hair. "My father is dead." No
inflection, no grief. Just a flat statement. The flickering flames.
They moved like that in the sickroom's parlor after she had stopped
fighting. She had stopped fighting. Images seemed to dance in the
flames; they mocked her weakness. Her eyes clamped shut, unable to
take the taunts. "I'm fine." Her hand trembled, then clamped back onto
the comb, the movements becoming viscous as she yanked at her hair,
the tips of the tines digging into her scalp.

Sophque moved quickly to pluck the comb from Yriadha's finger. "No,"
she said gently. "You're not fine." She didn't understand why her
friend was so affected by her father's death. She'd always been firm
in her dislike and rejection of the marriage he'd subjected her to. So
she began to comb gently through the damp hair. She hoped it would be
soothing in the way it was for her daughter. "Can you tell me about
it?"

The comb being pulled away allowed Yriadha's hands to fall into her
lap and they immediately clutched at the robe, wrinkling the fabric in
her grip. "I'm fine." She repeated, allowing the gentle strokes in her
hair to lull her again into that wonderful numbness. She opened her
eyes and saw her hands clutched in her robe, saw the darkly mottled
skin that her grip had parted the robe enough to bare. She wasn't
fine. She was forever marked. She gave a horrified cry and brought a
hand up to cover her mouth. Tears finally erupted with a heartbroken
sob.

"Yriadha," Sophque put her arms around her shoulders. "You don't have
to say it. I think I know." Thinking of where she'd gone and what she
knew about the Headwoman Sophque had a very good idea of who might
have done this to her. The one person she'd trusted at that Hold, the
one person she'd ever really cared about. Only a person like that
could break Yriadha this way. "Can you say who?"

She leaned hard into the embrace, covering her face now with both of
her hands as she finally sobbed out bitter tears. The numbness that
she had taken refuge in bled away, leaving a raw pain that she had no
immediate defense against. "He hurt me...I couldn't stop it..." It
came out in a moan filled with betrayal and a gut-wrenching shame so
deep that she felt it would never ease. "Look what he's done to me..."
She moved her hands to stare at her exposed thighs; she couldn't for
the life of her cover them, even though part of her brain cried out
that it wasn't decent.

The story spilled from her lips, interrupted by frequent deep
cries of disgust and despair. Also came the tale of what he was now
expecting of her and the fears that she might never be able to bear
the touch of a man again, that Bryvin would be disgusted because she
hadn't fought harder. That she might actually return to Golden Waves
Hold and never see him again. Yriadha turned, burying her head in
Sophque's shoulder, completely without the emotional barriers that she
had maintained for so long.

Sophque closed her eyes and rocked as Yriadha wept in her arms. She
knew, intimately, what had happened and no matter what Yriadha thought
she couldn't have fought hard enough to stop what had happened to her.
She'd seen the Holder Stenlis and could tell he was strong no matter
the cane and limp. "Shhh," she said as she would have to a child.
"Shhhh," she whispered and held her friend until the sobbing lessened.
Finally, after almost a candlemark Sophque rose and retrieved a
nightrail "Here," she said. "Let's get you into bed."

Yriadha was exhausted and her face felt raw. She was so wrung out that
she couldn't be embarrassed by the eruption of emotion; now she just
felt drained and limp. She hadn't slept the night before and her body
ached for sleep. But she feared it as well. She let her friend pull
the evening clothes over her and lead her to bed. As she laid down
with the soft blanket covering her, she looked up at Sophque, real
gratitude in her eyes. Her lips trembled as she spoke. "He's coming
for me in a sevenday. I'm afraid."

"I'll think of something," she promised. She'd already thought hard
about it and there was only one solution she could think of but she
wasn't going to tell Yriadha. The idea wasn't fully formed yet but she
knew in her heart there had to be a way to protect her from Stenlis.

Last updated on the March 3rd 2019

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I'm Fine