Risks and Reasons (1/2)

Writers: Halyonix
Date Posted: 15th April 2026

Characters: Isoria, Maeryld
Description: Maeryld arrives at Healer Hall and gets some unexpected advice
Location: Healer Hall
Date: month 1, day 5 of Turn 13
Notes: Mentioned: Laithan

She stepped off the ship with three bulging bags and a lifetime of regrets.

Maeryld closed her eyes as the breeze toyed with her dark hair, tugging free strands of it. She let herself breathe deeply, calmingly, for this moment was the end of one journey and the beginning of the next -- a journey that had, so far, cost her so much. If she failed after all of this risk…

No, she would not give in to doubt. Maeryld lifted her chin and set her posture straight. Her feelings continued to tumble haphazardly in her heart but her expression was one of confidence. “My thanks,” she said to the captain, projecting gratitude in her smile.

“Need me to carry--oop, no, looks like you got it just fine,” he started to say, amazed at how a woman of her short stature could handle the stuffed bags. Maeryld smiled at him indulgently. A woman’s body was made for handling burdens, usually in the form of babies. Bags were no different. She would not have let anyone take them anyway. They were all she had left to her name.

In truth, she hadn’t expected to arrive with much at all. The fight with her husband had been one for the ages and most of what she made off with was probably because he had been too angry to realize how _much_ he was giving her. Not a mark to her name, no, but plenty of belongings so she wouldn’t have to beg there. She’d earn her room and board easily enough somehow, she assured herself.

There was a woman, a slim creature with silver streaked dark hair, waiting for her on the dock. “Apprentice Maeryld,” the woman said. Maeryld’s heart leapt wildly. Apprentice! She was officially an apprentice! Oh, the joy to have taken the first step on her lifelong dream to be a Healer! “Welcome to the Hall. I’m journeywoman Isoria.” The woman spoke with formality and there was a shadow to her tones that made Maeryld wonder if this was her normal mood or if something had happened recently to cause that but that was not her business. “If you’ll follow me…”

“Of course. A pleasure to meet you, journeywoman,” Maeryld replied warmly. A journeywoman! Oh, she would have to ask how long it had taken the other woman to attain that rank. And under what fortuitous circumstances! The Halls had been dreadful about allowing women into their craft but there were other places, freer places that did not feel that restraint.

“Would you like me to carry one of your bags?” Isoria asked though her expression nearly begged for Maeryld to tell her no.

Maeryld shook her head. “I’m a mother, I’m used to it,” she answered easily. Though she hadn’t had little ones in Turns. And her children currently didn’t want to speak to her at all. But once a mother, always a mother. Hopefully, her studies would soon relieve her of having too much free time to second-guess her decisions.

Isoria damn near floated towards the Hall, moving with a grace that Maeryld envied. Maeryld was short, ample, a body that showed her maternity. She felt she had no fluid movement to her but she knew that she was beautiful in her own way. At least, plenty of men had told her such. Big hips were good for something besides just bearing children.

“The main Hall is four stories, with one of the levels underground,” Isoria explained as she motioned with a slim hand towards the large building ahead of them. She turned off the path towards a smaller set of buildings. Maeryld guessed that they were dormitories and housing and was presently correct. “Your quarters will be here. You have a roommate, but she has not arrived just yet,” Isoria informed Maeryld a few moments later as she showed her a sparsely set room. “I realize that this must be…odd…for you, being an older woman, but all apprentices are--

“It’s perfect, it’s great,” Maeryld interrupted with a big grin. She would make it work! “I understand my situation is abnormal. I won’t ask for any accommodations to that. I’m here to learn just like every other apprentice.” She wouldn’t beg but she also wouldn’t burden them with anything out of the way. “I’ll just set my bags down here and you can take me to wherever you need me next to be.”

It felt odd, no, _scary_ to be setting down the only things left to her name in a place she barely knew after clinging tightly to those bags for the last sevenday or so but she had to trust the Hall that no one had light fingers. She fussed for a moment, remembering that she had a few lovely jewelry pieces in one of the bags, but then left it, leaning into that tenuous trust. “Ready,” she said, projecting confidence to the journeywoman.

“Follow me,” Isoria said. “I’ll take you to meet Hallmaster Laithan.”

The Hallmaster! The one who had replied personally to her application! He had seemed a bit gruff in his letter but he was probably a very busy man with the new Hall so Maeryld forgave him that. Probably inundated with applications too. Maeryld’s heart swelled with gratitude once again that she had been accepted. “If I may ask, journeywoman, for any advice you would give an apprentice like me? You’ve obviously been doing this for Turns and I’d like to be equally successful at it.”

The graceful creature in front of her stopped, turned, and there was a terrible grief in her grey eyes that made Maeryld’s heart leap in pity. “Study. Hard. Learn everything there is. But know that at the end of the day, you will not be able to save the ones you love from death. And if that is what you’re here for, then I suggest you take those bags and return to the ship.” There was a patience to her posture that told Maeryld that Isoria would clearly wait for the other woman to make that decision.

Maeryld straightened her shoulders but the expression on her face was not one of bravado but one of deep seated truth. “Ever since my first child took their first steps away from me, I’ve always known that there would be a day when I would see them grow up and leave my side. And, Faranth forbid I still be alive, a day when they would die. I have carried that knowledge, that _fear_ deep in my bones and yet, I mothered them with all of the love that I could give. So, I am not here to learn how to stave away what comes for us all. I am here because I fear that if I do not do something more with my life, then I will see that day come for myself and all of them and hate myself even more.”

Isoria was quiet for a long moment. So long a moment that Maeryld wondered if she had made any sense. _She_ knew the reason why she was here. It fluttered, kicked underneath her heart like a newborn trying to break free of a womb that had held it contained for too long.

Maeryld did not know what hard lesson Isoria had learned but her heart went out to the other woman.

Eventually, the elder journeywoman motioned for Maeryld to follow her. The rest of the journey was quiet, with Maeryld taking in the sights of the Hall with increasing excitement. On the third floor, Isoria stopped in front of a door, one hand raised to knock, but then paused. She turned to the shorter woman with a ghost of a smile. “Good luck with your studies, apprentice Maeryld. I wish you success.”

She knocked and then opened the door, pushing it out of the way so that Maeryld could meet the Hallmaster.

Last updated on the May 1st 2026

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Risks and Reasons (1/2)