In Time...

Writers: Eimi, Yvonne
Date Posted: 24th July 2006

Characters: Penryn, Thalia
Description: Penryn comes to help Thalia in her garden, but they end up talking about more than just flowers.
Location: Garnet Valley Hold
Date: month 12, day 13 of Turn 3

Thalia looked up from the soon-to-be flower bed as a shadow crossed her back, and smiled when she saw who had joined her. "Penryn! This is a surprise. To what do I owe the honor?"

"I've come to help, of course," he smiled down at her. "You did say you wanted some, didn't you?"

"Of course!" She leaned up against her shovel and tipped her sunhat back. "But I didn't expect it so quickly. Not that I'm complaining, mind."

"Well, it's a sunny day, after all." The steward looked around and nodded approvingly. "It looks like a very nice start. What can I do to help?"

"Well... my plans are over there," she said, nodding toward a piece of hide tacked down with stones, "so you could pick up a shovel and help me make flower beds. Or you could work on the wall... although I must confess, I have _no_ idea how you'll be going about that. Maybe I ought to leave that to your discretion."

"The wall I can build will be nothing _fancy_, mind you. Just a simple stone wall, really. I should talk to the miners first and see if I can't have a bit of their unused stone from the quarry to build it with. Or would you rather brick? I think I could build a decent brick wall."

She shrugged. "Which ever you are most comfortable with. I'm planning on covering it with creeping vines either way."

"I'll see what's available then. Now, let's look at these plans of yours." He squatted down and looked at the tacked down sheet. Well, she certainly had some ambitious plans for the place. "So which flower bed are you working on there?"

"It isn't obvious?" Thalia asked worriedly. She knelt down beside the Steward, using his shoulder for balance, and pointed with a grubby finger at a blacked in part of the diagram. "This one here. Does that make sense? I'm not good at drawing maps... I can see things in my head but it's hard to draw it out properly."

"Oh no, it makes perfect sense..." Kind of. "So I guess that means I can start work on this one?" he asked pointing to the blob next to it. "Does it need to be that shape?"

The Lady felt her cheeks flame with embarrassment; she drew the brim of her hat down low and picked up her shovel again. "Not really."

Penryn suddenly felt like a real heel. "Well, actually," he said, trying to cover over his tactlessness, "I really like that shape. I think we are _far_ to uniform with gardens sometimes. Something more of an organic shape is... appropriate."

"Well.. whatever you think. It was a wobble on the page." She jammed the shovel into the earth and jumped on it to force it deeper. Roots screamed in protest. "Well, we'll see what happens." He walked over under the tree in search of tools. "Hmmmm... This doesn't look like the tool basket,"
he smiled, peering down at the peacefully sleeping babe.

Thalia felt a warm rush of pride, and left the shovel sticking out of the ground to join Penryn and Aslian. "No. I thought he'd like to come help out for a while, but the idea of work seems to have tired him right out!"

Penryn realized this was the first chance he had to really take a look at the future heir. Well, besides the day he had come to tell Thalia that her husband had been murdered. Aslian had grown considerably since then. "He certainly is a handsome little fellow." "I like to think so." She smiled at her baby. "But then, I'm a little biased, aren't I."

"What parent isn't, or so I hear. In this case, I have to agree, he's beautiful. I can see a lot of you in his face," he commented quietly.

Thalia smiled slightly. "You know... the other day I was trying to remember what my late husband looked like when he smiled... and I can't. Is that wrong of me?"

Penryn glanced up into her face for a brief moment before lowing his eyes to the basket again. "People tell me it isn't. But it does feel that way sometimes." There were things that he had to struggle to remember about Jaika, and they had known each other for turns longer than Thalia knew Lord Aswic. "You may remember sometime, though. For the longest time I forgot what my wife's singing voice sounded like. Then I dreamed of it, and I got that piece of her back for a while longer. She really was a terrible singer," he said with a tender smile at the memory.

"I just... worry. Aslian is going to want to know these things, and I can't possibly tell him that I _forgot_."

"There are plenty of people who remember Lord Aswic. He will have no shortage of people to tell him remembrances of him." He looked up and gave her an understanding smile. "You didn't have enough time with your husband to have every facet of him burned into your memory forever. You cannot help that. Fate just... took him away too soon."

She shook her head. "Not fate. Verora."

Penryn nodded, not knowing what to say to that. There had been nothing natural about her husband's death. The fact that they had not been able to find either the headwoman or her accomplice just made it that much harder. Secretly he hoped a fate worse than death would befall those two. Finally he reached out to take the former Lady Holder's hand in a gesture of understanding. "We haven't given up finding her, you know. No one will forget what she did."

"I know." She stared at her hand in his, slim and soft in his calloused and ink stained fingers. "Do you think she survived the winter?"

"I don't know," he admitted reluctantly. "But if she did, we'll find her."

"I hope she died," Thalia said, and was surprised at how venomous it sounded. She glanced at Penryn, unsure of how he'd react, then quickly looked away. "I mean it."

He stood up, hiding the wince at the sharp pain that traveled up from his knee. Placing a hand on her shoulder he pulled her a little closer. "I know you do," he said quietly. "And its not wrong of you. It's not wrong at all."

The Lady smiled slightly, but a slight noise from the baby at their feet turned her attention and she slipped away from Penryn to kneel again, and brush her finger along Aslian's cheek. "I just hate that things are so... unfinished."

"Give it time, Lady Thalia." It may have felt like turns, but amazingly, it had only been half a turn since the Hold had been turned upside down. He could not allow himself to lose hope that all would be set right again.

Give it time. All she ever heard was, 'give it time'. It was a well meaning but trite phrase, and it gnawed away at her and made her feel idle. Thalia winced slightly as she realized that she'd left a muddy smear on Aslian's cheek - but dirt never hurt anyone. And now that she had a garden... it was a pile of dirt and weeds now, but she saw something _different_ when she looked at it. Lush, green, full of creeping vines and fragrant blossoms... in time.

Give it time. The Lady allowed the Steward to help her back to her feet. She pulled a pair of delicate leather gloves from her apron pocket and slipped them on. "Well, talking about it isn't going to get that flowerbed dug. There's another shovel over there," she said, pointing. Then she smiled. "And Penryn?"

"Yes?"

"Thank you."

"Any time, Lady," Penryn replied with a gentle smile.

Last updated on the July 26th 2006

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