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Home » Great Library at Hoeth » Book of Tales » Tales of Si'anelle » A Further Telling of the Tale: Sebekneru Prince of Battle, Chapter Eleven: Darkness is the Hour Before Dawn
| A Further Telling of the Tale: Sebekneru Prince of Battle, Chapter Eleven: Darkness is the Hour Before Dawn |
| - by Lady Si'anelle |
As she rode close beside the Lady Si'anelle through the darkness that lay over the land a full hour before the first rays of the dawning sun would begin to drive away the night, Jean-marie did come to realise that the Banepearl's servant knew exactly where she was going. Illness and fatigue might well have laid claim to the noble Lady's thin and wasted body, except that her violet eyes held an intensity of purpose as if the dark was no barrier to her sight. And this despite the need for her to grip her pale and bone thin hands about her saddle brow to keep her seat upon Finaith.
Now Jean-marie did take a moment to glance back over her shoulder. Bronwyn was there still, riding in her loose limbed and casual seeming fashion beside the Araby woman T'amsine who had for this present time laid claim to Nadimar. The pair riding together as if there was no history of emnity between them. And behind Bronwyn and T'amsine she could make out the slight built and lightly armoured forms of T'amsine's band of fierce skirmishers. Of the Swordmasters of Hoeth there was not a sign; not so much as a single glit of bright Ithilmar against the darkness of the night.
"Their purpose is not our purpose my Lady of Quenelles," the Lady Si'anelle did then softly say to her. "Be not amazed that they do not follow as they said they would."
"How can you bear this my Lady?" she did ask of her, knowing that in this hour before dawn she was afraid. "How can you carry the burden of knowing all our petty failings? Shall the day come when I shall fail you when you shall have the most urgent need of me?"
"I am not a goddess Jean-marie, given to be infalible and all knowing" was the soft worded reply she did receive to her fearful questioning of the Lady Si'anelle. "Be the more afraid that the day might dawn when I may fail you when you do have a need of me." A pair of violet eyes well sunken in their sockets held her in focus for a time, then the Lady Si'anelle did look away her gaze once more on the deep shadows of the path ahead of them.
With her face now hot as she coloured Jean-marie did tell herself that she had been a fool to so thrust her fears upon Si'anelle of Avelorn. If she had been presently within her father's hall at the high table, and not here within the Borderlands, the greybeards would already be 'tut tutting' and naming her young and impetuous. And saying that she should be wed, so that a Bretonnian Lady's household duties would serve to teach her better self discpline. 'Young!' as if youth was a crime to greybeards' eyes and wisdom was their sole province.
When the Lady Si'anelle did of a sudden laugh in a bitter fashion Jean-marie was taken by suprise.
"My Lady of Quenelles," Si'anelle of Avelorn did now quietly say to her with her eyes still upon the night as Finaith continued to pick his way along the path. "You are not alone in being young. For this is also my most grevious fault, as it is that of my sweet Ae'thenal."
Which did serve to make Jean-marie stare at the she-Elf in some amazement; for the Lady Si'anelle did have to be old indeed as humankind does measure time. Slow now the Lady Si'anelle blinked her eyes and then did sigh, "I am but a scare three hundred mortal years of age; - impetuous and young in my kindred's sight. Which is why I did make the error which did lead me and my dear friend into exile Jean-marie."
And in the following silence that did lie between them Jean-marie did quietly weigh those words and the despairing tone in which they had been delivered to her ears. They must find Ae'thenal and soon, for it was plain that already the Lady Si'anelle was loosing heart and the holdfast's gates were but a half hour's ride at their backs. Soft now she began to pray to the Lady as she rode, touching again her deep faith that had been her's ever since she had been but a child. And so she continued to ride beside Si'anelle of Avelorn until the dawn did begin to light the sky and they soon after came upon a plowed field where Sebekneru and her Norsca shieldmaidens stood amidst the furrows as if they had been expecting them. |
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