Eli

Chapter 3

Eli

She has no right to talk about you like that. She thought and looked at a roe with her fawn lying in high grass just a few metres from her. Wild beasts...Once she realizes how peaceful creatures you are, she would take her words back...

She looked up to the sky at leaves trembling in the autumn breeze and somehow it made her sadness and fear disappear. She was sitting under an old beech tree with her knees drawn to her chest, looking at the sight above her. How is it that sometimes she was able to appreciate and admire the sight which came her way, being able to calm her restless mind and think about nothing at all, and sometimes it was the right opposite. Like the view, the air, the nature was something ordinary, usual, obvious... Just utter numbness, dreariness...No matter how hard you try, your stare is still dull, and mind is overcrowded by dim memories and sombre thoughts.

She was hungry for it'd been a week without a proper food. She wandered in her mind to the day when she had been leaving the mansion. Alexandra, one of the elder maids, being aware of Eli's situation, had offered her a basket of apples and cheese. If it were not for the other maids, who had seen them, being prepared to immediately tell on Alexandra to Madame Teller, she wouldn't have denied her good-hearted offer. Alexandra was the only one that had been kind to her, who did not despise her, and she did not want to cause her troubles for her kindness. Even though she would do anything for one bite of cheese now. The only thing she had been eating were wild blackberries, but their season was nearing its end and she would soon run out of any source of food... Other person would think about going back to the village to ask for a job and food...But she'd already known that wasn't an option for her. No one would ever employ her there.

Was I really being that selfish as Madame Teller had said? Have I been disgraceful?... Maybe I should have studied etiquette and learned how to become a good wife...But for what purpose? Nobody would ever like me, let alone love me...I was unnatural creature for them...lower species... They despise me. Have I been disgraceful for running away to the forest, instead of standing idly by their derisive expressions and insulting words? Of course, that I was very grateful to Madame Teller for hiring me a teacher to teach me how to read lips, for letting me stay at her home...But I couldn't fulfil their demands about me. I was – I am different, I cannot hear, I am not beautiful, and I am not "normal"... but I am human being like all of them...Even though I am just an inferior being in their eyes ...

Mum, Dad...Why did you leave me there alone...If you took me with you everything would have been different...we would have been together...

Eli took a deep breath in and felt dull pain in her chest. She stood up and kept walking far away from that place, where so much pain and fear had been born.

Garret

How is it that the world keeps going even though your loved one's no longer here? Shouldn't the world be sinking in darkness and despair? How is it that the sun keeps rising and setting even though there is nothing to be looking for in a next day, no smile that can light up a sombre day...

"You are not eating at all, Garret," his father frowned and put a cup of tea back on the table. They were in the dining hall, having breakfast and his father had just announced him he was sent to ease the tensed situation with trespassers in adjoining town, Bernea. When Garret left him without reaction, the king continued. "Garret, I know that you're suffering... "he said and looked warily at Garret, who was vacantly staring at the place where the queen would sit. He cleared his throat and continued: "But I appeal to you for putting these emotions aside. People need a firm hand; they need to be shown strength and power from their sovereign in times like this. And as a future king, it's your duty to put your sorrow aside. Do you understand?" he said earnestly. But Garret didn't reply.

"Do you understand?" the king repeated impatiently and louder than before. He punched the table. "Garret!" he shouted. It seemed prince had finally awoken and looked at his father, bewildered.

"Yes, sir... Excuse me, sir..." prince said and stood up from his chair. He started walking to the door, glossing over king's question.

"Garret! Where do you think you're going?" king yelled at him, but prince wouldn't stop, he just kept walking with a dim and hollow expression on his face like a shadow that had lost its master...

"Garret!" king's cry had echoed through the room just before the door slammed closed and the prince disappeared in the embrace of the hall.

He kept walking until he reached a royal stable, where he headed to his mother's horse box. He let himself in and closed the box's door. A white mare of Andalusian horse with grey mane tossed her head luckily and he rested his right palm on her forehead while slowly stroking her neck.

"Hey Spark," he said sorrowfully, and rested his head on mare's neck. Spark whinnied and he embraced her closer. "I miss her, too." He whispered with his face sank in Spark's fur feeling the warm of her body and for a slightest moment he didn't feel so alone.

After he had visited Spark, he came to visit Sapphira. Sapphira was a mare of wild Mustang horse, which his parents had given him for his 12th birthday. She had iron-grey coat, coal-black mane and tail with white stripes, black stockings and white irregular blaze on her head. She was the most beautiful horse he had ever seen.

The moment she noticed him, she whinnied and kicked gently her box's door.

"Hey, girl," he said and came in the box. "We have a bit of time before we are to set off... Wanna ride?" he smiled a little, and she neighed and tossed her head. "I hope you'd say that."

Then he saddled her up and they ran of the stable in a trot and as soon as the castle's walls were behind them, Sapphira burst into a gallop. 

*the picture: https://www.josephfiler.com/images/xl/Whitetail-Fawn-0023-Edit.jpg