She was dreaming again. Only this time, she wasn't greeted by the nightmares that usually plagued her but instead her mother.
She sat on the little wooden stool, legs crossed beneath her long skirts, hiding the bruises on her knees from where she had fallen playing at the rocks.
Her mother hummed softly as she brushed Asha's long hair with quick, even strokes.
She looked up into the mirror in front of her to find her mother smiling warmly at her. She was often told how much she resembled her mother but the girl didn't see it. The woman was beautiful, with warm brown eyes framed by thick black eyelashes and dark, lustrous curls that cascaded down her back. Despite her frail health, Asha had always thought of her mother as strong - invincible.
She watched as her mother's clever fingers worked her hair into an intricate braid.
"There you go little love," her mother said in her soft dornish lilt. She smiled at her daughter and placed a kiss on top of her head. Her father had called it a warrior's braid to her great joy, and she imagined looking like one of the heroines or princesses in the stories he told her.
The memory had been quite an ordinary one at the time. Asha wasn't quite sure why, out of all the times she had spent like this with her mother, it was this particular memory that her mind clung to. Perhaps it had been the last time she'd felt truly happy before the blissful ignorance and safety of childhood had been shattered.
She didn't really care.
She could feel it still. Her parents' love enduring despite all the pain. So Asha wrapped the memory around her heart, clinging onto it - a thread for her to follow through the darkness to find her mother's light. She could feel that light now like a warm glow, a hearth to centre herself, to give her strength. And when she awoke, Asha remembered the dream and she held her head a little higher.
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The Ghosts of Our Past
Fanfiction'A Targaryen alone in the world is a terrible thing.' - Maester Aemon Asha - a young, dornish sellsword finds her hunger for coin and food leads her along an unexpected path, into the company of Lords, Ladies and Lannisters. As she reluctantly befri...
