Tales of Magic Mist and Men of Ash

Part 1

"My dear tidy yourself" she said while handing the young girl the jaggedly cut piece of cloth the old woman always kept by her side. She used this often at times to wipe spills of wine and spills of tears. Perhaps that is why it was always tucked in her head covering and stained a deep red. It smelled of rotting grapes and similar to an old tunic, too small to be her father's, the young girl found tucked away in a drawer that was her mother's. The smell was strong and lingered even when not held to her nose although it was one she had knew she could place the reason. The young girl had not yet been able to recognize the stench of death.

"Look at me girl," the young girl obliged as she always has, "men fight with battles and dealings and daggers" the young girl turned to a deep, what seemed deep to her, slash in her arm. The girl winced, hurting from her scrapes and bruises, and hurting from her honor.

The girl had tried to pick fights out in the courtyard as it was a day thwarted by storms. With little work of the merchants being done their sons were free to create chaos elsewhere. A few of the boys older than her had taken up her offer to spar, 'the younger ones were wiser,' the young girl would say. This was her folly as she had been struck by one who happened to procure an honest blade and fell to tears. Her wound did not hurt as much as her pride as the boys laughed before they were shown away by some gentlemen who happened to be passing. 

"I just wanted to-"

"Women," the old woman had interrupted, "women use secrets."

"Secrets?" she asked, the largest secret she had ever been trusted to keep was when her father had taken a punishment of scolding meant for her from tearing her mother's gown she had dressed in once and slipped. Secrets held no power to the young girl at this point in her life.

"Swords, daggers, knives, and battle are violent my lady," she said as she meticulously cleaned and dressed the young girl's wound "but secrets are messier." The old woman stood from her stool quite slowly and gave a slight bow to the young girl who smiled gingerly in return, still pondering what the woman's words could even mean as she listened to the scrape of her door before the echoing pang of it being shut.

The young girl wanted to cry more than she was allotted but she gripped the pungent cloth in her hand, suddenly realizing that she held onto the only possession she knew her maid to have and immediately ran out her chamber door to return it. This would be the first time she would hear an innocent wail in pain.