Ink of My Heart: A Forbidden Love

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 2: ꜰᴏʀʙɪᴅᴅᴇɴ ꜰʀᴜɪᴛ

Adelia often found herself yearning for a connection with her sister, Isabella. Despite her earnest desires, their dissimilarities seemed to carve an unbridgeable chasm between them. Like contrasting hues on an artist's canvas, they stood as polar opposites, each personifying qualities as divergent as night and day, as distinct as sugar and salt.

Isabella, with her fair hair reminiscent of their mother's, remained consumed by her scholarly pursuits. Whether mastering the lute and harp with diligent practice, or spending endless hours on the manor's balcony painting breathtaking masterpieces—some so revered that wealthy patrons eagerly acquired them—the two sisters' inhabited entirely different worlds.

While Isabella immersed herself in language and literature, Adelia devoted her time to practicing archery and riding horses with Zayd. Though both sisters shared a love for reading, Adelia's tastes diverged from Isabella's, favouring colourful tales of adventure and romance over historical tomes and dreary scholastics. To conceal her forbidden indulgence from her mother, Adelia would bind the covers of her books with cloth, guarding her secret stories from prying eyes. She often read the books aloud to Zayd as they lay in the orchard, the turn of each page punctuated by the crunch of his teeth sinking into a pear.

Despite being met with coldness by Isabella, who was only a year older, Adelia couldn't help but admire her from a distance. Adelia regarded her as far more beautiful than herself, with her clear complexion and rosy lips. Isabella's blonde locks shimmered in the sunlight, casting a radiant glow, while her eyes sparkled like crystalline pools of blue, a lighter hue that Adelia considered infinitely more enchanting than her own.

Adelia, with her unruly brown hair that, unlike her sister, was rarely done, cascaded messily over her shoulders, often bringing home bits of hay from the stable or thistle from the forests. Isabella adorned herself with jewelry, while Adelia preferred to go without, finding such accessories cumbersome during her adventures. While she donned the customary dresses for formal occasions or when esteemed guests graced their manor, she eagerly shed the burdensome layers of fabric whenever the opportunity arose.

However, Adelia often pitied her sister, witnessing the weight she bore as the family's firstborn. Their mother's open disappointment at not having a son cast a shadow over them, driving Isabella to excel in every aspect of her life—education, talents, virtue, chastity—all in the pursuit of a prestigious match. It was a silent agreement, understood by all, that Isabella's accomplishments were her way of compensating for not having been born a son. Even so, their mother remained cold. Despite all of Isabella's efforts, the Lady Baroness was never fully appeased, her longing for a son never truly assuaged.

Adelia, cherished by her father, was shielded from the weighty burdens of scholarly pursuits and societal expectations that weighed heavily on Isabella's shoulders. The Baron exhibited unmistakable favouritism towards Adelia, finding comfort in the daughter who mirrored his own dark hair and temperament. Isabella, with her uncanny resemblance to their mother, perhaps served as an unwelcome reminder to the Baron of his wife's aloofness and rigidity. While both Isabella and the Lady Baroness were undeniably beautiful, their icy demeanour stood in glaring contrast to the Baron's warm and genial nature, traits effortlessly inherited by Adelia. Perhaps this was why both Adelia's mother and sister harboured such resentment towards her.