Rebellion

Prologue: Evangeline

Rebellion

Prologue: Evangeline

            I was very young when my mother was taken from us—barely four. My memories of her fade more and more with every year that passes. Now, so much later, I have only dim recollections left: a flash of kind, gray eyes, one iris tainted by white. A lilting voice that could make my name sound like music. A pair of arms wrapped tightly around me, promising to never let go.

            Rose doesn’t understand my fears that I may forget her. “She was our mother,” she just shrugs. “How could we forget her?”

            I have never been like Rosemary. She has always been the bright, bold twin. I, on the other hand, am the painfully shy one. I hold onto the few people I have tightly. And this is why losing my mother’s memory pains me. I must remember. I must.

            I listen to the stories that my grandparents and aunts and uncles tell of her, and I realize how little I truly know of the woman who was my mother. I knew her for a brief period of time, but she lived for years before that. She lived most of her life before my birth. There is so much that I do not know; so much that I wish to learn.

            Perhaps, if I learn enough about her, I will be able to understand her. Perhaps if I can understand her, I can discover how she managed to bear the burden that comes from being set apart. Perhaps then I would not feel so alone.

            For I am different, too.

            I have her eyes.

            I, too, am marked by Ailune.

            And I, too, am set apart from those around me.

            Maybe somewhere in my mother’s story is the answer to mine.