The Wolf and the Rose / Sequel to The Queen in the North

Twenty- four

Twenty four

El had lain awake for hours until she finally had picked up the courage to get up without waking Axel. Who to her surprise was curled up next to her, arm stretched across her body protectively. It wasn't exactly like she expected to bed wake up next to Axel. she felt nothing, while her mind was still foggy from sleep but after a few seconds the emptiness set in. At first she only shifted a little of her weight for under him, not daring to wake him as Waking him would mean answering questions and talking and he'd make a fuss and want to help and... her mind began to race as the realisation that she'd lost her baby crept up on her. Her heart sunk and hand drifted aimlessly to her stomach which was still swollen from the child. She squeezed her eyes shut to hold back tears, but the bitterness lingered. Resentment flooded her, if only she'd stayed in Highgarden, if only she hadn't have gotten so angry yesterday, if only... Anxiety surged through her and it took several minutes before she had claimed her breathing.

Everything seemed so surreal. In disbelief that she was even awake she Stretched out her fingertips to brush them against the curtains that surrounded the bed. She felt the cotton between her thumb and forefinger but still wasn't satisfied that they were real. She squeezed her eyes shut in the hope that tears might fall, but no tears came. She longed for Garlan like his presence might help her situation in some way. He could at least hold her, she rationalised with herself. Nether the less she wanted him so bad that it hurt her inside. For the first time in weeks the anger that had been dwelling in her mind was converted into this deep sadness that was caused by such an accumulation of everything that had progressively failed.

Her muscles ached and she could still feel the bleeding between her legs, although getting up to do anything about it was futile. She couldn't get up to call Rausa without waking Axel, nor did you want Axel to wake up to these blood soaked sheets. Instead El opted to mentally construct her letter to Garlan. It was either that or wallow in self pity until Axel woke. El thought of how he'd react while he read it, perhaps he'd get it in the morning before he went in to see their children. He'd almost certain cry but would compose himself before he left their rooms. Perhaps he'd go in to their children and he'd hold them, praise the gods for them. The gods who he swore didn't exists, But she knew that he'd be grateful to someone for his children.

Thinking of Garlan was only making her more distraught but she didn't have to wait long before Axel began to stir. only about ten minutes after she'd woken Axel shifted his arm and his eye lids fluttered like moth wings awakening from a cocoon. As he gained consciousness Axel quickly pulled his arm off her not quite knowing what to expect in El's semi-awake semi-hysterical state.

"Please don't say anything." She whispered.

The feeble winter sunlight flittered through the curtains and their brightness made Axel squint up his eyes. "I wasn't going to." He lied turning his cheek to peer at her over the soft mount of the pillow that separated him from El. Tears began streaming down her cheeks as she lay flat on her back, arms helplessly at her sides as she just cried and cried.

She pulled herself up after a long time of lying in silence crying with Axel just lying powerlessly beside her. She rose shakily and walked with all the strength she possessed yo the desk whether she took a quill and began scribbling down a letter to Garlan. She wanted Garlan so desperately that she was shaking as she began writing to him. Her emotions all gusted onto the page like a avalanche of heavy snow falling down a mountain. Her tears too gusted onto the page and wet it to the point whether the ink smudged in places but she continued. She told him everything in no coherent order, Revealing everything that she'd neglected to tell him in her previous letters. The fear that Garlan would travel north and come to her aid had gone because in that moment and in the moments when she attached the letter to the foot of the raven on her balcony. In fact she'd have liked nothing more in the world than to just fall apart in Garlan's arm with her face pressed against his chest.