Passive (Volume 2) - ON HOLD

Prologue-The Little Girl

14th Holly Moon, 435 AC, Shadowfall Castle, Valoria

 The nursery was hauntingly silent, every outside sound muffled by the falling snow beyond the narrow, bone-paneled windows. The little girl sat, perched on a window bench, her knees drawn up to her chest, her dark hair straggling free of her pigtails to fall in front of her face.

In the eight years of her life, the child could not remember ever having lived anywhere but the nursery at Shadowfall, though the nursemaids told her she'd been born somewhere in the south. They told her she'd been brought here when she was somewhere around three, to be raised under Lord Rolond's roof. Then, they would change the subject or hurry off, leaving her quiet alone–once again.

It was a sad place to raise a child, Cook always said, gently stroking the girl's hair. Lady Anna often echoed her, whenever the girl joined her in her solar. There were no other children at Shadowfall, and, the little girl assumed, the only reason she herself was there was because she was one of Lord Rolond's bastard children. 

She wasn't supposed to know about them, or that Lady Anna couldn't bear children, but servants talked, and the child listened. One of Lord Rolond's daughters worked as a seamstress for Lady Anna, Kathryn Sea. Next to the little girl, she was the youngest person in the holdfast, at fourteen. She'd been there ever since the child could remember, though she had never lived in the nursery.

The child blinked lethargically, dark eyelashes brushing softly against her cheeks. She stared into the darkness beyond the keep's walls. It was nearly Winter Solstice, and sunlight wouldn't touch Shadowfall until the end of Ice Moon, but, despite the perpetual darkness, the falling snowflakes glowed a stark white against the inky sky, illuminated by the multitude of candles whose lights spilled out of the windows and dissipated in the night.

"Miss Rose, it's time for bed," one of the nursemaids called, and the child unfolded herself slowly, her lanky body moving almost languidly through space.

The servants wouldn't rush her; they never did. They just told her it was time, blew out the candles, and let her be. Sometimes, when they were particularly lax, Kathryn would slip in, and they would talk until Rose fell asleep.

In the sudden darkness, after the servants had gone, Rose slipped out of bed, taking up on of the blankets, and tiptoed back to the window. She resettled herself with the blanket around her shoulders. Time passed, but she hardly noticed, as she fell into her thoughts once more.

People–strangers to Shadowfall, usually–often asked her if she was lonely. The question struck her as peculiar and confusing. This was all she had ever known, and, if she knew nothing else, how would she know if she was lonely, since she had nothing else to compare this state to. Besides, she was hardly alone. She had Cook, and Lady Anna, and Kathryn, and the servants–no, not alone. Not by a long shot,

And yet, there were nights like this one, where a hollow ache took hold beneath her breastbone, and her mind filled with a memory of children laughing. It couldn't be a memory, though, she reasoned each time the feeling appeared. There never had been children's laughter at Shadowfall. But the sounds were so real, so clear, that what else could they be but a memory?

A soft knock pulled her from her thoughts, and Kathryn poked her head in through a crack in the door. "Hello, Rosy-posy," she said, smiling her sweet smile. "Aren't you supposed to be in bed?"

Rose made a face, which made Kathryn laugh. "I was thinking," the little girl said. "About loneliness. Are you ever lonely?"

Something flitted across Kathryn's face, not the laugh Rose had expected, as she moved more fully into the room. It was a hint of sadness, or regret–no, not regret; grief–coupled with bitterness, and something so strange and twisted it made Rose's heart constrict.