The Chronicle of the Worthy Son

Heedless, pt. 1

"Would you mind terribly much if I left while you were talking with Heedful? I'd like to go check on the Bays." This was the first time Lark had really said anything all morning. While the quiet was nice, it was also an unsettling sign that Lark was out of sorts.

So Able was quick to reply, "No, you should do that. I'll be fine."

"Thank you." Lark gave him a grateful smile then, once they had reached the door to Fairweather's house, also gave him a reassuring one and knocked.

"Much better," Chessie said in lieu of a greeting when she opened the door.

"Chestnut Miller, Able Houser." Lark waved a hand from one of them to the other and back again. "Able, Chestnut. I'm gonna scoot for a bit." And he pointed back the way he came with his thumbs.

"Can't sit still for two minutes, can you?" Miller noted flatly.

"It's important."

"Fine." She opened the door more and looked at Able expectantly.

"Good luck, have fun." Lark flashed a quick smile and was back down the street.

"Yep," Able acknowledged, then stepped into the house.

The house of Heedful Fairweather was almost hot inside, which was probably why Miller was wearing a sleeveless tunic that incidentally showed the tattoos peeking out from her chest area and winding around her scrawny left arm. She offered to take Able's jacket, so he shrugged out of it and handed it to her.

"Thanks," he added. "So, do you...uh—the word is 'practice,' right? Practice the Eagle here in town? Is that where you know Lark from?"

She turned shocking green eyes on him and peered...almost it seemed through him.

"You're astute," she finally remarked after his guts had turned to ice. She hung up his jacket and proceeded into the main room.

"I'm sorry he's so presumptuous." He followed after her. "He means well."

"It's hardly your responsibility that he's a lousy practitioner yet skilled at making my life difficult." Then she gave him a wry smile, "But you're still allowed to like him."

Able's breath froze in his chest.

But fortunately, her back was to him again as she was pulling a rocking chair closer to the fire. "I like him myself, if I'm honest. Would you care to sit?" And she gestured to a...well, it wasn't a couch so much as a bench with cushions on it, and before he could reply she crossed to a door at the back of the room. "He's here, ma'am."

"I know it," rasped a shredded voice from within. "Me ears aren't that far gone."

Miller nodded and, clasping her hands together, turned back to scan the room and assure herself everything was in order. The room was rustic, roughly finished, and sparse, but tidy and not wanting in any necessity that Able saw.

The door opened and the oldest person Able had ever seen or probably ever would see hobbled into the room. Heedful Fairweather looked much like a speckled, melted candle. Her wispy white hair, mostly absent from the top of her head, was parted into two braids that each rested in her shoulders, which were so hunched that she looked like she was collapsing in on herself. She was bent nearly in half over the cane on which she leaned with both hands as she huffed and puffed determinedly with each shuffle.

Why wasn't Miller helping Fairweather? She just stood solemnly with unblinking eyes as Fairweather shuffled by her. Although, her stance had a readiness to it. Fairweather made it to the rocking chair on her own then, trembling with exertion, eased herself down into it. With a long, pained inhalation she straightened in her seat and peered at Able with one cloudy eye. The other eye was dead, the socket laced with scarring.