Chapter Eighteen:
Dreams of Tomorrow

 

 

 

 

Adrina rocked back and forth. She was quiet, angry—resolved to be angry forever. The darkness was a chasm that sought to swallow her, and if it did, nothing of the woman she was becoming would remain.

 

Everything she touched seemed to wither. Everything she cared about seemed to fade from the world. Why couldn’t she wither and fade away as well? It would be so easy to slip into the night and be gone from the world.

 

A quiet voice behind her called out, “Adrina, come down, let’s talk about this. You can’t control what other people do or think. You aren’t responsible—we tried and that’s all we could have done.”

 

Adrina spun around, the narrow brickwork of the castle wall making it difficult to keep her footing. Her long black hair fluttered in the wind. Her slender body wobbled.

 

Emel turned to Myrial. “Talk some sense into her please.”

 

“At times like this I would send Lady Isador to the wall. She would handle this, she’d know what to do.”

 

“Lady Isador isn’t here. It’s just you and I.”

 

Adrina stretched out her arms. She imagined she could float on the wind. “Come fly with me,” she whispered. “We can steal away into the night and no one will know.”

 

“Adrina, you can’t fly!” shouted Emel. “You’re scaring me, please come down!”

 

Adrina turned away from Emel and stared out into the darkness. “Why can’t I fly? If I can wish it, I can do it—and I wish to fly.”

 

“You have no magical powers; you’re no witch or devil,” said Myrial. “You can’t fly. Only birds can fly and you’re no bird. Take my hand, Adrina. Take my hand and come down from the wall.”

 

Adrina started to wave her arms. In her mind she was a bird, a bird that could fly and soar away into the darkness. “I could have done much more. I could have. Seth would have seen the truth. He would have known. Galan would be here now.”

 

Myrial took a few steps toward Adrina. “Galan is gone. Nothing you do will bring her back. Everything you do up there risks your life! You’re no fool. Why would you want to end as a fool? Is that how you want to be remembered, as a fool? A girl who couldn’t take the weight of the world.

 

“Let me tell you about the weight of the world, waking in dirt because there is no straw, eating food deemed unfit for the King’s pigs, being ordered about as a house slave, and I may have been the housemaster’s house slave, but he couldn’t have my heart, stop my mind from thinking or my soul from crying out. Never in all that time did I really wish to go—I wanted to live. Oh, how I wanted to live, to have the world see me as I saw the world. You gave me that chance, Adrina, a chance to become much more than I was. You never asked anything in return. You gave freely.