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| Chapter 3. The Owl | |
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aeve always rose just before dawn. After cleansing, she lit incense and meditated at her homemade shrine to her matron goddess. The daily ritual was her foundation, it linked her to a treasured time long past and gave her resolve and calm. An hour later she sat before the mirror in her bedroom and combed out her thick black mane and braided it neatly against her scalp. She chose small golden ornaments to clasp the end of the thick plait and pins with tiny glass beads that gleamed like stars against her midnight hair. That morning she painted a thin line of black around her steel gray eyes and dusted a little rouge on her pale cheeks. Her hand hesitated over the dish of wine red grease paint she often used to color her lips and thought better of it. Best not to draw too much attention to herself. Her towering height was often enough, but if she wore more than the usual amount of color, people would talk, and lately there was too much of that. That morning Maeve dressed in a loose gray jacket and gown that flattered and accentuated her hair and eyes. As always, when she left the little cottage, she was alone. She did not take meals at the longhouse any more but preferred to spend time with individual families who were friendly but not too nosey. That often meant dwarves, and most often the Ironfasts. Of the three families of dwarves who shared the little valley with the humans, Maeve shared a love of music and art with the Ironfasts and enjoyed their non-demanding companionship. Their manner was open and simple, lacking the complex chatter and disorganization of her fellow humans. Dwarves were songbirds and humans were garrulous, crafty ravens. Old Talag, the head of the Ironfast clan, was a masterful worker of stone and had helped build many of the homes gathered around him. Inside the cramped parlor of the little house she relaxed and quietly admired the little creatures and faces that lined the mantle and shelves. Talag had etched them from colorful pieces of rock in his more whimsical moments. Maeve owned several of them, often receiving them in exchange for her work and was currently trying to decide if it would be presumptuous to request the small sculpture of the barn owl. It would look quite handsome on her mantle. “I’m surprised you were not at last night’s supper,” Gretta remarked as she refilled Maeve’s stoneware mug with yak butter tea. Glomir looked up from his breakfast of scrambled egg and cheese. He was the only son of Talag and Gretta and an aspiring artist like his father. “I was tired. I have a lot of work to do before the new arrivals get here,” she said, although that was only partially true. As the only literate human living there, it had fallen to her to keep the accounts and ensure negotiations for the goods had gone in their favor. Of course, her height and mesmeric training helped a great deal with the latter task, but someone still had to keep the records straight and that unpleasant duty was also hers. Her usual workload had doubled recently now that the guild leader of the Order of the Crystal Palm was sending correspondence. Getting Anluan to help her craft thoughtful, coherent responses was grueling work. “Mog Ruith arrived yesterday,” Glomir blurted, “You should meet him! Folks say he is a fine piper.” “Because we are both tall?” Maeve asked, keeping the annoyance and sarcasm from her voice. It was only the fifth time since his arrival that it had been suggested to her. “Well, there is that,” Glomir chuckled. Maeve shrugged. She appreciated their good intentions. Married people tended to think everyone needed to be married to be happy. One of the ways they showed concern for her was with their not so subtle attempts at matchmaking. Mostly she found the gesture amusing and sweet, but today it felt awkward and annoying. Maeve knew this would happen when Mog Ruith arrived. Now that she was an accepted member of the village and, therefore, a part of their tribe, they would naturally want her to settle down and be more like one of them. Mog was an obvious match. “He likes rocks, too,” Glomir continued, oblivious of her inner turmoil. Maeve had to chuckle at this last statement. A love of rocks might not seem odd among dwarves, but it was not exactly a winning trait in a human. And Mog would not be the first man they had tried to palm off on her. She was still trying to put aside the earnest yet awkward wooing of Lars Lonegrim. The poor man occasionally stood on her door stoop like an abandoned dog hoping for little scraps of affection but was too scared to even knock on her door. That, more than anything, was why she was alone. Maeve was, first and foremost, a mesmer. Her kind were scary manipulators who played dirty. Everyone knew that. Love could only thrive between equals and there could be no equality where there was fear. Maeve was fine with being alone and was perfectly content to leave it that way. “I heard the barn owl in Vern’s old house screaming yesterday,” she said, deliberately changing the subject and hoping to guide conversation toward the acquisition of the little stone statue, “I wonder why it has not migrated this year. It is usually gone by now.” “Mog Ruith is moving into that house!” Glomir stated with more enthusiasm than Maeve felt necessary. She sighed this time. If she did not know better she would have assumed that having Mog as her neighbor was deliberate. Of course Maeve knew the long empty cottage was to be ceded to Anluan’s daughter once the marriage contract was final. Maeve assumed that her efforts to procure the materials and furnishings for the house were for that purpose and had thought nothing of it. “Do you like that owl?” Talag asked, following her gaze to the little sculpture. He made a gesture at his son to lay off with a worn hand and a frown caused his grizzled beard to bristle. She met the old dwarf’s kind blue eyes and smiled. She loved him as dearly as a father. She was reassured once more that he and his immediate family adored her in return and meant no harm. “Yes, it seems so alive. It’s beautiful.” Talag pushed aside his chair and waddled stiffly toward the sculpture, fetching it for her to admire closely. Maeve admired it in silence, stunned by the details with which Talag had brought out the tiny rows of feathers and the smooth roundness of the creature’s head. She loved seeing the owl in the evening and sometimes wished she too could fly away whenever she pleased. “I want you to have it,” the dwarf said. “Oh no, I couldn’t. Let me at least pay you for it,” Maeve replied, delighted and startled. Then she grew silent, knowing it was impolite to protest when a dwarf offered a gift, “I’m sorry. Thank you, Talag, I’d love to have this.” “The price is this,” the dwarf said gently, chuckling, “I’m going to tell you what I was thinking when I made it for you.” Maeve blinked, unaccustomed to this level of intimacy from the dwarves. “I see your surprise,” Talag chuckled, “Your people rarely understand us, they think we’re small humans with more hair and simpler mannerisms. Your kind forgets that we are old. We do not go about our days worrying about our mortality. We observe and we have no need for dissembling.” He was silent for a time, as dwarves often were among themselves. “I have seen you standing alone in your yard admiring the owl before you turn in for the night. You are both solitary creatures, and you both arrived as mysteries. You are both silent, although sometimes in the night you cry out like the owl and those who hear it shudder to imagine what it means.” Maeve lowered her face, inexplicably blinking away tears. Her hands trembled as she clutched the little statue that only moments before she would have paid anything to own. “The owl has no choice, it cannot be other than what it is,” Talag said quietly, “That is all I wished to say.” “Thank you,” she replied, her voice smoky with barely contained grief. Gretta clasped her hand and they spared her any further discussion. Maeve regained her composure quickly and thanked them again before excusing herself. She had work to do, after all.
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