Tales of the Void
Growing Up
A Short Story By
Black Waltz 0
†††
Tana stood in front of the mirror and examined herself very carefully, finding nothing and yet everything wrong with her reflection.
She was small, with short black hair and the body of an eight year old child. She was wearing her blue dress today, but with a jaunty cap which almost made her look a little bit taller. Across the room, there was a wall vandalized with many different coloured chalks; lines stretching from a quarter to almost one half of the ceiling. Tana rushed over to it and stood up straight under the markings, heels to the junction of wall and floor and remembering to keep her back nice and straight. She reached an arm up and with an awkward twist of her hand she added another horizontal line to the throng.
Moving away from the wall she turned around and regarded her work. The white line had overlapped with another line, and another and another. This didn’t surprise her. It was to be expected. In the past eleven years she had never grown a single inch.
This was from no genetic abnormality. She was not a dwarf or a halfling, though she had heard stories that they really did exist in the far-off lands to the west of Endia and Echuca. Tana had been eight years old for eleven years now, locked into a body frozen in time. Her childhood was permanent and it was really starting to become a pain, one great big boring drag.
What she wanted more than anything else was to become taller, everything after that would seem like a bonus. In her years at the castle orphanage she had slowly watched kids younger than her grow taller and taller, go from children into being big, distant adults. Once they became old enough to cope with the outside world they left, and more often than not Tana never saw them again. Only one of her friends had stayed on and that was in the role of taking care of everybody, to become a mother-figure to everybody who hadn’t been around to know her as a child herself. It was difficult to connect the governess to the shy, plain girl Tana had climbed trees and played dolls with so long ago.
She sighed and took off her cap, her arms swinging down loosely to her sides. She felt like the un-adopted orphan who couldn’t go anywhere because she could never grow up. Tana knew that she was not alone, at least one out of every five children in the castle was a discard, like herself, but they were all really little kids and she wasn’t sure she could talk to them, not in the way that she wanted to.
When Mara had grown up she had stopped being her best friend and became ‘Auntie Mara’ because it was just easier that way. She’d been friends with a younger but older boy who was smaller than her but had a head full of dreams. One day, three years ago, that dream just picked him up and took him away. He’d packed up all his things, told everybody he was going on an adventure, and was never seen again. If only somebody had listened to his excited proclamations sooner, but by then Acheron had already confirmed that Iyosuke was gone. He hadn’t even left an alastor behind, which was a good thing, she guessed.
After that, when her teacher Ravendor went away for forever and Magi came back after being gone for so long, things kind of went back to normal. Tana had had a feeling that something huge had gone on three years ago, but nobody had ever really explained it to her. It was the childlike body, she just assumed, it misled people into treating her as someone far younger than her years. She was aware that she would never grow up, that she would stay just as she was until she vanished suddenly just like Iyosuke, just like Ravendor, but there had to be a way around that. There simply had to be.
Tana already thought that she had found a lead. Since three years ago Magi had been getting a little older, if not by much. He had always been a discard just like her, so he must have cracked the secret in his time away from home. The young girl was determined to find out somehow.
She ran out of the bedroom that she shared with four other children and made her way quickly through the castle, her little shoes clacking on the cold stone floor. Everyone else was home today; her replacement teacher didn’t like to work on Wednesdays so her friends and the other kids were playing all over the place. The castle was organised chaos. It looked tremendously messy, but when prompted everybody could put their things away in the right places and the castle was perfectly clean underneath. Mara always did a great job at that, she’d gone on a whirlwind clean two weeks ago right until the doctor sentenced her to bed. Magi was making do in her place, and he was always hanging out somewhere outside.
Her friend Pippy was playing with some blocks almost completely on the first step of the castle spiral staircase. Tana had to stop to keep herself from slipping on a coloured block and falling down the stairs. Pippy was a tiny discard with orange ringlets and a seemingly permanent lisp. “Hi Tana!” She exclaimed as she looked up at the other girl stepping around a block dragon. “What have yoo been up to today?”
“I’m looking for Magi, but I haven’t seen him since breakfast. Have you seen him around?” Tana replied as Pippy grinned brightly at her. Magi was technically doing Mara’s job for her now, and he was surprisingly passable at it for a man, but some lady from Aria was helping him out by performing all the tasks a man couldn’t do, like cooking and helping some of the younger girls get dressed and bathed. Tana kind of recalled Emily helping out that way ages ago too, back when Sissy Margaret had to go and vanish from the world. Emily was a nice lady but she was no Mara or Sissy Margaret either.
She paused for a moment, thinking, and then crouched down to Pippy’s level. Pippy had also been around for several years, but she was still just as sweet and naïve as any normal five year old girl. She probably hadn’t even noticed that she wasn’t growing up either. Pippy knocked over the tower she had been working on and started afresh. “I fink he’s with the horseys in the stables, ‘cause Jack said he was gonna go help him later.” She explained.
Well that solved one mystery. Tana decided to press on, more out of curiosity than anything else. “Pippy, have you ever wanted to grow up and be big like everybody else?” She questioned haphazardly. She’d asked Iyosuke once, before he had left and he’d answered with some longwinded fantastical story about fighting dragons as soon as he was tall enough to get on a pony by himself.
Pippy pondered carefully, like she was trying to figure out a hard math problem. “If I was taller then I could reach the cookie jar all by myself without asking Auntie Mara for one, but I won’t get tall. Tabby said so. That’s okay though, ‘cause I’m still getting big on the inside.” She concluded, smiling.
“Yeah?” Tana said, brightening.
The smaller girl nodded vigorously. “Uh-huh! I can just get the ladder from the broom room and reach the cookies like that! I don’t think I could have thought of that back when I was littler.” She explained. Once she got a little older maybe she would be able to understand that it was a bad idea to have cookies right before dinnertime, but not even Tana believed in that just yet.
In any case, there was a small chunk of wisdom in the cookie of Pippy’s reasoning. For now, to her, that was all that really mattered. A while back Tana would have felt like that as well, but time was always passing even if her body refused to recognise it. She stood again. “Okay, well, I’m gonna go find Magi now. You wanna go look for bugs later on?”
“Okee! I wanna put them in Jack’s bed! Bye bye!” She waved on her hands and knees as Tana skipped over the smaller girl’s creations, hurrying down the long stone staircase.
“See you later!”
†††
There were always two horses kept in the stables around the back of the castle. They were quite mature now, two stockhorses that has once been raised in Aria to pull wagons, then bought by the castle to manage a carriage, to teach the more interested children how to ride properly, and as pets for all the younger ones. Usually one of the older boys took care of their feeding and grooming, considering himself the castle’s personal ostler, but he had left to undertake an apprenticeship in Bybble now that he had come of age. Nobody could really tell if Socks or Stockings missed him, but they were agreeable enough when Magi came around to feed and care for them.
In the beginning Magi Magemere hadn’t known the first thing about horses, retaining absolutely no information from his world before, but in the lands of Mainland Void horsepower was the predominant method of transport, so he had learnt their worth quickly. He didn’t mind caring for them now, clearing out the stables was a good exercise and Stockings was still fit enough to run happily and merrily with a rider upon her back.
Once he had learned properly it was easy to dash from the castle to Aria or even Bybble to fetch a doctor or anything else required. Right now the horses were easier to deal with than the children or his wife. He didn’t mind dealing with them, not really, but sometimes he just needed the time to get away. He’d spent quite a bit of time abroad in the first few years of his marriage and travelled often, but now was the time when he had to stay at home more than ever.
It was a tense time. As a discard Magi never would have expected he’d be in the position he was in right now. Three years ago the Time of Gathering took place and he’d been swept up in the Thousand-Year war, though he’d tried his best to flee from the destiny fate had especially reserved for him. He had wandered as an exile for almost half a year, until he had been slain by none other than the hands of a friend. What came after was like a long blurred dream, and then he found himself there at White’s side. His memory of the war’s end was foggy at the best of times, but after it was over there was a great darkness, and then somebody was talking to him… and then he was home.
He wished that his recollection of events was less disjointed than that, but anyone who could have clarified for him was already gone. BW’s body and will had dissolved once her mission in the Void was complete, Warren and Zagtakh had gone home to their respective islands, and Ravendor had long since vanished without a trace.
Despite what the older man had done Magi held him no ill will. As Ravendor had murdered him in the belief that he was protecting the Void from erasure, so too had he prevented the other ranger from reaching the two homunculi at the summit in that other world, the void within the Void. For some reason he felt that his being here, alive again and as a native capable of aging and dying was mostly thanks to the will of his old friend. That was what he had heard somewhere in the darkness; a voice telling him that.
‘You’re lucky you have such a good friend. He really cares about you.’
Magi had loved few people in his lifetime, but he had been one of them.
Mara was the other. God, Mara. It had been months now and he still wasn’t really sure how to handle her. For an expectant woman she had been rather mellow and reasonable, at least according to Emily who had experience with that sort of thing, but there was just something about the whole process that really terrified him. He wasn’t precisely sure what, so that was the reason why he was out in the stables; seeking refuge.
What he did know was that Stockings wouldn’t let him get anywhere near her back until she had ample opportunity to smell and sniff him thoroughly. She had already been groomed, fed and watered earlier this morning; now all she needed was a tack and bridle so he could take her out for a spin. He was lifting the heavy saddle and blanket up from the rack near Stockings’ pen when Tana appeared at the entrance of the stable.
To her the stables always smelt weird and interesting, like a mix of leather, slightly damp wood and horse poop. It wasn’t unpleasant, despite that last part with the poop. Hay was scattered all over the floor and wooden planks lay below that, but still Tana made sure to mind her step. Magi had his hair back in a ponytail which meant that he was still working, but it was only on the horses and it wouldn’t hurt to interrupt him. “Magi,” she called as Socks whickered softly at the sight of her, sticking her long brown nose over the door of her pen, “can I talk to you for a while? Are you busy?”
Magi looked up, placing the saddle back where it was meant to be on the rack. He wasn’t surprised to see Tana there, on school-free days many of the children wandered about wherever they wished to go. Tana had been around since the very beginning; even before Magi himself had ever shown up. He knew her well. “Not really. What is it?” He asked.
Stockings neighed loudly when she realised that Magi’s attention was being drawn away from her. She could be a jealous thing at times. Tana seemed troubled. “Can we go and talk outside? I wanna ask you some things and it might take more than a few minutes. It’s important.”
It was the seriousness in which she said that which caught Magi’s attention the most. Before it seemed like he was focussed on what he was doing, but now he had stopped. It sounded like she had a lot on her mind. He dusted his hands on his pants and strode up to the little girl. “Very well, I’ll follow you. What’s on your mind?” Together they walked back out into the sunlight.
Tana had always liked Magi for that reason. He was completely incapable of connecting with people on anything other than an adult level. He was just about the only adult she knew right now who did that. Outside of the stables the landscape was grey and green; the grey of the castle stone walls and the green of spring. It was a beautiful sunny day, the perfect kind of day untouched by chores or homework. Tana started up the pathway that circled the main keep of the castle, cutting through the courtyard and the garden to the east. She could hear the older man following a few steps behind her.
Now that she was ready to talk Tana wasn’t really sure what to say. She made a few ‘um’s and ‘ah’s while enjoying the sunlight, and noticed from the corner of her eye one of her friends drawing on the castle walls with a big hunk of white chalk. He was drawing a fish, a cow, and… some other animal that Tana couldn’t recognise. “Um, I was just thinking of something. How come you’re getting older now? You’ve gotten a little taller, and I know ‘cause Mara measures everybody and puts the lines down on the height wall.” She blurted out.
Yes, everybody in the castle was measured every three months or so, including the adults. He was surprised that Tana had noticed. Magi himself had hardly even noticed until recently; he’d done most of his growing before he had become a discard. He stopped walking, shaded by a sudden cloud, and once Tana realised she couldn’t hear him following her anymore she stopped as well. “I don’t know the reason why I am like this right now. I think that it might have something to do with losing my alastor, but I can’t be certain.” He confessed.
“Alastors… those are the things that come out of people right before they go away.” Tana pondered, surprising Magi with the accuracy of her knowledge. It was a delicate subject with most adults and even harder to bring up in regards to children. An idea occurred to Tana and she looked up at Magi. “So if only discards don’t age, and only discards have alastors, does that mean the alastors stop us from getting bigger? Why would they do that? What would make them want to do something like that?”
“That’s a very good question. I’ve heard that a lot of the mages and scientists of Dainan believe alastors use discards as a source of energy. It’s possible that they devour the body’s aging process, though I’ve also heard equal debate that they feed of negative emotions. I’m not sure which is the truth, or if neither are.” They started walking again. The garden wasn’t very far away and Magi had always found he could think at his best under the leaves and branches of a tree. He was well aware that this wasn’t a casual line of questioning; that Tana had probably been dwelling on this for quite some time. That wasn’t a good sign.
Tana knew about Dainan.
Warren had said he had come from Dainan, and he had said it was a huge city of perpetual snow and candles that never went out. Where she lived they only had snow a few weeks each year, so that land far away must be amazing fun. “I have an alastor too, don’t I?” She asked, just making sure.
Magi hesitated, but could find no real benefit in withholding the truth. “Yes you do.” He said.
It could be considered fortunate that Tana didn’t really comprehend the extent of what that entailed. They reached the garden, which were really just some trees and wildflowers. Mara dedicated most of her gardening skills to the courtyard out the front, but that wasn’t to say the back didn’t have its beauty as well. An oak tree stood out amongst the others, but it was still far too early in the seasons for acorns to be around. Tana walked up to it while thinking.
“So, if I got rid of my alastor I would grow big like everybody else, right? Then I could be just like you, Magi, and be tall and go wherever I wanted.” The small girl sat down against the grey trunk of the tree. “How do I get rid of it? Do I have to kill it?”
“I don’t think it’s worth the risk to chance that kind of reward. Many people die along with the alastors when they are killed.” Magi said, choosing his words carefully.
“But you didn’t! I just want to know how!” Tana pleaded, looking up at him with big desperate eyes.
Sighing, Magi walked over and sat down beside Tana beneath the leaves of the oak tree. There were still quite a few stripes of Elmdynirim left within him, so he felt much better sitting this way. “Why do you want to know so badly? Can you tell me that first?”
That question flustered the girl. There were so many reasons why, but she couldn’t figure out which was the best one to admit. “I don’t want to be a kid anymore. I’m supposed to be all grown up by now but I’m not. It’s not fair. I don’t wanna stay in this castle forever; I wanna be tall and go on adventures too like you and your friends. You were lucky Magi; you got to show up here when you were already all grown up.”
But she didn’t know that those hadn’t been adventures; that had been running away. All his wanderings had been escaping destiny, and by the end he still hadn’t done a very good job of it. He’d left Mara and all the others behind, and though it was entirely for their own safety he still felt guilty. “Many of my friends did not come back from their adventures. Conversely, Tana, you were able to have a good childhood while many discards never get that chance. I certainly don’t remember being a boy.”
The way he worded that made it seem like it meant something else, but it didn’t. Tana still found herself giggling at it anyway, which calmed her down somewhat in the long run. She scooted closer to where Magi was sitting and clasped her hands in her lap. “I remember when Mara was little, just like me. She was a few years older, I guess, but if I wasn’t a discard I’d be tall like her. We used to be best friends. She asked me years ago whether she should marry you.”
"And what did you say?"
“Don’t remember. I musta said the right thing though, ‘cause she married you anyway.” Tana smiled brightly. “Now she’s gonna have a baby. It looks like she’s eaten a beach ball; Emmy keeps on making jokes about it. Do you think they baby’s gonna be a discard because you used to be one?” She laughed.
“I don’t think that is possible, and if it is I hope that won’t be the case. Tana, it is true that you won’t get much taller but you’re still growing mentally. I don’t want to see anything happen to you for the sake of getting a little older. Many people would be upset if you went away.” He put an arm around her and gave her a loose hug. It surprised her a bit but she liked it anyway, because Magi wasn’t that much of a physically affectionate person.
“I miss Iyosuke. I want to be big so I can go and find out where he went. He only said he was going, he never really said goodbye.” Tana finally admitted, giving in to what was really on her mind. Iyosuke had been her best friend and after three years he was probably tall by now. Magi glanced at her with an unusual expression, one that she couldn’t at all figure out. It didn’t bother her; she beamed at him with her own thoughts. “Oh! If the baby turns out to be a boy maybe it can be Iyosuke, too!”
“Maybe.” Magi said. He didn’t sound very enthusiastic about the topic.
Tana couldn’t help but pick up on that. “Do you think you’re going to be a good daddy, Magi?”
“I don’t know. I hope so.” The blond ranger replied. He had no experience, he didn’t really know anybody who had biological children either, and if Magi ever had parents he had no memory of them now. It would be like taking a step into an unknown place that he would never be able to back out of. It was scary. Mara was trying her very hardest not to smother him, and she was an absolute saint for doing that as she was probably scared as well. He just couldn’t figure out why he was so frightened of that responsibility.
Luckily for him, Tana hit the problem right on the head. “If the baby is a native then it will grow up big and be an adult someday too. You’ll be around to watch it grow up like normal. It’s a good thing you’re not going to go away again.” She paused. “You’re not going on journeys anymore, right?”
He was afraid to give up his freedom. That was so childish of him. He’d been nervous when he first became engaged to Mara, because that possibly meant the axing of his freedom to do or go wherever he wanted. He was a ranger; that was the very definition of ranging. Mara was able to cope when he left anyway, because she was just strong like that, but after he had died she was only barely able to hold on. With a child there was no question of where he must be, within the castle walls for possibly the next ten or fifteen years of his life. With time, that would be the remainder of his youthful years.
It was clear to him just how immature that line of thought was, especially after committing so deeply to Mara in the first place. Magi laughed softly in spite of himself. “I really do need to grow up.” He said.
Tana glanced at him. “Huh? But you already have.” She answered.
“No, not entirely. I should go. I should go and talk to Mara.” He decided after great internal debate, standing up with a sense of purpose this time. He’d been avoiding his wife for his own selfish reasons while he needed to be closer to her more than ever now. Even if what she now represented frightened him he had to get over that for his family’s sake. He felt like a fool now.
“I was gonna go and talk to her next though,” Tana pouted, “in case you didn’t have any answers for me. Auntie Mara’s really smart now that she’s grown up.”
The blond man thought for a moment. There was quite a bit of day left as it was still only late morning. “Hm, how about this? I will go and take Stockings out for some exercise as I promised her that, and when I return I will go and talk with Mara. That should give you some time.” He hoped dearly to himself that he wasn’t procrastinating simply because the opportunity came up.
That sounded good to Tana. He’d be gone for at least an hour or more. “Okay. I’ll tell her you’ll be coming after I’m gone.” She eagerly hopped up onto her feet. “Magi?”
“Yes?”
Tana put her hands behind her back and beamed at him charmingly. “I think you’re going to be a good daddy. You’ve always been a really good one to all the kids here… and to me.” She said sincerely.
That couldn’t help but make Magi smile. “Thank you, Tana.”
She nodded. “I’ve gotta go now. Bye bye! Have fun riding!” With that she skipped away, following the path to make a full circumnavigation of the castle’s main keep. Magi watched her go until she was just a small flash of light blue in the distance, then he backtracked to the stables where his ride was waiting for him.
Something else, something unrelated began to hang over his mind. His thoughts were of Mara and the child, but also of Tana as well. He was familiar with all the signs, all the little nuances that spoke of an alastor preparing to wake up. It was some time away, if Tana’s behaviour was any indicator, but it was also soon. Soon enough for Magi to begin to think about what he was going to do once her alastor rose up into life.
He hoped that Tana would be able to figure out her problems by herself, because then she could do what Iyosuke did and leave peacefully, leave happily.
He thought that, once everything was said and done, that was what Tana wanted the most.
†††
Mara had never slept so much in her entire life. She had always been an early riser and was used to long days of hard work, enjoyment and fun. She was the kind of woman who found contentment at the end of a job well done, that was why it was so difficult and trying to stay still and do nothing for long periods of time. Ideally she was meant to sleep and rest, but there was only so much relaxation one could take.
The doctor, Magi and Emily had forced her into bed because she was probably a bit too eager in attempting to do her job exactly as before. They were afraid she might fall over or overexert herself, but it was so unnecessarily cruel to expect her to lie there for days and weeks until it was time for the baby to come out. Laura had brought her piles and piles of books to read, Emily had begrudgingly left her plenty of clothing to mend and sew, and Kitty came around periodically to ask for help with her homework. At least she had those things to keep herself from getting bored.
Right now she was looking over a hand-written atlas of the lands of Void, expertly filled in with inks of all different tones of grey, blue and green. It had been created by one of the expert mapmakers of Glen Innes, a small village and gigantic estate all the way on the other side of the mountains. Mara had always been rather fond of maps, when she was younger she’d spent many evenings trying to copy out all the shapes and gradients; every little minute detail.
Her own world was only a tiny crescent on the near-centre of the map. Aria, the castle, a little bit of the forest and sometimes Bybble. There had been times when she had travelled further, with Magi when she had been younger. She was glad she at least had a few stories to tell. Mara put the atlas down and picked up the pair of pants she was halfway through mending, fixing a rip that Jack had caused while making a sudden downward descent from a tree.
She worried a lot about Emily and Magi, about how they were getting on without her around to take care of things. Emily wasn’t that bad with the children but she certainly was no cleaning whiz; even the sight of mould and unnameable sticky things made the delicate blonde feel a little faint. Strange, considering the job she had chosen. Magi on the other hand was naturally tidy and didn’t think he was above such tasks, like so many other men, but he had trouble dealing with children as children. Working together she could only imagine what they might be dealing with, or how.
What she wanted more than ever now was to have her child and get back up onto her feet, so she wouldn’t have to feel useless anymore. She’d never thought having a baby would be this hindering, but she was still glad enough that she could use her hands. She didn’t have much else going for her right now. Mara had just finished mending the rip in the pants and was threading a fresh needle for later when the door creaked open and Emily slipped into the room.
Emily. She was a small, dainty woman about five years older than Mara. They had been next door neighbours back when she was small and lived with her parents in Aria. When both her mother and father died horribly in an alastor hunt Mara was moved to the orphanage and she lost contact with Emily for many years, then they had met at a market near the farming town where they had both grown up, purely by chance. She had nearly forgotten about her, but just one glance at the woman closely inspecting the fresh corn brought all those childhood memories back to the surface.
They were good friends now, just as things used to be. When Mara woke up one morning and realised that she wasn’t just getting fat, and knowing that Emily earned her living as a midwife and a nurse, well… the choice was pretty obvious. Here she was now, dressed appropriately for spring in a yellow sundress and a straw hat with a flower in it. The only thing that spoke of how hard she was working was the white apron worn over the top of the dress. “Mara?” She asked as she half stepped into the room.
Mara folded up the pair of pants nicely and placed them to the side. “Yes? What is it?” She smiled.
“How are you feeling right now? Are you okay?”
She asked her this regularly, every three or four hours now. Mara did not let the fact that it was beginning to bug her show up on her face. “I’m fine thank you.” She replied calmly.
Emily looked at her for a moment, but seemed satisfied with that. “Okay, just checking. There’s somebody here to see you, do you mind if I let them in?”
She sat up straighter in her bed in the hopes that it might be Magi coming to say hello. They still shared a bed but he was always busy during the daylight hours, presumably doing her job for her, but she continued to miss him. She missed him quite a bit nowadays. “Is it my husband?”
She looked so hopeful that Emily felt bad having to say no. “Sorry Mara, it is this little one instead.” She opened the door slightly wider and Tana popped her head inside, grinning.
The girl had been instructed to be on her best behaviour, but she was old enough now to figure it out for herself. “Hello Auntie Mara!” She chimed, waving. “Can I come in?”
With Tana she didn’t look that disappointed. There was always the chance Magi might come around later on in the day. Mara rested her hands on her belly. “Of course. Come in, come in and talk with me.” She invited happily, so Tana wormed her way under Emily’s arm and hopped inside. Mara had a very nice room that she only had to share with Magi, and years before it had belonged to Sissy Margaret. There was still a neat, tidy, modest quality to the place.
“Do you need anything else before I go?” Emily asked. She had to prepare at least two dozen sandwiches and many glasses of milk for lunch and then gather up all the wandering children so they could eat. It was a task just about as difficult as it sounded.
Mara shook her head. “I really am fine right now. If I do need something later I’ll just ask Tana to help me. Thank you again Emily.” She replied.
“Very well. See you later.” She left, closing the door gently behind her. Tana could hear the wooden sounds of her sandals clicking down the hallway as she made her way to the kitchen.
Tana rocked back and forth on her heels a bit as she thought about what to say, a cute smile plastered on her face. “It must be really boring sitting about in bed all day. How come you don’t get up and go for a walk and stuff?”
“I would like to if I could, but if Emily caught one sight of me she’d drag me right back here to bed.” Mara answered, sighing. It wasn’t worth the aggravation and she didn’t want to be a bother if she could help it. “What’s the matter, Tana? Did you want to talk to me about anything?”
“Yea… but I also just wanted to say hi too.” Tana walked up to the bed and moved a pile of books off a chair to the side, books with interesting titles like; “An Almanac of Magic’, ‘Towns and Villages of Void’, and ‘Primer of Nostalgic Fauna’. They all sounded very scientific. Tana sat down on the chair and swung her legs under the seat casually. “Maaaaara… how come I’m not getting any bigger?” She asked.
“It’s because you are a lost soul, you should know that already.” Mara said kindly, but guessed that Tana was trying to ask something more than that. “Lost souls stay the age they are but their minds are free to mature. I remember Ravendor complaining a long time ago that he couldn’t figure out a curriculum for his classes because everybody’s knowledge was so widely spaced.”
Tana missed Ravendor too. It had been three years since she’d been a part of his classes and those were really interesting compared to the teacher she had now. The new teacher made them read boring books and copy stuff out all the time, which worked in the long run she supposed, but she really missed times like when the dark-haired man had brought to class enough wooden weaponry and shields for everyone and told them all to fight it out responsibly. The best player of each age group got to miss out on homework for an entire week.
He’d gone where Iyosuke had gone, too. All that was left behind was an empty house and a whole lot of memories. “Yeah, Magi said lots of things about growing up too, but he couldn’t tell me anything that’ll help me grow. I wish BW was still around. She made me a drink once that made Iyosuke smell really bad when he drank it. It was so funny! I bet she could have made me a drink that would make me taller.” She sighed.
Mara couldn’t help but remember that as well. She was the one who had to figure out a way to eliminate the rotting fish smell. “So you saw Magi today? How is he?” He was coming to bed quite late nowadays and leaving before she even woke up, so the children he was caring for were probably getting far more attention from him than she could ever hope for. It was for the best, of course, but a part of her could still be jealous or lonely regardless if she wanted to feel it or not.
“He’s out riding on one of the horseys. He’s been acting funny too, like he’s worried about something.” She looked at Mara. “Well, he’s probably worried about you. He’s acting like he’s really scared of something but I don’t think he knows what it is. Boys can be really dumb sometimes.”
“Even when they’ve grown up.” Mara added with a giggle. That was rather an astute observation coming from Tana. Mara knew that the little girl was much older than she physically appeared, but she’d been happy as a child for so long that she’d hardly noticed Tana becoming more serious, more analytical than before. It was like the girl had finally realised she didn’t have to act out her frozen age anymore.
Tana went serious now, resting her elbows on her knees. “It’s not fair, you know. I should be grown up like you. If I weren’t a discard I’d be old enough to leave and go on my journey. It’s not fair that you get to grow up and go out and get married and have kids and all I get to look forward to is having to disappear. I can’t stand the thought of going away and everything staying the same afterwards, like I wasn’t even here in the first place.” She confessed. “It’d be like Iyosuke all over again. He’s gone now and nobody talks about him. Everyone’s forgotten.”
Mara hadn’t known Tana felt that way. She was usually such a happy child, never depressed at all. She slid herself over to the side of the bed so she could be closer to the girl. Tana had her head down, inspecting her shoes, so Mara leaned over and cocked her head to the side to get a better look at her face. Long brown hair fell down her face and she smiled sympathetically. “I haven’t forgotten Iyosuke. I miss him too. Many people have left us recently. I understand how you feel but sometimes it’s just best to grieve and move on with our lives, but never forget.”
Looking to the side, Tana noticed her oldest friend’s kind smile. It was infectious and she found herself smiling bashfully as well. “Yeah, but back when it happened I didn’t really understand what was going on. ‘Feels like I’ve only just realised that Iyosuke isn’t coming back. I wanna grow up so I can go and find out where he went. I can’t go away without knowing if he is okay!” She sniffled, going from smiles to tears in a matter of moments.
“Aww, Tana, come here…” Mara cooed, her motherly instincts kicking in as she took Tana gently by the arm and pulled her onto the bed, so she could hug her properly. Older or not, she was still small enough for Mara to get her arms around and hold her close. “Listen to me now, okay? Don’t you dare try and give yourself that sort of responsibility. You can’t control when lost souls arrive and depart, and you certainly can’t bring them back of your own volition.”
“But… but Magi came back, and he was gone for a long time!” Tana protested sadly, cuddling into Mara’s chest and wiping her nose.
“Yes, but I wasn’t the one who brought him back. I don’t know how he returned and neither does he, but I’m just grateful enough that he came back at all not to ask questions. You need to be able to be happy on your own merits. I don’t know where Iyosuke is right now, but I trust the gods who made this world and send us the lost souls. I’m sure wherever he is he’s happy now. Life is full of mystery and miracles.” Mara said.
There was one thing that could be said about Mara; she was the master of hugs and making people feel better. Her hugs were so warm and comforting. “I do wanna be happy, but I thought that being taller and finding Iyosuke would be the answer. I guess it wouldn’t matter now if Iyosuke isn’t here anymore. Life really is strange.”
“Mmhmm.”
And giving up on that idea, that responsibility really did make Tana feel worlds better about herself; it filled her with relief. Iyosuke had been her best friend and she missed him, but her happiness didn’t have to hinge on his presence here. Tana was Tana, whether she was big or whether she was small. Pippy had been right, she was still growing up exactly where it counted. She sighed deeply in Mara’s arms, closing her eyes.
They stayed that way for awhile, in comfortable silence. Eventually Tana shifted and rubbed at her eyes. She was possibly a little tired, as she hadn’t been sleeping well recently. “Your tummy feels weird.” She said softly, from the safety of Mara’s arms.
“That’s just the baby. It’s awake right now so it keeps moving around, but it will go to sleep soon.” Mara replied.
Tana thought to herself for a few moments, about how strange it was for people to come from other people. She had no parents and had come from nowhere, maybe that was why it was so strange to see life created this way too. Magi probably felt the very same way. “It really is mysterious, isn’t it? Life and stuff.” Tana mused.
“It certainly is.” The older woman agreed, running her fingers through Tana’s short hair.
“When I go to where Iyosuke and Ravendor and BW went, you all won’t forget me, right? Because I’ll still be alive somewhere?”
Looking down at her Mara could only be honest. “I will never forget you. Not once in my entire life.” She said. Yes, that definitely made Tana feel better now.
There was a knock at the door. Without being asked to come in Emily appeared at the doorway, her clean white apron now stained with the efforts of making lunch. It looked like cut meat and gravy sandwiches by the light brown patterns. “Hello? I’ve come to collect Tana. It’s lunchtime. Oh, am I interrupting a cuddle? I’m sorry.” She laughed.
The young girl clambered out of the hug and off the bed. “Aw, do I have to go?” She whined.
“I could use your help finding out where the rest of the children are. I honestly can’t find them all at once.” Emily admitted. The castle was a big place, and the sandwiches were at their yummiest while they were warm. They’d be cold by the time the woman found them all by herself.
Mara made to get out of bed. Without any help she was having trouble moving herself, but it was almost comical in an odd sort of way. Her stomach was like an anchor weighing her down. “Let me help you find them. I don’t mind-” She began.
“No, you stay there and don’t move so’s your baby can go to sleep.” Tana turned and protested, taking Mara by the shoulder and trying to push her back into bed. "I’ll go help Emmy find everyone else. ‘Sides, you have to be here when Magi comes to see you. He said that he’d be here soon.”
She stopped struggling and pulled her blankets up to her chin. “He said he’d come? Really?” The way she perked up and started glowing was endearing.
“He looked like he had something really important to tell you.” Tana informed her, then walked over to Emily at the door and left Mara to ponder excitedly what it was. She smiled at her governess and oldest friend. “Thanks for everything, Auntie Mara.”
“Just remember; you don’t need to grow up, you already have.” Mara concluded, waving, as her friends left the room.
†††
Magi turned up a lot later than he had originally planned. He’d taken Stockings for a good long gallop until the horse was practically steaming with sweat, then he led her down to the river for a drink and walked her home. He didn’t realise how late in the afternoon it was until he noticed the stretch of his shadow in the dry dirt road, estimating that it was about three o’clock or later. When Magi realised that he climbed back up on Stockings and cantered the rest of the way.
He locked the horse back in her stable and made his way directly to Mara’s room; his own room. He didn’t have to knock and nobody stopped him from going in, but he still wound up hesitating. It was probably silly for a fully grown man to stand outside in the hallway, afraid to face his own wife after the idiot he had been, but he still had his pride and it daunted him. Some of the children ran down the corridor behind him, pulling something along on a piece of string. It seemed like they were trying to fly a kite indoors again.
Magi sighed a long, deep sigh. He couldn’t run away like a child anymore, it wasn’t making him feel better and it definitely wasn’t good for Mara. He loved Mara more than anything else in the world. That was all that mattered and if he could keep her, if he could be sure that he wasn’t going to disappear ever again he’d take the responsibility of being a parent any day.
The voices of the children continued to echo along the corridor.
“It’s not riiiiising!”
“Run faster!”
“It’s getting banged up on the floor!”
And then there was the sound of broken glass. After a second Magi realised that it hadn’t come from the kids playing their outdoor games indoors, but closer, through the very door he was standing in front of. From Mara’s room.
Cold fear erupted in the pit of his stomach. He wrenched the doorknob and pushed the door in quickly, bursting into the room. What if Mara had fallen over and broken a mirror, and cut herself on it, and she and the child were bleeding to death even as he thought about it? It’d all be because he wasn’t around to keep her safe. It’d be all his fault-
“Mara, are you alright?!” He shouted.
His wife glanced at him clinging to the doorknob, surprised. He looked almost as white as a sheet, but all she had been doing was stacking glasses on her tummy out of boredom. She had had several empty water glasses on her bedside table and had suddenly wondered how many she could stack before they collapsed. She’d been doing well until the baby kicked and they all tumbled down, but she was quick with her hands and saved each glass but one. That one was in pieces on the floor now.
After the initial surprise Mara’s expression shifted to guilt, like a child who had been caught doing something naughty. “I-I’m sorry. I ran out of things to do and I broke it. It was an accident.” She apologised.
Magi sagged against the doorframe and finally allowed himself to breathe once more. “I am sorry I’m late,” he sighed weakly, “I seem to lose track of time whenever I am riding. Here, I’ll clean that up for you…” He moved to the cupboard in the corner of the room and took out a broom and pan, sweeping up all the shards of broken glass and dumping them into the wastepaper bin. The floor was hard stone so it was rather easy to clean.
Mara could see that she had really shaken him, and if she could she would have cleaned the mess by herself. She looked down at her hands as she listened to the tinkling sound of the glass falling into the garbage. Once he was done she stacked the remaining glasses back on the table, one by one. “I’ve really missed you.” She admitted quietly. She saw him every day but still it was not the same.
“I know. I have missed you too, but I’ve been an idiot about all of this. Everything I can’t deal with I tend to run away from, but all that makes me do is miss you more.” Magi said, leaning the broom against the wall and taking a seat at the front of the bed. He tried to maintain eye contact with her, and it got easier the more time went on. That was a relief. He smiled encouragingly. “It is a cowardly thing to run away.”
He was here now, so she could be patient with him. Mara didn’t want Magi to feel like he was being pushed or prodded into doing things he didn’t want to do. That was why she never chased him when he first decided to run away. “Why did you leave?” She asked him at last. “Why are you so scared of me now?”
He shook his head and moved further up the bed to be closer to her. He placed a hand on her large belly. “It feels like once this child is born something very significant will end. It’s something I’ve had with me all my life and once it’s gone I will be… I am terrified of what the future will be like. What if I am not good enough for you and the child? What if I am not worthy of this second chance that has been granted to me? I am no longer a discard but I’m still just like one, up there in my head.”
Magi paused for several moments, working out of himself the most important part that needed to be said. “When this child is born… I will be here for the rest of my life. That is what frightens me the most. I know how horrendously selfish it sounds.” He confessed.
Mara stared at him for what felt like a very long time. Right when Magi was beginning to feel unbearably uncomfortable she came to life again and abruptly burst into tears.
Poor Mara, but poor Magi as well. His heart dropped like a stone and he grasped his wife by the shoulders, unsure of what to do. He couldn’t stand tears, especially when those tears belonged to her. “What is it? What’s wrong? Oh, Mara, talk to me please!” He begged.
When he grasped her shoulders she leaned forward as much as she could and tried to grab him into a hug. She couldn’t quite do it properly at the angle she was in, but she tried hard anyway. Mostly she was acutely aware of the fact that her fingertips were digging hard into the fabric of his coat. “M-Magi… I thought… I thought…” She sobbed out.
“Yes? What did you think?” He pressed, feeling like a rotten bastard for making her cry in the first place.
She then did something which further confused Magi. In-between her sobs she found the breath to laugh. It was a nervous, relieved laugh. “I… I th-thought you were avoiding me b-because you were falling out of love with me, because I can’t do anything anymore and I’ve become big, fat and useless.” She sniffled. “I was so afraid you were going to come in one night and say you couldn’t do this with me.”
This was a revelation of epic proportions. Magi pulled away and held her at an arm’s length, the expression on his face absolutely indescribable. Mara wiped weakly at her eyes in the interim. “You thought I wouldn’t love you anymore just because you’re pregnant? Do you know how absolutely insane that sounds?” He declared incredulously.
“I know it’s a silly idea and all but I couldn’t help but think… I’m sorry…” She apologized with a shaky smile.
“And I thought that I was being the idiot here. Well, I still am, but so are you.” He tapped Mara very gently on the head with a closed fist. He smiled again as she looked at him with teary eyes. “Mara, I will never stop loving you. I love you and I love this child that is inside of you. You are always going to be beautiful to me no matter what.” He promised.
She mulled this over in silence, but thankfully she had stopped shaking. “Well, I can’t believe you think that I’d never let you travel the Void ever again. I’d never do that to you. I’d like it if you could stay until the baby is old enough for an education, but I fell in love with Magi the Ranger. I’d never want to take that sort of freedom away from him.” Mara explained, just as baffled at Magi’s silliness as he was with hers. She felt better after that cry, though. Much, much better than before.
“By that point I might not want to leave.” Magi commented offhandedly, folding his arms.
Mara could hardly believe that he was trying to devil’s advocate his own desires. “We will have to wait and see.” She argued.
“I’ve been such a child. I love you, Mara.”
“I love you too, Magi.”
They hugged, and they got the angle right this time. That hug turned into a kiss, and then several kisses. Eventually Mara pulled away. “Do you know Tana?” She asked, leaning back against her pillows. She had multiple pillows to support her back and head, but Emily had maybe gone a little bit overboard with the comfort.
“Of course I know Tana. What about her?” Magi replied, kicking off his boots.
Mara also had a feeling that Tana wasn’t going to be around for much longer, but she knew that her husband was very fond of her and she didn’t want to spoil the mood. She paused, changing her mind. “… Nothing. It’s nothing. I’m just glad she’s been able to grow up well.” She said.
But Magi was easily able to read her mind. It had been on his mind as well. He nodded and stretched out further on their bed, resting his head carefully against Mara’s tummy. It made quite an interesting pillow. “Yes, I completely agree.” He said. “She’s a good girl.”
And life and time continued to move on.
-fin-
