Tears

Finn finished another day at the orphanage before checking the garden again. She was keeping careful watch over Jimmy's flower so that she could harvest its pollen at the proper time. She had mulled dozens of possible questions she had as candidates for the next to be asked. She had narrowed it down to a few contenders.

What did he mean 'non-humans'? How did the disappearing work? What was the most useful thing for her to do to help defend the city? Did Jimmy have any way of knowing whether the people of her village were ok?

She turned these possibilities over in her mind as she returned to the Shermans' home. She hummed softly as she tended the garden, trying to chase away the gloom which threatened to overcome her in her loneliness. Lately Victoria had been helping her from time to time, but the child was nowhere to be seen this afternoon.

Jimmy's flower was thriving in the soil of the garden. She had painstakingly prepared the soil before planting it there with all the fertilizing substances she could think of. Now that it had been there long enough to fully take root, the delicate plant was likely only days away from being in full bloom.

She had previously wondered if the solitary blossom was due to its nature, or whether the previous malnutrition had limited the plant's growth. Now, though it seemed to be in the peak of health, it had not grown any additional flowers.

What a shame, in a way. Multiple flowers could provide a larger harvest of the pollen Jimmy was seeking.

Wait, was it a shame? She had no idea what the pollen's properties were or the purpose Jimmy needed it for. Perhaps it wasn't a shame at all.

Though Jimmy had only helped her and shown no malicious tendencies, the fact remained that he was a mysterious smuggler with many secrets. Mrs. Sherman, who was wise and discerning in her ways, had repeatedly cautioned against putting much trust in him.

Still, the healing tea had worked marvelously on Riley, and Finn would use her best judgment moving forward on how much to trust Jimmy at each turn. Hopefully that wouldn't come back to bite her at a later time.

Finishing up in the garden, it was time for her to read another letter from Roland, as her daily schedule now dictated. She was determined to get through each of them and remember him the way he deserved, no matter how much it hurt.

This journey through grieving was one she was trying to take gently, but in a nonavoidant way. It was a delicate balance and she hoped not to push herself over the edge and into a dark place she couldn't recover from. The routine was meant to help with that.

Entering the room she shared with Mayra, she closed the door for some privacy and selected one from the stack. This one had a bent corner, which she lingered over briefly. He obviously took great care to keep the other letters flat and pristine, which couldn't be easy in the military.

She wondered what had happened to make this singular one become bent and creased. She held it softly for a moment before gently flattening it and breaking the seal. Taking a deep breath, she read.

"Dearest Serafina,

I trudge on, training and trying and learning. Each day melts into the next, and I would lose them entirely, if not for these letters to you. They number my days and keep track of my heartbeats. The growing bundle of paper represents the growing yearning in my heart as I spend longer away from your eyes, your voice, your lips. Each moment I think of you and my love increases.

I cannot hope that you will readily return my love after my boorish behavior at my departure. I barely dare to hope you might ever return it. Whether or not you will, my heart remains yours. It has severed its ties to myself and has become irrevocably loyal to only you. I cannot take it back, though I may try; you must keep it or shatter it as you will. I love you.

I am yours forever,

Roland"

Tears flowed freely down Finn's face. She had no words to respond to what was before her. There was a gaping wound in her soul left by his death, and knowing that he had loved her... She couldn't tell whether it soothed the wound a little or ripped it further open.

She decided to try and let it be healing. She closed her eyes and let the tears flow. She relived the memory of Roland's kiss in light of this new declaration of love. To have had his love, however briefly, was now a beautiful memory she could carry with her forever.

A broken sob escaped her lips. The beauty of it intensified the pain of the loss. Her cry must have been louder than she thought, because Mayra gently knocked at the door before coming inside and sitting on the bed next to her.

Unable to explain anything, Finn just handed the letter to her friend with trembling hands, and hugged a pillow tightly while Mayra read.

"Oh, Finn. Oh..." Tears were streaming down Mayra's face now with almost the same frequency. Folding the letter, she set it reverently on the nightstand before turning and embracing Finn.

The girls cried together over the loss. Mayra felt the urge to burn her infernal books, which had made the grief of lost love seem noble and glorious. It was just pain. And now, her dearest friend in the world was shouldering this unbearable burden.

The two girls wept together until it was time for supper. Drying tears and washing faces, Finn hoped the hardest part of these emotions was passing. On top of the emotional pain, she hurt physically from the tears and the sobs. Why were people made this way, to feel so much?

A good distance away in the city, Ashley wondered the same. Though she couldn't show it outwardly, she deeply grieved the loss of her fellow recruits. She wished that she could have been there, even though she would have been little or no help to them.

The separation and isolation she felt were overwhelming. Positioned outside the City Hall as a guard, she saw her father come and go daily. It was infuriating.

She thought over his schemes with bitterness. He had revealed, though maybe not intentionally, that he thought the grueling training would make her quit.

She had wondered why she had been trained as hard as the men, and then dragged off on a journey to hunt wolves, and then transferred to guard the Hall, where he could daily browbeat her into submission. The final straw of maneuvering all women to be recalled was just another in his series of tricks.

At first she'd thought he had somehow directly interfered with each of these things, and thought ill of Captain Grayson for being under her father's thumb, but it seemed her father's machinations were more subtle than she had imagined. A simple suggestion here, thinking aloud there, and he wielded a strange amount of influence over the policies and people around him.

His manipulations disgusted and terrified her. Would she finally fall prey to them next? She shuddered, then furtively glanced around to make sure no one had noticed. She should be paying attention to her duties, not her own private thoughts.

But there was no one in the square to see her. She wasn't even in the direct line of sight of her counterpart, who guarded the opposite corner of the hall. When the Council was not in session, this was more of a ceremonial position than anything else.

She was little better than a scarecrow, discouraging thieves or vandals from taking their chances on the City's seat of government. Too many layers of security in other parts of the city would keep any real threat from ever making it this far.

Speaking of ceremonial, the sun was setting and it was time for the changing of the guard. The two reliefs marched across the square, splitting up at the center to arrive at the two corners now guarded.

Ashley raised her weapon in salute, and changed places with her replacement, then marched toward the center of the square at the same pace as her counterpart, where they met and marched away toward the barracks. They would split up just after the entrance, and she would head to her lonely place in the women's quarters by herself.

She sighed, tired of the monotony, but glad that for the evening she would be temporarily out of the reach of her father. It was easy for him to talk to her at the City Hall since he always had business there, but the privacy of the barracks afforded her some small measure of insulation from his invasion into her life.

She wished she had more.