Flames & Stone

© 1999 Deb Atwood

I was cold. I could feel ice within my fingertips, like slivers stuck under my nails. I dug at them as I stood there, waiting. The skin was cool to the touch, smooth, like stone. I realized I was shifting and didn’t even notice it. And I didn’t want to bother to shift back. I was almost most comfortable like this, skin of thick and heavy stone, of mottled grey and black. Cold on the outside, and on the inside. My emotional walls visible to anyone who cared to look. Impenetrable. Invincible.

With one hand I twisted the black ring upon my left hand. It seemed cold now, as though the life had left it as well. It symbolized the bond I shared with Marek… the wedding rings I had forged after our bond became a love bond, not just the marriage I’d asked him for to escape my house. And now that bond was shattered. I had felt it shatter, and remembered, clearly, the moment I felt his death. The shudders began again as the memory swept over me, and I clenched my fingers to the palms of my hand to keep from letting them show. Sharp stone fingernails dug into the cracks of the rough skin of my palms, but that form didn’t bleed. It was a fortress.

His body was there, next to me. A shell of the man I had loved. His hearty skin was pasty grey with death, his blue eyes closed to me. Thick blond hair lay limp upon the pallet.

But worst for me was looking at his hand. Every time I looked, I saw the pale band of skin where his ring used to rest. A black band, etched with designwork, to match mine, and both made to match his sword. I would have sent him to the afterlife with our bond still in place, but the ring was gone before his body was returned to Helgram. Both ring and sword.

I bit down hard on my lip, and shifted away the wound once I tasted the blood. If I ever saw those again… saw who had them. They would pay for what they had done to my husband, to my love, to my life.

"The little ones are hungry, Lady."

I turned to see Kelrian standing there, a baby in each arm. The two girls fussed, waving little palms in the air, then pressing hands against their lips and sucking desperately, whining again when nothing happened. I moved silently to the chair near Marek’s palette and sat, reaching up to accept first one twin then the other. In only a few days I had become adept at feeding the twins, one at each breast. I nodded to Kelrian, telling her curtly, "Go." Her expression was bland as she nodded and then left. They’d all become used to me. They knew I wanted to spend every last moment I could with Marek. Alone.

"This is your daddy," I said softly to the twins. "He’s dead, or he’d be here to love you just like I am. He was so excited waiting for you to be born. He used to lie there in bed, next to me, and put his hand on my belly to feel you kick. He would talk to you… although of course we only thought there was one of you then. I wish you could know him. I know you would love him as much as I, and he would love you." The memories swept over me yet again, like a kick to the gut, and I felt my stomach clench with the pain as tears rolled down my face, splashing onto soft little baby cheeks.

Delana looked up from her nursing, brown eyes wide, tiny brow furrowed in confusion. I whispered soothing nonsense sounds until she returned to her suckling. I had to remain calm, if only for the babies. But I felt so alone… so bereft. And it seemed that no one I spoke to understood.

The babes fell asleep at the breast, and I continued to cradle them, snuggling them close and enjoying the feel of someone who loved me unconditionally. Someone I could care for, and who would be there still tomorrow. The realization of life lay curled in my arms, even as I sat watching death steal my love away.

"Lady…"

Kelrian’s voice was soft from the doorway, and when I looked up, I realized that all of Marek’s family stood there, watching me. I moved the children, handing one to Kelrian, and then refastened my gown, settling the shawl back about my shoulders. I stood without a word, and moved to the side of the body, touching his cold chest lightly. Tear misted my cheeks, and I cradled Merina close to me, so close that she let out a soft wail as I held her too tightly. I pressed my face against her soft cap of babyhair, until Kelrian relieved me of my tiny burden, leaving me nothing to hold onto.

I felt hands at my shoulders, turning me, moving me away from Marek’s side. Four men moved in, one at each corner of the palette, lifting him easily. So big in life… so light now that life had left his body. I jerked away from whoever held me and moved between the others, so that I could walk next to him. My place was always next to him. I would walk next to him now until I had to let him go.

The procession went by in a haze. I knew Kelrian walked next to me, in case the babies needed me. But I had no attention to spare. Everything focused on Marek. With each step, I lived another moment of our life together. The first time he visited Ghil… while I was barely fifteen and working hard on my lessons, hoping that perhaps training in sorcery would help me leave Avril for good. Then when I was seventeen, proposing to him… and the horrible wait for a week until he decided that he would, indeed, marry me. Our wedding night, as he calmed me after the trauma of a family event. His gentle hands as he made love to me for the first time. The first day I realized I was truly in love with him, and that he loved me. The night we conceived the twins. And then finally, the moment of his death.

The pyre burned hot in front of us, and gentle hands urged me back, away from the palette as the bearers moved forward. But again I shrugged them away, and moved forward as well. Until I could feel the flames licking over the stone of my skin. Could feel the heat searing me. They tipped the palette, and Marek’s body slid into the flames. And I stood there, refusing to move, as the fire consumed him, and stole what little of him was left from me.

And then he was gone. I felt myself hovering on the edge of the flames, leaning forward, wanting to follow him. But then a touch on my shoulder pulled me back, and I stepped down, turning automatically to accept the fussing child that was pressed into my arms, cuddling her without even noting which twin I had.

It was over, and he was gone. And I felt like I would be stone forever.