Chapter 5:

Forgotten

Miasma


I couldn't understand it even until now. Why can I recollect sharing a meal and chatting with the woman before me, yet the sound of her name is static in my mind. I know I've heard her name before yet I could not remember it. As I began to open my mouth to ask what her name was, I suddenly hesitated. I'm sure she remembers the time she had with me up until now, even I remember our interactions; it was all the more wrong to forget her name. I felt that it would have been rude to her despite what we've been through thus far so I withheld my concern for now. I'm sure her name will come up again eventually.

We continued walking across the straight as beams of light danced across our faces. The light had slowly dimmed, then eventually disappeared, leaving nothing but an ambient evening glow. Before the dark started to settle in, we searched for a place to sleep. We turned toward the the abandoned settlement and walked into the first building we saw. From the outside, the building had the same appearance as all the others we had past, though it seemed a little less overgrown. It had two stories and had shattered glass panes and bend metal frames throughout. As we opened the old wooden door, the woman took out the miniature tripod and another bundle of flowers, the same kind she had used for cooking earlier today. She began to murmur to herself and a small flame ignited, suspended between the rings of her apparatus. She held it up, now using her miniature stove as a torch. As we looked around, we noticed that the inside seemed smaller than what the outside made it seem. An old wooden framework with metal reinforcements held the ceiling in place. Shattered glass and wood were scattered across the floor. There was a small dining table with four chairs in the middle of the room. Two of the chairs had been knocked over and the other two were horribly unaligned with the table. On the right most wall, a large stone oven sat and a messy pile of firewood next to it.

The woman scurried over to the pile of firewood and spoke. "Giveth me a hand, would thou?" I smoothly rushed over and helped her toss firewood into the soot covered stove. She placed the flame of her tiny stove against the firewood until its edge set ablaze. Given time, the fire had covered all the wood and the room was gently lit with the flames warmth. In the time it took the fire to grow, the woman and I had tidied up the house a bit and prepared the table for dinner.

We ate the same meal as lunch, though it tasted slightly more homey when cooked over a stove fire. Dinner was mostly silent with the occasional talk about today and a few chuckles, however, both of us never dared bring up my fall earlier. After dinner, we put out the stove fire and quietly went upstairs to search for a place to sleep. We found one room with two separate beds side by side with a wooden nightstand in between them. A small broken window just barely illuminated the space on the other side of the room. We each chose a bed and prepared to sleep. As I laid in bed I stared at the dark ceiling up above. Vines hung over the wooden frames of the roof, reminding me of the age of this place. Eventually I got bored of the view above me and turned on my side, then on my other side. An hour must've passed before I realized that I wasn't sleepy yet. I turned toward the woman in the other bed still laying down, her back facing me. She hadn't moved a muscle since we went to bed, yet I still decided to call to her.

"Hey you awake?" I asked in a breathy whisper.

"Unfortunately, I cannot sleepeth either." She answered back as she slowly turned toward me.

We looked at each other for a second before I decided to break the silence. "Um, I'm sorry about earlier... and thanks for saving me."

"Ha! If that is all then there is no reason to fret. We're travel companions now, so we must helpeth where we can!" She said with a smile.

She spoke as if she had known me for years, which left a sour taste in my mouth realizing that I had forgotten her name. I couldn't stand it any longer.

"I'm sorry if this is rude, but can you tell me your name again?" I asked as politely as possible.

"So thou has even forgotten my name now, how forgetful. No matter, again, I am Lady Ma--------, does that ringeth a bell?" She said.

I wiped my ears in confusion. "Sorry, can you repeat that." I asked.

"Hmmm, if I must, the name is Lady Ma-------." She said with a slightly louder tone.

"Why can't I..." I couldn't finish my sentence.

"What is the matter?" She asked.

"I- I don't know why, but your name specifically... I can't hear it." I stuttered. It was strange, every word out of her mouth was crystal clear, yet when her name came up, it sounded like a garbled mess. I couldn't make out a single syllable. 

"What does thou meaneth?" She asked with a concerned look on her face.

"Your name, it's incomprehensible, at least to me." I answered honestly. 

The women sat up and placed her chin in between her thumb and pointer to think of something. She stayed like this for a bit before finally opening her mouth.

"Okay, for now I shall giveth thou a different name to call me." She said calmly. I nodded silently in response. She sat in thought for a little longer, her faced morphed from one of concentration to one of regret.

"For now, thou shall calleth upon me as Fesha." She said.

Her voice was clear this time. "Okay, Fesha it is." I responded. She smiled reluctantly at the name, as if hiding something.

By the time we finished our conversation, the room became nearly pitch black in the night. We both laid down on the dusty mattresses covered in loose leaves. I held my eyes open for a little while longer, thinking about the name I had forgotten, but it never came back to me. Eventually, my eyes began to feel heavy and I drifted to sleep.

Miauklys
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