Yew, and the Beginning [1/6]

Yew expected that Astilbe would lead them back inside, but he stopped at the door to prop it open a sliver instead. The music found its way to them, although Yew couldn’t name the song. He pulled her close, spinning her around along with the rhythm; Yew was fairly sure it wasn’t an official dance, but rather a series of random pieces he was stringing together as he felt like it. Not that it mattered, he was much easier to follow along with than a fight. The steps he chose oscillated between flowing and playfulness, a few smooth rounds before he would abruptly change the pattern.

At one point she thought he might be tracing the floor plan of some ruins or other with their path. When she figured out the pattern, she switched it up on him, grinning at the chagrin on his face.

Eventually, they came to a lull; each step shorter and slower till their dance was just a big lazy circle, not really following the music anymore at all.

“I saw you talking to your sponsor earlier, how did that go?” Astilbe invited her to speak. Yew frowned at the memory, but it transformed somewhere along the way into something contemplative.

“It was… different than usual. Well, not entirely, he still tried to get me to call him ‘big brother’, but I saw something today that I didn’t before,” she recounted.

“Oh?” He leaned closer, encouraging her to continue.

“I saw, a crack, I think,” she looked at him like she would find the answer on his face if only she searched long enough. “For the longest time I thought he had just forgotten and moved on. After Ulma disappeared, it was like nothing had changed for him. He always said how much he loved her, but I never saw any sign that losing her affected him. All his words seemed like lies.” She took a deep breath, “it felt like my world was falling apart at the seams, and here he was, glib as ever. I hated him for that. For acting like nothing was wrong.”

“But not completely,” he offered, when she seemed stuck on the words.

“No, not completely. I didn’t understand why he kept treating me the same way after; like we’re family, even though he never got to marry her. If he loved her so much, how could he not blame me for what happened?” As she spoke, she realized she hadn’t ever told Astilbe the full story. “It’s my fault she’s gone, we were in those ruins because of me.” She stared into his eyes, full of guilt and sorrow. Then she looked away, towards the constellations, “I don’t understand why no one blames me, except me.”

Astilbe brought them back to the banister, “whatever happened, I’m sure it wasn’t your fault.”

Yew snapped at him, “how can you know that?! Why?!” She smacked a hand on the railing, the stone was cold and hard. It made her hand sting. Astilbe remained calm, gently picking up her abused hand and soothing it between his own.

“I know,” he said, “because I know you.” He was sure nothing she said could overturn everything he already thought of her.

“You- But you don’t even know,” she tried to argue. Her hand squeezed around his, urging him to understand.

“I know enough,” he squeezed back. She stomped a foot at him in frustration.

“You don’t-” Yew began, and spoke of days long before they ever met.

***

Yew and Ulma weren’t always sisters, although Yew didn’t remember the time before Ulma found her very well.

Yew remembers a stone alter, although she didn’t know that’s what it was until later. Her earliest memories are smeary and indistinct, her thoughts were so slow and her body cold as ice. The light of magic blazed around her, shapes she didn’t recognize or understand. They hurt her eyes; and the room was so dark after they faded away. There were hundreds of them lining the walls, ceiling, and floor. They were runes; the first she had ever seen. There weren’t any before, wherever that was; she can’t remember, but she knows that much. Something in her bones can still recall enough to tell her it's unfamiliar, but magic isn’t. It just wasn’t like this.

Her first clear emotion was confusion. But her first sensations were pain and cold and hunger. Yew was so so hungry. Too cold to move, too hungry to stay still. She had to leave the bright room that was now pitch black. There must be a way out, there must be something to eat outside. Her body felt so heavy. Every muscle and limb was pinned under a mountain. Gravity had turned all its attention to her, dragging her toward the center of the Earth. Each movement felt like an eternity without the sun or moon to tell her if time was passing at all. Did she spend minutes rolling over and pushing herself up, or days? Hours, or weeks? How long did it take to crawl down from a stone table that was colder than she was, and much bigger?

Her feet scarcely reached the ground on tiptoes, as she dangled from the side, scraping her arms and legs on the slide over the edge. The blood that welled up was thick and slow. She dropped, trying to support herself but failing. Her body rag-dolled to the floor, the kinetic energy of falling was what eventually rolled her down the short stairs of the dais. Sharp stones bit into her, but the pain was dull; she was numbed by the chill emanating from inside her. She wouldn’t notice the streaks of dark red she was leaving behind. She stayed on that freezing stone floor for a while, it sapped heat from her faster than her body was producing it.

She moved whenever she could, dragging herself along the floor with the sole motive of finding anything to eat. Saliva struggled to pool in her parched mouth at the thought, it stung as it forced itself through the glands. She couldn’t see a doorway, but she inched along the wall until she felt edges. Her tired, desperate, hands clenched around the doorframe with her meager strength like a lifeline. She heaved her limp form, weaker than a newborn, around the corner. Over and over, along each hall and wall until she found a place with a window.

The light of a waning moon shone through it, illuminating a plain crumbling room. It wasn’t a very big or fancy window, just a rectangle cut into a wall, but in that moment it felt like the doorway to heaven guiding her onward. It promised her freedom from this pitch black maze that held only ice and pain. She rallied everything left in her to pull herself up to the ledge, it was a little high for her short stature. She scrabbled against the wall, digging her feet into it and straining with both fingers and toes to climb. She felt like the world’s most inelegant gecko, which is pretty impressive as geckos are already fairly inelegant creatures. Once she got her torso onto the ledge she rested for a few minutes; breathing despite the weight of her lungs collapsing in her chest. She could see outside now, she was higher than she expected.

It seemed she was in a tower. The night sky full of clouds and stars stretched out wide in front of her; yawning and endless and truly beautiful. She wasn’t sure she’d ever seen it before. It was just like the stories… except, she didn’t remember the stories. She dangled over the edge, three floors up, and failed to navigate the molasses in her head. The more she chased her thoughts around the faster they fled away from her. Vanishing into an infinite void where she could not follow them. She had a feeling she should be careful… for some reason, but she couldn’t grasp it fully. Tipping over the edge, she tumbled down down down and crashed in a heap on the ground.

Pain jolted through her, wracking her whole body with it. It stabbed sharply in certain places especially. Her arm and leg weren’t like that before, they twisted around oddly when she tried to move them and they hurt so badly. She stopped moving, laying in the long grass. It was much softer and warmer than the stone. She laid there for hours, watching the wind blow the clouds around and rustle the grass. She was halfway to ravenous, but nothing near her seemed to be food. She wanted to cry, but had nothing to spare for tears. All she could manage was curling into a ball.

The approaching dawn turned the endless blue into hazy gray. In the still and silence she heard it; there was something moving in the grass beyond her view. It drew closer to her, unaware of her. From amongst the floppy blades, out jumped a rabbit. It seemed not to mind her, but it should have. Without thinking, her unbroken arm lashed out and clawed her hand into it. It started fighting desperately, but it was too late as she dragged it to her and bit into it, eyes glowing in the dim predawn. It died quickly after, but she had no mind to care, far too busy sating her empty stomach. She ate every last piece of it, fur and bones alike; when she finished she was still hungry, but her limbs weren’t bent funny anymore.

The pebbles that had embedded into her skin worked themselves free and the various scrapes closed. Nothing was fully healed, but it was all she needed to move. She rose onto her hands and knees, ragged smock and skin covered in a mix of her blood and the rabbit’s. She was nowhere near full, she went to find another rabbit, or whatever else was around. It didn’t take too long to stumble upon the burrow her first meal came from. She ate them all, each one made her feel stronger and more whole. Her injuries healed, her body warmed, her muscles became a help rather than a hinderance. But she was still hungry. She needed more.