The bottles were three, one was half-filled. The kettle was made of iron and rust, with a cracked wooden handle. The tea rested inside a glass jar with a leather fastened over the top, acting as a lid. From the drawers below the kitchen counter I got a metal spoon and placed crushed tea leaves on the cloth filter as she instructed me. Solimute was still sitting on her armchair, giving me the back, but her instructions were clear as day for me. Her kitchen was austere, with only some fruits and meat jerky stored in. Maybe after a life so long, so seemingly endless, she had learned that there were things she would not miss, and expelled them from her home. Compared to Dariel and Orphela’s, this house was closer to Ludlum’s than to a proper home. Maybe the silver statuette of a dancing woman that rested over the hearth was the only remaining superfluous item. I never asked about it. Family heirloom, personal whim, or something else, I shall never know.
When the infusion was finished, I served it on a cup and placed it in front of her, kneeling by her side. She stared at it as if she had never seen tea before. “Sweetie, this is not a tea cup: this one is used for milk. But don’t you worry, it will do.” She took it with both trembling hands and carefully lifted it to her lips. “It’s too strong, and you overdid it with the honey. Still… better than most men would expect from a dragon.”
“I am so sorry. There are enough ingredients to try again. Do you want me to—”
“None of that nonsense, this is my last tea and it is good enough, Terus. Now, tell me a bit about you. Where do you hail from? Where did you learn to speak tongues of men?
Then I told her about Ludlun and Zenvo in exquisite detail. I told her how her house looked, and didn’t look like, one of Ludlun’s houses. I told her about Dariel, Orphela, Sihea, and Dusk. About Mardhaka and the parrots and the crows she had gathered as her personal entourage. About Cirruin, and how he dreamed his best friend to life. About Terus, whose name I took without asking. I told her I would miss her listening silence, her sweet voice, and her calm stare.
“You are cursing this dragon with one more irrevocable loss with each passing second,” I told her flatly, tasting the sourness of my words.
“You will forget me in a month’s time, dear: you have a lot to keep on being for.”
You lied, Solimute. You lied so cruelly, old hag. Wherever you are now, read these lines, and see that I seldom forget, and Cirruin never does.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“Gods willing, you shall be right,” I limited myself to say. “Don’t people want to be remembered?”
“And be a burden? I have lived more than every other person on this earth. Three hundred years…” Life too long for a raven, too short for Terus or a dragon. “… three centuries is a long time. My descendants already don’t know me. How could I wish to burden you with a memory of mine?”
“Because I feel guilty,” I told her. And then stood. “You say I have not killed you, yet this prophecy would remain unfulfilled, had my path led elsewhere.”
“My husband died choking on a piece of meat. Had I not been visiting a friend, he would have lived to an old age, maybe. One of my grandchildren died of a curable illness because I lived too far away to deliver the medicinal herbs in time and my daughter didn’t have money for more. Had I lived closer, maybe he would have lived to have children of his own. Had I, could I, maybe, perhaps. Worthless, all of them, sweet Terus. People die, we come across them dying, or we are absent when they do and cannot help them. It’s how life goes, and no reason to blame us for accidents,” she said, leaving her drink to cool down over the table.
“But… I am triggering your death. How can I be okay with that?” I asked, trying to put on a façade worthy of a man begging for answers.
“Am I not happy with your visit? Is it not good to make me happy despite the fact the curtain will soon fall and end my life? It was a long life, it was good life. I will die in my sleep. I will die a good death.”
“What if I keep you up tonight?”
She shook her head. And then extended a finger while fixating her stare on my hand. “Are you sure you will be able?”
I was fading. Terror overtook me., I was fading. I would kill the oldd woman if I failed to keep her awake at night.
“No!” I uttered in all tongues I knew simultaneously. “Cirruin, don’t you dare stop dreaming me! Cirruin! No!”
“It is a good tea, Terus, I was just ruffling your feathers a bit as payback for telling me my pronunciation was good… for a human. Now go in peace, dream of a dragon. If you come back after I am gone, could you bring that silver statue to my grave? If someone hasn’t stolen it by then, suffice to say.”
“I don’t want to fade! I don’t want to kill you, Solimute!”
“Yet you must fade as your nature dictates, and I die as mine does. Farewell, Terus, be a good dream.”
“No!” I extended a hand towards her just before becoming undone.
And that was the first and last time I saw Solimute. Three days later, when the fog of inexistence lifted and I was for long enough to act, I willed myself into her home, and took the statuette to the small cemetery of the town. It was in the death of the night, where nobody would see me. It took me a couple hours to do it silently. But, for the sake of her last wish, I managed.
I regret the fact I never asked her which flowers she would like to have rain upon her grave, or what the statuette meant to her.