“My lady! It’s time to wake up, my lady!” Loud knocks echoed through Eliza’s newly emptied bedroom. She had scarcely slept, and when she did, her dreams had been nothing but nightmares. She could barely open her eyes from exhaustion, but still she managed to drag herself out of bed, and across the room to the dressing table. Normally she would have called for a maid, but today her mood was more for solitude. She looked in the mirror. Her blue eyes were still bloodshot, her blonde hair a mess from tossing and turning, her fair cheeks were marred by dried tears, and her face had marks from pillow folds. She felt heavy and slow, as if her arms and legs had been tied down by mill wheels, but still she brushed her hair and washed with the cold water in the basin from the night before. Before she left, Eliza dressed in the sky-blue and completely unused travel dress she had bought just to own one, as well as the polite smile she had worn every day for the last six years. As long as she was outside this room, nothing would tear this smile from her face. She had decided so all those years ago, but today the smile seemed stiffer and more unnatural than usual.
As she stepped out from her room and began to move down the hallway towards the foyer, she walked in the shadows of countless giant portraits made in the liking of her numerous ancestors and relatives. The closer she came to the foyer, the more recent the portraits, but hers had long since been removed; replaced by her brother’s. She alone lived in this wing of the manor. The other rooms were for guests and their attendants, but anyone rarely visited. As she came to the grand staircase at the hallway’s end leading down into the foyer of her father’s manor, she saw her parents there, waiting by the luggage. The maids had already begun carrying it to the coach waiting outside. Her mother smiled. At least Eliza thinks she did. To her, it had always looked more like a sneer, or maybe an amused grimace at best. Today it could be mistaken for a triumphant smirk. Eliza walked to them from the stairs and curtsied politely.
“Mother. Father. A good morning to you.”
“And to you, my sweet,” her mother said in a sugary voice, as she brushed her long dark hair away from her forehead, showing off the mark of union she wore there to display her status as a married woman. “I do hope you have slept well?”
“Very much so, thank you.”
“So much luggage you’re bringing. Surely you will have no use for a flute in the monastery?” her mother chuckled as a maid passed them carrying a gilded flute case.
“Ah, but I have heard that my future sisters are fond of singing, and I’m afraid my own vocal skills leave something to be desired,” Eliza replied, lowering her head demurely. “I’m certain my sisters would appreciate my accompaniment more. The journey is also quite long. I shall need something to keep myself entertained.”
Her mother nodded, seemingly either satisfied by the answer, or too indifferent on the matter to pursue it.
“We have prepared a little family breakfast before you leave. Won’t you join us before you go?”
“Of course, but should we not wait for my brother? I would like to say goodbye.” Eliza looked at her father. As usual he was looking at nothing but his wife, unaware that the question had even been addressed to him. Her mother was the one who replied in the end.
“Your brother needs his sleep. He has had a hard time keeping up with his studies, as I’m sure you know. It would be a pity to wake him just for this. You said goodbye to him yesterday as well, did you not?”
Eliza’s smile strained.
“I did, thank you for reminding me. Shall we eat then?” she said, and marched to the dining room before her mother could answer.
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The table was silent while they ate. An abnormality. Usually her brother would be there, and mother would fuss over him incessantly, while father enjoyed his perfect illusion of a happy little family with just the three of them. All that was heard now, was the scraping of silvered cutlery on fine porcelain, and the ticking of a large longcase clock that had been there for as long as anyone could remember. She used to hide inside it when she was little, and then jump out to scare her father as he entered the dining hall, just to tease him. Then he would chase her through the manor while she laughed and squealed in delight. How times had changed. Eliza startled as mother suddenly interrupted her reminiscing.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“I do believe the carriage is ready. We should not make the coachman wait,” she said, as if she hadn’t been perfectly happy to let him wait on her for hours on several occasions.
“Right you are, mother.” Eliza agreed, and got up. “I should be on my way.” She had barely been given time to finish her plate.
Her parents walked with her outside to the coach in the courtyard. It was an early summer morning, the roses were in full bloom, and the sun had just risen above the perfectly trimmed trees in the garden. Two guards were waiting on horseback at the sides of the coach. A pitiful number for a journey so long and perilous, especially through the Fathomless Forest. She would practically be begging to be robbed. In front of the coach door Eliza turned once again to her parents, and curtsied politely.
“I believe this is goodbye.” She looked up at her father. For once he had his head turned towards her, but it was still as if he wasn’t really seeing her. He nodded and smiled, not even opening his mouth to tell her that she would be missed, or even just wish her a safe journey. Mother wished her goodbye though, but in the usual polite, sugary yet impersonal tone she always adopted when speaking to Eliza. When she entered the coach the door was immediately closed behind her before Eliza even had the chance to sit down. As she looked out the window to wave, her parents had already turned to walk back inside, her father whispering something into mother’s ear that made her laugh. The coachman shouted “Yah!”, whipped the reins, and so the coach slowly rolled out of the courtyard, and through the open gates of Eliza’s childhood home. Her smile quivered, then faltered, but she refused to cry. Not again. Instead she clenched her jaw, curled up in a blanket in the corner of the seat, closed her eyes and prayed for sleep.
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Two days passed uneventfully, as Eliza and her escorts made their way towards the Fathomless Forest. They would stop at inns where they could rest in beds for the time being, but such comfort and luxury would not last. Though a wide paved road ran through it, the forest, true to its name, was vast and deep and held many dangers, chief among them the bandits that often prowled around in the area, robbing those with insufficient guard. Most people seemed to survive these robberies, at least the nobles, but she had heard that sometimes entire parties of nobles, guards and servants drove in there and never returned. For Eliza’s group It would take them at least four days to cross the forest at its narrowest point, switching between walk and trot. For now however, the group only had to worry about watering the horses regularly due to the hot sunny weather, and making sure they made it to an inn before closing time.
The first day and evening away from home Eliza had spent depressed, unable to do much besides looking out the coach window, and locking herself in her room at the first inn they stayed at. She felt helpless in her predicament. Even if she made it through the forest alive, all that awaited her on the other side was a lifetime of servitude to the Church of the Sun. She doubted that type of life would bring her anything more than the same unhappiness she had felt in her father’s isolated manor.
The entire next day was filled with many of the same spiraling negative emotions, but the evening offered her some respite from the misery that was her life, as what happened at the second inn piqued her interest. Because this inn had a bard. He was an older man, likely in his forties, with a big bushy beard, and colorful clothes in various shades of reds and yellows. He played a wooden lyre, and sang songs every patron seemed to know the lyrics to. Some of them told stories of heroes, battles, fairies and dragons, others could make even a pleasure girl blush with shame or embarrassment. The last type of song always made the male patrons laugh and whistle, and since most of the people there were local men resting after a long day of hard work, the common room became a pretty loud place to be. Eliza had rarely left her home for this long, and had only ever heard the musicians her parents hired for the balls and soiree’s they held, though such social affairs had been few and far between due to her mother, and Eliza had never been invited to any social gatherings away from home. She had also had a music teacher when she was little, but when mother had entered their lives, she put a stop to it immediately, so Eliza had to learn for herself from then on. Luckily mother had never discovered any of her more scandalous talents...
Eliza had never heard music like what this old bard was playing, though she had heard about its existence. She sat for hours, just listening, trying to subtly move her fingers under the table to mimic where they may be placed on a flute to produce the same sounds and melodies. Luckily many of the songs were repetitive, so she could soon hum the entire melody for many of them. Later that evening, when she was alone in her room, she practiced the fingerings on her flute while humming the melodies, before falling asleep late into the night. The next day she was woken up early with the sunrise, and around noontime, her party entered the Fathomless Forest.
Eliza [https://i.imgur.com/0UDGVlI.png]