Eliax Lestwood often assumed that she was insane. At least…that’s what she’d been assuming for the past ten years.
She was perfectly reasonable in this assumption, given that there were things in her mind and soul that had no right to be there; there were pieces of herself that no one understood, least of all her. And so Eliax was insane.
Even I classify her as insane, but my opinion doesn’t matter here.
Thump.
The sight of the city ahead slowly grew larger as the hours passed. The sight of trees, the road, the wagons in the caravan, and the sights of people around her also riding towards that distant city. The sight of the old palace as she finally got close enough to see it. Eliax could have sworn she’d been here before, but this was her first time going this far west.
Thump.
The sounds of a moving cart, wheels grinding against the hard earth. The sounds of talking voices as the other passengers entertained each other, the sounds of the animals that plodded onward tirelessly, the slurping as her neighbor drank from his canteen.
Thump.
The feel of the vibrating seat beneath her. The rough wood of the armrests which kept giving her splinters, the faint ache in the base of her back from sitting for so long. Hours of sitting. Months with this same group.
Thump.
The scent of horses and pack animals. The scent of Humans and Tuvei, even a few Seldaens, most of them sweating flagrantly in the noonday heat.
Thump.
The taste of bile as it rose to her mouth.
Eliax let out a long breath, clutching her single bag with tired hands. She was almost there. To Reiaran. A place where perhaps she might get some answers. The beating of her heart in the base of her stomach, the click click of her exoskeleton as she tapped her fingertips together.
She took out her notebook and began to write.
I couldn’t tell you anything that went down on those pages. It could have been observations, it could have been poetry. It could even have simply been a journal entry that was eventually lost forever. But Eliax wrote. She wrote until the charcoal of her pencil grew dull. She wrote until the steady rhythms of the caravan slowed to a crawl. She wrote until she finally worked up the courage to look up at the city walls.
There were many things that Eliax expected to happen when she saw the city for the first time, but oh blood and sand, she still wasn’t prepared for it.
She barely noticed as the caravan stopped outside the gates and each wagon who wanted to enter approached the wall, telling the names of those entering to a guard who stood helpfully nearby with a sheet of paper and an inking pen.
A flood of memories that still weren’t quite solid rushed through her mind and she barely noticed as she was admitted into the city. She sat stock still in the wagon as memories stirred at every brick and stone and poured memories into her head. Past the cracks in the paint that she’d attempted to shore up over the past couple of weeks. A bakery in front of her was a familiar shape, the scents penetrated the resonance and she remembered them from some time long ago.
The layout of the streets reminded her of mail for some reason, letters and envelopes. A broken street lamp accompanied a vague feeling of embarrassment. The scent of the nearby sea was so achingly familiar, even though Eliax had never seen the thing.
It was like every mental barrier, every distraction, every method of coping with these memories that she’d developed over the years was swept away without a thought. Laying her mind bare for tampering.
Estin always said that the past would lie in wait forever until she was prepared to face it. Well, the only concrete thing that Eliax got from the experience was a headache. That and a distant sense of loss.
She looked down and started writing again. This time, I could tell you what it was.
Resonance, page six, Reiaran. Subcategory twelve.
I’ve been here before. I can finally say with certainty.
Eliax stood up from the wagon at last as it reached the markets, she put her bag over her shoulder, and started looking for an inn to be her base of operations.
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The door in front of her swung open beneath her palm.
The tactile sensation was smooth, almost too smooth if that was possible. The Innkeeper must’ve spent a lot of money on the fine door, Eliax could see lovingly carved designs along the edges that would up the price immensely.
Even so, the Lazy Dryad wasn’t a particularly nice place, it was old and the layout was reminiscent of a large home. It was more like someone had expanded the dining area and kitchen, added a third floor, and turned their house into a bed and breakfast. From the cobbled together feel the place seemed to cultivate, Eliax could almost say for certain that it had gone through at least three full on renovations, and not all of them were recent ones.
She walked into the entry hall and examined the three tables with an open kitchen, it was...quaint. Also familiar. Eliax massaged her temples as the resonance tried to overload her with information. Memories that weren’t hers. Mostly she would need a couple of hours to build up her mental defenses again. After nearly being robbed twice thanks to losing her presence of thought at exactly the wrong moments, it was in her best interest to get her mind under control again quickly.
As was her habit, Eliax shoved any new memories to the back of her mind for later examination. She’d found that once a memory surfaced, She could afterward easily peruse it to her leisure. Eliax hesitantly rang a little bell with a sign labeled “Assistance” and glanced around as a woman’s voice sounded from upstairs, “I’ll be right down!”
A slightly chubby Tuvei quickly made her way down the stairs a few moments later, a basket of linens against one hip, “Hello dear! I’m Alsen Serian. What can I do for you today?”
Eliax examined her for a moment before looking away from her face and tracing the lines in the wallpaper behind the woman with her eyes. “I’m Eliax. I was wondering about renting a room for a month or two?”
Alsen grinned, “Of course, of course! I have plenty of room! Where are you from, Eliax?”
Eliax followed her almost by instinct as the Tuvei walked through the room and put the basket of linens on a table near the back door. “Just, Sanaria.”
Alsen sat down in an empty seat and motioned for Eliax to follow suit as she started folding some of the towels. “What part of Sanaria? I have a cousin over there somewhere…”
“Just the outer ring of Ceruleia,” She answered almost automatically.
Alsen blinked at her, “My my, that’s even farther than I thought.” She frowned, “It’s a big city too, much bigger than Reiaran.”
Eliax nodded awkwardly, paint in the sand. It was just paint. “Yes, it’s strange here. It’s almost like I’ve lived here forever.”
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Eliax woke up the next morning, ready to start a new day of speculation. Reiaran was a city that was filled with contradictions to her eyes. Half and half… she mused. She was caught between a world of the present and a world of the past. Never mind her personal instinct to focus on the future.
Eliax opened her notebook and made a mark of the date as she was prone to doing. It was a great, reliable way to make the resonance surface. As always, she stared at it for far too long, her mind barely comprehending the number that was apparently widely different from what the resonance thought it should be.
Being supremely unhelpful, the resonance completely neglected to inform her what it thought the number ought to be, only that this wasn’t it. Eliax was still waiting for it to slip up one of these days and inadvertently tell her something useful.
She shook her head, wrote a few quick thoughts, and headed down for breakfast. The free breakfast that came with getting a room here was half the reason She’d chosen Lazy Dryad over all the more conveniently placed taverns and inns. The other half of the reason was that it was one of the least frequented, and the fewer people around to disturb her the less distracted both herself and the resonance would become. The sparking thing almost had a mind of its own.
Eliax greeted Alsen politely as the smiling Tuvei scrambled some eggs. She had a motherly way about her, but besides not quite being as distant as Eliax would like her to be, Alsen wasn’t terrible. She was tidy, polite, strict about her rules, and gave Eliax a discount when she found out she was all the way from Ceruleia. She reminded Eliax of her own…mother.
Eliax let out a long breath, sat down at a table, and took out her notebook.
Mother resonance, page 1.
She’d been...wonderful. A person Eliax had wanted to be for the longest time. She’d been an artist, a craftswoman. Always making beautiful things. Busy with her hands and her mind which was as sharp as any blade. Before…
She…
…She didn’t have a mother. She’d never even known the woman who gave birth to her. Eliax had never had a woman to look up to. This was wholly a trick of the resonance.
Alsen came up to her and handed her a plate. Eggs, a warm roll, and a few apple slices. Eliax wasn’t able to thank her, she was gone before her mind recovered from the moment before.
Eliax took a bite and dutifully wrote down the experience with trembling hands.
Who were you?
I’m not sure.
The seconds ticked by.
Eliax dropped her fork, her hands were still shaking. Stupid, stupid. she reached for it with her foot, trying to edge it closer, but ended up kicking it further away. Sparks, she needed to calm herself down. Eliax sighed and cast a quick distortion spell, contracting the space between her hand and the fork, allowing her to simply pick it up.
She then firmly set it down on the table and kept eating, this time going over what the resonance had inadvertently told her moments before.
Whoever this past life or missing memories had been, she’d had a mother. She’d loved her mother so, so deeply. Far deeper than Eliax cared for anyone save Estin. It was the love of a child. The love of someone who had lost that person while still a child. The love had never had a chance to grow up.
She’d also been a Tuvei, and she’d lived here, in Reiaran.
Eliax curled her fingers once more around the fork, stabbing it into one of the apple slices.