A bleak dribble of icy rain ran down the windows of a cramped Mel apartment, lingering remnants of a morbid Winter. The sun shone dim and distant morning, and the chill seeped through two blankets wadded into the window’s cracks to seek exposed fingers and toes.
The old lady across the hall loved to reminisce of Winters before the Wyrm. Why, back in the days of a proper Keeper, it was a time of repose around the hearth! None of this endless, meandering grey, full of mold and arthritis for the faithful!
The same old lady gave Valkyrie Osh a voucher for a Keeper’s blessing on every new year, confident that this year the office would be restored and the girl brought to salvation.
Between that faith and the Winter ash-falls, Valkyrie knew which would take them all first.
Curling under her blankets, she squeezed her eyes shut against the truth of ticking clocks. Mrs. Hewes and a math test lurked in her future, and she prayed for something nicer like a bout of violent diarrhea.
Her mother, Wavespeaker in her formal robes today, knocked on her door. “Are you up, Valkyrie? You have that test today.”
“I know,” she mumbled.
Belle intruded further, smoothing the layers of Azure fabric across her belly. The robes were an Auren invention; stiff and thick, mockery of deacon robes, the fabric wrapped the Wavespeaker in an impersonal office.
High collar and stiff skirts so you know she’s a proper official. Can’t have the priests mistaken for the flock now. Not even foreign ones.
“You always do well with math, sweetie.”
“I cheat,” she muttered.
Belle sighed softly; the sound filled the room. “You do not.”
“Yes, I do. You could host a baseball game between Albert’s elbow and the desk.”
The Wavespeaker glanced away. “If you’re having trouble at school…”
Unspoken, shouted:
Again
“I’m passing,” she told her pillow.
“I can talk to Mrs. Hewes and–”
“I’m fine,” Valkyrie snapped!
“You’re almost there, sweetie,” the Wavespeaker encouraged, fingers plucking.
And then what? wondered the girl.
Belle sighed, straightened, and grasped the blankets of Valkyrie’s little bunker. “Young lady, it is a school day!”
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
She yanked, and Valkyrie shrieked as her bare feet touched the frigid metal post to her bed.
“C-cold!”
“Then put on some proper clothing!” her mother sighed. “Between the Conclave and my daughter…”
Turning, Belle noticed her homework. “I thought you said you’d finished everything!”
“It’s just review. I could blow through it in ten minutes.”
“Then why didn’t you?”
“That’s not the point!”
Valkyrie skulked past her mother to get a bra from her dresser.
Grimacing, Belle turned to pull her uniform from its hook. Holding up the blouse, she whispered to herself, “I dreamed of attending a city school, ribbons and pleats…”
One room schoolhouse, Osh under the mountain shadow, selling the farm. I know!
“Louise and I promised that we would…”
Give your child more than you had.
She walked in the shadow of a stranger. A hero – though all he’d managed to do was get killed. How could you repay a debt to someone you’d never even met?
“Your studies are important, Valkyrie.”
“Why? So I can apply for a finishing school?” the girl drawled, miming a Livery curtsy.
“It’s an important option,” Belle retorted. “You cannot work for Mishkan or Erudite without those credentials!”
Like I want to be some hen-pecked nursemaid for one of the great Ladies!
Like there would be any Houses left by the time Valkyrie finished the exhaustive Livery program.
Anything left of her beneath black skirts, white aprons, and an empty smile.
Belle glanced out Valkyrie’s window and spied children en route. She glanced at her yawning daughter – who had yet to finish selecting a bra – and scowled. “Valkyrie Osh, if you’re going to act like a baby, I’ll treat you like one!”
The sheer nonsense of that statement broke Valkyrie’s yawn. Eh? Logistically, how would that even work? Is she going to drag me to school in a bonnet? No way the teachers would…
Actually, given some of Valkyrie’s antics, the school might take such a stunt in stride.
“I’m moving, I’m moving…” she acquiesced, accepting the uniform from her mother.
Nodding, Belle grabbed a brush and began to stroke Valkyrie’s golden locks. “I’m sorry you aren’t enjoying school, sweetie.”
Wiggling into her blouse, the girl shrugged.
“There is another option, you know. The Maiden would be glad to…”
Valkyrie recoiled. “I don’t want to be some empty-headed dancer either, Mom!”
Months of frustration boiled over, and Belle yanked Valkyrie around to stare into her eyes. “Then what do you want to be?!”
The greatest Inventor to ever live – a sage of hidden mysteries – the Queen of the eastern tribes – a girl of meaning! Anything but a Livery maid for a dying House, a secretary for a squeaky Wavespeaker, or just another dancer girl for Esmerelda Azure-blessed!
Belle softened her tone. “Valkyrie…the evictions are getting worse. There is nary an Azure ally for us before Fourthborough.”
“Old Bill downstairs can help with anything heavy,” the girl shrugged.
“This isn’t about moving furniture!”
“The Azure way isn’t illegal,” Valkyrie objected, eyes flitting to anywhere but her mother.
“It is not supposed to be,” Belle agreed ominously. “Maybe we should assign a few of the…”
“I don’t need an escort, Mom. I can manage Fourthborough; I’ve been doing that walk for almost a year now!”
“I know…I know…” Belle sighed, releasing her. “Let’s talk about it tonight, okay?”
Valkyrie made a mental note to stay out late with Katherine and Lyla.
“Valkyrie? I love you.”
“…love you too, Mom.”
***
Belle watched her daughter saunter into the cold, wrapped in Louise’s old leather jacket, and her eyes filled with sudden tears.
She retreated to the other end of their tiny apartment and knelt before the makeshift Azure shrine.
How perfectly this shrine encapsulated her existence: a makeshift totem, fraying at the edges, permitted only by tolerance of higher authorities.
Wavespeaker.
The Conclave could have summoned someone stronger. Someone gifted in flowery speeches instead of a woman who could barely challenge her own daughter.
No, they chose the excommunicated hick from Osh to watch her flounder.
Belle squeezed her fingers into fists, fighting her tears, and prayed.
“Lynne…wherever you are…if you hear me…please, do what I cannot! Protect my foolish daughter!”