Page 5 of Sunder

But there was a tightness in his voice, the blame he pointed clearly meant for Mama.

Which made Orma cry anew.

Until he sighed and approached her, pulling her up and into his arms, blanket and all. “You’re going to have to be very brave,” he insisted. “Until we can get this sorted. Do you understand?”

No. Not at all.

“It hurts,” she confessed, because it did. “Is it supposed to?”

He took a sharp breath before shaking his head. “No, sweetling. It isn’t meant to hurt.”

She melted against him. Into the strength of his arms and the comfort of his scent. He wasn’t mad at her. She didn’t want him cross with mama either, but they would sort it out. They always did. Sometimes things could be a little prickly for a few days until they managed it, but they would.

He was carrying her. Mama followed, but he did not fly her up to her room like she expected. Instead, it was downward. Through stairs and tunnels she had never seen. Where the air was cool and musty. A cellar?

Where moonstones lit the way and the draught made her shiver as she clutched at her father’s robes.

“Where are we going?” she asked, her voice tight and small.

He wasn’t angry at the query. Merely adjusted this hold and let her see her mother following her behind, her eyes glistening in the light.

“To get you help, Orma. Everything is going to be all right.”

And Father did not lie to her, and she trusted them both, and so she settled and let him carry her.

And the tonic was still tugging at her eyelids, and it was getting harder to fight it off.

So she didn’t.

Because everything was going to be just fine.

Her father said so.

1. Offer

Many orbital cycles later...

Orma was situated in the courtyard. Not theirs—that one had lost much of its appeal long before. When children were replaced with tight-faced servants. When the suns began to glare too sharply against the stone. When twinkling threads lost some of their lustre.

It wasn’t their fault. The threads, that was.

It was hers.

She’d grown despondent.

Or perhaps it was beyond that, now.

Something a little too near to despair.

She had a book, but it had been plucked from the library with little care, and the title held no appeal for her. Botany, she suspected. A flower and its stem had been pressed into the cover, dry and brittle with age. Its impression, however, remained intact, the veins and patterns pressed into the vellum with precision so its imprint would last far longer than any flower possibly could.

This courtyard was heavily shaded, the trees old and left much to their own devices. It did not seem to matter as much as the manicured shrubberies that grew in precise lines at home. These were allowed to grow freely, their branchestangling in ways that the book would likely object to, detailing the importance of proper maintenance so the weight of the tree could be kept carefully in balance.

That was a profession, wasn’t it? She thought she’d seen such workers flittering about the city’s trees as they pruned and topped with practised eyes.

She had no skill. Not one she might boast about or claim as a profession. She could read. Could sew with moderate success. But she had no eye for the design itself, no instinct for how a fabric might drape into something so useful as a dress. Napkins, she could do. When fabric was square and the hems were mostly even, and her only decision lie in which of the few flowers she could embroider would decorate the corners.

She plucked through the pages of the book once more. An idle distraction. She’d hoped for company, but the door was locked and the rooms were dark, and while it was rude to linger—she knew those lessons well—she did not wish to return home.

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