Work Text:
April-May, 1938
Lyon's Corner House, Coventry Street, London, England
11:35 PM
He came in ten minutes before the closing time. He was lucky today was the last day of your training and so, you were left behind to serve the last of the customers by your senior colleagues. He was also lucky to be the handsomest man you had ever laid your eyes on. Not even the Hollywood movie stars could compare.
As he took his seat, you adjusted your cap and apron, and went to his table with your trusty notepad and pencil. You parroted out the little speech of practically one sentence your colleagues taught you. To greet the customer and ask what they'd like to order. Which drinks and dishes were available so late into the night and which weren't. Which dishes had varieties and which tea their choices would complement. Nine out of ten times, the customer made a random pairing of tea and snacks. It didn't matter. The customer is always right, as your superior had drilled into your head this morning.
Your feet hurt from all the standing and nipping around. That was what you were paid for, weren't you? To be one of the nippy waitresses working at a corner house of J. Lyon's and co. You had no family left since you turned one and lost your parents to either the Great war or the Spanish flu. Your aunt had been your only family until two weeks ago when a car ran over her. Hunger and poverty put a pause to your mourning. You intended to remain in the one-room flat you shared with four other working girls. So, this job you must adapt to quickly. At twenty, you had nonexistent luxury to date and wed.
Until now.
The blond man, who seemed to be in his early thirties, raked his purple eyes over the menu. He asked for Earl grey cream tea (at this hour?!) and treacle tart. He sounded tired too. Maybe the missus burnt the supper tonight. Or they had a fight? You already missed Hannah's quips about the customers and you hadn't officially started working yet. You went behind the counter to assemble a tray. Two split scones and the last slice of treacle tart you placed on separate plates. Saucers of strawberry jam and clotted cream you put beside the scones. On the tray you added a cup of hot water, a saucer of one teabag, a small jug of milk, and a lidded container of sugar cubes. One napkin folded with the cutlery by the edge and you returned to your handsome midnight patron.
At his table, he cleared up a spread of cards to make room for his order. You glanced quickly at the clock, five minutes till the end of your shift, and put his food on the table.
“Got no man waiting at home, tutti frutti?” he drawled and slipped the last of his cards (not playing cards) into a neat stack. Its height impressed you while you placed the plate of tart last on the table.
“Only unmarried women can work in this establishment, sir.”
“That's unfair. And I didn't order this.” He pointed at the plate of tart before he emptied the jug of milk into the hot water. As the liquid turned snowy, he carefully spread some cream, then some jam on one half of a scone. You pursed your lips and watched him dump the teabag into the milk.
“Cat got your sugary tongue, tutti frutti?” His purple gaze had been on you the entire time. You didn't realize you were making a face.
You stammered out an apology. “You said treacle tart.”
He returned the soggy teabag to its saucer. “I called you treacle tart. What, you've never been called that before?” When you timidly shook your head, he narrowed his gorgeous eyes and cocked his big head full of silver locks. “I find that hard to believe. A pretty, petite thing like you should be someone's trouble and strife by now. You're new, aren't you?”
You could feel the censure in his tone. Censure and curiosity. He called you trouble and strife. He was chiding you. “Only if you're a regular.”
He chuckled and put two sugar cubes into his tea. “Sorry for keeping you here. Gunter's closed some time ago and since then, I've been scouting around for a proper replacement. I miss their diavolini on their 1-2-3-4 cakes.”
“What's that, sir?”
He stirred his tea. “Also known as cup cake. One cup of butter, two cups of sugar, three cups of flour, and four eggs.”
“I meant the other word, starting with a D.”
He sipped his tea. “Sugar sprinkles. Colorful and beady. My favorite flavors are elderflower, violet, and neroli from bitter orange blossom.” He took a big bite of his scone. When you went to take back the plate of tart, your eyes roamed over to the top of his stack of cards. A colored picture of four purple blossoms bloomed in front of a boulder in the background.
“Livelong.”
You paused. “Pardon?”
“The flower of my card. Its name is Livelong. Or you can call it Orpine. My personal favorite is Midsummer Men. Apparently, during midsummer, if you stick two stems of flowers together, called live-long-love-long,” he rolled his eyes, “and keep it in your room, one for yourself and the other for your lover, and they grow in the same direction, the relationship grows positively. If not, otherwise. Which is stupid, considering flowers die and stop growing once you pluck them.”
You nodded in understanding and lifted the plate of tart.
“Keep it. I didn't have supper tonight.” He sipped his tea. “Now, tell me. What bothered you about my tea-drinking and scone-eating habits?” You tried to deny it but he didn't let it go. “I saw your grimace. Are you from Cornwall?”
You blinked and looked away. “My mother was.”
“Ah, I see. A Cornish popsy. Devonshire for me. Cream first, jam last. Here.” He nudged the two halves of the second scone to you, along with the leftover jam and cream. “Let's see the fuss behind your version of cream tea.”
You spread the jam and the cream the way you prefer. He bit into it and pretended to think deeply. “Can't tell the difference. They all mingle once you chew and swallow. What about you?” He gave you the half-bitten scone he had done the Devonian way.
You glanced around. Nobody was keeping an eye on you. You weren't officially a nippy yet. You could get away with it. Just this once, with a handsome customer you'd never see again. So, you did. You bit into the other piece. He lifted an eyebrow. You chuckled.
“The customer is always right.”
“My youngest brother spreads jam on one half, cream on the other, then joins them together.”
“An ingenious solution.”
“Indeed. And what about my tea?”
“My aunt, may she rest in peace, used to work as a lady's maid to a baroness. The woman taught her the proper way is tea first, milk second. Otherwise, you'd be known as Miffy.”
“Miffy?”
“Milk-in-First, an abbreviation for the working class people like me. Also, the baroness firmly believed pouring hot water and milk before tea could crack the porcelain.”
He lifted his cup and checked. “Nah, the cup seems fine to me.”
“I wouldn’t know. I don't take milk in my tea.”
He fanned his fingers on his chest in mock shock. “Scandalous! And how does it taste?”
“How tea should.”
“You sound like my brother. He never mixes dairy with his caffeine, only seven cubes of sugar.”
“He and I would get along then.”
“I'd rather you and I get along.”
You blushed and looked away. “If there's nothing else...”
He scoffed. “That's all it takes to get you flustered? I had a whole list of lines in my head.”
You ducked your head, embarrassed. You heard him click his tongue.
“Don't be shy. Be bold. Tell me what's on your mind right now.”
You glanced at the kitchen. “The manager might see I'm slacking.”
“And since you're new and it's the last day, the last hour of this month, I suppose you haven't officially been hired yet, have you?”
You shook your head. “I need the money for groceries and rent. I plan to work during the weekends.”
“Don't you have a man in your life to take care of you?”
He had neither a ring on his finger nor a mark of ever having sported one. You smiled shyly. “Nobody applied, so the position remains vacant. Why, are you interested?”
He smirked. “I reckoned this was my job interview.”
“You suppose correctly, sir.”
He placed his elbows on the table, knotted his fingers, and rested his cleft chin on top. “And how has my performance been so far?”
“It's too early to make a verdict so serious.”
“I can always bribe my way in.”
“That's unfortunate. I only appreciate honest men. To think you've been doing well so far.”
He raised his hands in surrender. “My apologies. To err is human. May I ask for another chance?”
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“If you take me seriously. My job is to nip around taking orders, but I will not let anyone do the same when it comes to the matters of the heart. If you're here for something to pass the time, you're already wasting my time.”
He sighed. “I'm sorry then.”
Your heart deflated but you didn't let it on. You took the plates, except for the tart which was still uneaten, and headed back to the counter. Once he left and your shift was over, you collected your one-button swagger coat, panama hat, and flat clutch, notified the manager, and headed home.
Outside, the handsome customer leaned against a streetlight, a lit cigarette between his fingers. His face was skyward. His profile was so perfect, you wished you could paint a life-size portrait or snap a picture. The late night breeze gently played with his silver hair and the flaps of his untied green polo coat. He looked so peaceful and ethereal, you dared not bother him. You quietly passed the lamppost. The clack of your heels made him turn around.
“Hey, now, you're leaving without me? After all we went through?”
You blinked. “You were waiting for me?” The disbelief in your tone was obvious.
“Of course. I never said I wasn't investing. Can I walk you home?”
You hesitated. His clothes, you hadn't paid attention to before, screamed old money, old money, old money. Your own outerwear was ghastly in comparison. You had mended your worn hat many times. Your red coat was a hand-me-down from Cassandra, one of your flatmates. Only your leather purse was in any good form to be seen with. You didn't want to be seen with him, not in your part of London.
“I live far away, sir. It's best if we part ways here.”
He scoffed. “And leave you to walk home alone? Fat chance I'll allow it. Tell me, where do you live?”
You hesitated. “The docklands.”
“Where exactly in the docklands, turtle dove?”
“Canning town,” you whispered, hoping he wouldn't hear you, or leave you if he did.
“I was raised in Walworth. A cockney, through and through.” He offered you his hand. When you timidly shook it, he laughed and kissed the back of your palm. Then, he tugged you closer, until your hand was wrapped around his bicep. “Don't feel bad about your humble origin.”
“I wasn't...”
“Yes, you were. Plain as the sun in daylight.”
You flushed. “Am I that easy to read?”
“Your distaste towards my cigs is obvious. Which reminds me.” He squashed his cigarette under his shoes. “Fret not, treacle tart. My mother says that anyone who is easy to read is easy to love. All you have to do is know how to read them.”
“You're a great reader.”
“Of people, yes. Books, no. You seem like a bookworm. What's your favorite?”
“Poems mostly. Robert Burns and the Romantics. Tennyson and Rossetti.”
“Auld lang syne, lotos eaters, and daffodils, huh?” He asked if you could recite one of your favorite poems.
So, you did.
“My love is like a red red rose
That's newly sprung in June;
O my Love's like the melodie
That's sweetly play'd in tune;
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in love am I;
And I will love thee still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry;
Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt with' the sun;
And I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o' life shall run.
And fare thee well, my only Love
And fare thee well, a while!
And I will come again, my Love,
Tho' it were ten thousand mile.”
You recited by heart. You gazed into his exotic eyes, while waiting for your night bus to take you across the city. He held your hand hostage the whole time, and even clapped a little when you finished. You unabashedly told him about your dream to save enough for a tour through the lake district and Aberfeldy some day.
“Aberfeldy?” he asked.
“A town in Scotland. My father's favorite poem was The Birks of Aberfeldy. I'd love to visit Schiehallion, also known as the fairy hill of Caledonia.”
Once the double decker arrived, you smiled and said your farewell. From your window, you waved at him. He didn't wave back, only stared thoughtfully at you. Just before the engine started, he ran inside and took the seat next to you, beating a man who was heading toward it.
“I cannot let you go home alone,” he told you breathlessly. “Not in this hour when you're the only female passenger.”
Sure enough, you were the only woman inside the bus. You felt thankful for his protection. During the ride, he showed you his box of tea cards that he had been collecting for a while now.
“Seventy-five, the entire collection. I only have my top twenty with me. I intend to memorize the descriptions of the flowers on the back.”
You took in the glow in his eyes, the stretch of his cheeks every time he smiled and talked about the flowers in the cards. The reverential way he preserved them. His favorite sugar sprinkle flavors were floral. “You love flowers, don't you, sir?” you asked out of nowhere. When his eyes widened, you mumbled an apology.
“I do,” he confessed. “In my childhood, I wanted to be a professional gardener. Or a botanist, or a farmer. I like plants. They don't judge you. Give them proper care and they'll love you back unconditionally.”
“So will you, won't you?”
He stared into your eyes with a soft smile. “So will I.”
Your stop came. You got down. You left him with your smile and walked away. Just as the bus began to drive off, he ran to the door and convinced the conductor to let him out. The driver begrudgingly listened, and you watched, a mere ten feet away, as the handsomest man you'd ever met ran to your side, breathless and beaming. You were hesitant to show him where you lived, but his actions so far had proved his sincerity. He followed you to your front door and seemed reluctant to part.
“It's already May Day. There's a belief from the medieval times,” he paused and leaned in, “if a man hangs a bouquet of lily of the valley from the door of the girl he fancies, and she wears the flowers on her hair before she comes to the maypole dance, it means she's agreed to become his.”
You glanced at your door behind you. It had no nails to hang the flowers from. “Well...”
In your distraction, you didn't notice him leaning over. When you turned slightly, his lips touched your cheek. He dragged them over to your ear. “I'll find a bouquet for you, rest assured, my turtle dove.”
The next morning, since you woke up before everyone else, you went to fetch the bottle of milk and the roll of newspaper. When you opened the door, a wonderful sight greeted you. From the knob hung a small bouquet of lily of the valley. One touch told you they were freshly plucked. Euphoric, you took them inside. One of your flatmates, Floris, asked about it. You told her about your admirer and what he hinted at doing last night. She offered to style some of your long hair into a half crown braid and pin the white flowers in them. You couldn't wear them all day, since your first day at work would start in six hours. As Maris, another flatmate, put away the milk and the paper, you brushed your teeth and opened the windows to air the room. A movement across the street caught your attention.
A man in a green polo coat and a gray fedora leaned against a streetlight, absentmindedly smoking a cigarette. You moved away as quietly as you could and asked Floris if she could do your hair now. She peeked out the window and saw him, still there. She did her magic on you and you admired your pretty half crown braid, with the white flowers tucked in and the rest of your dark strands down your back. You replaced your nightgown with a white satin and lace dress, an inheritance from your mother. You meekly came down the stairs and opened the front door.
A lamplighter shooed away your admirer to put out the light with his hook. Your midnight suitor wore a look of annoyance, before he noticed you in his periphery. When he took you in, with your hair up in a braid with his flowers, he grinned so brightly, even with the sun not up yet, the day became brighter and warmer. He crossed the street and reached you. You shyly let him take your hands.
“I don't even know your name, sir,” you murmured.
“Aegon Targaryen.” He kissed both your hands. “At your service.”
Before you could offer your own name, a chorus of voices surrounded you from nowhere and everywhere. As if wedding confetti, the voices were sprinkled all over your senses.
“Sir, please let her go...”
“Let us do our job...”
“You cannot hold her like this forever...”
“Excuse me, I'm a doctor. Let me check...”
Finally, his reply came, not from his body standing right in front of you, rather from the heavens.
“Please don't leave me. Please, turtle dove. Come back, come back to me, please. It's our wedding tomorrow. You're my bride, you must come back. Please, I cannot suffer this life without you.”
The white flowers on your hair bloomed into clots of blood. Your halo braid tumbled down. Then, everything around you, including both of you, exploded.
August, 194—
40, Upper Brook Street, Mayfair, London, England
11:35 AM
The thing about an explosion was that nobody lived to tell the tale. You'd either die, fully blown up, or you'd partially die every day and try to forget the event, but the pains all over your body wouldn't let you.
Aegon was somehow both the former and yet, he lived to tell the tale. But he was reluctant to share his story with anyone but you, and you would not lend him your ears, your time, your understanding, and your love. Not again, not ever. Once burnt, twice shy. And you had always been a shy girl.
He opened his eyes at last. The pains all over his body didn't come from his muscles, or his bones and organs within. He wished they did. Most physical pains nowadays could be suppressed with morphine or vice versa. Not the invisible, intangible heartache that was both untraceable and yet birthed from a broken heart.
He left his bed and limped to the bathroom. One look at his gaunt face in the mirror, on the stubble and his sunken eyes, and he wished he had died in his sleep. He was having such a pleasant dream about you, a dream that resembled his memory of the night he met you and the morning you let him cross the threshold of and into your heart. Now, he had been banished from your premise for life. Too bad he left all his belongings inside your heart's apartment. His feelings, his emotions, and his rationality. The last one made sense as to why he decided to visit the tearoom again. He'd been thrown out of there many times since his discharge from the army. He just couldn't let you go.
On his way out, he peeked into the nursery. The twin beds for Jaehaerys and Jaehaera stood angry from their emptiness. The half-made crib for his third child huddled as helplessly as the victims of Café de Paris bombing. That happened years ago. Why was he remembering that particular event? Was he still mourning the loss of the place where he took you for your first date?
He remembered the balmy night. It was Saturday, the seventh of May, 1938, right after you completed your first week at your job and received your first ever paycheck. Sure, it fell embarrassedly short when you tried to buy him a fancy drink, but your attempt endeared you to him, so much that he leaned over and kissed you before you could relinquish your whole week's earning on one drink for him.
“Let me pamper you, my turtle dove,” he had offered instead. “I'll coddle you so good, you'll never forget me.”
He couldn't take you home. You couldn't take him home. The restroom wasn't secluded or hygienic. So, he took you to an alley not far from the café and kissed you senseless against a wall. You wouldn't let him proceed further than his fingers and tongue between your legs, and his cock inside your hot, wet mouth. He promised to wait until marriage, if you'd like to marry him someday. Drunk in love, you gave him your premature reply.
“Yes, a million times yes!”
That felt like it happened a million years ago.
Aegon opened Helaena's bedroom door. They stopped sharing a bed since the night of their wedding. He came inside her after half an hour of mindless thrusting and left the room a minute later. Alicent initially objected to their decision, but one glimpse into her son's lifeless eyes and she relented. She had high hopes that her daughter, her ward to the rest of the world, would be able to fill the void you had left in him after you left him. Years had to pass for her to admit defeat.
Helaena's room was now as empty as if brand new. He remembered what happened. Because of the Blitz, she'd taken the kids, both alive and unborn, and fled to the north. Scotland, to be exact, where Criston and Alicent had moved to once they got married. You had attended their wedding, as Aegon's date. Everyone but his siblings and Criston disapproved. Otto threatened to disown Aegon. Alicent comforted herself with the delusion that you were just a fleeting fancy, a floozy who would leave once Otto's threat sank in.
You didn't. You stayed with Aegon, even sheltered him in your dilapidated tenement once he truly was disowned. What brought him back to his family was his siblings' threat to follow their brother and leave the old people to spend the winters of their lives alone and childless. They relented, on the condition that Aegon would marry Helaena, produce one heir and one spare, and keep you as his mistress on the side. If your union produced any offspring, they'd be his bastards with nothing to their names.
You objected. Not instantly, but you did. You spent almost a year as his mistress before it got to you. You broke both your hearts and left. Aegon followed you. With his siblings, you all planned to sneak you to replace Helaena during their wedding, heavily covered by multiple veils until after the priest announced you and Aegon as man and wife. The plan was set. Everything went accordingly.
What led to your departure still mystified Aegon. He couldn't, for the life of him, remember what he did to drive you away. You two had rarely fought, so grateful for each other's existence that ill wills and disagreements rarely divided you. What happened?
This was the question he asked you almost every day now that the British army had discharged him permanently. They questioned his sanity. He did too. Years of war and witnessing humanity cannibalize itself could take a toll on your brain, to the point his mind underwent a metamorphosis. Sanity never left him. It became insanity.
Aegon paused outside the tearoom where you worked. J. Lyon's and co. You had resigned a week before your wedding. You rejoined a week after it dissolved into nothing. Aegon was aware of the stigma of a bride left at the altar. Did he jilt you? He couldn't remember but it couldn't be possible. He'd never abandon you. He had always waited for you. Outside your work the night you met him. Outside your tenement the morning of May Day. Outside your work almost every weekend and some weekdays too.
Now, he waited for you to stop by his table inside the tearoom and acknowledge him. Even for a minute. To lure you in, he brought out his tea caddy full of his tea cards. You always fancied them, fascinated by the one hobby his mother allowed him. You had memorized the descriptions of all seventy-five flowers. Your favorites were orpine, wood anemone, and harebell. You were terribly upset when your pair of live-long-love-long had one orpine wither and the other live on. You sobbed when you learned it meant one of you would die much earlier than the other. You knew it'd be him, since he had been enlisted. Aemond, as expected, was exempted due to his one eye, so he joined the NCC, Non-Combatant Corps. The day Aegon was enlisted, you learned about the Targaryen family's secret hereditary hemophilia, as well as their real identity. That they were members of the royal family of Westeros. In fact, Aegon was the exiled, rightful heir to the Iron Throne, usurped by his older sister, according to his grandfather. They fled the country once Rhaenyra ascended the throne. You also learned about their custom of incestuous marriage and Helaena's true identity, that she was his sister and not a distant cousin like you were told. Aegon told you about the constant paranoia of his mother, terrified of Rhaenyra's spies and assassins.
Despite it all, you stayed with him. You'd rather raise hemophiliac children, and suffer from the paranoia of spies and assassins, incestuous royals, and power play. Everything but your separation from him.
Then, how come you left?
At last, you came to his table. He offered you a smile that you didn't return. He asked for cream tea and a slice of treacle tart. You told him they had run out of treacle tart and only had bakewell tart. So, he ordered that.
“Can we please talk?” he asked.
You sighed exasperatedly but continued to scribble down his orders. He decided to go first.
“I sent Helaena and the children to the countryside. She, uh, she's expecting again.”
You said nothing. You didn't so much as look at him, as if he truly were just a customer and never had been the love of your life.
“Mother and Grandsire live where I sent them. Aberfeldy.”
Still, nothing from you. He just mentioned the place in Scotland where your favorite poet once toured. Yet, you gave him no satisfaction of a reaction. Did he truly mean nothing to you anymore?
“My turtle dove, please tell me what I did, so I can fix it.”
You fixed him with a glare instead, and left to fetch his food. You practically slammed the tray on his table. The hot water for the tea spilled and scalded his thighs. He said nothing. He missed your sweet smile that welcomed him every time he visited, the extra scone on his plate, the extra minute you spent jotting down his order to ask him about his day. He missed you parroting to him the description behind the tea card he would leave with you from his last visit. You aimed to memorize every single one of them, so that should you lose the card, you'd remember the flower, remember him.
He remembered you. Why did you pretend as if you'd never laid eyes on him before today's visit?
He steeped the teabag in the water, then put it away to pour the milk. He halved the two scones, then spread the jam and the cream one by one. He bit into the bakewell tart and chewed morosely, his eyes on you. You were running around everywhere today. It seemed the staff had dwindled in number now that the war was in full swing, and needed all men and women on deck. Many establishments had pulled down their shutters, including Café de Paris, your favorite haunt. He missed holding you in his arms as you enjoyed the Emperors of Jazz, and watched Shakehips dance his way through the songs and the stage. Aegon would order brandy for you and rum for himself. Often, he would leave the basement to spare you and the others from his cigarette smoke. He'd return shortly after to find you draining his glass of rum as well. He always made sure to return you to your four girlfriends long before the witching hour.
Oh, how lovely those nights were.
He felt a pang below his ribcage when he watched you unashamedly flirt with a patron, despite the presence of the man's wife next to him. Since you left him, you had grown socially. Gone was the bashful caterpillar that hid in the cocoon. Now, you were the social butterfly who earned the most tips among your colleagues. You had moved out of your tenement. You changed your hairstyle often. Sometimes your sported trendy fur coats, sometimes shoddily mended hats and shoes. Sometimes, your voice sounded mousy, sometimes it was deep and sonorous. He felt as if he didn't know you anymore. You were many women with one face. In his eyes, that face lured him to you, to take your hand when you came to collect the tray. You yelped and shook him off. The patrons around you watched, both amused and disgusted, as the manager of the tearoom told him to leave.
“Come back one more time and I'll ring the police. Keep that in mind, you loony.”
Aegon paid for his meal. You watched on from two tables away, your glare unbearable. He collected his hat and scurried for the exit. You stopped him outside to hand over his forgotten tea caddy.
“I'm sorry, turtle dove,” he mumbled. You finally looked into his eyes. Yours were icy blue, not the chocolate brown that he fell in love with. How was it possible? He didn't know. He continued, his voice shaky. “It's just, I'm so lonely. I can't handle it any longer. Some days, I glance at my fan and wish to suspend from it with a coil of rope around my neck. Nobody will stop me if I do it. Helaena and the kids are gone. The twins... They told me how the other children at the playground call me a conchie, because of my discharge.” He felt the deluge down his cheeks. He expected you, as you had always done, to wipe them off and embrace him so tightly, all his sadness would squeeze out.
You didn't. Instead, you looked away in discomfort and wrung your gloved hands. He looked at the new hairstyle under your cap. He could swear you were sporting a soft, full pompadour inside. Now, beneath your cap, you sported wavy bangs and upswept hair. Your strands looked much lighter, borderline blonde, probably from the sun. But the sun was long gone. It was nighttime now. The sirens were back. You fidgeted, ready to duck back inside.
“Turtle dove, please, let me come back tomorrow,” he begged you. “I need someone so badly. I have nobody left but you. Don't you love me anymore?”
You finally turned your back on him. “Spare me,” you muttered. He heard you anyway. You didn't care. You ran back inside.
All around him, people scrambled to take shelter. Not as much panic as it was at the beginning of the war, but the fear was palpable in the air. Aegon felt no urgency to follow them. Rather, he glanced up at the sky that seemed to melt like ice cream in summer. All around him, bombs dropped like the confetti of a wedding, the one you and he never got to have. The one where his sister stood before him, not you, in the gown you had personally chosen for yourself. The veil no longer needed multiple layers to hide the bride's face. There was no fear of objection from his mother and grandsire. Nobody cared that a cataclysm erupted between his lungs, despite the calm, lifeless exterior he sported. Helaena saw his sorrow but could not help him. She was there with you every step of the way when you shopped for your dress, your veils and shoes, your bouquet, even the lingerie you would wear on your nuptial night. Aegon had caught a glimpse of you in your wedding gown. You were showing it to your girlfriends one afternoon. He hadn't meant to see you, but the door to your flat was ajar and your friends were squealing. He wanted to surprise you, which he did. Your flatmates shielded you from his view, while you hastily stripped yourself and stuffed the dress inside a trunk.
Aegon sobbed loudly but his wails were drowned by the siren and the sound of bombs exploding, of hearts breaking, of breaths stuttering and souls leaving their bodies.
“Aegon, you bullheaded idiot,” a familiar voice grunted. His grandsire.
“We should've known it won't be easy with him,” said Alicent. “He loved her too much. Always, he carried her pictures in his wallet. On his bedside, he kept the framed photo of her from their first date. The same nightclub where he took her the night before the wedding. He used to call her his trouble and strife. The way this is going, he isn't meant to survive without her, not for long.”
“I cannot accept this, Mother.” This came from his brother, Aemond. “By signing him off to them, you're letting them experiment on him like rats in a lab.”
“My brother, before he was reassigned as a farmer, was part of the bomb disposal squad of the NCC. He risked his life to save people from bombs. I want to remember him as a martyr. Now, nobody can hurt him. Nobody can taunt our children either.” Helaena, ever so kind, so gentle to him.
A plane flew over Aegon's head. Too low for him to easily pick out the model's name and make eye contact with the pilot.
You.
You dropped the bomb, as easily as God releasing lightning on His mortals. The incendiary hit its target, Aegon Targaryen.
At last, his world imploded.
September, 194—
Schiehallion, west-northwest of Aberfeldy, Perthshire, Scotland
“That certain night
The night we met
There was magic abroad in the air
There were angels dining at the Ritz
And a nightingale sang in Berkeley Square“I may be right, I may be wrong
But I'm perfectly willing to swear
That when you turned and smiled at me
A nightingale sang in Berkeley Square“The moon that lingered over London town
Poor puzzled moon, wore such a frown
How could he know we two were so in love
The whole darn world seemed upside down“The streets of town were paved with stars
It was such a romantic affair
And when you turned and smiled at me
A nightingale sang in Berkeley Square“How strange it was
How sweet and strange
There was never a dream to compare
What that hazy, crazy night we met
When a nightingale sang in Berkeley Square“Ah, this heart of mine beat loud and fast
Like a merry go round in a fair
And we were dancing cheek to cheek
When a nightingale sang in Berkeley Square“When dawn came stealing up
All gold and blue
To interrupt our rendezvous
I still remember when you smiled and said
Was that a dream or was it true?“Our homeward steps were just as light
As the dancing feet of Astaire
And like an echo far away
A nightingale sang in Berk-
That night in Berkeley
That night in Berkeley Square...”
The song ended with a flourish. The sound of your giggle replaced the tune from what was clearly a gramophone. His fingertips felt the grainy, wet texture of dirt, and the fibrous stalks of grass under him. A balmy breeze caressed his face, whose susurrus entered his ears along with the light trickle of running water. The slight warmth of the sun on his face made it golden red behind his eyelids.
That was how Aegon knew he must be dreaming.
“Was that a dream or was it true, turtle dove?” he asked, just to be sure.
“Why don't you open your eyes and find out?” you replied. Your fingers gently ran through his hair and across his scalp. He took your hands and kissed every inch of it.
“Open your eyes, my love. See for yourself what awaits you on this plane,” you cajoled him.
“What if I find a wasteland?”
“Trust me, please.”
He finally relented. The first thing he saw was the cloudless, gloriously blue sky above him. The foliage of the birch tree behind him shaded him. He was laying on the ground, his head on your lap. You wore your white silk and lace dress, with lily of the valley tucked in your half crown braid. Your eyes were chocolate brown, your hair as dark as onyx. A sweet smile on your lips, aimed at him. He sat up and cupped your face, just to make sure you were real.
“I am real, my love. As are you.” You leaned over and nudged your nose with his, your breath mingling.
“I believe you. I trust you, my turtle dove.”
You laughed. “I think that title suits to you more. You never stopped mourning me, did you?”
He gulped and looked at his lap.
“Hey now, there's no shame in grieving. You looked for me in every woman you met.”
The revelation cleared up the fog in his head. You were right, he realized with a start. The one he saw at the teashop, that wasn't you. That could never be you. His turtle dove could never be mean to him. You could never be cold and cruel, and watch on passively while he was thrown out. No, that wasn't you. That was one of your colleagues, Hannah, who was sick and tired of Aegon visiting the teashop almost every day since he was discharged from the army. He came and pleaded every single waitress catering to him, imagining them as you. It didn't take long for every single person in his presence to realize the truth behind the reason for his discharge.
He truly had gone mad.
Then again, madness was as hereditary in his family as hemophilia. They pitied him at first, before it reached the point of irritation and they could endure his antics no longer. When he couldn't visit the place where he first met you, he haunted other places. Your tenement in Canning Town, before he got violently mugged one night on his way home. Café de Paris, before he was hit by a car not fatally. His family, worried and defeated, admitted him to an asylum.
Under the birch tree, he sobbed in your arms and narrated to you all he went through. How they injected either Somnifen or insulin in large dosage to put him to sleep. How they then strapped him to chairs and zapped through his brain Thor's mighty lightning. For weeks, he slept like a dead man, while the doctors practically violated his body with drugs and shocks, his consent never needed. Whenever he woke up, he'd lose to oblivion a fragment of his memory. Never could he remember how many days had passed since he fell asleep, nor about his situation in life. He forgot his wife and three children. He forgot his mother had remarried.
He began to forget you.
At last, Aemond told him what else they had planned to do to Aegon since the aforementioned methods didn't work. Your memories of him, and the subsequent madness it incited, refused to leave him for good. That his mother and grandfather had already consented to the doctors to perform limbic leucotomy on him, since anterior cingulotomy didn't work.
“I told you I wouldn't last a day without you.” Aegon wept, his face stuffed in the crook of your neck. “I don't want to go back. Please, don't send me back. You always send me back.”
You lifted his face by his chin and kissed him softly. “Do you know where we are?”
He glanced around. Not far from them was a tiered waterfall. Above his head, birch trees arched over you, while carpets of wildflowers of all kinds surrounded you. You coaxed him to his feet and took his hand. “This is where I wanted to come. Aberfeldy.”
He returned your smile. “You finally had your wish granted.”
You tugged him opposite the waterfall. He fell into steps with you and kissed the back of your palm, before he tucked your arm around his bicep. “Where are we going?”
“The hill of the fairies. Schiehallion.”
The moment you mentioned the name, you both came out of Aberfeldy and spotted the hill not far from where you stood. Aegon felt a slight discomfort at the proximity. He'd done his research before your wedding. He had planned to bring you here for your honeymoon. According to Criston, who had lived here before, the hill was around twenty-five kilometers away from the town of Aberfeldy. Aegon had planned to drive you there, to preserve the delicacy of his wife's pretty little feet.
His wife. His trouble and strife.
At the foot of the hill, he stopped you. You cupped one of his cheeks and he leaned into the touch. Yes, this was you, the real you. The ones he saw in his last dream, those were never you. Not even Helen of Troy could hold a candle to you in his eyes. He turned his face to kiss your palm. “My turtle dove, be honest with me,” he said.
“I cannot be anything else.”
“Tell me, why did you leave me? Why did you not marry me? What did I do to drive you away?”
You stood on your toes and kissed his forehead. “Nothing you do can ever stop me from loving you, nor drive me away.”
“Then why...”
“Don't you remember?”
“Remember what?”
“Café de Paris.”
“What about it?”
“You sneaked us out the night before our wedding.”
“Okay, and?”
Just as you opened your mouth to reply, a voice stopped you.
“Daddy?”
The small voice of a child, a little girl. Aegon turned around and saw her. Silver hair in two plaits, with purple eyes and a white dress billowing in the wind. “Daddy!” she screamed and ran to Aegon. She collided with him with such force, they both toppled over.
“Jaehaera?”
The little girl grinned. A few of her front teeth were missing. Her eyes were the same shade of purple as her father's. She straddled his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!” the girl chanted like a spell and rocked Aegon from side to side. “I have been waiting for you for so long! I had a feeling you'll come today, so I sneaked out. Mummy suspected nothing.” She grinned with an innocent, infectious joy that made her father smile at last.
“You've grown so much. The last time I saw you, you were so tiny. Only a toddler. How old are you now, love?”
“Seven and one quarter.”
“Jaehaerys too, I suppose. What about your other sibling?”
“Maelor? He's only four. He'll turn five soon. Oh Daddy, Mummy will be so happy. She smiles so little. She'll smile all the time now.”
Aegon gently untangled her limbs around his torso and stood up. She clung to his leg and met his eyes. “You all still live here?”
She nodded eagerly. “Since I was, um, three? You saw us off at the station, remember?”
And he did remember. At the Charing Cross, with other parents who tearfully bid farewell to their children. Bombs were falling and children were the future, must be protected at all cost. Since Helaena was newly pregnant with Maelor, she too left with the twins. Only Criston, Aegon, Daeron, and Aemond stayed back. Criston and Daeron left for the frontline. Aemond joined the NCC bomb disposal squad. Aegon, transferred from the same squad, became a farmer due to his tritanomaly (unable to tell apart blue from green, and red from yellow). His childhood dream came true at last. Alas, you weren't there to see it. Aemond met Alys not long after, and they were hastily married. When Alys also became pregnant, she left for Aberfeldy to join her in-laws. After a year, Daeron became a martyr. Sometime later, Aegon was permanently discharged on the ground of insanity, and was strongly recommended to admit himself to an asylum. His mother and grandsire agreed. They came to London, where bombs still fell from the sky like bird droppings.
“You said, you said in your letters that you will visit us. You never did, Daddy. Jaehaerys and I waited for you. He still keeps one of your cards under his pillow.”
As if on cue, Aegon discovered a wooden box not far away. With Jaehaera still clinging to his leg, he hobbled to it. His tea caddy! He'd recognize it anywhere. He picked it up and Jaehaera finally let him go. She stood on her toes to see what her father got. When he opened it, she gasped and clapped at the sight of all his cards. Seventy-four of them. Aegon plucked a random card.
Wood anemone, one of your favorites. He showed it to his daughter.
“Oh, I saw it here.” She took his hand and pulled him with her. They climbed the hill and not far from the foot, she stopped to show her father the white flowers with yellow centers. A little further to its left, Aegon spotted the five-petaled blue blossoms of spring centian and white scurvy grass. He detected more flowers: sheep's-bit, mountain avens, ox-eye daisy, and cross-leaved heath. Borage, cow parsnip, creeping buttercup, and wild mignonette. Lastly, he spotted your absolute favorite that you never found in the concrete world of London.
A large carpet of harebell, either blue or purple, he couldn't tell.
He cast his eyes as far as he could see in the twilight. At the top, he saw your silhouette moving towards the dying sun.
“Turtle dove!” he called your name.
You turned around. Even though you stood with the sun on your back, as if a second sun had cast a spotlight over you, Aegon could clearly see your face, the tear tracks down your cheeks, your sad, sorrowful eyes as their headwater. With one hand, he carried Jaehaera, her arms and legs wrapped around his torso. With his other hand, he clutched the tea caddy to his side and ran to you. You waited until he reached you. He gently put Jaehaera to her feet and handed his box to her. Then, he turned to you. He cupped your cheeks and wiped your tears.
“Turtle dove, what's wrong?”
“I have to go.”
“What? Why? Where?”
You took his hands in yours and kissed them. “I've been waiting here for too long. This plane isn't for someone like me.”
“Someone like what?”
Just then, the sound of a plane flying over them. The sky was overcast. The sun had hid behind them, as if terrified of what was about to happen. The wind picked up its speed. Among its whoosh and the earsplitting noise of the plane, Aegon's instincts kicked in. He picked up his daughter and held your hand with the other.
“We need to go. We need to hide.” He craned his neck but the hill was as bare as desert dunes. No trees, no burrows. Only bushes and groundcover plants. So immersed he was in his panic, he didn't notice you had let go of his hand, or that Jaehaera was shouting to get his attention.
“Daddy, what's going on?” the poor girl asked him, frightful and confused.
“The plane... It has a bomb...”
“What plane? Daddy, there's no plane!”
But he didn't hear her over the engine and the whoosh of the wind. So, he did the only thing he could. He put his little girl on the ground and cocooned her with his own body.
“It's okay, baby, it's okay, Daddy's here, I won't let them hurt you. I won't let them do to you what they did to her. I'll keep you safe. I won't leave your side...”
Jaehaera whimpered under his weight but didn't stop him or throw him off her. She rather hugged him. “Daddy, Daddy, where did you go? Come back to me, Daddy. Come back!”
Wasn't that something he said to you once? When did he do that? He couldn't focus. He needed to protect his daughter. He needed to hide her from this evil world. He needed to save her. He must do more but what else could he do? He couldn't focus, the plane was getting closer. It must be stalking them. He tightened his hold around his little girl. She cried out when Aegon's fingers sunk into her arms unintentionally.
“Daddy, you're hurting me. Come back to me, Daddy. Don't leave me...”
Don't leave me...
Don't leave me, please...
Don't leave me, turtle dove...
Café de Paris
3–4 Coventry Street, London, England
March 8, 1941
9:30 PM
“Here we are, one glass of fine and dandy for you,” he handed you a glass of brandy and pecked your lips, “and one glass of finger and thumb for me,” he took a sip of his rum.
The band was assembling onstage. In fifteen minutes, the show would start and the place would finally fill up more than it was now. His itch for a cig was driving him up the wall. While you watched the jazz band set up, he slipped out his pack. At the click of his lighter, you turned around and gave him a look, his cigarette between his lips.
“Oh come on, just five minutes of smoke.”
“Kissing you feels like kissing a pile of ash.”
“And yet you keep coming back for more. Admit it, you love this pile of ash.”
But you didn't fall for his playful tone. You rather sighed pensively. “The orpine died last year. It died, Aegon. You're going to die in the war!” Your voice broke. “Are you sure about us meeting like this tonight? Tomorrow's our wedding. We're not supposed to see each other. You weren't supposed to see me in my dress! What if we're invoking God's wrath?”
He groaned. “I hate your girlfriends sometimes. Bunch of bitches.”
“Language! Is that the filth you'll teach our children?”
“Fine, I'll wash my mouth with lye before their birth. Happy now?”
You cupped and stroked his cheek. “I'm serious, love. Hannah lost both her brothers last month. Then, one of my regulars, Lizzie's husband has gone missing since Dunkirk. And you have hemophilia. Your blood won't clot and you'll bleed to death if you even get a paper cut. I'm scared, I'm so scared for you. I wish you didn't have to enlist. I want you with me. I want you here with me all the time.”
You placed his hand on your own cheek and slotted your face into his palm, a perfect fit. He felt the wetness on your cheeks. He dabbed at your face with a napkin. He was so good at it without smudging anything, you were grateful to have a groom like him tomorrow.
“I'll be fine. Aemond used to call me a cockroach because of the number of bar fights I survived in my adolescence.”
“No bar fights! God, I feel awful that I wasn't there to save you.”
“My knight in shining armor, what will I do without you?” he said dryly.
“Crash and burn, no doubt.”
“I have the blood of the dragon. I won't burn.”
“We'll see. Go on and smoke. But take it outside now before the show starts.”
“Already bossy, huh? You're gonna be my real trouble and strife like this.”
You stuck your tongue at him. When he nibbled on it, you squealed and pushed him away. He laughed and got up. “Don't go anywhere. I'll be right back, turtle dove.”
“And I'll be waiting for you,” you said primly, your glass of brandy in hand.
He drank you in properly from a distance. With help from Helaena, Aegon had smuggled one of his mother's evening dresses, a vintage Callot Sœurs water green and silver lamé gown, thread-thin straps, high-waisted, and the tops of your back and cleavage exposed. A cape of similar color and design across your neck and down your back in a train, that you took off once you took your seat in the front row. The gloves and shoes were yours, the pale green of chartreuse liqueur. You were the only girl he ever dated who still kept her hair long. When he first met you at the teashop, he reckoned they were short as typical. But when you wore your hair down on the morning of May Day with his flowers in your crown braid (or halo braid, he couldn't tell), he realized you kept your hair up in a chignon to resemble short hair. You told him it was out of your budget to maintain short hair by regular trips to the salon. So, you pretended to blend in. Several times he offered to pay for your hairstyling sessions, but you strictly forbade him. He couldn't wait to make you his wife, so that you wouldn't be able to stop him from pampering you.
Outside, he groaned a sigh of relief when he inhaled his first smoke of the day. It had been such a long day. His mother forbade him from seeing Helaena, as if he'd ever marry his odd little sister. Helaena, bless her soul, pretended as if she truly were going to be his bride tomorrow. Over his dead body!
Anyway, Aemond took care of everything, distracting their mother and grandsire with unnecessary details to fret over and thus, letting their youngest brother to act as a sort of Hermes between Aegon, you, and Helaena. Whatever bridal accessories his sister received, Daeron would smuggle it out of the house and to you. He had to go out of his way to track down their decoys from the addresses Aemond provided and thus, peddle around the whole city. At the end of the day, when he complained about his sore feet, Aegon reminded his privileged siblings that you had to do this every day from 11:45 AM to 11:45 PM. Helaena was glad that after your wedding, you wouldn't have to toil like this anymore. She firmly believed that once you and Aegon conceived, his mother would forgive you for the duplicity, maybe their grandsire too if it turned out to be a boy with classic Targaryen features.
The sound of a plane's arrival brought him out of his daydreaming. Aegon glanced at the sky, almost bored. God, could people not get to spend one night without these air raids? He couldn't wait to shoot some of these down once his duty began. The Germans were getting out of hand. Last September, you told him a school in your neighborhood was bombed and most of the couple hundred people dead or injured were kids.
The last plane was too close to call it safe. Aegon threw out his cigarette butt into a puddle of sewer water and ducked back inside. Just as he was going down the stairs to the basement, it happened.
An ear-splitting blast.
He was thrown back. He landed hard on the stairs, his head smacked against the wall. A hand held him from tumbling down the steps. His head hurt. He felt dizzy with double vision when he opened his eyes. There were screams and coughs and shouts asking what was happening and were they dead and someone's legs were trapped under a table, most likely a woman.
A woman!
Aegon tried his best to get on his feet. He fumbled around and down the stairs. He must make sure you were okay. You got to be. His stomach churned and he stopped to double over. He didn't care if he threw up on someone. He had to get rid of the little rum and tea he had consumed before coming here. Oh God, his head was hurting so bad.
He finally straightened up and reached the basement. The nightclub was in a great uproar. The lights were down, so it was dark in most parts. A few people, doctors and nurses who came here as patrons, were tending to the injured. He passed by two women whose vacant eyes told him they weren't merely injured. He gulped down his nausea and trudged toward where he assumed the stage was. That was where your table was, one on the front row. God, why was it so fucking dark in here? He croaked out your name, his tongue as dry as whenever he was hungover after a bar fight and a night spent in a police station. Once he located you, he would postpone the wedding tomorrow and cite tonight's outing as his reason. He survived a bomb attack, for fuck's sake! Even his grandsire couldn't argue against it. Since, to their eyes, Helaena was his bride, they wouldn't mind him going out with you tonight, unaware that you were his true bride. If only he could find you...
He did. Your legs stuck out from under a table. His body felt both hot and cold. His nausea returned with vengeance. He had to bite his cheeks to prevent its arrival up his esophagus. He limped toward your legs, one of your chartreuse shoes' heels broken, much less than your other leg at the ankle. Fuck, this wasn't good, this was not a good sign.
He dropped to his knees and pushed the table off of you. A puddle spread behind your head, on the floor.
A halo of dark blood.
Your blood.
You didn't keep your words.
You were gone.
September, 194—
Schiehallion, west-northwest of Aberfeldy, Perthshire, Scotland
“Daddy? Daddy, wake up, please. You're scaring me. Daddy! Don't die, please. I just got you back.”
His daughter's wails woke him up. He blinked the blurriness from his eyes. Warm fingers, tiny fingers, delicate fingers of his daughter rubbed the sand from his eyes. He smiled sadly and took her hands on his own. She sniffled and let him kiss them.
“I was so scared when you didn't move, Daddy. What happened? What's going on?” Jaehaera's face was wet. The poor baby had been crying. He wiped her face and kissed every inch of her.
“The plane...”
“What plane? There was no plane. The war is over, Uncle Aem said. No plane comes here anymore.” She pouted at what she supposed was a lie from her father.
Aegon looked at the sky. Sure enough, no planes. Only some scattered clouds and the orange of the dying sun. Tomorrow, it'd be reborn and return to the earth.
Unlike you.
Aegon sat up. Jaehaera quietly climbed off him. He held her close, while she clutched his tea caddy. He looked around. You weren't here anymore. Of course, you wouldn't.
You had died years ago.
His heart folded inwardly. The next moment, Jaehaera was wiping his face.
“Daddy, you're sad.”
He hugged her and stuffed his face in the crook of her neck, since you were here no longer. He wept and his little girl hugged him back. She didn't complain when his hold became too tight for her. But the poor baby couldn't keep off the whimper from leaving her lips. Aegon let her go and apologized.
“It's okay, Daddy. I don't mind.” She kissed his cheeks, right over his little dimples.
“While you were asleep, I saw more flowers bloom around us. They kept moving away to make room for the others. Wanna see?” And she was untangling herself and getting up and running up the hill. Aegon sighed, grabbed the tea caddy, and followed her. She showed him more flowers he hadn't noticed before. Oxlip and wood sorrel. Snowdrop and greater celandine. Scentless mayweed and periwinkle. Meadow cranesbill and rock rose.
At last, he spotted the harebells. Then, he heard your voice in the wind.
“Hope is like a harebell trembling from its birth,
Love is like a rose the joy of all the earth;
Faith is like a lily lifted high and white,
Love is like a lovely rose the world's delight;
Harebells and sweet lilies show a thornless growth,
But the rose with all its thorns excels them both.”
Jaehaera took the box from him and stuffed something in his hands. He glanced at the flowers. His eyesight failed to tell him whether they were purple or blue. He had been seeing things like this since the bombing, when he hit his head. He lost his colors the moment he lost you. How tragically poetic.
He glanced at your silhouette against the dying sun. “I'm sorry,” you whined. “I tried to leave you. But I can't. I broke my promise once. I won't do it again.”
Aegon hesitated. He looked at his daughter, who smiled sadly. “It's okay, Daddy. I'll become a florist for you.” She paused and thought it over. “Or a botanist, if I get any of Uncle Aem's genius.”
Aegon knelt and kissed every inch of her face and hands. “I'll be proud of you either way, my tutti frutti baby girl. I'll be here. I promise. On this hill. Whenever you feel lost or sad, come to me. I promise, I'll be here.”
She nodded.
“Tell your brothers too. I'll be here for all my babies.”
Jaehaera finally wept. Aegon kissed his daughter one last time. Then, he gave her his tea caddy and the cards within. Jaehaera nudged him in your direction. His eyes on his daughter, he began to step back, back, back, until he reached your side and you took his hand. He finally broke eye contact with her and glanced at you. You smiled and caressed his cheek.
A car honked not far down the hill. It stopped at the foot. Several people hurried out. A woman, a man, and two boys with silver hair, and two women with auburn and black hair. The boys were faster. The taller boy reached his twin first, all flushed and breathless.
“Haerys, you promised you wouldn't tell!” the girl cried out.
“I tried but it got so late. I got worried. I care about you, you dummy.” He lightly shoved his twin sister before he pulled her into a hug. It was hindered by the tea caddy in her hands. He put it down and hugged her quickly, before they both knelt for their little brother, who finally reached them. The taller boy gasped.
“Daddy's cards, Haerys,” the girl said.
“How...”
“He gave them to me. Look!” She pointed behind them, at the summit of the hill. The children saw the two silhouettes that watched over them, a man and his wife in a veil.
Their mother reached them soon, as did their uncle, aunt, and grandmother. The adults couldn't see the silhouettes, so they made a fuss over the little girl's finding.
“It was supposed to be in London. In Mayfair.” The auburn haired woman checked the tea caddy and the cards within. “No doubt this is his. I gave the box to him once tea became easier to store. We drank so much of it, we got more and more cards. He collected them all, my boy.” She sniffled.
The little girl glanced over her shoulder. The dying sun illuminated the two shadows walking toward it, hand in hand, up and up the hill, under the arch of invisible birch trees and over the carpet of harebells, wood anemones, and orpine.
Jaehaera smiled and said her goodbye.