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Mirtul 1465
Baldur’s Gate
Eliwyn sets down two cups of lavender tea mixed with milk and honey. One cup slides across the scrubbed work table of the kitchen to her mother. The other to the young patriar woman standing opposite of Eliwyn.
As the women drink, Lady Mara Whitburn opens her heart. She is far more poetic than Eliwyn has ever heard her. Her flowery words extolling the virtues of her secret suitor flow uninhibited. It’s actually quite sweet how obviously smitten the normally haughty Mara is.
Eliwyn’s mother, however, seems less taken by the pretty words. Annwyl regards Lady Mara with a soft if expressionless look. “Are you sure he returns your affections?”
“I am.”
“He has said he loves you? He has stated his intentions plainly?”
Mara falters, but only for a moment. “He loves me. Truly. I know he does. And I love him.”
A twitch of the eyebrow, imperceptible except to Eliwyn, betrays her mother’s skepticism. But then she nods her head from Eliwyn to the shelf of herbs.
From the cupboard, Eliwyn pulls out a special mortar and pestle used only for this particular remedy. She brings out a jar stashed far in the back filled with the dried roots of a rather peculiar plant. It looks like any other variety of fennel but is in fact an extremely potent contraceptive. This particular herb is a closely guarded secret of the elven midwives of Semberholme.
Eliwyn takes a small pinch of the roots, drops them into the bottom of the mortar, and muddles them just like her mother taught her. Not so much force that the roots lose their integrity, but just enough to release the valuable oils within. If not done exactly right it could fail to act as intended or worse. It could leave a woman completely infertile.
But Eliwyn has done this plenty of times now. In her head she sings an elven lullaby so as to get the timing just so. By the time she reaches the end, the perfect amount of the oils have been released.
Meanwhile, Annwyl scratches instructions on a small bit of paper. “It is most effective if you wait until after you next bleed. Mix it in with your tea or drizzle it on your breakfast—it’s quite tasteless.”
Lady Mara purses her lips. “I have to wait? I can’t take it right away?”
“You can,” Annwyl says with a slight snap. “But if you want it to be most effective then you should wait.”
“And this will guarantee that I won’t become…”
The quill clinks into the well. Eliwyn is still at the mortar but she knows exactly what look Annwyl is giving Mara. It is the sort of look that would make even the most arrogant of people feel small and stupid. Eliwyn hands the small bottle of root oil to her mother and resumes her spot.
“Of course it won’t guarantee such a thing. There is always a possibility, especially if it is not taken exactly right.”
“Is there nothing that will guarantee I won’t become pregnant?”
A heavy hush fills the room. Annwyl folds her hands into her lap and sits straight. She regards Mara for several long moments. Her voice is soft and low, almost mystical, when she speaks. “Do you really want such a thing?”
Mara’s eyes flick between Eliwyn and Annwyl. “Y-yes…”
“I warn you, it will take a great deal of strength. Not everyone is equal to it. But if you succeed you can rest easy knowing that you will, beyond any doubt, avoid pregnancy.”
At first, Mara pales. But then her cheeks flush and her wide eyes brighten. “I can do it. Whatever it is, I’m sure I can handle it.”
Annwyl’s eyebrow twitches again. “We shall see.”
With all the ethereal grace bequeathed to her race, Annwyl floats to the far side of the kitchen. From the cupboard she pulls down a small box. The intricate carvings are delicate and swooping and obviously of elven make. She returns to the table and opens the box. Mara strains to see what is inside. A small blue leaf twirls between Annwyl’s fingers giving off a faint, otherworldly glow.
“Take this leaf, and keep it on your person until you are next in the company of your beloved,” Annwyl says.
Mara tries to grab hold of the leaf, but Annwyl snatches it back.
“Now, listen closely, for if you do not follow these instructions precisely the leaf’s power will fail. Are you listening?”
Mara nods.
“When you and your young man find yourselves alone together, press the leaf between your knees and do not let it fall until he has taken his leave.”
Silence covers the table. Annwyl does not take her hard stare from Mara.
Mara, however, sits with her mouth agape, her gaze darting between Eliwyn and Annwyl. “That’s it? That’s the remedy? Abstinence?”
Annwyl blinks once, slowly.
Mara stands abruptly, swipes the bottle and the leaf from Annwyl, and huffs upstairs.
“Foolish girl,” Eliwyn’s mother mutters and she goes back to the ledger in which she had been writing.
“I wish you wouldn’t do that,” Eliwyn says. “Give them hope that you’re offering them something more powerful than you are.”
Her mother shoots a narrow-eyed glare at her. “Self-restraint is the most powerful force on this plane, Eliwyn. Have I not taught you that?”
Eliwyn huffs and clears away the remains of the tea.
***
Lady Caldwell undoubtedly has the finest garden in all of Baldur’s Gate. It is in the Sembian style, which Eliwyn has always found pleasing with its use of topiaries and long canals. Today, the lush lawns of the garden are filled with the many guests of Lady Caldwell’s last tea party of the season. Indeed, each table is like its own round garden bed filled with straw hats decorated with lace and ribbons and fresh blooms tucked into pinned up curls and plaits. The entire garden bursts with the last of spring’s silken pastel petticoats and the start of summer’s bold printed cottons.
The clinking of bone china cups and saucers mingles with the low chatter at the tables around Eliwyn. The tiered stand in the center of the table is laden with sugars dusted fairy cakes, pastry puffs filled with cream, and rounds of crusty bread spread with butter and topped with thin sliced radishes. Eliwyn takes a sip of the blueberry and black tea that is Lady Caldwell’s signature blend.
“Did you see Lady Durinbold’s hairstyle? She looks as if she is ready to join one of their flocks of sheep!”
Lady Valarken and Lady Mara titter at Lady Whitburn’s unkind remark. Susil Durinbold’s hair-do is perhaps a little unconventional, but no more ridiculous than the spray of paper birds currently adorning Lady Whitburn’s supercilious head. Eliwyn preoccupies herself with trying to decide which sweet to fill her plate with.
“Are you still having trouble with your lady’s maid, Avicia?”
Lady Valarken huffs. “I am indeed. I do not know what has come over the silly thing. She is in such a daze all the time. The housekeeper told me that just last night she was seen slipping out the back gate after curfew!” Lady Valarken drops one of the little cakes onto her plate with a clatter and purses her lips. “Do you know, I think she has a suitor. I am sure she will be resigning any day now.”
The two Whitburn ladies sigh and tut at the great misfortune that is the loss of a decent servant. Eliwyn takes another sip of her tea.
“Well, I have a truly delicious bit of gossip that is sure to take your thoughts away from that disappointing maid,” says Lady Whitburn in a conspiratorial voice. “I have it on the most excellent authority that Ferdan Eomane is soon to be engaged to a relation of the Bormul’s, one of their cousins from Amn!”
A flurry of motion erupts next to Eliwyn. All heads turn to Mara who is frantically wiping at her dress with her napkin. A dark stain blooms on the pale pink of her skirts. Lady Whitburn spews a string of reprimands at her daughter for this uncharacteristic display of clumsiness. Mara, white-faced despite this embarrassing accident, murmurs her apologies. Her eyes stay downcast and her bottom lip trembles.
But it is not her ruined dress that has Mara so distraught.
“Come,” Eliwyn says, standing and offering her hand to Mara. “Let us get some pearlash from the cook and try to salvage your dress.”
With a bowl of water now bubbling with pearlash, Eliwyn and Mara find a quiet spot in another part of the grounds. Eliwyn dabs at the brown splotch with a rag.
“That was quite a shocking bit of news your mother had,” Eliwyn says quietly without looking at Mara. “About Lord Ferdan.”
Dark pink spots appear like a sudden rain storm around the offensive stain as Mara’s tears roll down her cheeks.
“Oh Eliwyn…,” she sniffs. “I’ve been such a fool.” Her sniffs turn to gasps and then to sobs.
Eliwyn sets aside the bowl and rag and gathers Mara into her, just as she did some seventeen years ago when the girl was first born. The wet nurse had been delayed, so after Eliwyn’s mother cleaned up the babe and while Lady Whitburn slept, Eliwyn held Mara close to quiet her cries.
“What do men want from us? Why do they play these awful games?” Mara asks when her tears finally slow.
“I’m afraid I don’t know the answer to that, dearest.”
Mara gives a shuddering sigh. Then she jerks up and looks Eliwyn straight in the eye. “Have you ever been in love?”
Eliwyn blinks and her breath catches just a little. It’s been decades now since Marek passed, yet her heart twinges as she sees his face in her memory. “Once. Long ago.”
“Did it hurt like this for you, as well?”
Eliwyn bites down on her lip. Unrequited love. Star-crossed love. They are some of the most painful forms of that sweet madness.
“It did,” Eliwyn says quietly. “So believe me when I say that it won’t always feel like this. Give it enough dawns and soon it will be nothing more than a distant memory. And someday you will meet a man who is kind and honorable and loving him will be nothing but bliss.”
With a gentle thumb Eliwyn wipes away the last remnants of Mara’s anguish from her lashes. The two girls sit in silence, the din of the tea party echoing across the grounds of the mansion.
“Mara? May I ask…which remedy did you end up using?”
Mara is silent for a few moments as she takes up dabbing at her skirt again with the rag.
“The blue leaf.” She gives a bitter scoff. “He’s taken much from me, but not all of me. So, at least there’s that.”