Chapter Text
So’lek knew it in his heart that there would be no love after her.
It has not been more than seven nights since he lost his beloved. His wife. His flower. His Tamtey. He still remembered the warmth she left behind, how she once looked at him with her eyes full of love and adoration, those lips that uttered the word ma yawntu so casually it took his breath away, and the memory of their tsaheylu was still as fresh as the morning’s dew.
He sighed and brushed off the tears in the corner of his eyes. So’lek opened his eyes to see the beautiful woven pieces of the Trr’ong roof, shaping like the tsawke itself, and his mind could not help but wonder to the woman who had been as bright as the very sun that gave him comfort. If she were here, she would surely laugh, he thought. His wife was never one to be compared to the sun, saying she rather felt like the oare, the moon in the night. So’lek never got to tell her that no matter the moon or the sun, she was, no, is still the only thing that ever matters to him.
The Trr’ong hunter sat up in his sleeping mat, his shaking hand reaching out to feel the empty space beside him— it was never meant to be empty, she was supposed to be here, living a life with him. His amber eyes looked around at all the things she left behind, her favorite neck pieces still tucked neatly into the corner of their marui, the tana’ring flowers that she adored still lay in a woven basket near the head of her mattress, and even the palalukan bones crafted into a beautiful decorative piece.
He remembered her wide smile when she first completed her Trr’ong craftsmanship, the very way she had lovingly put on a lover’s brace on his arms, her softened gaze on his face rather than his hand as he also put it on her, and the sensations of her touch as she cradled his face and brought him in to nuzzle his crown.
So’lek did not know how to unlearn a life that he had already prepared to live.
Both of the lover’s brace— one of his, and one of hers— that now adorned both of his arms still weighed as light as the day they crafted it together, but now it felt as heavy as a tulkun, pulling him deeper down into the depths of his devotion, drowning him in the grief he wore with solemnity. He felt like he could not be without her here.
He pushed himself up, walking over to the corner of the marui to cradle her adornment in his hands, and his heart ached painfully as he remembered this was what she wore on the night of their mating.
The red and orange neckpieces, signifying the Trr’ong dawn, that his mother had made as a gift for their union that she wore with so much pride— stained with her blood on the day his other half came to be with Eywa. So’lek remembered his mother’s tears stained face as she gently washed the blood of her daughter-in-law off the gift she had made by the riverside, and how he just felt so numb watching the only physical remains of hers washed along the river.
He looked at her other clothing, holding it in his hands as the scent of her has started to fade with time— those relaxing smells, resembling the earth after the rain that he loves so much, still there but fading.
So’lek wished he could have a way to turn back time, preventing the beginning of their personal tragedy. He knew he could come to the tree of voices and see the spirit of hers one and many more times— those dark eyes that he had promised to protect, her favorite feather replica adornments would be tucked into her hair, and So’lek would get to hold her again.
Eywa knew he was a coward still, fearing that seeing her would make him miss her so much he would not know how to go on. He was not a non-believer, he had his faith and trust placed in Eywa just like any other of his people. But ever since then, in the back of his mind, he wondered if being able to see your loved ones as a spirit; getting to talk to them and holding them in your arms again, though it lacks warmth, would be such a blessing? He did not have the answer. Maybe he once had.
“Ma ‘itan,” a voice called out from the entrance of his marui, Kiro’s, his father. So’lek turned to look at him, the man himself looked tired like he had not slept well, the black mourning paint adorned his face. He remembered his father said they had prepared for a celebration of his union for many moons, and that he would get a good night's sleep once the joyous ceremony ended. It seemed that never did happen. “Come. It is time to pray for her passing.”
So’lek stayed silent. He did not want to pray for her passing, to pray for it meant the reality that she was never coming back would settle in his wounded soul, and that he still was not ready for. His Tamtey, his heart, the better half of his being, he missed her so much he could barely breathe.
“So’lek,” Kiro continued, stepping into the shared huts between his son and daughter-in-law. His eyes could not help but glance at all the signs of lives they intended to build together. A pang of sadness for his son hit him, truly, to lose their mate in such an early period was a pain most would not wish on another even in their worst of hatred.
Tamtey, being a Sarentu as she is, once told a story to them. Stories she heard from another in her Sarentu moot gathering.
It is a tale of one warrior who had lost her mate so young, she told them one night, it felt like Eywa had cursed their bond. They said she went out to bring him back, and was never seen again.
“Bring him back?” His wife, Tirei, asked. The thought of bringing someone back from Eywa's embrace was unheard of— strange and almost blasphemous in its nature. The Great Mother holds all her children in her heart, such that all energy is burrowed and one day be returned to her, he could not understand why one would do such a thing.
“Yes,” The Sarentu woman had replied, looking at So’lek who sat besides her, the light from the fireplace had reflected on both of their faces, and Kiro felt a sudden chill at the absolute devotion on both of their faces. “At least that was what I was told. She told her kin she would go bring him back, then she was gone, just like that. They all thought she must have been reunited with him among Eywa when she failed to show up after many moons.”
“But… What happened? Where did she go?” Kiro found himself asking, looking at Tamtey in bafflement as such a thought. Was it really possible? To reach for the Great Mother herself and get to hold your loved ones again? He was afraid of the answer, and judging by the looks on his wife's, she felt the same.
Tamtey shook her head, though the look on her face communicated otherwise, “We do not know, ma Kiro. That was all that has been said.”
“She must have loved him very much,” Tirei commented, the look on her face had eased up into something serene, the true daughter of the Trr’ong teaching, "Going against Eywa’s will to bring her love back in her arms again… That is a kind of love truly unheard of.”
“I like to think that she reunited with him again,” So'lek piped up, his amber eyes still focused on his betrothed, the softest of looks on his face. It was obvious he did not see the tragic lovers, only the woman in front of him who looked at him the same way, “Maybe the Great Mother was moved by her love and giving him back.”
“No matter whatever forms that might be,” Kiro had concluded, troubled looks on his face at such implications, though he too was deeply moved by such tales. He understood love, and what it could do to someone. He loved Tirei, his son, his daughter-in-law, and the family they had built here in the dawn of Eywa. When one was to be separated from them so soon— he supposed if there was a chance to bring them back, he too, might have taken it.
“Yes,” Tamtey had agreed, holding her beloved's hands in her own, loving looks upon her face as she looked at So’lek, “However ways she got him back, I bet she loves him all the same.”
The irony of the moment has not lost on Kiro. Tamtey had told them tales of separated by death lovers, and soon she would be the man in the tales, leaving So’lek to mourn her passing. Such a tragedy, such fates bestowed upon them all.
“Ma ‘itan,” he tried again, gently touching his son’s shoulders. He did not know how to wade this water, the gap between So'lek's grief and the love of a father had widened with loss, “Tamtey loved you like one would love their own souls. She would not want you to be like this.”
“She did, sempul,” So’lek agreed, body shaking lightly like he tried to reel in all the grief from snapping out of him.
Tamtey loved him so much. He knew that. Having known it from the very first day she had tucked the tana’ring flowers behind his ear after they finished their ikran’s race, her eyes reflected all the words she did not say, and So’lek fell deeper than ever into the depths of her adoration. He loves her too, and she knew it. She settled in the Trr’ong land because of him, having separated from her mother and sister whom she has loved just as much.
But love was not the end. Love would not lead to a happy ever after. Love was the thing that condemned them both, her to her last breath, and him to mourn the loss of it. The loss of her.
“She would not want me to be like this,” he continued, looking at his father, eyes saddened with grief and loss and love. The black paint dragged down his face highlighting the exhaustion he had felt for days. So’lek wished it did not have to be like this, “but she is not here anymore.”
“So’lek, she is waiting for you in Eywa’s embraces,” Kiro told him, trying to coax his son out of the grief, feeling a strange goosebumps at the faraway look in his eyes, and the way So’lek did not seem to look at him after he had finished saying that. The tales of the lost woman and the dead man plagued his thoughts, he could only wish it had not been on So’lek's mind at all, “Come see her when you are ready, ma ‘itan. Tamtey would love to see you again.”
“...I will, sempul.”
“In the meantime, come. It is fine if you are not ready for it yet, but you need to eat something. Everyone is worried. I do not think I have seen Wawen in such distress,” Kiro joked, trying to lighten up the mood and spirit lifting at the light smile his son adorned at the mentions of his mentor and brother in arms, “We are here for you. Always, So'lek.”
So’lek resisted the urge to flinch, that has been the last words she said to him before she went out to her death. Though his father was not at fault, he did not know, but So’lek hurted and ached all the same. Still, he nodded his head.
“I will,” with a slight smile still on his face, he nodded towards the entrance, “Mother must have missed you by now. Go, sempul. I will freshen up before I come to see everyone.”
“Your sa’nok can wait, So’lek.” he replied jokingly. Still he stepped out of the marui, sending his son one more encouraging smile, then he was gone and So'lek was alone again, standing at the place where he had once dreamed of a life built with his forever love.
Once left alone with his thoughts, So’lek looked at all the traces she left behind, and started packing.
He was sorry that he had to break his promise to everyone, but he would not live in a world where Tamtey did not exist. While his soul had yearned for her very being since the day she was taken away, his mind had thought of the story she had told his family— and the untold version that she did not tell his parents. The lost woman and the dead man was not just a tale, but a story. Things that happened in Eywa’eveng, however forbidden it seems.
So’lek might not be the first to follow in her footsteps, but he will be the first to succeed. In whatever forms Tamtey could come back to him, he would love her all the same. He was sure of it.