I pressed Anson tightly. I could feel his warm tears slide down my hand, and I ached for him. I rubbed my hand through his curly hair, slick with grime and grease. My own eyes smarted with tears, and I could soon feel them flow down my cheeks. I rocked Anson gently. He was my baby brother, and Lira had been like our big sister. She was the one who had stayed with us, to make sure that we did not go astray when the fighting became fierce. I wrinkled my brow. Had we ever shamed her? We were not the best fighters, Anson and I. How did she feel fleeing with us?
My lips trembled at the thought, and I pressed Anson tighter to me. Lira could not have been ashamed of us, I reasoned with myself. She could not have...she was too kind...too good...too gentle. But what if we had caused pain even a little corner of her soul? I sobbed at the thought and then wiped my nose. "Anson," I said, with a sniff, "Lira is happier where she is now, I think. Uien was sad, but she was happy, too, in a way." But that wouldn't take away the fact that she was gone. It would have been grand if she could have stayed in Bree, where I could have seen her regularly. But I suppose an elf could not have survived in such a bustling village. She had lived in a forest...a forest was where she would thrive, not in a town.
I wished that she was here, singing softly beside us; playing with Anson and I; I remembered the time we had tried to get her to smoke a bit of pipeweed -- ah, she had been so jolly; she would know how to comfort Anson. I didn't.
|