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MIDWINTER MAGIC: FOUR
Jera sighed softly, "No matter the potential, you will not be forever as you are now. Take heart in that if you are presently unsatisfied." She felt the girl's unhappiness with her situation, but she also recognized the role her youth was playing in it. "I know it seems forever and a day. Trust me, if you were of my kind, you'd be feeling this for decades instead of a few years. Think on it. However, if you want to see your future, there is much of it in your mother. If for some reason Kylan is not for you, Goddess forfend..." she noted with a smile, "Then there shall be others. In the meantime, if you really do want to be a magic user, some can be learned. Not all are born to it." The girl smiled softly, tracing a finger in small circles on the worktable in front of her. "I'd settle for enough magic to make him love me, the way I love him." Then she looked up, "You really think I'll turn out like Mama?" "Well, I 'see' her there in you, near ready to blossom, but... I also see a bit of a softer fire perhaps. Tis difficult to say how much of her will bloom through you. You are, after all, your own person." She paused a moment then felt it prudent to address the other issue. "As for making Kylan love you, well, there could be danger in that." "Danger? How could that possibly be dangerous?" "Hmmm... If I could have forced Wallace to grow into his wings to suit MY schedule, my whims... would it be right to do so? Would he survive it? Would he be happy without arriving there on his own? And, as some reckon these things, would I at some point pay the price with something in my own life being rushed before I was ready?" The girl sighed, giving some thought to the woman's words. "Da says I'm as impatient as Mama." The elf woman laughed, "I suppose that might be a shared trait, yes. But, there's something your father may not recall, a young girl's heart is oft a few steps ahead of a young man's. We sometimes wait for them to... catch up? Tis not always an easy lot." "So... " Arista was still churning these things in her mind, perhaps more than Jera intended to provoke. "D'ye think Uncle Ashe will catch up to you?" Jera merely arched a brow. "Hmmm... good question." She actually seemed a bit stumbled by it and cleared her throat as evidence. "I hadn't really thought... Good question." She kept to herself the notion that sometimes it seemed Ashe may have actually passed her, but for her own reasons she was not given to trusting it. "He keeps a distance between himself and others. Except the kids. Even with Mama and Da... there's a space between their heart and his." Arista voiced how she sees her uncle's reserve, the child in her not knowing how else to describe what is obviously a very adult trait. "Now see? There is a bit of magic in itself. Not all can detect such things." Thus Jera avoided the more direct topic of herself and Ashe. "You've never seen how he does that? Da does it too, but Mama got in. Maybe you're the one to get close to Uncle Ashe? I think a part of him is lonely, Lady Jera." Jera leaned forward on her knees and looked at the girl as to relay a quiet secret. "If that is so, then I surely share it and, Goddess willing, perhaps there can be a mutual remedy, hm?" She sat back again before returning the original topic. "But... I would not in any way try to make it happen. It will or it will not, as is true of all things." Arista watched her face a moment then nodded as she reached out a fingertip to gently touch Wallace. "Each worm must turn in his own time, just as each heart must do as well, hey?" She looked up at Jera and smiled. "That sounded like Da." "Then your Da is as wise as many have said." "He's a lot like his Uncle." Grinning, Jera checked on Wallace again herself, "Aye, that he surely is." Arista scanned around the greenhouse. "Well, if Wallace never turns, at least he'll have plenty to eat, and no birds after him to make of him a quick snack." Jera nodded to the girl's observation, "Thankfully, aye." then quite suddenly she turned to her with a bit of excitement in her voice. "I have an idea." It was so unexpected in fact that Arista blinked, "An idea? What kind of idea?" "Well, the wonderful scents here make me think... Now I would not conspire to devise any trick or deception or magic to get your Kylan's attention, but... Does your mother not make personal scents to be worn by ladies in this realm?" "Aye, she does. Oils and soaps and various creams and salves." "Aha, so then, can you not concoct something for yourself, something all your own? Be certain it pleases you first and I donnae propose that it waft into a room before you." Jera snickered. "But, something that will identify you and might catch the good sense... of a young dragonling. If not him, then others, which would surely still point him to you, one way or another. What think you?" Arista considered this idea, "... a fragrance... Hmmm... something lightly floral yet spicy..." She explained a bit of her thinking, "I am not much of a proper lady, I dinnae think." then picked a leaf from a shrub, holding it to her nose. "Spearmint..." "'Proper' is what? You seem courtly enough and you'll grow into the rest. Select what appeals to you, what you feel represents you, and shall thus present you to others. Particularly one other." They shared a smile and Arista nodded, "I shall. Now, shall we do one for you too? Perhaps my elven Uncle has a sense of smell to match his sense of hearing?" Jera snickered again, "He might at that. He might just. Although, with all the gathering and such I do, I'm likely to smell of any and all of it. I never really considered... You know, I realize that my ideas and advice to you might indeed be turned on me. I thank you for this enlightenment, M'lady Arista." She began to feather through a few plants herself, crushing a leaf now and then to get the full scent of it. Arista was still scenting the spearmint, now grinning. "And thank you as well m'Lady Jera... can I.. do I dare call us friends now?" The elven woman crushed a few blades of lemon grass in her hand then transferred the wilted foliage to her left as she extended her lemon-scented right hand to shake Arista's. "I'd say that's a fair statement." The human girl shook Jera's hand formally, while the contagious grin curved her mouth again. "Here's to friendship, Lady Jera... and to turning the noses and hearts of a few stubborn men?" Jera laughed and proceeded with Arista in their search for scent. "Aye, turn or tweak them, if it nae works?" Arista nodded and began picking and sniffing a variety of plants. The occasional sneeze punctuated the air as she sniffed a particularly pungent sample. END FOUR © 2002 DP & SO along with all other participants ~ This and other stories may be found at Willow's End |