Ander - Part 6: Subchapter 82
82
What?
Aisa couldn't have heard that right. The wind in this place was so loud it must have drowned out her true meaning, because she couldn't have said what she thought she just said. It was impossible.
I hate you.
Yes, that must have been what she actually said. Nothing else made sense. There was no way that girl could have anything left in her heart but bitter, burning hatred. Any love left in there was surely reserved for Mellah and no one else.
Renna opened her mouth wide to take in breath, and Aisa steeled herself for the barrage of hate that was about to come crashing into her.
I hate you! You're a cold-hearted bitch! You beat me every day just for being myself! You struck me because I reminded you so much of my father! You tore me open and left me to cry because you couldn't stand to see me smile when you were so miserable inside! I told you I loved you, and you threw me out into the night! You broke my heart and I hate you! I hate you! I hate you I hate I hate you I hate you I
"I forgive you, Mother!" she shouted, struggling to be heard above the roar coming from the Cora's throat. "I forgive you!"
Impossible.
Renna. Baiya Yamre.
Renna. Please forgive me.
The words she had painted across her body were not there to be answered! She had put them there because she needed to ask for forgiveness, yes, but asking for forgiveness and actually receiving it were two different things!
She shook her head, still unable to believe it. "No. No, you don't. You can't."
"I forgive you!" she yelled again, leaning so far over the spikes she was in danger of tumbling right over. "I forgive you, Mother!"
She made to block her ears, but Dorin seized her yet again and pulled her hands down. "No! You listen to her, Aisa! You listen to every damn word!"
She knew this feeling. It was the same as that terrible night, but also different. Lying on the ground, pretending to be asleep, shoving her face so hard into the side of the tent she could barely breathe, all while Renna poured her heart out, telling her she loved her, waiting for a reply, any reply, but receiving only silence.
Was she doing the same thing again? Pretending to be asleep? Pretending that she couldn't hear her only daughter's desperate words? For what? The first time she had had a reason. A weak reason, admittedly, but a reason nonetheless. She threw her daughter away, but not to be rid of her. She threw her away because she knew the girl couldn't stay any longer. She threw her away because she knew there was nothing left for her in that village except for a slow and agonizing death. Throwing her daughter away was the only 'motherly' thing Aisa had ever done.
But now... what was holding her back now? What was keeping her from telling her enka how she truly felt?
Renna was still up there, peeking over the serrated edges of the wall, her lips trembling and her eyes brimming with tears. "Please, Mother..." she whispered, all sound completely drowned out by the blizzard. "I forgive you..."
Aisa sank down to her knees, just as her daughter had done on that terrible, freezing night so long ago.
I've never been able to understand you, she thought, tears flowing down her face and dripping into the snow. I still can't... but...
She raised her head and looked her enka in the eye. Even though it was night-time and the air was filled with swirling snow, seeing her face was like seeing the sun cresting the jagged peaks of the mountain after a storm so long and terrible you thought the light would never shine again.
Aisa! Aisa, look! By the Cora, she's beautiful!
Rinno?
She remembered how cold it was. How dark and dismal. Snow pelting the side of their tent, pale shadows sliding down across their faces. Deep, throbbing pain, and a sense of emptiness, of something leaving her, and then the sound of a baby crying.
Oh! Oh! Just listen to that, Aisa! Can you hear her?
She could barely keep her eyes open, much less have a meaningful conversation with a shape that kept shifting in and out of focus, but yes, she could hear her.
Look! Look! Oh, Aisa, this is the most... Here...
She remembered a flash of terror as that blurry shape drew near, pushed forward by the arms of a Wolf she loved, tearing through her heart like a jagged thorn. She wasn't ready for this. She wasn't even close, and yet here it was, its tiny limbs flailing, its mouth opening and closing, actually breathing, actually living...
It was too much.
Rinno, no... she wanted to say, but didn't have the strength. I can't... I'll drop her... Don't... No, take her away... No!
He pushed the tiny creature into her arms, and she was so soft, incredibly warm, and after all the months she had spent lugging this little ball of lead around inside of her, she was shockingly light.
She's so small... Did she say that out loud?
She's perfect. Just like you. The warm touch of his lips against her cheek, his fingers in her hair. Can you hear that?
All she could hear were the cries of the baby in her arms. Was it supposed to be like this? Was it supposed to be so... terrifying? She didn't know if she could do this...
Rinno, I...
Shh. I'll be right back.
Rinno? Rinno don't -
Don't leave me alone with this thing.
By the Cora, did she say that out loud? Please, no! That wasn't something a mother was supposed to say!
A mother...? Am I a mother now? It can't be... I can't be a mother! Not yet! I can't do this!
Rinno was wearing that mischievous little smile of his, the one that always lifted the right side of his mouth just a tiny bit higher than the left, that special smile that always seemed to proclaim: I know something you don't know.
Rinno...
The snow stopped. Look...
He lifted the flap of their tent and a bright, golden spot of sunlight rushed in, almost blinding.
Aisa snapped her eyes shut and yelled at Rinno to close that damn thing, but he wouldn't answer.
Rinno?
I think... I think our baby just earned herself a name.
Are you insane? It's far too early for that. She's barely a minute old!
But look, Aisa! Just look!
She remembered blinking against the glare. Snow had fallen from the sky for three days straight, and it took a while for her eyes to adjust to this sudden, otherworldly brightness. But when they did, and she looked down...
What a sight she was.
The baby wasn't crying anymore. She was looking straight up at her mother, full of curiosity, bathed in a pool of sunlight. It reflected off her beautiful blue eyes in brilliant crescents. It was as if the sun itself had broken through the storm just to get a glimpse of her face.
Oh, Rinno... She didn't have any words for what she was seeing. How could she have been afraid of something so beautiful?
Rinno came and joined his family in their circle of light, a sheen to his eyes.
My mate is a father now, she thought, incredulous. And I'm a mother.
Rinno? What name did you want to give her?
He reached out and gently ran a finger along his daughter's cheek, laughing a little at her attempts to grab it. I want to name her 'Renna', if that's okay with you.
Aisa was never any good with the Old Wolven words. Back when she was a kid, she almost always found a way to skip out on her father's insufferably longwinded lessons.
She frowned, slightly confused. She knew that 'Rinno' meant 'Of The Cold' but she wasn't sure about 'Renna'. Something similar, maybe? It was winter time, so it would certainly fit.
You mean to name her after yourself?
Rinno laughed at that, but Aisa would have been fine with it. She loved her mate very much, and any name born from his would be a name to be proud of.
He wiped the tears from his eyes (first one side, then the other). No, Cora forbid. The name I'd like to give her is the exact opposite of mine, actually.
Aisa looked down at their baby girl. She couldn't understand it. She couldn't even believe it. A little life in her arms. It seemed so impossible, and yet she could actually feel it breathing against her chest, every bit as real as the pool of sunlight caressing her tiny cheeks.
What does it mean?
Rinno kissed his daughter on the nose and laughed at the way she wiggled at his touch.
In that moment, watching all the love Rinno was pouring out for their daughter, this tiny baby girl that had come into their lives so unexpectedly, Aisa wasn't afraid at all. As long as she had Rinno by her side, she knew they could face anything in this world. Anything at all.
In the old Wolven tongue, he said, marvelling at her tiny little fingers, the word 'Renna' simply means...
"Sunshine..."
Aisa would have given her life just to be able to hold her daughter. Not to drag her by the wrist, not to pin her to the ground, not to beat her until the pain went away, but just to hold her, like a real mother should, like she used to back when she was a baby and Rinno was still around, back when they were a family.
She just wanted to feel her sunshine again...
But she couldn't. She had her chance, and she squandered it. She would never, ever be able to touch her daughter again, or even come close. But there was something she could do, one last thing. It wouldn't absolve her of her sins, but maybe... just maybe... she could make up for the greatest one of them all. She wasn't thinking of the black eyes and swollen lips. She wasn't thinking of the blood on her knuckles. For her, the greatest sin didn't come from her fists. For her, and for Renna, she knew the greatest sin, the one that had caused the most pain and suffering...
Mother? I...
Go.
W- What?
I said go. Leave. Do whatever it is you're planning to do. I don't care anymore.
She had actually said that. She had told her only daughter that she simply didn't care. But even that, even that atrocity, was not the greatest sin of all.
B- But Mother... If I go... I don't think I can ever come back...
I've never been able to understand you, Renna. I tried. Cora knows I tried. But you were just too different.
I'm sorry...
I tried to make you strong. I tried to make you into the daughter I always wanted. But no matter what I said, no matter what I did, you always stayed you_._
I'm sorry...
How foolish she was. How blind to not see that this child didn't need to be changed at all, that Renna simply being Renna was the greatest gift any mother could have asked for.
Mother? I... I love you.
She didn't answer.
I love you.
She still didn't answer.
I love you...
Still nothing. The girl had reached out to her at the final moment, and what did she do? She turned her back on her enka when she needed her the most. She had closed her eyes and plugged her ears, wishing it all to go away.
M- Mother?
GET OUT!
That was the greatest sin of them all. Not the blood on her hands or the venom on her tongue, but her silence, her inability to give her daughter the answer she so desperately needed, something that should have come as naturally to a real mother as breathing.
She gathered it all together inside her heart: all the blame she fostered towards Rinno for leaving her all alone to care for a screaming infant by herself, all the nights spent crying herself to sleep, begging the monster in her arms to give her peace, if only for a single hour, all the anger that had clogged up every waking moment, all the bitter resentment, watching that monster grow month by month and year by year, coming to look more and more like the love she had lost forever, every slap and punch and seething curse aimed at the treasure he had left behind, telling herself it was for the girl's own good, but knowing otherwise, all the selfishness, all the hunger, all the desire to just get at something, even if it was her own daughter, to just beat it into the ground until it cried and begged for mercy, anything to fill up the gaping hole left inside.
She took it all, gathered it into a putrid, black ball, and expelled it into the world in a single shout that threatened to shatter her heart.
"I'm sorry!" She crossed her arms over her chest, feeling like she might literally tear herself apart. "I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!!" The words poured out of her like vomit, uncontrollable, tasting of the most bitter, poisonous bile. Her entire body convulsed with the sheer force of it. Tears flowed from her eyes and snot dripped from her nose, and still she couldn't stop, not until it all came out. She apologised over and over again, screaming into the wind and snow, knowing it wasn't enough, that it would never be enough, that mere words could never undo a lifetime of pain.
"Mother!"
Aisa stopped. She looked up at the wall. Renna was still up there, still looking down with trembling lips and tears in her eyes.
Of course. Why did I expect anything different? Why did I think words could undo everything I've done?
Renna slowly shook her head. "I already forgave you, Mother," she said. "You don't need to tell me you're sorry. There's only one thing I need to hear from you. It's the only thing I've ever wanted to hear from you. Please..."
One thing? No... it was far too late for that. There was no way it could possibly mean anything now, here at the end of it all.
I'm sorry, Mother... Please don't hurt me anymore...
I hurt you because I love you, Renna. It pains me every time you force me to do this. Please, please just stop. I beg of you, just stop!
I'm sorry...
She had said it before, so many times... but had she truly said it even once? She should have known better. She knew what real love was. Had she not felt it every time Rinno kissed her on the cheek or hugged her tight or complimented her awful cooking? Why couldn't she have returned the same kind of love to her own daughter, instead of that twisted, evil version of 'love' she had somehow convinced herself was true?
What right did she have to say those words now, here, at the end of it all?
Renna, tears streaming down her face, waiting to see if her pleas would be met with silence once again.
Mother? I... I love you...
She couldn't do it again. She couldn't break her daughter's heart for a second time. She knew she didn't deserve to say it, and she knew she deserved to hear it even less, but...
Sunshine.
"I love you, too!" Aisa screamed. It burst out of her, carrying all her guilt and shame with it. "I love you, too, Renna! I'm so sorry I couldn't tell you before! I'm so sorry!"
She felt drained, burnt out, more tired than she's ever been in her entire life. Even more than that, she was afraid. She was absolutely terrified. It was the exact same feeling that had filled her up in the moments after Renna's birth.
She looked up, not knowing what to expect. The wind carved two lines of searing cold across the paths her tears had taken down her face, and Renna was still up there, looking down at her mother, two white lines of frost decorating her own cheeks as well.
"Mother... I love you, too."
Sunshine.
Oh, Rinno... Aisa thought, feeling the warmth of her tears run down across the message she had painted across her body. I wish you could be here to see what a miracle our daughter has become.
*
Renna wiped her face and started down the walkway, moving past lines of silent Foxes. They followed her slow progress with eyes brimming with tears of their own, until she came to a stop in front of the Wolf who, one way or another, would bring an end to it all.
"Ander?"
He wasn't the same as he was before, she could see that right away. His eyes were red and bloodshot, like he hadn't gotten any sleep all week, and there were dark stains going across his cheeks, made by the passage of many tears, fresh and old. His movements were slow and lethargic. He wasn't even shivering, despite the extreme cold. His entire demeanour screamed of one who was struggling under an immense weight, and although she knew it would be wrong to pile even more on top of everything he was going through, it would be even more wrong to do nothing at all. To say nothing.
To remain silent.
He looked at her with those tired eyes, like he knew exactly what she was going to ask of him. As he moved, that awful horn swung against his chest, penduluming back and forth, a severed piece of an animal long dead.
"Please..." Renna fidgeted in place, clasping and unclasping her hands, trying to stop them from shaking. They blurred together into a shapeless mess as hot tears leaked from her eyes and dripped onto her intertwined fingers. "Please don't kill my mother!"
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