A treat for you :) An #AfterBurn draft snippet ‘Citaannn!’ The sharp, hard tone in her sister’s voice had Citaan clenching her jaw before she even realized it. At the pang of protest from her teeth she forced a slow exhalation. Count to ten, she chanted in her mind, they’re here to help. They just want to help. ‘CITAAN! WHERE ARE THE NAPPIES?’ ‘If they’re here to help,’ Citaan hissed caustically under her breath while she marched toward the nursery. ‘Why am I doing everything?’ She stepped into the nursery and froze. The carefully organized shelves, drawers, and closet appeared to have simultaneously exploded throughout the pretty room with its mauve walls, fluffy brown rug and fae embroidered curtains. The frustration from minutes ago vanished and an overwhelming urge to sob hit. Swallowing hard and closing her eyes, Citaan counted to ten. Again. Keeping her eyes shut against the chaos, she replied in an overly calm tone, ‘In the bucket. The black bucket is for dirty nappies and the white bucket clean.’ Then she pivoted on a heel and exited, ignoring her sister’s query as to what was wrong. The tears came now, tracking silently down her cheeks and she dashed them away with the back of a hand, feet moving faster and faster until she sprinted along the hall, aiming for the room at the end. With a snatch she opened the door and flung it shut behind her. The peace of their bedroom helped to quell the overwhelming urge to really sob. A few teary, shuddering breaths in and out allowed the tension to lower a notch and her hair to uncurl slightly from the tight coils it’d spin into at her distress. Citaan stared around the room, it felt so empty without Gredel there. She hadn’t slept in their bed since he had left, instead she spent every night on a makeshift bed in Rirae’s room, soothed to sleep by the sound of her daughter’s soft breaths. It hurt to be in this room again and her shoulders slumped. ‘Where you now?’ She whispered, voice breaking at the thought of him in danger. Images of his battered and bruised body lying broken somewhere haunted her dreams; in each dream his voice drifted through, whispering, ‘I love you’. A soft knock on the door caused her to twist, staring at the dark tan wood. ‘Who is it?’ She called, her voice croaky with tears. The solid doorknob turned and the door slowly eased open; her mother peeked around the edge. ‘Cetiah,’ she called softly, using Citaan’s infant name. ‘What’s wrong, darling?’ Citaan sighed, the despair and frustration vanishing leaving absolute exhaustion and sank onto the bed. ‘I can’t do it, Mama,’ she whispered with a guilty look. ‘I know they came to help, I just can’t handle it at the moment. I can’t be here. I need to be doing something, something to help.’ Her mother nodded and closed the door quietly behind her, walking to the bed and gently sat beside Citaan. She picked Citaan’s hand up threading her fingers through Citaan’s then looked into her daughter’s face with a smile. ‘You never could sit still at a time like this. Take Rirae, ride to the Castle. I know the sorceress will have work for you. I will keep your sisters busy here; we’ll spring clean the place. When Gredel returns it will be spotless.’ Her mother said it assertively with a brisk firm smile. Citaan swallowed back the tears and nodded. ‘Thank you, Mama.’
Posted on: Wed, 21 Aug 2013 08:04:20 +0000
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