With utmost haste, Master Halvatt and I arranged your trip to the capital, sending you and I to the distant city within the week. We were to attend the annual exhibition of magic, an event that was sure to please your curious nature.
For as long I have served your family, I have known you as an individual to appreciate the oddities of life. Though you were not born with the gift of magic yourself, save for your ability to grow enchanted roses, you would still spend countless hours pouring over dusty grimoires from the library, as if you hoped they would share with you the secrets of their power.
I too spent many a day in the library sitting at your side, looking into grimoires you wanted to show me so that I might have spirited them back to the manor without incurring the librarian's wrath. And though my own magical ability was laughably small, you seemed convinced that somehow, I might have been able to cast one of those incomprehensibly complex spells if I tried hard enough.
By some good fortune, we arrived at the capital ahead of schedule, giving us a week before the exhibition began. Much to my relief, you immediately took to the stores lining the busiest streets, perusing for several afternoons before deciding on what you wanted to buy. New dresses, sweets, jewelry, and books filled my arms as I tried my best to carry everything that caught your eye.
On the day before the exhibition, we were finishing up our final round of shopping when you requested to go into a men's tailor to buy something for your brother. I raised my eyebrow at the suggestion knowing how little regard you had for Master Halvatt, but complied, entering the store with you. I watched as you gallivanted through the lines of mannequins, walking in and out of sight until briefly, you vanished for a moment.
Within a few minutes, you emerged from the back of the store, carrying a silk tie and a fashionable hat. Yet despite your earlier excitement, a somber air seemed to linger over you now as you waved me over to pay for the garments.
Concerned, once we were back onto the bustling streets, I asked you what had gone amiss. You looked at me with hesitation, eyes shifting back and forth between me and your purchases, before you decided to speak: though the tie was for Master Halvatt, you had hoped to gift the hat to Gache Plajaerta upon your return.
However, you continued nervously, before we had left for the capital, you had already taken it upon yourself to avoid my watchful gaze and arrange a private meeting with Gache. And of course, during this same meeting you had confessed your love to him, knowing full well what that entailed. You had to, you explained, because he would have to leave for his home province soon.
I shook my head, dread creeping up my spine and chilling my back as you explained that you hoped him to still be alive by the time you returned. This time, you said, it would be different. You had a different feeling about this man. He wasn't like the others.
Your conviction did not match your words, though, and I very well heard the sound of doubt in your voice. As we walked back to the inn in silence, I could feel your worry gnawing away at us both. Master Halvatt would certainly be displeased to hear of this, but I feared for you more than anything else. You believed that the outcome would be different someday, even as you trekked down the same fruitless path of grief again...all we could do at this point was hope for a different outcome, as desperate and foolish of an endeavour that was.
Somehow, as the exhibition of magic came and went, you seemed to shed the worry that had plagued you beforehand. I myself could not do the same, but it was not my place to burden you with those thoughts. Lost in the displays of fortune telling tents, plants that grew in wondrous shapes, and multicoloured dancing flames, you seemed to be at peace with yourself for the first time in recent memory, and for that, I was grateful. I watched your figure wander down the streets and mingle with the attractions, gracefully moving from stand to stand as if you were a dancer without a care in the world. I saw the iridescent fires reflected in your eyes, their brightness second only to the shine in your irises.
You seemed so drunk on life, so alive.
For these few days, you forgot all that you were forced to carry. And despite my own concerns, the sight still brought a smile to my lips, loosening my breath and relaxing my stance. How radiant you were when you were free to do as you pleased, unbound by anything so dark as a deadly curse. The sight of you in such a state, it would be seared into my mind until the end of time.
How I wish we could've stayed in the capital like this forever, so that you would never have to go back into the shadow of your sorrows. So that you would never have to cry again.