Ariadna’s Star: Post 1

Chapter 1: The Stars Align

One of my favorite pastimes, besides for helping Mom take care of people, is gazing up at the night sky as I soar through the stars in my mind.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the daytime too. But laying out on a blanket behind our one-bedroom wooden home on one of the tallest hills in Inizion, watching the sun set and the stars blossom against the deep blue-black background, is a joy that I can’t pass up. Mom has taken to just assuming I’ll be out here every night unless I say something.

Sometimes she joins me, but tonight she’s finishing washing the dishes from dinner. I’d offered to help, but she told me I’d worked too much today. I’m not sure what she means—it seemed like any other day to me. Sure, Cooper came in today with a rather complicated fracture and in a significant amount of pain, but we’d been able to set his arm right and the medicine had worked, dulling the pain enough to let him sleep. And Barbara’s fever finally came down with all of our care, which was a relief, since she could give birth any time now. I thought it had been a successful day, and as a result my heart is full with hope and gladness as I watch the stars above.

A warm breeze glides through the long green grasses around my blanket. I turn my face to it, glad for the breath of fresh air. Summer had taken its time to arrive, especially for little Inizion. We’re one of the most northwestern villages in the entire Amenyl country. From what some of the more-traveled townsfolks have told me, we’re actually one of the most remote villages, too. This frightens some people, but I rather like the rural country.

I lift my hand in front of my face, its cool deep brown color difficult to see against the dark night sky beyond. Sometimes I wish I looked more like Mom, the wise Demetria of Inizion. Not because I didn’t like how I look—I love my black wavy hair, maybe as much as Mom does—but because it’s always a reminder that she isn’t my real mother. We don’t look a thing alike, and sometimes it makes me sad, because Mom is such a wonderful person.

My eyes drift back up to the night sky. The moon is low in the sky, waxing crescent, gleaming bright white. It’s not so bright that it drowns out everything—I can easily see Ariadna’s star, a radiant light to the north. Spotting the Dragon constellation, I smile as I connect the stars that consist of the constellation.

Despite the continent being named Drakonia—after dragons—everyone tells me that they don’t exist. Or if they did, they’ve been extinct for some time. I’m not sure what to believe, mostly because the stories about dragons are just as varied about whether or not they were real. Some stories depict the dragons as great protectors of nature or people. Other tales recount dragons laying waste to entire armies and destroying anything that lay between them and treasure. So I don’t know whether or not I want dragons to really exist.

These are the kind of thoughts that I regularly parse through during my evenings, staring up at the night sky. That, and the continuing thought of why I had to be cursed.

Oh, it’s not a real “curse” like I hear about in some of the tales of evil sorcerers cursing heroes and maidens. But it might as well be. I stare at my fingers, feeling the frightening power just below the surface. It’s always there, a force of destruction waiting to be summoned and unleashed. There was a word to describe this power, a word that comes up frequently in stories, but Ariadna help you if you even mention the word in connection to yourself. Sadly, I have the curse that raises more suspicion than circles of mushrooms or the strange lights in the forests that lay to the north. It’s the kind of curse that results in people mysteriously going missing from their homes in the dead of night, or even being executed on the spot the moment the curse is discovered.

I have magic.

Thinking the word makes me sick, and I quickly put my hand back down against my simple red cloth shirt. It wouldn’t be so bad if my magic was helpful. I often plead with Ariadna to change my magic into healing. How wondrous that would be!

But it remains the same. No doubt it’s the reason my blood parents abandoned me years ago. At least they didn’t kill me, like some may have done. There are many stories that magic was the result of terrible rituals, a “gift” from Anieros to his most devout followers. I shudder from an invisible chill.

Mom says that while maybe that’s how sorcerers gain such power, that I’m blameless. She thinks it’s actually a gift from Ariadna, and tells me not to let what the people of Amenyl think make me feel like I’ve done something wrong. I try to believe her. I still avoid using my magic at all costs, and not just because I’m afraid to be discovered, but because it makes me feel like I’ve done something wrong.

“Estelle!” Mom’s voice filters up the hill, her normally calm and warm tone a little higher pitched than usual.

“Yes?” I begin gathering my wool blanket up. That tone usually means something’s wrong. I can see her peeking out the backdoor, the light shining around her form.

“I could use your help.”

Shaking out the blanket, I brush off my brown cloth pants and make my way down the hill, my leather boots crunching in the grass. It’s more common for women to wear dresses and skirts, at least in Inizion, but I’ve only got a single dress and a single skirt, since most of the leftover clothes Mom and I get are men’s clothes. As a result, I tend to wear pants when Mom and I are working, since I’m more likely to have a replacement set.

Mom’s left the back door open, and I step into our humble abode, glad for the warmth of the fire from the fireplace. Our cots are tucked in one corner, the pot with leftover soup swung back over the fire to keep it hot and from becoming infected as easily, the clean, cracked wooden dishes stacked neatly beside the wash basin nearby. Across from our living space is our “office”—a couple of cots that had sheets strung up to act as privacy dividers. Mom has tied her graying blonde curls behind her head again, an indication that she’s in work mode, and has donned a blue cloth shirt that looks great against her fair skin. She’s directing a fair-haired young woman onto a bed, her face white, her eyes wide with fear, her belly large and low—it’s Barbara.

Mom’s dark eyes turn to me, and the laugh lines on her face deepen as she gives me a brief but sincere smile. “Barbara’s gone into labor,” she says, her strong voice calm and even once more.

I’ve delivered several babies with Mom—I know how this goes. “I’ll get the water,” I say. Mom just needs to know what I’m working on so that we don’t duplicate our efforts.

Grabbing one of our cleaned boiling pots, I go outside to our well, lug up a bucket of water, and dump this into the pot. I bring the pot back into the house and hook it on one of the rungs before swinging it over the fireplace. As I wash my hands Barbara cries out in pain, but it doesn’t sound out of the ordinary to me, so I don’t rush over.

Finished cleaning up, I head over to our supplies, laid out carefully on a table closer to the “office” portion of the room. At the back of the table are the seven books we have—the only ones in Inizion, in fact—as well as a little bit of parchment paper, and a bottle of ink stoppered with a cork to keep it fresh. Mom taught me how to read and write because sometimes we have to send for supplies for medicine from other cities, and because some medical procedures are complicated enough that it requires a better understanding of the human body. Underneath the table are our handcloths, towels, and blankets, and I gather up a number of these to be within easy-reach for Mom.

“Demetria? Is, is she going to be okay?” Maxwell, Barbara’s husband, asks anxiously, wringing his cap in his hands.

“Barbara is a strong woman,” Mom says, not shy to let Barbara hear her. “She and the baby are going to be just fine.”

It’s not a lie. It’s just that when Mom and I share a look, I know what she’s thinking, because I’m thinking it too, and Mom hadn’t said the statement with full confidence like she normally does. This wouldn’t be so worrisome if Barbara hadn’t just gotten over a fever, and she didn’t have that slight gaunt look in her face, the weariness of recovering from illness. This wasn’t going to be our easiest delivery, that was for sure. But Mom was here and in charge—she would see it through, and everything would work out in the end.

“Braxton, how about you take Maxwell to wait outside?” Mom says.

Braxton, a good friend of Maxwell, puts a strong arm around his shoulder and leads him out the front door, where I can hear other people, no doubt Barbara’s brothers and other extended family. Barbara’s mother Camille is already dabbing a cool cloth on Barbara’s forehead, and her wrinkled face splits into a smile when Barbara looks up at her.

“The first is always the scariest,” Camille says. Barbara manages a feeble smirk and gives a nod.

Seeing the beads of sweat only increase on Barbara’s forehead, and the rouge of a fever creeping onto her face again, I look over our medicinal supplies, selecting a number for different uses. I add a couple of drops of oils for a soothing aroma into a bowl of rags, waiting for hot water. A number of other herbs I set into a mortar and pestle, as these are for consuming. But I also set out one of our wooden mugs and begin putting herbs into a teaspoon, including a bit of a fever reducer. I mention it to Mom, who nods without looking at me as she checks Barbara’s pulse. The fever reducer is needed, as I can see the flush on Barbara’s cheeks clearly, but it could slow her labor too, and Mom needs to know that.

“Just remember,” Mom says to Barbara, her voice still calm, “women have been doing this since the first era. It might be your first child, but you’re not alone. And besides, just think! You’re going to have a baby boy or a baby girl soon.”

Now Barbara manages a real smile, and she accepts the mug of tea I hand her, sweetened with a little honey to take the edge off the bitterness of herbs. “Thank you,” she says to us both.

“Well, don’t thank us just yet,” Mom says. “You’re probably going to hate me in a little bit, and that’s okay. But then you can thank me once we’re done and you’re holding your little one.” Camille and I chuckle knowingly.

It was a labor that lasted all night—which isn’t that long, all things considered. I’ve known women to labor for days, especially with their first child. And it was rough, as Barbara’s fever drained her energy, and we had to coax her along.

But the best part was that tender cry that pierced the early morning hours, the sobs of joy from mother and father alike, and the cheers outside from friends and family.

Mom closes our makeshift panel around Barbara, Maxwell, and their new son, Scott, washed and wrapped in a soft blanket, sleeping in their arms. Sharing a weary smile, Mom and I set about cleaning the place up. I hum softly as I put on a pot of fresh water on the fireplace. It doesn’t matter that I might not sleep more than an hour or two today: moments like this are worth it all.