Winter, Pt.1

Condensation disappeared as she slid her finger along the chilled window. Water droplets, with the room reflected upside-down on their surface, slowly collected into a larger drop before it slid down the window, leaving a trail in its wake. She didn’t watch as they slid down to collect at the bottom of the glass; in fact, she wasn’t paying much attention to anything at all.

“Miss, sitting at the window won’t hurry the amount of time it takes for His Lordship to return home,” the maid ventured timidly.

Adra didn’t respond, continuing to stare beyond the frosted glass of the window as if she could see past the white veil of winter, past the front gates of their home, and into the countryside. Unable to pry the young girl away from the window, the maid curtsied hesitantly before removing herself to a different room. The door shut with a soft click behind her; only when the maid was gone, did Adra let her eyes flick back to wander around the rest of the room.

It was empty; not a surprise at this time of the year, since both of her parents were in the capital. Adra had never asked why, but once when she had been hiding during a storm and fallen asleep, she’d overheard them discussing something about getting something a resolution passed. She didn’t know what a resolution was, but… well, it had to be really serious, for them to be gone this long. They had promised to be home for Yule-tide and Midwinter, after all.

.to be continued

Choices

The Novel

“[The novel] is an exercise of make-believe that, like yoga or a religious festival, breaks down barriers of space and time and extends our sympathies, so that we are able to empathise with other lives and sorrows. It teaches compassion, the ability to ‘feel with’ others. And, like mythology, an important novel is transformative … If it is written and read with serious attention, a novel, like a myth or any great work of art, can become an initiation that helps us to make a painful rite of passage from one phase of life, one state of mind, to another. A novel, like a myth, teaches us to see the world differently; it shows us how to look into our own hearts and to see our world from a perspective that goes beyond our own self-interest. If professional religious leaders cannot instruct us in mythical lore, our artists and creative writers can perhaps step into this priestly role and bring fresh insight to our lost and damaged world.”

– Karen Armstrong, A Short History of Myth