TM Challenge 211
It was full three years before I saw any of my brothers again, and by that time I had a daughter grown wild in the fields of some far-off place, and had made my peace with my wife, and had grown accustomed to having nothing more in the world than the two of them--so that coming out of exile felt strange rather than welcome.
I had no comfort there any longer; it didn't feel right, and it didn't feel like coming home, so I built my two women a house farther off than I thought most men would like to travel in a day, and we lived there in much the same quiet as we always had.
After a while I got less afraid of my own brothers, and my daughter began to be a favourite of her uncles, and to spend time with her cousins. One day she went to her uncle Gawain's castle herself, to stay a week with him and her aunt Ragnelle, and Lynet and I were alone in our house. I'd stopped thinking that there were any less than the three of us, and the whole damned place felt empty and silent and cold, and it was like being alone again, before I'd even met Lynet, and had only the fear of my mother and the difficult friendship with my brothers to give me company.
I was quiet, and sat in my chair by the fireside.
Lynet came and sat beside me, quiet as I was, and began taking down her hair--her long beautiful hair I've always loved. When it was down her shoulders and lay in her lap, she looked at me, and took my hands and put them on her shoulders, and leaned close to me, and whispered, in her softest voice,--
"Thou whoreson devil, an thou dost not fetch thyself out of thy chair and behave thyself like a man instead of a stone, and do me the honour to braid me my hair, I swear I shall never let thee touch me again, and I'll watch thee beg and do naught but pay sweet time to thy brother."
And I swear--I laughed for the first time all day, and, God, it felt good.
Words: 376
I had no comfort there any longer; it didn't feel right, and it didn't feel like coming home, so I built my two women a house farther off than I thought most men would like to travel in a day, and we lived there in much the same quiet as we always had.
After a while I got less afraid of my own brothers, and my daughter began to be a favourite of her uncles, and to spend time with her cousins. One day she went to her uncle Gawain's castle herself, to stay a week with him and her aunt Ragnelle, and Lynet and I were alone in our house. I'd stopped thinking that there were any less than the three of us, and the whole damned place felt empty and silent and cold, and it was like being alone again, before I'd even met Lynet, and had only the fear of my mother and the difficult friendship with my brothers to give me company.
I was quiet, and sat in my chair by the fireside.
Lynet came and sat beside me, quiet as I was, and began taking down her hair--her long beautiful hair I've always loved. When it was down her shoulders and lay in her lap, she looked at me, and took my hands and put them on her shoulders, and leaned close to me, and whispered, in her softest voice,--
"Thou whoreson devil, an thou dost not fetch thyself out of thy chair and behave thyself like a man instead of a stone, and do me the honour to braid me my hair, I swear I shall never let thee touch me again, and I'll watch thee beg and do naught but pay sweet time to thy brother."
And I swear--I laughed for the first time all day, and, God, it felt good.
Words: 376