[Manardariel]

“Mother, look! Isn´t it gorgeous?” Ciana twirled around, her long braids falling around her. The setting sun was illuminating Lake Evendim, making it shine and glimmer under it´s green waters. Ciana did a cartwheel in the sand of the shore, her hands prickeling with exitement. They were here. After a long, wearying journey north, they had finally arrived in their new town, Evendim. Their new home.
Aletha smiled as she watched her daughter´s exitement. She was glad to have arrived, though Evendim wasn´t nearly as promising as it had sounded in Minas Anor. But at least she was free here, free to do whatever she wanted, start a new life. A new life. The sound, and the possibilty frightened her. Could she give up on being who she was in order to start a “new life”? Ciana could. The girl was talking less and less about the White City each day, she had even come to refer to their primitive wooden cabin by the lake as “home”. Aletha sighed. What was she doing here, in the wild? Did she belong here?
The truth was, Aletha didn´t know- and she didn´t want to, either. But what she did know was that whatever life had in place for them here, it was better what it had been at home.

“Ciana,” she called, “come on here. Dinner´s ready.”

Ciana got up and walked over to Aletha who had set up a fire before their small tent. Her eyes were shining full of exitement. Being out here was just wonderful. This is the kind of life I was made for! Not a boring life in a boring city- exitement, the wild, that´s where I belong! She looked around at the Lake, the colony of settlers. Families were eating, men fishing, children playing tag between plan wagons and tentds. They had arrived barely an hour ago. People were making plans for their houses, chatting happily about rooms, stables and working areas. Their was an air of exitement and dawn in the camp. Ciana sighed. Neither her mother nor herself had ever tried building something, let alone a house! But that was a worry for tomorrow. Tonight, they would spent another night in their tent. And it woldn´t be the last one...

Ciana joined her mother around the small fire. Evenings were friendly up north, though the weather was much harsher than down in Gondor. But the evenings were warm, and to Ciana and Aletha, that was a gift: they didn´t own a wagon, only thick woolen blankets, a small tent and the grass below them. That was their bed, and so it had been for the past weeks of traveling. They would be spending their time outdoors anyways, even later one when they did have a house. Here, they had sun and stars over their head, and other settlers to chat with if they wanted. Ciana looked up at her mother, grinning.

“So,” she said. “What next?” It wasn´t a question, not really. It was more an invitation to pull out an expected gift or idea. Aletha shrank together before her daughter. The truth was, she had no such present.

“I don´t know, honey. I thought things would settle themselves when we got hzere. I thought, we would have helpers, thought there´d be more people like us. People who don´t have a clue about the wild. I thought we´d manage...I think I was wrong.”
Horrified, Ciana jumped up. “You weren´t wrong, mother. We are managing. We have a tent, and blankets. We have enough to eat. We have friends. We perfectly fine. What did you expect this to be, a picnic?” Aletha smiled at her big girl, who always seemed to find the right words.

“We´ll manage,” she said, her voice louder as usual. “We´ll be fine."

Keep your hopes high, Ciana though. As high as those hills behind me.

[ August 31, 2003: Message edited by: Manardariel ]