Silver awoke in cramped and confusing conditions. There was stone beneath her, behind her and above her. Long legs had been pulled up to fit her in, her knees used as a bumpy pillow which, she now discovered, had left her with a painful crick in her neck and a tender patch on one cheek.
With a groan, she turned to the side and spat out a handful of white feathers. Why had she had feathers in her mouth? Why had she slept in, as it turned out, a cold hearth? Whose trousers were these and why, exactly, was there a piglet upon the thin, worn bed? Where, in fact, was she?
She peered through squinted eyes, trying to make sense of the scene. It took a few moments to think straight given the throbbing of her head, but when she managed to piece some things together, she wished that she had not.
They had stayed with the pyre until it had burned to naught but ash. When the ash had gone cold, she and Steel had made their way back to Trestlebridge. The horse needed a good rest and a good rub down, and she had needed... something that she would never find. In its place, she had decided that alcohol would help numb the pain and thus had drank herself into oblivion on whatever foul-tasting swill the shanty tavern could provide.
She didn't remember much after that. There may have been singing, there may even have been dancing, but the rest was blank. A quick check proved that she still wore all of her own clothes, despite the strange pants she had on over them, and that all of her limbs, digits and associate pieces were exactly where they were supposed to be. That made a change.
The scents of bacon and eggs cooking elsewhere in the building drifted beneath the door and up to her nose. Her stomach turned. She didn't want to stay here, she certainly didn't want to eat. Carefully, so as not to make herself feel worse – if that was even possible! - she stripped herself of the unknown britches, laid them upon the bed where the piglet still snoozed, took up her gear and, after leaving a gold piece upon the mantle to pay off any damages she may have wrought, she made her quiet and unsteady way out of the building and back into the small town.
An hour later saw her back on the road to the south. Steel was slow today, gentle. Perhaps he knew how awful she felt and was trying to be kind? Or perhaps he simply had no wish to run today. He had liked Rowan and the mare. Perhaps he was grieving as well?
They bypassed Bree, heading straight for the house upon the border of Towerglan and Wolfhaven. She had no wish for company tonight. She needed rest. She needed peace. More than that, she couldn't face the notion of telling people where she had been and why. Woad would need to know, but Silver still didn't know where the huntress lived. That, oddly enough, made things easier.
Evening was upon them by the time they made it back. Silver spent a good while making sure that her beloved steed was clean, fed, watered and comfortable. Only the best for him! After all he had been through at her side, he deserved a good pampering and the very act of doing so helped calm her as well.
Eventually, however, she had to face the cold, dark interior of her house. With a sigh and a heavy heart, she made her way in, laid and lit the fire, and then set about the arduous task of filling multiple buckets of water for boiling in order to take a well-needed bath. She stunk of death and decay, of horse and sweat, of cheap stale ale and smoke. She hurt inside and out. She was also, she realised when she examined her hands and looked into a small mirror, really rather filthy.
By the time she was finished filling the tub, bathing, scrubbing and emptying the water, Silver was beyond exhausted. Donning her voluminous grey robe, she walked toward the bedroom but paused on the threshold. It had been cold and quiet in that room for well over a month now. There had been naught there for her but loneliness and nightmares. She couldn't face that. Not now. Not tonight.
Their time together had been brief, and far from smooth. There had been a lot of uncertainty, a lot of learning to do, a lot of adaption and more than one spat, but there had also been a lot of love. At least, she wanted to think so.
Now, there was nothing but sorrow.
She stepped into the room only as far as it was necessary to retrieve some clean blankets. Then, as well as she could with the fluffy burden and the cane, she strode back out. Pausing only long enough to draft a letter for sending in the morning and bank the fire, Silver stepped back out into the cold night air.
She couldn't remain in that house tonight. She couldn't face the memories, good or bad. She couldn't face the silence or the emptiness left behind. It was soul-crushing. Agonising. So she did the only thing she could think of to lessen the pain.
She went to the stables and made herself a bed with blankets and straw. Lying down, with the comforting presence of a snoozing Steel, she cried herself to sleep.
