littlesistersword:
pullofthebowstring:
“Let’s not forget it.” Jaliqia caught hold of Aika’s elbow, expression stern, though it was open.
“Family listens to one another’s concerns and tries to work with them. I cannot do that for you, my family, unless you speak your mind. A marriage is always built upon communication. It is best we learn to communicate now, Aika, instead of struggling later.”
She let out a short sigh. “Besides. There is always a reason to talk about what’s bothering us.”
Aika rarely found such a reason, aside from not prolonging whatever conflict avoiding conflict had ironically caused. Her jaw tensed. She didn’t want to discuss it, but she would need to if she wanted Jaliqai to leave her alone about it.
“I am afraid,” She managed, “Not of the crags necessarily, of leaving everything my-” Not home, she couldn’t say home; not to Jaliqai. “-of never seeing the cove again.”
“I know-” What did she know? She had never left home, as in truly left it. “I know that once I leave I can’t return, I can’t visit, I can’t…”
All of those things were true, and Jaliqai’s expression softened at Aika’s revelations. Of course she was going to miss her home, and the people she had known there.
Of course she could not return. Jaliqai knew this. She had been remiss in not addressing it sooner.
“Aika...I know that it will be difficult to leave everything behind but -- in the end, it will be for the better. Your sister is not a kind woman, and eventually her wrath would have even fallen upon you. She would have tried to do something like burning you to death in a barn, rather than have her will defied.”
She reached out, making to tuck a lock of hair behind Aika’s ear.
“My family will never abuse you. I will never abuse you. You will not have to live in fear anymore.”