My Piece of Solitude

[alamea]

Why must we all conceal
What we think
How we feel
Must there be a secret me
I’m forced to hide?
I won’t pretend that i’m
Someone else
For all time

For once in my life I get a moment of peace. A moment to myself. Away from that bustling academy with all those arrogant pompus mages. Alamea thought as she stood on the top of the city walls that day, well, it was more night. The sun was setting, and it was the apprentice's favorite time to be out of doors. Her hazel eyes were scanning around as she leaned against the edge of the wall. Her robes were flowing slightly in the wind, and a staff was abandoned on the ground. Alamea's form was leaning precariously far over, but she didnt care. It was good to feel the wind on her face, the only voice in her ears.

"I am not the girl I once was." The apprentice uttered, her mind straying to different thoughts. It was true, since she had came to the academy, self esteem was something you could only dream of, and free time was a legend. All there you could think of was books, spells, getting stronger. Becoming smarter. To Alamea, it was all very confusing and stressful. She knew that once the apprenticeship was over it would get easier. But each moment was getting harder. Only recently had she been able to light a candle, and that was a simple spell most mages could do in her sleep. Once, before this, Alamea had been a simple girl on a farm, learning her family trade. Now she knew in her heart that one day she would be powerful, if she tried hard and trained hard.

But something made her wonder, did she want to be powerful and strong? Did she want to be a mage. Surely people would consider her arrogant for it, though Alamea didnt flaunt her magic, just tried hard. Did she really wish to bring down that history on her. Nobody really liked her at the Academy. She was too different. "So many choices, so many thoughts, when will I ever decide? When it is too late?" Her voice was barely a whisper. The girl's brown hair broke free of its ties and was now whipping around in the wind. Alamea made no attempt to restrain it, just sighed in frustration. This was all so confusing. Right now was the only moment she had to be alone, and she was spending it thinking about the mage academy. "What a fool I am"

[Ailena]

"So many choices, so many thoughts, when will I ever decide? When it is too late?"

"It's never too late," a quiet voice responded from the darkness. "Deciding takes time and it is those decisions made in haste that later we all come to regret."

Ailena was not sure what had possessed her to answer to the other's whisper. It was easily discerned that what the younger girl said was not meant for Ailena to hear, nor was it in her place to answer. Still, ever since she came to Avaren, her old habits were in a decline and she feared that her manners went with them.

The nineteen year old woman had long fought for independence and freedom. And now that she had found it, she feared that it was affecting her in all the wrong ways. She hated it, ultimately, hated it enough to wish for her old life back.

Yet for her there was no going back. She had done horrible things to get out of servitude and now it seemed to her that she was unfit for the life of freedom she so longed for. It was almost as though she was choking on all the fresh air that was entering her lungs.

That was one of the reasons the young mage had ventured up on the wall that so fiercely protected the city. The cold air and quiet was good for the mind, especially one as troubled as Ailena's. She found it easier to think with the open space around her, and just the solitude generated a calm atmosphere.

However, as she had entered the longest stretch of shadows long the west wall, another had come to share her place of comfort. Yet the dark shadows reaching down from the setting sun hid the dark haired woman from the other's gaze. She would probably have stayed hidden too, had she not responded. But the response was something that had come on it's own, without thought from the girl who had uttered it.

Now that she had spoken, Ailena saw it fit that she make her presence completely known. Walking out to where the other stood leaning over the edge, she let her dark eyes fall on the other girl as she too leaned over to look as the red sun hid behind the horizon.