Letter to my child
Andrei, someday you will be old enough to read these letters and then you will know whom was your mother.
Like so many other young girl, i was married by fourteen, the boy was a few years older than me, maybe sixteen i can't remember. We lived together on a small piece of land owned by his family and we worked this land with our hands and hearts. Your father's name was also Andrei, you were his pride and joy when i finally conceived a child, you my dearest. Twice before i lost the child i was carrying with me, i worked too hard, i ate too little. We did not knew why the child would not hold in me. Finally his mother came to me and said to rest, to eat well. We were poor people, we had close to nothing but our wish for a child was greater than all, and so your father made the needed sacrifice and you came to be. I was twenty two.
Our farm was small and the land sterile, our vegetables were tiny and hard. Life was not easy so we worked double, we had to feed you, feed ourselves. These hands that held you all along, they worked the land and bled for you. For Count and Country. When the man that collects taxes came, we would give him what we had saved, it was not much but we paid. The small land that now belonged to us, if we wanted to keep it, we had to pay. I was young and yet so old already, my body was a thousand sore under the plow, my hands dry from the sun and water and my breasts hanging low from feeding you, i was twenty five.
Like so many family, we did not only fought off the hardship of the land, but also the outlanders, the feys, the devils and Old Night, it was as if the land itself was rebelling against us. Night after night did the neuri came, the moon round as a marble and shinny like a mirror. It stared back at us, taunting in all manners, the poor people we are. Your father was a proud man but not the wisest, we had managed to buy a chicken, for fresh eggs, our gold mine we thought. A precious possession. When night came, we feared for it's life and out did your father went, outside of the walls who would protect us. The neuri came and ate your dad, i was a young widow, you, a fatherless child. I was twenty six.
My sister and her five children, she took you in, the gentle soul. She gave her husband four strong boys and together they worked the field like bulls. It was a sight to see them go, brothers. One sister that would marry a *rich* man. She offered to take you in, but my heart sank when it came to realize, there was no space for one more. You so tiny, it was no effort, but I would have to remain homeless. The boyard came and took the farm, we had no money to pay, no men to work. The shame of it all, but i feared not, you would be safe in the arms of my kin. On the road i took my dress and my boots.
Hunger and fear, i could no longer bare. The city is a mess of outlanders and fey and else. How can my child be raised in such a life, my blood, my kin, who would protect them? The guards and their incompetence? I had my doubts, whom else could i trust best but myself.
Give up woman, go home and raise your child. I can't i would bite in my jaw and keep my head high. I had to prove it to myself. I was twenty eight and i was a city guard.
