Word Count → 5+
His tolerance did not go unnoticed, or unrewarded. Having placed the children in the strange nest, Alaine offered the young male a gentle smile, and for once her emerald eyes seemed at peace. The children were tired, and after a customary glare and stare, allowed their little heads and eyelids to lower.
In peaceful sleep, she was allowed to forget their Wrongness. It was strange, but nobody had warned her that she would love her children more the closer to dead they appeared.
The Optime pair retreated back down the stairwell. Having been blessed with a light step herself, Alaine was able to note that Ezekiel himself was in possession of almost soundless movement. His walk was orchestrated with purpose, as she assumed everything in his life was. Not a flinch of muscle was wasted unnecessarily - The movements of a hunter, perhaps even a warrior. A strange reassurance settled in her breast. Her children would always be alienated, but at least they had a protector in Ezekiel de le Poer.
The door to the kitchen had fallen off its hinges long ago. The room was only separated from the hall by a swathe of thick cloth that hung in a curtain over the entranceway. Such a thing had been necessary to keep smokes and scents within the kitchen while she worked. Pulling the heavy, ratty material back with one hand, the slender woman slipped into the gloom. The room was small and had once been tiled - All that remained of such prettiness was the occasional china square and a mass of stained concrete. There was a working fireplace, in which currently sat a cauldron worthy of a Shakespearean witch. A workbench that had once been a dining table was littered with small bundles of various herbs and flora, most tied neatly in bunches at the stem with a section of twine.
More impressively were the walls. Little shelves had been fastened to the sides of the kitchen for her purpose, and they were currently filled with an eclectic clutter of glass bottles. Most were full, although some were half empty or completely so. The light filtered through their strange, opaque colors.
On a smaller table, propped against a wall at the very back of the room, were her more valuable items. Neat sections of cloth that had been ripped into rectangular bandages were rolled in cylindrical uniformity. Beside that was a small wooden box, in which was stored a number of formidable-looking medical devices such as needles and scalpels, tweezers and the like. The final object, which her eyes graced immediately with a loving air, was a book. Its leather cover was old, and the pages within brown and musty. Once, its title had been scripted most beautifully in gold inlay on the cover, but that too had been worn away by the touching of many fingers over time.
The Canon of Medicine would be invaluable to the right owner, but to Alaine it was merely a mystery. She could read the inner title, and a few notable words there-in, but it revealed no more of its secrets to her. Having walked directly to the book, the colliewoman leaned her meager weight against the table and gazed back at Ezekiel, searching hims with sharp emerald eyes for a reaction to this view of her inner sanctum.
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