Duck Lake hollow ashes

Easthollow's name wasn't warm and inviting to Laurel very much. On one side it was, as it was a home in some ways, but in many other ways it was just a house that she stayed in until... until they kicked her out, or until she decided to set off again on her own. If Indra'd still been here, she would probably not even be a part of Easthollow anymore. They would've left Charles, rather than the other way around, and they would've set out on their own.

Is he wrong? echoed the dark man's voice in her head, and it caused Laurel to snap out of her thoughts and look up. Suppose not, she said with a hint of nervousness. It's... a place to live. She wished that she could summon old Laurel back, that she could pretend to woo this man so that she might build up a positive relation somewhere else, so that she wasn't bound to Easthollow if not only by the fact that she had nowhere else to go, no one else to turn to. But you can't, can you, dearest. But she couldn't. Because I broke you. And mind you, you weren't even charming. She wasn't even charming. But you did accept my gifts. She did accept the free food. So really, it's all mostly your own fault, dearest. He was right about that, and that was why she could no longer force herself into that role, why she could not build up any positivity with anyone else ever again, because she was —

A f r a i d . . .

I should go, said Laurel hastily, while her eyes turned wet with raw emotion and pure fear of what this man might do to her if she stuck around. She looked up at him briefly, making eye contact for all but a few seconds. She hoped she would see him again -- a fleeting thought that Iliksis' voice inside her head laughed at heartily and madly -- and she wasn't sure why. Maybe because this meeting represented so much of her old life, so much of what she'd lost. I... You want him, don't you? No! Laurel looked caught off-guard, as if she realised that she had said too much. She shouldn't talk back to Iliksis, she should never talk back to Iliksis. For more reason than one.

Laurel grimaced as the initial shock faded from her face and she said: I'm so sorry. Her legs were trembling and she wanted to make to leave, like she had said she should, but somehow her legs were completely rooted to the ground and she couldn't leave. Laurel just stared at him with a mysterious air of too many emotions piled on top of one another, making it impossible to tell which it was that she was actually feeling.