Broken Antler Fen Scarlet

Many did not consider Wraen old, though she was nearing her fifth year on this Earth and to have survived this long was something of an achievement. But then the number of years did not matter so much as the state of one's health. It starts with little things and inconveniences - a pulled muscle here, a healing bruise from a fall or a kick there, but then it accumulates over time colds and fevers leave scars in one's lungs and those occasionall small pangs in the region of the heart that you write off as nothing, but in reality there are tiny spots of dead fibres there. Expanding. Growing. Teeth wear down and crack, joints get worn and inflamed. There was no wonder that Old Age was the strongest god. No one could win a fight against it. 

And, while Wraen was unaware of the actual changes in her body, she could give a fairly accurate account of, how all this made her feel. Unlike in the past, where all days were a string of "I can conquer the world", now she had good days and bad days. There were times, when she could no longer keep up with the speed of the world around her. She tried, she hobbled behind the caravan, eyes still trained on that bright and beckoning horizon, but she knew that there would be a day that she would not have enough strength to go on and would have to stop. She was good at hiding that all was not well and at the same time she often felt slightly disappointed that her family and friends preferred to live in a denial. Rather than taking her "I am old" serious, they saw it as a joke. They did not realize that "old" was how she felt with all the facets it entailed and not how she looked.

"What is uhum, Teya?" she asked the girl, not yet trusting her enough to tell all that was on her mind, happy to have a distraction.