Hushed Willows bating a whisper from a broken morning

January Theme: Rebirth

It had not been so long since Seabreeze has roused from her unconsciousness. It had not been so long since that day that Lily told her of the sea woman’s accident, hurried and out of breath. It had not been so long since her heart raced and mind went sour, looking upon the women who had her entire soul lie crumpled in a heap at the foot of the cliffs — if only Olive had been there, if only she could have warned her wife of the danger allure of the cliffs, perhaps Seabreeze could have been spared such pain. If only…

Alas, the Shakti woman had not been there, and she was mature enough now to understand that was just the way of things. Olive could no more change destiny than she could the stars in the sky, or the winds that blew; she was subject to the will of the gods as was everything that had ever lived or breathed. Seabreeze had been meant to suffer because from suffering came growth and abundance — Olive had been meant to suffer too, for the very same reasons. These weren’t always happy lessons, and often times felt as though her very essence and being were being torn into two, but Olive thanked the celestial gods for their blessings all the same. It was not their fault that she was merely mortal, and that sometimes even she could not scry their divine words from the pain which they wrought. Sometimes, it didn’t seem fair, but Olive knew that was the small way of looking at things. 

Olive was no longer a skilled nurse. Once, in a past life, she had cut her teeth using Dakarai as her patient — but it was a mode of necessity, a part of her life that she did not wish to revisit. The blood and the emotional anguish that came with nursing was not appealing to the shrouded empath, and when she was around those experiencing physical pain Olive found that she felt it, too. Perhaps such intuitive powers might have been a useful skills for a clinician, but Olive had no desire for it... all the same, she worked to heal Seabreeze with whatever knowledge remained inside her. In the end, perhaps it was not Olive’s nursing skills that had seen Seabreeze through the worst of it. It had been more of an energy thing. 

With Seabreeze having awakened, Olive felt a little more secure. She returned to her duties of interacting with the pack and mothering Eleuthera, Séamus, Okeanos and the newly-returned Ibis. Delight’s children might always be lost to her, but to Olive, it was not for lack of trying. This, like many other things that threatened to throw Olive off-kilter, she chose not to let bother her.

At the moment, Olive was neither with her convalescent wife nor with her litter of grown children. She was out, looking at a small clearing — a great location for the garden she had never started. Then, she had climbed to the summit of the great rocks [artfully avoiding the place she knew Seabreeze to have fallen from] and gazed upon the sky — full of invisible stars which she had neglected to speak to. Life had just moved so fast since the ordeal of leaving Sunspire and then moving the Sanctuary; had she truly let these parts of her, which were so essential to her very being, fall to the wayside? Either way, the ground now was frozen solid, and they sky full of heavy gray clouds, so these things must wait until spring. For now, Olive was fine to weave through the draping branches of the willows, a white snowfall all its own, and be thankful that all these different lessons happened in a place so beautiful; a place more holy than even she.  

Upon returning home she had expected to be swept up by her family and welcomed with love and affection, which she did recieve but it was in a limited manner; the Yule party had been occupying many minds and while they were happy to see her, it felt (at least to Ibis) that she had been forgotten by many of them. She'd seen Seabreeze, and she'd seen her brother, but all other chances to reconnect with her siblings had fallen short. Then, she'd found her father among the willows — a jarring experience considering all she had done to find him, only to fail. After the party she had been resting for long periods, withdrawn and needy simultaneously, until something worse befell Ibis — the loss of her mother.

Ibis did not know what had happened. The details weren't obscured from the children, but she had a hard time following the chaos as the adults sprang to attend to the body. A great fear had gripped Ibis in those first few moments, then days — a fear that she'd not just lost her father, but her mother too. That she'd be stuck with Olive (who she loved of course, but not with the same fervor as Seabreeze), or forgotten as her step-siblings became the center of Elysium. She stayed near Seabreeze whenever possible. Watching over her, guarding her, singing to her with sad little crooning, until she felt as if she'd been emptied out entirely. She just couldn't figure out what to do, and had to remove herself before the sense of dread and doom engulphed her.

Then, as Ibis distanced herself and put herself on "time out" for a little break, she saw Olive. The woman wasn't with Seabreeze right now, probably worried just as much but needing space too. The girl hadn't noticed the fall of night around the territory, but she felt the bite of the cold air as she left her mother. That cold pierced in to her, and without any logic to her thoughts, Ibis blamed Olive for that feeling. She watched the woman drift between the willows and was soon in pursuit.

Maybe if Ibis hadn't gotten lost, her mommy wouldn't have hurt herself. Maybe Seebee had been looking for her when she'd fallen? That thought put a hitch in her step, bringing with it a wave of intense guilt that made her belly feel as if it had dropped away. Ibis focused on Olive and picked up the pace, her quick little steps hastening until she was on an intercept course, feeling the cold air sweep across her little body and the cold settle in to her heart. Whatever happened, she didn't know who to blame or what to do to fix it, and she was immature enough to fixate upon Olive, choose her to take that blame.

Mum, she blurted, finding the sound catching in her throat. She was almost whispering; maybe the night air was making it difficult for her, or she had a need to whisper in case someone was around and sleeping. More likely, Ibis was conflicted about this exchange. She wanted to be angry and confrontational with Olive about the state of her other mother - yet, she couldn't do that. The little dandelion was at a loss as soon as she called attention to herself. As she prowled closer, she pressed her nose against Olive's shoulder and murmured, Is mum okay?

Olive was not alone forever; as a mother, she never was. It was not long before a small, shaking voice made its way through the branches of the willows, as delicate as the silken tendrils themselves. Olive welcomed the company, as she would always welcome her children to her side whenever they wished. The midwife would never turn away the company of babes, especially those she had helped to birth and then to raise up in this world.  They came first and foremost; everything else was simply secondary. 

The woman stopped her meandering and backtracked a step or two, finding the wisp of a girl braced against a tree and moving ever-closer. Olive let a small, happy hum emanate from the pit of her throat as she felt the girl press into her. She immediately folded to allow the girl a closer proximity, but she intuited that something wasn’t quite settled with the girl. There were vicissitudes to Ibis’s energy that Olive wished to smooth, and felt somewhat guilty about being so tied up with Seabreeze to notice before — even if she couldn’t quite put her finger on it.

“Hi Darling,” she purred dotingly. She continued into her explanation of Seabreeze’s state with the confidence of a woman who fully believed in the world she spoke. “Oh, yes, lovely. Mommy will be fine. She’ll always be fine, because she is kind-hearted, and when you are kind-hearted, the gods will always take care of you.” The tiny, grayscale woman gave her daughter a kiss upon the nose. “Do you believe me?” She inquired, knowing very well that the answer might be no.  After all, Ibis had only just returned home, and Olive remained ignorant of her adventures whilst away from her home. She knew nothing of the things the girl had seen, or the evils she had come to know.

Olive remained hopeful, and decided to look forward instead of lingering in the past. With little eyes watching her every move, the mother had to ensure that she was setting the best example that she could. Even if she wanted to lapse into negative thinking or her unawakened tendencies, she could not let herself. There was too much at stake. “It is important to me that you are okay, too — and if you are not okay, my little cherub, then we will work to make it so. Together, as a family… always.” Perhaps such sentiments were not welcome, but Olive had many things to say and wanted to say them before they were not alone anymore.

“I am happy you are are home. We missed you so.”