Ecladhreth

[The following pages contain many entries from many different moments, days, or nights.]

Apr. 10

Of course, I forget about this journal every time there’s excitement in my life.

Dec. 14

I’ve been neglecting my journal in favor of being holed up at home! Something about the cold weather makes me wish to do nothing by stay by the fire and tinker or read. O, my poor eyes, I strain them so. Working on the hand, working on the  thing, working on other writings, working on painting. Yes, I impulsively bought much paint and canvas and have been making a horrible mess — but I’ve been having fun.

[The script is the same as before. Again, each log is a new page, and again there is another torn introductory note that reads:]
 

We have been speaking plenty in person, now that you have recovered from your fever, so much of the stuff I would otherwise write in a report to you feels redundant at best. Still, I have found that there is much to say.

[The script is, overall, ostentatious. Overtly curly and perhaps hard to read, and it’s almost as if the author was already wishing to write his next sentence before the first had finished. With each log, a fresh page begins, but lying on top of them all is a torn slip of parchment that reads:]

Clay looks at the pie on the table, poking at it. The crust was soft and the apples inside seemed to have been cooked too long. The lad pouts and grabs his coin pouch and basket before moving out of the kitchen and towards the markets of Bree. He pauses here and there as his eyes spot wild herbs. A collection of mint and small onions cover the bottom of his basket as he makes it into the gates, his feet carrying him with springy steps over the stone paved roads. 

Clay tosses and turns on the straw-filled bed he was currently laying on before twisting to look toward the fireplace in the room. Soft snores came from beside him as Ashnell slept, ever on guard in case Brikan or even worse horrors came to find Clay as he slept. Even if the room had not been asked about there were many that wished to keep the boy safe and sharing a bed was the far least of his troubles. The heat of the fire never seemed to warm the bed anyway. 

Ecladhreth flings himself out of the chair and rushes for the kitchen door his feet slipping before he makes it out. He hits the stairs and gets up the sound of boots behind him. He  whistles for his mare and climbs on her as soon as she is close the feeling of a hand grabbing for his belt causing him a bit of panic. He nudges her into a hard gallop and holds on as he rushes towards the gate, the sound of hooves behind him. He makes it out and heads towards the fields where Wyetta has gone earlier.

   Eclad moves to the stables, his head pounding and his eyes beyond sore. He curls up in the piles of dry dusty hay and rests his arm over his eyes. A few tears ran down along his freckled cheeks as he did his best to take deep breaths, willing the headache to leave and go back to whatever pit it came from. Each sound around him was a new needle pressed into his scalp, each flicker of a lamp caused his eyes to scream. He was not a drunkard nor injured, no this was just how life was. The days of pain came and went.