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Ria sat on the bench her father had helped to build for her aunt's garden and just looked at all the different flowers that had been planted. She liked it here and often sat here to think. She understood her father's desire to get revenge for her mother's death, but the new information that her family hunted and killed beings that were not like them disturbed her as much as those cold, steely blue eyes she could not get out of her mind.
She let her mind settle on a bee as it went about the garden, collecting pollen from the flowers. She was not sure if this was one of the bees kept just outside the village, or if this was a wild bee, but as it flew past on the way to a garden belonging to someone else, her eyes fell on the cabin she had lived in with her father. An idea formed in her head, and she resolved to start visiting the cabin to see if she could find something that might give her answers to the questions she had. She was not sure how open her aunt would be to further questions and did not really want to wait too long to get answers.
A week had gone by, and there was no further talk of her father or what had happened to him. Ria discovered small groups of people in the village that trained to protect the villagers from outsiders that might intend harm and so joined a group of children who liked to watch these sessions. Not long afterward, she stumbled upon these same children, in the woods, doing the same things they had watched during training sessions. She decided to join them only to find out they were the children of hunters like her mother who had also lost a parent.
Ria got used to the schedule her aunt had and felt comfortable she would not be discovered when she would disappear to watch the training sessions then participate in the woods with the other children. She would also frequent her former home where she learned more about what Agnus had told her along with things she had yet to be told.
Ria would sometimes approach her Aunt Agnus with questions about things she had been told and wait to see if she would get an answer for stuff she had read in her parents' journals. Most of it was matching up, not that she did not believe what she was told or had read, but between the infrequent question and answer sessions with Agnus and the words Ria read, she would get a better understanding.
Time went by, and Ria had been keeping a journal she discovered her mother had bought for her with the intention of giving it to her. She recorded all her thoughts and plans and even how training sessions went. She got good and then better before she ended up leading the training sessions with her friends.
It had been several years, and Ria had only once attempted to bring up the man she saw in her dreams. At the time Agnus had quickly changed the subject, and so she never mentioned it again. She had managed to not say anything, not knowing that her aunt knew about the dreams that would frequently cause her to wake up. This night was different, though, as she was yelling at the man while still asleep.
Ria woke to find her aunt holding and rocking her while whispering soft soothing words to try and get her to wake up without being startled. It did not go as Agnus had planned. Ria was a bit alarmed, especially when she discovered her aunt knew about her dreams the whole time.
"I knew something was bothering you but when he brought you to me you were either sleeping or unconscious. I did not know what happened other than he killed your father and you had seen something. Even he was unsure what you had seen. He said you did talk to him but never told me what about," Agnus said in a nervous tone.
"I tried to talk to you the day it happened but you cut me off. There were so many times I wanted to ask about that day but did not know how to bring it up or even if I should," Ria replied with anger in her voice.
"I was not there and only know what I told you already. I did not think it appropriate to have such a conversation with someone as young as you were at the time," Agnus replied guiltily. "Do you remember anything from that day?" she asked almost as an afterthought.
Ria hung her head to hide the anger and the lie of her response, "No," she mumble and she watched as Agnus got up and left the room not sure if she should let the conversation end there but not willing to continue it either.
The next morning she got up before her aunt and headed into the woods to meet up with the friends she had been practicing with over the years. She let them know what she was going to do and made them promise to let her go alone. Before leaving she bid her friends farewell and left Torin in charge promising she would be back.
This is not quite done but it is getting longer than I anticipated when I started this.
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