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Writers: Yvonne
Date Posted: 25th March 2016

Characters: Narona, Gillence
Description: Narona receives a letter from her wayward sister, Vell
Location: Emerald Falls Hold
Date: month 4, day 16 of Turn 8
Notes: Mentioned: Vell

"Mom! Mom!" Narona raced around the corner, nearly colliding with one of the other Hold women carrying a basket of fresh sheets. "Sorry!" she called, then continued to run down the hall in a most unlady-like fashion. Narona skidded to a stop outside the kitchen door and barged in. "Look!" She held up her hand, her fingers clenched around a bit of hide.

Gillence dropped her knife and stood up, spilling bits of tuber skin all over the floor. "Is that--"

"It's from Vell!" Narona's voice shook as she unfolded the scrap of hide. "Dear everyone. I am fine, and my runner Itch should be coming to you soon. I had to sell him, so you'll see him come through the Hold with some Traders headed over the mountains. Be kind to them and give them a good price if you're able. They were good to me. I just found a small Cothold that knew Yarron, but he'd been by before he came to us. I miss home. I miss you all terribly. Please don't be angry. I will find my husband, and when I do, I will fly home and never leave again. Your loving daughter, Vell." Narona paused. "See? She's all right!"

"Loving daughter?" Gillence snorted. "What sort of loving daughter leaves home and goes gallivanting around Pern like that, leaving her mother to fret herself to death?!"

"Ma..."

Gillence held out her hand for the letter and scanned it through again. "Not a hint to where she is. Nothing about what's happened to her. My daughter, out on the road alone like that-- I don't understand how she hasn't been murdered by Holdless yet. Or worse."

"She's fine. She says she's just fine." Narona put her hands over her mother's. "And clearly she hasn't been murdered."

"She might have been, after she wrote that flaming letter," Gillence muttered. She stared at the letter and dashed the back of her hand against her eyes. They were suspiciously wet. "I just wish she'd come home."

"Me too." Narona nibbled her bottom lip. "Do you think she'll ever find Yarron?"

"One dirty man in all of Pern? Unlikely. That tunnelsnake of a Harper is long gone, and good riddance to him." Gillence scowled and stuffed the letter into her apron pocket. "And don't you go telling your father about this."

"He ought to know--"

"And he will." Gillence pointed a finger at her daughter. "Promise me, Narona."

Narona stared rebelliously at her mother for a moment, then nodded. "Fine. But you have to show it to him before Itch comes through with the Traders or he'll have them dragged over to the Lord Holder for theft and murder quicker than /between/." She hesitated. "Have you shown him _any_ of the letters yet?"

Her mother's lips tightened. "Of course I have."

"What about Eron? Can I tell him?" Narona clasped her hands beneath her chin as she begged. A ridiculous thing for a woman of twenty Turns to do, but sometimes it worked. And there was no way that she could keep the latest news from her sister a secret. "Please? I have to tell someone..."

Gillence sighed and sat back down again in front of her pile of tubers. "Fine. But mind that he doesn't tell your father until I have a chance to break the news."

"Thank you!" Narona spun and was out the door almost as soon as the words had left her lips. Her mother stared after her, tracking her daughter's movements until she disappeared somewhere into the depths of the cothold -- and hopefully this daughter would return.

In the mean time, there was nothing else she could do but wait. Gillence blinked back tears and turned back to her pile of tubers. There was dinner to make. Life went on.

Last updated on the April 4th 2016

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