He shook himself to toss off the spurs when the blanket came away, and looked steadily at his captors. Jon could not believe his eyes - for right before him stood his stepmother. She was barely older than himself - dressed completely in green with a circlet of pearls around her neck - he almost did not recognise her. Winding up her arm were three beaten gold bangles, with deer and rabbits embossed upon them here and there chasing each other around her arm - and her feet were sandalled as he had not seen before. A perfume reached out to him that was of musk and moss, and forest rain. She seemed to be in good health, and by his judgement, most affluent too.
“Mama”, he addressed her as he had been taught to do.
She fondly brushed the dirt from his shoulders and glanced at the group that had walked him to this hideaway place, and they fell back in obeisance, disappearing into the trees once again. Only the short monk remained.
“I live with the Elven community now”, she said affectionately - in a manner to put him at ease as quickly as possible. “They took me in and gave me everything I have.”
“Was this enchantment?” Jon asked himself - “Or a madness? Brain embargo? She had, after all, suffered so many blows to her head from Pa …”
“You should call me Isabelle - we both know that I am not truly your mother.” She was speaking plainly with a note of kindness and not in any way being immodest he noted. Thank the Gods. Isabelle appeared to be a relaxed and happy maiden, the likes he had not seen before.
Jon was much relieved to be pardoned from calling her ‘mother’. It had stung his tongue to have to name her such when he had missed his own true mother so sorely.
“Isabelle it is” he said, as he followed her deeper into the forest.
-Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses- Azlander Series
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