Alura | The Alura Trilogy, Book 1 [She-Ra 2018] ✔

30 | Another Way

Song: "Night Without a Star" by Adrian Von Ziegler

You wanted me to be a quiet ocean of goodness and servitude, Mother, and it is a noble goal. But I'm tired of the world trying to stop me, slapping my hand away for the tools I was given. I'm sick of my loved ones leaving me because the approval of my oppressors is worth more to them, as was true with Nell. I'm weary of having a father who's a coward. I must have a breakthrough, or I will go insane from sorrow. There are too many cracks in my vase.

❂❂❂

Light Spinner laid on the bed in the guest bedroom of the Great Hall, staring blankly upward, tears dripping down her face and her nose running behind her veil. He would not stay gone forever, she knew. And knew well she did, for after a half-hour he entered the room, exhausted and appearing older than his sixty-four years. They stared at each other: Light Spinner glaring out from a face smeared with black, and Norwyn with weary lines beneath those endlessly deep eyes that she had once trusted as a child.

She had envisioned this confrontation as her fists colliding with his face again and again, or perhaps her bringing herself to tell him she hated him. But the words wouldn't come. She shuddered and turned to the wall, speaking through a stuffy nose. "I don't want to talk with you."

"Light Spinner, I can explain - "

She scowled. "Stop lying. You can't, and we both know it. There are some things that can't be healed."

She stood and turned around, breathing heavily, igniting her light, but she didn't have the will to fire it at the old satyr. "It was you who blamed me for all my problems with my father. You hid the Spell-scroll from me. When Ántonin died, you never told me he died of a broken heart because he couldn't have me. Because you hid me from him and never told me he was there, waiting for me with open arms."

"I was trying to protect you from him!" Was that...desperation in his tone? Good, Light Spinner thought, a bitter smile gracing her veiled lips. I'm finally getting through to him. "I wanted to reunite you two, but I was...I was..."

A long pause. "Afraid," Light Spinner finished for him. "You were afraid. Afraid that you couldn't control me, that you would have to defend me from him if he was lying. Which he never would - my real father had a temper, and he hurt me, but he would never lie. And there is nothing worse in this world than a father who does deceive and refuses to defend his own daughter."

Norwyn winced. Light Spinner chuckled, the breath in her lungs cauterizing. "Believe me, I know what your fear does. I've been a victim of it ever since I came to Mystacor."

He stepped forward, but she lit more plasma in her hand. "I am not afraid, Norwyn. Not of myself, and not of you."

His calm demeanor melted before her eyes; it felt so good. Norwyn sputtered out his next words. "Light Spinner...please. We can come back from this. We can be a family - you, me, Micah, and Castaspella. We can reconcile if you just wait and don't rush into things that will kill you!"