Information

Nayome has a minion!

Simcha the Golden Goat

Nayome
Legacy Name: Nayome

The

Sweetheart Sheeta
Owner:

tendril

Age: 8 years, 9 months, 2 weeks

Born: July 9th, 2015

Adopted: 8 years, 9 months, 2 weeks ago

Adopted: July 9th, 2015

Statistics

Level: 1
Strength: 10
Defense: 10
Speed: 10
Health: 10
HP: 10/10
Intelligence: 0
Books Read: 0
Food Eaten: 0
Job: Unemployed

by User not found: catbreath

When I was taken outside of the village by my leery mother and father, I was put into the custody of an old blind woman. Our village believed that when one was cursed with an outward abnormality, like the woman's blindness, or my vitiligo, the gods had also blessed us in a way that couldn't be seen. They sent us away to be sages as soon as we became women by the cycle of the moon. The old woman's name was Shulamith and she could smell colors. She was a vibrant soul, always speaking her mind, spitting wit and truth. One evening when we were talking about the afterlife, she told me,
"When I die, don't bury me, but toss me in the ocean. I have always wanted to know what it would feel like to be as big as the sea, and to be needed by so many things."
And so I did.

Before Shulamith passed, she was my best friend and a great mentor. I was dropped in her lap at the supple and naive age of fourteen, and she fell from my arms four years later. In her yurt we had many conversations, about the universe, about the gods, about death, love, and soulmates. She believed we were soulmates, in the unconventional way. She believed my soul and her soul were friends long before our present life.
"The universe will not take me until you are ready, Nayome." She told me, "Have faith in yourself, in your strength, and in your mourning. Life will come again."

I suppose life did come again, two years later, in the form of Adlai.

Some say a cavalry corps,
some infantry, some, again,
will maintain that the swift oars

of our fleet are the finest
sight on dark earth; but I say
that whatever one loves, is.

Adlai came to me injured, as most people do. A war was being fought in a land I had never heard of and this man I had never met became wounded. But in some twisted, perhaps morbid way, I am ever so thankful for it.He was tall, very tall, six inches taller than me at least, and very broad. His skin was dark and almost copper. His hair was long, from being away, and his beard grew quickly. He was very quiet at first, just saying please, thank you, and telling lies when I asked if something hurt. Sometimes though, our eyes would meet and he did not look away. Then soon his humor shined through. I found him very entertaining; his banter was dark at times (which truthfully is my favorite, but it is rather unlady like of me, I suppose) and I did not hide my laughter from him.
But I was a healing sage, unallowed to marry, and unsure if I was deserving to, and he was a soldier, unallowed to stay.
By the next season he was healed enough that he felt he must return to his battalion, but asked if I wanted him to stay.
"I can't do that to you, Adlai. You know the answer as well as I, but I cannot allow my words to sound, to taunt you in your later thoughts."
He nodded and did not speak.
In a week's time, as I washed my clothes, I saw two ships coming towards the shore, and I knew precisely their intentions.
Adlai saw them not long after I did. He walked towards me, pulling my hand from the water and holding it in two of his.
"I will return as soon as I may."
"Be safe," I said "but just enough. I wouldn't mind you having an excuse."
We laughed together around our sadness and kept our goodbye short.

five decades later

A basket of freshly picked grapes sat beside me, and my wrinkled, sun spotted hands moved in harmony as I milked Simcha, my small goat. The sun was slowly falling through the sky and the salty breeze moved through my gray hair. From the pitcher I dipped a small amount of milk into my palm, and held it up to my mouth to taste. In it the flavor wild chives, which Simcha had grazed upon the day before, mingled with the flavor of the milk. I rose, kissed her forehead of coarse hair, and began returning to my yurt. As my old bones carried me slowly, I heard the whistle of a kingfisher.
Again, a kingfisher.
I turned to look for his vibrant feather, but instead I saw a tall, old man, walking up the beach. I waved to him, inviting him towards me, assuming he came to me to be healed. He waved back to me, and I changed my path, walking towards him instead.
“Hello,” I called out.
“Soon has finally come,” he said, “and none too early.”
His first words spoken were wrapped in familiarity; I recognized his smoky voice immediately. Adlai.
The basket of grapes fell from the hip I had been holding it against, and the pitcher of milk from my hand. Milk ran through the sandy grasses, and my feet ran through the milk, as my creaking bones moved faster than they had in many years.
We met by the dunes and held each other in an embrace of a lifetime.
“I was afraid you were dead,” I whispered into his chest.
“I was afraid you’d forgotten me.”
“Never, I thought of you in every sunset.”
“Please never again look at a sunset and think of me,” he held my head against his scruff covered chin. “For I will never leave you now. Instead I will always be the sunrise, coming back to you, as long as I live.”
Tears ran down my cheeks and into the sands -- tears ran down his cheeks and into my hair.

I took his hand, leading him back to the yurt in which I cared for him many moons ago. There he told me that after the war, he returned home, working as a carpenter, until several years later he married a woman who looked quite similar to me. About a year ago, she died, and Adlai took on the journey of finding me.
“I missed you, and thought of you so often,” he said “even when I was married. I felt so shameful of it, but I could not escape it, as if I knew I owed it to you, and to myself, because you saved my life.”
“I would love you even if I did not save your life, Adlai.”
Our emotions were truthful with one another for the first time.
“It is a greater love than can be just contained within one lifetime.” He nodded.

“We will never be apart again.”

- "some say..." quote by Sappho.
Pet Story Written by User not found: hare

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