Atlantic Roleplay Community Boards

[Arahim]

---

Arahim slept as he had never once slept since or before.

In his wakeless state, voices soared all about him. Filling an expanse both empty, and resonant, and yet warm, and full. A deep age upon it.

A story told over and over.

A solidity mingled with a tradition that was not his, but welcomed him as a long lost family member who had held moments in which he understood the unspoken, but could never quite repeat them, and, try as he might, could never truly claim them as his own.

Song stretched itself, male and female, deep and sonorous.

High pitched as from a dreamed again heaven.

Cacaphonous, and yet blended perfectly, tinged with a far fetched hope.

Touched with despair.

The carol filled him, as it filled the empty stone spaces he dreamed of, but had never really seen. Colored light, blues and yellows draped lazily upon him, eager to show him a path, but reluctant to change what was his. Reluctant to taint what it was that made her love him.

Lives so born apart.

Her gift was her life as she had always known it to be, and a complicity to include him, no matter where their intertwined paths lead them.

Her gift lay cold upon his neck. A gift bearing their only child's name.

A tiny part of the life she knew not too long ago, bared naked and taken into his trust willingly.

Christopher Sherwood.

A sworl of dreams, slowly chanted music echoing within a place of quiet worship at a time when man stopped and noticed his fellow man...

Repeating pleasantly in his mind,

"Thou little tiny child."

[Sylvan Sherwood]

---

Glowing remnants of the fires that filled the various braziers and stoves throughout the house bore the only light, lending an almost other worldly glow to the chill white marble. But this night, there were none awake to appreciate the ethereal feel throughout the residence shared by the small family.

Christopher lay in his tiny bed, dreaming the dreams of innocent children.

On the other side of the curtain slept his parents, weary from the day's festivities and reverent celebration. Sylvan never realized how difficult it could be, to explain 'her' Christmas to someone from this world, though until recently she'd never really had the need or desire. But oh, how she wanted to share this with Arahim; her heart told her he would appreciate the many details.

The day had started early, with a predawn feast shared by the adults, with Sylvan having worked diligently in the kitchen since the tiny hours of night, all the while singing the carols of her homeland and not caring one whit that her grosgrain voice was hardly the pleasing soprano of a choir singer. The two moved languidly into exchanging gifts. Throughout this time, Sylvan shared the miracle of Christmas as celebrated at her birthplace and as she understood it. Her delight was not so very secret that she finally was able to celebrate in a way that was never part of her own family. Christmas for Sylvan had always been a secret, rebellious thing, among the dark magicians and necromancers of her youth.

It filled Sylvan with gladness to see Arahim so readily affix the medal of St. Christopher at his throat--again, she had paid a visit to the silversmith and dictated in great detail what she wanted. Experience had proved useful to the smith; he asked no questions even though the woman's requests were so odd. He knew he would be paid well, and he was.

Afterward, the couple gently woke Christopher, and Sylvan regaled the child with tales of Father Christmas and his gifts. Indulgently, Christopher's parents laughed and smiled as he ate his fill of sweet, honeyed rolls and other treats that Sylvan herself had prepared, in between excited bouts of playing with his many new toys. Eventually, the boy's energy sputtered and left him asleep on the rug surrounded by his haul. When Arahim lifted him to put him to bed, Christopher opened his eyes to tiny slits, smiling dreamily at his dad for the briefest of moments before succumbing again to rest.

As the weak sunlight died early on this night, here in the dead of Winter, so did the energy levels. Arahim and Sylvan shared a bottle of the Harvest Wine he'd brought home from a gypsy festival, and soon what little endurance they had was gone. To their own bed they went, hand in hand and once again feeling at one with each other.

Soon they slept. Sylvan dreamed of a field trip she had gone on with one of the many schools she'd attended. Blissfully, her dreaming mind was able to expunge the hurts of being expelled time and time again for things well beyond her control. In the dream she stood in the churchyard of St. Paul's Cathedral, probably the most beautiful in all of London. There were snowflakes dancing lazily down, a little gift from Heaven. In the way that dreams create, she was suddenly inside, looking up at the dome and the many beautiful stained glass windows--unable to choose what to study first, trying to take everything in much as she had that day of the visit. In the choir loft, the Coventry Carol was being sung, sounding as if all the angels of Heaven had descended into this place for the enjoyment of the uniformed schoolgirls standing in awe below. The dreaming girl that Sylvan was wiped a tear from her eye quickly, before the other, cruel girls could see; this was the beauty of a dream. Sometimes, this time included, hurts could be erased, rearranged. As the Carol wore on, Sylvan realized that she was now grown, her face still tilted upward to the dome, and she did not care that another tear fell.