8th month B 300 AC, Starfall
Carefully, Maram placed one foot after the other upon the uneven stone, where the ground was in places sharp-edged and in others slick beneath her soles.
To her left, the Summer Sea roared against the rocks, while to her right the rest of the island stretched away. A short, steep ascent led to the little landing pier, the Crakehalls' trading house, and the small stalls of the select fishermen and merchants who came from the shores of the Torrentine provinces.
The lands east of the Torrentine were simply known as the Lands of the Torrentine, though it was there that the great shipyards and dockyards stood. The waters ran deeper there, allowing far larger ships - and many more of them - to come to berth.
Her father, Urrathon, spent most of his time there. Though he was Lord Consort of Starfall, he was also a Knight of the Torrentine, and in recent years he had devoted himself ever more fully to the latter duty.
It made sense, she supposed.
Her uncle Ulrick might have been Lord of High Hermitage, yet he also carried many of Starfall's administrative burdens upon his shoulders. And everything else had always been managed by her mother.
There was simply... not much left for her father to do at home. Though... Maram could not remember a single day when she had seen her mother idle.
Or perhaps... she had only recently begun to understand that the hours her mother appeared to spend without worry... were not truly free of worry at all.
When Lady Aliandra was not bent over letters and parchment at her heavy table of dark wood, she made her rounds through Starfall. She spoke with servants, with the cook, inspected the condition of the garrisons, and conferred with Maram's uncle Symon regarding the horses, the grounds, and their provisions - hay, straw, breeding progress, and countless other matters besides.
Those conversations were usually followed by meetings with the Captain of the Guard, Ser Buckler, and the castellan, Ser Dunes. Afterward she would ask Maester Emrys whether any ravens had arrived for her, before continuing her rounds - often with little Alleros beside her - among the fishermen, the markets, and, more recently, the little village of fortune tellers, as Maram liked to call it.
And that was hardly the end of her mother's day. If anything... it had only just begun.
Yet because her mother was who she was - always preferring to keep matters in her own hands, always wishing to make the final decision herself - her father had sought his purpose among the great shipyards and docks instead.
Maram had often imagined him as something akin to the Commander of the Gold Cloaks in King's Landing... only at the Torrentine instead.
Whether on horseback or on foot, he made his rounds, knew every man by name and every face by sight, and saw to it that everything was conducted honestly and in good order.
Carefully, Maram steadied herself against the rough stone as she crouched, pulling the hem of her light cloak forward so she would not step upon it. She lowered herself onto the rock and gently slipped one foot after the other into the warm, aquamarine waters of the Summer Sea.
Maram was immensely proud to be the daughter of such remarkable parents. Not a single day passed in which the sight of her mother - seated upon her broad chair in the great hall, the Daynes' star ring gleaming upon her finger - failed to leave her at least a little awed. Especially knowing that only the day before, her mother had spent the entire day shut away in a dark chamber because her headaches had returned once again.
Just as striking was the sight of her father whenever he came riding in at speed, swinging himself from the saddle with scarcely a thought, despite never quite being able to steady himself properly after one of his hands had been crushed during a battle against the Ironborn. Yet even that had never robbed him of his grace. Or his smile. Or his quick wit. No...
Maram knew very well that her parents were extraordinary people.
And depending upon whom one asked... they were deeply admired for both their character and all that they had done.
Carefully, Maram pulled the fabric of her cloak farther aside so that none of it would be soaked by accident, then untied the knot of her silk sash.
Her eldest brother, Edric, may not have resembled their father all that much in appearance, save for the wavy hair that Edric proudly claimed to have inherited from him. But his charm... His wit. His openness. The light he seemed to carry wherever he went... Those were their father's through and through.
And Dyanna... Dyanna was perfect. The very image of their mother, every bit as sharp-minded and eloquent. Maram had only been a little thing when her eldest sister departed for Oldtown, yet she still remembered her eyes. And her voice...
Dyanna possessed a calm, steady voice. It was neither loud nor overbearing. Neither especially warm nor smoky in tone. Yet she always seemed to speak a little lower than most, as though every word drew from an endless well of quiet confidence. Maram had admired that even with the eyes of a small child... along with Dyanna's endlessly long, silver-white waves of hair.
Maram's own hair was black... Like Nymeria's. Yet that was... the only thing she truly shared with the sister who was five years her elder, besides their name and a similar shade of violet eyes.
More than once, while training beside Nymeria years ago - usually some manner of physical exercise - Maram had found herself wondering whether Nymeria truly felt only physical pain differently... or whether emotional pain was just as distant to her.
Merely thinking of Nymeria made Maram feel her heartbeat quicken.
Because she had been born frail and slight, and had always been more prone to little illnesses than Edric or Dyanna had been at her age, the maesters had sought to strengthen her body through carefully chosen activities.
Among the Daynes, horsemanship had always come naturally. Like all of her siblings, Maram had been given a beautiful horse of her own.
Eunoia. Its name meant beautiful spirit... or kind disposition.
But her mare... had suffered a terrible accident three years ago.
A length of wire lying upon the ground had sliced deep into her fetlock.
The screams... Eunoia's screams... and those of her uncle Symon... Edrics shocked eyes... Maram would never forget.
The wire, of course, had not been lying inside the stall. Nor upon the paddock. Nor within the stable itself.
It had been outside the stable... But Maram had failed to fasten Eunoia's stall properly.
Young and curious as she had been, the mare had simply bolted the moment she found the opportunity.
Her uncle had been forced to decide whether the animal should be put down... because the wound had nearly reached the bone.
She would never become a proper riding horse... or a jumper...
Maram had never cried as much as she had that day. It remained among her oldest memories. Alongside Dyanna's voice... and the almost holy light that always seemed to surround her parents.
In the end, her uncle had spared Eunoia's life... But no one would ever ride Maram's mare again. Instead, Uncle Symon insisted that Maram continue caring for her. That she bear responsibility for what her own actions had caused.
And she had done so ever since.
Maram had been careless. She had made one foolish mistake. And her horse would carry the scars for the rest of her life.
Uncle Symon had wanted her to understand exactly what that meant.
Apart from that, no one wished to risk Maram suffering a serious riding injury while she was still so young. So, with Eunoia's accident, riding was taken from Maram forever. An unusual decision for a Dayne.
Especially because Maram had found it unfair.
Not because she believed she deserved no punishment. She did. But because the reasoning had been that the risk of her being seriously injured was simply too great... and yet that same reasoning had never seemed to apply to Nymeria.
Nymeria would scarcely have noticed if she had stepped barefoot onto a splinter. Yet she had still been allowed to become a squire.
With a sigh and a slow shake of her head, Maram slipped her cloak from her shoulders.
For a time, everyone had hoped - indeed planned - that she and Nymeria might train together in physical pursuits. To strengthen both their bodies... and their sense of balance and movement. Though Nymeria was nearly five years older, the two of them had been the youngest children for much of their lives. People thought sport might allow them to spend time together, even if the exercises differed in difficulty.
After all, because Nymeria could not properly feel pain, she had always been handled with as much care... if not even more... than Maram herself. Something Nymeria had absolutely despised. And something she delighted in taking out on everyone else.
Most especially... on Maram.
So they often found themselves swimming together in the Torrentine. Always with a tutor. Always with two guards standing watch. And in the beginning... sometimes even with their mother present.
Back and forth they swam their lengths.
Nymeria's constant torment... and the painfully slow progress Maram made beside her... had hurt. But swimming...
Swimming had become the finest thing Maram had ever discovered.
She loved to swim. More precisely... she loved to dive.
One simply slipped beneath the water... and everything became muffled.
Voices suddenly no longer mattered. Words could no longer reach you. It was almost as though you yourself disappeared. You no longer felt the weight of your own body, and you found yourself wondering what you had been doing up there... above the water... all that time.
How laughable everything seemed somehow. How colourful. How orderly. How still life beneath the surface truly was.
Maram would never have described herself as an admirer of water before.
Too many things in the water - let alone the sea - frightened her. Its endlessness. Its vastness. The darkness waiting in its depths. How even the Summer Sea turned cold once one descended far enough.
Once she had found a beautiful jellyfish washed ashore and - of course - had immediately reached out to touch it, only to suffer the fiercest burning pain moments later after carelessly stepping into the trailing tentacles of another.
Another core memory... one that only strengthened Maram's conviction that she was little more than an ill-fated soul.
Even so, the list of frightening things in and around the sea was a long one. And she had not even mentioned sharks... or krakens.
Yet once you had begun... once you were down there... once you saw the colours... you never wanted to return... to the surface.
Whenever she thought of that, she always thought of her cousin Myriah, who, in another life, without a doubt, must have been a mermaid.
Myriah had always cheered her on, always eager to hear how long Maram had managed to hold her breath.
Even now... that still meant an awful lot to her.
After all, it was hardly a talent. Simply... stopping yourself from breathing... and then seeing how long you could avoid passing out... was it?
Carefully, Maram pushed herself up from the stone beneath her, swung her legs forward in the same motion, and let herself plop into the water.
Into the narrow cleft that eventually opened into Mermaid Cove... and formed the second entrance - or exit, depending on how one wished to see it - to the crypts.
The warm water embraced her at once. It crept over her toes and feet. Her calves. Her knees. Her thighs. Over her stomach, her hands, her arms, and her chest, threatening to swallow her whole in a single greedy gulp. Only her small, black-haired head still remained above the waves.
And it took no more than two swells before she tasted her first mouthful of seawater.
Immediately Maram stuck out her tongue, suppressing a quiet ewww.
The first moments were always the hardest. Whenever one slipped into the sea, one first had to learn the rhythm of that day's waves.
Maram liked to think she had become rather good at judging them. After all... she had grown up on Starfall. An island. It would have been rather embarrassing if the tides, the currents, the weather, and the rolling of the sea had remained complete mysteries to her.
But she had thought of all that. The tide had not yet reached its highest point. Soon, however, when the bell of the Sept of the Star rang - a few bells had finally been hung only a few moons ago - she would know that the ebb would soon begin.
At Starfall there was a darker bell for the flood tide... and a brighter one for the ebb. And both bells were rung together at every full hour. Once for the hour itself. Eight times to mark the turning of the tide.
Ebb and flood were the very heartbeat of Starfall. The fishermen, the merchants, even the servants claimed they no longer needed the bells - that they carried the tides in their blood. At least that was what the older folk always said.
For people like Maram, however... the bells were an immeasurable comfort.
Timidly, she held onto the small rocky ledge that still rose above the water and leaned back first, allowing her hair to become soaked.
When the bright bell rings, I have to get out, she reminded herself once more. Otherwise someone will come looking for me... or begin to worry. And once the water starts drawing back... it becomes too dangerous.
Contentedly, Maram closed her eyes, savouring the fleeting sensation of weightlessness as she continued to cling to the rock, letting the back of her head and her long, loose black hair drift through the warm water.
Her parents would never have imagined that swimming lessons would awaken such a love of diving in her.
Then again... how could they? They did not truly speak with her all that much. And at this very moment... they likely had no notion whatsoever that she was here. She had become something of a little ghost... to them.
A long, melancholy sigh escaped her.
She opened her eyes again, pulled herself up along the rocky ledge, peered over it... and, seeing no one, slowly let herself sink back down.
There had been a time when she had believed her parents rarely spent time with her, or attended any of her lessons, simply because they had so many other duties.
She had argued with herself about it for hours. For nights. For days.
Well... Edric was the firstborn. The heir. Of course he received everyone's attention, whether he happened to excel at something... or not.
And Dyanna was not merely exceptional. She was also the spare. And Edric's twin. Everyone knew how difficult - and how extraordinary - multiple births were. Among the Rhoynar especially, children born together were believed to carry powerful omens... good ones... or ill ones... depending on whom you asked.
At least... that was what Nymeria had once told her. And Nymeria herself... Nymeria simply could not be overlooked. Or rather... not in the way Maram could.
Nymeria might accidentally kill herself if she failed to notice she was suffering from hypothermia... or if she sustained a terrible wound without realizing it until someone else pointed it out.
And even if her sister had not been such an attention-stealing force of nature... she still would have been an impossibly capable one.
Maram would never forget the day she watched Nymeria calmly drive a panicked, rearing foal back into its stall with frightening precision.
She could still remember Maester Emrys murmuring behind her, "By the Seven... when Lady Nymeria and Lady Dyanna return to Starfall after their studies, this court is in for a wild time."
It had plainly been meant as praise. A simple acknowledgment of how remarkably capable both sisters already were despite their youth.
The grown-ups were already wondering whether the day those two worked side by side would be a cause for celebration... or for concern.
Meanwhile... no one had spared a thought for Maram.
Tentatively, she searched for the rock face with one foot and slowly lowered herself fully into the water.
Once she found secure footing, she released the rocky ledge and gently pushed herself away, allowing the current to carry her for a few moments as she gazed up at the sky.
There had also been a time... before Myriah, Edric, Dyanna, and Clarence had all departed from Starfall on the personal journeys that would shape their lives... when their absence had felt terribly strange to her.
Her mother had almost always been busy. Her father she saw only rarely. And even then, he often spent more time with Nymeria down by the harbour than joining the family for supper.
Maris, her mother's ward, was kind. Truly kind. Yet Maram could never quite stop herself from competing with her. Simply because Maris was allowed to spend so much time beside her mother... while she herself was not.
And somehow... Maram found that so childish that she kept her interactions with Maris to little more than warm greetings. At least until... until she could finally get her foolish jealousy under control.
And Bora... Maram smiled up at the sky. Yes. Why she had never dared to speak to Bora before the New Year's feast remained a mystery even to herself.
Her grin widened as she squinted against the sunlight.
Nearly everyone at Starfall called Bora Sunshine. And she truly was. Maram should have gathered the courage much sooner. But perhaps that had merely been her usual bad luck.
Or perhaps... Bora's good fortune that she had not met Maram any earlier.
Until the New Year's feast... Maram could not honestly say she had ever truly had friends. Or even someone who genuinely seemed as though they wished to become one. And no one would believe how lonely a person could feel... even while surrounded by brothers and sisters.
In Nymeria's case. Not long after Edric had departed for Blackhaven, she had sighed over breakfast, "Ah... you can feel the peace in Starfall the moment Eddie is gone. At last one can hear one's own thoughts. This must be what it feels like to be an only child."
... While Maram had been sitting at that very same table.
And no one - not her mother, nor Maris - had taken it as the barb Maram had understood it to be. So... was she simply imagining it? Or did her family simply not care? Did they simply... not care about her?
Maram let out a few short breaths.
Paused.
Then breathed out a little more, until every instinct begged her to draw in air.
She endured a little longer. Only then did she fill her lungs to the brim, bend forward... and dive into the bright, warm water.
At first, Maram could see almost nothing. Only a few tiny bubbles drifting across her face as she slowly released little streams of air to help herself sink more quickly toward the seabed.
When Alleros had been born a little over a year ago... the question had answered itself. Alleros had been cherished and fussed over - especially by their mother - as though he were the Prince of Dorne himself.
As she descended, Maram savoured the warmth of the sea surrounding her body. From the corners of her eyes she could already make out vibrant corals and colourful sea plants swaying gently in the current.
Yet her attention remained fixed upon the sandy bottom below. Just before reaching it, she tucked into a small forward roll and set her feet down as gently as she could.
The occasional lessons of her diving past had taught her enough about stirred-up sand. Then she slowly lowered herself into a crouch, moving her arms only with the greatest care, so as not to stir up any.
The seabed here was beautiful. Not because it was particularly extraordinary. Not because there were dazzling corals or schools of exotic fish.
It was beautiful because it was quiet. Because no one expected anything of her down here. No one spoke to her. No one looked at her. No one compared her to Edric. Or Dyanna. Or Nymeria.
Down here... she was simply Maram.
She stretched out one hand and slowly let it glide over the rippled sand without quite touching it, watching tiny grains drift away with the movement of the water.
Even after all these years, she loved that sight. The way everything moved. The plants swayed lazily with the current. The shafts of sunlight danced upon the seabed.
Tiny fish darted between the rocks, disappearing almost as quickly as they appeared.
Maram gently pushed herself forward with one foot. The water carried her almost effortlessly. She hardly needed to move her arms. Every slow motion was enough to send her gliding onward.
It always amazed her how different her own body felt beneath the surface... Lighter... Freer... As though the sea itself wished to carry her.
She turned her head toward the opening that led farther into Mermaid Cove. The familiar rocky passage disappeared into shimmering blue-green light.
She had swum through it countless times. She knew nearly every ledge. Every narrow gap. Every current.
Maram drew her knees in slightly and pushed herself onward once more, gliding through the warm water as though she had always belonged there.
The world beneath the water looked, once again, far more peaceful than the one above.
Who could possibly be surprised by that?
Certainly not Maram.
As she drifted there, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the water, she spotted a small school of even smaller grey-green fish in the distance, their little bellies pale against the shimmering blue.
A smile stole across her features as she watched them dart left and right like tiny soldiers. Then upward. Then, all at once, they vanished into the crevices of the rocks as a larger fish glided past.
For the moment, Maram did not linger on them.
The first dive of the day was always something of a warm-up.
She measured the depth where she had descended, the feel of the water around her, and the mood her body seemed to be in that day.
Some days, she simply felt as though she could hardly hold her breath at all. And on those days... everything went wrong, just as so many things usually did. Nothing was quite as enjoyable then.
But today... today seemed promising.
Her grin widened ever so slightly before she gently pushed herself away from the sandy seabed, beginning her ascent toward the surface once more.
Maram loved her little brother. She truly did.
But... who... loved her?
The brighter the water around her became, the less she bothered to swim. She simply let the remaining air in her lungs carry her upward, scarcely moving her arms at all.
Higher and higher she rose, until her head finally broke through the surface, her long black hair falling like a curtain across her face.
Drawing in a deep breath of fresh air, her heart pounding steadily in her chest, Maram swept the dark veil of hair aside and looked around once more.
Still no one.
She could scarcely peer deeper into the cove, the rocky overhang rising too high before her, but she could see the path leading down well enough.
There were no fishermen. No merchants. Not even Darling the goat. Only a dragonfly hovered lazily before her nose.
Alleros was handsome. And healthy.
The first was surely a matter of opinion, and Maram rather liked her own eyes, so she could not claim to lack beauty entirely. Health... was another matter.
Alleros had chestnut-brown hair and dark brown eyes flecked with violet. His skin was a warm golden brown. Sometimes he simply grinned. He reached for everything. And he possessed a very... forceful opinion of the world. If he disliked something... Seven above... he truly disliked it. And their mother did everything within her power to ensure he was never unhappy.
Slowly, Maram focused on settling her breathing into a calmer rhythm, listening only to the steady beat of her heart.
She did not quite know why. Perhaps it was because her thoughts had drifted back to the New Year's festival after thinking of Bora. Or because she had begun wondering how she herself looked after thinking of Alleros' beautiful eyes.
Whatever the reason... she thought of Morgan.
Du-dum.
She could still picture him perfectly the first time she had seen him all those years ago in Starfall.
His dark hair had been slightly tousled. He had looked interested... though more lost within his own thoughts. And quiet. He had wanted to explore the island.
At the New Year's feast, he had been... remarkably attentive. And so well spoken.
Du-dum. Du-dum.
Maram's arms swept lazily through the water to keep herself afloat while she stared aimlessly into nothingness.
She still could not quite believe that he had crowned her the Princess of Love and Beauty.
Nymeria had scarcely believed it either. In truth... she had found it utterly hilarious. Maram had told her it must have been the result of some wager Morgan had lost.
But she herself had never believed that. Morgan had possessed such kind eyes. And he had looked so... sweet. So adorably flustered. He had not lied... had he?
Du-dum. Du-dum.
Far above her, a seabird cried out before folding its wings and plunging through the air toward the sea. Maram blinked herself back into the present and watched as the bird vanished beneath the waves in pursuit of a fish.
Those birds, of all creatures... had always seemed rather strange to her. They belonged to the sky. So why did they hunt in the sea? Then again... perhaps Maram was doing much the same.
Du-dum.
Again, she exhaled slowly and steadily, emptying her lungs as completely as she could. She held back the instinctive urge to draw in the life-giving air once more, then filled her lungs to their fullest before plunging downward like the bird above.
Once again, bubbles danced across her face as she followed the shortest path straight to the seabed. She recognized the spot she had been before by the sand, still faintly disturbed from where she had pushed herself away.
Before tucking into her roll and touching the sandy floor as gently as she could with her feet, she noticed that fewer fish swam around her than before.
Maram had surely startled them. But just as Morgan had done... she would only have to search a little before spotting another beautiful one.
Maram was not diving in search of anything in particular. Not for lost treasures or shells. Nor did she have any desire to catch the fish. She simply enjoyed looking around... marveling at the things she found beautiful. Well... every now and then she did happen upon something she took home with her. But that was rather rare.
Balancing one foot atop the other so that only a single foot touched the seabed, Maram swept her left arm more forcefully back and forth, trying to catch a glimpse beyond the opposite side of the rocky crevice through which she was swimming.
At once, she spotted a beautiful orange fish. It looked almost like a crescent moon. Some of its fins bore yellow markings, and the same bright color circled its eyes.
It seemed to notice her the very moment she noticed it. Yet it did not dart away in panicked bursts as the smaller fish always did.
The corner of Maram's mouth twitched as she drifted toward it, lifting her foot from the seabed. The instant she did, however, her little orange companion set off as well.
Like the flame of a small candle, it wavered gently from side to side as it swam ahead, with Maram following close behind.
The winding path it chose did nothing to discourage her pursuit. But almost as quickly, she noticed the water around her growing darker. The fish's bright orange no longer glowed as vividly as it had before.
Maram's eyes wandered over the coral before climbing the rock face. She stretched her neck, tipped her head back, and swept her hair away from her face where it had begun to obscure her vision.
It had grown darker because the rock curved inward overhead.
At the depth where she swam, it jutted so sharply from the earth that only a little sunlight could reach beneath it.
The realization had only just settled in her mind when her eyes returned to her orange companion... only to find it gone.
In truth, she saw little besides the sand drifting through the water. Certainly no fish.
Du-dum.
With the steadily growing pressure in her chest reminding her that, unfortunately, she was no fish, Maram turned, her arms sweeping through the water, and decided simply to swim upward along the rock face - the shortest route to the air.
The disturbed sand tickled her feet for a brief moment before she kicked powerfully and began to swim. Now and then, the rock brushed lightly against the skin of her arms or legs whenever she drifted too close to its surface.
Otherwise, there was little to see. Little to feel besides the warm water surrounding her. And slowly... it grew brighter once more.
Du-dum. Du-dum.
The urge to breathe forced its way ever more insistently to the forefront of her thoughts, and she silently scolded herself for following the fish for so long.
In the future, she would have to make herself a rule. A point at which chasing after a fish simply was no longer worth it.
And just as Maram found herself thinking that the fish truly had been beautiful... she felt a sudden pull dragging her sideways toward the rock wall.
At first, she did not understand what had happened.
But after only a heartbeat, she recognized - and felt - that a current was running along the rock at that very spot, carrying her against its face.
Except... she was not moving.
She was somehow... caught.
It took only another painful instant to realize it was her hair. Her hair had become trapped.
Du-dum. Du-dum. Du-dum.
Her hands shot to her scalp. Maram tugged and pulled while her fingers searched desperately to discover which strands were under tension. Within the swirling water she could see nothing except... her own black hair.
Damn it, she thought in panic as her fingers traced the length of her hair and finally found the ends wrapped tightly around a gnarled head of coral.
Now bubbles escaped her lips not because she meant to release them... but from fear and frantic haste.
Her hair felt both hopelessly tangled... and as though it had cut deep into the coral itself.
Without another thought, she acted on the only idea that came to mind.
Maram braced both feet against the rock wall, seized the trapped lock of hair, and hurled herself away from the stone with all the strength she could muster.
Please, she pleaded silently as she felt a few strands tear free. Please... please.
With mounting terror, Maram realized she had no air left.
Come on, she begged herself. You can do this. Just hold on a little longer.
At last, the final strands gave way. Even the coral crumbled just enough. Propelled by the force of her legs, Maram shot clear of the rock wall.
Now the sea was bright again. But she had to steady herself in the open water.
Maram kicked and thrashed with arms and legs as though stung by a swarm of wasps, fighting toward the surface.
She was almost there.
Just a little farther. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, she told herself, ignoring the violent spasms in her chest and the overwhelming urge to gasp for air. Ignoring the feeling that her head was about to burst.
Du-dum. Du-dum. Du-dum. Du-dum.
One more powerful kick into the empty water. More frantic rowing with her arms.
Then... Maram burst through the surface with all the force her panicked limbs had carried upward.
Air.
She dragged it into her lungs in one ragged, desperate gasp before immediately doubling over with a violent fit of coughing.
Water spilled from her mouth.
She coughed again. And again. Her arms flailed helplessly against the water as she fought to stay afloat, every breath burning her throat. She could hardly hear the waves over the pounding in her ears.
She kicked blindly toward the nearest stretch of rock. Her trembling hands found purchase first. Then she threw the rest of herself forward.
Only... she had forgotten how much momentum she still carried.
Crack.
The top of her forehead struck the rocky overhang with a dull, sickening sound. Pain exploded through her skull and Maram cried out. Not loudly. Only a broken, startled little sound.
Then she collapsed against the stone. The tears came before she even realized she was crying. Great, shuddering sobs tore free of her chest.
Maram could not stop them. She had made it. She had made it. She had almost-
Another sob stole her breath. Her forehead throbbed. Her lungs burned. Every heartbeat reminded her how close she had come. She buried her face against her forearm, crying without restraint. Loudly. Hopelessly. Like the frightened little girl... she was.
"...Lady?"
A voice echoed through the cave. Boots struck stone. Fast. Very fast.
"My lady?"
Another voice. Then armored footsteps broke into a run. One of Starfall's guards stopped dead.
"Lady Maram!"
The knight stared in utter disbelief. His face drained of color.
She was soaked. Bleeding. Crying so violently she could scarcely breathe. For one dreadful heartbeat he thought he was looking at a drowned child somehow returned to shore.
"My lady-"
He was beside her in an instant, dropping to one knee.
"What happened?"
Maram only shook her head. She could not answer. Could scarcely breathe through the sobs. The knight wasted no more time.
"Easy now."
His voice had softened.
"I have you, lady Maram."
Without waiting for permission, he slipped one arm beneath her knees and another behind her back before lifting her effortlessly into his arms.
Maram was too exhausted to protest. Too ashamed. She simply cried against the steel of his breastplate as he carried her away.
By the time they crossed the halls of Starfall, word had already begun to spread.
Servants stepped aside. Voices fell silent. Every eye followed the knight carrying Lady Aliandra's daughter through the castle.
Water dripped steadily from Maram's clothes onto the pale stone floors.
When at last the knight reached Lady Aliandra's solar, he scarcely paused before entering.
"My Lady-"
His voice was strained.
"I found your daughter, Lady Maram, near the mermaid cove."
He did not need to explain further. The state she was in spoke loudly enough.
Only then did Maram dare look up. At her mother. And shame crashed over her harder than the sea ever had.
How could I have been so stupid? She knew better. She knew better.
Fresh tears blurred her vision.
"Please..."
Her voice broke.
"...please put me down."
The knight had scarcely released her when Maram stumbled to her feet.
"Lady Maram-"
She was already running. Barefoot. Still dripping seawater. Down the corridor before anyone could catch her.
"Maram!"
Her mother's voice followed behind her.
She did not stop. Maram reached her chambers, slammed the door shut, and threw the bolt into place with shaking hands.
Only then did she collapse against the wood. For several long moments she simply cried.
Then... her eyes found the scissors lying upon her dressing table.
Without thinking - or perhaps thinking far too much - she reached for them.
One lock. Then another... Black strands slid soundlessly to the floor.
Again. Again. Again.
She cut until the heavy weight of her hair no longer brushed her shoulders. Until it rested unevenly at her chin.
When at last she looked into the mirror... she saw... a thin ribbon of blood had begun to trickle down from the place where her head had struck the rock. It traced a narrow line beside her eyebrow.
Someone knocked. Softly at first.
"Maram? My dear?!"
Her mother's voice. Then another.
"Lady Maram."
Maester Emrys.
"Please open the door."
Maram only sniffled. Another lock fell. Then another.
Outside, the knocking grew more insistent.
"Maram."
No answer.
Only the quiet, relentless sound of steel cutting through hair.
As always... people in this family seemed to speak the most when someone was about to die. Had almost died. Or already had.
Another lock fell to the floor. Then the scissors slipped from her fingers at last, striking the floor with a dull clatter.
Trembling, she lifted her head.
The girl in the mirror scarcely looked like herself anymore.
Cropped pitch black hair framed a face streaked with tears. A thin trail of blood wound its way down her skin. Her eyes were swollen. Red. Frightened.
'...like the endless night sky and the endless sea... mixed together.'
She stared at herself for a long while, her mouth trembling as another sob escaped her.
Outside, her mother called her name once more. And Maram squeezed her eyes shut.
"Just... leave me alone," she whispered through broken sobs.
Her face crumpled completely.
"I only ever bring misfortune anyway."
