Chapter 22: The compassion of a construct
Moonlight leaks through the windows of a small, tidy room situated in a quiet corner of East Market Inn. Soft, silver-lined shadows sneak across its floor boards as Arienne Gluurin, granddaughter and only surviving relative of the inn's owner, Lady Aribelle Gluurin, prepares herself for bed.
A sheer nightgown clung to her body like a shimmer of mist, as thin as a whisper.
Like most women, she cares little for the traditions of modesty in a world where men had long since forgotten how to lust.
She sits at a dresser, brushing her long, auburn hair with slow, solemn, mechanical strokes.
Performing her nightly routines like clockwork, she moves in numb succession and almost ritual silence, the same way she always had. Day after day. Year after year.
She kneels to the Great Mother and lifts her bed covers, ready to drown in another night of dreamless sleep.
But she's interrupted by a loud knock.
"Grandma?" she blinks.
She moves to the door with a ghostly grace, but before she could reach it, it creaks open.
She's greeted by a flaming rat's nest of tangled hair and a sleep-drunk Vuvi, her face still creased with pillow lines and streaks of dried drool.
Behind her stands Pip, freshly oiled, polished, and humming faintly.