Being Strong

***The following is an excerpt from Raina's Story ****  

“Good afternoon Mr. Bartle,” grunted a raspy voice to the left of the sealed entrance.

Dumbstruck, Raina stared in awe at the gargantuan owls that, moments before, she had assumed to be statues. Both had turned their heads inward to survey the pair with shrewd eyes. They towered over her each holding a radiant shields. The owl to their right had a solid white face, a creamy brown feather coat, and speckled tan patches all over its body. To their left was a somewhat aged black and grey horned owl with knowing green eyes.  Each bore hardened expressions that conveyed wisdom of struggles not even Raina had experienced. The effect of their hardened appearance was more startling than the unbelievable discovery that she had found herself standing before giant living owls inside an enormous tree.

“Alfred!” Bartle addressed the horned owl. “Good to see you back! How is your wing?”

“Healing well sir,” the owl responded raising his free wing slightly to revel a distinct bend in the tip.

“Very good! You will be back on the front lines in no time.”

“Hopefully sir.”

The speckled owl released a derisive puff of air, and rotated its head to survey the hall beyond them.

“Are you here to speak with the queen?” Alfred asked.

“Yes,” replied Bartle. “It is rather important. So please excuse us for the brevity today.”

Alfred cocked his head down slightly, and scanned Raina with a wizened gaze. “Of course,” he croaked.

The tawny owl, having returned to look in their direction, stretched a colossal wing out before them. With a graceful flick of the tip, the bird opened the doorway, and returned to the statuesque posture in which Raina had first observed it.

The doors slowly glided open. Eager to see what was inside, Raina stepped forward ahead of Bartle. She crossed over the threshold of the double doors and was struck instantly with a powerful floral scent. She looked around her.  It seemed more enormous than anything else she had seen in the Royal Cypress. The room must have been at the top most point of the tree because Raina saw no covering above their heads. The sun shone directly into the rotunda, saturating Raina in a pleasant warmness. All around birds tweeted, wind whistled, and yet the space echoed with the peaceful kind of silence that she had not heard for years.

It reminded her of that last camping trip she had taken with her family when Mark told her she was too small to help set up the tent.  Unsure what to do about feeling useless, Raina had lain her sleeping bag in an open area, and stared at the vibrant rays of light coming through the branches above. She had zoned out entirely as the birds around her chirped to one another quietly, and the squirrels skittered through the trees.

That’s what the Queen’s quarters sounded like to Raina. It was nothing short of magnificent. As the light came through an open ceiling, it warmed the vast space by glistening off the walls and floor, both of which seemed to be made of marble. As Raina crouched to get a closer look she realized they were made of an agate like material that reminded her of the blocks of petrified wood in Mr. Star’s science class at school.

Raina was amazed. The room was absolutely beautiful, and she had never seen anything like it before. She got to her feet and spun around slowly, scanning the room for signs of whoever might be lucky enough to call this place home. As she turned, Raina suddenly became aware of a faint but strangely familiar sound.  She had heard it all along, but originally thought it just a dove cooing in the distance.  Now that she had taken in her surroundings, the noise grew louder, and it sounded like something she had heard before.  She tilted her head slightly to hear it better. That’s when she recognized it.  The sound was familiar, but not because it came from something she had heard before.  It was a sound she knew well because it came from someone she had heard before.  Raina went pale with the realization, as all the blood rushed out of her head. 

It was the very whimpering sound her brother made when he was trying to be strong.  This was a noise that killed Raina. It beat-up her heart every time she heard it. She had spent the last four years of her life doing her best to allow him the childhood he deserved. She strived just to give him the one she did not have. Despite her best efforts, Raina could never fully protect Tam. He was too young, and yet he already had been through too much.

She tried as hard as possible to shield him, but there had been times when Tam had witnessed everything before she could usher him away.  Against her will, he had seen Mark strike her for having cold dinner on evenings he stumbled home later than usual. Tam had watched as Mark slammed butcher knives into the sink where Raina’s hands were submerged in bubbles, and as he cried out in fear Tam had seen countless glass bottles shatter on the walls around him.  The reminder of her brother’s cry forced Raina outside of herself once more. She stood and watched the memory of herself this past summer, before Tam began kindergarten. It was the moment when Raina finally realized she could not always protect him.

“Hey Tam Tam,” she had whispered one afternoon after the Mean Man had passed out on the recliner behind them.

“He-ey Wain-uh!” he grinned innocently.

“I know things aren’t always easy around here,” she began.

Tam placed his crayons atop his mystical creature coloring book, and gazed at Raina with a quizzical slant to his brown eyes. “What you mean?” he asked.

Raina sighed. The look tugged at her heart strings. She considered forgoing the entire conversation.  Why rob him of this desire to remain oblivious, she thought to herself.  But, she knew the answer. As Tam got older, he was going to see more.  In two different schools, their schedules were going to become complicated, and Raina couldn’t always be around for Tam like she wanted to be. At 13, there was only so much Raina could do to protect her baby brother. One day he would understand what was going on, and she couldn’t shield him from his feelings. She could only teach him how to continue on despite them.

Raina tucked the right corner of her mouth into her cheek in a sorrowful expression. Unable to answer her brother in words, she tilted the tip of her head toward their unwitting guardian laying comatose on the recliner. She shrugged her shoulders and Raised her eyebrows in an effort to say everything she could not.

Tam followed her gaze. He made it clear he understood in his prompt return to the phoenix coloring sheet. Words were not necessary. Raina knew he did not want to discuss it.  She knew he did not want to embrace their circumstances as a reality, because it was exactly how she felt.  So, she gave him a minute of frantic scribbling with focused determination. She let him savor the structure provided by the preordained boundaries of the colorless bird afire.

“Tam Tam,” she whispered again after allowing his break from reality.

His only response was to switch his purple crayon to red as if to signal a stop to the conversation.

“I know this is hard Tam Tam,” she gulped, “but I need to see your eyes.”

Still he refused. As much as she wanted to join him in his denial, Raina carried on.

“You know you can cry around me right?” Her own eyes started to well, but Raina forced the tears away. “Whatever you need to do around me, it’s okay. Okay?”

Tam sniffed, and traded his red crayon out for an orange one.

“Did you hear what I said?” She asked.                                     

His lower lip trembled and his nose wrinkled as he nodded at the colorful bird below him.

Thankful for an actual response, Raina breathed out. “It’s not always safe to cry though. Is it Tam Tam?”

His coloring slowed, and he peaked at her from beneath his long lashes as he traded once again for a yellow crayon.  Tam’s coloring slowed as his head rocked side to side.

“Yeah, I know that.” A heavy weight slowly pushed on her chest as Raina acknowledged her sweet brother’s suffering. “So, sometimes we have to pretend to be strong, and I know that feels awful. But, I promise it will only ever be for short times, and then I will come and save you.  Okay?”

“Okay,” he croaked quietly.

“I will always be there for you when you need to cry Tam Tam. No matter what.”

As Raina remembered this conversation she reentered her body.

“Tam?!”  She cried out. “Where is he?! Tam!” Her hair whipped across her face as she flipped her head erratically.

“He’s here Love,” came Bartle’s unexpectedly even voice.

She circled to her right, and discovered the portly man crouched just at the edge of the room. His gazed was aimed at something on the ground before him. She ran to his side. Before she could question Bartle, Raina became immediately concerned with what hung in the altar above his head. No longer disturbed by the mystical elements of her surroundings, Raina froze as she peered into a watery orb suspended in an iridescent spectrum of light.  She accepted it for the unknown object it was. However, she could not accept what she saw inside it. At its center, Raina saw Tam sitting on a curb.  It was dusk, and the helpless little 5 year old whimpered quietly while he waited for his sister to retrieve him from a deserted school yard.

She felt like a ton of bricks dropped from her shoulders to her belly button. She had completely neglected him. She snapped around to face Bartle.

“Stand up!" She declared authoritatively. "We need to go get my brother!”

“We will need my mother for that,” Bartle said with a curiously somber tone, his head still trained on the floor.

“Well,” she barked at the top of his balding head. “Hurry up then! Where is she?”

Bartle made an odd choking sound then sputtered, “she’s gone. They have taken the queen .” He sobbed into his hands.

Confused, Raina finally looked to the ground before her guide.  There, she saw a bloody footprint smeared on the floor. Directly beside it, Raina saw a cracked diamond dagger alongside a pair of similarly blood-soaked purple butterfly wings. Though they were crumpled and ripped, the wings were large enough to cover her own spine.

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To be continued...