[Memory] I refuse

[Mannon]

Frost 60, 109 AoS

“You don’t get to say who I love and who I don’t!” Mannon screamed across the room, her face was red. Tears were streaming down her face.
“Calm yourself, child!” Her mother boomed back, eliciting a hiccuped sob from Mannon.
“I won’t!” The girl answered with a stubbornness of a teenager she was.
“You will, or…” The matriarch raised her hand again and Mannon cowered. She knew, she just showed weakness but the power of the matriarch over her children was too great to break, no matter the amount of swelled up courage in Mannon's chest.
And as she cringed, her eyes fell on Madelyn who was watching Mannon with a mixture of astonishment and disapproval. “It’s your fault,” Mannon growled at her sister.
“It’s your bloody fault…!” She managed to take only one step towards Madelyn before a hand grasped her by the arm and tossed her back. Then another slap landed on her face.
“You respect your elders, Mannon!” Her mother exclaimed. It was just as well that she pulled Mannon back and grounded her in the way she did because Mannon wasn’t sure what she would have done if she got to her sister. But she knew it wouldn't be pretty.
Having that plan ruined, she held her cheek instead. Without restraint she allowed the sobs to jerk at her torso whilst staring at Madelyn with such hate, it was as heated as passion.
“So let me repeat myself one last time, Mannon. And for your own good, you better hear me and remember,” her mother said in a cold voice that Mannon grew to despise at that moment. “You won’t see this Axel again. You won’t meet him, sleep with him, you won’t even think about him. Is that clear?”
Mannon didn’t respond. Her eyes were burying into her sister who could no longer hold her gaze and was staring at the floor. Mannon hoped it was in shame.
“Mannon?! Answer me!” Her mother commanded.
Mannon reluctantly tore her eyes away from Madelyn like a hungry predator that found alternative prey. Mannon's lips twisted. It wasn't a smile but a soul-deep expression of disdain she suddenly held for the people in the room.
Her mother remained stoic like a statue, an emotionless caricature of a woman. The girl chuckled at that thought.
A series of stern stomps across the floor brought her mother close to her again. Even before another blow could fall, Mannon raised her hand to shield herself. There it was again. Reflexes. She wanted to chop her arm off.
“I will,” Mannon barked out, stepping back.
“You will what,” her mother demanded. Mannon gritted her teeth.
The spoken word is what binds you. A promise can’t be broken lest it breaks you as a person, she remembered the words her mother drilled into her from a young age. Back when she was still acting as a mother and not a symbol of the house.
Mannon stepped back again, puffing out her chest, dropping her hands and lifting her chin. “I will do whatever the hell I want! You don’t own me! Boss her around like your puppet,” she pointed sharply at Madelyn, “but leave me alone! I don’t need you. Never did! Never will!”
And before her mother’s anger reached her, Mannon did something that none of her children had dared to do before. She ran away from punishment.
Her mother shouted her name as Mannon bolted through the door and into the corridor. She was running away from the life that suddenly suffocated her and towards a future that was promised to liberate her. Because she didn’t break any promises yet. There was no reason for others to break their promises to her, right?

[Mannon]

She burst into his room, shivering with cold, barely dressed in anything warm with nothing but a satchel with some clothes.
“Mannon?” Axel said, shocked and scantily dressed.
The consequences of her actions were dawning on Mannon, causing her mind to be single-pointedly focused. “We need to go,” she blurted out.
“What? Why?” He walked past her and closed the door, shaking his head and shooing someone away.
“We need to go, Axel. Right now,” Mannon repeated in a whisper, backing away from the door. She looked around as though someone was due to jump her any moment from any shadow.
“Hey, hey, calm down, M. Tell me what happened.” His voice dropped, grown softer. In that low hum, she found solace and the shaking the beset her gradually disappeared until it was nothing but chills.
“I rebelled against my mother,” she admitted, unable to meet his eyes.
“What?” His question wasn’t as astonished as it was amused. She looked at him and found confusion in those azures of his eyes and an uncertain smile on his lips.
“You don’t get it,” Mannon breathed out and stepped back. “Oh no, you don’t get it!” And her heart sped up again. The paranoia returned and she rushed out of the view of a window.
“None of us, not one sibling, ever stood up against our mother. I shouted at her. I frickin’ ran away, Axel! She’s going to kill me. No. Not kill me. She’s gonna...oh god. I don’t know what she’s gonna do…” Her eyes were bouncing all over the floor.
She heard Axel took a few steps towards her. “So you’re telling me you ran away.” He was sitting down on the edge of the bed when she looked at him again, this time with a frown on his brow. “Why?”
Mannon’s bottom lip quivered, but she held her chin up in pride. “She told me to forget about you. To never see you again and to sign the contract with another nobleman. I refused.”
For the first time since she entered, Axel looked at her nearly with mouth hanging open. Time didn’t stand still, it dragged. The cracking of wood in the fireplace counted each moment. Then Axel broke the silence with a short burst of laughter.
“Oh dear. My dear, dear Mannon.” Axel stood up and walked over to her. His naked chest with a mess of hair in the middle was calling to her. She leaned against it like a pillow and his arms were her blanket.
“My dearest Mannon,” he whispered into her hair. They stayed like this for a while, before Axel leaned back, breaking the moment again. “Is this all you brought?”
Mannon nodded with a frown. “I didn’t know how much time I’d have before she’d come to finish what she started.”
His thumb ran across her cheek. “That’s ok. We’ll get you more when we arrive at my estate.” Then his lips touched hers. A short kiss of promise, she thought. “Right then. You say we need to go, so we go.”
Her hand on the satchel tightened. She watched him gather his things, get dressed. Her heart was beating fast again. The cocktail of fear, anticipation and adrenaline intoxicating her as much as Axel’s presence itself.

[Mannon]

Not all good things had to come to an end. As long as Mannon had any say in it, they wouldn’t. But in her young naivety and the first attempt on running away, she grew complacent. She stopped checking around for guards. She got this far, what could stop her now?
“Lady Mannon?” The voice rang through the courtyard as they led their horses out of the stables.
The smile she had on her face since sneaking out of Axel’s room, froze.
One, she realized she was wrong. Two, it seemed her mother was taking her attempt seriously and that came with a twisted sense of pride.
“Lady Mannon, I’ve been tasked to bring you back inside the manor.” One look at the man and Mannon knew he was the captain of the guard. And he did not come alone.
Her mother didn't just take her seriously. She sent authority. The Captain was a man of skills...but also heart.
She shot a frightened look back at Axel like a doe at an arrow point. All bravery vanished from her like vapour above a pot of boiling water. The Captain and her were closer than she was to her own father.
Anger and doubts entered the stage of emotions. She knew her mother was playing the feelings card at Mannon. It was the last resort that Mannon always listened to. But it infuriated her that her mother would play it now too.
Axel was looking from her to the men and back before leaning towards her, taking her chin.
“You trust me?” He asked Mannon in a hushed voice, but with an intensity that blurred the immediate danger.
Mannon nodded, squeezing the reigns.
“Then start mounting your horse,” Axel instructed her.
“But ---”
“Do it!” He barked the command between them.
Mannon felt it rumble down her body like an avalanche of rocks. The shadows of the night must have also disfigured his face because surely that was not the face of her lover.
But Mannon didn’t question it further. She started mounting. She was certain Axel knew what he was doing. So she would follow.
“Lady Mannon. Please. Your mother wants you back in the manor,” the captain continued and she heard him approach. She settled in the saddle.
“Lady Mannon.” The Captain’s voice was growing alerted. “Your mother---”
At that moment, the anger of earlier swelled in her chest like a wave. Next to her, Axel also mounted his horse and somehow that gave her courage. They could easily outride them now.
“My mother can pop out another daughter!” Mannon yelled at the captain, shooting him a fired glare. It hurt her and she felt sorry immediately, but it was too late to stop. “I won't be punished for wanting to live.” She growled the words in a way she never expressed herself before, stopping the men in their tracks for a moment. Mannon was always a wild card, but always within reason. This was out of bounds. This was more than they were told to expect.
But they didn’t get a say because soon after she said what she wanted to say, she heeled the horse. It neighed and bolted.
“Lady Mannon!” She heard the captain scream behind her. She swallowed the lump in her throat.
She looked back just once. It was not to see the men who were sent to prevent her from leaving.
Axel was a length behind her. In the night, she thought she saw a wide smile. It gave her chills. It was only years later that she learnt that those chills were not the good kind.

[Haldir]

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XP:

• 5 {No Magic}

Pieces of knowledge:

• Psychology: Anger clouds judgement
  Psychology: Panic feels like suffocation
  Psychology: Paranoia is not based on objective reason
  Running: Dash through doors
  Persuasion: Barked command is intimidating and might be enough to persuade someone to do something

Loot:

• N/A

Injuries:

• N/A

Comments:

• If you have any questions, comments or concerns, let me know. Enjoy your rewards!