April 22, The Year of Our
Lord 1111
Dear Nhu,
I hope this letter find you well,
dear sister. I worry about you, all alone in a new marriage to a man you barely
know. This letter should bring you a level of comfort, to hear the words of a
sister when you are now constantly surrounding by strange. How is your husband,
by the by? And the new home? Do tell.
I feel bereft
without your company. I am a young woman all alone, with you in a far village, married and proper and I, spinster age, all alone. To think that you married before I did. I
do hope to see you again, sister. Boat travel is unwieldy, but if to see you at
the end, I would risk my terrible fright of water. I’m sure I could stay
below-decks for the majority of such a journey.
I turned 22
last week. I know you know this, as the letter you sent for my birthday arrived
just yesterday. You must have written that weeks ago! I quite enjoyed the stories of your new life. I would love to
know more about the antics of these odd characters that you have so suddenly
found yourself acquainted with.
It’s the year 1111 and many say
we are due for a bad year, with those awful repeating numbers. I do not quite
believe the superstition, but I am more careful walking down the street
certainly.
I have a new
dress, bought for my joy at being 22. It’s a lavender silk, in the style that
you always envied and admired. It swirls when on a jaunt and, oh, it amuses me.
Not much does these days, without your giggle at my side. I am aware that you
already have three such dresses, but no matter, I wished for you to know of my
simple happiness at my latest possession.
Do you
remember the simpler times? Back when both our parents were alive and we lived
oblivious happy little lives as the daughters of a great landowner? Buying
sweets at the sweet-sellers each time mother let us accompany her to town? The
games we would play in our little courtyard, me a delicate young princess and
you my mother the queen who would try to marry me off to any plant, cat or dog
that wandered into our tiled kingdom?
I feel quite reminiscent.
This house is too big for just one person, Nhu. Yes, mother and father are
buried on the hill behind the house, but that is no company. Bones don't talk, at least to sane people. The servants,
well, it wouldn’t be proper in the slightest for me to make acquaintances with
any one of them. Maybe I will attempt to make friends among the other people of
our station here.
I was in the
capital the other week and found the most delightful necklaces at a store. The
merchant was quite befuddled by my perfect pronounciation, as he apparentley did not think me high-class, but soon recovered
enough from the shock to sell me a necklace or three. I told him they were for
friends, but in truth, they were all for me. I justify it because we certainly
can afford it, being that I am the sole heiress of the agricultural empire
father has nurtured into fruition here and that I was feeling unlike myself.
I must go.
The books need to be looked at and you know father would rise out of his grave
if I did not oversee such action myself. It is good that the emperor has a new
push for agriculture, it certainly benefits us. And the lawyer is coming by
again, no doubt aghast by father’s decision to leave all to his daughter, an
unmarried, shriveling daughter at that.
To conclude, I am aggrieved to
say that I am not feeling my utmost. It might be a combination of you leaving
and the new stares I draw as an even older unmarried, unattached woman of
repute. People talk, you know.
I think I shall put one of father’s remedies to the test to try to remedy this. Though people are not especially inclined to offer themselves to die on my blade. It seems to get harder and harder to find someone to bathe my blade in the blood of. Oh, well, I will find someone disposable. Just as father always said, “A murder done is a day well won.”
I think I shall put one of father’s remedies to the test to try to remedy this. Though people are not especially inclined to offer themselves to die on my blade. It seems to get harder and harder to find someone to bathe my blade in the blood of. Oh, well, I will find someone disposable. Just as father always said, “A murder done is a day well won.”
With love and a swirl of new
skirts,
Your sister,
Anh
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