That was confirmation enough for Dana. The woman knew what she had been about and had done it just the same. "Why, Lady Erin? Why hide me from this world? I am forced now to deal with things I should have done as a child. I am stuck in a place where nothing I do is the right way, because everything I know I learned in books."
She paused, conversations were not one sided. "Well, Dana, you couldn't have eased into the thing hmm? You always were impetuous." The woman sighed and Dana held her tongue.
"You will not like my answer, and I do not like giving it to you, but I suppose you have earned the right to know. You, are my only child. I have never made and do not plan to make another. I wanted you out of some maternal need to nurture something not myself. You were there on that road like an answer to my wishes, all pale and tiny and in need of love.
So I kept you, and raised you, and gave you this life so that you could be with me forever. It broke my heart when you announced a need to leave. I am still undone by your parting, but it was right you of you to leave. Every child must grow up and leave their mother."
Dana was dumbstruck, she had never know Lady Erin to be a selfish woman, not any more than any other being, but this...this was a gross misuse of person. She had other questions, but she knew they would all circle back to this.
"It was wrong. You were wrong to do such a thing Lady Erin. You should have pushed me out beyond our four walls, made me get up and pursue the men that walked away. You should have taught me that there will be people in this world that cause a great ugly beast to rise in my chest. You should have told me there were horrors in this world that I could not imagine. And you should have taught me how to think on my feet and not be overwhelmed when something new comes my way.
Instead you let me hide in my perfect little room, in my perfect little space of the world. And if something hurt me, well that was just gotten rid of. You treated me like a little child, one to be protected and coddled. I have lived nearly a millennium and I have never know heartbreak. Well, I do now and it is long long overdue. It was wrong, very very wrong."
Her words stopped when she ran out of breath, and she sat listening to the silence, wondering if her maker was even there. "You are very right, Dana. I should have let you grow and become your own person. What do you want from me?"
A soft sigh escaped her, and she swiped at the tears flowing down her cheeks. "Nothing, I want absolutely nothing. You answered my questions and now it is up to me to figure out how to not drown when some one throws me in the water."
"Be well Lady Erin."
"May the wind be at your back." It sounded like an automatic response and it hurt Dana more that any of the rest of the words that had been said. She hung up the phone, pushed everything off her bed, and lost herself in the tears and pillows.
((Dana out))
It's a Cold and It's a Broken Hallelujah (private)
Dana sat in the center of her bed, the sleek black phone from the table beside her. She'd already contacted the manor staff on the procedure of making a call to Ireland, and now she sat staring at the phone.
With a deep breath, she picked up the receiver and carefully dialed the number neatly printed in the book by her knee. It rang three full times before someone on the other end picked it up, and a voice she didn't recognize spoke in her mother tongue.
"Good morning. Can I help you?"
Dana slipped easily into the language, and it felt a bit like coming home. "Good morning. This is Dana ó Ceallaigh, I need to speak to the Lady Erin."
There was a brief silence and Dana wondered what the woman was doing. "Of course, please hold a moment?"
"Yes, thank you."
There was a click, and then silence. A soft sort of buzzing sound and while Dana waited for the stranger to dart through the home she'd shared with Lady Erin, she closed the book with the number, pushed it to the side and pulled the other small black leather book that had been sitting on the bed with her. After flipping several pages, she came to one that had several lines written and spaced. These were the questions she'd chosen to ask her maker.
There was another click, and the sounds of a receiver being picked up, a door shutting, a soft breath, and a sigh. "Dana, is that really you?"
Dana froze for a moment, the sound of her voice make something inside her ache and a knot to form in her throat. Perhaps she was a bit homesick as well. "Yes, Lady Erin, it is I. How have you been?"
It was Lady Erin's turn to pause, and Dana wondered if the woman had a similar ache just behind her heart. "I am, and have been, quite well, thank you. How are you getting along in America? Your letters have been riveting, I can only imagine the reality is much more."
A soft sigh pushed at her chest. "I am getting along as well as I can. That is why I called. I...I have a few questions I need answered."
She heard the noises of Lady Erin shifting, of bed clothes moving. "I'd be happy to help in any way I can. Only give me a moment?"
"Of course." The noises that Dana heard indicated that Lady Erin had not been alone. There was more shifting, muffled voices quiet enough that Dana was certain the deep tones came from a male vampire. She was curious, but not enough that she would ask. After the sound of a door closing again, Lady Erin returned to the phone.
"Now where were we? Ah yes, you have questions about living in America. I'm not sure I will be much help, Dana, I've never been to America."
Another sigh moved her chest. "I fear m'lady that my questions have absolutely nothing to do with how one goes about living in America."
There was another slight pause. "Oh. I have a feeling I am not going to enjoy the answering of these questions. Well then, go ahead, I suppose I am surprised you waited so long."
Dana
14 years ago