Years apart

Laziness is sometimes a gift. Picking up what you previously lost, only to find once more its joys and misteries... that's the unsung glory of laziness - Helena Falend, in her Letter of Longing
 
Dear Journal,
 
I did not think anyone would write anything in here any more, but I reminisced those great, horrible, intense, excruciating, beautiful days on our Sapphire Sword and in our (sorry, Miyun's!) chest. And I remembered how weirdly fulfilling it was to write it all down on these flimsy pieces of paper. It got hard at the end, because of the small incident of my blinding, but I found people with the right attitude to write things down for me (people who would not openly judge).
 
Today, I found such an impartial soul again, her name is Lena, she's one of my closest Sisters, sisters of the Order of the Black Sapphire, that is. Yes, dear journal, I finally did it. A magical order for the frail sex. Someone had to do it, eventually. Let Tallion have his manly Ionolian order. I have my little tower overlooking the Bay of Alomir, and my 40 Sisters.
 
Seeing as I am falling directly into my greatest journal-writing sin of all time - messiness - I will try to structure some coherent thoughts as well.
 
First, it's been a great while since i last wrote in here. I have some scribbled notes about the great last battle - the battle of the Tower. Somehow, I don't want to finish them, but I know I must. Too much pain in those pages, I have to say. Even compared to what was before... And there is so much beauty in this world to write about now... I just can't do it. Not with all those dark thoughts consuming me at night.
 
I never truly recovered. As expected. What I last saw with my own eyes will forever haunt my dreams, and those voices... they will never go silent. For now, though, I'm not too worried. I have plenty of reasons to smile and keep the voices well at bay.
 
You see, dear journal, the incredible occured - Eve Parion, bane of humans, Elves, Strygians and all races big and small, somehow wound up a mother! To a healthy child, hopefully bearing as few traits from her mother as possible. Her name is Fiona. It was Bart's idea for a name. It is a beautiful name, and rather rare, to be honest. I wouldn't have thought of it. I, for one, could only think of symbolic names, stupidities, bookworm instincts. Why should a child be cursed with a weird name because a parent has nothing better to do? That being said, I am secretly jealous of Tallion's talent of keeping the memory of his friends and family. He named his first-born Rydaspis Bajid Almas. A mouthful, but a beautiful one at that.
 
My little girl is just Fiona. She was born in a time of peace, a time of joy, even if not of plenty. The world, shattered as it was, is recovering. It's not easy, it's not sudden. But it's quite fast, to be honest. Well, my little Fiona is most of my world now, anyway. And she's growing very, very fast. She's more than one year old! She was born on 19 November 859. Yeah... it's insane how fast time flies by.
 
She's everything I probably wasn't: cute, quiet, a joyous smile, always laughing at her parent's shenanigans. Bart especially knows how to entertain her. He's such a sweet father. I always knew he would be a good one. Hehe.
 
I very rarely let go of Fiona. I either carry her around in my arms or in my all purpose crib. I am quite confident with navigating around nowadays, blind as I am. Especially in the tower, I have formed this mental map, and can quite easily trace my steps. Still, Bart helps me a lot and the Sisters also provide invaluable help. It's not easy when the mother is both blind and clumsy.
 
I'm quite proud of her, dear journal. And proud of us. We overcame this great war. Of course... Darkness remains. In my case, wounds that will never, ever heal. Not just my eyes. But especially that. Bart and Fiona make me love life, but without them... I can't even imagine what that would have been like. Sometimes I wonder... How are the others coping? Are they feeling down? Are they troubled by the many monsters of our past? Not all of them have company, people who understand them, who went through the same thing... Verfys disappeared somewhere, God knows where... All alone. Tallion.... He's not that far away, but he's busy, we saw him twice, I think, after we broke up the party, and we hear from him only from time to time. He seems happy, but I know it can't be easy to rebuild Ionolia amidst all those ruins bearing so many memories.... Even Marc, with all his optimism, must be feeling down many times. You know, he still is alone. No wife or family for him right now. He's quite the adventurer now, always first to go on explorations and more recently diplomatic missions to the Continent! I gave him a secret task to find out more about Verfy. Maybe she's still around there somewhere.
 
I may be happy here, in spite of my literal demons, but I often think about the others. We didn't exactly part on the best of terms. After that ugly business in the Continent with Zarkuz's pirates, we fought the undead and prevailed, but... it felt forced... We were all utterly spent, sick of each other somehow.... We parted ways and it all felt so empty, but in the same time there was a semblance of peace. It was finally over. Maybe all our collective pains made it too hard to stay together. I don't know. Here in Alomir we have quite the working community. Damaschini sunk himself into his leadership role, and he seems to be quite happy and fulfilled. I'm glad for him. Miyun got to become a queen of sorts, as she jokes, queen of the underworld. She's growing fast, too fast perhaps, hah. And Marc, as I said, is around and helps Damaschini a lot.
 
To be fair, the more I think about these things, the sadder I get. There's a very sour taste in my mouth whenever I think of that period, right after the battle at the Tower. I miss them.
 
Maybe I should invite Tallion next Independence day.
 
Oh, I haven't mentioned my Bart is now a full-time politician! He was some kind of First Diplomat, a counselor for Damaschini, and now he's in the Great Gathering, elected by the people and whatnot. He has a group of people called a party, and he won some votes, and now he's very busy as a result... It's not like he's doing that much right now. I am supportive, but to me it seems like a waste of his time. Time better spent would be time spent with me and FIona.... :)
 
But a man's ambition is a man's ambition.
 
I am a hypocrite, of course, because I also did my own party-thing, but not for politics, but for protecting the island. My order of the Black Sapphire protects Alomir from any unwanted guests, and I plan to make it an active order as well. In time, we will send our members to other countries to help them against disease, disasters, necromancers, monsters, whatever. We will also explore and find out more about the world... Big dreams. But hey, I came quite far with this order so far. I'm astonished. So who knows?
 
Hm, the celebrations for this year's Starfall festival are starting. Better join them. I hope Lullaby and Rafil are well. At night, I ofter think of them too.
 
Well, off I go. This felt good.
 
Wherever you are, I hope you will smile tonight. Nixie, Verfy, Tallion, Kelly, Vas, Iz. I know the rest are smiling at us from up above.
 
May the Almighty protect us all.