Thread: Flower in the Grove (Atroxa & Rivine)

Freedom was a rare thing to be cherished and enjoyed, and enjoyed it she did. She knew giving in to her whim and indulging in this flight of fancy would have repercussions, but it would be worth it. They couldn't do any worse to her than they already were and would do. Confined, restrained, bound to honor some promise made by her father to a man she'd never met. It hadn't happened yet, but it would, it was, after all, her lot in life. Or that's what her dear step mother kept telling her. Grow up and accept your fate, fulfill your responsibility to your family. She would, what choice did she had but to forsake her title and go on the lamb? And though she did sometimes fantasize about doing just that, she knew she couldn't. What did she know of caring for herself? No, she was doomed to live trapped between two mindsets. Her father had raised her strong-willed and bold, but now she was expected to be mild mannered and obedient, but she couldn't! Didn't they understand that? As it were, she was for once not feeling bound by thoughts of duty and responsibility and honor, instead she was flying over the fields, wearing the split skirts her step mother hated so much for riding. A real lady, she told Alyssa every time she put them on, rides side saddle. What she meant was a real lady never spread her legs to ride astride a beast like some wildling. Well, sometimes she wished she had been born a wildling! As it were though, she had been born a Tarly, daughter to Cormac Tarly and his first wife, the late Lillian Ambrose. Really if Alyssa had it her way, she would be wearing trousers and not a skirt at all, but she knew her stepmother would really make her miserable if she did that. Though, what was the point now? Alyssa had managed to outmaneuver her escort, comprising of her two ladies in waiting and two of her family's knights. If she were a more mature and sympathetic person, she would have thought first of how this would effect them, but she wasn't. She was, admittedly, rather spoiled and self centered, something that everyone blamed on her father, and expected her to shed herself of such unbecoming behavior overnight. Well, she'd so far stubbornly refused, and if anything had become more and more unruly in the last few years. This wasn't the first time that Alyssa had used her fearless riding and knowledge of the land to leave behind her. She knew every trail and every hill, her father had shown them all to her. It was nothing for her to be able to lose anyone so completely in a patch of trees little bigger than a grove as if it were a vast forest. The copper-red chestnut mare she rode on was well-bred, with a broad blaze down her shapely head, a beauty by any standards. And her rider even more so. Golden blonde like her father, but with her mother's pale blue eyes, and fair skin, she was beautiful, and she knew it. Her curling blonde hair was currently plaited back in a braid, which when still fell down her back, but was currently flying behind her like a banner as her mare sliced through the waist high grass like a boat over water, the hissing swish of grass against the creature's legs and belly, her hooves striking the ground, and the wind rushing past were the only music Alyssa wanted to ever hear again, She slowed her mare, Braitha, as they neared another clump of trees, an old apple grove, now long overgrown, walking the horse between the trees, feeling the creature panting heavily under her. The mare knew where to go, smelling water on the air, and found her way to the stream that ran through the pocket of trees just off one of the roads that lead to her family's manor. Alyssa dismounted, leaving the reins draped over Braitha's neck so that the horse could drink from the stream and clip at the grass while Alyssa went to a nearby black berry bush she'd visited since childhood.