(East of the Sun)
Elanor lived by the sea. Well, not *right* by the sea, but close enough that sometimes she woke in the night to the sound of crashing waves; dissolving on waking to Fastred's steady breathing beside her. Sometimes, if the weather was fair enough and the wind not too strong, she'd take the children with her; babe cradled close in her arms and another one or two with fierce fists in her skirt. In the summer, when the water was calm enough, she'd teach them to swim as the towers kept watch behind them: no child of hers was going to lose its life to these salty depths.
Sometimes her parents came to visit. Rosie always refused - politely enough, but still refused - to come with her to the water; complaining of joints aching with the wet, instead sitting for a smoke and a yarn with Fastred. Sam-dad came with her, but only as far as the uneasy line where the tufts of blade-grass met the expanse of sand, dwindling out like freckles, where he'd sit with arms curled loosely about his knees, watching the children splash in the shallows.
Once the young ones were old enough that Elanor didn't have to be mere steps away from them as they swam, she sat with her father on the sandy carpet of grass, mimicking his posture and glancing at him thoughtfully from time to time. He wasn't so much watching the children, she realised now, as staring out past them to where the horizon blended into sky, glowing hazily with the promise of something *beyond*. She told him about hearing the waves in her sleep once, and he gave her a queer smile, turning away from the sea to look at her - but only for a moment.
~