The beginning of the end

I’ve delayed the inevitable long enough. It’s time to get to the meat of the story.

The beginning of the end of the best years of my life, came with the end of my mother’s life.

While it was not unexpected that she would die long before I would, even we elves have a clock of sorts, and eventually that clock runs out. It was the circumstances around her death that made all the difference.

My mother, the truest, gentlest, most peace loving pacifist you would ever meet, took her own life.

Imagine that for a moment. A woman who abhorred violence in any form, whether it be words, or acts, turned her one and only act of violence upon herself.

I can’t even begin to understand what was going on in her head. I know what happened only days before, but I still can’t fathom what she was feeling. There are times I think that I could have done more; that I could have prevented what happened from happening.

You see, when my mother died I wasn’t there.

I was off on a… mission… of sorts.

The mission, I’ll get into the details of it later, but it was the first time I sought vengeance, the first time I felt rage, and the first time I had a glimpse of the elf I would become. I can tell you this, the woman I became during those few days, was not someone I liked.

To this day, I can still smell the stench that I chased down without mercy. The stench that I first picked up when I found my mother in her favorite clearing. The stench that grew stronger as I carried her home, and washed her body and cleaned her wounds.

It’s the stench that will always make me think of the haunted look of defeat I saw in her eyes.

If I’m honest, this is the day I lost my mother; the day her eyes lost their light. When she ended it forever a few days later, she was already long tone.

As for me, I think my fate was sealed then too.