Forty-Nine
Apr. 22nd, 2013 05:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
theonecalledwanderWith the business of the night concluded and nothing more to be done until daylight, I find myself in the position of having nothing else to do except sleep.
Which is not the same as saying that I do sleep. You must understand that while I have learned to steal precious moments of restful slumber whenever and wherever they may be found, under even the most dreadful of circumstances... but after having heard the fearful testimony of the baying hounds and knowinng what had been abroad in the night, I did not want to close my eyes.
If I have learned to take my rest as I can, so, too, have I learned to go without it for short periods of time. I pass the long, slow night aimlessly roaming the front of Bel's upstairs apartment while she sleeps soundly in her bed, more accustomed to the state of affairs. "Normal" isn't just relative, it's infinitely flexible. The nightly performance I bore witness to has become normal to her, though with luck it will not remain so.
I know what you are thinking, my treasured reader: a beautiful woman, a restless night spent trapped indoors... but who could think of such a thing at a time like this? Well, I could, in truth. I could hardly not. But as I said, she sleeps soundly while I fidget with the tool of my trade, working mild charms for alertness and against intrusion.
There's very little to worry about. The downstairs is naturally warded against the undead by virtue of those many garlands of garlic, and the smell of the stuff permeates the upstairs as well. But I am an efficient worrier with a lonely night ahead of me, and I make do with what little I have.
Which is not the same as saying that I do sleep. You must understand that while I have learned to steal precious moments of restful slumber whenever and wherever they may be found, under even the most dreadful of circumstances... but after having heard the fearful testimony of the baying hounds and knowinng what had been abroad in the night, I did not want to close my eyes.
If I have learned to take my rest as I can, so, too, have I learned to go without it for short periods of time. I pass the long, slow night aimlessly roaming the front of Bel's upstairs apartment while she sleeps soundly in her bed, more accustomed to the state of affairs. "Normal" isn't just relative, it's infinitely flexible. The nightly performance I bore witness to has become normal to her, though with luck it will not remain so.
I know what you are thinking, my treasured reader: a beautiful woman, a restless night spent trapped indoors... but who could think of such a thing at a time like this? Well, I could, in truth. I could hardly not. But as I said, she sleeps soundly while I fidget with the tool of my trade, working mild charms for alertness and against intrusion.
There's very little to worry about. The downstairs is naturally warded against the undead by virtue of those many garlands of garlic, and the smell of the stuff permeates the upstairs as well. But I am an efficient worrier with a lonely night ahead of me, and I make do with what little I have.