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The Gardens, Tuesday All Day

Cassidy wasn't hiding in the gardens, except for how she was.

She'd come down very early in the morning, before it was light out, because she hadn't been able to sleep. She'd pulled up a protective yellow shield around herself and started in on pulling weeds and digging in the dirt to move rocks and stones that she didn't think belonged where they were.

She took one break, which would only be called a break if someone was feeling really generous. After that, she continued to weed and dig in the garden. Her hands and knees became scraped up, but she kept working. At some point, she dimly registered aches and pains in her back and shoulders, but it was a pain that kept her from focusing on her thoughts.

When one of the tools broke in her hands from use, she didn't even seem to notice it and just gripped it by the splintered handle and continued to claw and hoe the garden to make sure it was suitable for planting.

[[OOC: So very, very open :D]]

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"What are you doing?"

That would be one teenage Healer-in-training shrieking, yes it would. She calmed herself quickly, though, and went to crouch next to Cassidy -- while simultaneously using the strength of her jewel to keep Cassidy from digging for the moment.

"Talk to me," she said softly, putting a hint of snap into it. This was one of the times when she was allowed to take some sort of attitude with her Queen, so Mother Night, she was going to.

"I'm working," Cassidy said quietly, trying to tug at the tool Shira was holding so that she could dig out the rocks that shouldn't have been in this part of her gardens.

She wasn't even aware that she was getting smears of her own blood on the rocks and weeds that she was dislodging.

"For a definition of working that includes bleeding on things, then yes. Yes, I suppose you are working." Shira got cranky when she was worried.

"You need to stop, Cassidy. You're hurt. You need to let me take care of your hands."

"The land needs to be taken care of," she murmured, acting like she didn't even feel how badly she had already damaged her hands in her complete focus on the dirt and stones of the garden. "Have to take care of the land so it will be there to take care of the people. Have to make sure it is taken care of well."

"Can't take care of the land if the Queen isn't taken care of," Shira said. "Let me take care of your hands and you can go back to working."

Except no way was she letting that happen, but she obviously wasn't going to tell Cassidy that.

"I can't fail the land again," Cassidy said and now there were tears in her eyes that were starting to try to make dirty trails down her cheeks as she kept tugging at rocks and throwing them to the side. "I won't fail in my responsibilities again, Shira. I will not."

She turned her focus to tugging at the ground again.

Shira let go of her hold on the tools, but only so she could reach in and try to physically grab them. "You haven't failed in anything, Cassidy," she said gently. "Not that I can tell. You are a good Queen. That doesn't change just because of what you went through."

Well, at least they were getting closer to the heart of the matter.

She tugged one of the garden claws free of Shira's grip and ducked her head as she continued to work the ground beneath her.

"I wasn't powerful enough or beautiful enough to keep myself from being thrown into some weird dungeon in that other world. They could hurt me without fear that someone would stop them because I wasn't Queen enough. I'll never be Queen enough, Shira. I'm not a Healer, I'm not a Black Widow, I'm only a weak Queen. You and Karla were strong enough and powerful enough not to get caught in that prison when we were all changed. I failed my family. I failed my males --" not that she had more than one -- "and I failed the land."

Edited 2012-07-31 23:28 (UTC)

"I was lucky not to get caught," Shira corrected. "And bullshit you're not powerful enough. Or did you forget that we wear the same Jewel?" She arched an eyebrow at that. "And I beg to differ that you failed. If anything, I was the one who failed you."

Maybe talking about her issues would distract Cassidy a little. It was worth a try. She needed to calm her Queen a little before she could get the other girl to consent to healing.

"You didn't fail me because you didn't know me that well, Shira. You didn't know in that world that I was your Queen."

"No, but you were my friend," Shira said. "We had that much, at least, and I couldn't keep you from getting thrown in Detention."

Cassie ducked her head so that Shira wouldn't see the tears in her eyes.

"I'm glad you weren't there. It was horrible. I thought I was going to die there. I almost wanted to."

"Tell me about it," Shira urged softly, gently, as she dropped from a crouch into a sitting position. "Tell me what happened. And I'll tell you what I was up to." Maybe a trade, information for information, would make it easier to talk. Or maybe not, she didn't know. But worth a try.

"We didn't get fed much. It kept us alive, but it didn't let us have very much energy. I have no idea what we were given as food. I only ate it a couple of times. Nights, especially, it was difficult to eat sometimes."

Cassidy kept up with digging in the garden as she spoke in a very quiet voice.

"I was part of the resistance," Shira said. "I didn't stay anywhere for very long. Crashed on people's couches a lot. Sean and Annja kept trying to get me to stay with them, but I didn't want to put them in danger -- Sean was one of the best magic users we had." Strange to think how important they'd been to her in that world, when in this one she didn't even know them.

She reached out to touch Cassidy's hands lightly with one of her own. "Let me help?" If she couldn't physically stop her, she could do the work for her. "Tell me what to do?"

"I don't know who they are." She kept running the pronged tool through the ground. "The detention... we were locked so deep in the castle that no one could have found us if they didn't know where to look. It was all concrete and steel and for more than two years I couldn't touch the land." Cassidy shuddered. "That's what started my mind splintering."

It was bad enough for Shira when she couldn't connect with the land in her own way and she wasn't even a Queen; she couldn't imagine what that kind of thing had done to Cassidy.

"What finished the job?" she asked, not afraid of asking the question but still not actually wanting to ask it. It needed asking, though.

"R-Raven," she said, not looking at Shira and focusing completely on the land. "She trapped me in my mind." She swallowed. "I watched my Jewel turn to dust in my hands and blow away. The land was dying and rotting around and beneath me no longer how much blood and power I used to try to save it."

Shira growled, not at Raven specifically so much as it was the idea of anyone breaking her Queen that way.

"You have your Jewel, though," she said, forcing herself to smile. "And I think you'd be within your every right to lighten your load for a few minutes by using a little bit of your power -- after you let me clean up those cuts and scrapes on your hands."

She'd keep after Cassidy until she gave in, but she saw no reason she couldn't keep things pleasant as long as possible.

"I disappointed Karla because I failed to take care of my males. I failed to do everything a Queen was supposed to and Karla reminded me how badly I did and how my brother could have gotten himself killed because I didn't take care."

She kept digging and scratching at the dirt, ignoring the blood that she could feel mixing with the dirt and rocks in the garden.

"Damn it, stop," Shira snapped. "You are hurting yourself right now beyond what I will allow and if you don't stop and let me take care of your hands before they get really bad, so help me, I'll write home and tell Ranon."

Cassidy flinched at the anger in Shira and stopped where she was, her shoulders drooping. She still held onto one of the tools, but pulled it and her bloody hand into her lap, ducking her head.

"It doesn't matter if I get hurt, Shira, I'm not going to be a very good Queen. How can I protect my court and their people when I couldn't take care of myself and the land. Even Elle knew I was breaking."

Three of the four young women she trusted implicitly and three of them hurt her deeply.

"You're still young," Shira said, calling in her healing supplies and opening the small case. "You're learning, yes, but you're still young. You go through things in life, some of them horrible, but do you let those situations win? No, you don't. You find what you can learn from them and you take it to heart and deal with the rest later."

She waited until she'd cleaned Cassidy's hands and was reaching for her bandages before asking, "How did Elle know you were breaking? And why do I not like the fear in your voice and your very being when you say her name?"

She let Shira work on her hands this time, knowing she would just be out here again or in the Preserve trying to make sure the land was taken care of and was being fed drops of her blood to strengthen them.

She tried not to show her fear of Raven, but the fear of Elle was something she was struggling harder with.

"I was Elle's favorite person to torture," she said softly, tears appearing in her eyes before she blinked them away. "She tortured me with her power and called me her pet."

"Do you want me to talk to her, then?" Shira asked. "Explain why you're avoiding her? Because if you avoid her and she doesn't know why, she's going to start hating herself even more than she will when she knows. And I know you're hurting so badly right now, but you can't afford to let one of your greatest protectors start doubting herself."

"She remembers, Shira. We all do." Cassidy said softly. "I'm not avoiding her. I'm focusing on the things I failed to pay attention to."

And if she was also hiding from some people, she wasn't about to admit it.

"Fair enough," she said to the first part. "And paying attention to things is good, I'm not saying it isn't. But you can't neglect the members of your Court in favor of caring for the land. That's not what a good Queen does, either. A good Queen finds the balance. She lets her Court help her."

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The Gardens, Tuesday All Day

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