Oft ic sceolde ana Often (or always) I had alone
uhtna gehwylce to speak of my trouble
mine ceare cwiþan. each morning before dawn.
Nis nu cwicra nan There is none now living
þe ic him modsefan to whom I dare
minne durre clearly speak
sweotule asecgan. of my innermost thoughts.
Long have the words as spoken to me by the scops of the homeland eons ago now rang true in my mind now since they were spoken to me long ago by a warm hearth and the mead-cup. Little in my mind then to even pay the words much reverence. Now they burn deeply in my soul as I sit here in the dark in pitch blackness in my room of the Prancing Pony, that all the walls around me should seem to close in, crushing me like a vice. Long has my burden been too great to bear, so much so that I bear more so that I would feel as though I carry the weight of the sky of all Arda, pressing down on me. Hurting. A horrid pain. Long have I also had to struggle with this terrible urge in the back of my mind, lurking there somewhere among the broken strands of my thought. Too many masks, too many lies to conceal my past and what I have done. I cannot think. It has been some time since I have attempted the writing of a journal and I would scribble now by the faintest candle-light in an effort to give some voice to my woes. I sing songs in a singing voice that no man nor beast would have ever heard and I would think of Sefa, gentle Sefa. For the last time I found myself in such a trance it was she that came to me.
I write these words simply to shed some light on the inner-workings of my mind once I am gone and should the worst come to pass and the darkness take me. So that you, the reader, may one day perhaps not judge me quite as harshly if that indeed would be the case. The waif of a girl could not help me, no one can. The very nature of my existence would compound the torments of her own mind and worsen them beyond repair. A girl already determined to drink herself into an early grave. No, it would break her. If I could start again a million miles away I would. My mind goes blank and I struggle to write as I put pen to paper this minute. Grief is the flaw in love, a double-edged sword. To be able to love we must be able to despair at that which we lose, and grief is the mechanism in which one can lose all hope given time if oft repeated. It has fostered a sense of aloneness in me for as long as I can remember now within recent times. It has not only destroyed my ability to connect with others but also my ability to be at peace with myself. For that is what I want more than anything.
Oh Erinwyn, why did you forsake me so in spirit? You were my rock, the one person in the world I could speak freely with but over time it even eroded your resolve, the beast within me. Not only that but given reflection I was living a life that was making me unhappy, trying for so long to be something I was not and to this day I still feel as though I have let young Leofric down. But you promised me that you would always be there and you were not. Ever since I left after for so long you had stalled our wedding I have been wandering lost ever since. The nights alone hour after hour giving me no respite from the memories and the guilt that haunts my every waking step. On the one hand I am free of the responsibility with regards to an inheritance that should never have been mine. But on the other, I have never felt as adrift and without purpose.
Yes, I have secrets. Secrets that would mortify the populace at large but they are kept for good reason as there is more at stake than just my own tainted life should they be revealed. I do not think there is a man or woman alive that does not put on a public face but the slander which befalls me at present rocks me to my very core. The baselessness of it is entirely unprecedented. Folks that I thought were my friends have turned against me. How quick people are to judge. One side of a story is all well and good until the whole tale is told but there is nobody that will give me that chance. Nobody to listen. And what they would say offends my honour completely. Far from a bastion of moral purity as I may be I will nonetheless distance myself from this with assuredness. Absurd and wild as some of the allegations are. I want more than anything to unload everything and stand before someone as plain and honest as day. Who will not forsake me. To bear my true self once and for all and not just the one side to my personality that, whilst not lacking in sincerity for the most part is always bound by those secrets.
Cressa Cottongrass sits downstairs, once a whore always a whore. Whatever you might say about my dalliances with the fairer sex I was always respectfully honest and not once did I toy with a woman’s heart and give her false hope, I enjoyed myself, I respected them enough to ensure that they enjoyed themselves. Contrary to Terry’s blind chivalry and naïve view of the world I have come to learn that women can be just as bad as the men when it comes to relations of a carnal nature. He would paint me out to be a heart-breaking womaniser who has no respect for any whom I have shared a bed with and he would be wrong. The fool, such a stick up his arse. So keen to play the noble guardian of the damsel in distress regardless of who is to blame. He would look at me as though I were Bill Ferny simply for a month of madness and even though I did nothing wrong in my eyes is a man not entitled to make mistakes in his life? I could not go on as I was, it was making me feel empty inside. For the next morning I would soon be on my own again even as I enjoyed the physical contact among the laughter. Say what you like, but I have made one or two friends that will probably stick with me. One of the most important things was I had to enjoy the company of the women I was with not exclusively treat them as a piece of meat as some would like to believe.
But when I pledged my heart to that woman as hopelessly infatuated as I was I meant it, truly. But she lied to me and gave me false hope and then took another man's bed meanwhile. It is not something I head into lightly, that pledge sacred on my part. I never had cheated on Erinwyn nor would I have Cressa. But it was not to be, I was a fool. I should have listened to Chief Watcher Odall when he said in uncertain terms when he said she could appear to be anything a man wanted her to be on a whim. Though I do now not believe her to be behind this malicious slur. To think, me a slaver? Supposing I am a man that would go around luring women into my clutches under false pretences then how come Rannie still walks the streets among others. I care for her but am now uncertain as to what make out, it was said that she might have been the one spreading false rumours and was spying on me but that is likely just simple mind-games by Terry, pathetic as that is. I basked in the warmth of my hearth after that confrontation, determined as I was to get to the bottom of this. And I felt a strongly sudden urge to tighten a noose around the central beam of my home, stand on a chair and throw myself off of it. I seem to decay more as time goes on, exposed to the ravages of a daily rain with little respite. The soft flicker of the sun in the sky above my head distant and elusive. To know and feel myself turning into something increasingly more and more feeble. I feel like the strong gusts of wind are blowing away more of me when I walk through the hedge wall day by day, chipping away at my soul. My days foggy, clear objects in my mind obscured as I would struggle to concentrate. The fetters of my mind are breaking, in an aid to get Rannie to trust me more beyond a simple judgement of character I spoke of the days when I first came to Eriador and the highwaymen took me. I feel sick, I need to speak with somebody or I will simply burst. I pin the last vestige of my strength on the hope that she will accept me for who I am though I am by now, more than ready for that hangman’s noose… A slaver, am I? The frightened boy taken by the brigands when he first came into the land and kept captive for three years and forced to do horrible things which still weigh on his conscience today so much so that he would never be able to deprive any innocent soul of their freedom as it contradicts every fibre of his moral being? Beaten, and tortured. Not that I can tell them that, they would twist it to suit their own rotten prejudices. The rumour mill is more vicious than I could truly have imagined.
Somebody has it out for me. I have taken Rannie as a lover and will court her properly. She is a truly lovely lass, bright. Makes me laugh, seems to have done some things in the past herself and surprisingly didn't react as harshly to me scraping the surface of days gone by as I thought. So many musings, so many happenings, so much guilt of late that I could not act sooner... I couldn't possibly write it all down. I do not need these falsehoods laid on my table. Perhaps I can connect or perhaps this will be my undoing. I'm ready for that. Assuming my tongue does not fail me and go no further in my revelations. That is a distinct possibility.
