The Queen in the South

A Household in Tren

"Amara, it's time to wake up!" I heard my mother yell.

I groaned as I turned over in my bed and threw a pillow over my head.

"It can't be morning already!" I mumbled grumpily.

"Well, it is!" I heard the sound of her light footsteps on the wooden floors indicating that she was coming closer. "And you're going to be late for school if you don't get up." She warned.

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"Okay, desperate times call for desperate measures, come on Ben, do your thing."

Before I could protest I felt a sharp jolt run up my body.

I let out a squeal and shot up in my bed.

I looked up and glared at the woman I called my mother. She had a pleased smile on her face and a happy baby boy jumping in her arms.

"Who needs one of those expensive alarm clocks when you have this little zapper." She smiled, as she brought the child closer to herself and nuzzled her nose on his.

"Mawa!" The baby stuck one of it's pudgy little hands in my direction as he tried to say my name.

I instinctively leaned back.

Ben wasn't by far a fire bender but he had been showing little signs of lightning bending. Of course his bolts where hardly anything dangerous. All they did was sting you a little but it still hurt a lot.

"You know this is child abuse." I told her as I rubbed the spot where the little monster had shocked me on my leg.

She rested Ben on her hip.

"You're almost eighteen, Mara. You're not a child anymore." She muttered dryly.

"Fine. It's young adult abuse." I told her.

She shrugged. "That works. I just wish my young adult of a daughter wasn't so in love with her bed."

I gasped and patted my wooden twin bed.
"She doesn't mean that, she loves you." I whispered to it.

She sighed, "my daughter talks to beds, now. Whoever will I get to marry a girl who talks to beds?" She muttered to herself.

She turned her attention to me and rose a brow. "Hmm... I suppose it doesn't matter. You already have a man who wishes to marry you, don't you?" Her lips tugged up in a small smile.

I felt my cheeks warm up at her statement.

"Will you look at the time?" I spoke, quickly changing the topic and scrambling out of bed. "Mother why are we standing around chitchatting. Do you not realise that we're going to be late!"

I could feel my mother's eyes following me in amusement as I hastily spread my bed.

"You know, I was talking to Pam yesterday. She told me she went out to the docks to meet Flint. He got back from the training camp in Agni yesterday, you know."

"Is that so?" I spoke, taking my time as I carefully tucked in the corners on my bed. Of course she knew that I knew. It was all I had spoken about since he left.

"Uh huh... I know you and Stella went down there yesterday as well. You didn't happen to catch a glimpse of him, did you?"

I sighed and finally stood up straight.

I folded my arms across my chest and narrowed my eyes at her.

"What do you know, Christine?"

She smiled mischievously as she balanced a fussy Ben on her hip.