Description A large book with a flimsy cover and crisp, fragile, yellowed pages. Its many creases and dog-eared pages tell of its near constant use.

What I am writing I am not sure. But it's clear to me as to why.

She passed me in the Lower Bazaar. I'd delivered another lot of letters to the Crone, and I was dreaming of ways to spend the gold. But it all seemed so worthless when I saw her. She glided into the marketplace with casual grace, yet she had a cheerful spring in her step that caused her head to bob up and down, ruffling the shining, dark brown curtain that was her hair. Her face was firm and composed with purpose, as she wandered through the dirty streets - an incongruous diamond in a coal mine - she craned her neck occasionally to look more closely at something that caught her eye. I couldn't look away.

She smiled politely as she spoke to Harrison, and as she turned, she looked me straight in the eyes from across the market. She looked shocked for a fraction of a moment before her face seemed to relax, and we looked into each other with such deep insight, such knowing, such understanding, it seemed, for so long. She started moving closer. My heart raced, my stomach fluttered, and she smiled.

"May Tymora bless and brighten your dark, darling." The first words she ever spoke to me.

She glided off, with that, and I stared after her. A gray dress. Slender, naked shoulders. But what intrigued me most were those eyes. Those bright, wide, hazel eyes. They had stared straight into mine for what seemed like an age. I walked the way to Upper, with a pocket full of gold, a heart full of heaven and a head full of Her.

It was some time until I saw her again. She was calming children down about the Chosen threat, telling them there was nothing to fear. That Tymora would favour them if they were bold and strong and faithful. How utterly wrong she was in the end, but never the less.

She was beautiful and serene. My heart melted as I gazed into her eyes, and she gazed back. I went on to continue my deliveries and by the time I returned, she was gone. I mourned her a little, I wanted to be with her.

I saw her, occasionally in the streets about Lower, then one dark we spoke again.

She smiled, "Tymora bless you, darling."

"You as well, uh- Miss, what is your name? I keep- I mean- I keep seeing you, and-"

"I'm Ari, Ariwyn, but they call me Ari." She interrupted, to my relief.

"Well met, I am Ellisar. But they call me Ellis."

It became silent, and awkward after that. But it was progress. We bid each other good dark and went on our ways again. It felt so wonderful. I was sure she must feel the same way.

Whenever we saw each other in the streets, we would always catch one another's gaze. We would sometimes stare, and when the other noticed, look abruptly away. It was painfully obvious, but neither of us had the courage to do anything, it seemed.

I see her every dark, now. Always looking me in the eyes. Smiling. Never waving. Never a movement more. Always looking directly into mine.

Every dark now I resolve to tell her how I feel, and every dark ends with my feeling like a failure. It seems so easy, and will be so worth the trouble.

She sat with me in the Crone, right next to me, when a bunch of the lads had come together for a drink. The Chosen had invaded, and been repulsed. But they had killed many men of Lower. It was becoming dangerous to be in the Lower City, more so than usual. Yet it was where Ari remained, spreading the word and blessings of Tymora. It was admirable. I think, even if I did not love her, I would think so.

We spoke at length after the others left, inquiring about one another. It was not a conversation that friends had. Every time one of us asked a question and the other answered, they would ask a question back. It was ecstasy, learning of her.

Twenty seven years of age, nine older than myself. She was Cormyrean, an acolyte of Tymora from the surface world. She was taken in by the Temple as a child, when her parents abandoned her in destitution. She travelled extensively, but was tricked by a merchant who sold her to the Drow in exchange for their weaponry. Little did he know that they would disintegrate once the light of the surface touched their contours. She spent some time in slavery, praying to Tymora at every oppurtunity. Her unwavering faith and virtue preserved her, even when those around her had lost hope. Eventually, she was freed thanks to a combination of luck and a well placed Seeker Freedom Raid.

She left after a time. I resolved more strongly to tell her.

My desires are consuming me. Every time I see her, my chest wells up with happiness. Our eyes meet. But seeds of doubt plague me. What if she only looks because I look at her? What if she doesn't feel the same as I? What if she doesn't love me at all?

Every dark is a failure, every dark I resolve to do something, and every dark I am too cowardly to do it. The Chosen trouble me, I just hope Ari will be alright.

She walked with me to the Lower Bazaar. On the way back to the Crone, we took the way around the Fortress, it was empty, silent. Most were in their homes, the Chosen had them spooked with the recent attacks. Corpses still littered the streets from the incursions.

"Why are we going this way?"

I shrugged. She was right, it was a longer way to go around the Fortress, but I wanted to be alone with her for longer.

I felt frustrated. I had to do something, it couldn't go on any longer. The silent knowing, the days of hating myself for my failure to rise, to triumph. The battle had seemed won, all that remained was to announce my victory.

I touched her on the shoulder and she jerked her head around, looking at me expectantly.

"I love you."

Something happened to her face that I cannot entirely recall or express. She seemed avoidant, disgusted, or unsure of what to do. Her eyebrows furrowed for the split second it took her to turn back to the alley before us.

"Is that something they taught you in Upper?"

"Maybe." I said, not quite knowing what she meant. What was happening?

I slowed my pace, and she quickened hers. We were nearing the Crone.

"I'm sorry." I said.

She was silent, until she opened the door of the Crone.

"Why are you walking so slow?"

"Look- I- I want to know, do you love me?"

She didn't keep eye contact. Something had changed. "Not in that way."

My perceptions seemed to float about in some haze, as if they did not know what to focus on, what to do. I was stunned, petrified with disbelief. It struck me later how much of a fool I'd been, how I had seen things that were not there. That despite all the gazes we shared, despite all the happenings, despite all the evidence I had fenced away in that obsessive part of the mind; it could all be decimated, disintegrated, destroyed. Turned to dust before the storm of one simple declarative statement.

What awkwardness I felt at that moment, what idiocy, I couldn't think, only experience her avoidant glances, her now stagnating attempt to spare my feelings by standing with me outside the Crone. Her odd demeanour had ignited some craving, some desperate hope inside me. Why did she stay?