The Cemetary, Quroke Haven, Northern, Ireland...
High winds and numerous swirling grey clouds loomed over the small village of Quroke Haven, Ireland as a heartbroken and tearful eleven-year-old Tobias R. L. Magorian found himself looking at the deep hole in the ground where everyone had been gathered in their Sunday best to pay their final respects to the deceased Mrs. Melinda Collum. He had taken care to dress as nicely as he knew she'd wanted him to as he stood staring at the coffin that was to be lowered into the ground knowing all too well that his dear mother would be lowered with it. He would never again see her smile or the way her blue eyes lit up whenever she'd been reciting poems that caught her fancy or going on about her favorite literature. He had learned a great deal from this woman he had been told had not been his mother by the drunken brute who had taken care to avoid her funeral. They had not liked each other much but Milenda had cared for his son a great deal. Out of some measure of respect for her, he avoided her funeral so as not to cause a scene. Tobias had been accompanied by a neighbor who had been good friends with Milenda and stood beside him as they both mourned the rather incredible woman's loss.
Eleven Years.
For eleven years, Lady Milenda Collum had been the only mother that young Toby had ever known and his little heart had been well and truly broken in the wake of her loss. He had not understood death at all nor the reason for such a lovely woman with the kindest heart of any of the village was taken from them so abruptly as opposed to the vile people that stalked the streets night and day doing whatever they could to bring harm or ruin to someone else because they couldn't rightly navigate their own lives accordingly.
Dollaran had been one of those such people that went through life blaming others for his collective failures and lack of establishing himself as anything but a cold and embittered drunken brute.
Toby's rage seemed to increase as he recalled all the times the bastard had avoided death when he'd been the one in dire need of it. From his constant brawls with other sea men and wars with the locals, he should have been dead a thousand times over. The true story of what happened to his birth mother had only increased the heartbroken lad's desire for the old drunk to finally meet his end.
He had learned from Milenda's friend Mrs. Prewitt that his father had been the true cause of his late biological mother's suffering and eventual death. It was well noted that he'd beat and force himself onto the poor foreign woman for days on end and had the nerve to wonder why even a commonplace whore had not wished to engage with him.
Not one man had been of the mind to turn their lovely young daughters over to such an irredeemable wretch and as a result, Dollaran had been largely celibate ever since he'd gone and killed the one person he could get trim from. Tobias was more than a little furious to find out that his parents had not actually been married but that he was the product of vile sexual assault and abuse on the part of the drunken brute to a helpless woman a long way from home. He had to commend his true mother, Cheyanne Springwater, whom Milenda had told him stories about being one of the strongest and bravest women she had ever known and how tragic it was that she'd been unable to help her when the time came.
He had begun to understand that Dollaran had been the source of all his misery and his mother's until her bitter end. Lady Collum had taken it upon herself to love and nurture him even through her own pain as she'd lost her own child after giving birth and still was able to produce milk. Tobias had no idea that he was suckling from another child's supply and if he hadn't died before his arrival, he might not have ever gotten to become her son in the first place.
The lad Tobias sighed as he looked down at the hole in the ground wondering when everyone would have their time to be lowered into the earth when their life ended. After the service, he took off and wandered about the cemetery on his own until he came across the grave of his biological mother Cheyanne Springwater. He had wanted to know about her and her people but found that no one knew much of anything about her aside from the merchant that sold her to Dollaran in the first place. To know that he wasn't at all the product of two people in love like most of the children of the village had been something difficult for the lad to face as he sat with tears-stained eyes reading his mother's headstone as he ran his shaking fingers across the words etched in it.
Here Lies
Cheyanne Springwater, a foreigner who died giving birth to a son.
That was it.
That was all her headstone had said despite all she had endured and see as if her life had not mattered to anyone aside from a few strangers that took pity upon the beaten and battered woman so far from home.
Once more anger swelled inside the young lad's chest as he thought of what she must have had to endure due to the bastard he called a father. Dollaran had not cared for anything aside from himself and his urges, be they drinking or trying to stick his tiny drunken cock into someone.
With Milenda gone, the word had taken on a more darker shade in the life of the young Toby and he found himself given to bitterness and rage in the wake of being stuck with the drunken bastard and suffering his raging fits with blow after blow until the monster took off on another of his endless sea voyages where he came back with just enough gold to drink it up at the local pub and lord his value over the head of his son who had not been able to make even one gold coin in the wake of his adoptive mother's passing.
Days turned into weeks, weeks became months, and finally years had passed and nothing seemed to change in between the beatings and the drinking on Dollaran's part. Tobias weathered it all believing as everyone else had in town that he was just as cursed as the drunken brute Dollaran had been.