Summoner's Song

Rain pounded into the earth, the black clouds over head growled with distant thunder. Night was falling, but the light of day had long since surrendered to the darkness of the storm. She pressed her face to the window's cold glass, the dark room behind her lit by a single oil lamp, and she sang.
Brief, violent lightning occasionally illuminated her face, and it seemed she cried, the drops of rain running down the glass of the window she stared out of like tears upon her cheeks. Beneath her breath, she sang a child's lullaby, and the eery chant carried through the storm, a silent wail of terror and pain. At its sound, the animals in the surrounding forest fell silent, trembling in their burrows and nests, and dogs whined and cowered under tables. Horses snorted and stomped nervously in their stalls, and it seemed even the trees waved in grief, the wind crying out their pain.
Her voice was hauntingly beautiful, even as a child. The song she sang was wordless, a chant meant to comfort and heal, but the pain in her heart rendered it a keen of undying grief. And those lucky humans that caught at its sound felt the need to fall to the ground and weep in despair. For even as it was beautiful, even as it was sad, they knew that they would never hear its like again. It was the song of the Sumner, and not meant for those of their kind.
Lightning struck the sky once more, flying accross hair as black as night, and eyes as blue and deep as the storm-tossed ocean. Tonight this child inherited her birthright, the voice of the Sumner and rejection of her own people, for they would never understand her calling, her purpose. Tonight, she found the song in her soul, and tonight, her father was dying.
She threw the glass panes open and stepped out onto the rain-drenched porch, her voice rising, transcending the child's melody, the falling rain melding with the tears on the cheeks. And even as sobs captured her throat, her voice held strong and true, as she heard her father's song fall and slowly fade away from the world's weaving of sounds and melodies. Her voice rose higher, the thunder answering her plea with a violent roar. The rain fell harder upon the ground, pounding as she raised her hands to the sky and threw back her head. And finally she felt her father's life extinguish, she felt the last rasping breath upon his dry, chapped lips, the flutter of his lashes as his weary eyes closed, and she knew they would not open again.
Only then did she allow herself to fall to the wet stone tiles, her arms around her knees, curling on the ground like a wounded, dying animal. Now she screamed, and her body convulsed with the strength of her sobs, her heart breaking, broken. And the rain calmed its drenching torrent, the thunder quieted its roars, and the wind broke its maddening whispers, comforting the child, gentling the passing of the only one who would ever truly understand her world, sharing the pain at the loss of the only person she had ever loved. Yet she knew that their grief was no equal to hers.
The Sumner had died, his voice reborn in his heir, and the world's songs could be sung once more. The earth mourned its soul's singer, but the earth had seen countless seasons, countless lives, and though the Sumner was more precious than most, his life was a brief flicker of flame in the bonfire of her existence.
The Sumner's daughter wailed her sadness and pain, and the earth keened with her, the trees' leaves whispering of the Sumner's passing in the wind, the storms calling his name as their mighty waves crashed against the cliffs, the thunder rolling mightily in the dark, clouded sky. The child rose, rain pattering unfelt upon her, cold wind making her tremble.
The servants came out of the house, the butler murmuring condolences, the viscount's valet stiff and looking abandoned, and her nursemaid even crying as she wrapped her in a large quilt. As they made to bustle her through the door, she stopped them. The three looked at her in askance.
"My father is dead," she told them. They looked at her, amazed, for it was the first time she had spoken in her entire life, the first time they had ever heard her voice. They nodded, carefully. Her tears dried, and she rose shattered eyes to the heavy sky.
"Leave me," she commanded brusquely, her voice not that of the child she was. As they retreated, she walked to the edge of the terrace, and looked over the forest that lay before her. She knew her duty, her calling. It was what she was meant to do, what her father had dedicated his life to. Her voice rose once more, and her chant was peaceful, quiet, comforting after the storm, the violent roar of her dark emotions. She felt her heart lift at her song. She walked down the steps, still singing as the rain drizzled around her, and stepped, her feet bare and touching the earth, into the forest. She walked there, among those she was meant to hear and to keep, singing, offering them comfort and peace. Her eyes were still sad, her heart still ached, but the song eased her burden. The Sumner's daughter walked to the cliffs and stared out at the restless sea. She smiled, a sad, broken smile, and her song faltered to a stop. Her father had died. Already the burden of her enourmous responsibilty made her stumble. She was meant to sing the earth's soul, to call forth the seasons, to chant for the waves and the birth of the trees. Her name was Moira, and she was the Sumner.