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rainbowfic2012-03-24 02:13 pm
kay_brooke) wrote in rainbowfic2012-03-24 02:13 pm
Brown #7, Snow White #9, Tyrian Purple #18
Name: kay_brooke
Story: The Myrrosta
Colors: Brown #7 (brown talk), Snow White #9 (stolen child), Tyrian Purple #18 (virgin hunter)
Styles/Supplies: Pastels fororigfic_bingo card prompt "lies/secrets"
Word Count: 2,546
Rating/Warnings: PG-13; no standard warnings apply
Summary: There are two unexpected arrivals at the Court.
There was no grand affair when he came home, no parade or celebration in the streets, hardly any acknowledgment at all that he was a conquering hero come home from successfully fighting off the barbarian hordes that threatened their very way of life.
Some may have thought this a troubling sign, that the people of Jaharta neither knew nor cared what their Councilor was doing or that he had faced death and survived to continue his rule. But there was no grand affair because Atro didn't want it, because he didn't feel like the conquering hero or the brave leader. He felt like an exhausted man who had slogged through a war with a bloody sword in his hand and mud in his boots, who had seen terrible things and more of people's innards than he had ever wanted to see. Atro had been in battles before, had taken lives in the name of his city and in order to defend his own life, but he had never experienced a proper, dirty war like the one just finished.
In his mind, it had been a nasty, filthy task. A necessary one, to be sure, but not one that warranted a celebration. So he came home in secret, riding through the city in the middle of the night on a horse unmarked with his standard, the hood of his cloak pulled down over his face. He only allowed the guards at the front gate of the Court to recognize him. They seemed surprised, but it wasn't their place to question their Councilor. They let him in with little more comment than that they were glad to see him home and whole.
Atro left his horse at the stables to be brushed down and entered the Private Hall. One of the servants saw him and jumped to attention.
"Lord Atro," said the young man, bowing. "We were not expecting you home tonight. The letter we received from the Ryn suggested you would be arriving on the morrow."
"I decided not to ride with the Ryn's retinue," said Atro. He discarded his cloak, dropping it on the floor.
The servant smoothly bent to pick it up. "Apologies, my lord, but we haven't anything prepared. There will still be bread in the kitchen that I could--"
"I'm not hungry," said Atro.
"Then shall I get someone to prepare a bath?"
"No."
The servant looked for a moment like he wanted to protest, and Atro knew it was because he neither looked nor smelled like he'd seen any comforts in a long time. But all he wanted to do was go to bed.
"If my lord desires, I'll fetch the seneschal--"
"Why would I want to see him?" Atro demanded. "I don't need anything right now. I'm going to bed." He headed toward the stairs that led to his chambers.
"My lord," said the servant quickly. When Atro turned back with a sigh, he added, "The seneschal asked that he be notified immediately upon your arrival."
"Why?"
The servant looked around, like he was making sure they were alone. Atro narrowed his eyes in suspicion. He had been gone for half a year, with little news of what had been happening at the Court. He trusted his advisors were competent enough to oversee whatever matters came to them, but he didn't like the way the servant was acting. What had happened while he was gone?
"He has a message for you," said the servant.
"What message is that?"
"I don't know," said the servant stiffly. He suddenly seemed uncomfortable, and Atro definitely didn't like that.
"Whatever the seneschal has to say to me can wait until tomorrow," said Atro. "I'm not going to do anything right now but walk up those stairs to my chambers and my bed. I'm sure the seneschal wouldn't object to that."
"But, my lord--"
Atro held up a hand to stop the servant. "Is anyone dying?"
"No, my lord." The servant furrowed his brow in confusion.
"Is a war eminent? Another one?"
"No, my lord, but--"
"No." Atro made the statement as firm as he could through his exhaustion. "I can barely stand by myself. I'll talk to the seneschal first thing in the morning, but if there's no emergency right at this moment, it can wait." Then, just to put a point on the fact that the conversation was over, he added, "You are dismissed."
Before the servant could muster another objection, Atro turned and strode up the stairs, down the hall, and into his chambers.
Hopina was wide awake and waiting for him. And, judging by the hard set of her jaw and her pale, tear-streaked face, she was beyond furious at him.
"Hopina?" he stuttered, coming to a halt right inside his door. He was surprised to see her in his chambers. They of course shared a bed when he was at the Court, but she had her own chambers and he had thought that while he was gone she would sleep there. Hopina had no practical nor sentimental reason to want to sleep in her husband's bed.
"You're home finally," she said, but she didn't sound glad. She had been sitting on the bed, her fingers twisted angrily in the blankets, but now she stood up.
"I'm home," Atro said, nodding. "What are you doing in here?"
"Waiting for you."
"I wasn't supposed to arrive home until tomorrow."
She shook her head. "I know you. Or rather, I thought I did. Were you never going to tell me?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Your son," she hissed, taking a step toward him. Suddenly her anger was back in full force. "Were you just going to hide him away for the rest of your life? And if so--" she stepped right up to him, tilting her head back to look into his eyes--"why didn't you do a better job of it?"
He gaped at her. Nothing she had said made any sense, and he wondered if he was even more tired than he thought, to hear nonsense words coming out of his wife's mouth. "What are you talking about? I don't have a son." What a ludicrous accusation. He hoped to have a son soon, as he was now home for the foreseeable future. He had been married to Hopina for two years, so it was time to start producing heirs, the only reason his city had demanded he even marry in the first place.
"Don't lie to me," said Hopina. Hot, angry tears stood out in the corners of her eyes. "I think I've earned that much, to ask that you don't lie to me."
He took her by the shoulders and tried to ignore the pang he felt when she wrenched away from him. "I would never lie to you, Hopina. I don't know what you heard, but I have no children." Once upon a time, before his father had died and he had been exiled from his city, Atro had a bit of a reputation with women. He had grown older and wiser since then, but perhaps some of the rumors persisted. He had always been careful, though, even as a fumbling, awkward teenager, and he knew for a fact none of his dalliances had resulted in unexpected products.
"How can you tell me that," she said, her voice low and dangerous, "when just yesterday your son was delivered right to the front gate? Held out to me like I was supposed to know what to do with him and told that he was our problem now?"
Atro stepped back, gritting his teeth. He had hoped this wasn't what he thought it might be, but it seemed as if it was. "Someone is trying to get something from me," he said. "I've had . . . relations with other women before. You know that. There were no children, never any children. But if someone were to claim--" He stopped himself and shook his head. Was someone after the Councilorship? Surely whoever it was knew that the final decision of heir lay entirely with the Councilor? It was tradition that the eldest son inherit, even if that boy was a bastard as Atro himself was, but the law didn't demand it. Atro's own father hadn't had a choice, because Atro was his only offspring. But Atro had Hopina, and there was no reason to think she couldn't bear children of her own. Whoever thought they could lay claim to the Court by producing Atro's bastard "son" was wrong.
"Take me to him," he said. He would have to find some way to prove the child wasn't his.
"So you do have a son," said Hopina, but she seemed to have deflated, more sad than angry now.
"No," said Atro. "I think someone might be trying to make a move for my rule."
Hopina shook her head. "Atro, no, I don't think that's what's happening here." She looked him in the eyes again, and this time she seemed a little scared.
"Hopina? What do you mean? What's wrong?" Atro didn't like this one bit.
She turned away and stepped toward the antechamber. "You should come see him."
"That's what I said," Atro protested, but he followed Hopina out of his chambers and down the hall to another set of rooms.
"The maids turned this into a nursery," said Hopina as she opened the door. "It was a quick job, but his arrival was unexpected." The open door revealed a small room with a bed in the corner. A chair was set up next to the bed, and in it was one of the maids, her eyes drooping a little. When Hopina entered, though, she sat up straight. Her eyes grew wide as Atro followed his wife in.
"My lord," she said, standing up and bowing.
Atro waved her away. His eyes were fixed on the bed and the blanket-covered lump in the middle of it. A child. Not a baby. Well, that would make sense. It had been a few years since he had last been with any woman in the Court other than his own wife. "Wake him," he demanded.
"He's just fallen asleep," said the maid. "He's been ever so unsettled since he arrived, crying for a familiar face."
"Wake him."
She bowed her head again and went to the bed to rouse the child in it. The boy made an unhappy sound as she removed the covers and shook him awake, but he sat up, rubbing his eyes, and Atro didn't need to see the imploring gaze Hopina turned on him, because he could see just fine on his own why she was so bothered.
The boy in front of him didn't look like him, with his tousled blond hair, his pale skin, and his delicate features, but Atro recognized immediately who he did look like. And the child seemed perhaps three years old, which would make him exactly the right age. Atro's mind did the math automatically, and he didn't like the answer it came up with. He took a deep breath and stepped backwards. "Gods," he whispered.
"He is yours," said Hopina.
Atro closed his eyes. "I didn't know. I didn't . . . no one ever told me." But how could anyone have? He had left that village and never gone back. He had just left, and now, here, right in front of him . . .
"He's a salkiy," said Hopina softly, that note of fright still in her voice.
Atro couldn't open his eyes, not yet, but what Hopina said was true. The few moments he had looked at the child had etched every feature into his mind's eye, bringing back memories of a time he had nearly forgotten about, had left so far in his past that he hadn't even thought about it--thought about her--since it had happened.
"Atro."
Hopina's voice was so soft, and so questioning, and he couldn't not answer it. "When I was--when we fled the city, Merrus and I, we went to his village, the one he was born in. He thought his family would take me in." And they had, though that hadn't lasted long. "There was a woman there--a salkiy, she wasn't from Merrus's family, she was just a salkiy in the village--and she--"
"What?" said Hopina as the silence stretched on. Atro opened his eyes in time to see her usher the nurse out. The boy was making little whimpering sounds, but mostly he was staring wide-eyed at Atro. Atro tried not to look at him.
"It's a long story," he said, sighing. "We were together, though. A couple times. A few times. I didn't think she'd . . . I didn't know. Merrus and I were only in the village for a month. We left, and I never saw her again."
"They brought him to the gate yesterday morning," said Hopina. She was staring at the child, as if Atro's fear had sapped her own and she could face what was in front of her better than he. "Human messengers. They said they were from Byret in Okkand."
Atro cocked his head. "What would Byret have to do with a salkiy village?"
She shrugged. "They didn't say. But they had the boy. Said he had been brought to Byret and that they had been told he was the son of Councilor Atro of Jaharta. So they brought him here."
"Alone?" asked Atro. "Where's his mother?" He could only think of his own real mother, the salkiy Mynlai, who had been forcibly separated from him soon after he was born, and how that had led to so much trouble in his life. Had someone stolen this boy from Allia? If so, they had to get him back to her immediately.
Hopina shook her head sadly. "They said they had been told the mother was dead. That was why someone decided to send him to his father."
Atro took a deep breath, taking a moment to process the fact that Allia was dead. He hadn't loved her, but the sudden, blunt news of her death made him reel a little. "I see."
"So he is yours?" Hopina was still waiting for a straight answer, and because Atro had meant it when he said he would never lie to her, he gave it.
"Yes. I think so."
She nodded. "What do we do now?"
Atro looked at the boy then, right back into his wide, staring, gray eyes, and said, "Take care of him. He is my son."
Hopina clenched her jaw. "And will you be naming him your heir as well?"
"Of course not," said Atro. "The city has a hard enough time with me being half salkiy, and I look as human as any of them. He," he gestured at the child, "is more salkiy than human. They city would never accept him. I can take care of him, but I can't claim him in that way. Our eldest son, the one you and I make, will be my heir."
Hopina regarded him silently for a few moments, then nodded and said, "Good."
kay_brookeStory: The Myrrosta
Colors: Brown #7 (brown talk), Snow White #9 (stolen child), Tyrian Purple #18 (virgin hunter)
Styles/Supplies: Pastels for
origfic_bingo card prompt "lies/secrets"Word Count: 2,546
Rating/Warnings: PG-13; no standard warnings apply
Summary: There are two unexpected arrivals at the Court.
There was no grand affair when he came home, no parade or celebration in the streets, hardly any acknowledgment at all that he was a conquering hero come home from successfully fighting off the barbarian hordes that threatened their very way of life.
Some may have thought this a troubling sign, that the people of Jaharta neither knew nor cared what their Councilor was doing or that he had faced death and survived to continue his rule. But there was no grand affair because Atro didn't want it, because he didn't feel like the conquering hero or the brave leader. He felt like an exhausted man who had slogged through a war with a bloody sword in his hand and mud in his boots, who had seen terrible things and more of people's innards than he had ever wanted to see. Atro had been in battles before, had taken lives in the name of his city and in order to defend his own life, but he had never experienced a proper, dirty war like the one just finished.
In his mind, it had been a nasty, filthy task. A necessary one, to be sure, but not one that warranted a celebration. So he came home in secret, riding through the city in the middle of the night on a horse unmarked with his standard, the hood of his cloak pulled down over his face. He only allowed the guards at the front gate of the Court to recognize him. They seemed surprised, but it wasn't their place to question their Councilor. They let him in with little more comment than that they were glad to see him home and whole.
Atro left his horse at the stables to be brushed down and entered the Private Hall. One of the servants saw him and jumped to attention.
"Lord Atro," said the young man, bowing. "We were not expecting you home tonight. The letter we received from the Ryn suggested you would be arriving on the morrow."
"I decided not to ride with the Ryn's retinue," said Atro. He discarded his cloak, dropping it on the floor.
The servant smoothly bent to pick it up. "Apologies, my lord, but we haven't anything prepared. There will still be bread in the kitchen that I could--"
"I'm not hungry," said Atro.
"Then shall I get someone to prepare a bath?"
"No."
The servant looked for a moment like he wanted to protest, and Atro knew it was because he neither looked nor smelled like he'd seen any comforts in a long time. But all he wanted to do was go to bed.
"If my lord desires, I'll fetch the seneschal--"
"Why would I want to see him?" Atro demanded. "I don't need anything right now. I'm going to bed." He headed toward the stairs that led to his chambers.
"My lord," said the servant quickly. When Atro turned back with a sigh, he added, "The seneschal asked that he be notified immediately upon your arrival."
"Why?"
The servant looked around, like he was making sure they were alone. Atro narrowed his eyes in suspicion. He had been gone for half a year, with little news of what had been happening at the Court. He trusted his advisors were competent enough to oversee whatever matters came to them, but he didn't like the way the servant was acting. What had happened while he was gone?
"He has a message for you," said the servant.
"What message is that?"
"I don't know," said the servant stiffly. He suddenly seemed uncomfortable, and Atro definitely didn't like that.
"Whatever the seneschal has to say to me can wait until tomorrow," said Atro. "I'm not going to do anything right now but walk up those stairs to my chambers and my bed. I'm sure the seneschal wouldn't object to that."
"But, my lord--"
Atro held up a hand to stop the servant. "Is anyone dying?"
"No, my lord." The servant furrowed his brow in confusion.
"Is a war eminent? Another one?"
"No, my lord, but--"
"No." Atro made the statement as firm as he could through his exhaustion. "I can barely stand by myself. I'll talk to the seneschal first thing in the morning, but if there's no emergency right at this moment, it can wait." Then, just to put a point on the fact that the conversation was over, he added, "You are dismissed."
Before the servant could muster another objection, Atro turned and strode up the stairs, down the hall, and into his chambers.
Hopina was wide awake and waiting for him. And, judging by the hard set of her jaw and her pale, tear-streaked face, she was beyond furious at him.
"Hopina?" he stuttered, coming to a halt right inside his door. He was surprised to see her in his chambers. They of course shared a bed when he was at the Court, but she had her own chambers and he had thought that while he was gone she would sleep there. Hopina had no practical nor sentimental reason to want to sleep in her husband's bed.
"You're home finally," she said, but she didn't sound glad. She had been sitting on the bed, her fingers twisted angrily in the blankets, but now she stood up.
"I'm home," Atro said, nodding. "What are you doing in here?"
"Waiting for you."
"I wasn't supposed to arrive home until tomorrow."
She shook her head. "I know you. Or rather, I thought I did. Were you never going to tell me?"
"What are you talking about?"
"Your son," she hissed, taking a step toward him. Suddenly her anger was back in full force. "Were you just going to hide him away for the rest of your life? And if so--" she stepped right up to him, tilting her head back to look into his eyes--"why didn't you do a better job of it?"
He gaped at her. Nothing she had said made any sense, and he wondered if he was even more tired than he thought, to hear nonsense words coming out of his wife's mouth. "What are you talking about? I don't have a son." What a ludicrous accusation. He hoped to have a son soon, as he was now home for the foreseeable future. He had been married to Hopina for two years, so it was time to start producing heirs, the only reason his city had demanded he even marry in the first place.
"Don't lie to me," said Hopina. Hot, angry tears stood out in the corners of her eyes. "I think I've earned that much, to ask that you don't lie to me."
He took her by the shoulders and tried to ignore the pang he felt when she wrenched away from him. "I would never lie to you, Hopina. I don't know what you heard, but I have no children." Once upon a time, before his father had died and he had been exiled from his city, Atro had a bit of a reputation with women. He had grown older and wiser since then, but perhaps some of the rumors persisted. He had always been careful, though, even as a fumbling, awkward teenager, and he knew for a fact none of his dalliances had resulted in unexpected products.
"How can you tell me that," she said, her voice low and dangerous, "when just yesterday your son was delivered right to the front gate? Held out to me like I was supposed to know what to do with him and told that he was our problem now?"
Atro stepped back, gritting his teeth. He had hoped this wasn't what he thought it might be, but it seemed as if it was. "Someone is trying to get something from me," he said. "I've had . . . relations with other women before. You know that. There were no children, never any children. But if someone were to claim--" He stopped himself and shook his head. Was someone after the Councilorship? Surely whoever it was knew that the final decision of heir lay entirely with the Councilor? It was tradition that the eldest son inherit, even if that boy was a bastard as Atro himself was, but the law didn't demand it. Atro's own father hadn't had a choice, because Atro was his only offspring. But Atro had Hopina, and there was no reason to think she couldn't bear children of her own. Whoever thought they could lay claim to the Court by producing Atro's bastard "son" was wrong.
"Take me to him," he said. He would have to find some way to prove the child wasn't his.
"So you do have a son," said Hopina, but she seemed to have deflated, more sad than angry now.
"No," said Atro. "I think someone might be trying to make a move for my rule."
Hopina shook her head. "Atro, no, I don't think that's what's happening here." She looked him in the eyes again, and this time she seemed a little scared.
"Hopina? What do you mean? What's wrong?" Atro didn't like this one bit.
She turned away and stepped toward the antechamber. "You should come see him."
"That's what I said," Atro protested, but he followed Hopina out of his chambers and down the hall to another set of rooms.
"The maids turned this into a nursery," said Hopina as she opened the door. "It was a quick job, but his arrival was unexpected." The open door revealed a small room with a bed in the corner. A chair was set up next to the bed, and in it was one of the maids, her eyes drooping a little. When Hopina entered, though, she sat up straight. Her eyes grew wide as Atro followed his wife in.
"My lord," she said, standing up and bowing.
Atro waved her away. His eyes were fixed on the bed and the blanket-covered lump in the middle of it. A child. Not a baby. Well, that would make sense. It had been a few years since he had last been with any woman in the Court other than his own wife. "Wake him," he demanded.
"He's just fallen asleep," said the maid. "He's been ever so unsettled since he arrived, crying for a familiar face."
"Wake him."
She bowed her head again and went to the bed to rouse the child in it. The boy made an unhappy sound as she removed the covers and shook him awake, but he sat up, rubbing his eyes, and Atro didn't need to see the imploring gaze Hopina turned on him, because he could see just fine on his own why she was so bothered.
The boy in front of him didn't look like him, with his tousled blond hair, his pale skin, and his delicate features, but Atro recognized immediately who he did look like. And the child seemed perhaps three years old, which would make him exactly the right age. Atro's mind did the math automatically, and he didn't like the answer it came up with. He took a deep breath and stepped backwards. "Gods," he whispered.
"He is yours," said Hopina.
Atro closed his eyes. "I didn't know. I didn't . . . no one ever told me." But how could anyone have? He had left that village and never gone back. He had just left, and now, here, right in front of him . . .
"He's a salkiy," said Hopina softly, that note of fright still in her voice.
Atro couldn't open his eyes, not yet, but what Hopina said was true. The few moments he had looked at the child had etched every feature into his mind's eye, bringing back memories of a time he had nearly forgotten about, had left so far in his past that he hadn't even thought about it--thought about her--since it had happened.
"Atro."
Hopina's voice was so soft, and so questioning, and he couldn't not answer it. "When I was--when we fled the city, Merrus and I, we went to his village, the one he was born in. He thought his family would take me in." And they had, though that hadn't lasted long. "There was a woman there--a salkiy, she wasn't from Merrus's family, she was just a salkiy in the village--and she--"
"What?" said Hopina as the silence stretched on. Atro opened his eyes in time to see her usher the nurse out. The boy was making little whimpering sounds, but mostly he was staring wide-eyed at Atro. Atro tried not to look at him.
"It's a long story," he said, sighing. "We were together, though. A couple times. A few times. I didn't think she'd . . . I didn't know. Merrus and I were only in the village for a month. We left, and I never saw her again."
"They brought him to the gate yesterday morning," said Hopina. She was staring at the child, as if Atro's fear had sapped her own and she could face what was in front of her better than he. "Human messengers. They said they were from Byret in Okkand."
Atro cocked his head. "What would Byret have to do with a salkiy village?"
She shrugged. "They didn't say. But they had the boy. Said he had been brought to Byret and that they had been told he was the son of Councilor Atro of Jaharta. So they brought him here."
"Alone?" asked Atro. "Where's his mother?" He could only think of his own real mother, the salkiy Mynlai, who had been forcibly separated from him soon after he was born, and how that had led to so much trouble in his life. Had someone stolen this boy from Allia? If so, they had to get him back to her immediately.
Hopina shook her head sadly. "They said they had been told the mother was dead. That was why someone decided to send him to his father."
Atro took a deep breath, taking a moment to process the fact that Allia was dead. He hadn't loved her, but the sudden, blunt news of her death made him reel a little. "I see."
"So he is yours?" Hopina was still waiting for a straight answer, and because Atro had meant it when he said he would never lie to her, he gave it.
"Yes. I think so."
She nodded. "What do we do now?"
Atro looked at the boy then, right back into his wide, staring, gray eyes, and said, "Take care of him. He is my son."
Hopina clenched her jaw. "And will you be naming him your heir as well?"
"Of course not," said Atro. "The city has a hard enough time with me being half salkiy, and I look as human as any of them. He," he gestured at the child, "is more salkiy than human. They city would never accept him. I can take care of him, but I can't claim him in that way. Our eldest son, the one you and I make, will be my heir."
Hopina regarded him silently for a few moments, then nodded and said, "Good."
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