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rainbowfic2023-03-11 11:01 pm
shadowsong26) wrote in rainbowfic2023-03-11 11:01 pm
Amaranth #3, Halloween Orange #8
Name: shadowsong26
Story: Begin and Begin and Begin
'Verse: Feredar
Colors: Amaranth #3. Eternity, Halloween Orange #8. Our roads may be golden, or broken, or lost, but we'll walk on them willingly, knowing the cost
Supplies and Materials: graffiti (I'll Have Seconds challenge), canvas (the first one), frame (the last one), pastels (Year of the OTP Prompt List: March prompt "fresh starts"), novelty beads
Word Count: 1035
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Taz, Dallu
Warnings: References to war/combat and estrangement.
Notes: Constructive criticism welcome, as always. As far as the last one, goes, incidentally, Kes is thinking the exact same thing Taz is at this point so.
You don’t exactly blend in here, but you don’t stand out in the tavern quite as much as you do on the streets. There are others of your kin here, mostly drinking with their Captains and their crews. The young man who sold you your beer did raise an eyebrow at you being alone, but you just smiled at him, trying to appear Mysterious, and flipped him an extra coin (even though you don’t have many left; not after spending probably too much on Islander-style clothing so you wouldn’t bake yourself to death).
You're not sure whether it was the mystique of a navigator fresh from the North or the coin, but whichever it was, it did the trick. He laughed, and let you be.
You settle yourself in a corner to watch and wait. You’re…not really sure how this next part will work. Other navigators, those who had retired and come home, couldn’t describe it as more than…
Like the feeling of lightning about to strike. That push and pull of power in the air just before the sparks go off. Tension and release.
You’ll know.
Helpful.
You sit there for an hour, then another, get a second beer from the same young man and then--
You hear laughter over the noise of the crowd, and turn your head toward the sound, and then you see her.
She tosses her head back, gold jewelry glinting in the firelight. She’s young; and your heart freezes for a minute because what if she’s not a Captain yet; but you can feel the sparks dancing in her laughter, echoing sparks dancing under your skin.
Navigators tie themselves to Captains more than ships. That part has been drilled into your head for as long as you’ve known you would be coming South to find one.
This is your Captain.
You memorize her face, everything you can see of her clothing and jewelry; the other woman standing just behind her. All the details you can see in the dim light, enough to let you find her ship in the morning. It wouldn’t be right, to approach her here. You’re not sure how you know that, but you know.
You finish your beer and slip out, as surreptitiously as you can--it helps that the bar is crowded now; even when you catch someone’s eye, which you do, no one really looks twice--to ask the right questions and find your ship.
Tomorrow, your life will truly begin.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~
Dallu stands at your side, the way he has day (and night) for all the five years since he came to join you.
“It’s war,” you say. He’s the first person you tell--you haven’t even told Kes yet, and she’s your second. “Official now.”
He nods. “You know what I can do for you.”
“Yeah.” There are rules, about battle magic. You’re not sure what all of them are, but you know he has them, and you know they’re there for a reason. You’ve thought about it--especially since you’ve seen this coming since you started making your little raids upriver all those months ago.
Because, sure, Dallu’s a decent hand with a knife, and a hell of a shot with a bow or crossbow when needed. And you know, better than most, that calling lightning when an arrow would do--just like sending a Great Lady when a Little Brother could do the job--might cause more problems than it solved. If it even solved the problem you were there for in the first place.
But he’s yours, and you worry. And it’s real, open war now. Which means things have changed.
“Hey,” he says, and his fingers find yours on the railing.
You smile, and lean over to kiss him. “I know,” you say, when you pull away. “We’ll see it through. We always do, yeah?” He’s still with you. Til the end. And you’ll keep him safe, with or without his lightning. Til the end.
“Damn right we do.” He kisses you again. “Time to tell the others?”
“Yeah,” you say. You squeeze his hand, then pull away. Time to be Captain; time to find Kes and get the crew together and tell them that even though everything’s changed…
Well. Some things haven’t. You still have each other.
Now you just have a godsdamned war to fight.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~
You stand together on the deck of a little ship, well-stocked with all the provisions you need for the long trip North. Just the two of you. A sort of wedding trip, a sort of honeymoon.
Or a way to make sure you won’t drive each other totally mad without other people around as a buffer, but you don’t think that’s likely.
It wasn’t an easy decision, not for either of you. Because for both of you, now, in a way, it’s going home and leaving home, all at once.
But it’s the right decision. You both know that, as sure as you know you want to spend the rest of your lives together. After the war, after everything you’ve seen, everything you’ve lost…you’re ready for it. Even if it means leaving the Islands behind.
The one thing is, you wish Kes had been on the beach to say goodbye, but you’re not…it’s not a surprise, exactly, that she stayed away. A lot of things had been said, during that fight, after that last battle weeks ago. Some deserved, some not. You don’t really blame her for still being angry.
”She’ll probably write us in a year or so.”
”Maybe, maybe not. You know how stubborn she is.”
”Or you could write her.”
”Yeah, she ain’t the only stubborn one. Besides, if she hasn’t…if she ain’t ready to forgive me, I’m not gonna push. You know?”
Time will solve that problem, one way or another. You hope.
And now, it seems, you have all the time in the world.
Your hands find each other on the railing, and one of you leans in first, the other only half a heartbeat behind, for a long, lingering kiss.
The Islands are just a faint greenish smudge on the horizon by the time you break away.
“Ready?”
“Ready.”
You pull apart, to your different duties, ready to ride the waves and guide the weather and carry yourselves, together, into the future.
Story: Begin and Begin and Begin
'Verse: Feredar
Colors: Amaranth #3. Eternity, Halloween Orange #8. Our roads may be golden, or broken, or lost, but we'll walk on them willingly, knowing the cost
Supplies and Materials: graffiti (I'll Have Seconds challenge), canvas (the first one), frame (the last one), pastels (Year of the OTP Prompt List: March prompt "fresh starts"), novelty beads
Word Count: 1035
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Taz, Dallu
Warnings: References to war/combat and estrangement.
Notes: Constructive criticism welcome, as always. As far as the last one, goes, incidentally, Kes is thinking the exact same thing Taz is at this point so.
You don’t exactly blend in here, but you don’t stand out in the tavern quite as much as you do on the streets. There are others of your kin here, mostly drinking with their Captains and their crews. The young man who sold you your beer did raise an eyebrow at you being alone, but you just smiled at him, trying to appear Mysterious, and flipped him an extra coin (even though you don’t have many left; not after spending probably too much on Islander-style clothing so you wouldn’t bake yourself to death).
You're not sure whether it was the mystique of a navigator fresh from the North or the coin, but whichever it was, it did the trick. He laughed, and let you be.
You settle yourself in a corner to watch and wait. You’re…not really sure how this next part will work. Other navigators, those who had retired and come home, couldn’t describe it as more than…
Like the feeling of lightning about to strike. That push and pull of power in the air just before the sparks go off. Tension and release.
You’ll know.
Helpful.
You sit there for an hour, then another, get a second beer from the same young man and then--
You hear laughter over the noise of the crowd, and turn your head toward the sound, and then you see her.
She tosses her head back, gold jewelry glinting in the firelight. She’s young; and your heart freezes for a minute because what if she’s not a Captain yet; but you can feel the sparks dancing in her laughter, echoing sparks dancing under your skin.
Navigators tie themselves to Captains more than ships. That part has been drilled into your head for as long as you’ve known you would be coming South to find one.
This is your Captain.
You memorize her face, everything you can see of her clothing and jewelry; the other woman standing just behind her. All the details you can see in the dim light, enough to let you find her ship in the morning. It wouldn’t be right, to approach her here. You’re not sure how you know that, but you know.
You finish your beer and slip out, as surreptitiously as you can--it helps that the bar is crowded now; even when you catch someone’s eye, which you do, no one really looks twice--to ask the right questions and find your ship.
Tomorrow, your life will truly begin.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~
Dallu stands at your side, the way he has day (and night) for all the five years since he came to join you.
“It’s war,” you say. He’s the first person you tell--you haven’t even told Kes yet, and she’s your second. “Official now.”
He nods. “You know what I can do for you.”
“Yeah.” There are rules, about battle magic. You’re not sure what all of them are, but you know he has them, and you know they’re there for a reason. You’ve thought about it--especially since you’ve seen this coming since you started making your little raids upriver all those months ago.
Because, sure, Dallu’s a decent hand with a knife, and a hell of a shot with a bow or crossbow when needed. And you know, better than most, that calling lightning when an arrow would do--just like sending a Great Lady when a Little Brother could do the job--might cause more problems than it solved. If it even solved the problem you were there for in the first place.
But he’s yours, and you worry. And it’s real, open war now. Which means things have changed.
“Hey,” he says, and his fingers find yours on the railing.
You smile, and lean over to kiss him. “I know,” you say, when you pull away. “We’ll see it through. We always do, yeah?” He’s still with you. Til the end. And you’ll keep him safe, with or without his lightning. Til the end.
“Damn right we do.” He kisses you again. “Time to tell the others?”
“Yeah,” you say. You squeeze his hand, then pull away. Time to be Captain; time to find Kes and get the crew together and tell them that even though everything’s changed…
Well. Some things haven’t. You still have each other.
Now you just have a godsdamned war to fight.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~
You stand together on the deck of a little ship, well-stocked with all the provisions you need for the long trip North. Just the two of you. A sort of wedding trip, a sort of honeymoon.
Or a way to make sure you won’t drive each other totally mad without other people around as a buffer, but you don’t think that’s likely.
It wasn’t an easy decision, not for either of you. Because for both of you, now, in a way, it’s going home and leaving home, all at once.
But it’s the right decision. You both know that, as sure as you know you want to spend the rest of your lives together. After the war, after everything you’ve seen, everything you’ve lost…you’re ready for it. Even if it means leaving the Islands behind.
The one thing is, you wish Kes had been on the beach to say goodbye, but you’re not…it’s not a surprise, exactly, that she stayed away. A lot of things had been said, during that fight, after that last battle weeks ago. Some deserved, some not. You don’t really blame her for still being angry.
”She’ll probably write us in a year or so.”
”Maybe, maybe not. You know how stubborn she is.”
”Or you could write her.”
”Yeah, she ain’t the only stubborn one. Besides, if she hasn’t…if she ain’t ready to forgive me, I’m not gonna push. You know?”
Time will solve that problem, one way or another. You hope.
And now, it seems, you have all the time in the world.
Your hands find each other on the railing, and one of you leans in first, the other only half a heartbeat behind, for a long, lingering kiss.
The Islands are just a faint greenish smudge on the horizon by the time you break away.
“Ready?”
“Ready.”
You pull apart, to your different duties, ready to ride the waves and guide the weather and carry yourselves, together, into the future.
no subject
Like the feeling of lightning about to strike. That push and pull of power in the air just before the sparks go off. Tension and release. is especially nice.
(Btw, you seem to have lost a word or two out of this line near the start: Whether it was the mystique of a navigator fresh from the North or laughed, and let you be.)
no subject
(soooooo i did, thank you! fixed now)
no subject
“There is something about a bathroom that feels like a fortress. A closed bathroom door may only be about two inches of plywood, but it feels like an iron bar.” ― Ursula Vernon, Castle Hangnail
“Inspiration knocks now and again, but spite bangs on the door all year long.” ― T. Kingfisher, Clockwork Boys
“A stupid mule is still smarter than a good horse or a bad man.” ― Ursula Vernon, Apex Magazine Issue 80
no subject
no subject