Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
Welcome to Kuwa- ...thingy!

This site is purely here for our own enjoyment, which means it's not open to the public. Well, I guess you can read our ramblings if you want... Beware, though. They are known to cause severe mental damage when we've been nightsick.

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
Vale of the White Horse
Topic Started: 5 Jan 2010, 13:03 (19,327 Views)
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
Morcant grabbed the man by the scruff of his neck and pushed him back towards his own table. 'Give my sister a look like that one more time and I'll reach down your throat to pull your heart out with my bare hands,' he growled.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
It was just a drunk, Essylt thought. She took Morcant's sleeve. ‘Let’s go, shall we?’
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
With a last disgusted look on the man, he turned around and followed Essylt out of the inn, making sure to shield her as much from the men's glances as possible. Even when they were out of the tavern, his muscles didn't relax and he suddenly realized that he'd probably never be able to think of Essylt in the arms of another man and not feel like murdering someone.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
She glanced back at his face. Once she had compared him to the sound of thunder at the closing of a summer’s day; it was how she felt about him now. ‘You never treated Elgued that way. This was just a drunkard. I doubt he’d be able to do something to me.’ She raised her hands briefly. ‘Not even Rufus managed that.’ She couldn’t help but sound bitter about it. What if she could never marry because her hands pushed off everyone that tried to touch her as a woman?
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
'Because Elgued's not a drunk,' he muttered. 'And I'd rather stop any attempts to molest you in advance.'
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
‘I know. I’m glad for that.’ The small inn-room changed into a shed though a small hall. There was a bile of hay, stacked together in a corner. It was colder here, but there was enough to snug into. ‘With the cloak and the blanket, it’ll probably be warm.’ Her shoulders hurt from carrying her small bundle all those days. She moved them, but that only made it worse. Dropping the bundle, she sank down on a bound stack, massaging her neck and left shoulder with her fingers. Even through her clothes she could feel hardness of those muscles. She bit her lip and looked around. Cobwebs in the corners. A few goats had a place on the other side. She smelled their musky scent.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
'Better than rocks or soil,' he agreed with a nod and set his things down. Essylt looked a little bit pained as she started rubbing her neck and shoulder. He'd carry both their bags tomorrow, he decided. His muscles could take it, but Essylt wasn't used to this sort of life yet. 'You feeling all right?'
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
‘A little strained,’ she admitted with a weary smile. ‘I’ve always had this bad shoulder. It hurts easily.’
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
'You should've told me, my shoulders are strong enough to carry the bags for two people.' He smiled at her.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
‘Morcant.’ Her hand slipped down into her lap with a sigh. ‘I know you’re doing all of this for me because you feel guilty. But I’m not holy. Don’t you think you’ve done enough already to relief you of this blame you’re carrying?’
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
He pressed his lips to a thin line. 'To be frank; no, I don't think so. But guilt or not, I'd have offered to carry your bags anyway.' He shrugged, his expression softening. 'I am strong enough for it.'
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
What would he have been like if he had not lost the life he’d been leading before Gwyddien? His loyalty touched her and she found it hard to guard her face; perhaps he’d see the expression that dwelled there. ‘I know you are. I’ll ask you next time.’ She petted on the hay. ‘Won’t you come sit? Can I have a look at the wound on your head?'
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
'If you want,' he said and sat down. 'It stopped hurting a while ago.' Morcant wondered what she was thinking, and if it was about him or something else. Something had filtered through her expression, but it was gone too soon for him to make out what it was.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
‘That’s good. I was afraid it would infect.’ She pushed his hair away carefully, but the horizontal cut was scarcely more than a slightly swollen, reddish line across his skin. ‘You look fine. I’m sorry for worrying too much, if it bothers you. It was how we lost Branwen, so I’ll always be more on edge in such cases.’
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
'Yes, well, I didn't really expect to get out alive, either,' he said with a tight grin. The feeling of her light, cool fingers against his forehead was distracting, to say the least.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
She let his locks fall back. ‘Don’t try to die for me again.’ She meant it with a smile, but it was hard to conceal the grave taste in her voice. Essylt wrapped the cloak out, as well as the blanket. A fire would be out of the question, but she felt the wind leaking through the holes in the roof. ‘Take whatever you want,’ she said. ‘I’m always cold these days, so it shouldn’t make a difference.’ But the hay was soft and she could always seduce one of the goats to lie next to her. Essylt’s lips moved up.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
'Can't promise anything,' he said as lightly as he could, then took a look at their things. 'I don't need anything but the clothes on my back, and since they're dry, I'll be fine. You take the blanket.'
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
They had little more to do than to lay down for sleep as the late afternoon changed gradually into evening and then into night. Essylt, wrapped in the blanket, listened to the shuffling sounds of the goats; their chewing on the hay and rubbing against each other as they, too, put their heads down. She slumbered, seeing half-visions of her father's washed-out face, creased with lines from worry. Perhaps he was holding on to Carwyn while he descended a hilltop, looking over the two lakes by the caer. Perhaps it wasn’t raining and were those tears running down his cheekbones. Had she done a terrible thing? She pulled herself away before she could really dream and looked with night-eyes into the dark ceiling, where there were nothing but swallowing shadows to look back down on her.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
Morcant's head felt like someone had replaced the contents with cottonwool. His throat was sore too, but that was probably because he swallowed so much water. No matter how he felt right now, after a good night's sleep it'd be gone - had to be gone. He wondered if Essylt couldn't sleep, since he heard her breathing change a couple of times. But he didn't dare ask, in case she'd just slumbered off. Ignoring the pounding in his ears that sounded suspiciously like the raging of the river, he squinted his eyes shut and waited for sleep to come get him.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
It was dark night. Morcant must be asleep now, so why couldn’t she? Essylt rolled over to her side, staring at his dark shape lying close to her. I’m not holy, she had told him. Did that mean that she had forgiven him? She wasn’t sure how she felt about that; the memory was still as bleak and painful as before, but then she wasn’t even sure how forgiveness should feel. Perhaps it wasn’t anything like a feeling at all, but just something people told each other sometimes.
She rolled back, sitting up without removing the blanket from her knees. The hay around her rustled. She blinked into the shadows. ‘Owl.’ Soft whispers, because she did not want to wake Morcant up. ‘Come here.’
He came, almost silver in the night where the black spots faded into grey. He landed on her bent knees, staring at her as though expecting a question. ‘And I do have questions,’ she murmured. ‘What are you? Who am I…what am I? Why won’t you speak? You’re one of Them, are you not…I don’t know if I can accept all of this, or what I’m becoming. I’ve never asked for it. I don’t want to be forced into being something like a cursed woman and never have any answers!’ It was more like a hiss now, and she took a deep breath. ‘At least lead me to answers then, if that’s all you can do. Let me find who’s doing this to me.’
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
He wasn't asleep, but he wasn't really awake either. He heard Essylt's voice, but he couldn't figure out whether she was talking to him or the hay, or whether it was in his dream or otherwise. Morcant turned on his other side and tried not to drown again.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
‘And what about Morcant?’ she whispered again, leaning over to stare into the owl’s silvery eyes. ‘Is he even supposed to be here? I know you made him come to me when I asked you to, but what if he’ll die? He nearly drowned in that river and he wouldn’t have, if it wasn’t for me. Or…Am I supposed to be what he wants me to be?’ She took three strands of hay between her fingers, turning them to fragile strings of ice. They looked like frozen threads of cobweb or very slim icicles now. ‘A killer of Romans? Should I have killed Marcus Lentulus? You were there, didn’t you see what happened? How would I have explained a dead, naked Roman in my bed chamber?’ Essylt shook her head at the owl, who turned his own to stare at her lopsided. Her mouth softened. ‘Well, you’re not of any help, are you? You can’t even keep the nightmares away. Still, I feel better with you than alone if I can’t sleep.’
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
The restless slumber he fell in was induced with dreams - no, they weren't even dreams, they were simply fragments of images without any real connection. One moment he was pressing his lips against Essylt's pale skin, the next he was forcing her on her knees to look at something in a pool of water. He drowned a couple of times, too - sometimes in the water, sometimes in a mass of blonde curls and sometimes in nothing at all. He was killing Romans with his bare hands now, and a second later he was being ripped to pieces by dogs. A naked man loomed over Essylt, touching her - was that him? No, he saw a Roman nose and suddenly his mind went up in flames.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
The owl remained perfecltly silent. Well, she had not expected anything else, though perhaps she’d hoped for a solemn voice leaking from that bill, telling her all she craved to understand. Essylt let herself fall back, turning her head to the left. He was breathing with short, hard and irregular gasps. It almost reminded her of a woman in labour. ‘Are you alright?’ He didn’t hear the whisper in the dark. Was he sleeping, then? She rolled closer, suddenly worried. One hand to his brow told her that his skin was glowing. Too hot, she thought. She took the blanket and draped it over his shoulders. ‘Morcant?’
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
Get your hands off of her, you son of a bitch, he shouted in his dream, though all that came from his lips in the real world were a few whisps of breath. The Roman molesting Essylt turned around with a snarl, turning into a hideous monster that jumped on him and tore his throat to shreds. The hot blood that ran from his wounds covered his entire body in a film of burning warmth and he tossed and turned to get rid of it.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
He was probably better off asleep, though she thought he must be dreaming heavily. She wished she could wrap him in her arms like he had done, but instead she just lay down closer to him, one arm over his shoulder and arm. Some life she had been plunged into, she thought sighing. Some life indeed.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
Now, he couldn't even get a good look at one image before another intruded, and then a next. After what seemed like countless centuries, they all exploded in a bright blur and he fell into a deeper, dreamless sleep.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
Though he was asleep, his arm had felt hard like a tree trunk. Now his breathing changed into a deeper and slower rhythm and the tension leaked away. Essylt closed her eyes, smelling the sweet hay, the goats and Morcant. Him most of all. It reminded her of the forest and the earth they had slept on so many times. There was a hint of water and wind in that smell, of smoky wood and fire. The smell of outdoors, a life unprotected but unrestricted, so unlike her own. Well, now she had exiled herself from that and he was probably the best companion she could wish for. It was odd to remember that he had first pressed a knife to her throat. She wondered if he’d have run the blade over her skin if she had struggled. Her kidnapper. Essylt felt the long fingers of the wind creep over her from above the ceiling and tugged a bit of the blanket over herself. It was probably fair to admit that she was doing the kidnapping now – not with daggers and bondages; no, he was doing his own binding. She even feared his commitment a little; it felt like he was forging an iron chain to her, but the iron was still blazing in the fire.
She drowsed off again, falling into a deep pit with soft shadows that caught her like a thousand arms.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Sonja
Red & dangerous! Rawr!
The first thing he noticed as he woke up, was a soft pressure on his arm. Turning his head to find the reason, he saw that it was Essylt's smaller arm on his own. For a moment, Morcant thought he was still dreaming and didn't dare to move, afraid to shatter the image that was so much more enjoyable than the nightmares - though he couldn't even remember half of them. When nothing changed for many long moments though, he realized he wasn't dreaming and that Essylt was in fact laying with her arm on his. And he kept even stiller, not wanting to wake her.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
Marieke
Lief! <3 (and powerful!)
His hand was in her hair and he pressed her head down, forcing her on her knees into a lake. Her clothes drenched and she sat to her thighs in the water. Essylt didn’t know where they were. She didn’t know how long he’d keep her like this if she did not cast her eyes down. All she knew was that she feared to see beneath the surface. Her heart was pounding. He knelt behind her, murmuring something she didn’t hear. He kissed her neck. She stared into the water and saw only his hands; how they wrapped around her arms and moved up, his fingers pressing into her breasts.
And then there was Carwyn, his big eyes wide open to gaze up at both their faces. He was smiling a baby laugh, and it reminded her of sunflowers and endless skies.
Offline Profile Quote Post Goto Top
 
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
Go to Next Page
« Previous Topic · Vale of the White Horse · Next Topic »
Add Reply


Theme created by vcd of the ZetaBoards Theme ZoneStyle District