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tamingthemuse2013-05-18 01:32 am
tekia.livejournal.com) wrote in tamingthemuse2013-05-18 01:32 am
Entry tags:
Prompt# 356 - Drusy Quartz - Audra - Tekia - Exalted/original
Title: Audra
Fandom: Exalted/original
Prompt: drusy quartz
Warnings: none
Rating: G
Summary: Character study of a child that had forgotten what it was like to be a normal human, almost.
She once had a name.
It was so long ago, she couldn’t quite remember what it was. If she closed her eyes and tried really hard, she thought that perhaps the soft voice cooing at her through her memories was her mother’s voice singing to her. Maybe she even said her name a time or two, but the memories were faint and clouded with time.
What she did remember, what she would always remember, was the fire that took her family’s lives and changed hers forever.
She had been but a child, too frightened to flee as the flames had licked at the curtain that separated her home from the community housing. The smoke had choked her and turned her tears hot on her cheeks to the point that, even now, years upon years later, she could still feel their phantom burns.
The house had been dark, and the sky beyond the window low with clouds. There had been no moonlight spilling through the window to light up her mother’s fair hair as she sat with her. No. Her mother hadn’t been with her when the fire happened.
She shook her head and had to push her hair back over her shoulder when the motion sent it spilling into her lap.
Her mother’s hair had been yellow, and glowed in the moon’s soft light. It had been like magic, she seemed to remember thinking. Now, of course, she knew a magic of a far different sort, but she wondered if it had been her mother’s own special magic. A mother’s magic.
But her village had burnt to the ground, and she would have gone down with it, stuck in the little room of a home, her parents absent, and chaos running rampant through the place as villagers fought against the fire.
Then he had come through the window in a flurry of cloth and hair and yellow eyes. He had gathered her up into his arms and held her close as he fled through the window and into the forest. She had been too frightened by the fire, by the stranger, and by the speed at which they fled to even cry. She clung to his cloak like a lifeline, watching over his shoulder as the glow of the massive fire faded behind a thick wall of trees.
When he had finally stopped running, he had wrapped her in his cloak and wiped the tears from her face. To the day she died, if she ever died, she would never forget his eyes, glowing yellow in the dark.
He held her close to his side throughout the night as people came to speak with him, and then left them. Sometimes they shouted at him, and sometimes they murmured softly over her head, but he never let them take her from him, no matter how hard they glared at her.
She hadn’t known him at the time, but, somehow, she was safe with him. She knew it as surely as she knew the dragons were their protectors.
With a snort, she shoved away from the washing pool and wiped her hands on her skirt. Fat lot of good that had done, trusting in the dragons to protect them. Her parents had died believing that the five dragons were the people’s protectors, and she was grateful that they never learned just how self-centered and aloof the dragons had really been.
She was grateful that she never had to contend with them at all.
She glanced around the cave that had been her home for far longer than it hadn’t, drinking in the sight of the drusy quartz glittering like so much stars captured in a white sky. The pools were just as white, milky and sweet, and sometimes warm. There was more silver than gold in the cave, and even a few jewels that glittered far brighter than the stars she hadn’t seen in ages upon ages.
In each pool, stones of quartz made paths from one side of the cave to the next, delving ever deeper into the earth, but the cave never lost its brilliance. Magic. She smiled at the sight of white silk pooling around a corner and skipped over to it, her small feet barely touching down on the stepping stones. She gathered up the silk into her arms, humming softly.
He liked to make messes in their cave.
He liked to have things strewn about, threatening to trip the unwary. He liked to make the cave reshape itself until they both had to pause at each corner to figure out where they really were.
His chaos was far tamer than anything in the outside world.
She found him laying half on a shelf, half standing, his arms folded under his chin, and his eyes vacant. Taller than her by more than a head, she had to reach on to her tip toes to drape the silk over his shoulders.
While the man with the yellow eyes had saved her from the outside world, it was her that saved this strange man.
That wasn’t quite right.
In the outside world, those that had been in charge had deemed her dangerous. They looked into her future, and saw in her something to fear. They feared her so greatly, that they had set fire to her whole village just to rid the world of her.
Even as a child, lost and frightened, she had realized what a precarious position she had been in, protected from the fate makers only by the yellow eyed man’s thin arms. He had fought with his brothers to protect her, and in the end had brought her here, to this man.
They had saved each other, then.
He turned now to her, his huge almond shaped eyes blinking slowly as he drew back into himself. “You are sad,” he said, his voice both soft and hard, deep and melodious and harsh.
Today, his skin was as thin as the film of cream that sometimes coated the stagnant of pools, as pale as the milky waters. His eyes were such a dark brown they were nearly black, and far larger than a human’s could possibly ever become. His hair was the color of tree bark, and his ears as large as a horse’s, fine brown fur shimmering in the glittering light of the cave. Two grand antlers perched on his head, giving him even more height than his birdlike legs.
Feathers as white as his skin folded the leather of his legs into his knees, hidden under the short tunic he wore.
“Nay,” she murmured with a shake of her head. “Only remembering what I can’t recall of my past.”
His head tilted to one side, and, for a moment, she worried that the massive antlers would topple his head from his shoulders. Such a thing didn’t happen, for he was not only magic, but he was far too majestic for such a thing to happen.
“Why do you dwell on such things? Did you not agree that it was here you would be happiest?”
She nodded and carefully climbed up onto the shelf, putting her face level with his. “And it is here that I am happiest. But, I am still human, despite how much magic you have poured into me.” She looked down at her hands, folded so politely in her lap. She still felt like a child covered in soot, bare footed and hungry, but she knew that her image was quite the opposite. She had learned a lot from him, and, without her consent, she had adapted his manners into her own.
What would they yellow eyed man say if he saw her now? Would his eyes soften with pride? She liked to hope so. If she ever saw him again.
“I don’t remember my mother’s face. Did I have a mother? I don’t remember.”
His eyes slid away from her, seeing something that she was not privy to. “This, I do not have the answer to.”
She nodded. “Of course. I lost my family long before I came to you.” Unfolding her hands, she pressed one to the cool stone next to her. She picked at the sparkles in the quartz for a moment before dropping her hand back to her lap with a sigh. She bit the inside of her lip a moment before she looked back to him. “I’m happy here, Master. I am happy that the danger that I posed to the human world cannot manifest, and I am happy that I can give you a relief from your solitude.”
He looked back at her before he grinned, lips stretched wide over sharp, dagger-like teeth. Were she anybody else, she would have shivered in fear, but she had no fear of him.
She, of course, knew what he was, what he was capable of, but he was no danger to her. To anybody, really.
Like her, he was forever banished from the living world into this cave. Unlike her, he wasn’t here by his own free will.
As a child, she had been informed by those that control fate that she posed a grave threat to the mortal world. How, she didn’t know, but what her fate held in store for the world was so much feared that they wanted her dead.
The yellow eyed man had saved her and protected her against the others, and offered her a place where she could live, and live with a purpose without fear of her fate, or of his brethren.
She had come here willingly, to protect the world from herself.
He had been sentenced here by the same people that had sentenced her to death. In the cave that wasn’t quite in the same world as the living world, but so far removed from the Chaos from which he had come.
And the yellow eyed one knew his name and could control him with only a word.
He had made the man her protector, and he had made her his companion. It was a win-win. She lived without fear, and he wasn’t alone.
She smiled at him. “Do you remember my name?”
“Audra,” he said, her name thick and heavy in his honey voice. He shoved away from the self and held his hand out to her, his long fingers ending in even longer claws. She took his hand in hers and let him help her off the shelf.
“Audra,” she repeated as she followed him. “Do you think, whatever danger my fate spelled for me is still there, out there? Or has it passed? Does it await me, just outside the opening of the cave that I cannot see?”
He shrugged, thin shoulders graceful as they rose under his tunic. “Fate is a mortal thing, and I know nothing of it. Fate is written in Order, the opposite of Chaos. Ask me why the living die, or why the wolf grins, or why gold turns good men bad. Those, I can answer. Why fate demands sacrifices from those that create it, I do not understand nor do I care to.” He slanted her a look out of the corner of his eyes, the deep color reflecting the brilliance of the cave’s walls, reminding her of the yellow eyed man’s eyes and the stars she had glimpsed inside them. “If you wish to know, leave the cave. You do not see the exit, because you do not want to see it. You know where it is.”
She smiled at him, sure in this as she had never been sure of anything before. “I do not want to leave.” She curled her arm around his and felt feathers shift under his sleeve. “I am happy here. And I am happy to never have to leave here. It is here that I find myself home.”
Fandom: Exalted/original
Prompt: drusy quartz
Warnings: none
Rating: G
Summary: Character study of a child that had forgotten what it was like to be a normal human, almost.
She once had a name.
It was so long ago, she couldn’t quite remember what it was. If she closed her eyes and tried really hard, she thought that perhaps the soft voice cooing at her through her memories was her mother’s voice singing to her. Maybe she even said her name a time or two, but the memories were faint and clouded with time.
What she did remember, what she would always remember, was the fire that took her family’s lives and changed hers forever.
She had been but a child, too frightened to flee as the flames had licked at the curtain that separated her home from the community housing. The smoke had choked her and turned her tears hot on her cheeks to the point that, even now, years upon years later, she could still feel their phantom burns.
The house had been dark, and the sky beyond the window low with clouds. There had been no moonlight spilling through the window to light up her mother’s fair hair as she sat with her. No. Her mother hadn’t been with her when the fire happened.
She shook her head and had to push her hair back over her shoulder when the motion sent it spilling into her lap.
Her mother’s hair had been yellow, and glowed in the moon’s soft light. It had been like magic, she seemed to remember thinking. Now, of course, she knew a magic of a far different sort, but she wondered if it had been her mother’s own special magic. A mother’s magic.
But her village had burnt to the ground, and she would have gone down with it, stuck in the little room of a home, her parents absent, and chaos running rampant through the place as villagers fought against the fire.
Then he had come through the window in a flurry of cloth and hair and yellow eyes. He had gathered her up into his arms and held her close as he fled through the window and into the forest. She had been too frightened by the fire, by the stranger, and by the speed at which they fled to even cry. She clung to his cloak like a lifeline, watching over his shoulder as the glow of the massive fire faded behind a thick wall of trees.
When he had finally stopped running, he had wrapped her in his cloak and wiped the tears from her face. To the day she died, if she ever died, she would never forget his eyes, glowing yellow in the dark.
He held her close to his side throughout the night as people came to speak with him, and then left them. Sometimes they shouted at him, and sometimes they murmured softly over her head, but he never let them take her from him, no matter how hard they glared at her.
She hadn’t known him at the time, but, somehow, she was safe with him. She knew it as surely as she knew the dragons were their protectors.
With a snort, she shoved away from the washing pool and wiped her hands on her skirt. Fat lot of good that had done, trusting in the dragons to protect them. Her parents had died believing that the five dragons were the people’s protectors, and she was grateful that they never learned just how self-centered and aloof the dragons had really been.
She was grateful that she never had to contend with them at all.
She glanced around the cave that had been her home for far longer than it hadn’t, drinking in the sight of the drusy quartz glittering like so much stars captured in a white sky. The pools were just as white, milky and sweet, and sometimes warm. There was more silver than gold in the cave, and even a few jewels that glittered far brighter than the stars she hadn’t seen in ages upon ages.
In each pool, stones of quartz made paths from one side of the cave to the next, delving ever deeper into the earth, but the cave never lost its brilliance. Magic. She smiled at the sight of white silk pooling around a corner and skipped over to it, her small feet barely touching down on the stepping stones. She gathered up the silk into her arms, humming softly.
He liked to make messes in their cave.
He liked to have things strewn about, threatening to trip the unwary. He liked to make the cave reshape itself until they both had to pause at each corner to figure out where they really were.
His chaos was far tamer than anything in the outside world.
She found him laying half on a shelf, half standing, his arms folded under his chin, and his eyes vacant. Taller than her by more than a head, she had to reach on to her tip toes to drape the silk over his shoulders.
While the man with the yellow eyes had saved her from the outside world, it was her that saved this strange man.
That wasn’t quite right.
In the outside world, those that had been in charge had deemed her dangerous. They looked into her future, and saw in her something to fear. They feared her so greatly, that they had set fire to her whole village just to rid the world of her.
Even as a child, lost and frightened, she had realized what a precarious position she had been in, protected from the fate makers only by the yellow eyed man’s thin arms. He had fought with his brothers to protect her, and in the end had brought her here, to this man.
They had saved each other, then.
He turned now to her, his huge almond shaped eyes blinking slowly as he drew back into himself. “You are sad,” he said, his voice both soft and hard, deep and melodious and harsh.
Today, his skin was as thin as the film of cream that sometimes coated the stagnant of pools, as pale as the milky waters. His eyes were such a dark brown they were nearly black, and far larger than a human’s could possibly ever become. His hair was the color of tree bark, and his ears as large as a horse’s, fine brown fur shimmering in the glittering light of the cave. Two grand antlers perched on his head, giving him even more height than his birdlike legs.
Feathers as white as his skin folded the leather of his legs into his knees, hidden under the short tunic he wore.
“Nay,” she murmured with a shake of her head. “Only remembering what I can’t recall of my past.”
His head tilted to one side, and, for a moment, she worried that the massive antlers would topple his head from his shoulders. Such a thing didn’t happen, for he was not only magic, but he was far too majestic for such a thing to happen.
“Why do you dwell on such things? Did you not agree that it was here you would be happiest?”
She nodded and carefully climbed up onto the shelf, putting her face level with his. “And it is here that I am happiest. But, I am still human, despite how much magic you have poured into me.” She looked down at her hands, folded so politely in her lap. She still felt like a child covered in soot, bare footed and hungry, but she knew that her image was quite the opposite. She had learned a lot from him, and, without her consent, she had adapted his manners into her own.
What would they yellow eyed man say if he saw her now? Would his eyes soften with pride? She liked to hope so. If she ever saw him again.
“I don’t remember my mother’s face. Did I have a mother? I don’t remember.”
His eyes slid away from her, seeing something that she was not privy to. “This, I do not have the answer to.”
She nodded. “Of course. I lost my family long before I came to you.” Unfolding her hands, she pressed one to the cool stone next to her. She picked at the sparkles in the quartz for a moment before dropping her hand back to her lap with a sigh. She bit the inside of her lip a moment before she looked back to him. “I’m happy here, Master. I am happy that the danger that I posed to the human world cannot manifest, and I am happy that I can give you a relief from your solitude.”
He looked back at her before he grinned, lips stretched wide over sharp, dagger-like teeth. Were she anybody else, she would have shivered in fear, but she had no fear of him.
She, of course, knew what he was, what he was capable of, but he was no danger to her. To anybody, really.
Like her, he was forever banished from the living world into this cave. Unlike her, he wasn’t here by his own free will.
As a child, she had been informed by those that control fate that she posed a grave threat to the mortal world. How, she didn’t know, but what her fate held in store for the world was so much feared that they wanted her dead.
The yellow eyed man had saved her and protected her against the others, and offered her a place where she could live, and live with a purpose without fear of her fate, or of his brethren.
She had come here willingly, to protect the world from herself.
He had been sentenced here by the same people that had sentenced her to death. In the cave that wasn’t quite in the same world as the living world, but so far removed from the Chaos from which he had come.
And the yellow eyed one knew his name and could control him with only a word.
He had made the man her protector, and he had made her his companion. It was a win-win. She lived without fear, and he wasn’t alone.
She smiled at him. “Do you remember my name?”
“Audra,” he said, her name thick and heavy in his honey voice. He shoved away from the self and held his hand out to her, his long fingers ending in even longer claws. She took his hand in hers and let him help her off the shelf.
“Audra,” she repeated as she followed him. “Do you think, whatever danger my fate spelled for me is still there, out there? Or has it passed? Does it await me, just outside the opening of the cave that I cannot see?”
He shrugged, thin shoulders graceful as they rose under his tunic. “Fate is a mortal thing, and I know nothing of it. Fate is written in Order, the opposite of Chaos. Ask me why the living die, or why the wolf grins, or why gold turns good men bad. Those, I can answer. Why fate demands sacrifices from those that create it, I do not understand nor do I care to.” He slanted her a look out of the corner of his eyes, the deep color reflecting the brilliance of the cave’s walls, reminding her of the yellow eyed man’s eyes and the stars she had glimpsed inside them. “If you wish to know, leave the cave. You do not see the exit, because you do not want to see it. You know where it is.”
She smiled at him, sure in this as she had never been sure of anything before. “I do not want to leave.” She curled her arm around his and felt feathers shift under his sleeve. “I am happy here. And I am happy to never have to leave here. It is here that I find myself home.”