Post by Seek on Jun 29, 2011 4:28:54 GMT 10
Title: Never Been To Spain
Rating: G
Prompt: Once Upon A Time - #13
Summary: Part of the Three Dog Night series for the MPP challenge. Nestor and Mattes talk about the hill country.
-
Well I never been to heaven
But I been to Oklahoma
Well they tell me I was born there
But I really don't remember
In Oklahoma, not Arizona
What does it matter
What does it matter
“I’ve never been to the hills,” Nestor says. Mattes’s thighs are aching; he hasn’t sat a horse in years, and the Hurdik curses still come easily to his tongue. Demon-horse. Stubborn rock-devil. Cobble has a hard mouth, that much Mattes can tell after a few surreptious yanks at the bit. The horse knows he doesn’t have the seat of an experienced rider and he is almost convinced that Cobble picks every rut in the path on purpose.
He fights exasperation. “There’s nothing much there,” Mattes says quietly. He thinks of smoke, of death. He’d chosen life, all those years ago when he ran away as a gangly little boy. He’d been right. He would have died there. Died with the rest of them. He’d wanted to be a sellsword, once, or a soldier in the king’s army. He’d wanted the sword, not a baton. He’d never thought of being a Dog.
“Rugged country. Tough, and strong, like the people. The hill folk.”
Mattes glances at Nestor, but the sun has cast his face into shadow. Unreadable. Feels Nestor nudge Scythia into a grudging trot, coming up by his side. From the look of the sky, it is time to stop soon. He breathes in the familiar scents: dust and scrubbed stone and the hints of grass and rain, drinks in the crags and the harsh ochre stone where hooves have long pounded the dirt beyond fertility and the soft wind that brings this all to him.
“I grew up here,” he breathes.
Nestor glances over at him, their horses so close that they could lock batons, and says, “Show me.” And manages to make it sound like so much more.
Rating: G
Prompt: Once Upon A Time - #13
Summary: Part of the Three Dog Night series for the MPP challenge. Nestor and Mattes talk about the hill country.
-
Well I never been to heaven
But I been to Oklahoma
Well they tell me I was born there
But I really don't remember
In Oklahoma, not Arizona
What does it matter
What does it matter
“I’ve never been to the hills,” Nestor says. Mattes’s thighs are aching; he hasn’t sat a horse in years, and the Hurdik curses still come easily to his tongue. Demon-horse. Stubborn rock-devil. Cobble has a hard mouth, that much Mattes can tell after a few surreptious yanks at the bit. The horse knows he doesn’t have the seat of an experienced rider and he is almost convinced that Cobble picks every rut in the path on purpose.
He fights exasperation. “There’s nothing much there,” Mattes says quietly. He thinks of smoke, of death. He’d chosen life, all those years ago when he ran away as a gangly little boy. He’d been right. He would have died there. Died with the rest of them. He’d wanted to be a sellsword, once, or a soldier in the king’s army. He’d wanted the sword, not a baton. He’d never thought of being a Dog.
“Rugged country. Tough, and strong, like the people. The hill folk.”
Mattes glances at Nestor, but the sun has cast his face into shadow. Unreadable. Feels Nestor nudge Scythia into a grudging trot, coming up by his side. From the look of the sky, it is time to stop soon. He breathes in the familiar scents: dust and scrubbed stone and the hints of grass and rain, drinks in the crags and the harsh ochre stone where hooves have long pounded the dirt beyond fertility and the soft wind that brings this all to him.
“I grew up here,” he breathes.
Nestor glances over at him, their horses so close that they could lock batons, and says, “Show me.” And manages to make it sound like so much more.