Post by Seek on Apr 16, 2015 23:36:09 GMT 10
Series: Where the Wind Blows
Title: History
Rating: PG
Event: 200 Freestyle
Competition: Decathlon
Words: 296 words
Summary: History is a complicated thing.
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As a student, Erik learns everything he couldn’t in Scanra. He spends a semester studying cartography and mathematics; another on minerology, and lingers for a delightful four semester on plants and animals. “Causes are complex,” says one of his teachers; a historian of some repute. “Sometimes, they are like old trees—the roots go very deep, indeed. A historian’s task is to carefully unearth these roots, to study them, and to understand them.” Oakroot’s smile is brittle; the man is impatient to a fault. But commanding. No student scrawls idly as the man speaks. “We have the advantage of a clearer viewpoint than our ancestors. We can see through the tangle of affairs to the beating heart of the past. But we must do so cautiously.”
The past is complex: studying it is fraught with pitfalls for the careless. But a careful mind can uncover…connections. A young Erik studies the flight of birds, carefully scratches their pinions into tree-bark with a knife. A deep root; an early beginning, easily obscured.
So it is that one winter, Sigrun Juhanisra dies undertaking the Great Rite. He’s not from Erik’s village but one nearby; still, Erik knows of him, and something snaps that day and when Inar finds him, head bowed at the frozen pond, he says nothing, holds out his hand, and takes Erik back home.
But there’s no going back. By spring, Inar performs the Great Rite himself. Erik doesn’t know this; won’t know this until the moment he feels a sharp pain in his left eye and his knife cuts sharply across the wings of the hawk he’s carving.
Soon after, Erik watches Scanra fade into obscurity on the horizon, white-knuckled hands clutching at the wooden ship’s rail, the taste of freedom salt on his tongue.
Title: History
Rating: PG
Event: 200 Freestyle
Competition: Decathlon
Words: 296 words
Summary: History is a complicated thing.
-
As a student, Erik learns everything he couldn’t in Scanra. He spends a semester studying cartography and mathematics; another on minerology, and lingers for a delightful four semester on plants and animals. “Causes are complex,” says one of his teachers; a historian of some repute. “Sometimes, they are like old trees—the roots go very deep, indeed. A historian’s task is to carefully unearth these roots, to study them, and to understand them.” Oakroot’s smile is brittle; the man is impatient to a fault. But commanding. No student scrawls idly as the man speaks. “We have the advantage of a clearer viewpoint than our ancestors. We can see through the tangle of affairs to the beating heart of the past. But we must do so cautiously.”
The past is complex: studying it is fraught with pitfalls for the careless. But a careful mind can uncover…connections. A young Erik studies the flight of birds, carefully scratches their pinions into tree-bark with a knife. A deep root; an early beginning, easily obscured.
So it is that one winter, Sigrun Juhanisra dies undertaking the Great Rite. He’s not from Erik’s village but one nearby; still, Erik knows of him, and something snaps that day and when Inar finds him, head bowed at the frozen pond, he says nothing, holds out his hand, and takes Erik back home.
But there’s no going back. By spring, Inar performs the Great Rite himself. Erik doesn’t know this; won’t know this until the moment he feels a sharp pain in his left eye and his knife cuts sharply across the wings of the hawk he’s carving.
Soon after, Erik watches Scanra fade into obscurity on the horizon, white-knuckled hands clutching at the wooden ship’s rail, the taste of freedom salt on his tongue.