Post by kitsunerei88 on Jun 18, 2016 14:08:32 GMT 10
Title: What It Is
Rating: G
Word Count: 1105
Summary (and any Warnings): Dove was never supposed to be Queen. A character study.
Notes: More introspection. I don’t know if I like this piece. I must step outside my comfort zone sometime.
Dove is short, and she knows it. She’s short, even with the raised pattens that Aly has kindly imported for her from Tortall, shorter than Aly and probably a good foot shorter than Taybur. She looks shorter than she is because he insists on surrounding her with his best men, who for some reason or another were always, and she really did mean always, tall.
She’s also not what one could call beautiful. It isn’t that she is ugly - no one would say so, and not only because she is fairly certain the Queen’s Guard would take it as a mortal offense and swords would be drawn. Rather, her skin is clear and her eyes are often described as “solemn”. No one would call her ugly, but certainly, she is plain, especially compared to Sarai.
She’s known this since she was young, since she was twelve and the rebellion, decades in the making, was boiling around her. Sarai never knew. Sarai was the beautiful one, the passionate one - the one that people got passionate about, the one that people would die for. Sarai never knew about the rebellion, not really. She might have had an inkling, but she never would have gone through with it. It was so obvious, though, that Dove thinks that perhaps Sarai actively tried not to know.
Dove’s known Sarai her whole life, and can say with confidence that had Sarai ever known about the extent of the preparations, she would have fled anyway. Sarai would never have seen the big picture - she would never have seen that the raka were done with luarin rule, then, and they weren’t going to take her no for an answer. The raka were short on candidates, and they were either going to win or die, and at that point, one could only run with it.
Which isn’t to say, of course, that things weren’t hard. The people wanted Saraiyu. They got Dove. And even if it isn’t something they wanted, and it isn’t something Dove thinks she would have wanted, had she had the choice, it is what it is.
When Dove thinks back to the first moments of her rule, she doesn’t think about her coronation. She doesn’t even think about the moment Imajane threw herself from the tower, finishing the Rittevon line. No, Dove thinks of the room - the room where, for the first time, she stepped into the place always meant for Sarai.
At thirteen, Dove faced a room of passionate, angry adults and, with Aly unconscious on the floor, presented them with the facts, in brutal honesty and frankness. She remembers, now, the expressions of devastation, anger, hopelessness around the room, and remembers facing them, looking at each of the rebels in the eyes.
“I’m not what you wanted. I know that. I’m young, and more than anything else, I’m not Saraiyu. I don’t look beautiful on a horse. I don’t have a big circle of friends, the connections that Saraiyu did. I don’t have Sarai’s passion - her passion for her people, her passion for her family, her passion for the Islands.
“But I have a lot of things that Saraiyu never had - I have patience. I have calm. Though I am young, I have the ability to listen, the ability to learn, the ability to weigh my options dispassionately and come to a good decision based on the facts.
“Right now, the fact is that we don’t have a choice. It doesn’t matter that Saraiyu is gone. We are too deep in the rebellion now. The fact is that we win this, or we all hang, and our families, friends, neighbours, acquaintances, whole villages hang with us. We’re in too deep now, and you are too well-prepared, and you don’t have a choice.
I’m not what you want, but I’m what you have. It is what it is, so we may as well finish this scene and continue with this meeting.”
It’s a short speech - it’s not really what Dove considers stirring. Dove doesn’t do passion. But it’s real, and perhaps it is just the blunt reality of facts that turns the conversation around. They do accept Dove, though, so it does what it’s supposed to.
And she learns. She hates the game - hates it when the Rittevons present her with the marriage to Dunevon, hates being invited to the ridiculous affairs on the royal pavilions. She hates fluttering, hates the soft flattery and hates the lack of directness marking royal life. But it is what it is - and she plays the game, acts shocked and flattered and considerate when the Rittevons present her with the marriage, acts the admiring audience at the events in the royal pavilion. It is what it is, and what it is is necessary.
Just shy of fourteen, Dovasary Haiming Temaida Balitang ascends the throne of the Copper Isles. And, as much as she dislikes it, the games continue - as they always have done, as they always will.
The games, now, are different. She can change the events in the royal pavilions, of course, but not too much - she can’t change the royal court too much without upsetting old and very supportive noble houses. It’s enough of an effort to make sure that the reinstated raka noble houses are invited to luarin events, and vice versa. She can choose her own marriage, yes - but within constraints. It needs to be someone from the Copper Isles, someone relatively well-respected by both luarin and raka, someone who could help unite her fractured country and solidify her rule. She can choose not to befriend some people - but not too much, because their families are powerful, and she needs them too much.
When she thinks back to the past, when King Oron was alive and the Balitangs were much in favour at court, when Sarai was there to flutter and admire, when Dove was free - the loss is intense. She misses that freedom, misses sneaking out to visit the booksellers and merchants without an armed guard, misses being unimportant.
But it is what it is, and Dove steps up to it.
Rating: G
Word Count: 1105
Summary (and any Warnings): Dove was never supposed to be Queen. A character study.
Notes: More introspection. I don’t know if I like this piece. I must step outside my comfort zone sometime.
XXX
Dove is short, and she knows it. She’s short, even with the raised pattens that Aly has kindly imported for her from Tortall, shorter than Aly and probably a good foot shorter than Taybur. She looks shorter than she is because he insists on surrounding her with his best men, who for some reason or another were always, and she really did mean always, tall.
She’s also not what one could call beautiful. It isn’t that she is ugly - no one would say so, and not only because she is fairly certain the Queen’s Guard would take it as a mortal offense and swords would be drawn. Rather, her skin is clear and her eyes are often described as “solemn”. No one would call her ugly, but certainly, she is plain, especially compared to Sarai.
She’s known this since she was young, since she was twelve and the rebellion, decades in the making, was boiling around her. Sarai never knew. Sarai was the beautiful one, the passionate one - the one that people got passionate about, the one that people would die for. Sarai never knew about the rebellion, not really. She might have had an inkling, but she never would have gone through with it. It was so obvious, though, that Dove thinks that perhaps Sarai actively tried not to know.
Dove’s known Sarai her whole life, and can say with confidence that had Sarai ever known about the extent of the preparations, she would have fled anyway. Sarai would never have seen the big picture - she would never have seen that the raka were done with luarin rule, then, and they weren’t going to take her no for an answer. The raka were short on candidates, and they were either going to win or die, and at that point, one could only run with it.
Which isn’t to say, of course, that things weren’t hard. The people wanted Saraiyu. They got Dove. And even if it isn’t something they wanted, and it isn’t something Dove thinks she would have wanted, had she had the choice, it is what it is.
When Dove thinks back to the first moments of her rule, she doesn’t think about her coronation. She doesn’t even think about the moment Imajane threw herself from the tower, finishing the Rittevon line. No, Dove thinks of the room - the room where, for the first time, she stepped into the place always meant for Sarai.
At thirteen, Dove faced a room of passionate, angry adults and, with Aly unconscious on the floor, presented them with the facts, in brutal honesty and frankness. She remembers, now, the expressions of devastation, anger, hopelessness around the room, and remembers facing them, looking at each of the rebels in the eyes.
“I’m not what you wanted. I know that. I’m young, and more than anything else, I’m not Saraiyu. I don’t look beautiful on a horse. I don’t have a big circle of friends, the connections that Saraiyu did. I don’t have Sarai’s passion - her passion for her people, her passion for her family, her passion for the Islands.
“But I have a lot of things that Saraiyu never had - I have patience. I have calm. Though I am young, I have the ability to listen, the ability to learn, the ability to weigh my options dispassionately and come to a good decision based on the facts.
“Right now, the fact is that we don’t have a choice. It doesn’t matter that Saraiyu is gone. We are too deep in the rebellion now. The fact is that we win this, or we all hang, and our families, friends, neighbours, acquaintances, whole villages hang with us. We’re in too deep now, and you are too well-prepared, and you don’t have a choice.
I’m not what you want, but I’m what you have. It is what it is, so we may as well finish this scene and continue with this meeting.”
It’s a short speech - it’s not really what Dove considers stirring. Dove doesn’t do passion. But it’s real, and perhaps it is just the blunt reality of facts that turns the conversation around. They do accept Dove, though, so it does what it’s supposed to.
And she learns. She hates the game - hates it when the Rittevons present her with the marriage to Dunevon, hates being invited to the ridiculous affairs on the royal pavilions. She hates fluttering, hates the soft flattery and hates the lack of directness marking royal life. But it is what it is - and she plays the game, acts shocked and flattered and considerate when the Rittevons present her with the marriage, acts the admiring audience at the events in the royal pavilion. It is what it is, and what it is is necessary.
Just shy of fourteen, Dovasary Haiming Temaida Balitang ascends the throne of the Copper Isles. And, as much as she dislikes it, the games continue - as they always have done, as they always will.
The games, now, are different. She can change the events in the royal pavilions, of course, but not too much - she can’t change the royal court too much without upsetting old and very supportive noble houses. It’s enough of an effort to make sure that the reinstated raka noble houses are invited to luarin events, and vice versa. She can choose her own marriage, yes - but within constraints. It needs to be someone from the Copper Isles, someone relatively well-respected by both luarin and raka, someone who could help unite her fractured country and solidify her rule. She can choose not to befriend some people - but not too much, because their families are powerful, and she needs them too much.
When she thinks back to the past, when King Oron was alive and the Balitangs were much in favour at court, when Sarai was there to flutter and admire, when Dove was free - the loss is intense. She misses that freedom, misses sneaking out to visit the booksellers and merchants without an armed guard, misses being unimportant.
But it is what it is, and Dove steps up to it.
XXX