Post by rainstormamaya on May 2, 2009 9:57:37 GMT 10
Title: Stubborn
Rating: PG-13 for safety
Summary: Kalasin, Roald, Liam, Lianne, Jasson, Vania: six Contes, six lives, six personalities and one common trait.
A/N: Kat is evil and gives me drabble prompts that make me write things like this which take forever. ^^' The prompt was 'Conte kids- stubborn', and of course, I ended up writing about all six of them individually because I'm crazy like that.
~~~
“I won’t hide, Uncle George,” Kalasin says. Kalasin: blue dress and blue eyes, fragile wisp of black hair, thin child’s figure and disproportionate Gift, her hands bloodstained and her dress marked while the thumps and screams of the siege of Pirate’s Swoop encircle her like a candle flame in perfect darkness: surrounded, but not suffocated.
She turns her back on the small measure of safety George has tried to offer her, and returns to the infirmary.
~~~
“I’d rather not, Father,” Roald says mildly. “Joren of Stone Mountain is the single nastiest page I’ve ever had the bad luck to become slightly acquainted with.”
Despite the fact that that’s the most unqualified condemnation of anyone Jonathan’s ever heard his son utter since he was six years old, Jonathan looks as if he is about to make suggestions involving being more civil to Joren -who does belong to a very powerful family, after all- but Roald just flicks an eyebrow sceptically at him. “I can understand the need not to be seen to favour any one group of people, but I will not sit next to Joren and listen to him discuss all the ways in which this country could be improved, starting with ejecting Keladry of Mindelan from page training, nor will I spend time with someone who thinks bullying first-years is a good idea.”
~~~
“Do you want me to beg for mercy?” Liam asks mockingly, his hazel eyes jeering as he parries a blow with the little strength he has left. The Tusaini knight is just toying with him now, battering him slowly to death, taking out years of resentment in a prince’s blood. Liam knows that if he asked for mercy he would die with the words on his lips, and Liam does not intend to die that kind of death.
“Sorry, Roald,” he mutters, as the last blow arrives, “sorry, Jasson,” and he takes his last knife and throws it as Uncle George taught him so long ago - got it in one, Liam, bull’s-eye. It does not save him, but it does kill the knight.
Liam of Conté goes down fighting.
~~~
“I can’t allow you to make unprotected forays into the Lower City! Mithros, Lianne- if any of them knew who you were-”
“They don’t, Da,” Lianne says patiently. She is not wearing a princess’s clothes; her sober green dress is very plain, but good, and old enough that unpleasant stains don’t matter. Tucked into a pocket is the armband of a healer at one of the two Crown-funded clinics in the Lower City. “That’s why I call myself Anne, and that’s why I dress like this, in order to prevent myself being recognised. Furthermore, I don’t understand what’s scandalous about my doing a little healing for hideously deprived people, free of charge in my own time, or dangerous about working for a very well-guarded Crown-funded clinic.”
“This nonsense will end!”
“No.” Lianne’s voice is soft, bit there’s steel there. “It won’t. How did you meet Uncle George, Father?”
The answer is in the Lower City, in a thieves’ den called the Dancing Dove, and they both know it. They also both know that Lianne has won.
~~~
Jasson is bruised, battered, bound hand and foot and exhausted, but not broken. “You can make this end,” the mage says. “You can stay in Tortall. All you have to do is do as I say...”
“You mean, tell my father and brother to grant you all the power, all the land and all the money you want in exchange for my life?” Jasson demands. “Thanks, but no.” He gets a solid kick in the ribs for his words.
“This will be your fault,” the mage warns, stepping out of the pentagon he has built around Jasson and ostentatiously preparing to cast a spell. “You will travel to a place beyond reach of your precious family or friends; they will never see you again, and it will be your fault because you were too stubborn. You will spend the rest of your life there. I expect it to be very short.”
Jasson’s mouth is dry, but he summons enough saliva up to spit in the general direction of the mage’s feet: then there is a flash of brilliant light that seemed to seep into Jasson’s head and blast it like the winds of a sandstorm and Jasson knows no more.
He regrets even less.
~~~
It’s raining, and Vania slips and falls full-length in the mud, and only gets shouted at for it. “Get up, Conté! You’re not done yet!”
She feels like crying, and knows that all anyone will say if she quits is that she couldn't take it. “They’ll be especially hard on you, because you’re a princess. You’ll have to prove you really want to be a Rider. You’ll have to be better than the best.”
Vania remembers the words of her friends among the Queen’s Riders, of men and women who have been decorated for bravery, seen unspeakable horrors, killed in her family’s name and rescued her from trees, and hauls herself out of the mud to continue running. She can look forward to stilted conversation at dinner, as even her notorious whirlwind charm can’t put her fellow trainees at ease, sleep that doesn’t seem to make a dent on the exhaustion and the Assistant Commander yelling her and her fellows out of bed before dawn the next morning, and it does make her wonder if it’s worth it, if she can ever be the Rider she wants to be.
She finishes the run with her fellow trainees and staggers away to the baths, cursing steadily and viciously under her breath. She will not give up.
Rating: PG-13 for safety
Summary: Kalasin, Roald, Liam, Lianne, Jasson, Vania: six Contes, six lives, six personalities and one common trait.
A/N: Kat is evil and gives me drabble prompts that make me write things like this which take forever. ^^' The prompt was 'Conte kids- stubborn', and of course, I ended up writing about all six of them individually because I'm crazy like that.
~~~
“I won’t hide, Uncle George,” Kalasin says. Kalasin: blue dress and blue eyes, fragile wisp of black hair, thin child’s figure and disproportionate Gift, her hands bloodstained and her dress marked while the thumps and screams of the siege of Pirate’s Swoop encircle her like a candle flame in perfect darkness: surrounded, but not suffocated.
She turns her back on the small measure of safety George has tried to offer her, and returns to the infirmary.
~~~
“I’d rather not, Father,” Roald says mildly. “Joren of Stone Mountain is the single nastiest page I’ve ever had the bad luck to become slightly acquainted with.”
Despite the fact that that’s the most unqualified condemnation of anyone Jonathan’s ever heard his son utter since he was six years old, Jonathan looks as if he is about to make suggestions involving being more civil to Joren -who does belong to a very powerful family, after all- but Roald just flicks an eyebrow sceptically at him. “I can understand the need not to be seen to favour any one group of people, but I will not sit next to Joren and listen to him discuss all the ways in which this country could be improved, starting with ejecting Keladry of Mindelan from page training, nor will I spend time with someone who thinks bullying first-years is a good idea.”
~~~
“Do you want me to beg for mercy?” Liam asks mockingly, his hazel eyes jeering as he parries a blow with the little strength he has left. The Tusaini knight is just toying with him now, battering him slowly to death, taking out years of resentment in a prince’s blood. Liam knows that if he asked for mercy he would die with the words on his lips, and Liam does not intend to die that kind of death.
“Sorry, Roald,” he mutters, as the last blow arrives, “sorry, Jasson,” and he takes his last knife and throws it as Uncle George taught him so long ago - got it in one, Liam, bull’s-eye. It does not save him, but it does kill the knight.
Liam of Conté goes down fighting.
~~~
“I can’t allow you to make unprotected forays into the Lower City! Mithros, Lianne- if any of them knew who you were-”
“They don’t, Da,” Lianne says patiently. She is not wearing a princess’s clothes; her sober green dress is very plain, but good, and old enough that unpleasant stains don’t matter. Tucked into a pocket is the armband of a healer at one of the two Crown-funded clinics in the Lower City. “That’s why I call myself Anne, and that’s why I dress like this, in order to prevent myself being recognised. Furthermore, I don’t understand what’s scandalous about my doing a little healing for hideously deprived people, free of charge in my own time, or dangerous about working for a very well-guarded Crown-funded clinic.”
“This nonsense will end!”
“No.” Lianne’s voice is soft, bit there’s steel there. “It won’t. How did you meet Uncle George, Father?”
The answer is in the Lower City, in a thieves’ den called the Dancing Dove, and they both know it. They also both know that Lianne has won.
~~~
Jasson is bruised, battered, bound hand and foot and exhausted, but not broken. “You can make this end,” the mage says. “You can stay in Tortall. All you have to do is do as I say...”
“You mean, tell my father and brother to grant you all the power, all the land and all the money you want in exchange for my life?” Jasson demands. “Thanks, but no.” He gets a solid kick in the ribs for his words.
“This will be your fault,” the mage warns, stepping out of the pentagon he has built around Jasson and ostentatiously preparing to cast a spell. “You will travel to a place beyond reach of your precious family or friends; they will never see you again, and it will be your fault because you were too stubborn. You will spend the rest of your life there. I expect it to be very short.”
Jasson’s mouth is dry, but he summons enough saliva up to spit in the general direction of the mage’s feet: then there is a flash of brilliant light that seemed to seep into Jasson’s head and blast it like the winds of a sandstorm and Jasson knows no more.
He regrets even less.
~~~
It’s raining, and Vania slips and falls full-length in the mud, and only gets shouted at for it. “Get up, Conté! You’re not done yet!”
She feels like crying, and knows that all anyone will say if she quits is that she couldn't take it. “They’ll be especially hard on you, because you’re a princess. You’ll have to prove you really want to be a Rider. You’ll have to be better than the best.”
Vania remembers the words of her friends among the Queen’s Riders, of men and women who have been decorated for bravery, seen unspeakable horrors, killed in her family’s name and rescued her from trees, and hauls herself out of the mud to continue running. She can look forward to stilted conversation at dinner, as even her notorious whirlwind charm can’t put her fellow trainees at ease, sleep that doesn’t seem to make a dent on the exhaustion and the Assistant Commander yelling her and her fellows out of bed before dawn the next morning, and it does make her wonder if it’s worth it, if she can ever be the Rider she wants to be.
She finishes the run with her fellow trainees and staggers away to the baths, cursing steadily and viciously under her breath. She will not give up.