Archive | April 16, 2012

Birthday

Apr16

For rix_scaedu‘s Prompt.

It was easy to lose track of the days in the box. Sometimes Bruin thought that’s why it was that way. Other times, he just thought the box was that, a box, because it was the most frustrating thing it could be, a solid square of white foam with nothing to mark it from the outside.

On clear-headed day-like-things, he thought they’d probably picked something where he couldn’t be heard or seen from the outside, no matter what he did, no matter how loud he was. But why, he wasn’t sure – why hide him, why capture him at all. He wasn’t even sure who his captors were.

They came in, every so often, the one bringing him food, the other, water, the third, reading material. The fourth one brought pain sometimes, pleasure other times, and Bruin never knew what brought either on, or when it would be coming.

The one who called herself Storm-Chaser surprised him awake one morning, Storm-Chaser, who brought him food. She was carrying a small cake with one candle in it.

“Happy birthday, Teddy.” They never called him Bruin. He was beginning to wonder if anyone ever had.

“It’s my birthday?” He stared at the cake. He couldn’t remember if he’d ever had a birthday cake before. He thought his birthday was in May. May was a long time from when he’d been taken, wasn’t it? “I get a cake?”

“Of course you get a cake, silly.” She set down the cake and cut two slices out of it, taking one for herself. “And later, Russet will be here to celebrate with you.”

Russet Lance was the one who brought pain sometimes, pleasure other time. “Good?” Bruin offered. He wasn’t sure it was really good.

“Good.” Storm-Chaser smiled brightly at him. “Maybe we’ll bring you a friend to keep you company. Would you like that?”

“Yes?” He wasn’t sure if he would, but when he said no, or bad, she went away for a long time, they all did.

“Good.” She smiled at him again and, taking her slice of cake, left him alone in the white blankness again.

Outside, Storm-Chaser, Alison, nodded to her team. “He’s just about broken,” she told them. “Maybe another two, three days, and we can do whatever we want with him.”

“And then we bring in the Princess?” Morning Birdsong, Rangi, was far too eager about this for Alison’s tastes.

“And then we bring in the Princess.”

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/324254.html. You can comment here or there.

A Family Matter

Apr16

This Sort of went sideways, but it’s to [personal profile] anke‘s Prompts.

Addergoole has a landing page here.

I like this story a lot but I don’t think it’s canon.

“They try to split up siblings as much as they can, and they try to split up twins even more.”

Viktor had told Blanchfleur that, her first week of school. It hadn’t helped, much, except to know that it wasn’t something she or Florabella had done, it wasn’t a punishment, except in the way that everything at this school was a punishment. It helped, too, to know her Keeper was missing his twin as much as she was missing hers. Maybe more: Viktor was the younger twin.

She made it through her two years without Bell, and did her best to help her twin through her first years in turn. Then it was time to leave, again, leaving her sister to the very-well-protected prison that was Addergoole.

She did what she could to live her life while waiting for Bell, carving out a spot for them in a nearby town that would accept fae despite the raging war, raising her two children, and learning how to fight the monsters that littered their countryside. Everything she did, she did waiting for Bell.

Two years passed, and the note came instead of her sister. Waiting for something. Will be there as soon as I can.

Fleur worried, and prepared, and fought monsters. Addergoole had given her good practice at all three.

A year passed, with regular notes from Bell, notes, and no presence, a year, and then another year. It was July of the second year when her twin showed up, with six children and a lost-looking giant of a boy and a tiny elf of a girl, like a train of refugees.

“I promised them we’d go back for their twins when they graduated,” Bell explained, “but I had to wait this long. This is Basil. My second son is his, and the youngest is his second daughter. By Hestia, that’s her.”

Fleur looked over the motley crew. “Bell…”

“I’m not nuts, I promise.” Her twin smiled at her. Their faces were no longer identical, even if their Changes had been nearly so. It was disconcerting, looking into what had once been a mirror and a reflection. She shifted to their twin-speak, a language they hadn’t used now in four years. “Hestia and her twin are great with kids. And we’re going to need the help. And Basil and Clement… well, you’ll see. They’re good for us.”

Good for us. Relieved that Bell at least remembered that there were two of them, Fleur helped their guests settle in.

The next two years were wild, violent, and bloody. Hestia turned out to be a menace with an iron skillet, while cy’Luca Basil was a warrior through and through. They fought bigger and bigger monsters, keeping a wider and wider territory free of the returned-gods influence, always knowing the biggest foe was yet to come.

There was little time for lovemaking, little time for cuddling, but when there was, they cuddled together. Basil, Fleur found, was indeed good for them.

And, in two years, when Clement and Vesta came to join them, Fleur found there was more to “good for them” then she’d ever imagined. “You planned this, didn’t you?” she accused Bell. She was supposed to be the planner,not her sister.

“I did. We need the hearth girls. We need the boys’ strength. And, more than that…”

“You love them. And you hoped I’d love them too.”

“Yeah?” It was almost a relief to see Florabella nervous and uncertain again. “I did. Too far?”

“Just far enough, little sister. Just far enough.”

They would be wed in spring. But first, they had a monster to kill.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/323864.html. You can comment here or there.