Orlaith, Her First Year

Second in a series of character-building vignettes following a bunch of characters through their time at Addergoole & beyond. Orlaith we’ve seen much later in her life, in the series with her son Hunter-Hale and her later Kept Adder.

(Ora tag here)
(Adder tag here)
(Hunter-Hale tag here)

The Dreamwidth icon is Orlaith’s daughter Ce’Rilla.

Content warning: Hell Night


Hell Night, Year 10 of the Addergoole School

“Come on, come on, be mine and all the pain will stop.” Someone – she couldn’t see who – had Orlaith bent backwards until she felt like her spine would snap, another hand on her ankles like he was trying to turn her into a wheel. Orlaith made a little noise of pain, and then did the thing she did best.

“Come on,” she echoed back at him, but her tone was coaxing, harmless. “You don’t really want me, do you? You want a prettier girl. Someone stronger, someone more obedient? I’m not really your type of girl, am I?”

She didn’t know what was going on, but she was pretty sure if it involved having your spine nearly snapped to get there, she didn’t want any of it.

“Yeah, I probably don’t want you. Hurry up, get out of here.”

And like that, he let her go. Orlaith wasted no time at all in getting out of there. Sometimes, they listened when she did that. A lot of the time, after she stopped talking, they changed her mind.

“That was impressive.” The voice came out of nowhere – smooth, slick. Ora felt an urge to trust the speaker; she turned around to look at him and the urge was overwhelming. Skinny, short for a guy but still taller than her, with dyed-red hair – but all of that was almost a memory, someone she’d seen in the halls. All she could see, now, looking at him, were his eyes, amber as a cat’s and every bit as creepy.

“Thank you?”

“Of course. And now, pretty little liar… now you’re going to be mine. Tempero Intinn Orlaith cy’Valerian. Say that you’re mine.

“I’m yours.” She couldn’t have said no if she’d wanted to, but she didn’t find herself really wanting to, either.

“Good. Now, Orlaith oro’Accalon, you and I are going to have a talk about judicious use of powers.”

His stern tone sent a strange tingling down to her toes. “What? Powers?” She looked as innocent as she could. I wasn’t doing anything wrong, really. Was I?

He tapped her nose with two fingers. “First, do not use your power on me. Secondly, if you do not learn to corral it on your own, I will corral it for you. And, so you know I’m serious… sit down.”

Orlaith found herself sitting on the carpeted hall, feeling miserably like she’d let down this complete stranger. “What…?” Judicious use of your powers.

“I think this is going to be an educational year for you, Orlaith.”

She was suddenly worried that it would be.

This entry was originally posted at http://aldersprig.dreamwidth.org/539729.html. You can comment here or there.

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