Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ Embers in the Sand ❯ Embers in the Sand-Short Story ( Chapter 1 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

.................. “Warfare has always been the domain of men,” a dark hand caressed long silken hair, “You should have stayed home like the other women. Watched your lover return home with the head of my brother, or your father boast about how many of my people he has killed. But now, you're in my land. And you must pay the consequences.”
.................. There were no tears glistening in those pale azure eyes, only defiance, hard as a dagger. Skin the color of moonlight seemed oddly out of place amidst the harsh ropes and black-gloved hands of the her Southern captor, and the hair that would shine golden in the sun now looked sick and weary in the darkness of Vergot's tent.
.................. “Should I have stayed and wept over the casquet of my husband, sand spawn? Should I have listened to his friends recount his death, recall how your vile brethren spat and chanted on his still-twitching body before you burned him alive?”
.................. Vergot chuckled, “So Northern women do have some spirit after all. Or maybe just the girls. Married so young? You look too small to be wearing your mother's dress, let alone making vendettas against men.” The last word had a special emphasis, and Vergot's contemptuous tone left no question that he had ever taken her seriously.
.................. “You think I wouldn't kill you, sand spawn? You think I haven't killed enough of your kind all ready? Men, women, and children, one for every hundred of ours you murdered. I've done it, oh yes,” She was trembling now, though from passion or exhaustion was unclear. Blue eyes shone with a light that could only termed as madness, “Over at that pigsty of a village you called Mu'tain. I killed them. All of them! Dead, dead, dead! Because, because I killed them!”
.................. “You little viper,” the captive was on the ground, trying to clutch at her throat as the hand encircling it began to squeeze, “I had friends in Mu'tain. I think it'd be an honor to send you to them as an offering.”
.................. The girl smiled at him, her face a very deep shade of red, and Vergot let go impulsively. Knuckling his brow, he took a deep breath.
.................. “It would shame me to kill a woman, and you do not deserve the honor of being taken by a warrior. After this, you do not even deserve to be raped. I will give you to the council, and you will perish in the most unbearable of agony. May the gods spit on your soul.”
.................. Heading for the entry to his tent, Vergot paused as he reached the open air of the night sky. Around him the shifting sands of the desert seemed at rest, the hum of the night beetles a lullaby to send the infinite now-charcoal grains of sand to sleep. Silently, he turned to regard his captive once more, to look into the eyes of a witch before he delivered her to justice.
.................. The glistening sapphires of her eyes and the soft curves of her face could have made her beautiful, if not for her bared teeth and furious eyes, which made her ressemble an animal. She was a lioness, searching her captor's eyes for any trace of compassion to take advantage of, yet that small body could not belong to a killer. She was young, far too young, everywhere but in her eyes. Those eyes, they spoke of savagery and hate, of past hurts that refused to heal and perhaps even a plea, to end this farce and kill her.
.................. “I should have known it was a woman who would have poisoned the wells. No warrior has so little honor.”
.................. It was hardly a compliment, but those childish eyes flickered, uncertain. It seemed she would not yet be delivered to the council for burning.
.................. “I...didn't know what to do. I had no choice.” That was a child's voice, pleading for understanding but those eyes spoke volume. She had suffered far too much to be any child.
.................. Vergot did not reply. He did not have to, she was, after all, in the wrong and he was right. One did not speak to murderesses any more than one spoke to one's dog. A piercing, unforgiving gaze would be the only thing he could give this woman in all honor.
.................. “You set you doom for yourself,” she continued, tears appearing at the edge of her eyes, “You just ignored me. Like I didn't exist. I was one of the enemy, and you ignored me!"
.................. "Maybe," Vergot thundered, "We thought you had more honor than you showed. Unlike your people, we treat our captives with respect and the honor that befits them."
.................. "You treat your captives with respect and honor," the girl sneered, lips curling back in contempt, "Maybe to your eyes. The truth is that you're just too blind to see a woman as anything more than an object you can trade around, too stupid to see past your own oversized ego."
.................. "It is your people who practice rape and the murder of childrens, witch, not mine! It was your people who came down in their longships to search for slaves and have since not stopped coming to our shores, where we pay them back as they deserve. You should be on your knees, thanking us for our mercy and magnanimity, not poisoning us for the trust we have placed in you!"
.................. "Trust!" she screamed back at him, "What trust can there be from a man who offers to either marry or kill you? I had to service his desires, that slobbering dog, but I never gave in to your hypocrisy. Your so-called 'words of love' which you whisper to me at night while by day you go to take the field against my people, dragging back my husband's friends to burn them alive. That's why we leave your carcasses to be eaten by the vultures, sand spawn, because you have the empty souls of mongrels! Curs, all of you!"
.................. Vergot approached her with murder in his eyes. Had she been a man, his knife would already have traversed her throat, but he knew death was just what this mad she-wolf was looking for. He'd make her pay for insulting his honor, but he did not know how without in the process losing his own.
.................. Ramming his fingers into the soft flesh of her neck, he lifted her up by her head, holding her face very close to his. "You want me to treat you like your people treat our prisoners. Spit on my traditions then. I shall show you yours."
.................. He threw her back against the rippling walls of the tent, her head making a satisfying sound as it collided with a wooden post. Before the captive could wiggle herself into a seated position Vergot was there, breathing into her face and jamming his knee between her legs.
.................. "I think you'll like this, Northern chit. My sister didn't when your soldiers came barging into our village, but then you Northerners have strange customs."
.................. Drawing his knife across the rope keeping her legs bound together, Vergot forced them apart in one brutal motion.
.................. "Go ahead, sand spawn," she whispered, eyes gleaming with rage and madness, "Hurt me. You can't touch me, you stupid Southerner, I don't feel anything. You've done your worse already. You can't hurt me anymore."
.................. Vergot's movements stopped, and he looked down at this girl, whose dress was already in shreds from his frenzied attempt to reduce her to servility. He dropped his knife, suddenly ashamed of what he had been about to do. Mother of the sands, but how young this girl was. Life was unjustly cruel.
.................. The beating waves of the sea stared up at him, small drops of rain already trickling down her cheeks. He did not resist when she dropped her head on his shoulder, nor did he move to comfort her, though he ached to. They both knew how this would end.
.................. She sobbed for what seemed at once to be ages and mere moments. He longed to cradle her in his arms and kiss her, but he could not.
.................. At length the flow of tears dried and she looked up at him, stars of beryl holding his own auburn eyes hostage.
.................. "I didn't stay to see what happened. I just waited for N'haileth to come home, and I stabbed him right through the belly, like he deserved. And then I left."
.................. She didn't take her eyes off him and he knew as long as she didn't he would never be able to move.
.................. "The little children, the women, I didn't want to, but I had to. For honor's sake. To avenge my husband. We're both prisoners here Vergot, by the same stupid honor that says we have to kill each other."
.................. Vergot felt a lump form in his throat as she continued.
.................. "I just wandered through the desert for hours, maybe even days. There's really no time in the desert is there?"
.................. Vergot smiled, "No there really isn't." Somehow, the smile felt utterly natural.
.................. "I just wandered round in circles. I couldn't go anywhere, I couldn't lay down and die, I was almost free, so close, but not really. I wasn't ever free was I?"
.................. Vergot bowed his head, "No man may escape his duty. And I suppose, no woman either."
.................. She gave him a hint of a smile, as if she had understood the pain it had caused him to say that last phrase. She was a child, but she had already overturned his world.
.................. "There was always Cedric. Now that I'm with you, I don't know if he was as noble as everyone said. I don't care anymore. Love is for fairy tales. Out here, it's just blood and sand. Blood and sand and your bloody damned honor."
.................. It wasn't said in a humorous way but the smile returned to Vergot's mouth, unbidden, and the girl returned it. It was a conspiratorial smile; they both shared a secret joke that only they could understand.
.................. "Well,"she said sadly, "We've still got time before dawn approaches. I think I'd like to spend my last night with you."
.................. The lump in his throat was painful, and Vergot feared she could see the tears in his own eyes, "It would be an honor, my lady, to accept." There were no beautiful words of love that he could say that held as much meaning as that simple sentence. She understood. They both did.
.................. When the dawn came, he knew, he would bring her before the council. And she would come with him and confess her crimes of her own free will. But before then, the night would belong only to them, to share this one moment free of everything save love.