Two Kids and a Knight
Sept 28, 2014 21:10:43 GMT -5
Post by Harbor on Sept 28, 2014 21:10:43 GMT -5
Beryl wasn’t sure how she felt about having left her city behind to camp with the enemy. They had won the battle, sure, so she was on the right side as far as wanting to avoid further trouble in her life, but there were a lot of street-folk she’d known who disapproved. She saw a few of them helping out now that the fighting was over and all was done, but that didn’t mean the majority wasn’t still swathed with a low-level anarchy. Beryl didn’t understand half of what was going on or being said, but that was a common state to her. She didn’t mind. It was all the niceness here that worried her. All these people smiling at her no matter how tired they were as they hurried on by, hands or arms entirely full, hair a-frazzled. It was madness. That sort of thing bugged her when she didn’t understand it.
But she’d been allowed to keep Finlach. That’s what she’d decided to name the infant she’d pulled out from under the dead woman. She told the lady healer who’d first seen to the pair or them that he was her brother, and, after drawing out of the girl a strict promise not to be churlish about asking for help or supplies, at long last the healer allowed her to keep him. Beryl took him everywhere with her, and after she got some buttered milk into him, the boy turned out to be robust enough, no longer the frail little quiet thing he’d been only days before. He still looked like she’d been neglecting him, but at least he no longer acted like it.
Even with Fin to look after though Beryl sometimes still got bored. She’d spend a few hours lining twigs up end to end until they were too snarled to do anything else with, or finish all the still-ragged hems on her dress and apron with borrowed thread and her own needle, or borrow a drop-spindle and twist some dusty thread for a while, but eventually she always lacked enough to do to be content. Granted, Beryl was rarely content regardless—it wasn’t in her nature. But usually she wasn’t outright irritable. Since she was doing her best to cultivate her curious side, however, whenever she felt the rot of boredom creeping back in she always found some other adult to pester with questions or to observe. On occasion that adult was even William. She felt she owed it to him to keep nearabouts to him, to keep him company since he’d been the one to bring her into this life, or to keep an eye on him if nothing else. Nice people like him made her scowl. She couldn’t make any sense of them.
Hoisting Fin up on the sling she’d sewn for him, settling his weight onto her back, and tying it in the front, Beryl decided to pay William another visit. He was usually fairly easy for her to find, even being as short as she was among all these adults. Finally finding him, she tugged a knot of her hair out of Fin’s mouth—she could feel him gumming it back there; that couldn’t be healthy—and thumped down onto a stump, kicking her feet. ”Whatcha doing?”
But she’d been allowed to keep Finlach. That’s what she’d decided to name the infant she’d pulled out from under the dead woman. She told the lady healer who’d first seen to the pair or them that he was her brother, and, after drawing out of the girl a strict promise not to be churlish about asking for help or supplies, at long last the healer allowed her to keep him. Beryl took him everywhere with her, and after she got some buttered milk into him, the boy turned out to be robust enough, no longer the frail little quiet thing he’d been only days before. He still looked like she’d been neglecting him, but at least he no longer acted like it.
Even with Fin to look after though Beryl sometimes still got bored. She’d spend a few hours lining twigs up end to end until they were too snarled to do anything else with, or finish all the still-ragged hems on her dress and apron with borrowed thread and her own needle, or borrow a drop-spindle and twist some dusty thread for a while, but eventually she always lacked enough to do to be content. Granted, Beryl was rarely content regardless—it wasn’t in her nature. But usually she wasn’t outright irritable. Since she was doing her best to cultivate her curious side, however, whenever she felt the rot of boredom creeping back in she always found some other adult to pester with questions or to observe. On occasion that adult was even William. She felt she owed it to him to keep nearabouts to him, to keep him company since he’d been the one to bring her into this life, or to keep an eye on him if nothing else. Nice people like him made her scowl. She couldn’t make any sense of them.
Hoisting Fin up on the sling she’d sewn for him, settling his weight onto her back, and tying it in the front, Beryl decided to pay William another visit. He was usually fairly easy for her to find, even being as short as she was among all these adults. Finally finding him, she tugged a knot of her hair out of Fin’s mouth—she could feel him gumming it back there; that couldn’t be healthy—and thumped down onto a stump, kicking her feet. ”Whatcha doing?”
