[December 16] [Fire Emblem 11] Constancy
Dec. 9th, 2010 12:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
runicloreConstancy
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: December 16 - Shelves of memory
Series: Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon / Mystery of the Emblem
Characters: Nyna
Rating: K
Words: 687
Warnings: n/a
Notes: This is full of awkwardness. Part of it is intentional, but most of it is me not knowing how to write Nyna after all, and speculating about things, and coming up with plot (ha ha) and bad dialogue off the top of my head.
....................................................................
"This is constancy," Nyna's mother said, holding a cherry blossom pinched between her finger and thumb. "Isn't it lovely?" Beside her laquered nails and heavy gold rings, it looked simple. Fragile. Another clung to the wing of her blonde hair, swept back over her ear by a bejeweled comb. "Your father gave me a vial of their essence as my bridegift; they say the distillation alone was worth more than my family estate."
Nyna crouched down to choose one of her own from the moss, because she wasn't tall enough to reach the branch. Her skirt bunched under her thighs, and the front slid and skipped around her in a half-circle of rippled, dappled shadows and ruffles. Her mother told her to kneel, one knee upon the ground-- that pose was obscene. But my knees will get dirty-- she started to say. Your dirty knees will not be on display for the staff was the reply. Nyna stood up and glanced back, but no one was nearby. At the very end of the garden she saw a gardener in the cool shade behind the columns with a broom, and the scratch of its bristles across the stone walk reached her as a whisper. White domes of cherry and the shafts of sunlight between them made the palace a distant apparition.
Her mother's hand on her hair brought Nyna's gaze back; she felt her mother's nails comb back to the braid woven against the back of her head and the loops of ribbons tying it, tickling the back of her neck. "Why wouldn't you speak to him?" Nyna asked, looking down at her three-petaled blossom. The fourth must have been ripped away by the wind. "Nana said you wouldn't let Father in when he knocked on your door last night. Why?"
The hand went still. "I've been ill - you know that."
"You were fine yesterday--" Nyna saw her mother's pink slippers peek from beneath the hem of her skirt and thought, almost, to back away when she found herself pulled in. This was her favorite dress to see her mother in - a dark read, the print an endless fall of cherry blossoms, coincidentally. It made her lips look so red and beautiful, her eyes so very blue. "Are you mad because he left?"
Though she half-hoped it wouldn't, the whisper carried. "Your father always leaves at the most difficult times," her mother said. "I wonder where he went."
Because her intonation did not rise in question, Nyna swallowed her response that she didn't know. Was she supposed to know? Did Mother want her to know? He wasn't gone very long. "Are you better now?" She raised her chin again, looked at her mother's pallor - still too pale - and the set of her shoulders, which always gave away when she felt under the weather. "Boah taught me how to use a healing staff. I can help."
Mother sighed, her lips turning up before she forced them down again. "No." Her eyes sparkled, and Nyna thought that was a good sign. They let the breeze sweep their blossoms away together, and her mother stroked her hair again, this time with both hands, fiddling with her fringe and arranging the ringlets just so. "My dear Nyna. You'll be a wonderful help to your husband one day."
"Unless I have a brother," she said. "Then I can help him - I think it would be better that way."
Mother picked a white petal from Nyna's hair and flicked it into the wind. "I do not think you will have a brother after all. But that's fine - you're all I have ever wanted."
Oh.
Nyna wasn't sure she said it aloud or not. Mother didn't respond, only withdrew her hands, folded them at her waist, and turned her face northward while the wind carried her hair in golden streams on the wind.
So that was what happened.
......................................................................
I suppose eventually I'll get good at this. Or maybe I won't. I'll end up with a Nyna canon I can use for the big story, at least.
.
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: December 16 - Shelves of memory
Series: Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon / Mystery of the Emblem
Characters: Nyna
Rating: K
Words: 687
Warnings: n/a
Notes: This is full of awkwardness. Part of it is intentional, but most of it is me not knowing how to write Nyna after all, and speculating about things, and coming up with plot (ha ha) and bad dialogue off the top of my head.
....................................................................
"This is constancy," Nyna's mother said, holding a cherry blossom pinched between her finger and thumb. "Isn't it lovely?" Beside her laquered nails and heavy gold rings, it looked simple. Fragile. Another clung to the wing of her blonde hair, swept back over her ear by a bejeweled comb. "Your father gave me a vial of their essence as my bridegift; they say the distillation alone was worth more than my family estate."
Nyna crouched down to choose one of her own from the moss, because she wasn't tall enough to reach the branch. Her skirt bunched under her thighs, and the front slid and skipped around her in a half-circle of rippled, dappled shadows and ruffles. Her mother told her to kneel, one knee upon the ground-- that pose was obscene. But my knees will get dirty-- she started to say. Your dirty knees will not be on display for the staff was the reply. Nyna stood up and glanced back, but no one was nearby. At the very end of the garden she saw a gardener in the cool shade behind the columns with a broom, and the scratch of its bristles across the stone walk reached her as a whisper. White domes of cherry and the shafts of sunlight between them made the palace a distant apparition.
Her mother's hand on her hair brought Nyna's gaze back; she felt her mother's nails comb back to the braid woven against the back of her head and the loops of ribbons tying it, tickling the back of her neck. "Why wouldn't you speak to him?" Nyna asked, looking down at her three-petaled blossom. The fourth must have been ripped away by the wind. "Nana said you wouldn't let Father in when he knocked on your door last night. Why?"
The hand went still. "I've been ill - you know that."
"You were fine yesterday--" Nyna saw her mother's pink slippers peek from beneath the hem of her skirt and thought, almost, to back away when she found herself pulled in. This was her favorite dress to see her mother in - a dark read, the print an endless fall of cherry blossoms, coincidentally. It made her lips look so red and beautiful, her eyes so very blue. "Are you mad because he left?"
Though she half-hoped it wouldn't, the whisper carried. "Your father always leaves at the most difficult times," her mother said. "I wonder where he went."
Because her intonation did not rise in question, Nyna swallowed her response that she didn't know. Was she supposed to know? Did Mother want her to know? He wasn't gone very long. "Are you better now?" She raised her chin again, looked at her mother's pallor - still too pale - and the set of her shoulders, which always gave away when she felt under the weather. "Boah taught me how to use a healing staff. I can help."
Mother sighed, her lips turning up before she forced them down again. "No." Her eyes sparkled, and Nyna thought that was a good sign. They let the breeze sweep their blossoms away together, and her mother stroked her hair again, this time with both hands, fiddling with her fringe and arranging the ringlets just so. "My dear Nyna. You'll be a wonderful help to your husband one day."
"Unless I have a brother," she said. "Then I can help him - I think it would be better that way."
Mother picked a white petal from Nyna's hair and flicked it into the wind. "I do not think you will have a brother after all. But that's fine - you're all I have ever wanted."
Oh.
Nyna wasn't sure she said it aloud or not. Mother didn't respond, only withdrew her hands, folded them at her waist, and turned her face northward while the wind carried her hair in golden streams on the wind.
So that was what happened.
......................................................................
I suppose eventually I'll get good at this. Or maybe I won't. I'll end up with a Nyna canon I can use for the big story, at least.
.