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runicloreSuikoden: 20, Xeno: 18. Something must be done about this travesty.
* * *
Waving grasses stretched to eternity in shades of green and straw yellow, parched beneath a summer sun and obscured by a haze of dust where the grass was not so firmly rooted to the soil. Sarah would have liked to call it empty, but the wind carried too many voices on its current for the proper effect. She turned her back on them to return to the scraggly copse of trees they'd set camp in. As the first to return from their reconnisance mission, it was her responsibility to get the fire going and begin preparing the evening meal.
Sarah thought Albert had planned it that way when he passed out their assignments; one couldn't debate his skill in military matters, but she'd try Yuber's cooking before touching anything Albert produced in a kitchen.
The campsite was just as they'd left it, if a bit windblown and dusty. A fire flared up at a wave of her hand, and she washed a large, flat rock clean so she could cut vegetables. They didn't have much this time. There was a nearby Karayan settlement she could visit for more rations, but Sarah was no fool - they would take note of someone with her coloring and accent, and they weren't supposed to be here, not yet. To be noticed would be to sabotage their carefully laid plans. And that only made the idea more tempting, so she put it from her mind.
It was easy to lose herself in the mundanity of cooking. The call of the wind was often joined by a keening from the mountains at her back, from which chill air was carried on the current, and if she listened very hard, she could even hear the earth hum in response. There was no room for thought. If it was difficult to ignore her instinct to stop Luc dead in his tracks before his plan could be put in motion, it was just as hard to ignore the echo that traveled to her through the rock, with the air, of the ruins he was looking for, and many more that he wasn't.
Her response, when he returned to camp that evening to ask about their progress, had been prepared before they set out. 'I'm sorry, Master Luc,' she would say. 'There is no sign of the ceremonial complex anywhere in this area. We must not be close, or I would sense it.'
He would sigh in disappointment and glance into the distance; sometimes glare, but mostly he just stared and rubbed his hand, and seemed to be lost in thought.
Sarah was being truthful enough. The complex wasn't near at all, and though she'd sensed it the moment they set foot in the region and would have to say so if he asked, he hadn't asked. Not yet. She dreaded the outburst that would begin something like, 'Can't you sense, anything, anything at all?' and end with his bitter disappointment, and possibly even the hostile glare he reserved for Harmonians he particularly disliked. She might even deserve it, just for being Harmonian herself in the vaguest sense of the term.
Maybe, if their search took long enough, he would lose his nerve. Maybe he would give up. Maybe he would come to his senses and put an end to it. That was worth risking his ire. She didn't know what it was like to feel his anger, but better he be alive and angry than the alternative.
.
Luc was disappointed as anticipated. And when Sarah rested her head in his shoulder as she did every evening, and wondered - as she always did - how long her deception could possibly last, she decided to simply be grateful that it was so far unknown and took refuge in the sound of his voice as they discussed mundane things. She found peace there until the next day, when it all began again.
* * *
Word: unknown
Time: no clue, people kept talking to me. =D
* * *
Waving grasses stretched to eternity in shades of green and straw yellow, parched beneath a summer sun and obscured by a haze of dust where the grass was not so firmly rooted to the soil. Sarah would have liked to call it empty, but the wind carried too many voices on its current for the proper effect. She turned her back on them to return to the scraggly copse of trees they'd set camp in. As the first to return from their reconnisance mission, it was her responsibility to get the fire going and begin preparing the evening meal.
Sarah thought Albert had planned it that way when he passed out their assignments; one couldn't debate his skill in military matters, but she'd try Yuber's cooking before touching anything Albert produced in a kitchen.
The campsite was just as they'd left it, if a bit windblown and dusty. A fire flared up at a wave of her hand, and she washed a large, flat rock clean so she could cut vegetables. They didn't have much this time. There was a nearby Karayan settlement she could visit for more rations, but Sarah was no fool - they would take note of someone with her coloring and accent, and they weren't supposed to be here, not yet. To be noticed would be to sabotage their carefully laid plans. And that only made the idea more tempting, so she put it from her mind.
It was easy to lose herself in the mundanity of cooking. The call of the wind was often joined by a keening from the mountains at her back, from which chill air was carried on the current, and if she listened very hard, she could even hear the earth hum in response. There was no room for thought. If it was difficult to ignore her instinct to stop Luc dead in his tracks before his plan could be put in motion, it was just as hard to ignore the echo that traveled to her through the rock, with the air, of the ruins he was looking for, and many more that he wasn't.
Her response, when he returned to camp that evening to ask about their progress, had been prepared before they set out. 'I'm sorry, Master Luc,' she would say. 'There is no sign of the ceremonial complex anywhere in this area. We must not be close, or I would sense it.'
He would sigh in disappointment and glance into the distance; sometimes glare, but mostly he just stared and rubbed his hand, and seemed to be lost in thought.
Sarah was being truthful enough. The complex wasn't near at all, and though she'd sensed it the moment they set foot in the region and would have to say so if he asked, he hadn't asked. Not yet. She dreaded the outburst that would begin something like, 'Can't you sense, anything, anything at all?' and end with his bitter disappointment, and possibly even the hostile glare he reserved for Harmonians he particularly disliked. She might even deserve it, just for being Harmonian herself in the vaguest sense of the term.
Maybe, if their search took long enough, he would lose his nerve. Maybe he would give up. Maybe he would come to his senses and put an end to it. That was worth risking his ire. She didn't know what it was like to feel his anger, but better he be alive and angry than the alternative.
.
Luc was disappointed as anticipated. And when Sarah rested her head in his shoulder as she did every evening, and wondered - as she always did - how long her deception could possibly last, she decided to simply be grateful that it was so far unknown and took refuge in the sound of his voice as they discussed mundane things. She found peace there until the next day, when it all began again.
* * *
Word: unknown
Time: no clue, people kept talking to me. =D
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no subject
Date: 2006-04-03 03:03 pm (UTC)Wait, isn't that what you meant?
Seriously, this is very, very, very very very good. I'm serious. For realz.
Also, and related only in a vague sense, I think you will really like Sukoden V.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-10 05:04 am (UTC)I wish I had more time to continue this. Thank you for your comment.