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runicloreLight and Honor
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: 2 - Thus spring begins
Gauntlet Theme: 30 - the heavenly scales got dropped and lost
Series: Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon
Characters: Nyna, Camus
Rating: K (mention of blood, but nothing terrible)
Words: 2090
Notes: I've never written these characters before, nor for this game (aside from a short one-shot), and my schedule for this month is forcing me to write really fast as I go. That should be a warning.
................................................................
The streets of Archaneia did not run with blood as Nyna expected when the crown city fell to the combined forces of Grust and Dolhr, though she only learned of the conquest later from her captor. She knew the city burned while she fled; the dull red glow above the minarets appeared in her dreams every night hence, the walls limned with gold, the tiled roofs, domed library, the slender towers of the palace of her birth all angular shadows against dusty orange haze. When she looked back that night to see the moon rise above the hills, it was large enough to swallow Archaneia, dim and yellow and almost like a sunrise.
Perhaps it was the angle at which Nyna twisted in her saddle to gaze back at her city that loosened her grip on the reigns, that forced her to clutch tighter with her knees to the horse-- it turned, and she might have gone back, would have, if a retainer had not seized her arm and the reins. Do not rush to ruin, your highness! Midia. She nudged her horse closer, held Nyna on their course and shouted: Ride! The enemy has left the city in pursuit! Whether it was true or not didn't matter, as they rode faster, and the pound of hooves on the hard-packed road resonated in her body, her mind, set her bones vibrating. The Fire Emblem burned where it hung beneath her shift, pulling and grinding the chain beneath her breasts while it danced against her stomach.
Her escort was cut down by knights in black. One by one they fell - Olsen with a spear in his gut, Laila when she leapt from her horse to protect Nyna from an attack she never saw, and all she remembered afterward were the white fletches of arrows quivering with the force of their lodging in Laila's back, and their fall from the horse into the grass. Dust choked her throat. The scent of blood pooled in her nostrils. Hooves drummed close by, and the warm weight of her shield, the lily scent and softness of her red hair, bore Nyna into darkness.
Princess-- princess, where--
Midia. Perhaps she was dead now.
Is the Sable Order now a pack of dogs for Dolhr? I'll send you running back to your master!
Lucian-- slain. Nyna didn't hear his last breath, but she knew it in her heart when she opened her eyes to the crimson runner in her throne room and heard the echo of foreign accents bounce from the walls. Hazy red light lit the windows. Char and smoke tainted the air, circled the torches with dirty haloes. Her hands were bound beneath her and four men flanked her, their black armor dulled by blood and soot and their surcoats ragged. They wouldn't look at her, so she couldn't ask why.
Why was she alive? Why did she listen when they told her to flee and protect Archaneia's hope?
Where were her parents? If the throne was occupied--
It didn't sound as if a voice of authority had yet entered, for the murmurs and echoes were mixed and uncertain. Nyna was alive because they did not have the authority to kill her, nothing more.
It was only a matter of time.
.
Spring dawned cool and hazy over Archaneia to the clatter of steel armor and the sharp clap of hard-shod boots on the flagstone tiles. Nyna waited on her knees in the throne room as she'd waited most of the night, though her guards changed and she was given a sip of water from a cracked porcelain bowl when they asked her a question - she couldn't remember what or when, and they all looked the same - and she could not answer, but felt her lips crack and bleed. The taste of her own blood joined the memory of others and lingered in her nose. The Fire Emblem rested quiescent against her skin, warm, hard, sharp around the edges. They told her nothing of her parents; she knew only that Grust held Archaneia, not Dolhr, at least in so many words. She knew some of her retainers had survived, but not which or how many. She knew the fires had been put out, and the commons corraled in the palace square where they could be watched. The sons and daughters of the land, the blood of the great houses, were being hunted across the countryside, those who had not been routed at the battle front or lost before that.
Once, her father told her demoralization won a war. Two armies may be matched spear to spear, he said, and victory will go to he who harnesses the power of rumor and intimidation. Take a general and make of him a legend, though he knows not battle - so said the ancient tactics manuals. Nyna watched the angle of the sun change and wondered how long she would wait to see the face of Dolhr as it was represented by Grust, and whether the famed Sable Knight was indeed the legend they wielded to break her father's army upon the rocky southern soil. He was tall, they said, and fair. He was the essence of knighthood. His blade split bone and armor as an axe splintered soft wood.
He was light, and honor, everything that was still good at the center of Grust's rotting court.
I will not believe it, her mother said. Not until I see his face beyond the city walls will I believe the might of Grust turned against us. Dolhr is feinting.
What did she say in reply? She couldn't remember. The ropes binding her wrists rubbed and cut her skin until she was sure it bled. She could no longer feel her fingers. Her gown was ripped at the shoulder and showing skin. Her hair tangled on either side of her face, smeared with mud and clay so it looked gray instead of blond, stained rusty brown on one side. When she bent her head to rub an itch on her shoulder, the color flaked down, dusted her dirty white skirt. Cherry trees bloomed in the garden outside the hall, their branches frothy white clouds drifting past the window against the dingy sky.
Perhaps she shouldn't have tried to run-- the front was supposed to be leagues away when Dolhr attacked; plans to flee eastward to Talys were well and good when the enemy was only a shadow on the horizon, but sheer folly when he pounded on one's gates with siege engines and singed the walls with dragonfire. She should have waited with her parents and met their fate, whatever it was.
Nyna knew what must have happened, yet to say it, even within the vault of her mind, would make it a certainty. Thus, when the enemy commander graced her with his presence and greeted her with a precisely angled bow, a low It is my pleasure, Princess upon his lips, she cut him off with a word and gained her feet without help, though he stepped forward to extend his hand. The Sable Knight was indeed tall, though she hesitated to call him fair; his patrician features would have suited stone better than flesh and blood. The irony did not escape her.
"I would see my parents," she said, and hardly recognized the gravelled voice as her own.
He had the nerve to look her in the eye. "That is impossible. I apologize."
The angle Nyna's hands were tied forced her to hunch forward. "Do you take me for a fool? I know what you've done." Her keepers stepped back, left her alone, and she wondered if she was the fool, to provoke him.
Camus folded his arms at his back and breathed deep, his mouth compressing to a line that whitened with pressure. She saw soldiers pass the doors, which stood open, and heard the undertone of their voices in the far corners of the room. Black draped the throne, smeared the stone floor, charred the edges of the crimson runner. Nyna wondered if blood discolored the cushions, if flames had melted the golden scrollwork. Crates stacked high in the corners, barrels, boxes, bolts of cloth and sheafs of paper tied with string piled atop them. She'd watched them carry each box in, heard the rattle of metal and glass. It seemed Medeus had a use for Archaneia's riches, if not its crown-- or perhaps he promised wealth to Grust, though its commander was well-enough adorned with gold thread piping and embroidery, with golden buttons, with silver.
His sword was sheathed at his waist. Her heart drummed in her throat and tried to choke her. She hoped the blade was sharp.
"Princess Nyna," he said, finally, his baritone pitched low and his gaze finally lowered-- slightly. "I thought to spare you the sight. You will not recognize them."
Her bindings were fortunate that moment; had Nyna been free, she would have clutched her shoulder if her hands were free, tried to hide the rent in her gown that exposed her skin and left the sides folding down like flaps, almost indecent. It might be he didn't care - that he stared at a point over her shoulder, or the grass in her hair which still flittered down to the red carpet when she moved quickly enough to disturb the matted tangles. She watched his face for a shadow, a line, some hint as to his thoughts. "Where are they?"
Now Camus did look elsewhere, though his head didn't move. "Hanging from the wall of the inner city."
The Emblem chilled against her skin. Armor scraped behind her, reminder of the four knights and their weapons, all aimed for her back; the sound grated, made her want to shrug it away. She had to swallow her heart - again, and then again - to clear her throat, work enough moisture into her mouth to speak. "I must have heard you wrong."
No. By the inclination of his head, she'd heard correctly. He licked his lips. "By order of the king--"
"Grust is not king here!"
"--they were dragged by horseback before a gathering of your citizens to be displayed as proof of our victory."
Nyna's hands clenched. Her fingers prickled and went numb again, felt only through her gown, like they were pieces of wood attached to her wrists. You will not recognize them, he said, and to mind came warnings from her riding instructor, admonishments of her handling of the reigns, of the way she sat in the saddle. I once saw a man unhorsed and dragged half a league because he wrapped the reigns around his arm that way, the woman had said, fingers tapping her pony's neck. His leg was shattered when we got him loose. We saw the bone, white and we-- have you no stomach for such things? She slapped her riding crop to the fencepost. Then do as you're told! She was replaced with a kinder teacher, but Nyna saw her face in the city now and again.
"This is the honor of the famed Sable Order-- the torture and humiliation of your victims?" She wanted her nails to bite her palms and bleed. Let the first blood be hers. "You treat us like criminals!"
"War is unkind, princess. It makes criminals of us all."
She could have slapped him. "I will see my parents before I die."
Camus regarded her with a slight frown, the first expression she'd seen cross his face. His pale hair glinted slightly orange, the sable brown of his eyes just red enough to make her hate them. "As you wish." He beckoned, and she heard her escort move into formation behind her. Their commander moved to her side and took hold of her arm with long, black-gloved fingers which tightened when she tried to pull away. "Death does not await you tonight unless you try to run, my lady." He pulled her forward, and the heavy boots of his knights followed. "Do not test my kindness."
Nyna stumbled on the hem of her skirt but held her chin high, and did not answer.
.............................................
I can only hope I'll get better with practice.
.
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: 2 - Thus spring begins
Gauntlet Theme: 30 - the heavenly scales got dropped and lost
Series: Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon
Characters: Nyna, Camus
Rating: K (mention of blood, but nothing terrible)
Words: 2090
Notes: I've never written these characters before, nor for this game (aside from a short one-shot), and my schedule for this month is forcing me to write really fast as I go. That should be a warning.
................................................................
The streets of Archaneia did not run with blood as Nyna expected when the crown city fell to the combined forces of Grust and Dolhr, though she only learned of the conquest later from her captor. She knew the city burned while she fled; the dull red glow above the minarets appeared in her dreams every night hence, the walls limned with gold, the tiled roofs, domed library, the slender towers of the palace of her birth all angular shadows against dusty orange haze. When she looked back that night to see the moon rise above the hills, it was large enough to swallow Archaneia, dim and yellow and almost like a sunrise.
Perhaps it was the angle at which Nyna twisted in her saddle to gaze back at her city that loosened her grip on the reigns, that forced her to clutch tighter with her knees to the horse-- it turned, and she might have gone back, would have, if a retainer had not seized her arm and the reins. Do not rush to ruin, your highness! Midia. She nudged her horse closer, held Nyna on their course and shouted: Ride! The enemy has left the city in pursuit! Whether it was true or not didn't matter, as they rode faster, and the pound of hooves on the hard-packed road resonated in her body, her mind, set her bones vibrating. The Fire Emblem burned where it hung beneath her shift, pulling and grinding the chain beneath her breasts while it danced against her stomach.
Her escort was cut down by knights in black. One by one they fell - Olsen with a spear in his gut, Laila when she leapt from her horse to protect Nyna from an attack she never saw, and all she remembered afterward were the white fletches of arrows quivering with the force of their lodging in Laila's back, and their fall from the horse into the grass. Dust choked her throat. The scent of blood pooled in her nostrils. Hooves drummed close by, and the warm weight of her shield, the lily scent and softness of her red hair, bore Nyna into darkness.
Princess-- princess, where--
Midia. Perhaps she was dead now.
Is the Sable Order now a pack of dogs for Dolhr? I'll send you running back to your master!
Lucian-- slain. Nyna didn't hear his last breath, but she knew it in her heart when she opened her eyes to the crimson runner in her throne room and heard the echo of foreign accents bounce from the walls. Hazy red light lit the windows. Char and smoke tainted the air, circled the torches with dirty haloes. Her hands were bound beneath her and four men flanked her, their black armor dulled by blood and soot and their surcoats ragged. They wouldn't look at her, so she couldn't ask why.
Why was she alive? Why did she listen when they told her to flee and protect Archaneia's hope?
Where were her parents? If the throne was occupied--
It didn't sound as if a voice of authority had yet entered, for the murmurs and echoes were mixed and uncertain. Nyna was alive because they did not have the authority to kill her, nothing more.
It was only a matter of time.
.
Spring dawned cool and hazy over Archaneia to the clatter of steel armor and the sharp clap of hard-shod boots on the flagstone tiles. Nyna waited on her knees in the throne room as she'd waited most of the night, though her guards changed and she was given a sip of water from a cracked porcelain bowl when they asked her a question - she couldn't remember what or when, and they all looked the same - and she could not answer, but felt her lips crack and bleed. The taste of her own blood joined the memory of others and lingered in her nose. The Fire Emblem rested quiescent against her skin, warm, hard, sharp around the edges. They told her nothing of her parents; she knew only that Grust held Archaneia, not Dolhr, at least in so many words. She knew some of her retainers had survived, but not which or how many. She knew the fires had been put out, and the commons corraled in the palace square where they could be watched. The sons and daughters of the land, the blood of the great houses, were being hunted across the countryside, those who had not been routed at the battle front or lost before that.
Once, her father told her demoralization won a war. Two armies may be matched spear to spear, he said, and victory will go to he who harnesses the power of rumor and intimidation. Take a general and make of him a legend, though he knows not battle - so said the ancient tactics manuals. Nyna watched the angle of the sun change and wondered how long she would wait to see the face of Dolhr as it was represented by Grust, and whether the famed Sable Knight was indeed the legend they wielded to break her father's army upon the rocky southern soil. He was tall, they said, and fair. He was the essence of knighthood. His blade split bone and armor as an axe splintered soft wood.
He was light, and honor, everything that was still good at the center of Grust's rotting court.
I will not believe it, her mother said. Not until I see his face beyond the city walls will I believe the might of Grust turned against us. Dolhr is feinting.
What did she say in reply? She couldn't remember. The ropes binding her wrists rubbed and cut her skin until she was sure it bled. She could no longer feel her fingers. Her gown was ripped at the shoulder and showing skin. Her hair tangled on either side of her face, smeared with mud and clay so it looked gray instead of blond, stained rusty brown on one side. When she bent her head to rub an itch on her shoulder, the color flaked down, dusted her dirty white skirt. Cherry trees bloomed in the garden outside the hall, their branches frothy white clouds drifting past the window against the dingy sky.
Perhaps she shouldn't have tried to run-- the front was supposed to be leagues away when Dolhr attacked; plans to flee eastward to Talys were well and good when the enemy was only a shadow on the horizon, but sheer folly when he pounded on one's gates with siege engines and singed the walls with dragonfire. She should have waited with her parents and met their fate, whatever it was.
Nyna knew what must have happened, yet to say it, even within the vault of her mind, would make it a certainty. Thus, when the enemy commander graced her with his presence and greeted her with a precisely angled bow, a low It is my pleasure, Princess upon his lips, she cut him off with a word and gained her feet without help, though he stepped forward to extend his hand. The Sable Knight was indeed tall, though she hesitated to call him fair; his patrician features would have suited stone better than flesh and blood. The irony did not escape her.
"I would see my parents," she said, and hardly recognized the gravelled voice as her own.
He had the nerve to look her in the eye. "That is impossible. I apologize."
The angle Nyna's hands were tied forced her to hunch forward. "Do you take me for a fool? I know what you've done." Her keepers stepped back, left her alone, and she wondered if she was the fool, to provoke him.
Camus folded his arms at his back and breathed deep, his mouth compressing to a line that whitened with pressure. She saw soldiers pass the doors, which stood open, and heard the undertone of their voices in the far corners of the room. Black draped the throne, smeared the stone floor, charred the edges of the crimson runner. Nyna wondered if blood discolored the cushions, if flames had melted the golden scrollwork. Crates stacked high in the corners, barrels, boxes, bolts of cloth and sheafs of paper tied with string piled atop them. She'd watched them carry each box in, heard the rattle of metal and glass. It seemed Medeus had a use for Archaneia's riches, if not its crown-- or perhaps he promised wealth to Grust, though its commander was well-enough adorned with gold thread piping and embroidery, with golden buttons, with silver.
His sword was sheathed at his waist. Her heart drummed in her throat and tried to choke her. She hoped the blade was sharp.
"Princess Nyna," he said, finally, his baritone pitched low and his gaze finally lowered-- slightly. "I thought to spare you the sight. You will not recognize them."
Her bindings were fortunate that moment; had Nyna been free, she would have clutched her shoulder if her hands were free, tried to hide the rent in her gown that exposed her skin and left the sides folding down like flaps, almost indecent. It might be he didn't care - that he stared at a point over her shoulder, or the grass in her hair which still flittered down to the red carpet when she moved quickly enough to disturb the matted tangles. She watched his face for a shadow, a line, some hint as to his thoughts. "Where are they?"
Now Camus did look elsewhere, though his head didn't move. "Hanging from the wall of the inner city."
The Emblem chilled against her skin. Armor scraped behind her, reminder of the four knights and their weapons, all aimed for her back; the sound grated, made her want to shrug it away. She had to swallow her heart - again, and then again - to clear her throat, work enough moisture into her mouth to speak. "I must have heard you wrong."
No. By the inclination of his head, she'd heard correctly. He licked his lips. "By order of the king--"
"Grust is not king here!"
"--they were dragged by horseback before a gathering of your citizens to be displayed as proof of our victory."
Nyna's hands clenched. Her fingers prickled and went numb again, felt only through her gown, like they were pieces of wood attached to her wrists. You will not recognize them, he said, and to mind came warnings from her riding instructor, admonishments of her handling of the reigns, of the way she sat in the saddle. I once saw a man unhorsed and dragged half a league because he wrapped the reigns around his arm that way, the woman had said, fingers tapping her pony's neck. His leg was shattered when we got him loose. We saw the bone, white and we-- have you no stomach for such things? She slapped her riding crop to the fencepost. Then do as you're told! She was replaced with a kinder teacher, but Nyna saw her face in the city now and again.
"This is the honor of the famed Sable Order-- the torture and humiliation of your victims?" She wanted her nails to bite her palms and bleed. Let the first blood be hers. "You treat us like criminals!"
"War is unkind, princess. It makes criminals of us all."
She could have slapped him. "I will see my parents before I die."
Camus regarded her with a slight frown, the first expression she'd seen cross his face. His pale hair glinted slightly orange, the sable brown of his eyes just red enough to make her hate them. "As you wish." He beckoned, and she heard her escort move into formation behind her. Their commander moved to her side and took hold of her arm with long, black-gloved fingers which tightened when she tried to pull away. "Death does not await you tonight unless you try to run, my lady." He pulled her forward, and the heavy boots of his knights followed. "Do not test my kindness."
Nyna stumbled on the hem of her skirt but held her chin high, and did not answer.
.............................................
I can only hope I'll get better with practice.
.
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Date: 2009-10-03 09:00 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-10-03 11:31 pm (UTC)