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 Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2006 11:22 am
Shopping was one of the unhappy necessaries of this settled life, Jin had discovered.
She had taken to wearing thin slippers on her feet, after discovering many merchants were unwilling to let her come in without them. She didn't understand the notion behind "No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service," but she still needed to eat.
In the evening, she would pray for forgiveness. The Phoenix would understand.
With Siahndi clinging close to her elbow, Jin looked over the produce. It was all just a little expensive, but she supposed winter would have that effect.
Siahndi was having a ball.
Though he never let go of Jin's arm, he was exceptionally curious and wanted to touch everything in the store, except that Jin got angry at him for that. And he really didn't want to make Jin angry. "Are we getting toast?"
"We'll get some bread for toast," she promised.
Abruptly, Siahndi reached down into the peaches with his free hand. Jin sputtered a moment in protest, but the boy, today, had no interest in manhandling the fruit.
"Look what I found!"
Sitting in his outstretched palm was a small brown bug. If it were possible for an insect to look indignant, this one would have been very much so at the indignity of losing its breakfast of peaches.
Jin tilted her head. "An earwig."
"Why's it called that?"
"Because some people think they burrow into people's ears and lay eggs in the brain." It had been a favourite horror story among the sisters-in-training. It was particularly unsettling when the drafty stone Hall had a tendency to trap insects during the summer months, which would buzz around the sleeping quarters all night.
"Do they?" Siahndi was enthralled.
"No. I think they just eat fruit." Jin pursed her lips. "They can pinch, though, with their tails. So, be careful."
"Where should I put it?"
Jin blinked. "Just put it back where you found it."
She moved away, and Siahndi, though quite nervous at being separated from even by a few paltry metres, laid the earwig down carefully on the peaches. He even petted it gently.
A few moments later, he scurried back to latch tightly onto Jin's arm again, leaving a dessicated little insect corpse for some unlucky shopper to find.
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Posted: Fri Mar 10, 2006 10:33 am
Siahndi yawned, puzzled by his guardian's odd habits.
Every morning, and every evening, she would kneel down in the center of the room. She would not answer if he spoke to her, she would not move if he touched her, and she barely seemed to be breathing.
She said it was praying.
It made Siahndi a bit nervous, really, that Jin would sit down and act dead twice a day, and completely ignore him.
That wasn't quite true.
Once, Siahndi had burned himself on the stove, and his cry of pain had brought her back to consciousness. She'd quickly dressed his wound, rather awkwardly kissed it better when he asked her to, and returned to her prayers.
Siahndi, this morning, was trying to occupy himself with a little reading workbook, but he was bored.
And thirsty.
He got down from the table and went to fetch a stool to get a glass out of the cupboards, filled it with water from the sink.
Ice. He needed ice. Jin got ice out of the freezer, so that was where he would look. Siahndi shuffled the stool over, and clambered up to find the ice cubes.
He quickly lost interest in the ice.
Hunched in between a few things, with frost on the feathers, was a small, bright red bird, quite dead.
Siahndi turned it over in his hands. He... he could remember. This had been him. It was still a very strange thing to recall.
There was a soft sound, behind him. Jin had finished her prayers, and she looked white.
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