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 Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 12:29 pm
They’d caught sight of the small totem he carried so carefully, it was silly to think he’d be able to really hide it when he kept pulling it out to look it over, to touch it. He had to confess that he knew only a little about guardians, and what he knew…might well be more myth than fact. Was it real? He thought so… he wasn’t sure, who would know?
So they’d advised him to seek out “Petra”, she’d know they advised. He imagined some old wise woman, hunched and wrinkled like an old brown apple. That, he thought, would be the kind of woman who must know about the Chosen, at the youngest he expected perhaps someone his father’s age.
He’d sent a message ahead that he would be late on his return, blamed a small fever that kept him from traveling and trusted that his father would believe it. After all he wasn’t ‘manly’ enough to keep from illness, or something of the sort.
They said he could find her in town today, and that that was a lucky thing since she was more or less a nomad, wandering from place to place as she always had. She’d be at market someone recommended, to sell goats. So, limping along on aching, blistered feet he searched the market for goats, he didn’t see an old woman, he didn’t even see someone his father’s age. He saw a girl.
Maybe at least, she’d know where he could find Petra.
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Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 12:47 pm
It's rare that Spokelse isn't at Petra's side, and in fact she is--she's lying down behind the cart where the girl sits, keeping out of the sight of all the curious travelers, tired of reaching hands and staring eyes. The blankets draped over the sides of the wagon shield her from view, as large as a draft horse now that's Awakened--and if she had the antlers of a stag, she'd be given away in an instant.
The girl on the cart has a feral sort of look to her: a deep scar twists one corner of her full lip, and her eyebrows are heavy and drawn. She is perhaps thirteen, maybe fourteen: but her face is brown from hard work in the sun, and her hands, folded in her lap, are callused and rough and scabbed and scarred. Her underfed body is wrapped in a rough shawl, and when she realizes that the stranger is approaching her cart, she jabs a finger at one of the goats tied to the front of the cart.
"Nice and fat," she observes, and it is. It bleats a little. "Got some buckets of milk, too."
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Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 2:52 pm
He blinked, realizing that he was looking at a deer beside her, or something like one, the tail… He opened his mouth trying to find the words to ask the question, but it wouldn’t come out the way he wanted. He was realizing, much to his chagrin that the young lady before him, if she could be called that given her manners. Was… more likely than not, Petra.
“I ah, are, are you…Petra?” He managed sounding perhaps a little strangled as he gave a little bow to be polite. “I…” he started to say something more, trying to find the right words but it all sounded very foolish when they ran through his mind, in the end he lifted his hands and showed her the stone totem with furrowed brow. “They, said I should find Petra.”
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Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2013 12:27 am
She looks at the totem silently, all her attention on it rather than the person holding it, and Spokelse rises, shaking off the road dust and nosing her way closer. She, too, examines the totem, leaning past Petra's elbow as if to sniff at it. "I," she says finally, "ain't got s**t to tell you." Spokelse's head whips around sharply to deliver a glare, and sulkily, the girl modifies her position: "Well, not much, anyway. What do you want?" endejester SORRY I AM A FAILURE D: I finally tagged tho
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Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2013 6:19 am
His gaze flicked between the deer, who just glowered at the girl, and the young lady who was now sulking about it. “I…er…” he replied with something less than gentlemanly dignity. As though his life could become that much stranger really, he thought wryly.
“They said you’d be the best person to ask about…these.” He said and glanced again at the deer who’d snuffed at his small figurine. “There was a tree, and…” He faltered watching for any expressions on her face that might indicate she was about to dismiss him again. Lord was she even his own age? Surely she must be younger… what happened to venerable wise women?
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Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2013 10:38 am
"Well how much of the old stories do you know?" she asks. "It'll turn into a fawn. And then you'll have a deer. And you can sort of... talk with it, in your head." She shifts uncomfortably in her seat and eyes Spokelse sideways as she adds: "and eventually maybe just normal talk to it too."
She glances at his hand and looks away, then reaches into a pocket at her side for a lump of chewing tobacco, which she stows in her jaw. When she resumes talking it gives her the air of an old man.
"Don't you know any of the old stories at all?"
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