Saturday, August 22, 2009
Sorry
I've been sick for like three weeks so I'm going to have to promise the next chapter next week. I'm sorry. Thanks for understanding.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Dragon's Apprentice (10)
Part 10
Lynn knew that something was wrong as soon as the bidding started on the first girl and the sounds of the auction began. There were far too many voices and the few glimpses she got as the curtain parted only confirmed her worst fears. This was one of those years where half the bloody world turned out for the auction. Slavers, rich men looking for help for their impossibly large mansions, and who knew who else now stood beyond that curtain. Hundreds, possibly a thousand or more, people had gathered and most of them wouldn’t know her. She was going to sell! She was going to get taken away!
Lynn looked around franticly as reality sank in. She knew she was pretty enough to sell…to anyone who didn’t know the bite of her personality, at any rate. With so many strangers she was bound to go as soon as she stepped out on that stage, but by this point there was no longer any hope of running. There had been girls who had tried to run in the past, a few who had even made it, so careful guards of married village men were now posted all over the place, stoic and unmoved by the tears of many of the other girls lined up behind her. It was too late to get away.
Abruptly rough hands gripped her shoulders and shoved her, all dignity aside, out through the curtain. She’d been so busy panicking that she hadn’t heard her name called. She spun, fully intending to run, only to see her father standing just out of sight of the crowd behind the curtain, staring at her with intense blue-gray eyes and it occurred to her that her parents were counting on her. She didn’t know what they were counting on her for, but they were counting on her and, as there was apparently no escape, the least she could do was face her fate with pride.
Slowly she turned to face the crowd and froze again. There were more people clustered about the stage then she’d ever seen in one place in her life, almost all of them talking, one over the other. The shear noise was astounding, the volume was massive and she had to wonder how anyone heard anything. Even as she stood there the auction continued, people signaling for the next highest bid as the town magistrate called out with more voice then she’d ever heard him use so fast she couldn’t understand him.
She shivered, but still stood as straight as she could and walked over to stand center stage where she gazed coldly out over the clusters of people. She tried to gather her best ice queen stare and felt that she managed fairly well until she spotted him.
He stood at least a head above the others around him in a space that had been cleared for him. In one hand he clutched the reigns of a golden horse with white mane. The horse and man both stared at her, the man with an intensity that was almost frightening. He was silent within the throng, unmoving, an island in a sea of human bodies, just listening to several other bid on her, but just as it seemed a man dressed in leather and chains was about to win the bid he put in a bid that had caused a thick silence to descend over the crowd like a blanket of snow on a winter night. All heads turned to stare at him. Even Lynn had never heard such a sum of money come from a human mouth. A dragon’s, yes, but never a human.
She stared at him with the rest of the town until the sound of a gavel pounding broke the silence.
“Sold!” The town magistrate bellowed and almost everyone jumped.
Lynn swallowed hard and thought again of running, but even as she thought it she spotted the men coming to collect her and guide her to her new husband who was already being ushered off to sign papers. Before they could reach her, though, she turned on her own and headed for the steps that led over to the coral where those that had made purchases were taken to sign all of the correct paperwork. It had been a horse coral, one of the small ones used for training colts, but now it had several old, battered desks pushed close to the fencing, each with a man seated behind it. The steps to the stage led directly down into it and she went willingly, proudly, to stand at the coral’s center, not looking at anyone even though her mother drifted within her line of sight, tears streaming down her face.
Lynn knew that something was wrong as soon as the bidding started on the first girl and the sounds of the auction began. There were far too many voices and the few glimpses she got as the curtain parted only confirmed her worst fears. This was one of those years where half the bloody world turned out for the auction. Slavers, rich men looking for help for their impossibly large mansions, and who knew who else now stood beyond that curtain. Hundreds, possibly a thousand or more, people had gathered and most of them wouldn’t know her. She was going to sell! She was going to get taken away!
Lynn looked around franticly as reality sank in. She knew she was pretty enough to sell…to anyone who didn’t know the bite of her personality, at any rate. With so many strangers she was bound to go as soon as she stepped out on that stage, but by this point there was no longer any hope of running. There had been girls who had tried to run in the past, a few who had even made it, so careful guards of married village men were now posted all over the place, stoic and unmoved by the tears of many of the other girls lined up behind her. It was too late to get away.
Abruptly rough hands gripped her shoulders and shoved her, all dignity aside, out through the curtain. She’d been so busy panicking that she hadn’t heard her name called. She spun, fully intending to run, only to see her father standing just out of sight of the crowd behind the curtain, staring at her with intense blue-gray eyes and it occurred to her that her parents were counting on her. She didn’t know what they were counting on her for, but they were counting on her and, as there was apparently no escape, the least she could do was face her fate with pride.
Slowly she turned to face the crowd and froze again. There were more people clustered about the stage then she’d ever seen in one place in her life, almost all of them talking, one over the other. The shear noise was astounding, the volume was massive and she had to wonder how anyone heard anything. Even as she stood there the auction continued, people signaling for the next highest bid as the town magistrate called out with more voice then she’d ever heard him use so fast she couldn’t understand him.
She shivered, but still stood as straight as she could and walked over to stand center stage where she gazed coldly out over the clusters of people. She tried to gather her best ice queen stare and felt that she managed fairly well until she spotted him.
He stood at least a head above the others around him in a space that had been cleared for him. In one hand he clutched the reigns of a golden horse with white mane. The horse and man both stared at her, the man with an intensity that was almost frightening. He was silent within the throng, unmoving, an island in a sea of human bodies, just listening to several other bid on her, but just as it seemed a man dressed in leather and chains was about to win the bid he put in a bid that had caused a thick silence to descend over the crowd like a blanket of snow on a winter night. All heads turned to stare at him. Even Lynn had never heard such a sum of money come from a human mouth. A dragon’s, yes, but never a human.
She stared at him with the rest of the town until the sound of a gavel pounding broke the silence.
“Sold!” The town magistrate bellowed and almost everyone jumped.
Lynn swallowed hard and thought again of running, but even as she thought it she spotted the men coming to collect her and guide her to her new husband who was already being ushered off to sign papers. Before they could reach her, though, she turned on her own and headed for the steps that led over to the coral where those that had made purchases were taken to sign all of the correct paperwork. It had been a horse coral, one of the small ones used for training colts, but now it had several old, battered desks pushed close to the fencing, each with a man seated behind it. The steps to the stage led directly down into it and she went willingly, proudly, to stand at the coral’s center, not looking at anyone even though her mother drifted within her line of sight, tears streaming down her face.
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Dragon's Apprentice
For those of you that check, I'm sorry it's late. It's been one of those weeks. Thanks for your patients.
Part Nine
He pushed through the crowd, inserting elbows into soft midsections where necessary, with three horses in tow. Occasionally he would pause and put one foot in the stirrup of his own horse’s saddle and he would pull himself up to look out over the crowd.
His master was well visible from this vantage point, standing heads above those gathered around him, his long, almost white, blonde hair catching the sunlight and throwing it back. The man stood straight and noble, his eyes fixed on the crude stage that had been erected for the sole use of the barbaric auction his master had gone ahead of him to reach. Perched upon his master’s nose was a strange contraption of brown glass cut into neat little ovals and held before his eyes with delicate silver straps and bands. Skin so white it could have been cut marble made him stand out even worse then his fine dress, odd eye pieces, his master called them ‘glasses’, and waist length, almost white hair, braided down his back.
Estin shook his head to himself, hopped down from this latest move to gain his bearings and elbowed a particularly heavy set man in worn farmers cloths in the ribs and tugged the three reluctant horses behind him as he continued to make his way to where his master stood.
“You just had to center yourself in the crowd, didn’t you?” Estin asked as he at last made it into the five foot space the crowd had left around his master’s tall, lean form. That beautiful, male face turned slowly toward him, though with those infernal - what were they?- glasses it was impossible for Estin to tell if he was actually looking at him.
His master grinned. “I like being the center of attention,” His master said with his usual humor before he turned to look back at the stage. “Did you bring my horse?” He asked though Estin was sure that he had looked.
Estin rolled his eyes. “No. I left the ornery creature about one hundred miles down the road and traded him for a mule. Of course I have him. Do I look stupid to you? No, wait, don’t answer that,” He said and looked away as his master’s shoulder’s shook with silent laughter.
“So…why did I need to lug, not only your horse, but an extra all this way to this boon dock town stuffed in the middle of the gods only know where? Don’t tell me that you actually plan to buy one of these poor unfortunate backward women,” Estin said and preformed the same trick he had used to spot his master through the crowd to get a look at the stage. Sometimes he hated being shorter than the average woman. Other times he didn’t care.
His master turned to look at him and one pail brow arched above the glasses. “You look ridiculous,” His master said in his usual way.
Estin snorted. “I’ll chop you off at the hips and we’ll see if you fair any better for seeing over a crowd of people this big,” He said.
Again his master’s shoulders shook in silent laughter. Estin just ignored him.
“So, are you going to buy one of these poor souls?” Estin asked again.
His master kicked two sets of saddle bags at his feet. “The money’s in here,” He said, “ Now hush. I need to listen for the right name.”
“So, we’re here for someone specific? Does she know we’re coming?” Estin asked.
“Shh!” His master shushed him, the sound somehow half growl.
Estin frowned but held the rest of his comments to himself as a small, angry looking man in purple robes wandered, almost as if half lost, out onto the stage, a gavel clutched in one hand as if he planned to fight the congregation with it. For a moment he faced the crowd and shifted his weight from foot to foot in a nervous, small kind of way, and hopped up and down a couple of times, the gavel lifting higher as if he were about to begin to preach, before, just as suddenly, he turned and shuffled, his shoulders hunched so far forward it looked as if he were trying to disappear, to the podium. Slowly he climbed up the small step stool placed behind it so that he was at least level with the old, wooden podium and faced the crowd again. The look on his face was almost furious now and when he pounded the gavel down in a call for silence Estin was sure that he was going to break it.
With a grumble and a sigh, sure that everyone on the planet was trying to get in his way, Estin pushed a strand of brown hair that had escaped his warrior’s tail out of his face and looked up at his ever patient horse who looked back at him with calm, brown eyes. With another sigh Estin clambered up the animal’s back to drape himself across the saddle. After all, he didn’t want to stand out too much, but he still wanted to see.
The old man behind the podium glared at him briefly, as if Estin cared what some old grump thought of him, before he banged the gavel one last time and began to drone on about something about witches and evil and young women tempted into the arms of the devil.
Estin wished he’d just get on with it and hoped that the girl his master wanted wouldn’t be too far back in the line. He didn’t know how long he could stay comfortable draped across the saddle like so much luggage before he began to loose circulation in necessary limbs.
At long last, after a long dissertation on who knew what - Estin tuned it out less then half way through- the old man banged the gavel one last time and called the name of the first girl.
Part Nine
He pushed through the crowd, inserting elbows into soft midsections where necessary, with three horses in tow. Occasionally he would pause and put one foot in the stirrup of his own horse’s saddle and he would pull himself up to look out over the crowd.
His master was well visible from this vantage point, standing heads above those gathered around him, his long, almost white, blonde hair catching the sunlight and throwing it back. The man stood straight and noble, his eyes fixed on the crude stage that had been erected for the sole use of the barbaric auction his master had gone ahead of him to reach. Perched upon his master’s nose was a strange contraption of brown glass cut into neat little ovals and held before his eyes with delicate silver straps and bands. Skin so white it could have been cut marble made him stand out even worse then his fine dress, odd eye pieces, his master called them ‘glasses’, and waist length, almost white hair, braided down his back.
Estin shook his head to himself, hopped down from this latest move to gain his bearings and elbowed a particularly heavy set man in worn farmers cloths in the ribs and tugged the three reluctant horses behind him as he continued to make his way to where his master stood.
“You just had to center yourself in the crowd, didn’t you?” Estin asked as he at last made it into the five foot space the crowd had left around his master’s tall, lean form. That beautiful, male face turned slowly toward him, though with those infernal - what were they?- glasses it was impossible for Estin to tell if he was actually looking at him.
His master grinned. “I like being the center of attention,” His master said with his usual humor before he turned to look back at the stage. “Did you bring my horse?” He asked though Estin was sure that he had looked.
Estin rolled his eyes. “No. I left the ornery creature about one hundred miles down the road and traded him for a mule. Of course I have him. Do I look stupid to you? No, wait, don’t answer that,” He said and looked away as his master’s shoulder’s shook with silent laughter.
“So…why did I need to lug, not only your horse, but an extra all this way to this boon dock town stuffed in the middle of the gods only know where? Don’t tell me that you actually plan to buy one of these poor unfortunate backward women,” Estin said and preformed the same trick he had used to spot his master through the crowd to get a look at the stage. Sometimes he hated being shorter than the average woman. Other times he didn’t care.
His master turned to look at him and one pail brow arched above the glasses. “You look ridiculous,” His master said in his usual way.
Estin snorted. “I’ll chop you off at the hips and we’ll see if you fair any better for seeing over a crowd of people this big,” He said.
Again his master’s shoulders shook in silent laughter. Estin just ignored him.
“So, are you going to buy one of these poor souls?” Estin asked again.
His master kicked two sets of saddle bags at his feet. “The money’s in here,” He said, “ Now hush. I need to listen for the right name.”
“So, we’re here for someone specific? Does she know we’re coming?” Estin asked.
“Shh!” His master shushed him, the sound somehow half growl.
Estin frowned but held the rest of his comments to himself as a small, angry looking man in purple robes wandered, almost as if half lost, out onto the stage, a gavel clutched in one hand as if he planned to fight the congregation with it. For a moment he faced the crowd and shifted his weight from foot to foot in a nervous, small kind of way, and hopped up and down a couple of times, the gavel lifting higher as if he were about to begin to preach, before, just as suddenly, he turned and shuffled, his shoulders hunched so far forward it looked as if he were trying to disappear, to the podium. Slowly he climbed up the small step stool placed behind it so that he was at least level with the old, wooden podium and faced the crowd again. The look on his face was almost furious now and when he pounded the gavel down in a call for silence Estin was sure that he was going to break it.
With a grumble and a sigh, sure that everyone on the planet was trying to get in his way, Estin pushed a strand of brown hair that had escaped his warrior’s tail out of his face and looked up at his ever patient horse who looked back at him with calm, brown eyes. With another sigh Estin clambered up the animal’s back to drape himself across the saddle. After all, he didn’t want to stand out too much, but he still wanted to see.
The old man behind the podium glared at him briefly, as if Estin cared what some old grump thought of him, before he banged the gavel one last time and began to drone on about something about witches and evil and young women tempted into the arms of the devil.
Estin wished he’d just get on with it and hoped that the girl his master wanted wouldn’t be too far back in the line. He didn’t know how long he could stay comfortable draped across the saddle like so much luggage before he began to loose circulation in necessary limbs.
At long last, after a long dissertation on who knew what - Estin tuned it out less then half way through- the old man banged the gavel one last time and called the name of the first girl.
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