Good as any, Better than most

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Mine Chapter 3, part two

She knew then that she was fainting.

Sound returned first, lightly flowing, then louder.  A cacophony of indescribable clashing noise assaulted her pre-consciousness, and then her conscious thought.  Individual sounds floated out of the din, sounds that while recognizable, didn’t belong in the chorus.  A blacksmith’s hammer ringing over cold iron, the cook humming the notes she always did while making bread, a dog growling through a haunch of meat, sounds that certainly existed in the demnse, yet none should be with the others.  Thousands of sounds she recognized, her mind slowly picking out the recognizable from the unknown.  Turning her head, she recognized the change, realized that this was no hallucination, she was hearing them, actually hearing things from a radius around her.  The volume and focused changed as she moved her head, yet she could recognize and correlate the sound, and the location it should be.  The smithy, a mile from the stables where she had fallen.  The keep’s kitchen, 400 meters to her right.  Her brother Stabil and his wife, above the kitchen 3 floors, talking in hushed tones about an heir.

As the minutes passed, her mind took in the sounds, cataloging, remembering, placing, blocking the unknown.  The din eased, became familiar.  The strident disharmony sorting itself into a recognizable stratum, as her mind accustomed itself with the harmony of life turning around her. 

Finally, she opened her eyes.  She was again briefly overwhelmed by the input, the clarity and distance which she was now seeing.  Perhaps her brain had adjusted to the new sensory overload, for she only took a few seconds to set the sights to order.  The blades of grass, serrated edges directly in front her.  Beyond them, the keep, the coarse texture of its external stonework apparent to her now, something she’d never noticed before.  The colors took the longest to resolve, turning from a motley disarray of shades, turning again to a harmony of light.  Differences in shades were now apparent to her, and her mind turned itself to sorting the overload into something familiar.  Less than a minute had passed this time, yet she was able to comprehend what she was seeing easily now.  The world had taken on a clarity. 

The breeze blew on her, rubbing her face with those same blades of grass.  Smells and sensations doubly assaulted her, but now her brain had its defense.  It only took seconds for those to right themselves, to attune to this new way of being.  She licked her lips, and could taste the very air in the breeze.  No time at all was required for her mind to catalog out the bouquet, the individual flavors drifting in the breeze.

She sat up.  She could still see Humphrey laying where he had fallen.  Her heart tore then, knowing that she had caused his death.  The assault on her senses brought with it the realization that she was something different than what she’d been when she woke this morning.  She could feel the strength of her limbs and she knew that she had lifted the horse, a 300 stone bulk of flesh, with no more effort than she lifted her fork.  In her shock, she had dropped the gelding, and Humphrey had just been in the way.

Tears flowed freely down her cheeks then.  Humphrey, the stickman busybody that had taught her to count, to read, to cipher was gone.  He’d taught her the history of the land, how to act formally and informally, and basically everything else parents would teach their children.  He had been like a mother and father to her, in ways even closer than her real father.  She rushed to his side, the distance again disappearing in a fraction of a second.  This time though, her body was ready, and more importantly, so was her mind.  No motion sickness reared its head, only the mourning for a loss so deep it quickly overshadowed any delight in newfound abilities.

The farrier found her there, holding Humphrey’s body hours later, when their absence on stead was noticed.  She was out of tears, out of sound, rocking back and forth.

Monday, January 19, 2009

Mine Chapter 3, Part one

The wind blew cold on the upswept cliff walls.

Onieda looked down into the valley, taking in the majestic views.  This morning she had broken her fast with her family.  This afternoon, she was alone.  More than alone, she knew she was different than anyone.  Her father looked upon her with some sort of reverence broking on fanatical, not with the loving gaze of patriarch.  Her once loved brothers disavowed her name.  The friends, the servants, to the one had lost their friendly demeanor, treating her with a coldness she’d never witnessed.

And why?  Why had everything in her life turned on its side.  Everything in her seeming charmed life had changed into something out of a story.  Bereft of any warmth, simply because she…

What?

What had occurred?  She’d eaten her morning meal, like she had for every day in memory.  Yes, it was her birthday, but there’d been 17 before.  After the food, she was supposed to have gone on a ride with the estates chamberlain, one of the duties she performed for her father.  Inventorying the harvest, the growth.  Tending to the needs of the workers. 

Yet, when she had grabbed hold of the pommel, and pulled to vault herself into the saddle, just as she’d done thousands of times before, it happened.  Instead of her feet leaving the ground, the horse screamed and was suddenly sideways, held up only by the cinch around it, and her hand on the horn.

An instant of confusion, and fear laced her every thought.  She let go the pommel, and the horse fell.  It lay for an instant, and then bolted.  Bolted over the chamberlain.  A slight man, he was crushed to death instantly beneath the strider’s hooves.  She took a hurried step to lend aid to the bloody corpse, not knowing him already dead, and found herself across the field. 

Again, the moment of fear, the confusion, and another feeling raced through her.  This time…sickness, both physical and mental played across her.  Slowly she turned to look back to where she had been standing a second earlier.  The sickness felt like she had first felt riding in the manor carriage, the movement inside not matching the movement outside the small windows.  The mental pains resulting from a complete lack of comprehension, “how is this happening?”

She could clearly see the chamberlain laying.  Humphrey.  From this distance, he should look like a tattered pile of cloth, yet she could easily see every line, every detail.  The trickle of ocher running from the corner of his mouth, and eye.  The caved in appearance of his chest.  The lack of and motion.  She knew then that he was dead.

She knew then that she was fainting.