History
A look into the short, but distant past
She clambered free of the mud and reeds and let herself sink down to the slick grass. Her breath came in harsh, labored gasps as muscles protested further use with painful fire. Her children squirmed free of her arms, young son and daughter toddling forward...but not far.
The mother remained on her knees, held tilted backwards so that her eyes stared upwards into that great endless blue. Her body ached, and the dirt of the earthen floor rubbed into the raw flesh of her legs with a fury. The wounds were too young to have healed yet, and even so, the trauma she'd just went through was enough to undue even the best stitcher's work. It didn't matter, though, she knew defeat.
It was a sad day when the hunter understood what it was to be the hunted.
Death would be merciful, at least. They cared nothing for torture. There would be but a single strike, for her, and then her children. But she'd not let them get her precious babes so long as there was life within her. They, those scrawny, battered creatures, were her everything. It was for them that she fled, and for them she would die, so that they would be spared a far worse fate.
There was no bitterness for her pursuers, yet that did not make her any less desperate.
A shift in the breeze, so faint as to be barely noticeable to most, alerted her to the presence of another. Snapping her head 'round, the mother scrabbled for her children, scooping them up in arms that were still laced with muscle despite the weakness she felt. It was as if it was all she could do to shield them from the world and its harsh realities. Once more in her grasp, the youngest of the two whimpered.
Amber-colored eyes narrowed as the intruder made himself known. Stepping cautiously out into view, she and he did no more than merely stare at one another for a time. “End it, then,” the mother at last said. Her voice was dry and rasping.
“Them, too?” He asked, eyes flickering to where her two children clung to her torso in mute horror. “I thought you might try to strike a deal. Mothers will always try to bargain for the lives of their children.”
“Your kind never abide by them.” She answered with a snarl. Her lips, which had at one point and time been full and beautiful, were now cracked and bleeding. They peeled back over her teeth to reveal vicious, stained canines.
“No. But mothers the world over are the same.” He seemed amused by her defiance, a faint smile taking up residence upon his chilly features. They should not have been that way. They should have felt warm and...and grandfatherly. The man was unassuming enough, dressed in simple finery.
“I won't act out this play for you. Be done with it. Quickly.” Her heart twisted with terror and abject sorrow. She could feel their warmth against her sweat-soaked flesh, and almost taste their fear. They were only babes...
The female could not read his expression in the sun's dying light, only that it was curiously...empty.
When he at last spoke again, his words shocked her. “Your death is not what brought me here.” A hand had reached up to stroke thoughtfully at his great white beard, as though even he were contemplating the weight of his words. Then he was striding towards her, glacial eyes passing through her very core as he knelt. A hand came to rest upon the golden-topped crown of her son. It could almost have been a tender scene to an onlooker, if it only wasn't for the air of ownership that came along with it. They were not living, breathing beings in his mind's eye. Just tools.
“I've come to make a deal,” looking towards her children as he said so.
Breath catching, the Kelvic mother looked up into the creature's eyes, and saw nothing of mockery. Her gaze then dropped, for the briefest of moments, towards her young son and daughter.
She nodded.
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A level plain stretched out before him, ending with a ridge about a league or so distant. Although he could not see it, the bearded fellow knew that it was there the land reached out to kiss the sea. In the crook of one arm he held the boy, which he judged to be no more than a few months old. The young girl, whose hand he held gently as they walked, was the same age, but he could never really be sure. Neither of the children seemed entirely aware, and it had been obvious to him that neither had understood when their mother hugged them goodbye.
Their long ordeal in trying to escape had put them both into shock, and there could be no doubt that witnessing the gruesome death of their father had only made things worse. With a sense of passing curiosity, he wondered if these two would grow up wearing these scars, or if they were too young to even make sense of it all.
“Do you see what lies ahead, little one?” He asked of the girl. Luminous, round eyes stared forward. After a moment, she gave the tiniest of nods.
“Good,” he said with a tug at his beard. “That is where you must go. Watch after your brother now. It is time for you to walk these paths alone.”
