L’lorne
stuck her head into the hut and glanced around the half lighted darkness. No one.
With a nod of approval she slipped in and headed right for the basket
that contained her few possessions. Of
prime concern was the large animal hide bag that sat on top, the one she was
about to fill.
In went the
necklace her father had given her, made of sparkling stones and shells from
some land where the river met an even greater body of water she had only ever
heard stories of. Next came the blanket
she and her mother had constructed together, a great piece of fabric decorated
with vibrant symbols of protection and luck.
An extra pair of sandals, her secret stash of sweet rock that she
smuggled from the last harvest festival, a small doll made of wood and fabric
that she had since she was a kid, all went into the bag.
"Not
even going to say good bye?" Her
mother's voice surprised her, and the bag fell in a lump to the floor. L’lorne turned to face her, and exposed the
pendant she had won, the twisted T.
"You're going with him, aren't you?" L’lorne couldn't even nod. Shame suddenly fell on her, trying to force
her eyes down to the ground.
"He said
he would teach me," she finally choked out.
"About
what? What could he teach you that you
cannot learn here?"
"The
stars," L’lorne said hesitantly.
"He promised to teach me about the stars."
Her mother
stepped toward her and L’lorne winced in expectance of a slap. Instead, she was embraced in a hug. "You're too much like I was at your
age." Her voice softened to almost
a whisper. "I would have gone too,
if I had been given a chance. I always
loved to bathe in the light of the stars."
"Mother."
"There
is still so much you have to learn from me.
Things that at your age I didn't even realize I had to learn, things you
haven't even thought of yet." She
moved her daughter to look her right in the face. "How to be a wife, how to be a mother,
dozens of others, and I want to teach them to you so bad so you can know all
the feelings I am feeling now."
"If I
don't go," L’lorne finally gathered the courage to say. "Then that's all I'll ever learn. I'll never know any more."
"Is
that so bad?" L’lorne couldn't
answer, she couldn't be angry either, and fell onto her mother's chest. "If you go, you'll learn those lessons
alone, I won't be there to help you."
"I
know."
"Your
father won't be happy. Your brothers
won't be happy either."
"I
want to learn about the stars."
Lcorn
Denofors lightly pushed her daughter back and smiled into her eyes. "You can only go if you promise to come
back and see me and tell me all you learned."
L’lorne
smiled. "I promise, I
promise."
---------
Deborah had
very little with her, at least as far as L’lorne had seen so far. There was a photograph of her and her mother,
kept in the inside chest pocket, right next to the girl's heart. In one of the covered pockets was a clutch of
credit chips, maybe 30 worth, and a lighter, which seemed a touch out of
place. A half eaten bag of potato chips
and a candy bar was in the other pocket, and one glove sat in each of the hand
pockets of the coat.
How much
had she left behind? She had said she
had gathered quite a few things before leaving the only home she really ever
knew, but she didn't insist on returning for them as L’lorne had expected she
would. Now, as the sun set along the
quiet stretch of road some 28 miles away from where they had started, going
back for them would be quite impossible.
Well, as far as Deborah was concerned anyway.
A sign they
passed was worn, but read that they had finally entered a new county, and
according to the map, there was a town only a couple miles more away. It would take maybe a half hour of walking at
most, just enough time to check into a local motel for the night.
L’lorne
looked back at the girl, and decided that it was impossible. Deborah was mentally exhausted, but not from
the walk, just everything leading up to it was enough to wear out even the most
active soul. She wouldn't admit it,
though, that wasn't the kind of person she was, and if it were left to simply
that, she would insist that they continue.
But she
didn't know how tired she really was, how much her body had worn out in the
last seven hours. The girl was
reasonably fit, for her age and economic bracket, as well as her lifestyle, yet
there was no way she could make such a trip on her own, she'd never survive it. L’lorne had to massage the leg muscles to
keep them going, adjust the amount of oxygen flowing through her blood, and her
heart rate, so that she could simply keep up.
Lactic acid had to be drawn out carefully, so just enough burn could
still be felt, but wouldn't overwhelm and exhaust Deborah, while the rest of
the body had to be told not to over react to, well, everything that was
happening. Doing all this while making
it almost invisible to Deborah's ever watchful eyes had been difficult, and
spoiling it now with a sharp boost to her system just to get her an extra
couple of miles wasn't worth the effort.
"We
should stop," L’lorne said aloud.
Deborah
glanced around at fields and road and grunted.
"Yeah, where?"
"Over
there." A large tree, unremarkable
by all accounts, and a cluster of three, car sized rocks stood only a couple of
hundred meters away, plenty close enough to make it.
"Hope
you brought blankets, it gets pretty cold at night." L’lorne only smiled. They'd be plenty warm enough. A warm front had, spontaneously, as far as
meteorologists were concerned, settled of the entire region. To help it out, a thick stream of clouds, far
too weak to carry any serious rain, but thick enough to trap heat at the
surface had come in along with the front.
Deborah
settled down against one of the rocks with a huff. L’lorne spent a few moments gathering dried
sticks and piling them nearby. As she
worked, she watched Deborah rub her tired limbs and desperately try to keep
from actually falling asleep. "You
know," L’lorne dropped another pile of sticks and began to organize them
into a proper pile for burning.
"You can just go to sleep, I won't hold it against you."
"I'm
fine," Deborah lied, a yawn punctuating her fib.
L’lorne
said nothing. She grabbed one of the
larger, flatter sticks, almost a limb in size, and placed a longer one at a
right angle on it and began to drill the longer one into it with her bare hand,
while the other hand gathered dried leaves and grass around it.
"What
are you doing?"
"Starting
a fire." The smoke began to rise up
from the pile, and suddenly a sharp light sprung up. With a push, the now burning leaves slipped
under the pile of sticks and began to generate a nice, warming fire.
"Never
seen anyone do that before."
L’lorne
smiled. "I always used to start
fires like this. Only way I could when I
was a kid."
"I use
a lighter." Deborah dug into her
pocket and tossed it to L’lorne who caught it with ease. She turned the silver, refillable lighter in
her hand, feeling the long, narrow groves that had been carved into it long
after it had been originally manufactured.
"Nice. Your mothers?"
"Sort
of." Deborah placed one hand out
and tested the heat of the fire before bringing the other in to join it. "She always left it in her coat, using
only when she wore it. I think,"
she paused, looking to check her own thoughts, then letting them out
anyway. "I think it belonged to my
father."
"Really?" L’lorne scanned the metal casing looking for
a few cells that might have survived the years.
It was habit anymore.
"Once,
when she was using it, I asked her about dad, and she got this real sad look in
her eyes and just stared at it, like she was remembering something. Then she changed the subject." Her hand flipped over and requested the
lighter's return. L’lorne obliged. There was no leftover genetic material that
couldn't be traced to Deborah or her mother.
It wouldn't take much to find the girl's father, but to what end? Best case, he would be in the same boat as
the mother, worse case. . .
No, Ritch
'arrd wouldn't have. Some random woman,
relatively uneducated, powerless? Not
his type. He certainly wouldn't have
sent people to grab her off the street if he had, he could have just
asked. In any case, Deborah would have
been far more interesting than her mother.
"Something
wrong?"
"Oh,
no, I was just remembering someone I loved once. You just reminded me of him."
Another
yawn. "Really? He leave you too?"
"Sort
of. Actually, I'm out looking for
him. He's around somewhere, and I'd like
to see him again." L’lorne
considered continuing, but the girl had already fallen asleep. Good, no sense going into too many details,
especially since L’lorne herself was a bit short of them as well. Besides, if she knew Deborah as well as she
thought she did, there would be more questions tomorrow.
---------
Questions
1. What kind of person is Lcorn Llorne? What does she look like (in your mind)?
2. What kind of person is the Deborah Ignigus? What does she look like (in your mind)?
3. Does the setting seem fitting? Would you like to know more?
4. I didn't write this story with chapters in mind. If I did, does this seem a good place to begin a chapter?
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