Postcards From the Past

Writers: Leigh M-F.
Date Posted: 31st December 2015

Characters: A'kua
Description: Before he meets Eionen, A'kua finally explains a few things to Zeiranth.
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 3, day 23 of Turn 8
Notes: Mentioned: NPCs Eionen, Shastia, Falior, Bailan and Gordione; Ninaine,
Jessmyr and Ilyssia (indirectly), Nokala, Genna.

It was a few minutes into evening free time. He would have to go see Eionen
soon. A'kua was sitting on his cot, rubbing his shaking hands and seeking
some sort of calm, but all he could find was ice within him. Maybe he
should just go with the ice; if it got him through this, he would take it.

Zeiranth was on his couch, watching his chosen and twitching his head from
side to side. The weyrling finally noticed the fidgeting and caught
Zeiranth's chin, turning the dragonet's head toward him. "What is it?"

The little bronze made a gesture like he was trying to bite his lower lip,
but his mouth wasn't flexible enough for that. }:I know I said you should
listen to that man if it makes him go away,:{ he finally said, }:but maybe
it was a bad idea. You're still all spinny inside.:{

"I am."

}:Are you sure you don't want me in the room with you?:{

"I'm sure. He doesn't deserve to see you."

Zeiranth's eyes whirled, shifting shades of concern. }:Why do you hate him
so much? Is he from that place you don't like to think about?:{

A'kua shook his head. "No."

}:But if he's your sire, why do you hate him?:{

"I'll tell you when-"

}:Don't say you'll tell me when I'm older. I'm older _now_ and I want to
know _now_,:{ the baby bronze insisted. }:I'm your dragon and you're my
partner. You're supposed to trust me even if I don't understand.:{

The tall redhead was silent. His hands shook harder until he laced his
fingers together to make them stop. "It's a long story."

}:Then make it shorter.:{

A'kua finally sighed. **You came into this world happy. I came into it
covered in blood because I was a big infant,** he thought, slowly and
painfully. **At first I was fine. I thought nothin' was wrong with the hold
I grew up in.** He remembered grapes and hops, corn and pottery, ovines,
caprines, porcines and a few milchbeasts, herdbeasts, and dray beasts. He
remembered people tilling the fields and working the wheels, carding hair
and wool to spin thread.

**The older I got, the more I noticed things weren't all right. The hold
harper would slap my hands if he thought I was daydreamin' or if he thought
my handwriting was too messy. When I picked one of the three gitars
available because I wanted to learn how to play when I was ten, he looked
at me like he wished I'd never been born.**

He could still remember how Falior's eyes had burned with disgust, but he
had come to every lesson because he wanted to learn, and then because he
wanted to make Falior angry before the harper told him there would be no
more lessons.

**Mothers told their sons to not be bad like me; fathers told their
daughters not to talk to me. Pregnant women or women with newborns would
stay away from me, as if I was dangerous. Dirty looks were thrown at my
mother whenever she had to leave the cottage to get somethin' or drop off
what little quiltin' and weavin' she was allowed to do. My own grandsire
acted as though he couldn't stand me. I asked Ma why we were hated, and she
said she had flown with a man who wasn't supposed to be her mate. But she
didn't tell me who her mate was meant to be.

**The boys started shoutin' names at me from across the path. One day I
yelled somethin' worse.** That had lead to his first brawl at twelve Turns
old. He had literally limped home with a bloody nose, bruised knuckles, and
several pulled muscles. Shastia had patched him up and asked him not to do
something so foolish again.

He hadn't listened.

**Ma fought with her pa a lot. She drank more and more.** Wineskins. So
many wineskins. He still didn't know how she had gotten them, and he
probably didn't want to, come to think of it. **I just kept gettin' angrier
and angrier. A lot of the boys stopped pickin' on me because I hurt them so
badly, but some persisted.** He couldn't really remember their names now.
**The headaches you worried about were worse back then. It got hard to
sleep or eat sometimes. I kept askin' Ma to leave with me on a trader
caravan, but she finally told me to stop. So I did.**

A'kua looked down at the floor, remembering wavy black hair and a smug but
beautiful smile. **Some of the only things that made me happy were takin'
the gitar from the harper's cottage and dreamin' out loud while I sang, and
this girl I knew. I thought she liked me, and I cared about her. We sort of
flew together a few times before I asked her to be my mate, but she laughed
and said-** He paused. **She rejected me, but I was so lonely and angry
that I kept goin' back to her, even though I'd stopped carin'.

**Then Ma died. I was sad, but also relieved: I was free. I didn't have to
be the parent when she should've been. I ran away, and wound up here at
Dragonsfall. But I was still so hurt from everythin' I'd gone through. I
couldn't make friends unless they were women, or they were someone I could
hurt if I had to. Even when I learned how to trust, to stop bein' so
paranoid and accept these people really did care for me, it was still hard
to remember I was safe and I could relax. Sometimes it's still hard. But I
put it all behind me. I found some healin', and even a mate I'll love
forever, so I was finally happy.**

He cracked his knuckles. **But that man, the one my mother flew with, is
here, and I'm angry again. You were right to tell me I should listen in
order to make him go away, Zei. I'm not happy, but if it works, I'll be
glad to see him leave.**

Zeiranth was quiet for several minutes as he tried to process all the
information he had been given. }:Do you think you could forgive him, like
Nokala said you should?:{

"_Never._" The word was dark, stony, and dripping with poison.

Zeiranth laid his head in A'kua's lap. }:I love you,:{ was all he said.

The weyrling scratched around his headknobs. **I love you too, Zei, and I'm
goin' to need you more than ever. You don't have to listen, or watch, or
anythin' that might make you uncomfortable, but I do need you.**

}:Then I'll be in your mind like you're in mine.:{

"Thank you."

A'kua stood. Zeiranth let him. And the weyrling left, walking to wait
outside the agreed-upon classroom for Genna.

Each step seemed to help encase his heart in another layer of ice, and that
was fine by him.

Last updated on the January 1st 2016

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Postcards From the Past