A/N: Something that I made up around Christmas time, at the start of the school holidays. Spending my time lounging around the house I thought I better be productive, or something….. I hope you like it, suggestions are welcome, any ideas if the story is going downhill too are also gladly accepted! AND I do tend to reply to all messages, so if you don't reply back, I'll feel unloved. xoxo – Raven
I stood on a little platform above the gathering crowd, the guitar in my hands felt heavy, I told myself to focus on my breathing just like Mama always said, but it's always difficult to concentrate when all can hear is the sound of my pounding heart. A light autumn breeze ruffled my skirt and I shivered slightly. The crowd was getting anxious and the children started jostling each other, now or never, I thought. Opening my mouth wide I took a deep breath, struck a few chords on the guitar and started to sing.
I had taken many singing lessons with Mama when I was younger, she had always insisted, "If you cannot sing to earn your keep, Anselmo will cast you out." The words that Mama spoke were never taken lightly, all the orphans that lived in our troupe looked up to her as a grandmotherly figure and her words were trusted. The thought of being cast out of my family if I couldn't earn money cut me deeply as a child, as I had no mother or father who would leave with me, like many of the children in the Wayless folk, we were orphans. According to all the adults there was another troupe, years back, that were our rivals. A tribal war erupted between the Gypsy troupes and many lives were lost, among those lives were those of my parents and the parents of many friends. Anselmo holds no remorse for starting that war and killing so many, all he cared for was fame and money.
As our leader, Anselmo's word was law. I never doubted what Mama said about him, he was a greedy man who cared for nothing apart from gold, and keeping us alive was second on his to-do-list. He lived in a lavish caravan, hand carved and painted in reds and gold, which showed his wealth greatly. Although while everyone else worked he appeared to do nothing but spend the gold we had collected. But that's not to say that we were starving, we were all given rations that would keep us fit and well, and water was always free.
"Des… Despina," a hand shook me gently, "Des, wake up. Come on, please!" Opening my eyes to a bright light, I tried to squint against the glare. Seeing my discomfort Arianne shut the curtains a bit
but still continued to drag me out of bed.
"Goddess Ari, I'm up. Can't let me rest can you?" Playfully I pushed her onto my bed and got dressed ignoring her squeals of, "Don't wake the babes, Don't rock their cradle, Do not try to feed them biscuits!" Thankfully the caravan had stopped when I opened the door, there was a nasty incident a while back where a young boy opened the door when they were still moving and landed on his face and got trampled by the caravan behind his parents', he was okay, but has a wicked scar now.
"Des! Can you please take Tinka, I'm going to wash Foxley." Shoving a babe into my arms Arianne continued to wrestle with her son and get him into a tub that still needed to be filled with water.
Arianne and I had grown up together, best friends since we were young. But it seemed that she grew up faster than me, getting married at fifteen and giving birth to twins nine months later, thankfully we could still share a caravan, else I'd be out of a home. Tinka and Foxley were the two most beautiful babes to have ever been born, they were perfect in every way. Tinka always smiled and laughed, her dark brown curls bounced whenever she moved and Foxley couldn't keep still always moving and shoving dirt in his mouth, causing his mother to have heart attacks.
Clutching Tinka to my chest, I wrapped my shawl around her as the air was quite crisp. Moving over to the fire place that was being set up, I set the angel down to find her some food, letting her crawl and dribble on other people. Looking up at the trees that surrounded the camp, I noticed the light mist that still hung to the branches, refusing to disappear. Water droplets hung in the air collecting on our faces and hair, they dampened the wood and food became soggy fast. Wiping the beads from my brow, I found the women setting up the food bench.
"Mornin'. What would 'cha like, honey? This weather's a bit drab, ain't it?" Whilst they chatted amongst themselves about the weather I handed over my food chip and waited for my bread and broth.
"Ere you are, poppet. Hope it tastes alright, Anselmo cut down the spices we're aloud to use in the kiddies food. He 'recons they can't 'preciate the flavours or somefing, so tell us later if it's alright, 'kay?" As she turned away I thought to ask for a bottle so I could feed Tinka, she didn't seem to happy that she'd been asked for again. Traipsing back to where Tinka sat in the slowly growing mud puddle, I shoved the bread in my mouth and scooped her up and took her back to the caravan to change her into some warmer clothes. As I sat on the cushions scattered on the floor I gazed at the fast approaching rain clouds, the broth cold in my lap. Tinka seemed content rolling on the floor with a bottle of water.
"Despina, hey! Thanks for watching her," a soaking wet Ari came through the door holding a grinning boy on her hip, "Bit wet, isn't it?" Plonking the boy next to the girl, Ari sat next to me and stole my broth. "Hey, Des?"
"Yep." I scratched a mosquito bite.
"Have you thought about getting married? I mean, you're getting kinda old now, ya know? So I was just wondering…" Ari glanced at me from the corner of her eye, they were beautiful eyes, large and brown. But at sixteen I didn't feel that old, "No, I haven't given it any thought. Why?"
"Well, when I was washing Mr. Trouble here, I overheard the older mothers. They were saying that Anselmo is going to start arranging marriages because there aren't enough children to keep the Wayless folk going, ya know? And the older mothers are, well, old. So they'll all be passing to the next life, with hardly any kiddies left."
"Hrmm, but no one has caught my fancy. Ari, we all grew up together, I see them boys as my brothers, not as potential husbands." Brushing the hair from my forehead I watched the twins play together, giggling and gumming each other's hands.
"Why don't you look at one of the older guys, like I did? Des, I don't want you to be unhappy, so it would be better if some things were of your choosing. You have a fire in you Des, when you want to unleash it, but you're also away with the faeries half the time. I found love and am happy with my life, I don't want you to be forced to marry some boy that is like your brother or a really old man. Your happiness is all I want, we're friends yeah? You know I love you." Throwing her arms around my shoulders, Ari pulled me to her and nestled her face in my damp hair.
"I want to be happy too Ari."
A/N: What an anti-climax, this is a warning stop reading this. I've read over it 3 times and every time it gets worse, *sigh*, it's a bit of a fail whale. Hope everyone is have an awesome (!) Christmas break and is tanning nicely. 3 my respect goes out to those who want to read more of this rubbish. Xoxo – Raven