Silent Flower
Summary: Ah, yet another tale of a man engaged and the woman he's not allowed to love.
Disclaimer: If I were Jim Henson, I would be dead, and this makes me sad. Likewise, if I were Shakespeare (whose plot I could be stealing) I would likewise be dead. Again, I would be sad.
Hey, HeartlessRomantic here. No, there is no love at first sight here. If you want that, go to someone whose name ISN'T HeartlessRomantic.
Chapter 1
Fingernails
Her fingernails were short. They always got short when she was scared or upset. They had full right to be so now. Kya was Hypi. The Hypis are a peaceful group, very like the Gypsies, only they don't travel. The Hypis live far out beyond the Labyrinth and the Goblin City, in an area that can only be described as a swamp. In this swamp, they live in wooden houses on stilts to keep out the animals and the water. The Hypi land is about under the Aboveground land of France, near the Nymph land. The two groups don't converse much, the Hypis resented the Nymphs for their power and magic.
Most Hypis were humans, people who failed the Labyrinth and ran away, without going home. None remember it, which makes this theory a little shaky, but it is the only one they have. Some are Gypsies who were sick of traveling, some are Elves who stayed after the Occupation of human year 1938, some are humans with no remembrance of anything but the Hypis, some are Naiads or Dryads. They are the only peoples of the world, Mij Nosneh, where the royals were humans.
Now they were under attack. Who could possibly want to attack the Hypi Kingdom? she wondered. 'Kingdom' is probably a stretch there, as there isn't more than an acre total of Hypi land and no economy to speak of. They barter mainly small things a chicken for two loaves of bread and the like. If you can't give, you can't take.
There had only every been two wars in which the Hypis took part in- their independence as a race in the human time 1793 and their call to arms to overthrow the tyrannical Elven government (who, at the time, had ruled from the D'log Mountains far to the east—rather near Aboveground Egypt, to the Revlis Sea far to the west—rather near Aboveground Alaska) in human time 1939.
Now, less than sixty years later, they were taking up arms again. The Hypis did not forge weapons, they traded for them. Ach, that's gonna make it difficult to fight…fight and live that is… Kya thought as she slipped a leather helmet over her blonde hair.
She felt heavy. She wore stiff leather armor (she traded a cow for that) heavy boots (traded actual gold for that, and that was hard to come by for the Hypis) and chain mail. Chain mail! She could have traded a sister for that! Assuming of course, that she had one. How was she supposed to run in this? Couldn't work. Ever.
"Ay-up!" shouted the general. The general was Mi Ton Elbaht-cuot-nu, the local butcher. He was the only one who had ever held a sword, in the Revolution against the Elves. He was human. His lieutenant was Y'loh Nam, the priest of the Four Gods (Ra, god of the elements; Odin, god of unity; Zeus, god of wrath; and Jehovah, god of peace. Their functions vary per race, but the gods are the same.) He had also been in the Revolution, and Independence War, and ironically enough, was Elven.
Kya was a princess who had never held a sword until she woke up last month to fire, shouts, darkness at noon. Back then she had been quiet, shy, pretty, and peaceful. She had been water. Then the Goblins had attacked. No longer would River-Heart be River-Heart. She was Fire-Soul now. And so she would remain until the Goblins left, and her Kingdom returned to its former peace.
They were going to storm the Labyrinth.
Gods help us.