Author's note: No prompts anymore, so this will be updated whenever inspiration strikes. (( and )) indicate thoughtspeak.
This one comes from book 8.
I don't like water.
I mean, it's fine to drink and all that, right? Necessary for the whole "survival" thing, granted. But just being, you know, in it? Around it? Nope. Not for me.
Not anymore.
I went swimming a couple of times as a kid, sure, but it's not like I had a pool to go to or anything. I'd float on my back, looking up at the sky.
Point is, I'm not comfortable in the water. And yet, here I am, hovering less than a foot above it. Like I could be comfortable anyway.
I look down. My reflection gazes back fiercely at me, distorted a little bit. Cautiously, I lower my talon.
Nope, can't do it. I take off, spiraling above the river.
Maybe I should have asked Ax, but it's not something I really want to talk to him about. There are different rituals, I know: the one where he steps in the stream, the one where he doesn't…All right, this is going to be one of the ones where water just isn't involved, period.
I alight on a tall branch and look out over the forest, trying to summon up the face in my mind. Odd that it appears effortlessly but now, now that I'm trying to be deliberate about it, I can't bring myself to do it. I really, really, don't want to think about this anymore.
But I do.
((I'm sorry.)) Let's start with the basics. ((I-you know what I did, and why, it worked out for the best. So…))
This isn't awkward at all.
((Forgive me, please.))
And nothing happens. Didn't expect anything too, of course. Though now I don't know what I did expect.
((Did you have to swear an oath? What do you swear by?))
It's bad enough I'm addressing a dead…person, doing it in the present tense is just weird. Maybe I'm talking to all of them.
((But you would have broken it, to help us. So…thanks?))
Nothing's settled. Nothing's going to be easy anymore. This is war-this is how I'm going to live now.
But even in wars like these, there can still be heroes.