Back to writing some bits of fiction. Actually, I've been writing all week when I can find the time. All that sickness last week has made me make up for lost time this week.
This week's flash fiction piece is brought to you by me trying to find something to share from my camp WIP, but not thinking any of it fit to post yet. So I wrote this scene up. It's just short of 1000 words. Not sure if it'll make it into the final draft, but regardless, it was a good exercise in getting into third-limited again before camp happens in June. (She says as she goes off to write in omniscient elsewhere...)
No warnings this week, I believe. Although the word r**e (if the word triggers you, odds are you can guess what it is) does appear once.
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The chief cleared her throat and set her pen down on the
darkened desk. She felt the sweat ooze down her skin beneath her silk robes and
considered calling for an attendant to turn on the fan above her – but it was
midnight, and all the attendants were asleep. Even her loyal bodyguard was
probably asleep just outside the office door.
Cairn stared at the contract before her and read it for the
hundredth time. It was her handwriting that spelled out the terms, but it was
Lord Ramaron Marlow’s signature that swept across the bottom of the parchment.
An extra line existed for Cairn to put her name and stamp the official seal of
the Second Tribe. Only then would the contract be binding and the mission
granted.
What am I doing? The
image of a swath of blond hair walked by before Cairn, although there was none
there to touch. She heard the conservative laughter in her memory. My love, what have I done?
Folly. Signing the contract would be pure and utter folly. By
selling Sonall Gardiah to this julah Cairn
put the peace of Second Tribe at jeopardy – what would happen should death
befall Cairn, its great chief? With the second in command away and unfit to
assume duty, chaos would rule as mercenaries fought to take the deposed chief’s
place. And why shouldn’t something happen to Cairn, considering the name beside
Sonall’s on the contract was none other than Sulim di’Graelic, the sleeping bodyguard
just beyond the door.
I doom us all.
Truly, the odds that doom would descend with this contract were slim to none,
but if Cairn’s predecessor had taught her anything it was to always assume and
plan for the worse. But if what Ramaron Marlow had told her was true, then
Second Tribe would cease to exist if nothing was done.
“I need your two best hands, your greatest team.” With the
gold to back him up, any chief would have jumped at Ramaron Marlow’s proposal,
idiotic or not. But even the promise of gold could not sway the chief’s heart
in this matter. She could not sign the contract.
No, she would. She had to. She was Cairn di’Cerilyn, the
chief of the Second Tribe of Cerilyn. It was her duty to put her mercenaries
and their livelihoods above her own desires, something her esteemed predecessor
had failed to acknowledge. They were as good as her children, the whole lot of
them, including the looters and the rapists that made her life hell every time
lawsuits were brought up against them. They depended on her decisions to feed
and clothe them, and if what Ramaron Marlow said was true…they depended on her
to keep them existing.
Cairn picked up the pen and tapped the edge on the contract.
She wrote her adopted name as slowly as her heart beat beneath her robes.
She was still safe, since the seal was not planted yet.
Her throat was dry, but she still managed to call out to the
slumbering oaf in the corridor. “Sulim.” Her voice sounded like the doom she
would bring them all.
A thump, and then the door opened. Sulim staggered in as she
rubbed one eye. A stronger chief would have reprimanded her, but all Cairn
could see was the swath of blond hair and the taut lips that laughed when they
were alone.
“Ugh, what?” There was no laughing that night.
Cairn gazed at her and then at the contract. “Come here. You
must help me.”
Sulim appeared too tired to question Cairn’s strange
request. She stumbled to the desk and stood beside Cairn’s chair with a sway
that made the chief wish she could send her to bed. And I would follow you. Instead the chief picked up her seal from
her desk and put it into Sulim’s hand.
“Help me stamp this contract.”
“Then can we go to bed?”
Cairn chuckled. “As many times as you like.”
“Once should suffice.” Sulim yawned as her hand traveled
along the seal and met Cairn’s palm. Together they pushed the seal to the
contract and were done with it. “There.
Now please tell me you’re going to bed so I can get some sleep.”
Cairn opened her mouth to tell Sulim what she had just
helped her sign. But how would she say it? I’ve
sold you again, after I promised I wouldn’t. It didn’t sit well.
It could wait for the morning.
“Go.” Cairn shooed her away. “I’m just as likely to die on
my way to bed tonight as I am in my sleep. Go get your own.”
She watched Sulim bow her head and take leave of the office.
They exchanged no pleasantries, as it was assumed they would see each other
again soon enough.
Alone again, Cairn foisted her head into her hands and
sobbed. A tear crept through her fingers and splattered the edge of the soiled
contract. My love, my love, what have I
done? Cairn stood in defiance to herself and left the contract to rot on
her desk. I’ve sold you and killed you,
that’s what I’ve done.
Come morning she would have to tell Sulim what she had done.
Until then she had a few blessed hours of pretending she had not agreed to send
her bodyguard off to her death.
Those hours were best spent abed, Cairn decided. She picked
up her remaining things and trudged into the corridor towards her apartments,
alone and unguarded. She would have to get used to it in the coming weeks.
Years.
For if Sulim di’Graelic died, Cairn would not take another
bodyguard, so her own death could come that much quicker.
My love, my love, I’ve
sealed our fates. Cerilyn is doomed, and
we’re all to die.
