where the trojans?
I was not around to see Zolin’s rise or fall. I missed, unfortunately, the exciting fire-and-brimstone of a regime cut short of its proper vicious end. But I do listen to the voices of the peasants (when I have time), and I do walk the common streets, and I know: while the girl-queen Seraphina may have shed her collar with as little fuss as she would peel a scab, there are others who still wear theirs.
But I know this like I know that the gods have at one time or another come down to earth, which is to say vaguely, and without real evidence; it’s possible I’ve never even seen a real child soldier in the streets. I certainly don’t remember taking note of any. And though I know it isn’t true, I can’t help imagining them as kinds of monsters.
Head dragged down by the silver chain. Roughened from infinite bruises and scars. Probably with dark, sunken eyes, transparent, unfocused eyes that you can see to the bottom of as if they were puddles, whose banks—the deepest part, the stones that line the bottom of the river—are nothing but hungry and hungry and hungry.
And so when I see her, walking down the street toward me, the thought that she is (was?) one of them does not even cross my mind. She does not look like a monster. Sad, certainly. Walking with the kind of stiff trudge you see in urchins raised on the street. Her head is cast in cool shadow from the hood that falls above it, but I still catch the glint of eyes bright and blue.
I think nothing of the glint around her neck but that it might be a fine necklace.
“G’morning,” I drawl, loud enough to let it carry. The streets are quiet, the air cold and still; I don’t think she’ll have any trouble hearing me, especially as I draw closer
and closer
and closer.
@teiran <3
