Oct 15, 2022
A portrait for a friendo. So happy with how this one turned out!
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A portrait for a friendo. So happy with how this one turned out!
16. LUCUBRATION
@severine-savage, @loadedmemory, @dragons-ire, @kinari
When Otolin rises, the first thing he does is reach for the small brown-and-black leather book at his bedside table.
From there, he begins to fill it out meticulously with his agenda for the day, whether it be the usual tasks or something new to accomplish. Throughout the day, he’s sure to cross off each task as it’s tackled and even adds notes here and there. It’ll be a good thing to reference in the future.
There are others like it, of course, also filled to the brim with copious notes and entries like a journal. Each one has been placed in the drawer of the bedside table, neatly organized by date and time and stacked on top of one another.
Before he does fill out, he does take a moment to reflect on the previous day’s entry.
Breandan Ducaille ( @geimhleag ) Bonus:
The Hero in Your Head
The following story contains some violence and harsh language.
He’s been awake for hours.
Sleep always eluded him in their grasp. Not much has changed there.
“He’s… he’s still up.”
Youthful voices. They can’t be more than eighteen, or maybe even nineteen?
Hard to place in the darkness.
Otolin doesn’t really struggle much. He’s not actually bound, but instead has been left to sit here in this old cell. The sound of running water continues, a steady stream that shifts through and over moss-covered rocks. It gives him an idea where he might be.
Not far from where the ambush had occurred, where their ambush had been… ambushed? Is “counter-ambush” even a word? A phrase?
It’s these thoughts that keep him company.
That, and those of his companions. His… friends. Closer than that.
Keep him from going mad.
It’s not the first time she’s done this, kept him locked off from the others and in the lack of company of his own thoughts, or whatever was in his head in those days, whatever they had taught him.
“She’s coming!”
The youthful voices pick up, a quick beat, and then drop out. The silence is death, broken by the rust-covered creak of a metal door opening inward into his cell.
He doesn’t move, keeping still in a sitting position on the floor, legs crossed underneath him. But his mind works, starts to churn through options: how easy would it be… to…
“I know what you’re thinking,” she says in that familiar low tone.
Otolin doesn’t respond.
A fraction of a heartbeat Made us what we are A brother and a sister For better or for worse
A billion words ago They sang a song of leaving An echo from the chorus Will call them back again
-Covenant, Call the Ships to Port
(Feat: @witchespromise)
(Screenshots by @entropytea )
On returning to the vineyard, Silvestre fell silent. Perhaps Brighid sensed he needed time to think. She kissed his cheek and said something about reading for a little while in the study upstairs. He squeezed her hand, smiled at her reassuringly. The sight of her made his heart ache in ways he never knew before.
He loved her. Painfully so.
Wandering out to the vineyards, he rubbed his arms for warmth in the growing twilight. He passed different varieties of grapes, each with their own distinct flavor. Years of his father’s tutelage finally sank in, and he recounted in his head which grapes made what wine, and what it best paired with. He stole a fat purple one off the vine and tasted it. Sour still, but he ate it anyway, thick skin and all.
He looked up toward the two story building made for the business. To the apartment upstairs his parents used when they were visiting. That he and Brighid used now. The light in the window, where he imagined Brighid sitting in her nightgown and robe. Remembered the flash of pale, soft skin beneath his fingers.
He’d broken Halone’s laws to lie with her. No regret in doing so, but it meant a great deal to him. He did not enter into such a partnership lightly, intending at some point to marry her.
Yet to do so would mean a great deal of obligation on Breandan’s part. As the male heir to their father’s estate, it imparted certain responsibilities to him in Ishgard. Traditions of courtship old and antique between the high houses and their vassals. That meant a tie to the nation he did not have now. The loss of freedom to roam as he did. To sacrifice his happiness for his sister’s. And for Silvestre’s.
Unconscionable to ask Breandan for such a sacrifice. This left Silvestre wondering what to do. To break off the courtship was just as abhorrent an idea. The anguish it would cause Brighid, just imagining it, made him stop and grasp a post to steady himself. It was that or simply never marry her, also an unfathomable idea. He may have ignored Halone’s laws once, but he could not live in sin with her indefinitely. It would eventually break his spirit.
Maybe this was his punishment. Halone’s spear driven straight through to remind him of his sins. Had he not slept with Brighid, there might be recourse, a thin thread of logic that went no where, but he grasped it like a lifeline anyway. But now the die was cast, and he had to deal with the consequences of his defiance against Her laws.
He reached into his pocket, found the rosary he kept there. The sigil of Halone, three spears, and the little worry stone Breandan gave him for Starlight. There in the center of the vineyard, he knelt, a knee pressed into the dirt.
He prayed. For guidance, for Brighid, for Breandan. And for forgiveness.
(Mentions of @witchespromise and @geimhleag.)
Just another night at the Forgotten Knight, dropping hot albums with @geimhleag & @witchesandlotuses.
Smoking outside in Camp Drybone. @geimhleag