[ prompt #10 - foster ]
No matter how many days pass, Merden can't quite believe that this is how the world works now.
Life in Ala Mhigo was never easy, but the difference between hard and gruelling is stark. At the heart of it all: the Garleans. It was they who were responsible for all of this misery and hate, for the hardships, for the endless trudge from village to village trying to find someone worth selling to.
Only once has he asked about his sister since the occupation began, and the looks on his parents' faces were severe enough he knows never to ask about her again. So, like any good Ala Mhigan boy, he asks Rhalgr instead.
Not that it does him much good, for He never responds. Idly, Merden wonders if the rest of the Twelve might know of her - perhaps Nymeia, if he asks nicely, because hadn't Orella had to swear to a new god on her blade in front of the whole kingdom? He had been there, he knows that's what happened, even if their parents had muttered about the whole debacle privately at home. Merden didn't understand what the fuss was about - still doesn't, for that matter. Surely it was for the better they spoke to the Spinner rather than the Destroyer? The clue was in the name.
But no, his parents had said. We know you love your sister, but she does not know everything - and besides, wouldn't Rhalgr be angry if he stopped all conversations with Him? And for a while it works, playing on the boy's fears of being struck down, but teenagehood went hand in hand with natural rebellion.
Around the time he starts appealing to Nymeia's better judgement he hears about an entirely different rebellion.
He's fourteen and three moons, quite old enough to be helping around the house, and collecting a sack of meat from one of the hunters that migrated with them when Ala Mera collapsed. He waits in the square, in the overbearing afternoon heat - for there is no pause in the heat, no shade, no clouds - when a man he doesn't recognise approaches.
"Hello," he says, for he was taught to be polite, but warily, for there are plenty of Garlean sympathisers that already walk among them. He's civil, not stupid.
"How old are you, boy?"
It isn't an uncommon question. At sixteen he could enlist to the Garlean army, if he wanted, and he's a little taller than the average boy, for his age. He isn't sure if that's what his parents want: they've never said one way or the other, and they're polite to kinsmen and invaders alike.
Something of his wariness must show on his face, for the man raises his hands, palms up, as though guilty. The cut of his jaw marks him as a native of the Peaks - not that that means much, anymore.
"I mean no harm," he says, and leans in close. "Do you like the way things are now, boy?"
Merden doesn't need to think too hard about his answer, though he keeps his mouth firmly closed. He might not remember what it was like before the Mad King ruined the place, but even he knows the difference between fear and powerlessness, though after all this time he still isn't sure which he'd prefer, if given the choice.
Still, he must needs be careful. That's what his parents are always telling him - what Orella had always told him, too, though he cannot imagine her gentle chastisements were anything more than simple concern shining through, no matter how reticient she always was.
"Why?" he asks instead of answering directly. "I have food to eat and a roof to sleep under. Things could be worse."
"Aye, that they could. Say -" and the stranger shrugs, as though all this means nothing much. "Some few of us are meeting by the river's edge later, when the sun goes down. Would be nice to have a new face join us."
"Join you? What for?"
He never forgets the toothy smile flashed his way, altogether too encouraging. It fosters an excitement in his belly he's never felt before, that he knows not how to tamp down or contain, and it courses through him like a flashflood. It promises better things than this: meat throughout the week instead of once a sennight; no more stooping to hide his growth spurt from every recruiting soldier that walks through Ala Gannha.
"Payback," is the answer, and Merden agrees before his brain can catch up.
