April Flowers Prompt #23, Into the Sunrise
Title: Into the Sunrise
Author: mrstater
Rating & Warnings: rated G
Characters/ Pairing: Betriz, implied Caz/Betriz
Prompt: #23, Keep moving way up high / You see the light / It shines forever / Sail through the crimson skies / The purest light / The light that sets you free / If time will set you free ("You Can Still Be Free," by Savage Garden)
Format & Word Count: drabble, 250 words
Summary: The flight from Valenda, in Betriz's words.
A line of red, like blood seeping from a neat slash of a sword, divides the black land from the black sky. For the first time since mounting her horse, Betriz has a sense of the time: dawn is coming.
When they rode out under the full moon, she'd wondered if dy Jironal's men would ride them down and slay them before she saw another sunrise. Now she sees the first red sliver, and, not only that, but the silhouette of the castle , as well. They have made it.
Well--nearly so. Another mile or two, and they will be safe, though her legs, screaming in the stirrups, and her back, burning as she leans low in her saddle, and her fingers, incapable of uncurling around the reins (she has an inkling of what Caz experienced all those months at the oar), protest at the thought of another yard, much less another mile.
But she digs in her heels, lays over her horse's neck, holds on tighter--for Iselle, who looks as if she could ride from dusk till dawn again if it would save her family and her kingdom, for Caz, who rode for the Royesse even though he might well be the least fit person in the realm to do so. Because they would be free--of dy Jironal, of curses, of demons…
And by the gods, Betriz dy Ferrej will be free, too. To serve her Lady. To marry Caz.
She rides toward the red dawn.
Author: mrstater
Rating & Warnings: rated G
Characters/ Pairing: Betriz, implied Caz/Betriz
Prompt: #23, Keep moving way up high / You see the light / It shines forever / Sail through the crimson skies / The purest light / The light that sets you free / If time will set you free ("You Can Still Be Free," by Savage Garden)
Format & Word Count: drabble, 250 words
Summary: The flight from Valenda, in Betriz's words.
A line of red, like blood seeping from a neat slash of a sword, divides the black land from the black sky. For the first time since mounting her horse, Betriz has a sense of the time: dawn is coming.
When they rode out under the full moon, she'd wondered if dy Jironal's men would ride them down and slay them before she saw another sunrise. Now she sees the first red sliver, and, not only that, but the silhouette of the castle , as well. They have made it.
Well--nearly so. Another mile or two, and they will be safe, though her legs, screaming in the stirrups, and her back, burning as she leans low in her saddle, and her fingers, incapable of uncurling around the reins (she has an inkling of what Caz experienced all those months at the oar), protest at the thought of another yard, much less another mile.
But she digs in her heels, lays over her horse's neck, holds on tighter--for Iselle, who looks as if she could ride from dusk till dawn again if it would save her family and her kingdom, for Caz, who rode for the Royesse even though he might well be the least fit person in the realm to do so. Because they would be free--of dy Jironal, of curses, of demons…
And by the gods, Betriz dy Ferrej will be free, too. To serve her Lady. To marry Caz.
She rides toward the red dawn.