origfic: Twelve Ells of Wool
Beadslut's going to kill me. I'm supposed to be working on the Big!Bang, but I made the mistake of checking my flist and a prompt caught me and Aigh!
A published author is running a fic contest in her journal and is anyone surprised that “I have spun twelve ells of wool. You have killed a man. A fine morning's work for us both." proved irresistable?
--:--
“Greetings, mother.”
She blinked up at him in surprise. “Such formality, my son? Then be welcome at my hearth, as I would remind a stranger.”
“Should I throw myself at your feet?” he asked.
“And roll with the dog? You did, not so long ago.”
He sat, then, at her feet as he’d said, and stared into the sunlight. Her sleeve brushed his cheek as the whirling spindle rose and fell in the same soft pattern that he’d known from birth, the rhythm he’d nursed to, the same whisper of sound that accompanied his first steps and ushered every evening’s rest.
“My hands are bloody.” He spread them before him, showing the lie. The stranger’s body had fallen away, not onto him. Any blood remaining was indistinguishable from the mud and smoke and dirt of their journey home.
“Remember when you fell off the rock?”
“Mother, I was six!”
“Your hands were bloody then. Remember when you sliced open your cheek because you insisted on helping -“
“Setting a foundation is not the same as…”
“As killing?” She waited for him to nod. “I disagree.” Again the spindle fell, pulling the carded wool into line, tight and strong. He did not move away. She wrapped the thread, then set the spindle spinning again. “You were in the council. You were… we were,” she corrected herself, “one in this decision. Hands up.” He obeyed instantly, years of habit. She smiled at him, a man at her feet, doing a child’s chore more patiently than he ever had then. “I have spun twelve ells of wool. You have killed a man. A fine morning's work for us both." He twitched and she rapped the tips of his fingers in reprimand. “Tomorrow I shall dye the wool. Not all of it, but some. Madder, I think, and the last of the woad. And iron, as always. In three days, I shall weave. Tomorrow you shall join the others to give council, to take council, to fight again. In three days, you will pull my loom into the sunshine, because you love me and it’s heavy,” she said and he ducked his head to hide his smile. “Then you shall go away to divide the duties and the rewards of today’s work. This is what we do.”
He twisted the skein into a coil with the ease of long practice and she shook the roving from where it wound around the distaff at her wrist. He stroked the coil of carded wool in the basket at her feet, feeling the fibers catch on the calluses on his hands. “Would you learn to spin, my son?” she asked, her voice low. He could pretend he had not heard. She continued, “I promise you, my shears are heavy, too.”
A published author is running a fic contest in her journal and is anyone surprised that “I have spun twelve ells of wool. You have killed a man. A fine morning's work for us both." proved irresistable?
--:--
“Greetings, mother.”
She blinked up at him in surprise. “Such formality, my son? Then be welcome at my hearth, as I would remind a stranger.”
“Should I throw myself at your feet?” he asked.
“And roll with the dog? You did, not so long ago.”
He sat, then, at her feet as he’d said, and stared into the sunlight. Her sleeve brushed his cheek as the whirling spindle rose and fell in the same soft pattern that he’d known from birth, the rhythm he’d nursed to, the same whisper of sound that accompanied his first steps and ushered every evening’s rest.
“My hands are bloody.” He spread them before him, showing the lie. The stranger’s body had fallen away, not onto him. Any blood remaining was indistinguishable from the mud and smoke and dirt of their journey home.
“Remember when you fell off the rock?”
“Mother, I was six!”
“Your hands were bloody then. Remember when you sliced open your cheek because you insisted on helping -“
“Setting a foundation is not the same as…”
“As killing?” She waited for him to nod. “I disagree.” Again the spindle fell, pulling the carded wool into line, tight and strong. He did not move away. She wrapped the thread, then set the spindle spinning again. “You were in the council. You were… we were,” she corrected herself, “one in this decision. Hands up.” He obeyed instantly, years of habit. She smiled at him, a man at her feet, doing a child’s chore more patiently than he ever had then. “I have spun twelve ells of wool. You have killed a man. A fine morning's work for us both." He twitched and she rapped the tips of his fingers in reprimand. “Tomorrow I shall dye the wool. Not all of it, but some. Madder, I think, and the last of the woad. And iron, as always. In three days, I shall weave. Tomorrow you shall join the others to give council, to take council, to fight again. In three days, you will pull my loom into the sunshine, because you love me and it’s heavy,” she said and he ducked his head to hide his smile. “Then you shall go away to divide the duties and the rewards of today’s work. This is what we do.”
He twisted the skein into a coil with the ease of long practice and she shook the roving from where it wound around the distaff at her wrist. He stroked the coil of carded wool in the basket at her feet, feeling the fibers catch on the calluses on his hands. “Would you learn to spin, my son?” she asked, her voice low. He could pretend he had not heard. She continued, “I promise you, my shears are heavy, too.”