(no subject)
There are other ways to get to Amber. Trump in on a sibling’s card, or even Amber’s own. Other roads, too; you don’t have to came through Arden.
Arden, that glorious playground of the princes and princesses when they are young and rowdy and still impressionable. Arden, where Fiona, delicate little Fiona, had run wild with her short-cropped her and her wolfhounds and her horses. Arden, of green-gold light and the soaring, towering trees; pines, oaks, maples, ashes and so, so many more trees that it would be nearly impossible to name them all.
It’s been a while since she has been in Arden. Centuries, really, and nearly three of them at that. Nearly three centuries since she left Julian and the forest that has become his domain. He had never known the wild girl who had hunted here; she’d calmed down by the time he was old enough to remember her, calmed down and turned to books and painting and Dworkin now that she’d worked off the violent excesses of temper and youth.
But that temper, and that wild young girl, are never far beneath Fiona’s pretty, cultured surface and it’s with that smile and that glint in her green eyes that she rides into Arden. Not by herself, oh no. She has another horse with her. They are hunting horses, well-bred and well-trained, fast and sure-footed. Both of them are brown, nothing fancy about the colour. Nothing that stands out.
Fiona dismounts smoothly, strokes her horse’s nose and leads the two of them off the well beaten road. Not far, though, she’s still on the clearing either side of it, just closer to the trees that seem to form a cathedral roof over the road. For a moment, the little princess’s smile is soft, nostalgic, and then it attains a coldness.
She’s here for a reason. And, yes, she had promised Mary Anne, but if she were being honest with herself, Fiona can admit that to a certain extent she’s using her friend to get back at her lover-brother. Ah well. Mary Anne should know by now what the Amberites are. And it’s with that in mind that Fiona pulls out the queen of swords card. She’s never done this before, but in theory it should work. Any card can be a trump, you just need to focus on
(her eyes human-bright-young blue and queen-old-knowing-spooky blue hair blonde-yellow-golden-sunkissed hair scars and smiles sex and fun and violent and cruel human girl inhuman queen burns and gunshots Vietnam with blood and screams shocked chair spins and falls dancing and laughing she’s human too-human girl-child cynic-woman kisses just that drink the tequila messed-up girl shared a lover sharedshare secrets talk and gossip understands
weapons and husbands
still friends
Mary Anne)
the person.
Arden, that glorious playground of the princes and princesses when they are young and rowdy and still impressionable. Arden, where Fiona, delicate little Fiona, had run wild with her short-cropped her and her wolfhounds and her horses. Arden, of green-gold light and the soaring, towering trees; pines, oaks, maples, ashes and so, so many more trees that it would be nearly impossible to name them all.
It’s been a while since she has been in Arden. Centuries, really, and nearly three of them at that. Nearly three centuries since she left Julian and the forest that has become his domain. He had never known the wild girl who had hunted here; she’d calmed down by the time he was old enough to remember her, calmed down and turned to books and painting and Dworkin now that she’d worked off the violent excesses of temper and youth.
But that temper, and that wild young girl, are never far beneath Fiona’s pretty, cultured surface and it’s with that smile and that glint in her green eyes that she rides into Arden. Not by herself, oh no. She has another horse with her. They are hunting horses, well-bred and well-trained, fast and sure-footed. Both of them are brown, nothing fancy about the colour. Nothing that stands out.
Fiona dismounts smoothly, strokes her horse’s nose and leads the two of them off the well beaten road. Not far, though, she’s still on the clearing either side of it, just closer to the trees that seem to form a cathedral roof over the road. For a moment, the little princess’s smile is soft, nostalgic, and then it attains a coldness.
She’s here for a reason. And, yes, she had promised Mary Anne, but if she were being honest with herself, Fiona can admit that to a certain extent she’s using her friend to get back at her lover-brother. Ah well. Mary Anne should know by now what the Amberites are. And it’s with that in mind that Fiona pulls out the queen of swords card. She’s never done this before, but in theory it should work. Any card can be a trump, you just need to focus on
(her eyes human-bright-young blue and queen-old-knowing-spooky blue hair blonde-yellow-golden-sunkissed hair scars and smiles sex and fun and violent and cruel human girl inhuman queen burns and gunshots Vietnam with blood and screams shocked chair spins and falls dancing and laughing she’s human too-human girl-child cynic-woman kisses just that drink the tequila messed-up girl shared a lover sharedshare secrets talk and gossip understands
weapons and husbands
still friends
Mary Anne)
the person.