Intercomm: Through Forest
Title: Through Forest
Author: secretchord
Word Count: 581
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Djaq
Spoilers/Warnings: None
Summary: Pre-series. A morning in a cage with slaves.
Disclaimer: I do not own Robin Hood. I'm not making any money from this.
Odour of blood on the ancestral stair!
And we that have shed none must gather there
And clamour in drunken frenzy for the moon.
-William Butler Yeats
Weak orange light filtered through the slats of their cage, illuminating the chaotic dance of dust motes, mesmerizing her, freeing her for a moment from the nightmare. Her black eyes reflected an unblinking glimmer of sunrise, full of foreign lights and colors - she would never have guessed that England had this kind of beauty. All the white men were ugly, all they talked about was war and death and blood, and so she had always imagined their home to be a place barren of life. Mist - she had always pictured mist. Grave, pale men, wandering in gray clouds, clawing at the soil of what they had conquered...
The wagon rolled into the forest, and the light dimmed.
Through the torn, ragged cloth that covered their cage, she could see lush greenery, and tree trunks still black from a recent rain. She couldn't smell anything beyond the filth of unwashed bodied and rotted meat, but she imagined that the scent of rain would be different here than back home. She pressed her nose in between the iron bars that she held on to, trying to breathe in something other than urine and fear and rot -
“Saffiyah!”
A hand pulled on her shirt. She lost her balance and fell onto another prisoner - just a body now, ruined from lack of water; her skin crawled to be touching it - and glared behind her.
“I just want to see.”
“You'll get us whipped,” the slave said.
She shook her head as she tried to shift away from the dead body, a difficulty in such a cramped space. A bump in the road knocked her head against one of the iron bars of their cage. She went dizzy, and slumped into a corner.
“They'll whip us anyway,” she murmured, cradling her head. The other slave, Abbud, made a fist, and pressed it into his thigh.
“Kassem cannot take another beating. He is already too weak.”
She looked over at the boy. He was shivering. She reached over and put a hand to his cheek, and was not surprised to find fever.
“Perhaps it is best.”
“What?”
She turned her eyes back to Abbud.
“He either dies here, now, with us - or he dies alone in the mines. Already his belly swells. It cannot be much longer. Better his suffering be ended now.”
Abbud peered intently at her.
“Are you giving up, Saffiyah?”
She glanced at the others, some sleeping, some too sick to be coherent, the rest listening and looking on.
“No,” she answered, feeling the word come from an abyss within her, unstoppable. “I will not yield.”
Abbud leaned back against the wall of the wagon. The fist loosened, flowered into an open palm. They rode in silence through the forest. She didn't know how much further they had to go. The wait was torture.
“Omm,” the boy mumbled. His eyes were closed in a fever-dream. She remembered the dying warriors back home, bleeding out, coming apart with pain - they had called for their mothers, too.
“Omm!”
She reached for the boy's hand. His fingers twitched under hers.
The forest pulled them deeper, and through a hole in the cage cover she could see a gray mist gathering.
Author: secretchord
Word Count: 581
Rating: PG-13
Characters/Pairings: Djaq
Spoilers/Warnings: None
Summary: Pre-series. A morning in a cage with slaves.
Disclaimer: I do not own Robin Hood. I'm not making any money from this.
Odour of blood on the ancestral stair!
And we that have shed none must gather there
And clamour in drunken frenzy for the moon.
-William Butler Yeats
Weak orange light filtered through the slats of their cage, illuminating the chaotic dance of dust motes, mesmerizing her, freeing her for a moment from the nightmare. Her black eyes reflected an unblinking glimmer of sunrise, full of foreign lights and colors - she would never have guessed that England had this kind of beauty. All the white men were ugly, all they talked about was war and death and blood, and so she had always imagined their home to be a place barren of life. Mist - she had always pictured mist. Grave, pale men, wandering in gray clouds, clawing at the soil of what they had conquered...
The wagon rolled into the forest, and the light dimmed.
Through the torn, ragged cloth that covered their cage, she could see lush greenery, and tree trunks still black from a recent rain. She couldn't smell anything beyond the filth of unwashed bodied and rotted meat, but she imagined that the scent of rain would be different here than back home. She pressed her nose in between the iron bars that she held on to, trying to breathe in something other than urine and fear and rot -
“Saffiyah!”
A hand pulled on her shirt. She lost her balance and fell onto another prisoner - just a body now, ruined from lack of water; her skin crawled to be touching it - and glared behind her.
“I just want to see.”
“You'll get us whipped,” the slave said.
She shook her head as she tried to shift away from the dead body, a difficulty in such a cramped space. A bump in the road knocked her head against one of the iron bars of their cage. She went dizzy, and slumped into a corner.
“They'll whip us anyway,” she murmured, cradling her head. The other slave, Abbud, made a fist, and pressed it into his thigh.
“Kassem cannot take another beating. He is already too weak.”
She looked over at the boy. He was shivering. She reached over and put a hand to his cheek, and was not surprised to find fever.
“Perhaps it is best.”
“What?”
She turned her eyes back to Abbud.
“He either dies here, now, with us - or he dies alone in the mines. Already his belly swells. It cannot be much longer. Better his suffering be ended now.”
Abbud peered intently at her.
“Are you giving up, Saffiyah?”
She glanced at the others, some sleeping, some too sick to be coherent, the rest listening and looking on.
“No,” she answered, feeling the word come from an abyss within her, unstoppable. “I will not yield.”
Abbud leaned back against the wall of the wagon. The fist loosened, flowered into an open palm. They rode in silence through the forest. She didn't know how much further they had to go. The wait was torture.
“Omm,” the boy mumbled. His eyes were closed in a fever-dream. She remembered the dying warriors back home, bleeding out, coming apart with pain - they had called for their mothers, too.
“Omm!”
She reached for the boy's hand. His fingers twitched under hers.
The forest pulled them deeper, and through a hole in the cage cover she could see a gray mist gathering.