[Challenge 022: Town Life] Every Little Thing
Title: Every Little Thing
Game: FE9/10
Word Count: 497 (according to Microsoft Word)
Characters: Zihark
Warnings: none
Summary: He goes home. Set during the time between FE9 and FE10.
Notes: FFN mirror is here.
His mother's hair is gray, now. It's gray and thin; in the sunlight it almost looks like cobwebs. It shouldn't surprise Zihark-after all, he was going gray himself by the time he reached seventeen. But he remembers her with brown hair, just like he remembers Allis's tavern (now a boarded-up shack) and the proud road to this little coal-town (a road now overrun by weeds).
The tea still smells the same, at least. She'd always mixed her tea stronger than anyone else in town; her friend Breda made fun of her for it. "You like having your tea kick you in the teeth?"
He mentions that now, smiling wryly: "Breda was right; I never found anyone who mixed tea half as strong as you." His mother smiles back, but only faintly, and Zihark wonders if he shouldn't've said that, wonders if Breda's still here at all. So much has changed since the war.
His mother rises, going to fetch something from the cupboard, but she trips. Zihark startles; he's halfway to his feet before she catches herself, gripping the edge of the table. "It's these darn rickety floorboards," she says. "I'll get the carpenter to see to it." She laughs, but Zihark can't help noticing how her arm quavers as she pulls herself upright, how stiff her left knee is when she walks.
She never asks what he's been doing-not directly. She asks how he's been eating, if the road was hard. He tries to tell her more (leaving out his work with Crimea, and of course, her), but his mother's faint frowns stop him. She seems happier when he speaks of bare, inconsequential things-a wandering bard, a snatch of Nevassan gossip-so he speaks of those instead.
Soon he notices a strain in his own shoulders, notices how tense he is-like he's afraid?-or expecting a scolding, rather. But he's not seventeen anymore, he reminds himself, just like his mother's hair isn't brown anymore; that time passed years ago, when he'd seen her last.
When she finally says "There's something I need to tell you," he already knows what she's going to say, but he still feels his throat tighten. When he'd first entered the house, the table had been set for only one.
She's rubbing the thin band around her finger, and her voice threatens to crack with every syllable, but it never quite does. Not when his father dies north of Nevassa in the war; not when his brother is taken to a Begnion labor camp and the letters stop. Her voice doesn't crack until the very end, when she finally asks if Zihark's planning to stay a while or if he's just passing through: "You've grown so much." He reaches across the table and puts his hands over hers; she's shaking as she repeats: "You've grown so much." For the first time Zihark wonders if he could have stayed, should have stayed, and he feels a floorboard creak underfoot.
Game: FE9/10
Word Count: 497 (according to Microsoft Word)
Characters: Zihark
Warnings: none
Summary: He goes home. Set during the time between FE9 and FE10.
Notes: FFN mirror is here.
His mother's hair is gray, now. It's gray and thin; in the sunlight it almost looks like cobwebs. It shouldn't surprise Zihark-after all, he was going gray himself by the time he reached seventeen. But he remembers her with brown hair, just like he remembers Allis's tavern (now a boarded-up shack) and the proud road to this little coal-town (a road now overrun by weeds).
The tea still smells the same, at least. She'd always mixed her tea stronger than anyone else in town; her friend Breda made fun of her for it. "You like having your tea kick you in the teeth?"
He mentions that now, smiling wryly: "Breda was right; I never found anyone who mixed tea half as strong as you." His mother smiles back, but only faintly, and Zihark wonders if he shouldn't've said that, wonders if Breda's still here at all. So much has changed since the war.
His mother rises, going to fetch something from the cupboard, but she trips. Zihark startles; he's halfway to his feet before she catches herself, gripping the edge of the table. "It's these darn rickety floorboards," she says. "I'll get the carpenter to see to it." She laughs, but Zihark can't help noticing how her arm quavers as she pulls herself upright, how stiff her left knee is when she walks.
She never asks what he's been doing-not directly. She asks how he's been eating, if the road was hard. He tries to tell her more (leaving out his work with Crimea, and of course, her), but his mother's faint frowns stop him. She seems happier when he speaks of bare, inconsequential things-a wandering bard, a snatch of Nevassan gossip-so he speaks of those instead.
Soon he notices a strain in his own shoulders, notices how tense he is-like he's afraid?-or expecting a scolding, rather. But he's not seventeen anymore, he reminds himself, just like his mother's hair isn't brown anymore; that time passed years ago, when he'd seen her last.
When she finally says "There's something I need to tell you," he already knows what she's going to say, but he still feels his throat tighten. When he'd first entered the house, the table had been set for only one.
She's rubbing the thin band around her finger, and her voice threatens to crack with every syllable, but it never quite does. Not when his father dies north of Nevassa in the war; not when his brother is taken to a Begnion labor camp and the letters stop. Her voice doesn't crack until the very end, when she finally asks if Zihark's planning to stay a while or if he's just passing through: "You've grown so much." He reaches across the table and puts his hands over hers; she's shaking as she repeats: "You've grown so much." For the first time Zihark wonders if he could have stayed, should have stayed, and he feels a floorboard creak underfoot.