wading in waist high water [tradwives.vs.sk] day 2 / 11:15am

He is very small in this dream, climbing into an old wooden crib that holds his sister.

Because it is a dream, he knows innately that it's his sister. That is her, breathing in the darkness, irregular rise and fall of the room. That is her underneath the blanket, the fabric rough from dampness clenched in his hands. The room is cold. That is her.

She bleats. Body of a frozen calf, glued to the crib, soft eyeball glinting in the moonlight.

It's snowing. House on fire in the distance outside the window. His sister is alive, she has golden hair like the colour of hay when it's brushed clean. Sal won't let him go out onto the road for the longest time. Summer buzz of flies. His sister is alive. The southern road out of the city, the knight from the book says. What is this story about. The knight looks different in this light. He's knelt on the ground before a throne. He's on his knees. What is this story about now.

It's still dark when Lu wakes up, rim of sun on the horizon. The cloak slips off him as he sits, reaching for the lance.

Tick is there.

The knife glows in his hands, that book fanned out on his other side.

Lu slowly digs his knuckles to his forehead.

He had no dreams since leaving Ten. Not for the three long days he was drifting in and out of sleep in the center, not with the cold syringe of sedative pumped into his veins the days after he stood in the room with that trainer. The fog is soft like mold around them, faint white haze in the dawn, clinging to the rubble. The chill stiffens his joints.

He moves to grab the lance, and when he turns back again, Tick's blinking up at the sky, his gaze shifting incrementally until they're staring at each other. Lu watches his hand flex on the hilt.

Kicked him in the night, he starts whining. And Lu thinks about kicking him again.

But he still has the book. He's flipping carefully through the pages already, bent over the fragment of a barely legible passage. Tick must parse something out of it though, because he's announcing he's going to the tower before the sun's finished rising.

Or he could just be stupid.

That's what Lucius starts thinking, few hours later. The high noon light hangs gauzy above them, pale blue on the ponds. He watches Tick trip over a rock for the hundredth time, head down, scribbling into the margins furiously. Another pause in a space where the ribs of trees thin out. He leans against a trunk, staring flatly as Tick turns in a circle.

That way.

The way they came from.

Lu might really kick him.

But something splashes into the water. Stops them both from another spat. Lu's halfway to closing the distance between them when they both turn to look.

In the middle of the pool, the thin sun filters down onto the statue.

He dreamed of one, and it appears now. The knight stands frozen, but the water ripples softly around its knees, the algae parted.

Delay of realization.

And it's almost a trick of a light, the stiff turn of its head, sun falling across the carved grooves of its armour. The shadows change. Grinding noise, creak of stone shifting, the weight of it dents the soft banks of the pool.

The statue draws its sword.

Tick runs.

Lu's going to kill him.

He's scrambling away, through the trees. And Lu is going to spear him.

Except now the knight has its sword raised, now the knight is stomping towards him, that groaning of limbs coming closer.

It's not alive, it's rock. It doesn't bleed or rot or cry, and so it doesn't scare Lucius. A stone knight dies a good and clean death. How honourable. Lu is holding a weapon. He is not holding his brother's hand.

He grits his teeth until his jaw hurts, swings the lance around like a bat.

He's going to kill Tick.

Tick makes it a good few feet, to his credit.

His ankle catches a root, and then a stone hand catches him. He's yanked backwards so fast that he can feel his neck pop. The book flies out of his hands, the whiplash of the trees, breath completely knocked out of him.

The statue flings him.

He lands in the water.

Except it's not really a landing, per say. Quite decisively, he's smacked against the surface of the pond. Very hard. It feels like being thrown into a wall, and then being compensated with a slight sinking, like a delayed, somewhat apologetic, cushioning. There's the whoosh of the water flooding in over him, surprise forcing a mouthful, just as cold as it was yesterday.

What did he say earlier. What did he say.

Absolutely not getting wet today. Definitely staying dry.

Now he's flat on the floor of the pond again. Moss against his cheek.

He's getting rid of the cloak. It's official. That's what the statue latched on to to grab him, same move that Lu pulled, now it's sopping wet and trying to smother him again as he sits up in the water, spluttering.

He flails for his bag. The book is somewhere on the bank, landed out of sight. Knife. Where. There's one in his boot. The thing's attention is still on Lu when Tick reaches down, when something knocks against his foot in the water. And since Lu is obviously handling the threat, Tick closes his fist around it and fishes the thing out.

He holds it up. Squints. Looks back at the knight.

He's holding a stone hand. Jagged wrist wound along the top, the surface crumbling at a touch.

Lu's spear swings again.

Holy shit, did he do that? Did he take the statue's hand off? He hit it that hard? Is this some kind of cruel dramatic irony?

That thing earlier, about Tick being lucky to survive the night. Double that. Triple it, maybe. If Lu's strong enough to do that, if he's quick enough, then how the hell is Tick still alive.

Right.

Useful.

That's what he said.

He looks back at the dismembered hand. The hand in his hand.

Ok. Ok, so, then Lu can definitely handle himself. He's fine. Tick crawls a little further out of the pool. No problem. Nothing to see here. His expertise is not needed. He can take a hint. He's leaving again.

The give of something soft.

Rough pads of his animal fingers pressing down lightly, silver hair falling like a curtain, gentle words, blanket beneath, grass poking through the wool and the give of something soft.

Stern hands wrapped around the hilt of a sword and the sound of a butcher's shop– the give of something soft as the end of the knight's blade runs the boy through.

He stares at his victim, watching as his face flickers with the brutal agony a brief moment can bring. The knight doesn't know why he dares bear witness. It isn't part of the curse of his existence, to watch.

Some wounds are self inflicted.

There's a mighty crack.

The knight shifts slightly as it digs its feet into the soft, mossy floor of the pool. The boy's lance has become embedded in his chest. For half a second, they stand there, tied together by some twisted version of fate. It would have made a worthy end for the knight, if there could ever be an end in sight for the weary thing.

They stand close enough that he can see the flecks of colour in his enemy's eyes. Little slivers of brass around pupils blown with pain. The knight's own eyes are shrouded by his helm, with just a slit in the metal to see out of. Still, his enemy might just be able to make out empty pools of blank, smooth marble staring back at him.

The pause lasts a moment longer, then the knight's head turns sharply to the pond's edge. The first one, the wizard, is trying to run again, but the knight expects this from his kind. His head turns back slightly to glance briefly at Lucius before he tugs his blade out of his chest, stepping off the end of the lance in the same move.

His wrist crumbles away further with the rough movement. The knight rests his sword on his shoulder and holds the stub of his arm out above the pool, as if to call forth the ruins of his hand.

Small bits of stone rise out of the water as if by magic and slot themselves slowly back into place with soft clicks into the crooks and crannies of the incision. They build themselves there until the stub is smooth marble, but the bulk of his hand does not come.

He looks back towards the grassy bank. The wizard crawls with one hand, one arm preoccupied with holding something to his chest.

His stump raises in the direction of the coward. Sun cuts through the canopy high overhead, spots of sun shine down, bathing the knight in a soft, golden glow. The knight beckons.

The hand flattens its palm against the chest of its would be kidnapper and pushes, making its way to its rightful place with no regard for any obstacles in its path.

The knight awaits them both, sword raised to greet them.

It has eyes under the helmet. Smooth, round curve of irises in shadow. Or something like it.

Someone gave it a face beneath. Why would they do that.

He doesn't really have much time to consider it. Gone before it sinks in.

Sometimes the violence of survival is so fast. The lance grinds out of the stone, the sword slides out of his chest. He looks when the knight turns its head with the scrape of its muscle, and then they're both staring at Tick slowly crawling out of the pool.

Lu's going to kill him.

Stupid, useless, idiot –

Comes flying back, suddenly thrown into the arms of the knight, its hand flexing towards the broken edges of crumbling stone.

The blood pours down the front of Lu's shirt as he heaves up the lance, breath burning against the soft slice of the wound. Tick's still holding the granite hand, he clings to the knight's arm like black mold. The sun goes warm through the canopy, backlights him as he brings the lance back up again.

Stupid useless idiot says I was trying to lead it away.

"So you are bait."

Fine.

Hold still. Don't move. The clear shot at the statue might just be through Tick's head.

The water again. Face first this time. He's shaken off rather unceremoniously, dropping the knife on the way down and landing with another splash. At the statue's feet this time.

It would be so easy to squash him. Step on him, fuse his spine with his ribcage and be done with it. There'll be a body in the pond lying facedown with a single treadless footprint on its back.

Because his scrambling is a little halfhearted now. The adrenaline was there in the beginning, but it's been how many minutes of this? It's been how many separate falls? He's soaked, tossed around, cold, and the fear has slowly but surely ebbed away into frustration. His back still aches from being smacked into the water. Every inhale triggers a strange sound in the lungs.

There's only so many times he can convince himself that the universe is on his side.

Now he's just sloshing through the water, sluggishly feeling around for that silver handle. His fingers dig into the moss and rip up chunks of green that rise up past his face to float across the ripples. He pushes against the soft sponge of the floor, searching, and feels along the edges of long tree root that's decided to snake its way across the bottom.

The water was clear before. It's less clear now.

So much blood, it's very dark where it twists under the surface, before it spreads like ink and tints the pond a rose colour. It's dripping from Lucius still, making it progressively harder to peer through.

But there's the the root. There's the moss, and the bare sections he clawed at. There's the heel of the statue, encased in its stone armour. There's Lu's foot too. The sandal. There's the knife.