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As always, here is the link to the current ficathon, if you want to come play too. :)
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( 13. ) For anonymous: Any, any, a broken thread, written 12/20/17 [AO3 version]
unwound, unknit, unraveled (150 words)
"Oh yes, he had a thread; everyone does, from the tiniest quark all the way up to the universe itself," says the youngest of the sisters, and the smile she offers Mazikeen, while full of glinting teeth and the shadow of her other roles, is honest: one fundamental force of nature paying due respect to another.
"Had?" Mazikeen asks the oldest, eyes skipping meaningfully to her shears.
Atropos cackles and clicks the blades together with the rattle of falling bones: "Not I who ended him, dearie, if indeed he found an end at all -- see for yourself if you like," she says, and fishes a thread of tarnished gold (a contradiction incarnate, as so much of him was) from her ratty pocket, its end fraying to ever-finer shards of glinting fiber until they dissolve into dust and firelight, intangible as memories, and might-have-beens, and the unrelenting will to find escape.
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( 14. ) For anonymous: Darkangel Trilogy, Ravenna & Melchior, companionship, written 12/28/17 [AO3 version]
And o'er his heart a shadow (400 words exactly)
Note: Way more than three sentences, whoops...
-----
First he thinks that the Lady saved him -- gathered his frayed memories on her spindle, rewove the fabric of his mind and heart, and strung the finished tapestry in a body of ebony and starmetal -- to be a weapon against her lost and deadly daughter. Bitter and grieving, he buries himself in work instead of war, turns the unnatural strength and length of life she granted him to building and rebuilding the shattered machinery of the city.
When she says nothing against his choices, he begins to think that perhaps this was her goal all along, that she saved him to pit the small weight of his knowledge and influence against Oriencor's growing strength, while the Lady devotes her daymonths to weaving endless possibilities, seeking the pattern by which to breathe the world to life anew instead of dry decay. No sooner does the thought crystallize than he realizes its pride and folly, and he abandons his work (which was futile in any case; he cannot match Oriencor's reach or ruthlessness) to watch over her rooms and remind her to eat and sleep lest her loom swallow her entire and leave her no thread to trace home to her self and her life.
When she smiles and tells him not to fear, that she has set safeguards on her loom to wake her and commands in her tower to feed her, he kneels and asks, for the first time in years he has long since ceased counting, why she saved him and what she wishes him to do.
The Lady is silent for a long moment, and he holds his breath for his presumption, but then she rests her brown hand (the color of fertile earth, rich with water and hope) over his heart and says, "I saved you because she who saves one life saves the world entire; and I wish for you to make your own choices, no matter where they lead. I can give so few people freedom if the future is to hold, but to you, I can grant with gladness this rarest and most precious gift. Use it as you will."
Melchior touches her hand with his own, and raises his head, and meets her eyes: clear and depthless and shining... and beneath the glory, beneath her knowledge and power and will, the hidden shadow of loneliness and grief.
He makes his choice.
He stays.
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( 15. ) For anonymous: Any, any, nets of gold, written 12/29/17 [AO3 version]
I shall repay (150 words)
"You catch more flies with honey than vinegar," Wilson's mother used to say under her breath while his father lectured about injury and punishment, about reputation and revenge, about a strong right arm and the will to apply it to his enemies, and she was right because it was for love of her that Wilson struck down their tormentor.
He thinks of her precept now as he weaves a net of vengeance through his city, binding ever more people to his quest with chains of gold that gleam rich and warm with promise -- but not gold all the way through; scratch the surface and the iron beneath will stab and burn, as it should for those who would betray him.
When his net clamps tight around Murdock, Wilson won't bother with the gilding; because for all his weakness and his failures, on this one subject his father was also right.
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( 16. ) For anonymous: Any, any, jar of rainbows, written 12/29/17 [AO3 version]
practical magic (200 words exactly)
"Happy Birthday; I made you a jar of rainbows," Luna says, and hands Hermione a jam jar filled with shards of broken glass; bemused, Hermione blinks, then decides to offer thanks now and figure out what the gift actually is later when she won't cause offense or disrupt the party Ron and Harry have managed to surprise her with.
That evening in her Diagon Alley flat, she casts every spell she can think of on the jar, even going so far as to check whether there are wizarding folktales about glass seeds that sprouted into light, but to all appearances Luna simply handed her a jar of rubbish; she leaves it on the kitchen windowsill for lack of better options, since it would be rude to toss it out for at least a year.
When she stumbles into her kitchen the next morning in search of tea and toast, the room is filled with splintered light, brilliant and fiery as if she's standing inside the heart of an opal, and Hermione can't help laughing at the realization that Luna -- Luna Lovegood, of all people! -- gave her a completely Muggle gift that was somehow more magical than all the others.
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( 17. ) For anonymous: Any, any, pine, bamboo, plum, written 12/29/17 (prompt choice courtesy of ![[tumblr.com profile]](https://www.tumblr.com/favicon.ico)
yggidee) [AO3 version]
worth a thousand words (275 words)
Natasha sends him a letter, the first week in Wakanda; Steve doesn't bother asking how she found him, or why T'Challa decided to allow this message through, just unfolds the smooth, heavy paper to see what empty words she's arranged into a backhanded weapon, maybe even pointed enough to pierce through the numbness of leaving his life behind for the second time in less than a decade.
But instead of her handwriting (or whatever style she's imitating this year), the paper is covered in a delicate Chinese-style watercolor -- a country path winds past a lone plum tree in flower by a covered pavilion, across a bridge framed by graceful stands of bamboo, up to a pass between improbably-shaped mountains, crowned by gnarled and windswept pines -- and, fluttering to the floor, a tiny fortune-cookie paper in cheap blue ink with lottery numbers on the back reminds him that the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step... except the last word is crossed out and "sketch" is printed neatly in its place.
Steve snorts at her nerve, but despite his best effort to hold his annoyance, he can't help admiring the slightly awkward grace of the work, and somewhere in the back of his mind the Wakandan bas-reliefs, sculptures, and embroidery he's been absorbing in his aimless passage through the palace from the guest suites to the medical complex click abruptly together into a style he wants to apply to the landscape outside his bedroom window; as he reaches for a pencil and notepad, a corner of his mind is already plotting how to get his answer to Natasha, and what subtle teasing to include.
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( 18. ) For anonymous: Any, any, "dark they were, and golden eyed", written 12/30/17 (prompt choice courtesy of grumpyoldsnake) [AO3 version]
one for the road (175 words)
"In those days," said Aravis, the light of the tiny campfire casting weird shadows over the planes of her face, "demons in the shape of men walked the earth; dark they were, and golden-eyed, and their every breath--"
"I don't see what's evil about having black fur or yellow eyes," Bree interrupted with a harrumphing snort; "that describes half the Cats I've known, to say nothing of the occasional Wolf or Goat, and I've never noticed that hide color made much difference to the character of humans either, though I grant your eyes aren't generally sun-colored."
As the Horse and girl descended into bickering, Shasta leaned back against Hwin's side, and murmured, "Two minims that they somehow return to war stories before the moon tops the lemon trees beyond the sugarcane field; what say you?" and bit back a laugh when Hwin rolled her eyes and replied, "It is written that a fool and her money are soon parted, but the wise mare tends her gold like her own foal; I would have bet three minims on the same result."
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I want to knock out a few more before 2018. We'll see how that goes...
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( 13. ) For anonymous: Any, any, a broken thread, written 12/20/17 [AO3 version]unwound, unknit, unraveled (150 words)
"Oh yes, he had a thread; everyone does, from the tiniest quark all the way up to the universe itself," says the youngest of the sisters, and the smile she offers Mazikeen, while full of glinting teeth and the shadow of her other roles, is honest: one fundamental force of nature paying due respect to another.
"Had?" Mazikeen asks the oldest, eyes skipping meaningfully to her shears.
Atropos cackles and clicks the blades together with the rattle of falling bones: "Not I who ended him, dearie, if indeed he found an end at all -- see for yourself if you like," she says, and fishes a thread of tarnished gold (a contradiction incarnate, as so much of him was) from her ratty pocket, its end fraying to ever-finer shards of glinting fiber until they dissolve into dust and firelight, intangible as memories, and might-have-beens, and the unrelenting will to find escape.
---------------
---------------
( 14. ) For anonymous: Darkangel Trilogy, Ravenna & Melchior, companionship, written 12/28/17 [AO3 version]And o'er his heart a shadow (400 words exactly)
Note: Way more than three sentences, whoops...
-----
First he thinks that the Lady saved him -- gathered his frayed memories on her spindle, rewove the fabric of his mind and heart, and strung the finished tapestry in a body of ebony and starmetal -- to be a weapon against her lost and deadly daughter. Bitter and grieving, he buries himself in work instead of war, turns the unnatural strength and length of life she granted him to building and rebuilding the shattered machinery of the city.
When she says nothing against his choices, he begins to think that perhaps this was her goal all along, that she saved him to pit the small weight of his knowledge and influence against Oriencor's growing strength, while the Lady devotes her daymonths to weaving endless possibilities, seeking the pattern by which to breathe the world to life anew instead of dry decay. No sooner does the thought crystallize than he realizes its pride and folly, and he abandons his work (which was futile in any case; he cannot match Oriencor's reach or ruthlessness) to watch over her rooms and remind her to eat and sleep lest her loom swallow her entire and leave her no thread to trace home to her self and her life.
When she smiles and tells him not to fear, that she has set safeguards on her loom to wake her and commands in her tower to feed her, he kneels and asks, for the first time in years he has long since ceased counting, why she saved him and what she wishes him to do.
The Lady is silent for a long moment, and he holds his breath for his presumption, but then she rests her brown hand (the color of fertile earth, rich with water and hope) over his heart and says, "I saved you because she who saves one life saves the world entire; and I wish for you to make your own choices, no matter where they lead. I can give so few people freedom if the future is to hold, but to you, I can grant with gladness this rarest and most precious gift. Use it as you will."
Melchior touches her hand with his own, and raises his head, and meets her eyes: clear and depthless and shining... and beneath the glory, beneath her knowledge and power and will, the hidden shadow of loneliness and grief.
He makes his choice.
He stays.
---------------
---------------
( 15. ) For anonymous: Any, any, nets of gold, written 12/29/17 [AO3 version]I shall repay (150 words)
"You catch more flies with honey than vinegar," Wilson's mother used to say under her breath while his father lectured about injury and punishment, about reputation and revenge, about a strong right arm and the will to apply it to his enemies, and she was right because it was for love of her that Wilson struck down their tormentor.
He thinks of her precept now as he weaves a net of vengeance through his city, binding ever more people to his quest with chains of gold that gleam rich and warm with promise -- but not gold all the way through; scratch the surface and the iron beneath will stab and burn, as it should for those who would betray him.
When his net clamps tight around Murdock, Wilson won't bother with the gilding; because for all his weakness and his failures, on this one subject his father was also right.
---------------
---------------
( 16. ) For anonymous: Any, any, jar of rainbows, written 12/29/17 [AO3 version]practical magic (200 words exactly)
"Happy Birthday; I made you a jar of rainbows," Luna says, and hands Hermione a jam jar filled with shards of broken glass; bemused, Hermione blinks, then decides to offer thanks now and figure out what the gift actually is later when she won't cause offense or disrupt the party Ron and Harry have managed to surprise her with.
That evening in her Diagon Alley flat, she casts every spell she can think of on the jar, even going so far as to check whether there are wizarding folktales about glass seeds that sprouted into light, but to all appearances Luna simply handed her a jar of rubbish; she leaves it on the kitchen windowsill for lack of better options, since it would be rude to toss it out for at least a year.
When she stumbles into her kitchen the next morning in search of tea and toast, the room is filled with splintered light, brilliant and fiery as if she's standing inside the heart of an opal, and Hermione can't help laughing at the realization that Luna -- Luna Lovegood, of all people! -- gave her a completely Muggle gift that was somehow more magical than all the others.
---------------
---------------
( 17. ) For anonymous: Any, any, pine, bamboo, plum, written 12/29/17 (prompt choice courtesy of worth a thousand words (275 words)
Natasha sends him a letter, the first week in Wakanda; Steve doesn't bother asking how she found him, or why T'Challa decided to allow this message through, just unfolds the smooth, heavy paper to see what empty words she's arranged into a backhanded weapon, maybe even pointed enough to pierce through the numbness of leaving his life behind for the second time in less than a decade.
But instead of her handwriting (or whatever style she's imitating this year), the paper is covered in a delicate Chinese-style watercolor -- a country path winds past a lone plum tree in flower by a covered pavilion, across a bridge framed by graceful stands of bamboo, up to a pass between improbably-shaped mountains, crowned by gnarled and windswept pines -- and, fluttering to the floor, a tiny fortune-cookie paper in cheap blue ink with lottery numbers on the back reminds him that the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step... except the last word is crossed out and "sketch" is printed neatly in its place.
Steve snorts at her nerve, but despite his best effort to hold his annoyance, he can't help admiring the slightly awkward grace of the work, and somewhere in the back of his mind the Wakandan bas-reliefs, sculptures, and embroidery he's been absorbing in his aimless passage through the palace from the guest suites to the medical complex click abruptly together into a style he wants to apply to the landscape outside his bedroom window; as he reaches for a pencil and notepad, a corner of his mind is already plotting how to get his answer to Natasha, and what subtle teasing to include.
---------------
---------------
( 18. ) For anonymous: Any, any, "dark they were, and golden eyed", written 12/30/17 (prompt choice courtesy of one for the road (175 words)
"In those days," said Aravis, the light of the tiny campfire casting weird shadows over the planes of her face, "demons in the shape of men walked the earth; dark they were, and golden-eyed, and their every breath--"
"I don't see what's evil about having black fur or yellow eyes," Bree interrupted with a harrumphing snort; "that describes half the Cats I've known, to say nothing of the occasional Wolf or Goat, and I've never noticed that hide color made much difference to the character of humans either, though I grant your eyes aren't generally sun-colored."
As the Horse and girl descended into bickering, Shasta leaned back against Hwin's side, and murmured, "Two minims that they somehow return to war stories before the moon tops the lemon trees beyond the sugarcane field; what say you?" and bit back a laugh when Hwin rolled her eyes and replied, "It is written that a fool and her money are soon parted, but the wise mare tends her gold like her own foal; I would have bet three minims on the same result."
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I want to knock out a few more before 2018. We'll see how that goes...
