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Dec. 11th, 2018 03:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7I'm going through my Google Docs, there's stuff in there from twelve years ago at least, it's a mess.
I was looking for snippets of fanfic to post, stuff people would be interested in, but I just found a doc that's labeled "NaNoWriMo 2011" that I have literally no memory of.
I'm actually... not sure I wrote it?
I don't know if I'm still in contact with anyone from 2011. I think that was before I'd gotten back into fanfic? I hadn't been writing, for years, I don't think? I don't... remember, though.
I have no memory whatsoever of writing this. Does anyone recognize this? Did someone share the doc with me and then leave Google so there's no record of it? I just don't know. I would swear I've never seen this piece before, though I can recognize a few details that are the kind of thing I would've stolen from various familiar sources and then edited as I refined my worldbuilding. It's consistent with my writing.
But I have literally zero recollection whatsoever of writing it.
(Like... there's clearly influences from Martha Wells' Wheel of the Infinite, in the details of the guardians and caste markers, and I had been reading that novel around that time, but I literally don't remember any of this.)
Galan was moodily pulling the fringe out of his blanket, listening idly for the hoofbeats that would presage his father's return. His father was still toweringly furious with him over the loss of his old guardian, and the shadow of the powerful man's anger loomed over the tent where they lived for now.
The wooden door in its doorframe slammed open with a shuddering thump, and Galan started, and winced as it jostled the stitches in the wound down his thigh. Kazan strode in, and behind him stalked a weatherbeaten man in a travel-stained, frayed jerkin and standard-issue Mahid helmet, eyes startlingly pale in his sun-dark face.
"Galan," Kazan barked, "you stand for me."
"My leg," Galan said, but bit it off and dragged himself sullenly upright. He recognized this mood of his father's and knew any resistance would meet with a sharp cuff to the head. Kazan's eyes glinted dangerously, and Galan steadied himself carefully, not letting his eyes stray too much to the strange man.
"It's only what you deserve," Kazan said. He turned to address the stranger. "Eyat, you resume your service, but this time to me. This is my son Galan. You guard him. I will speak to you more of this, but must go now."
Kazan whirled and went back through the door, thumping it shut behind him. Galan stood a moment longer, wavering, staring at the stranger, then eased himself warily down to sit on his cot again. The stranger stood utterly motionless, gazing impassively at him.
The man was a soldier, certainly; he had a Mahidim helmet with its face shield pushed up, and a well-worn rifle slung over one shoulder. His jerkin was faded and patched and covered the distinctive shape of a Mahidim breastplate, his shoulders squared by it.
He didn't look like a guardian. Guardians were always clean-cut, always obtrusively unobtrusive. This man was filthy, dirt ground into the creases of skin around his neck, dust settled in the lines of his face, and something in his blank, inscrutable stare was insolent.
"Who are you," Galan managed to demand.
The man hesitated, ice-blue eyes shifting from middle distance to focus sharply on Galan's face. "Eyat," he said, and there was an audible space where a unit appelation and a rank signifier, should have been.
"Eyat who," Galan prompted, annoyed, and unsettled.
"That remains to be seen," the man answered.
Galan eyed the man's ears. There were caste markings there, sure enough; but there were also confusing scars where some had been removed, and Galan couldn't begin to puzzle out what was what. He also had a facial tattoo like a married man, the distinctive dark line along the cheekbone. Even more unsettled, Galan watched the man watching him and wished he hadn't said anything.
"I guess I can't ask you what the hell is going on, then," the man said after a moment's heavy silence. He had no accent; he was Mahid and spoke the language with no inflection. He sounded like a guardian, sounded like the stern disciplined men Galan had grown up surrounded by.
He just didn't look like one.
"I am the last person in the world," Galan said bitterly, "to ever ask what the hell is going on."
Unexpectedly Eyat laughed. His posture changed, some of the steel going out of his backbone, and he unslung the rifle from his shoulder and set it to lean against the partition. He hooked a stool familiarly with his foot and sat on it with a sigh, pulling a canteen off the back of his belt. "I should've known," he said.
Galan wanted to ask what he should've known, but made himself be silent, watching the man drink from the canteen. He put it back on his belt, then unfastened his helmet's dangling chin strap and pulled it off, setting it on the ground next to him.
His hair was a wild mass of overgrown curls. Mahid soldiers cut it off; guardians wore it long, but tightly braided. Galan had never seen hair like this, ungroomed and untrimmed. His own hair was meticulously braided, as befitted his station as a young nobleman.
"What are you?" Galan asked, despite himself.
The man scratched at his scalp, yawning and working his fingers through his thick hair, and after a long moment tossed his hair back and looked up at Galan, looking deeply weary. Guardians rarely showed any kind of emotion or vulnerability. This man was familiar enough to pass as one, but was wrong in too many ways.
"That's what remains to be seen," he said. Galan could see the tension still in the man's shoulders and spine, though he sat as though he were relaxed. No easy feat, on these flimsy canvas camp stools. His shins were curved like a horseman's, toes pointing inward in repose.
A guardian wouldn't have a marriage tattoo. Guardians couldn't marry, it was a feature of their caste. A soldier wouldn't have long hair. But this man was obviously a soldier, dusty from battle. There was even a little spray of dried blood flecking the edge of his neck where the helmet's face shield would have stopped, and decorating the shoulder of the faded jerkin.
It hit Galan like his father's open hand: a mercenary. Eyat was a mercenary.
Kazan had left him alone in a tent with an armed mercenary.
Galan gathered his breath carefully, considering what to do next. He was unarmed; his father had taken his pistol and his knife after Ruat had been killed, despite his protestations that it would leave him utterly bereft of protection.
If Eyat was a mercenary, he had to have defected. He had Mahid caste markings. He was from here. He even had equipment from here. His rifle was of Keloha make, but the body armor and helmet were Mahid.
Kazan had left Galan with an armed mercenary who was a defector or traitor.
Galan glanced up and noticed Eyat's perfectly blank expression. He'd grown up among men with perfectly blank expressions, raised by a woman with an entire spectrum of perfectly blank expressions, so he knew how to read this one. Eyat knew Galan knew, now, and was affecting nonchalance to see how he'd react. Galan closed his face, not letting his eyes flicker to Eyat's hands. In his peripheral vision he could see that neither held a weapon, neither had moved toward the belt or thigh, where standard holsters tended to be. But he refused to look more carefully. He stared at Eyat's face, like a rabbit staring at a snake.
"This is novel," Galan said finally. "Of all the things my father has done to me, this is by far the strangest. I hadn't realized he was quite so upset about Ruat."
Eyat looked startled. "Ruat," he said. "What about Ruat?"
From his tone, he'd known the man. Perfect. Galan sighed, and looked away; he wasn't going to be able to save himself from a man like this. So there was no point staring him down; knowing the exact instant death was coming wouldn't help him ward it off. The man probably had a knife in his gauntlet, like an assassin. Galan had been trained to look for all sorts of things like that, but his ability to defend himself extended solely to fending off an initial attack so that his guardian could have time to save him.
"I got him killed," Galan said. Lies wouldn't help either. If his father wanted him dead now, he was dead. Ruat had been just a servant, and Galan was an irreplaceable sole heir, but Kazan was brutal and ruthless enough to do anything to anyone for any reason.
Eyat was silent, but visibly stricken. "I'm sorry to hear that," he said finally. "Ruat was a good man."
"Not as sorry as I am, surely," Galan said. It was the first time he had admitted that it was his fault. He had insisted up until now that he wasn't to blame. But in the face of this stranger's ice-blue gaze he knew that prevaricating would make him sound like a whiny child. "I did something rash, and he had to rescue me, and died doing his duty."
Eyat nodded, and looked down, something in his shoulders' rigid line drooping. "I see," he said. Galan risked another look at him, counting the scars in his ears. He was younger than Ruat had been; Galan was bad at ages but reckoned Eyat wasn't old yet, but wasn't young; the skin around his eyes was crinkled with years of sun, and a few hairs in his wild mane and full beard had faded to silver, but his skin was still taut, his hands battered but his fingers still straight. Ruat's face had settled into deep creases and his voice had begun to roughen, and in the mornings his hands had ached and he had needed to work them limber again, the knuckles swollen and starting to twist.
And now age no longer troubled him.
"You don't remember me," Eyat said, looking up and catching Galan studying him. "I remember you well. You've grown a great deal."
I was looking for snippets of fanfic to post, stuff people would be interested in, but I just found a doc that's labeled "NaNoWriMo 2011" that I have literally no memory of.
I'm actually... not sure I wrote it?
I don't know if I'm still in contact with anyone from 2011. I think that was before I'd gotten back into fanfic? I hadn't been writing, for years, I don't think? I don't... remember, though.
I have no memory whatsoever of writing this. Does anyone recognize this? Did someone share the doc with me and then leave Google so there's no record of it? I just don't know. I would swear I've never seen this piece before, though I can recognize a few details that are the kind of thing I would've stolen from various familiar sources and then edited as I refined my worldbuilding. It's consistent with my writing.
But I have literally zero recollection whatsoever of writing it.
(Like... there's clearly influences from Martha Wells' Wheel of the Infinite, in the details of the guardians and caste markers, and I had been reading that novel around that time, but I literally don't remember any of this.)
Galan was moodily pulling the fringe out of his blanket, listening idly for the hoofbeats that would presage his father's return. His father was still toweringly furious with him over the loss of his old guardian, and the shadow of the powerful man's anger loomed over the tent where they lived for now.
The wooden door in its doorframe slammed open with a shuddering thump, and Galan started, and winced as it jostled the stitches in the wound down his thigh. Kazan strode in, and behind him stalked a weatherbeaten man in a travel-stained, frayed jerkin and standard-issue Mahid helmet, eyes startlingly pale in his sun-dark face.
"Galan," Kazan barked, "you stand for me."
"My leg," Galan said, but bit it off and dragged himself sullenly upright. He recognized this mood of his father's and knew any resistance would meet with a sharp cuff to the head. Kazan's eyes glinted dangerously, and Galan steadied himself carefully, not letting his eyes stray too much to the strange man.
"It's only what you deserve," Kazan said. He turned to address the stranger. "Eyat, you resume your service, but this time to me. This is my son Galan. You guard him. I will speak to you more of this, but must go now."
Kazan whirled and went back through the door, thumping it shut behind him. Galan stood a moment longer, wavering, staring at the stranger, then eased himself warily down to sit on his cot again. The stranger stood utterly motionless, gazing impassively at him.
The man was a soldier, certainly; he had a Mahidim helmet with its face shield pushed up, and a well-worn rifle slung over one shoulder. His jerkin was faded and patched and covered the distinctive shape of a Mahidim breastplate, his shoulders squared by it.
He didn't look like a guardian. Guardians were always clean-cut, always obtrusively unobtrusive. This man was filthy, dirt ground into the creases of skin around his neck, dust settled in the lines of his face, and something in his blank, inscrutable stare was insolent.
"Who are you," Galan managed to demand.
The man hesitated, ice-blue eyes shifting from middle distance to focus sharply on Galan's face. "Eyat," he said, and there was an audible space where a unit appelation and a rank signifier, should have been.
"Eyat who," Galan prompted, annoyed, and unsettled.
"That remains to be seen," the man answered.
Galan eyed the man's ears. There were caste markings there, sure enough; but there were also confusing scars where some had been removed, and Galan couldn't begin to puzzle out what was what. He also had a facial tattoo like a married man, the distinctive dark line along the cheekbone. Even more unsettled, Galan watched the man watching him and wished he hadn't said anything.
"I guess I can't ask you what the hell is going on, then," the man said after a moment's heavy silence. He had no accent; he was Mahid and spoke the language with no inflection. He sounded like a guardian, sounded like the stern disciplined men Galan had grown up surrounded by.
He just didn't look like one.
"I am the last person in the world," Galan said bitterly, "to ever ask what the hell is going on."
Unexpectedly Eyat laughed. His posture changed, some of the steel going out of his backbone, and he unslung the rifle from his shoulder and set it to lean against the partition. He hooked a stool familiarly with his foot and sat on it with a sigh, pulling a canteen off the back of his belt. "I should've known," he said.
Galan wanted to ask what he should've known, but made himself be silent, watching the man drink from the canteen. He put it back on his belt, then unfastened his helmet's dangling chin strap and pulled it off, setting it on the ground next to him.
His hair was a wild mass of overgrown curls. Mahid soldiers cut it off; guardians wore it long, but tightly braided. Galan had never seen hair like this, ungroomed and untrimmed. His own hair was meticulously braided, as befitted his station as a young nobleman.
"What are you?" Galan asked, despite himself.
The man scratched at his scalp, yawning and working his fingers through his thick hair, and after a long moment tossed his hair back and looked up at Galan, looking deeply weary. Guardians rarely showed any kind of emotion or vulnerability. This man was familiar enough to pass as one, but was wrong in too many ways.
"That's what remains to be seen," he said. Galan could see the tension still in the man's shoulders and spine, though he sat as though he were relaxed. No easy feat, on these flimsy canvas camp stools. His shins were curved like a horseman's, toes pointing inward in repose.
A guardian wouldn't have a marriage tattoo. Guardians couldn't marry, it was a feature of their caste. A soldier wouldn't have long hair. But this man was obviously a soldier, dusty from battle. There was even a little spray of dried blood flecking the edge of his neck where the helmet's face shield would have stopped, and decorating the shoulder of the faded jerkin.
It hit Galan like his father's open hand: a mercenary. Eyat was a mercenary.
Kazan had left him alone in a tent with an armed mercenary.
Galan gathered his breath carefully, considering what to do next. He was unarmed; his father had taken his pistol and his knife after Ruat had been killed, despite his protestations that it would leave him utterly bereft of protection.
If Eyat was a mercenary, he had to have defected. He had Mahid caste markings. He was from here. He even had equipment from here. His rifle was of Keloha make, but the body armor and helmet were Mahid.
Kazan had left Galan with an armed mercenary who was a defector or traitor.
Galan glanced up and noticed Eyat's perfectly blank expression. He'd grown up among men with perfectly blank expressions, raised by a woman with an entire spectrum of perfectly blank expressions, so he knew how to read this one. Eyat knew Galan knew, now, and was affecting nonchalance to see how he'd react. Galan closed his face, not letting his eyes flicker to Eyat's hands. In his peripheral vision he could see that neither held a weapon, neither had moved toward the belt or thigh, where standard holsters tended to be. But he refused to look more carefully. He stared at Eyat's face, like a rabbit staring at a snake.
"This is novel," Galan said finally. "Of all the things my father has done to me, this is by far the strangest. I hadn't realized he was quite so upset about Ruat."
Eyat looked startled. "Ruat," he said. "What about Ruat?"
From his tone, he'd known the man. Perfect. Galan sighed, and looked away; he wasn't going to be able to save himself from a man like this. So there was no point staring him down; knowing the exact instant death was coming wouldn't help him ward it off. The man probably had a knife in his gauntlet, like an assassin. Galan had been trained to look for all sorts of things like that, but his ability to defend himself extended solely to fending off an initial attack so that his guardian could have time to save him.
"I got him killed," Galan said. Lies wouldn't help either. If his father wanted him dead now, he was dead. Ruat had been just a servant, and Galan was an irreplaceable sole heir, but Kazan was brutal and ruthless enough to do anything to anyone for any reason.
Eyat was silent, but visibly stricken. "I'm sorry to hear that," he said finally. "Ruat was a good man."
"Not as sorry as I am, surely," Galan said. It was the first time he had admitted that it was his fault. He had insisted up until now that he wasn't to blame. But in the face of this stranger's ice-blue gaze he knew that prevaricating would make him sound like a whiny child. "I did something rash, and he had to rescue me, and died doing his duty."
Eyat nodded, and looked down, something in his shoulders' rigid line drooping. "I see," he said. Galan risked another look at him, counting the scars in his ears. He was younger than Ruat had been; Galan was bad at ages but reckoned Eyat wasn't old yet, but wasn't young; the skin around his eyes was crinkled with years of sun, and a few hairs in his wild mane and full beard had faded to silver, but his skin was still taut, his hands battered but his fingers still straight. Ruat's face had settled into deep creases and his voice had begun to roughen, and in the mornings his hands had ached and he had needed to work them limber again, the knuckles swollen and starting to twist.
And now age no longer troubled him.
"You don't remember me," Eyat said, looking up and catching Galan studying him. "I remember you well. You've grown a great deal."
