First original post yayyy! Welcome welcome. Ummm, so this is a story I wrote awhile ago for class and I figure this is a good a place as ever to start with.
I dunno how much context to give; this is a story taking place in my world, in a country called eroth. And the main character is my original species called erothans. I might go into it later if anyone asks but whatevs
Um. Cw: death, blood
Scabbard
Suddenly, I see.
The man hovering over me is grizzled, beard caked with soot, but looks at me with fondness. He polishes me with an old cloth until I shine his reflection in warm firelight.
I do not know how I know all these words.
“Your name is Blessed,” the man says “because that’s what you are.”
“I do not know what that means,” I say.
“You will,” he assures.
He stands, and carries me gingerly to the workbench, then hides my body so I no longer reflect anything but the gold shimmer from my grip. The sheath is warm, and comfortable, but I know I’m not meant to stay here long. Eventually, I must be wielded.
He grabs me by my sheath and carries me outside. The world has more colour than I could’ve ever imagined. Blue, and green, and bright, bright white. All the colours that didn’t exist in the forge.
My favourite colour has to be blue, blue, blue. The endless sky.
The man suddenly kneels, and I am handed to the most beautiful person I have ever seen, or will ever see. She has eyes that are blue, green, blue. Her skin reminds of the clay used to build the forge.
“What’s your name?” she asks me.
“Blessed,” I say.
She turns and unsheaths me, swinging me around for a moment and examining my blade, my grip, and my soul.
“A perfect name,” she says approvingly.
“I’m Lady Klaio, and I’m so glad tohave you.”
She hands something to the man that clinks, and then sheaths me once again.
When I am unsheathed again, Lady Klaio is sitting in the glow of firelight. The sky is dark, but not black. Grey, blue… white. Warm, familiar, lifegiving firelight. Her eyes glow, and the cool blue-green clashes with the yellow. She is smiling, and if I had the ability, I would smile too. I know I have to protect her.
“Do you know how to wield me?” I ask, suddenly anxious.
“I do. Don’t worry,” she coos.
“Tomorrow we’re going to the woods to find the man who wronged me.”
“May my blade remain sharp for you.”
She laughs, “We can work on your conversation skills later.”
Her laugh makes me wish I could smile.
Lady Klaio tucks me back into my sheath as she goes back into her tent and sets me beside her. I watch her through the night as she lays perfectly still.
I am on her hip. It is where I belong. She’s running and I can see the man ahead of us. My blade burns for his flesh, but in my scabbard I remain. I cheer as the man trips, and she laughs. When he stands up he draws a blade of his own. A dead thing. Uncared for. Old and rusted. When its blade clashes with mine, I feel filthy.
When I shout in disgust, the man staggers and Lady Klaio thrusts me into his chest.
My body turns red, red, red.
I drip blood onto the forest floor as the man falls, and I am satisfied.
Klaio is singing. She always sings the same song. It’s her favourite, and it’s the only one I know. She tells me it’s one her mother sang to her, and it’s how she keeps her alive.
I don’t know what she means, but I’m sure I will. That is always what I’m told.
I watch the world roll by from horseback, and the hoofbeats hit rhythmically with her voice. I learn it quickly, and I sing it with her.
A man is attacking her and I am filled with rage. I only wish I could move on my own.
By now, I know how to anticipate movements.
I call, “UP,” and she slashes up to block the man’s blade. I cry, “ACROSS,” and she blocks his next hit easily.
The clank of metal on metal is a ringing bell; a tremor up my body that I feel in my very core, but it is replaced by the next hit, and the next. Until finally I am still, and so is the beast that dared assault my Klaio. With every score of my being, I am made for her, but in the same way, she is mine.
The cloth is soft, and gently wipes the blood from my blade. Her hands are more calloused, but her grip is the same, and so is mine, thanks to her. The rag grows damp, and she dips it into the stream that runs by us and trickles softly. The sun reflects on the water and the stones, and I see brown, yellow, white. It is cold, and soothing. I can only imagine this is what a bath feels like, going off how Klaio has described it.
As my silvery shine reappears, her eyes reflect in them. Klaio isn’t staring at herself, though, she is looking at me, into me. I am doing the same for her. She cleans the dirt from the fuller in my blade, and it tickles; every time. I laugh. She smiles as if she wasn’t expecting me to.
“Does that tickle?” she says patronizingly.
“Don’t,” I warn, as if I can stop her.
She flips me over and runs her cloth up and down the length of the other groove and I laugh loud enough to frighten the birds in the tree overhead.
“STOP, STOP!” I cry. This was one out of a dozen times I wished I could break free.
She is laughing. I have gladly killed for that laugh.
“Not until you tell me you love me,” she taunts.
“I LOVE YOU! I LOVE YOU, KLAIO! I’LL LET THE WHOLE OF EROTH KNOW!”
She finally stops and pecks a kiss onto my pommel.
“I love you too, my Blessed.”
A huge building. Klaio holds me gingerly, and cradles me against her chest. I am comfortable. We sit still for a long time, and then the painter turns the canvas around, and it is a perfect picture of us.
“It’s perfect,” she coos as she returns me to my scabbard. “Just like my Blessed.”
She shows me portraits of her family afterward. Siblings and cousins, parents and nieces and nephews. There’s one that she says is her, but it’s so much smaller.
She has changed so much.
I look back at her, and realize there are lines in her face that were not always there. She is still changing.
I cannot change with her.
She cannot see my turmoil, and smiles. She always smiles; she’s always so happy. Is she not afraid of the change? Is she… afraid of anything?
I notice her changing again.
Her hair is turning grey, one long streak at a time. Her hands do not grip me the same: they are less nimble, and covered in bumps that run the length of her fingers. She is still my Klaio, but I worry. Her eyes are blue, green, white… she is missing spots when she polishes me, and her reflexes are slower.
“Why don’t you stop? Return home?” I ask from her belt.
“Because I would have to hang you up,” she replies. Her voice rattles deeper in her throat now. “And I would hate to do that to you.”
“I wouldn’t mind… if it meant you were safe.”
“But then you would collect dust; you hate dust.”
“I do…” I admit, “but—”
She hushes me. The cave entrance echoed our voices, and down the way we can see firelight. Klaio pulls me from my sheath and holds me at her side before we even see the thieves. She has been doing that a lot of late. She’s getting slower at unsheathing me.
Klaio’s steps are quiet and careful. Her eyes glow in the dark room, but duller; I can hardly see, so I have to trust that she can. The stones scrape imperceptibly under the soles of her boots. I see the back of a man’s head molded by the glow of a campfire, then another, then more. There are six of them; I wonder if that’s too many for us.
My blade scrapes along the stone wall like claws on slate, and if I had lungs I would be holding my breath. The thieves turn around and Klaio gasps, raising me out of instinct. In the blazing light of the fire all I can see is the other blades.
Daggers and cutlasses and rapiers glinting in the glow. There are too many of them.
“UP!” I scream, but I’m too late, and Klaios takes a hit to her shoulder. I shout in panic and scan around, but all I can see is red, and orange, and silver. I can’t parse any sounds beyond the echoing screams of Klaio and the thieves around her. I can only feel her hand, gripping tight around my hilt and shaking.
She’s shaking.
Why is she shaking?
I wasn't supposed to, but I steal a glance up at her face, and the painful red light is drowning out her shining eyes. She looks pained… scared. The expression is burned into my memory from decades of dealing the final blow. I turn my attention back to the thieves and watch as a dagger blinks into focus, and I wail,
“GUARD!”
My blade slams into the cold stone. She dropped me.
I look up and she’s clutching her chest, the campfire illuminating just enough for me to be horrified. Red, dark, red…
“KLAIO!” I cry, desperate to move, desperate to hold her the way she holds me. I needed to save her, I needed to protect her.
“Blessed…” she croaked.
“Klaio, please,” I whispered with a shattered voice, “please, you can’t.”
The clamour vanished as the thieves grabbed their things and ran.
“YOU COWARDS!” I screamed, and my voice screamed back from the cave walls.
Klaio’s wizened hands wrapped around my hilt and pulled me close. The abrasive dancing light of the fire on her face made her look just like she did when she got me. The wrinkles rubbed away, and she smiled. I still wished I could smile too.
She grabbed my blade with her bare hands and the familiar warmth of blood ran over me.
“What are you doing?” I asked. “Holding you the way I always wanted to,” she panted. The teal light from her eyes was getting dimmer, and the warm puddle was spreading under me.
“I love you,” I said, “My Klaio, my lady.”
“I love you too, my Blessed, my…—”
The blue-green light vanished and I screamed into the cavern, letting my own echoes deafen me.
The world is black, black, black. No movement, no sound, no light.
I am a dead thing. Uncared for. Old and rusted. I was loved, and loved well, once. I am in her arms; it’s where I belong. The flesh has been picked clean off her bones, but she is still my Klaio.
I still sing her song. To keep her memory alive. My voice echoes back at me so I harmonize with myself at all hours of the day. I don’t know how long it’s been. Only now do I understand my name. I was Blessed, but Klaio is the one who blessed me.
Thank you so much for reading my lil story! lemme know if you want more or wanna be on a taglist or anything. I will be posting from all over the timeline and from various other worlds yay!
@fleur-alise
