Marcella
Mari liked to think that she didn’t have a violent bone in her body, but her brother was really challenging that thought.
She was beginning to wonder if she’d lost the ability to think entirely as she leaped out of her chair and ran after Tristan. It wasn’t hard to keep up with him as they were equal in their lack of muscle.
“Tristan!” She called. “Come back! We’ll get sick!”
Realizing she was on his tail, Tristan shouted back, “What the hell are you doing?!”
“I could say the same for you!”
“Go back home, I’ll be right there!”
“Like hell I am!”
She didn’t want to admit it, and maybe it was purely the adrenaline that filled her veins, but there was something exhilarating in running after her idiot brother beneath the setting sun- the remnants of bright reds and oranges giving way to a midnight blue.
Mari had watched the same sunsets a million times from her home, but none of it compared to this.
“Crap, I’m going to be late!”
“Late for what?” Mari asked, following his gaze as they descended the hill. It landed on the campfire that marked the center of their village, empty now but full of markets and stables and-
The army recruitment stand.
Mari laughed. “You can’t be serious.”
“Says the girl who still believes in vampires!”
“Vampires are more believable than you joining the army!”
“Shut up!” Tristan wheezed. “You have no idea what it’s like to be stuck inside that cage mom calls a home!”
“Are you a dumbass?! I live with you!”
“Really? Because up until now you could’ve fooled me!”
Mari didn’t reply. He had a point, this was probably the longest conversation (if you could call it that) she had with her brother in years, and she was always curled up somewhere with a book while he shut himself in his room. But she supposed it was their mother, really, who didn’t let him leave. Unlike Tristan, Mari was perfectly content to watch the sun set from their cottage.
It was better than facing what was out there.
Luckily, the air tonight was void of the savage winds that typically plagued Danethal. Mari recalled the passages about Rhovandy from the book her mother gave her for her fifteenth birthday, The Lands of Lysia. It was said that the small province lodged westward behind the others had the shortest winters and longest summers, during which people would hike to the shores and bathe in the clear, sparkling water. Apart from the beauty of its mountains and cities, colorful stone houses lining the rivers that all flowed to the castle, Rhovandy was known for the beauty of its citizens, especially the royal family. Tan and dark-eyed, the Windsor’s had reigned all of Lysia, apart from the barren shadowlands, since all the former kingdoms (now provinces with dukes overseeing the lords that owned smaller counties within them) had united as one.
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Why they united was anyone’s guess. It happened hundreds of years ago and nobody knew how to read the old tongue that had evolved into modern day Lysian. All Mari knew from her books was that there was a great war that almost wiped out the continent until the kingdoms united and fought back- against who was as much a mystery, although the royal family claimed it was merely a large tribe of bandits.
Mari didn’t know if she believed that, but she would give anything to find out the truth. She’d fall asleep almost every night dreaming of it- walking in the halls of the great manors, some nearly as large and opulent as the royal castle itself, that served as universities for the purpose of forging scholars for the kingdom. They were mostly found in Rhovandy, although some dedicated to more soldiery subjects were spread across Azeris, the province bordering it that was known for it’s military stronghold and training of new troops.
Perhaps in another life, she’d tell herself. If she hadn’t been so sick and her family so poor, she could have become an academic. Perhaps she would even cure her own illness, not that much was known about it, and she’d looked. Had asked her own mother thousands of times why she couldn’t, no matter what, bleed.
She’d spent too long staring down at the veins on her wrists with a hairpin in hand, a voice in her head taunting her to just pierce the skin- just once, to see what would happen.
But her rationality would soon set in and she’d pretend like the voice was never there.
Finally, they reached the village center and made their way towards the stand past the still burning campfire, their path illuminated by the light of the fire and torches that hung from the various homes and buildings. Some were shops owned by tailors and blacksmiths, their products on display through the windows. Some were owned by bakers, butchers, carpenters- Mari even spotted a clump of wooden planks abandoned on the side of the pathway.
She’d never cared much for the village but it might’ve been nice to grow up here.
There was no soldier at the stand, but Mari could see a figure walking deeper into the village. It had to be him.
“Mom’s going to kill you,” she said to Tristan who was still running, albeit at a slower pace. She could smell the smoke of the fire they’d just passed on his clothes.
“She won’t know until tomorrow, it’ll be my birthday surprise to her.”
“Your birthday surprise is a heart attack?”
He threw her a glare. “If I knew you were this funny I’d have treated you like an actual sister, Marcella. Oh, and if I hadn’t mentioned it yet, happy birthday.”
“Don’t call me that, and right back at you!”
It wasn’t that Mari hated her name, it was that the only memory she had of her father was him calling her by the nickname, and Marcella felt too formal anyhow.
“Hey!” Tristan called, Mari realized, to the figure.
He continued walking.
Mari sighed. To hell with it. “Hey!”
The figure paused and turned, revealing a young man’s face beneath the shadows, no older than twenty-two or so.
“You know, for someone typically so silent, you’re pretty good at being loud.”
Mari shot him a glare before the two finally crossed the distance to the man- him coming closer to meet them. She’d never seen a soldier so close in person before, but his uniform looked exactly like the description she’d read in books. Metal plated armor lined with sapphires that shone beneath the moonlight- the royal family’s emblem, a crown sewn into a flag of blue and yellow, hung on his chest. As for the soldier himself, he had warm green eyes beneath a tussle of dirty-blonde hair.
“What are you kids doing here?” He asked once they met, looking from Mari to her brother. “It’s past sunset.”
“We can tell,” Tristan said automatically before seemingly realizing he was speaking to a soldier. “Sorry, sir, I meant that we left before then.”
The soldier cocked a brow. “And what is it you need?”
“Well,” Tristan murmured, looking down at his feet. “I wanted to join the army as a soldier. Today’s my sixteenth birthday.”
The soldier smiled kindly. “That’s great to hear, but you need your guardian with you to provide consent.”
Tristan blinked, and Mari felt her own heart drop in her chest. Not that she cared. “What?”
“Yeah, at least until you’re nineteen and can join yourself.”
“I was just joking, I’m not really sixteen,” he pleaded, to Mari’s surprise, with tears in his eyes. She didn’t understand why anyone would want to be as something as dangerous as a soldier, but what did she know.
The soldier sighed, moving closer to place a comforting hand on his shoulder- a ruby ring on his finger. It almost looked too pretty for a fake jewel, but a soldier from Danethal definitely could’t afford a real one. Or perhaps it'd been a gift.
He paused as he studied Tristan, thinking of what to say. “I- look, kid, I really am sorry. Just come back next week with your guardian and you’ll be fine.”
If Tristan looked upset before, he was utterly devastated now. “And if I don’t, I have to wait three more years?”
The soldier nodded, looking at him with pity lit in his eyes. “Why don’t you get back home, now? You must be from around here, although I don’t think I’ve seen you before.”
Before Tristan could reply, Mari chimed in, “Yes, sir. We’ll be on our way, thank you.”
She grabbed her brother’s arm and pulled him along as she began walking back the way they came, her runner's high long forgotten.
After a few silent moments, during which Mari peered over her shoulder to see the soldier still standing and staring after them, she said quietly, “It’s just three more years.”
Tristan said nothing as he allowed her to drag him away.