22 Ashan, 717
.
The sun was slowly rising, yet a young woman wearing a flattering, yet ridiculous dress in such frigid weather, had just woken up. She yawned and brushed her eyes with the back of her hand before taking a step out into the chilly evening air. She inhaled a few deep breaths and scanned her surroundings, oblivious to the weather other than the fact that it was “a bit chilly”.
It was here that the woman had mixed feelings of whether or not she wished to go outside today. It was so warm and comfortable in her tent. However, she had felt unproductive the day before and needed to exercise her brain.
The woman with eyes the colour of loamy sea quickly slipped back into the tent where she warmed herself in the mounds of blankets. It had only taken her a trill to conclude that today was going to be a lazy day. But she was going to accomplish something. The trial was just beginning after all and she already had out her journal and pencil to accompany it. She pushed her bedroll and blanket to the side so she’d have more room to write before licking the end of the pencil, a bad habit she had developed through bouts of writer's block.
Today she planned to open her mind to the creative world around her. There were tons of activity around the city, but since it was early Ashan and Tous didn’t feel much like exploring since it was still cold out, it would be difficult to write about it without actually seeing it. It wasn’t a drawback, though. She had tons of imagination stored in her mind from both her past and what she planned to do in the future. She just needed to reach in and handle it with care as she wrote it down.
Tapping the pencil to her chin a few times, the woman tried to think. Thinking was her speciality, but when it came to have free reign on what to think about, she wasn’t in her strongest suit.
With her head tilted the side, her legs sprawled out behind her as she lay on her belly, an idea eventually popped into her mind. I shall write a poem, she thought to herself as her eyes naturally glued themselves to the piece of paper laid out to her advantage.
Ideas were already sprouting inside her mind like flowers rising to great the sun in the morning, their petals opening to welcome the rays that cast down upon their bodies. Just that depiction right there sent Tous into a frenzy:
”As the sunlight stirs amidst the clouds
The wildlife below rises to greet it
Its rays falling to kiss the ground
The warmth it brings caressing many souls.
Apart from a small gale amid the stagnant air
The flowers never faulter to cease their avid stillness
The birds chirp overhead, singing their songs
And the deer graze nearby.
A stream of water flows through the trees
There is nothing but tranquility here
The sway of the trees give comfort to all
But soon the sun must say its farewell.
Slowly lowering itself below the horizon
The glow of its embers seem to die out
Until next morning when it returns
The sounds of nature will begin again.”
Brushing a stray lock of crimson hair from her face, Tous sat up and stretched, reading over all she had recently written. She corrected a few spelling errors before rereading it a second time to see how it sounded.
Nature. Once she thought about it, the word sounded strange in the mind. The definition of the word meant so many different things to the young Yludih, but only one definition, the one her birth mother had described to her, stuck out to her as it had through all the arcs.
Her mother’s voice whispered into her ear then: ‘nature defines the beauty created by the wonderful immortals of the universe.’
It was so wonderful, the ways in which words ignited several different images in someone's mind at the exact same time. It was methodically said as if it had been repeated a million times, yet each time was spoken from the depths of the heart. It was genuine and special to Tous, and only flashes of images of her mother or memories of the time she had spent with her came to her each trial, making it all the more special. It was all she had to live by in remembering her mother.
After thinking over some of her mother’s philosophical phrases, Tous started to come up with her own. They were thoughtful, yet confusing, and at the same time, sensible, to anyone who thought hard enough about the truth behind their meaning.
“When you’re stuck, you’re never stuck. You’re merely advancing onto an answer to your problem.”
Clapping a hand over her mouth quickly. Had she just said that? It surly wasn't her mother's voice in her ears that time so she couldn't only assume it had been her. She smiled to herself, feeling rather proud that she had said something quite intelligent and thoughtful. Tous started to mull that concept over in her head, moulding it so it could be something she could better work with. She conjured up more ideas to write about in her head, but inevitably fell short and stuck with how else to describe nature as she had in her previous writing. What else stuck out to her like the sun on a trial of clear sky?
“A butterfly,” the woman whispered to herself, smiling at the thought of the magnificence and beatitude of such a creature. There was a handful of things to write about describing the thing; the list was endless. So, Tous immersed herself into another frenzy of thoughts as they poured out from her mind and onto the paper:
”Translucent wings shine in the morning
And they glow heavenly at night
Their powdered scales full of colour
Creating such a beautiful sight.
Its fluttering propels it across leaves
Its antennae senses for disturbance
Stealing pollen for other flowers
The value of the creature is of great importance.
To fly on the wings of freedom
To feel the wind across its body
It casts hope across all of nature’s beauty
For it is necessary for its special hobby…”
A grimace appeared on the young Yludih's face. She dropped her pencil and began to massage a cramp in her hand. It had just started and she worried that it wouldn't relieve itself, thereby sinking her hopes of continuing to write. Her worries were made true as the terrible truth became apparent- she had lost her train of thought. Everything she had going on inside her head had vanished like when you fog up a window and your reflection disappears. All that remained were a few empty sentences and no hope to revive them. The woman wasn’t sad, though. She fought with against the pessimism that was slowly growing inside her gut and turned to look at the positives only- she had gotten some pretty detailed work written down and was proud of herself for it.
Besides, with her hand throbbing slightly, she decided it was time to take a short break.
She changed her position so she was no longer lying on her stomach but was now sitting with her legs crossed. She laid her pencil beside her as she opted to flip through her journal to look at past entries; she had many. She had written short paragraphs of her adventures into the city, namely ones that invigorated a sense of adventure and reflected her emotions through times of distress. Travelling to Rharne hadn't been a fun time, but leaving her stepmother had been worth it.
Her eyes scanned her previous passages and with every word, every sentence, and every paragraph of detailed writing, she felt overcome with the very emotions she had felt during the time she had first written them. That's when her mother's voice flittered through her ears a second time: "When ever you are feeling creative, write. But whenever you are uninspired, read."
She then began to write, honing in on her mother's words as though she were standing right beside her:
“Tick, tock, tick tock
There goes a clock, a heartbeat
It suddenly stops, it truly stops
Shuffling, shuffling behind me.
To turn and see, to really see
Yellow eyes and baring teeth
Sharp, so sharp, like daggers
A wolf of serene hostility.
I’ve invaded, disturbed, unearthed
His privacy no longer his
He chases me, chases me close behind
I trip, I fall, I know I’m dead.
Instead of accepting defeat
I pull out a weapon, a sharp weapon
I draw it out front and wait, I wait
I patiently wait for the chance to continue my life.
Tick tock, tick tock,
The clock is my heart beat
Tick, tock, tick tock,
I’m still alive and breathing.
I move the wolf, the dead beast before me
I move him to safety and breath
I breath and breathe and breathe
I am alive.”
It was a different style than she was used to writing in- she had done so on a whim- but it came from her heart and was especially driven from her one of her mother's philosophical words. And although it brought back some memories both happy and sad in origin, it felt good to get them down on paper.
Suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, Tous caught sight of some colourful feathers. With wings the colour of blueberries and a beak the shade of the sun, a small bird was perched gracefully on a branch not a few feet outside the mesh flap of her tent window. The young Yludih was about to describe in her journal the bird's appearance when it began to sing a song of its kind. The musical pitch that left the bird’s beak sent shivers down her spine. They were the good kind of shivers, though, and for whatever reason, they reminded her of home.
Transfixed by both the bird's physical beauty and it's talent to sing, the woman had regained a sense of inspiration worthy of her picking up the pencil. She flipped back to the page where she had been writing earlier and began to write, only this time it was less prose and more statement:
"I journey from place to place with my feathers out
I call to my kind with a song that cannot be ignored.
Hear me, my friends and fellows alike,
For I fathom a new home to call my own."
And that's exactly how Tous felt. She hoped this new city would be her new home. She just had to figure out how to make it so.
It was here that the woman had mixed feelings of whether or not she wished to go outside today. It was so warm and comfortable in her tent. However, she had felt unproductive the day before and needed to exercise her brain.
The woman with eyes the colour of loamy sea quickly slipped back into the tent where she warmed herself in the mounds of blankets. It had only taken her a trill to conclude that today was going to be a lazy day. But she was going to accomplish something. The trial was just beginning after all and she already had out her journal and pencil to accompany it. She pushed her bedroll and blanket to the side so she’d have more room to write before licking the end of the pencil, a bad habit she had developed through bouts of writer's block.
Today she planned to open her mind to the creative world around her. There were tons of activity around the city, but since it was early Ashan and Tous didn’t feel much like exploring since it was still cold out, it would be difficult to write about it without actually seeing it. It wasn’t a drawback, though. She had tons of imagination stored in her mind from both her past and what she planned to do in the future. She just needed to reach in and handle it with care as she wrote it down.
Tapping the pencil to her chin a few times, the woman tried to think. Thinking was her speciality, but when it came to have free reign on what to think about, she wasn’t in her strongest suit.
With her head tilted the side, her legs sprawled out behind her as she lay on her belly, an idea eventually popped into her mind. I shall write a poem, she thought to herself as her eyes naturally glued themselves to the piece of paper laid out to her advantage.
Ideas were already sprouting inside her mind like flowers rising to great the sun in the morning, their petals opening to welcome the rays that cast down upon their bodies. Just that depiction right there sent Tous into a frenzy:
”As the sunlight stirs amidst the clouds
The wildlife below rises to greet it
Its rays falling to kiss the ground
The warmth it brings caressing many souls.
Apart from a small gale amid the stagnant air
The flowers never faulter to cease their avid stillness
The birds chirp overhead, singing their songs
And the deer graze nearby.
A stream of water flows through the trees
There is nothing but tranquility here
The sway of the trees give comfort to all
But soon the sun must say its farewell.
Slowly lowering itself below the horizon
The glow of its embers seem to die out
Until next morning when it returns
The sounds of nature will begin again.”
Brushing a stray lock of crimson hair from her face, Tous sat up and stretched, reading over all she had recently written. She corrected a few spelling errors before rereading it a second time to see how it sounded.
Nature. Once she thought about it, the word sounded strange in the mind. The definition of the word meant so many different things to the young Yludih, but only one definition, the one her birth mother had described to her, stuck out to her as it had through all the arcs.
Her mother’s voice whispered into her ear then: ‘nature defines the beauty created by the wonderful immortals of the universe.’
It was so wonderful, the ways in which words ignited several different images in someone's mind at the exact same time. It was methodically said as if it had been repeated a million times, yet each time was spoken from the depths of the heart. It was genuine and special to Tous, and only flashes of images of her mother or memories of the time she had spent with her came to her each trial, making it all the more special. It was all she had to live by in remembering her mother.
After thinking over some of her mother’s philosophical phrases, Tous started to come up with her own. They were thoughtful, yet confusing, and at the same time, sensible, to anyone who thought hard enough about the truth behind their meaning.
“When you’re stuck, you’re never stuck. You’re merely advancing onto an answer to your problem.”
Clapping a hand over her mouth quickly. Had she just said that? It surly wasn't her mother's voice in her ears that time so she couldn't only assume it had been her. She smiled to herself, feeling rather proud that she had said something quite intelligent and thoughtful. Tous started to mull that concept over in her head, moulding it so it could be something she could better work with. She conjured up more ideas to write about in her head, but inevitably fell short and stuck with how else to describe nature as she had in her previous writing. What else stuck out to her like the sun on a trial of clear sky?
“A butterfly,” the woman whispered to herself, smiling at the thought of the magnificence and beatitude of such a creature. There was a handful of things to write about describing the thing; the list was endless. So, Tous immersed herself into another frenzy of thoughts as they poured out from her mind and onto the paper:
”Translucent wings shine in the morning
And they glow heavenly at night
Their powdered scales full of colour
Creating such a beautiful sight.
Its fluttering propels it across leaves
Its antennae senses for disturbance
Stealing pollen for other flowers
The value of the creature is of great importance.
To fly on the wings of freedom
To feel the wind across its body
It casts hope across all of nature’s beauty
For it is necessary for its special hobby…”
A grimace appeared on the young Yludih's face. She dropped her pencil and began to massage a cramp in her hand. It had just started and she worried that it wouldn't relieve itself, thereby sinking her hopes of continuing to write. Her worries were made true as the terrible truth became apparent- she had lost her train of thought. Everything she had going on inside her head had vanished like when you fog up a window and your reflection disappears. All that remained were a few empty sentences and no hope to revive them. The woman wasn’t sad, though. She fought with against the pessimism that was slowly growing inside her gut and turned to look at the positives only- she had gotten some pretty detailed work written down and was proud of herself for it.
Besides, with her hand throbbing slightly, she decided it was time to take a short break.
She changed her position so she was no longer lying on her stomach but was now sitting with her legs crossed. She laid her pencil beside her as she opted to flip through her journal to look at past entries; she had many. She had written short paragraphs of her adventures into the city, namely ones that invigorated a sense of adventure and reflected her emotions through times of distress. Travelling to Rharne hadn't been a fun time, but leaving her stepmother had been worth it.
Her eyes scanned her previous passages and with every word, every sentence, and every paragraph of detailed writing, she felt overcome with the very emotions she had felt during the time she had first written them. That's when her mother's voice flittered through her ears a second time: "When ever you are feeling creative, write. But whenever you are uninspired, read."
She then began to write, honing in on her mother's words as though she were standing right beside her:
“Tick, tock, tick tock
There goes a clock, a heartbeat
It suddenly stops, it truly stops
Shuffling, shuffling behind me.
To turn and see, to really see
Yellow eyes and baring teeth
Sharp, so sharp, like daggers
A wolf of serene hostility.
I’ve invaded, disturbed, unearthed
His privacy no longer his
He chases me, chases me close behind
I trip, I fall, I know I’m dead.
Instead of accepting defeat
I pull out a weapon, a sharp weapon
I draw it out front and wait, I wait
I patiently wait for the chance to continue my life.
Tick tock, tick tock,
The clock is my heart beat
Tick, tock, tick tock,
I’m still alive and breathing.
I move the wolf, the dead beast before me
I move him to safety and breath
I breath and breathe and breathe
I am alive.”
It was a different style than she was used to writing in- she had done so on a whim- but it came from her heart and was especially driven from her one of her mother's philosophical words. And although it brought back some memories both happy and sad in origin, it felt good to get them down on paper.
Suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, Tous caught sight of some colourful feathers. With wings the colour of blueberries and a beak the shade of the sun, a small bird was perched gracefully on a branch not a few feet outside the mesh flap of her tent window. The young Yludih was about to describe in her journal the bird's appearance when it began to sing a song of its kind. The musical pitch that left the bird’s beak sent shivers down her spine. They were the good kind of shivers, though, and for whatever reason, they reminded her of home.
Transfixed by both the bird's physical beauty and it's talent to sing, the woman had regained a sense of inspiration worthy of her picking up the pencil. She flipped back to the page where she had been writing earlier and began to write, only this time it was less prose and more statement:
"I journey from place to place with my feathers out
I call to my kind with a song that cannot be ignored.
Hear me, my friends and fellows alike,
For I fathom a new home to call my own."
And that's exactly how Tous felt. She hoped this new city would be her new home. She just had to figure out how to make it so.
