Dreaming of a White Nightmare (pm to Join)

[Saul Sticks]

Rolling back over, Saul pushed himself up with a groan as long and as agonized as the houses had given when they had collapsed. He had forgotten the family he had left safe and warm beneath their own house. He was too tired and too sore to curse anymore, so he stumbled over to a fire that had been started for the refugees of fallen houses to warm themselves by. Nearby, he spotted the girl from the first home, still wrapped cozily in his coat. He wanted the coat back, but now still wasn’t the time to ask for it. Waiting by the fire until the ache left his fingers, he watched the proceedings. Knights were running to and fro, some previously outlined plan keeping them organized and progressing against the natural power of the snow. All people had been evacuated from all homes, and the knights had them gathering either at the fire or in the few structures that were deemed solid enough to withstand the crushing weight of the long-gathered snow. Once Saul was warm enough to continue on, he flagged down a knight who looked less busy than the rest and informed her of the family he had left beneath the rubble of their home. The knight smiled and thanked Saul, then barked out viciously at three squires who snapped smartly to attention. With the four in tow, Saul led them to the house where the family was still waiting and breathing the fresh air through the space Saul had created for them. The knight barked out orders again, and the three squires moved to carry out the commands. He noticed the knight herself wasn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. She did the brunt of the heavy work, continuing to command the squires in ways that made the job effortless. In a few minutes, two more planks had been pulled away. “Come on up.” The knight gestured the family up. The girl began to cry inside. “I don’t wanna go out. It’s cold out there.” “Yes, it is. The man said it would be warmer inside, remember?” Saul recognized the voice of the parent who had spoken with him before. “Then I’m not going out.” The knight did her best to encourage the child out. “It’s alright, love. It’s not as cold out here as it seems.” “You’re a liar.” Saul raised his eyebrows. The girl wasn’t wrong. The ache was returning to his hands, and he didn’t have time to wait for the girl to work up to leaving the warm cave of snow and wood. Impatiently pushing his way past the squires, he stepped up to the hole. “Allow me.” He crouched down, a bit gingerly, next to the hole and smiled at the girl. “You’re right. You can’t trust these knights. She’s an absolute liar. It’s as cold as Avanthal out here. But do you remember that I didn’t lie to you? Everything I said was true, right?” She nodded at him. “So you know I’m not a liar, right?” She nodded again. “I promise you that it’s cold out here, but I also promise that there’s a warm fire going that will be worth leaving here for.” The girl thought about it a moment, then smiled and held up her hands for Saul to pull her out. She was small, but the muscle in his back protested nonetheless as he lifted her with one arm. When he helped the two parents out, he did his best to hide his grimace, but it still showed. The mother showed her concern. “Are you alright, sir?” Saul didn’t need a stranger’s pity. He feigned a smile, something he was getting decent at. “Fine, miss. I just tweaked a muscle is all. Nothing rest won’t handle.” He led them back to one of the buildings where a steady blaze was roaring in the fireplace. The girl whose shovel Saul had taken spotted him and came to his side. “Are you finished helping?” There was concern in her eyes. “If you are, I’ll take my shovel back and see where I can help.” Saul didn’t have it on him. In the haze of exhaustion and pain, he searched his pockets as if he might find the tool there before he remembered he had left it at the home where he hurt his back. “Shit,” he muttered and walked out the door, leaving the woman more than a little confused. Backtracking to the house, Saul found the shovel sticking out of the snow, retrieved it, and returned to the lodge. Handing the shovel to its owner, he pushed his way through the people until he reached the fire where he lied down in front of it. He didn’t care if people thought less of him for quitting. He had injured himself for people he didn’t even know. He cursed his stupidity. Then, as he had plenty of time and nothing to do with it, he cursed everything he had cursed earlier. He cursed the girl, the coat, the woman he had seen saving people. Then he cursed the first man he had met earlier. Mostly just because he came to mind.

[Dove Brown]

Dove crawled out into snow that soaked through her thin shirt and trousers and left her aching with cold all over. She wasn't the only one lying in the snow - there was a man on his back in it near another collapsed house. As she got her breath back, she heard him get up with a groan and trudge away over snow that creaked underfoot.

The woman digger hugged Dove before she could escape. "Thank you! Thank you so much. You saved my Sayna and she's all I have left of her father. I won't forget it."

Dove shrugged uncomfortably as the arms trapped her. "She's hurt her leg. You'd best get her to the healers. I - I need to go. There's others buried too." She pulled free, snatched up her shovel and fled. She was her father's reminder of her mother, but he wouldn't have praised any rescuer, just cursed her again for surviving. She hurt to see otherwise, but she told herself it was the cold. Well, cold and grazes and bruises. She paused to take stock. Her shirt had torn at some point. She had grazes on her hands, shoulder, and hip, bruises on both shins, and a splinter hanging loosely from the heel of her left hand. She eased the splinter out with a wince and looked round. Knights swarmed all over the outpost with squires trotting at their heels, and the light was growing, some from fires, some from Syna as it lifted above the horizon.

She rubbed her face wearily, leaving a smear of blood across it from the grazes, and dragged herself onward. She'd seen what happened when knights were left to it three years ago, and she was never again going to hide in fear while others fought. Never. Too many people died when knights got involved directly in their lives.

[Alexander Faircroft]

Description "Alex Common" Alex thoughts "Myrian" "Fratava" "Others"

Alex paused a moment, his gaze swung over the distant sight of knights lying about digging and chipping in where they could. He looked down at his hands torn and cold. Out of the corner of his eye he spotted the woman who’d chastised him earlier. He walked over slowly. Swaying lightly with the fatigue and exertion. The snow beneath him trampled and crushed into a flat pathway. A small fire had been built and people were huddling around it for warmth. Alex closed the distance to the fire and the woman. Stopping next to her he clapped a bloodied hand on her shoulder. His breaths heavy and his push to keep going fading fast.

“You were right. I burned through too much energy. Think you could give me a hand over to the fire?” A small smile of honesty and a look of deep exhaustion on his face, he’d been ploughing for an extra half bell on top of everyone else. And if he could actually lift the shovel he’d be still going. He’d still be digging people out but right now he was stumbling and the cold was sapping his strength faster than he had been. He slipped his hand from her shoulder and stated to walk under his own sputtering steam. Each step was smaller than the last. Where earlier he’d been running around like a madman, his steps were smaller like he was trying to hold his weight up on stilts. Small shuffles and sways. If she didn’t give him a hand he’d reach the fire in a half chime.

Upon reaching the fire he’d sit in the glow of the flames. His hands in front of the flames, he needed to warm back up to rest a moment and push some energy back into him before he could continue. Perhaps she did too. He sat cross legged basking in the warmth of the fire with the cold winds to his back.

[Dove Brown]

She flinched when a hand came down hard on her grazed shoulder. Turning, she saw the frantic digger from earlier and heard him admit she was right and ask for her help. He was a squire, she remembered, which meant the Order would come down on her if she refused to help him. And her head barely came up to his shoulder - what did he expect her to do, drag him like she'd often dragged her drunken father home? He swayed where he stood and she sighed, took her shovel in one hand and grabbed the back of his coat with the other before he fell into either the fire or the snow. "That's the difference between you knights and us farmers," she told him wearily as she took some of his weight on her uninjured shoulder. "Knights train to fight. Short burst of action and they're done. Farmers train to keep going all day." There were other differences in her mind too, but she wasn't about to tell him knights were too arrogant to his face. Especially not when they were digging out her neighbours. Or that farmers that couldn't let go didn't stay farmers for long. You had to be able to raise, tend, and protect something for anywhere from seasons to years - and then kill it, tear it out of life, cut it up, eat it, use it. And then give the same care to another crop, or another animal.

When they reached the fire, he sank down to a cross-legged pose and held his hands out to the flames. The warmth of the fire felt good, she had to admit. She laid her shovel down beside her for a moment, and let her cold hands thaw out slowly. Thawing too fast hurt, but it wasn't the first time in her life she'd been out in the snow and half frozen, by now she knew what to expect. She should check on her own house at some point and see if it was still standing, but for now, she sat on packed snow and let it drive out the aching chill.

[Alexander Faircroft]

Description "Alex Common" Alex thoughts "Myrian" "Fratava" "Others"

That was the difference between the knights and the farmers? Alex looked into the flames. “Y’know were not that different. The only real difference is what we’re protecting. Farmers protect their crops and their animals, as well as their families.” Alex sighed the plume of white breath fading back to normal as it approached the fire. “Whereas the knights protect everything. From the fields to the city. I just went at things from the wrong angle…” He sighed staring into the flickering orange and yellow. Alex listened to the sound of shovels around him and the slamming of wood on wood. Screaming infant. Fathers and mothers fighting against the cold and the snow to save people.

He clenched his hand at his side. He was furious with himself. Why did he not have the staminal to help to keep up to push through and make a difference!? Alex groaned lightly trying to rise back up and help. His muscles strained and screamed at him. He was in no shape to be getting back up but he pushed. He had an obligation to protect these people. In the end he only managed to get to on knee he was that out of energy. A pained look on his face as he stared into the flames willing it to work faster to rejuvenate him to fill his body with the strength he needed to continue.

“I’ve got to get back to this…People still need my help.” He groaned and staggered back to his feet finally thawed out enough. Using the shovel as a prop and a walking stick he started to usher himself back out. He pushed through the cold the fire now at his back. The beacon of warmth there, but the light of day before him. He was going to do what he could to help. He’d started and even if he couldn’t move he was determined to Push forwards and see it to the end.

[Dove Brown]

"I've heard that before," Dove muttered when he said farmers and knights weren't that different, thinking back to a summer picnic with Nivel. Movement caught the corner of her eye and she stared in disbelief as Alex staggered back to his feet and started back towards the houses. Was he nuts? He could barely walk, let alone dig. He was going to be more of a hindrance than a help, again.

She found herself back on her feet and limping after him before she thought. Her grazed hip and bruised shins had stiffened up badly while she sat, but she was still faster than he was at the moment. She grabbed his arm and pulled him round, holding him up if he lost his balance. "Listen to me, idiot. You're only going to make more work for everyone else when you fall on your nose," she snapped. "Stay out of folk's way until you can walk without propping yourself up. You are not the only person out here and you can't do everything. I was right the first time wasn't I? Trust me to be right again."

She half expected one of the other knights or squires to take offence at her tone, but was too tired and cold to care right now. If he pulled away, she'd let him go, but she'd rather get back to the fire and thaw out properly.

OOCSorry for the short post

[Alexander Faircroft]

Description "Alex Common" Alex thoughts "Myrian" "Fratava" "Others"

Alex stepped on marching or rather trudging as best he could out into the cold once again. Alex left a hand on his arm pulling him back around his feet gave way beneath him and he slipped. A hand caught him and helped him back. She was chiding him again. She was right but he couldn’t just let it go. “I know…But I can’t just sit by idly.” She was right and he knew it but he knew he had an obligation. Walking with her back to the fires he slipped out of her grip and fell on the snow. The cold cushion slipping him off into a slightly wet patch near the fire.

He groaned out a breath and lay in the warmth of the fire. “I never got a chance to ask your name?” He half coughed and half chuckled out. He lay in the cold air with the warmth of the fire washing over him. He’d taken worse punishment but this wasn’t abuse this was exhaustion. A very different kind of beast. He had to resign himself to try and regain some strength. “You’re right again though. There are others that can carry on the digging and get people out of this mess but I want to stand with them. If not helping them physically but support them. Give them hope.” He glanced across to her his eyes catching the fire, adding a spark of resolution to his words and face.

“There are some people who need that. Some who’ve lost more than just their home. Their family, their friends. It almost feels like I have a duty to let them know it’s going to be ok. And that there are some who could still use their help.” Alex spoke not with a commanding but more of a caring tone. Less the air of arrogance and pride a knight may have but more the humility of someone who felt they had to help wherever they could.

[Dove Brown]

He stopped and let her guide him back to the fire, though in the end he fell through her grasp into the snow and lay there. At least, Dove decided, as he talked on, he hadn't fallen in the fire. She set her shovel down beside her and half sat, half fell onto the ground beside the fire. They weren't the only ones clustered there. A mix of rescued and rescuers of all ages came and went. One of the order's cooks took advantage of the fire's existance to set a kettle of water heating for hot tea, and passed around baskets of yesterday's bread. Dove took a piece and passed the basket on. With everyone digging, there probably wouldn't be fresh bread made today.

"My name is Dove," she said when he asked, listening to her namesakes crooning their dawn song from the top of the Garrison. "What's yours - I'm presuming it isn't 'idiot'?" She turned her hands over to examine the grazes there in the growing light and wiped away the obvious bits of dirt with the tail of her shirt. She couldn't see her other grazes well enough to do the same, and she hoped that didn't mean they'd get infected.

She met his gaze briefly when he looked over at her. "Nothing wrong with your voice. Start with the other people round the fire. And eat something. That'll help." She bit into the plain bread. It was dry, like her mouth, and hard to get down when she was this tired. She'd eaten worse, and she'd been hungry often enough to know never to turn food down. "Just - remember that being ok means it's also ok to grieve. Folk are allowed to miss those they've lost. At least," she added, thinking of her father's sixteen years of grief and blame, "as long as they aren't hurting anyone else in the process."

[Alexander Faircroft]

Description "Alex Common" Alex thoughts "Myrian" "Fratava" "Others"

Alex sighed staring skywards now. The fire’s heat now licking at his side. The basket of bread passed over him. He wasn’t hungry, more to the point he felt sick. Sick to his stomach that he couldn’t do more. “Well Dove. My name certainly isn’t idiot, however most knights you ask would probably call me that.” He let out a small chuckle, his shoulders screaming at him in protest. “I’m Alex, a fairly new squire…Like almost a full season as a squire new.” He smiled out lightly. He motioned as best he could to sit up but his body wasn’t having any of it. So until it would obey him he just lay there.

“I know it’s ok to grieve…I’ve done my fair share. I just want to let people know that as difficult and ark as it is now. As hard and hopeless the road ahead seems. It gets better, it never gets any easier but it gets better.” He spoke with such an honest clarity that a few of the people around the fire started to take note. A few of them even caught themselves with a small spark of hope rekindled within. Alex groaned lightly as he forced his body up, he was getting to sit up if it killed him. A full twenty ticks of struggling and he managed to sit up.

“And you’re right as long as people don’t hurt others grief isn’t a bad thing. It’s when it becomes bitter anger and longing that it turns toxic.” Alex coughed hard into the back of one of his hands. His eyes now looking around the fires to see some smiling faces. Not broad and happy but resolved and determined ones. “You sound like you know something about grief turning into pain.” A curiosity in his voice, light and almost soothing as usual despite being edged with exhaustion. “I don’t expect you to tell me the means of it. But it does sound like you know what you’re talking about.” Behind him another loud creak and snap followed, another house turning to rubble but luckily no-one was within.

[Dove Brown]

"I do know," she said quietly. "But now isn't the time to talk about it - another day maybe." Her mother's death wasn't exactly news to Mithryn, or her father's grief, or the damage the storm wrought - but he wanted hope, not hate. When he said he'd grieved, she nodded. "What I've seen - when you lose someone, you don't forget them. You miss them. Life isn't the same afterwards, but you can let them go, and, well, it's not been bad since..." Since she escaped the prison of Syliras's walls, since she escaped living with her father and the blame he piled on her, since she came home to Mithryn and open skies and a place of her own.

A place she didn't even know was still standing, she realised with a sickening feeling inside. She closed her eyes for a moment and swallowed hard, driving the lump down, out of her throat into her belly. "Some people don't let go so easily, and that's when folk get hurt." She looked sideways at him. "Sometimes they hurt themselves too." She tipped her head back to watch the smoke wind its way up past the dawn sky and vanish amongst the clouds. "But another day rolls in, and life goes on. You make the most of it, if you're wise." She wasn't wise, but she felt old next to his drivenness. She sensed eyes watching her, taking her in, but kept her own gaze on the sky. Farming had a rhythm and a virtue to it that she loved, but there were days when she just wanted to take herself up into the depths of the sky and outwait whatever grief was happening on the ground. It didn't matter what was happening, the sky was there, and she could turn to it for comfort. Except when she was trapped in Syliras. She took a slow breath, then another. The cold air bit into her throat, and she swallowed once more.