Posted here – http://www.addergoole.com/9/2013/12/december-drabble-so-you-knew/
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Archive | December 26, 2013
Orig_fic Bingo – Aunts Verse
Story: An Argument of Magic
Prompt: Magic
Series: The Aunt Family
Summary: Evangaline and the Grannies are not in agreement about teaching magic to the next generation. Eva’s the Aunt, though…
Evangaline was having an argument with the Grannies.
She wasn’t having it directly, of course. One did not simply walk into Mordor; one didn’t simply confront the Grannies. At least, it wasn’t often done, and she hadn’t quite gotten up the nerve yet.
But she was doing things they were telling her not to, in ways that they were certain to find out about eventually.
“Let the children come to their magic naturally. The time for formal training is once they’re older, and once they’re more certain in their power.” That was the line every single one of the grannies – except Rosaria, who just smirked – had given. Implicit in the instruction were two things: that the “children” were female, and that learning either happened on one’s own or via formal instruction. Evangaline was kicking both of those assumptions in the teeth.
She’d started the “lessons” over something that nobody actually called “baby-sitting,” because the children were in their teens or tweens, and certainly old enough, by normal standards, to be left on their own. Beryl and Stone had started them, actually, by asking questions. It had taken Evangaline a couple visits to realize exactly how intent the kids were, and by the fourth lesson, she was prepared for them.
“Why do you think we save everything?”
She could tell by the way they looked at each other – five of them, Beryl and Stone first among them, but the rest no less magically-inclined or bright – that they hadn’t been expecting her to catch on so quickly.
“You can consider me practice for the Grannies. You need to work on your subtlety, but we can focus on that another time. Why do you think we save everything?”
Anessa answered, cautiously. “The grannies – that is, Grandma Karen – said it wasn’t time to teach us, yet.”
“And I’m just asking you questions. Why do you think we save everything?”
Anessa’s brother Matthias finally answered, every bit as cautious. “Because there’s a lesson in everything?”
“Exactly. And I need you five to help me clean out the storage room, so I have room for my own stores. Let’s go.”
She might be having an argument with the Grannies, but she was going to give herself plenty of wiggle room, until she was too far into this for them to call her off. She might be the Aunt, but she knew where the family power came from.
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BINGO: Row
This is a fill for my Dec 12 2013 card. I’ve been using the card as a prompt call, so the first Bingo has been posted free.
Column G Prompts (five stories) – freedom, lost in translation, grace, now and then, change of pace
Title: Freedom
Series: Stranded World
Prompt: Freedom
Rating: G
Warnings: Supportive family
Notes: Two of the RoundTree siblings discuss freedom
Title: Lost in Translation
Series: Addergole (Fae Apoc)
Prompt: Lost in Translation
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Story – none. Setting – all
Notes: Addergoole is a long-running setting, including two web-serials and dozens of short pieces; the setting is dystopic. This story is set apart from much of the problems of the world, however.
Title: Falling from Grace
Series: New: Fall from Grace
Prompt: Grace
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: self-harm/body modification
Notes:
Title: Then and Now
Series: Dragons Next Door
Prompt: Then & Now
Rating: G
Warnings: none
Notes: none
Title: A Change of Pace
Series: Tír na Cali
Prompt: Change of Pace
Rating: G
Warnings: story – none. Setting – all
Notes: Tír na Cali is a long-running setting that involves kidnapping, slavery, and occasionally incest. This particular story involves absolutely none of that.
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A Change of Pace, a story of Tír na Cali for the OrigFic Bingo
To thnidu‘s prompt to my orig-fic card. This fills the “Change of Pace” slot.
This is set with new characters in my Tír na Cali setting; its landing page is here.
This is a Cali storywith no slavery. 😉
The Duchess’ family did not often eat together.
Her children were, all but the twins, grown adults, and since they were all but the twins male, they were mostly married as well.
Niles, who still lived at home, helped his mother’s head of household plan the meal; Jeriel and Lauriel, the twins, helped the head of the maids arrange the seating. The Duchess had seven children, five daughters-in-law, and eight grand-children; the seating arrangements took a bit of planning to get everyone where they needed to be. Add in that Achishar wasn’t speaking to Emlen’s wife (nobody could remember why anymore) and a half-dozen other feuds, and seating the family for dinner became rather good training for some day running a fractious and wild Duchy.
“Do you think it’ll work out?” Niles was the twins’ go-to for questions. He had far more free time than the Duchess, and was old enough that he knew everything.
“I think…” He folded several napkins while he considered his answer. “Whatever our Lady Mother is wishing to work out here will work out. The informal place settings are a cue, and the mid-week date. She’s looking for a ‘family dinner,’ not something states-like.”
The twins shared a look. Jeriel led for the next question. “Why?”
“I don’t know.” Niles almost never admitted that. It was enough to shut his sisters up.
~
“I thought we could use a change of pace.” The Duchess looked around her assembled children, daughters-in-law, and grandchildren. “I thought all of us could use an hour or two where we were not statespeople but simply family.”
Boone’s wife Lady Dorseigh, the Countess of South March, said what many of them were thinking. “I don’t understand how that can be, your Ladyship.”
“Hannah. Today, for the next hour, I’m just Hannah, or, if you want to be very informal, you can call me ‘mom.'”
Lady Dorseigh, finding herself the designated spokesperson for the table, sounded as perplexed as most of them felt. “…Why? Why… Hannah?”
“As I said, I think you could use a change of pace. I think I could use a change of pace.”
It was Niles who finally figured it out. “Think of it,” he offered, “like taking your shoes off and falling down in your private sitting room. This is that, only with a handful of other people who understand. A breather.”
“A breather.” Lady Dorseigh nodded slowly; the others followed suit, in time with their ability to understand. “This is a lovely Yule gift. Thank you… mom.”
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